Reckless (Free Preview) (23 page)

There were a
lot of soldiers on the bridge — not just the sentries by the palace gate, but
also among the crowds strolling past the shops.
 
Many of the Goyl women wore dresses embroidered with stones that matched
the color of their skin.
 
The stones were
so finely cut that the fabric glistened like snakeskin, and Jacob caught
himself wondering what Clara would look like in such a dress.
 
How
long will this last?

The Fairy's
windows gaped like green eyes from the light sandstone.
 
Barely twenty yards above them was the point
where the bridge's metal joists were bolted to the palace wall, but the façade,
in contrast to that of the other stalactites, was shiny-smooth and afforded no
purchase.

And yet he had
to try.
 
Behind him, Valiant was
muttering something about the limitations of the human mind.
 
Jacob pulled the snuffbox from his
pocket.
 
It contained one of the most
useful magical items he'd ever found:
 
a
very long single golden hair.
 
The Dwarf
fell silent as Jacob began to rub the hair between his fingers.
 
It began to sprout more fibers, each as fine
as the silk of a spider.
 
Soon the hair
was as thick as Jacob's middle finger and stronger than any rope in this or the
other world.
 
But it wasn't just its
strength that made it such a useful tool.
 
It had other, even more wondrous properties.
 
The rope could grow to any length you
desired, and it could attach itself to the exact spot you looked at when you
threw it.

"A Rapunzel-hair.
 
Not bad!"
 
Valiant murmured
as Jacob took the rope and looked down at the green windows.
 
"But not even that rope will help you
with the guards.
 
They'll see you as
clearly as they'd see a bug crawling over their faces!"

In reply,
Jacob produced the green glass bottle from his pocket.
 
He had stolen it from a Stilt, and it was
filled with the slime of a snail that could make you invisible for a few
hours.
 
The carnivorous snails that
produced it used it as camouflage to sneak up on any prey they fancied.
 
Stilts and Thumblings bred the snails for the
slime, which enabled them to go on their forays similarly undetected.
 
The slime had to be smeared under one's nose
— quite an unsavory procedure, even though it didn't smell — and the effect
was
immediate.
 
The
only problems were the side effects, including hours of debilitating nausea as
well as, after repeated use, temporary paralysis.

"Rapunzel-hair and waneslime."
 
Jacob heard a trace of admiration in the
Dwarf's voice.
 
"I must admit,
you're quite well equipped.
 
All the
same, I'd just as soon know where your gold tree is before you climb over
there."

Jacob was
already smearing the slime under his nose.

"Oh
no," he said.
 
"What if you've
neglected to tell me
something,
and the King's guards
are waiting for me down there?
 
The rope
is strong enough for only one, so you get to stay up here.
 
But if the guards spot me, then you'd better
find a way to distract them; otherwise you can say good-bye to your gold
tree."

Before the
Dwarf could protest, Jacob swung himself over the balustrade.
 
The slime already made his body disappear, as
if the darkness were swallowing it up.
 
As he climbed down to the iron girders, he could no longer see his own
hands.
 
Holding onto one of the struts,
he threw the rope.
 
The golden cord wound
through the air like a snake wriggling through the water, until it attached
itself to a ledge between the malachite windows.

What if you actually find Will behind there,
Jacob?
 
Even if you can break the Dark
Fairy's spell, he'll still be asleep.
 
How are you going to get him out of the fortress?
 
He didn't know the answer.
 
He just knew that he had to try.
 
And that he could still feel Clara's lips on
his own.

Climbing a
Rapunzel-rope was easy.
 
The rope adhered
to his hands as if it were trying to hold on to them.
 
Jacob tried to ignore the abyss beneath
him.
 
All
will be well
.
 
The stalactite inched
toward him, sinewy, like a muscle cast in stone.
 
He already felt the nausea brought on by the
waneslime.
 
A few more yards, Jacob.
 
Don't look down.
 
Ignore the
height.

He tightened
his grip on the taut rope and climbed on until finally his invisible hands
touched the smooth wall.
 
His feet found
the ledge and, leaning against the cool stone, he took a moment to recover his
breath.
 
The green windows to his left
and his right shimmered like hardened water.
 
What now,
Jacob
 
You
can't just break one.
 
That would have immediately summoned all the
guards.

He pulled
Chanute's knife from his belt and set the blade against the glass.
 
He noticed the hole with the moonstone rim
only after the snake had shot out of it.
 
Moonstone as pale as the snake's scales, as pale as
its mistress's skin.
 
It wrapped
itself around Jacob's neck before he realized what was happening.
 
He tried to ram the knife through the scales,
but it entangled him so relentlessly that his fingers let go of the haft, and
he could do nothing but claw in desperation at the scaly body.
 
His feet slipped, and he hung helplessly
above the abyss like a snared bird, the strangling snake around his throat.
 
Two more serpents slithered out of another
hole next to him and wrapped themselves around his chest and legs. Jacob fought
for breath, and the last thing he saw was the golden rope coming away from the
ledge with a sudden jolt and disappearing into the darkness above him.

38

Found
And
Lost

Sandstone
walls and iron bars.
 
A
lizard-skin boot kicking him in the ribs.
 
Gray uniforms in the red fog that filled his
head.
 
At least the snakes were gone, and
he could breathe.
 
The Dwarf sold me out again
was the only thought that penetrated
the red fog.
 
When had he done it, Jacob?
 
In one of the stores, while you were waiting like a sheep?

He wanted to
sit up, but they had bound his hands, and his throat hurt so much that he had
trouble swallowing.

"Who
brought you back from the dead?
 
Her sister?"

The jasper
Goyl stepped out of the dark.

"I didn't
believe it when the Fairy told me you were still alive.
 
That was a well-aimed shot."
 
He spoke the dialect of the Empire with a
heavy accent.
 
"It was her idea to
spread the word your brother was with her, and you went for it like a fly into
the spider's web.
 
Bad luck the snakes
aren't even fooled by waneslime.
 
But you
did much better than the two
onyx
Goyl who tried to
climb down to the King's chambers.
 
We
had to scrape their remains from the roofs of the city."

Jacob pushed
back against the wall and managed to sit up.
 
The cell they had thrown him into was no different from the cells in a
human prison.
 
The same metal bars, the
same desperate scrawls on the walls.

"Where's
my brother?"
 
His voice was so
hoarse that he could barely hear himself.
 
And he felt extremely sick from the waneslime.

The Goyl
didn't answer.

"Where
did you leave the girl?" he asked instead.

He surely
didn't mean Fox.
 
What did they want with
Clara?
 
What do you think, Jacob?
 
Your
brother is sleeping, and they can't wake him.
 
That's good news, isn't it?
 
And that Valiant had not given her away proved that the Dwarf really had
taken quite a fancy to her.

So you just play dumb, Jacob.

"What
girl?"

That answer
got him another kick in the stomach, winding him as the snakes had done.
 
The soldier doing the kicking was a
woman.
 
Jacob thought he recognized
her.
 
Of course.
 
He'd shot her out of her saddle in the valley
of the Unicorns.
 
It would've been her
pleasure to continue kicking, but the jasper Goyl stopped her.

"Leave
him, Nesser," he said.
 
"We
won't get anything from him that way."

Jacob had
heard about the scorpions.

Almost
affectionately, Nesser let the creature crawl over her fingers before placing
it on Jacob's chest.
 
It was colorless
and barely longer than Jacob's thumb, but its pincers shone like silvery metal.

"There
not much they can do to Goyl skin," said the jasper Goyl as the scorpion
crawled under Jacob's shirt, "but yours is so much softer.
 
So... once again, where's the girl?"

The scorpion
dug its pincers into Jacob's chest as if it wanted to eat him alive.
 
Jacob managed not to scream until it plunged
its poisonous tail into him.
 
He gasped
with pain and fear as the venom poured fire under his skin.

"Where's
the girl?"

The She
-Goyl placed three more scorpions on his chest,
asking the same question, over and over.
 
But
Will
would sleep as long as he did not tell
them anything.
 
Jacob screamed with pain
until he lost his voice, wishing he had jade skin himself.
 
He wondered whether the poison would at least
burn away the Larks' Water — then he finally lost consciousness.

*
         
*
         
*
         
*
         
*

When Jacob
woke up, he had no memory of what, if anything, he'd told them.
 
He was in a different cell.
 
From the narrow window, he could see the
hanging palace.
 
His whole body was
aflame, as if he had scalded his skin.
 
His weapons belt was gone, as were all the other items he'd had with
him, but fortunately they had left him his handkerchief.
 
Fortunately?
 
And how are a couple of gold coins going to
help you now,
Jacob
 
The
Goyl soldiers were
infamous for their incorruptibility.

Jacob managed
to get to his knees.
 
Metal bars
separated his cell from the neighboring one, and what he saw through those bars
made him forget his pain.

Will.

He pushed his
shoulder against the wall and slowly got to his feet.
 
His brother lay as if dead, but he was
breathing.
 
There were still traces of
human skin on his forehead.
 
The Red
Fairy had kept her promise.
 
She had
stopped time.

Footsteps
echoed down the dark corridor, and Jacob backed against the bars behind which
his brother was sleeping.
 
The jasper Goyl.
 
Hentzau — Jacob now knew his name.
 
He was coming toward their cells with two guards, and when Jacob saw whom
they were dragging with them, he wanted to smash his head against the metal
bars.

He had told
them what they wanted to know.

Clara had a
bloody gash on her forehead.
 
Her eyes
were wide with fear.
 
Where's Fox
?
Jacob wanted to ask her, but she
didn't even seem to notice him.
 
All she
could see was his brother.

Hentzau pushed
her into Will's cell, and Clara took a step toward him, but then she stopped,
as if remembering that only a few hours earlier she'd kissed the other brother.

"Clara."

She turned,
her face a torrent of emotions: horror, anxiety, despair — and shame.

She approached
the iron bars and touched the red marks on Jacob's throat.
 
"What did they do to you?" she
whispered.

"It's
nothing.
 
Where is Fox?"

"They
caught her, too."

She took his
hand as the Goyl snapped to attention in front of the cell.
 
Even Hentzau straightened his shoulders,
though his reluctance clearly showed.
 
Jacob knew immediately who that woman was who was coming down the
corridor.

The Dark
Fairy's hair was lighter than that of her sister; but Jacob didn't wonder how
she had earned her name.
 
He felt her
darkness like a shadow on his skin, though it wasn't fear that made his heart
beat faster.