.12.

SOME SORT OF WITCHY THING

Quicksilver let Anastazia’s question linger in the air while she turned it over in her head.

Was she ready to fight? Ready to become a witch? She could not imagine how to answer. So much had happened in the last few days—most of all in the last few hours—that she had hardly had time to catch her breath.

“Hang on a moment,” Sly Boots spoke up, pounding his fist against the pillow. “The only thing we’re going to do is return to our own time. I mean, is there really any question about this? My parents are there, our home is there. We can’t just leave it behind.” Silence met his words. He looked to Quicksilver, his face tense and earnest. “Quicksilver?”

She could not look at him. Now that he had said the words aloud, it was very easy to decide that she wanted to stay in this time after all. For what was there for her to return to? She had nothing and no one. The only creature in the world she cared about was sitting by the window—well, except for the girls and the sisters of her convent, but when had they ever cared about her? Although even they didn’t deserve whatever the wolves had done to them.

“If we defeat the Wolf King,” Fox murmured, as though he had heard the thoughts in her head, “then we’ll change the future, and they’ll be all right, won’t they? They’ll never be attacked, because the Wolf King will never have been alive to attack them.”

Quicksilver considered his sharp, whiskered face. “I suppose you’re right.”

“I’m afraid there’s no way to return just yet,” Anastazia said. “Not only does such an act require much more powerful magic than we have access to at the moment, it also would require Fox to sacrifice—”

“Absolutely not,” Quicksilver interrupted. “There will be no sacrifices here.” She tilted up his face. “I promise I’ll never make you do that, Fox. Never.”

Fox huffed indignantly. “I should think not.”

“What do you expect me to do?” asked Sly Boots. “Leave my parents to die of fever or be killed by the Wolf King when he burns Willow-on-the-River to the ground?”

“Do keep in mind,” said Anastazia evenly, “that if we succeed in our task, and therefore change the future, we could prevent your parents from ever getting cursed in the first place.”

Sly Boots opened his mouth and shut it again, looking stumped.

“But in the meantime,” Anastazia continued, “we cannot afford to concern ourselves with the fates of individuals. This is a war. We are fighting to save our kind.”

“Witches aren’t my kind,” Sly Boots pointed out, his voice low. “They’re the reason my parents are ill. And now they’re the reason why I’ve been separated from them.” The expression on his face reminded Quicksilver of how he had looked in his parents’ bedroom, right before he had shattered the bowl against the wall.

Quicksilver rolled her eyes. “No one forced you to come thieving with me. You could have said, ‘No thank you, I’d rather cry at home alone in my slippers,’ and you wouldn’t have been there when the Wolf King came, and Fox and I would have come back to the past by ourselves.”

Flushing, Sly Boots said, “Well, I didn’t ask you to break into my home and try to rob me, did I?”

“Hah! As if you’d anything worth stealing.”

Sly Boots shot to his feet. “I would have had something worth stealing—lots of somethings—if I hadn’t had to sell it all to get medicine for my parents, and they would have never taken ill were it not for you—you—”

Anastazia raised a cool eyebrow. “Yes? Go on. Us what?”

Quicksilver crossed her arms over her chest. “Yes, please. Do say whatever nasty word you were about to say.”

Fox curled his tail around his body, his eyes twinkling. “Oh, this ought to be fun.”

Sly Boots tossed the pillow onto the bed. “Never mind.”

“Quite right.” Anastazia sniffed. “Unless you would like to wander off into this world and fend for yourself against any rogue witch who might fancy making you her servant—and believe me, you have the air of a particularly useful servant—or some beast so savage not even your sleeping mind could have imagined it, then you will have to remain here, with us, and help us fight our fight.”

Sly Boots glared at Anastazia, but his glare was sorely outmatched. He looked down at the bedcovers.

“I don’t see any other way about it, Boots,” said Quicksilver. “If we’re stuck here, we’re stuck here, but I don’t like to remain stuck for long.” Quicksilver rose to her feet. “If you’ll teach me magic,” she said to Anastazia, “I’ll help you fight the Wolf King. Or find the what’s-it things. The bones of the First Ones’ monsters.” She paused. “You already have some of them, right? You’ve managed to hang on to at least a couple of skeletons, maybe?”

Anastazia’s face fell, her mouth thinning. “No. I had two of them, and then I lost them to the Wolf King before I found you. In every one of our lifetimes, we have found these skeletons hidden in different parts of the Star Lands, and they don’t always stay in the same place for long. Before the First Ones died, they put a spell on their monsters so that their skeletons might never be found, and they did a fine job. They can cloak and glamour themselves to look different than what they are. They’re here one instant, and three kingdoms away the next. You’ll find one only to lose it a moment later if you don’t grab it fast enough. That’s what happened to me—for ten years I hid two of them, carrying them with me wherever I went. I was lucky. And then, only days before I found you, they vanished.”

Anastazia took a deep, shuddering breath and then let out a rattling, wet cough. “I’ve brought you to a time in the past when the Wolf King hasn’t yet found any of the skeletons—at least I don’t think he has—but as for us . . . we’ll have to start with nothing. No skeletons, no advantage . . .”

Quicksilver swallowed hard. “Well . . . once we do have the skeletons, we can destroy them, right?”

“We haven’t yet designed a spell strong enough to do it, but we will,” said Anastazia. “Each time we get closer. Meanwhile, we’ll steal as many of them as we can and try to keep them out of the Wolf King’s reach until that day comes.”

Quicksilver was silent for a long moment. When she finally held out her hand, she tried to make herself seem more confident than she felt. “All right, then. It’s a deal.”

Anastazia, amused, slapped her palm. When their skin touched, a spark zipped between them.

“Agreed.”

“And,” said Quicksilver, turning to Sly Boots, “as soon as I figure out a way to return, I’ll send you right back home, so you can be with your parents. I can’t imagine it will take me long. If magic is anything like thieving, I ought to learn quickly.”

“Hah!” snorted Anastazia.

“Don’t worry, child,” Fox said, stretching and yawning. “With me as your monster, you can’t go wrong.”

Quicksilver flushed. “Child? I’m twelve.”

“Can’t go wrong,” Anastazia repeated, shaking her head. “Oh, stupid little fools. You’ve no idea what lies ahead.”

Ignoring her, and Fox’s smug face, Quicksilver thrust out her hand again. “Agreed, Boots?”

Sly Boots considered her. “You promise you’ll do that for me? You’ll send me home the moment you can? Even if . . . ?” He trailed off, glancing Fox’s way.

“I won’t do it if it hurts Fox, no,” said Quicksilver. “But I’ll find another way, I’m sure of it. I always find a way.”

After a moment, Sly Boots gave a nervous smile, and they slapped hands. “Agreed.”

Quicksilver wiped her palm on her coat. “You’re always so nasty and sweaty. First thing I’m going to do is find some sort of . . . witchy thing . . . to fix that.”

“It’s called a spell,” Anastazia hissed. “Witchy thing. Indeed.”

“Well, how am I supposed to know what it’s called?”

Fox stretched, sticking his rump into the air, and then sat up. “Shall we begin now? I’m still bored, you know. No offense, child,” he continued, cutting off Quicksilver’s indignant reply, “but when you’re a monster, the rest of the world seems dull as pudding.”

“I like pudding,” Sly Boots offered.

“Of course you do,” said Fox soothingly.

Anastazia, grumbling to herself, fluffed her pillows and blew out the candles. “First, we sleep. We’ll begin in the morning—that is, if I decide not to run away and leave you noisy lot to your own devices.”

With the candles out, the room soon fell silent. Fox padded over to the window couch and curled up in a ball with his nose tucked under his hind leg.

Quicksilver watched him for a long time, forcing her heavy eyes to stay open, for when he was like this—quiet and still—he was the Fox she had always known, and not the strange, sharp creature he had become.