Sixteen

They headed back the way Eleanor and Otto had come, along walking trails that zagged and zigged and climbed and fell. Otto’s and Pip’s bikes were made for this kind of riding, but Eleanor’s wasn’t, and the trip to Pip’s house had knocked something loose in the front wheel, making it rattle whenever she went downhill and groan whenever she went uphill. Sometimes she had to stop and walk the rickety old thing instead, which slowed all of them down.

“We’re close,” Otto said at last, as they pedaled along a smooth track between the trees. He’d promised that the place he had in mind would be a good spot to hide, at least while they rested—all of them were exhausted. Eleanor’s lungs ached, and she panted for breath, the cold air stinging her throat. Pip seemed like she could keep riding all night. “It’s just around—”

“Look out!” Otto yelled, as they rounded a bend in the trees.

The dog loomed out of the darkness, its glowing red eyes the only color since the gray seeped in. They clattered to a stop, Eleanor barely jumping free of her bike as it toppled and skidded, coming to a rest in front of the dog. It looked down at the bike and let out a rumbling growl, then shifted its gaze back to them.

Up close, the dog was massive. Bigger than the biggest dog Eleanor had ever seen. Its head was level with her chest, its brow blunt, its fur short and shining. It simply stepped over the bike and paced toward them. They scrambled back, Eleanor grabbing for the fire poker. It caught briefly against the zipper before coming free. She brandished it in front of her.

“Stay back!” she said.

The dog stopped, but it didn’t look terribly concerned. Its breath fogged the air.

But it wasn’t fog. It was breathing out smoke. Eleanor gulped. “Let us past,” she said.

“No,” the dog replied in a deep, male voice. Otto squeaked in surprise, and Eleanor realized she hadn’t gotten around to explaining about the cat-of-ashes or the whole “talking beasts” thing.

“Iron hurts you,” Eleanor said with confidence. The book had told them that much.

Instead of answering, the dog leaped at her. Eleanor yelped and stumbled backward in surprise. She tried to swing the fire poker, but the dog’s huge paws hit her in the chest and she flew backward, the poker sailing out of her grip. She hit the ground hard. Her vision filled with sparks, and when it cleared, the dog loomed over her, smoke spilling from between his yellow teeth, his red eyes boring into hers. One huge paw pressed down on her chest, pinning her.

“Little beast,” it said in a low rumble of a voice. “You are nothing. You are small. You are afraid.”

“Get off of her!” Pip yelled. She had the poker in both hands, and she swung it in a ferocious arc.

It hit the dog and kept on going, swinging straight through him and sending a cloud of black specks and bright sparks into the air. He howled and leaped back, shaking himself and shedding more sparks and ash. A red line glowed across his side where the iron had passed through him. It looked like an ember when you blew on it.

Pip stood with her legs planted and the poker gripped tight. “Field hockey,” she said. “Back off, buddy.”

The dog let out a snarl. He sank back on his haunches and then twisted, launching himself off between the trees. He knocked against trunks here and there, leaving the bark glowing and smoking, but then he was gone.

Pip stuck out her hand to help Eleanor up.

“Thanks,” Eleanor said. “That was really brave.”

“That was amazing,” Otto agreed.

“Don’t worry about it. I really wanted to hit something anyway,” Pip said, sticking out her tongue. “Now, come on! We should get out of here before it comes back.”

They pedaled down the last stretch of the track, which led right past Otto’s backyard. The omnipresent gray gave it an ominous look: the swing set loomed, the treehouse crouched among the branches like a hungry beast. There were toys scattered over the lawn, but they were oddly regimented, all lined up to face the same direction. The house itself seemed in a battle between disrepair and the cookie-cutter perfection of the town, everything just a hair off and giving the impression of someone extremely stressed and barely holding it together.

Their vantage point gave them a good view of the road out front and the three cars parked there—a beat-up red Honda in the driveway and two sleek black cars parked on the street. One of them was the car Eleanor had spotted earlier. The black cars definitely didn’t match the house with hearts painted on the back door.

“Looks like it was a good idea to get out of the house early,” Otto whispered.

Just then, the front door opened. Three figures in crisp black-and-white suits, two men and a woman, marched out to the cars. The woman got into the passenger seat of one of them, the men got into the drivers’ seats, and they pulled away.

“Let’s not stick around,” Pip suggested. Otto led them away, winding through the trees, until they came to an overhang, like a shallow cave. Otto had screened it off with branches and a sign that said OTTO’S PLACE (KEEP OUT! ESPECIALLY EMILY!). Inside he’d stowed a plastic storage box with some comic books and granola bars and a sleeping bag.

“We should be safe here,” Otto said. He winced.

“Nowhere is safe,” Pip said. “The colors are gone—something’s happening all over.” She sounded about as freaked out as Eleanor felt. It seemed like things turning gray should be the least of their problems, but instead of getting used to it, she was getting more and more unsettled. Like the whole world had turned dangerous, and set its hungry eyes on them. She shivered, and caught Otto doing the same.

“Does anybody know this place is here?” Eleanor asked.

“Just Emily, and she’s off at college,” Otto said. “I think we should be okay for a little while, at least.”

“The cat-of-ashes said we would be in danger from midnight to midnight,” Eleanor said. They gave her blank looks. Right. She still hadn’t told them about the cat’s visit. She explained as quickly as she could, which still took a while, with both of them interrupting with questions and exclamations.

“So we’re in danger until midnight?” Pip said when she was done.

“Do you think we can stay hidden that long?” Eleanor asked.

“I doubt it,” Otto replied. “The graveyard dog could track our scent. And the rattlebird can fly. It probably can find us just by flying around.”

“So we can’t just wait it out,” Eleanor said, a little glimmer of hope going dim.

“The book told us how to fight the graveyard dog,” Pip said. “The iron worked. There’s got to be something else in there, right?”

“I’ve already looked it over a hundred times,” Eleanor said mournfully. “There are some things about the beasts, but there’s nothing about how to beat the curse or the People Who Look Away.” Still, she pulled the book out of her bag and opened it to the beginning, letting her gaze wander down the list of titles while Otto shone the phone flashlight for her.

The familiar titles were all there.

But there was another.

“‘The Thirteenth Key,’” Eleanor read.

“Well,” Otto said, “that wasn’t there before.”

“It’s about Jack,” Eleanor said, skimming quickly. “And the girl with backward hands, and the hedgewitch. ‘The heroes three.’ They go back to the kingdom from the first story, but it’s been a hundred and fifty years. Listen. ‘The kingdom was as perfect as the day the princess had been taken, not a leaf out of place, not a flower wilted. Yet it was gray—colorless and brittle, full of smiles but without joy. Its people were like marionettes, moving about their lives tugged along by the strings of habit. For the stranger who had blessed and cursed them had crafted from their joy twelve keys. Nearly all their joy had been stolen in this way, but there was a little left, and one key more to make. And should that key be forged, a door would open, and what lay on the other side was more frightening by far than any beast or calamity the world had ever known.’”

She read on. The three heroes fought their way through the sort of trials that fairy tales often held—riddles and beasts and the like. “‘And then they sought an audience with the Storyteller. He permitted them three questions, and each asked one, but none was the right one. They did not know how to close the door for good, but still they had to do something, and so they set out to destroy the keys . . .’”

The heroes succeeded. They broke the keys and kept the door from opening, but it wasn’t a happy ending. Some people left the kingdom, and their color returned, and they learned joy again. But more remained, and stayed gray, and the kingdom was perfect and joyless, and the heroes never defeated the People Who Look Away. “‘And they knew,’” Eleanor finished, “‘that somewhere else, in some other kingdom, a stranger was standing before a king or a queen or an emperor and making them a promise.’”

“That’s an awful story,” Pip said. “It’s sad.”

“They stopped it, though,” Otto pointed out.

“And everyone was still miserable. And it didn’t stop the bad guys,” Pip said. “It’s not a proper ending if you don’t beat the bad guys.”

“Maybe they would have if they’d asked the right questions,” Eleanor said.

“Well, what are the right questions?” Pip demanded. “And who do we ask? What are we supposed to do?”

Eleanor rubbed her eyes. Adrenaline had kept her up, but now her brain felt like it was wrapped in cotton. For a moment, the immensity of everything that was happening rose up over Eleanor like a tidal wave, about to crash down. But she forced herself to take a deep breath. All they needed was a list. A plan. “First,” she started. She paused, thinking. “First, we should get some sleep.”

“Sleep?” Pip said. “You think we should sleep at a time like this?”

“Yes,” Eleanor said. “I think we need to sleep, if we’ve got any hope of staying ahead of the January Society and figuring all of this out. So first we rest. Second, we’ll go back to Ashford House. The cat-of-ashes said that there was something important there. She said—everything in this house has a purpose. And the book and the article, they were both from Andy Ashford. It’s the best place to look for more clues. And then—and then we figure out how to make it to midnight.” Midnight to midnight, that’s what the cat-of-ashes had said. If they could make it that long, they’d be safe.

She hoped.

The rest of the plan—the how part of making it that long—would have to wait until they knew more. Make the rest of the plan, she added to the end of the list in her head, and felt a little better.

But not much.