CHAPTER TWENTY FIVE

When I awoke the next morning to the sound of carriages clattering and people laughing, I was nestled against a wall. I had passed out in the street. Sometimes during the night I'd managed to crawl over here. My hands went down to my coin purse, still tucked in my boot. Although it hurt to, I opened my eyes.

Activity swam before me with people traveling, some sparing me concerned glances but most ignoring yet another casualty of the festival. My eyes darted between hooves and feet. The magic trail was gone. I tried squinting. Not only was it faded where the sunlight hit, which might be an issue of brightness rather than magic, but in the shadows cast by the building hovering in front of the sun, there was still no trail.

I held my head, swearing silently to myself.

Most of the pain wasn't even from the killer combination hangover that the potions plus the cider that frosty no-good woman had given me. Sure, there was steady throbbing pain in my skull, but more than that, my hip ached from laying against the hard stone all night. A weird pinching had manifested between my shoulder blade and my neck, I supposed because I had been leaning at an odd angle.

I stood up, feeling three hundred years older than I actually was. I stretched, but after pulling something the wrong way at the wrong time, I curled back into a small aching ball. Is this how Mallow felt every time she slept on the ground?

A fresh round of guilt washed over me. I massaged the spots I could reach thoughtfully as I contemplated my next move. That tracking potion had been my hope to find her and put the kibosh on whatever sort of sinister plans her abductors had. And here I had fallen asleep not once, but twice since she'd gone missing. Worst. Hero. Ever.

Thinking that if they'd ever let me into the Avalon Academy, I'd probably be kicked out in under five seconds, I had an idea that was slightly more helpful. The way I had come was now a sunlight choked street.

Although it seemed like a journey of miles in the drunken fog of the previous night, I had only walked half a block from the Avalonry. No one was milling around it since no charity was happening at the moment. I sauntered over and knocked on the door. The banging sound made me wince even though I was the one doing it.

I waited. Then I waited some more. The serene gurgling of the door side pond became irritating rather than soothing as I counted its bubbling cycles. Nobody answered. I angrily grabbed the door handle. Scalding pain shot across my palm. I yanked it back. I thought for a moment it was because the sun had heated the dark metal handle. Gazing at the glowing red handle between my now splayed, tender fingers, I realized it was enchanted.

Taking that as an indicator that nobody was home, I crouched down and shoved my hand into the small, sparkling pond on the side of the building, which was admittedly less annoying now. As the gentle water soothed the burn, I contemplated what to do next. The Avalons were probably scattered around town, so unless I spotted one of the shiny icicles, they wouldn't be able to help until nightfall. My strategy with the tracking potion didn't succeed either, though it would have if not for me passing out.

"No." I mused. "Unless the people that have Mallow could so easily be overtaken by one underweight, unarmed and inebriated fool." Something grazed my hand in the water. The pond was teeming with fish. About half a dozen white fish were flitting about the water near my hands. One nibbled at the fingertip, and I laughed. Then I blinked and pulled my hand back. The burning was gone. I wondered whether it was the enchantment wearing off or the fish healing it. I reached up and touched the shiner the guard had left on me from visiting Mallow the other day.

Yup, it still hurt. Winsor must have dropped the spell during the night.

All around people were staring at me. I decided I didn't mind so much though, and I inhaled and held my nose with my hand. I submerged my face up to my ears. At first all I felt were the waves as the fish fled. Then, a swipe of slimy scales and the caress of a silken fin from my chin, beside my nose, and along my eyes. I pulled my head out, shaking the water from it.

I reached up again and touched my eye.

Healed. I grinned and reached into my pocket. The orange peel had long since dried, but I had held onto it because its smell was nice.

"You guys like orange?" I asked. I crumbled it into the water, and they all swam around, nipping at the floating bits. Their vacant stares and gaping mouths took my mind off my troubles. I remembered seeing a drawing of white fish like this before in an Encyclopedia of All Writable Knowledge. Fortuity Fish, that's what they were called. One of the most common of magical creatures. They were looked upon favorably by Avalons who raised them in farms. I had, upon initially seeing them, wondered why nobody poached the poor little guys out of this shallow pond. Now I understood that they did far more alive for the town then they could ever do dead... even as magical creatures. Why, the only person who could even utilize a magical creature dead was a sorcerer...

A sorcerer.

I mulled over it. There were lots of sorcerers here in town for this event, like Ricardo and Juris who had shown definite interest in her. But they had nowhere to keep her once they had captured her. They would still be suspects, but now that my tracking potion was gone, I could only count on good fortune to run into them again. So, I started with targets I could find. Bernard, the obnoxious owner of the shoe shop, and Winsor Reglar, the Age Day brat. And then there was the Divinis himself, but he wasn't interested in Mallow. If anything, he wanted her out of Blythe. One of them must have taken Mallow. Winsor was the obvious suspect, considering he liked Mallow so much. In addition, everyone hated him and he smelled weird.

"What do you think fish?" I asked. Even with these new insights, I couldn't get up and run after sorcerers. I needed a plan. "Do you think the creepy kid no one likes did it? The one in all black?" I asked. They listened patiently, and I moved over to linger in the shade.

"Nah, me neither," I said after a moment. "Being unpopular isn't a motive, no matter how much people would like it to be. Though... he could be motivated by wanting Mallow... for what, I'm not sure." I grimaced. He was flirting with her pretty heartily when he finally did meet her. He did say he wanted her, but not as a bride at the play. But... he hadn't gotten a good eyeful of her then. He seemed more infatuated then hostile.

The next suspect who I actually could locate was Bernard.

"Bernard's rude, definitely. And I don't like him at all. But again, that's not a motive." I rubbed my small beard thoughtfully. "Let's see... he is a sorcerer but doesn't like casting magic in front of other people. And he actually chose to be a craftsperson, which I never heard of a sorcerer doing before. He said I could never afford his... wait." I addressed the Fortuity Fish. "What if he wanted to make a new kind of enchanted shoes?"

They glubbed in thought. I sat on my behind.

"Right. What if his shoes are enchanted like the door handle here? That would explain why they would be so astronomically priced. And to make enchanted shoes, you need magical creatures."

My eyes went wide.

"And Bernard is the only person who knew where Mallow was when she was kidnapped. Even I was still figuring it out, but he could see from the sky where she was. Weird how when he locates her, she goes missing." I paused. "Very, very fishy."

I laughed apologetically at the fish.

"Right, that was bad. I'm going to walk over there and making a plan while I do so. Can't hang out here all day." I stood up, my body protesting and aching all over again. "Don't worry Mallow, here I come!" I declared.

I jogged toward the cordwainer's shop.

Although I thought as hard as possible with the throbbing headache between my temples, I somehow didn't come up with a genius plan that would allow me to outmaneuver a sorcerer into both revealing Mallow's location and surrendering his own magic. (And preferably all of his coin.) Instead, when I arrived at the pillars that had so left an impression on me when we first entered Blythe, I stopped in my tracks.

I remembered how although Winsor seemed powerful on the first day, I could punch him solidly and win a fight. I'd have to stay close to Bernard and if he started to rhyme, hit him so hard his jaw would come loose. No talking, no casting. There was the small issue that Winsor was fifty pounds lighter than me and Bernard a good two hundred more, but I'd deal with that technical detail later.

I pushed open the door. The place was as clean and tidy as before. Bernard was bent over a pair of dress shoes at the counter, gently hammering at a heel. He glanced up at me, and then back down at his work. He laid the work down.

"Oh good!" He got up and shuffled over to me. I took a few long strides across the room until we were standing close together. He tilted his head back.

"You're finally here. Did you manage to find Mallow yesterday?"

Not a trace of lying or deceit on his face. Either I had the wrong guy, or he was good.

He was a salesman. Like me. He was a good liar.

"Actually, I was hoping you'd seen her," I said. Bernard arms fell to his side, hands balled into fists.

"And after I went through all the trouble of casting a spell for you, something I don't normally do for people." He clucked his tongue in irritation and hustled over to the counter. He reached beneath it, disappearing for a second. I heard his muffled voice. "You should really keep better track of your daughter, adopted or no. When I ran away, my father made sure to..." He trailed off.

"He what?"

"Never mind. It's embarrassing." Bernard popped back into view over the counter, and in his arms he held a pair of soft leather boots, too big for any man I'd ever met. He dropped them on the counter. "Either way, I finished them. This week has been insane. To finish them quickly, I moved Mallow ahead of some of my oldest friends on my to-do list. The poor ladies who work for me have been doing triple overtime; I just let them go home about an hour ago."

I stepped up to the counter. For a moment I forgot my mission and let myself admire the shoes. They were plain enough in construction, tanned leather with six iron buckles and a reinforced sole. However, the top had a soft lining of fur. I reached out and ran my hand along it. Rabbit. And then I felt the pattern sewn below that. Those decorative knots I saw him doodling the other day swirled in gentle white curls that travelled along the brim of the boot and down to the ankle in increasingly wide and loosening spirals.

"It's..." My breath caught in my throat.

"I know, she only ordered them plain." He spun the quill in his thick fingers, somehow the ink not spraying everything. "But I thought, you know, how often is a Moon Giant going to wear my shoes?" He pointed at the inside of the tongue. "I signed it there, since she's going to be tromping around in the mud."

As I explored the shoe, my hand ended up cupping over the gentle curving pattern. In the soft pool of purple and gray shadow, the decoration glowed.

Just like Mallow's hair.

I tried to keep my composure as I sat the boots back down.

"I hope I don't owe you extra for those embellishments."

"Oh, no." Bernard shook his head. "Though, you do owe me."

He pointed at my boots. I stepped back, my gold buckles and red leather accents in jeopardy.

"What about them?" I asked.

"Your boots, I need them."

"You don't have enough already?"

"The agreement for the spell that helped you locate her? Remember, it was that you give me those old embarrassments and wear someone else's garb. You're bringing down the value of a Bernard Reglar original by tromping around in those."

I silently reminded myself this man was a kidnapper and possibly in breach of the sentient testing laws laid down by the Centralized Magical Arcanacracy. He could mouth off all he wanted now. In a little bit he'd be locked up in a dungeon in the Majikast. And all because he couldn't resist showing off.

"But I didn't locate her," I pointed out. Bernard's chest swelled.

"That's hardly my fault is it? I moved the entire sky for you."

"Why didn't you cast a tracking spell?" I asked, trying to pin him down. If he would have cast that, he wouldn't have moved me so far from Mallow, meaning I would have gotten to her before his cronies or him.

"There are risks to that," he mumbled. "Either way, I don't need them. I'm tidy so I don't lose things."

"Oh?" I asked. I pointed at one of his fancy shoes on the shelf. He remained stonily silent. I walked over to it and plucked it up, causing him to gasp. I ran my finger along the outside. It was smooth, so slick, like touching ice, but not freezing. Then I slipped my hand inside. It pulsed with heat. Temporarily repulsed by shock, I yanked my hand out.

"Be careful with that! It's lined with magma dragon scales! If you damage even one, it'd be worth more than you!"

"Ah, so you're saying one of your shoes is worth more... than a person?" I asked, placing the shoe back on the shelf.

"Maybe not a person, but definitely you." He swatted at my hands, shooing me away from the shelf. He did it hard enough my hand stung. "Now, give me those old boots of mine and I'll give you Mallow's."

"What good are Mallow's boots if I don't have her?"

"It's irrelevant. The deal we struck was for me helping you find her."

"Which I didn't," I said. "Tell you what, you give me Mallow and I'll give you these old embarrassing boots of mine." I crossed my ankles. He gaped up at me, his small mouth open beneath his mustache. Then he closed his mouth. Did he want the boots back bad enough to give me Mallow? How much was his pride worth? The veins in his neck showed. He spoke through clenched teeth.

"How can I give you Mallow? If I'd seen her, I would have given her the boots myself. Now, I'll even give you some more coin plus Mallow's boots, and all you'd need do is give me those old ones."

"No, not until I have Mallow," I said. "I don't care about the boots or the coin, all I want is Mallow."

"I don't sell lost daughters; I sell shoes!" he shouted. It wasn't a roar or a booming wave of noise. It was a normal, irritated, little guy shout. The impact came when his hands flew forward. He shoved me. Dormant muscle slid underneath his pudgy arms. I stepped back with the force instead of resisting it. His right hand curled into a fist.

I took another step back before he swung. He struck only air. My own empty hands were useless. I couldn't hit a sorcerer. Ungifted just didn't hit sorcerers. All I could do was retreat. I bumped into the wall. My elbow jingled a buckle on a ladies high heeled boot with too many belts. Without looking away, I moved my hand to grab one of the belts at the seam. I pulled it taut, threatening to tear it off.

"Wait, don't!" Bernard flexed his fingers. His scowl began to thaw with... disappointment? We stood, staring at each other. He looked down as his anger boiled away, a hissing of numbers as he counted backward from ten. When he gazed back at me, he was smaller seeming.

"It's not my job to help you in your family disputes or any other way for that matter," Bernard continued. My blood rose and he went on. "My only job is to make and sell shoes. So stop acting like I owe you something. You're nothing more than a customer, and not one important enough to talk to me this way. You've worn my patience thin."

Right before I could prepare a killer punch and kick combination, his expression softened. Sincerity laced his features.

"Unless... is she in trouble or something?" Bernard asked. "I mean, if she's avoiding you because you're this frustrating, that's fine, but..." He trailed off. "I thought because she was a Moon Giant she'd never be in danger, but..." His words faded again.

I didn't expect him to react like this. I debated what to do next as he searched my face with his eyes. I released the shoe hostage.

"Do you have a reason to suspect she's in danger?" he pressed. He was denying he did it to such an extent as to pretend to care about her. What a creep. He himself may have had Mallow kidnapped, and probably cobbled into shoes. And if he knew I knew, then he might have me crafted into a pair of shoes too. He'd already attacked me. I needed to search without his over sight.

"No." My mind took in the layout of the shop. I located a doorway with no windows near it. A backroom? I tried to determine whether it lead to a closet or a cellar. He'd need a big cellar to keep Mallow in, but if she were sitting or lying on her side...

"That's a relief." Bernard sighed. "There's been a lot of young people going missing in Blythe these last few years, and the Avalons have been completely incompetent at putting a stop to it—"

The door opened as Sir Osoro stormed into the shop.

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