The Girl Who Raced Fairyland All the Way Home (9 page)

“The Stone?” the Headmistress asked, nonplussed.

“Yes, the Stone. Was he a tyrant?”

“I don't suppose there was anyone
to
tyrannize, except ammonites and will-o'-the-wisps.”

“HELLO,” said the First Stone amiably.

“See? He wasn't a tyrant, so it's possible not to steal and crush and outlaw and cast terrible spells. Not that I shall have time to do any of those things. I've only got two more days as Queen. Which I think is
awfully
unfair. You all got to be in charge as long as you could hold on to it. I still don't understand why I can't just keep on being Queen.”

“I thought you didn't want it,” said Madame Tanaquill coolly.

September's cheeks burned. “I didn't want to do my mathematics homework back home. Or mend the fence or mind the chickens. But I did it anyway. Just because a person doesn't want to do a thing doesn't mean they ought to shirk.” The words came out before September could stop them. She tripped and fell into honesty at the worst times, and came up with the truth all over her dress. The crown felt suddenly warm on her head.

“It's hardly a usual situation,” the Elephanta said.

“Be grateful, girlie,” huffed Cutty Soames. “Fairyland likes you. She's doing you a favor. Because, if not for the Derby, one of us would probably have killed you before you even got to meet our Jack. I think Titania already had a plan involving a mud puddle.”

“Where
is
Titania?” September asked, choosing to ignore the threats of a goblin in a pirate coat. “And all the others?”

“We didn't invite
everyone,
” Hushnow, the Ancient and Demented Raven Lord, crooned. “Only people who've decided to race already. Oh, and of course, only people we can stand to share the air with. Goldmouth is a brute and the Knapper would murder us all inside a minute and never spill his drink. Titania's halfway to Buyan by now. She had enough of Queening before Tansy there was even born. Oh! How she and her man used to fight! Sank half of Fairyland underground by the time they got themselves tuckered out. A lot of us feel that way. Getting cast down by some young upstart once was quite enough.”

“So this is it? You're the only ones racing?”

“Two more days, child,” said Curdleblood softly. “Everyone must decide in their own time.”

“Well, I oughtn't to be here at all, then,” said September, setting her snifter down. “I haven't decided yet. Whether I'm going to race in the Derby.”

This caused some uproar among the members of the Once and Future Club.

“See?” bellowed Charlie Crunchcrab. “
See?
She doesn't even
want
it. She's a disgrace! Why did the crown pick her when she's just a little nobody with no ambition?”

“Come off it, Chuck,” Madame Tanaquill snorted. “You hired those two kids to find a way for you to abdicate. We all know it. You didn't want it, either.”

“Well, I do
now
. I didn't abdicate! I meant to, yes, but I didn't! The crown was taken away from me. There's nothing like a robbery to sharpen your priorities.”

“And
I
didn't depose you on purpose, Charles!” snapped September. “I don't know why you're so cross with me. It's not like you were doing such a marvelous job at it, you know.”

The Panther of Rough Storms interrupted them. His golden eyes gleamed in the lamplight. “I'm sorry, September, but you have to race. Hasn't anyone explained it to you? The Derby won't work if you don't compete. You cannot abdicate, remember. We must
take
Fairyland from you. You are the Queen; you have the crown. It is only half a Race. The other half is a Hunt. And I suspect we will end up with a Duel as our third half before it's all done. It's hardly a Derby without Duels. We are Racing one another. We are searching for the Heart of Fairyland. We will Duel to determine the strongest. But we are Hunting you. You are the fox, and we are the hounds.”

“Well, that is the oddest way to run a government I have ever heard of,” September said stubbornly. “It's just absurd to elect a leader with a race or a chase or a hunt for a heart!”

“What's an ‘elect'?” asked Hushnow, the Ancient and Demented Raven Lord.

“It's how we decide who's in charge where I come from. Everyone in the whole country votes for the President and the man who gets the most votes wins.”

A chorus of gasps went up from the club. Madame Tanaquill held a handkerchief over her mouth.

“That's ghastly!” cried the Hushnow, the Ancient and Demented Raven Lord.

“What if everyone chooses the wrong man?” gawped Pinecrack. “And if it's
always
a man and never a moose or an octopus or a spriggan I think that's just obscene, and prejudiced, and you ought to leave right now.”

September frowned. “Well, sometimes people do. But it's only for a few years, and then there's another election.”

The Rex Tyrannosaur looked nauseous. “Quite, quite horrid,” he whispered.

“Yes, I think we'd all better collect ourselves,” said the Headmistress. “Nothing like that could ever happen here, of course. Perish the thought.”

“Well, it could, you know…,” began September.

“
Perish the thought!
” the Headmistress roared. She cleared her throat and composed herself, wiping her hands on her skirt.

“Please.” September held up her hands. “I didn't mean to offend. Let me ask a question instead: Why do you want to rule Fairyland? Why are any of you so riled up to get the crown? It seems like a bit of a raw deal to me, if I'm to be honest. Assassinations and intrigue and eating the same thing for every meal in case a Greatvole comes to tea and on top of it all you can't ever quit, even if you want to. Yes, I understand it's devilish fun to be in charge of things and tell everyone what to do, but I can think of at least three things that I like better! And one of them is being left well enough alone!”

“Well, it's hard to get anyone to let you eat them if you're not King,” said the Rex Tyrannosaur thoughtfully.

“If you're on top, you can make certain you and yours never have to live in a cage again,” Madame Tanaquill said through clenched teeth. “And, even better, you can fill those cages up again with everyone who ever hurt you.”

“Or, if certain folk are gobbling up the whole world for themselves, you can stop them so there's something left for everyone else,” snarled Charlie Crunchcrab.

“It's the biggest heist there is.” Cutty Soames sighed dreamily. “The big score, the last hit. When you're King, you've won.”

Tanaquill couldn't leave it at one answer. She tapped her glass with one long fingernail. “You can make the whole world look just like you, and never have to look at anything frightening or different ever again.”

“And when you see something dreadful, something that needs mending, something that cries out in pain, you can fix it. You can make it right and no one can stand in the way of your rightness,” the Headmistress said softly.

“Yes, that's the main thing,” crowed Hushnow, the Ancient and Demented Raven Lord. “No one can stand in your way. No one can talk back to you or call you a stupid crow or make you feel small ever, ever again. You get to feel big forever.”

Cutty Soames nodded. His cutlass shone. “
Not
being King is like a chain round your neck. It's the only way to be sure you can always do just as you desire.”

“But what do you desire that you can't have without a crown? None of you are starving. You all wear jewels and smell wonderful and live in splendid houses. What do you want to do that you cannot?”

“Nothing just
now,
” admitted Cutty. “But there could always be
something
.”

The members of the Once and Future Club left the knot that had formed at the First Stone's bar and settled into a number of chairs and sofas. September sat gingerly on a pale blue-and-gold seat that looked like it had escaped from someone's dining table.

“So.” September sighed, tucking into her water and moss. “I have to race.”

“Obviously,” sighed Madame Tanaquill. “The Stoat of Arms ought to have told you. I shall strangle all of them when I see them next. I haven't strangled the Stoat for centuries. It'll be just like old times.”

“Please don't strangle anyone! I'm sure they meant to tell me. It's been a busy day! I can hardly keep my feet under me I'm so tired! All right then. I have to race the ancient Kings and Queens of Fairyland this Thursday morning at eight o'clock, which is before breakfast. I don't suppose any of you would tell me where the Heart of Fairyland is? Just to make it fair.”

“I haven't the first idea,” said the Prime Minister of Fairyland, shrugging.

“They don't even know
what
it is,” yawned Iago, who had snoozed through their quarreling, curled up by the fireplace.

“Well, that's the trick of it,” said Cutty Soames a bit guiltily. “If we knew, it wouldn't be much of a race. I suppose it could be anything: a doorknob, a bag of wind, a jeweled necklace, a rhinoceros…”

“A hot air balloon, a spinning wheel, a tear from the eye of a phoenix, a bicycle pump…,” added Pinecrack.

“An egg with a needle inside, a book that reads itself, a golden ball, a golden toad, a golden sword with a golden toad's soul in the blade…,” Thrum growled. “Or a great lot of things scattered all over the blasted place.”

“We don't know.” Madame Tanaquill silenced them all with a glance. “Some of us have ideas—some of us have
moronic
ideas—but we don't know.”

A small shadow fell over Iago's green-yellow eyes and the glowing hearth. A girl's shadow.

“I know,” said the Marquess. She stepped into the room imperiously, as though she had never for a moment ceased to own those chairs, those lamps, that fireplace, even the glasses and plates.

Madame Tanaquill rolled her eyes. “Oh,
do
shut up.”

The Marquess knelt beside Iago and stroked his ears. He purred in delight. “I
do
know what it is. Perhaps the rest of you spent your time in the Briary counting your gold or your servants or your toenail clippings, but I did not. Even before my first reign, Queen Mallow's reign, I was a student of Dry Magic and Dry means books. I know more about Fairyland than any of you could scrape off the floors of your glitter-rotted minds. Even you, Foxy. I'll meet you all at Mummery with pots of tea and a footbath ready, and when you've had a nice rest, you can all go hang. Coming back the first time was so hard, so difficult. But this? This is easy. This is nothing. This is a postmistress's work. Get the package, deliver it, collect postage fee, which, in this case, is my crown.” She looked straight at September. “You wicked little
thief.
”

“It's sweet when humans try to lie,” Crunchcrab sneered. “They're such amateurs. You're nothing but a filthy farmer's daughter and the only thing you know is what to feed a cow. I don't know why anyone is pretending we don't know what will happen on Thursday. Tanaquill will win and grind all our faces into the dirt, and we'll have to call her Your Highness for a thousand years. That is how the world works. The worst wins. I wasn't bad enough, that's where I went wrong. And you? You're not even on the books, Missie Marquess.”

The Marquess's hair flushed deep cerulean blue, like the underside of the sea. She smiled. It was a smile that grew in the grinning, deeper and wider and kinder and brighter, until September shuddered. She remembered that smile. It froze her bones.

“And you are a Ferryman who abandoned his boat. You ought to be ashamed. Do you even know where she's anchored? I do. Starfish have chewed halfway through the hull, giant seagulls have pecked out the portholes, and there's a family of sea lions living in the captain's cabin. That poor ship. I've half a mind to mend her myself.”

Anyone else might have ignored her, or scoffed at her, for it would never list among the immortal lines of villainous banter. But Charles Crunchcrab the First flushed deeply, horror and shame flooding his face. His eyes filled with hot tears. The Ferryman of the Barleybroom said no more.

“Now,” said the Marquess cheerfully, her hair brightening to gold. “I should very much like a drink.”

But as September watched her stare down the First Stone until he put a little sand in a cup and dropped it in front of her, she thought that the Marquess had no better idea than any of them. After all, she knew a little about pretending to be brave when the fear in you has eaten up half your heart.

*   *   *

September left the Once and Future Club exhausted, hardly able to stand in her mary janes. The Green Wind was not waiting to guide her to her bedroom, nor the Stoat of Arms nor Saturday nor A-Through-L nor even the stuffed wombat. She stood alone in the Briary. All she could hear was its quiet, steady blooming.

“Sleep, Briary,” she whispered. “Show me where I sleep.”

For a moment, the hallway remained a hallway, long and green and silent. Then, a slender row of pale silver flowers sprang up beneath her feet. It whirled forward, each blossom sprouting as September put her foot to it. She laughed and ran along the silver path, her tiredness all gone, racing the flowers down staircases and round pillars, under buttresses and through doors wide and small. Finally, the silver blossoms came up short in a wine cellar deep within the Briary, at the edge of a trapdoor with a bronze pull-ring bolted into it. September felt very uncertain that this was meant to be her bedroom, but the flowers seemed insistent, waving back and forth all round the door in the floor.

“All right, all right!” said September, and pulled up the ring. She saw nothing inside but a soft half-light. She thought, for a moment, of climbing through all the dark doors of Fairyland Below until she found a Minotaur. She thought of wriggling into the hole at the top of Moonkin Hill. September took a breath. “All of that turned out reasonably well, I suppose!” And she crawled down into the light, toes pointed like a dancing girl's.