Insidious Read online

  “Hello? Newbie halfling here who will be out of town those three days and currently hasn’t a clue what’s going on.” Joy pointed to herself. “I can’t go.”

  “Correction—you must go,” Graus Claude said. “It is a welcome gala being held in your honor, after all—it will probably be the event of the century. To snub this invitation would cast yourself as a social pariah, which, trust me, is not a viable option.” His hands wove themselves together in pairs. “And you have nothing to worry about concerning distance or time. Indeed, there are far more serious things to worry about.”

  “Like if I’m going to grow wings?”

  “Don’t be absurd.” Graus Claude sniffed. “You would have sprouted fledgling nubs by now.”

  Joy dropped her head into her hands and felt sick.

  “Now, now, don’t fret overmuch—these things take time and, considering how dilute your lineage, you may be long in the tooth before you develop fangs.” Joy shot him a look. “Or gills,” he amended. “Actually, you might be quite fetching in spots.”

  “Stop,” Joy said, closing her eyes and rubbing her hands over her knees. “One conniption fit at a time, okay?” She took a deep breath through her nose and out through her mouth. “If there’s no way that I can possibly learn everything before I immortally offend someone and smear both our reps, what options does that leave us with?”

  Graus Claude gave one of his wide, toothy smiles.

  “That’s simple,” he said. “We cheat.”

  * * *

  Joy picked up a pearl from a small pile spread across the Bailiwick’s desk. He was inspecting each one carefully, comparing their size and color and hue. It was hard for her to imagine Graus Claude ordering her a dress to match. Ball gown, she reminded herself, for my welcome gala. It was too ridiculous to take seriously.

  “Is this really necessary?” she said.

  “Trust me, Miss Malone, I believe this is our best option, given the current situation.” He opened his hand expectantly. Joy placed the pearl into his palm.

  “I don’t understand what this has to do with my learning enough proper etiquette in time for the gala.”

  Graus Claude grinned. “Leave it to me.”

  “So I can stop typing?”

  “Very droll,” he said while rolling the pearls between two plates of smoked glass suspended over a mirror. Joy couldn’t quite see how the thing held itself together, but Graus Claude stared intently at each pearl with a jeweler’s eyepiece jammed under his brow and several thin instruments in each of his hands. Long tubules ran from what looked like a brass coronet on his forehead to a nest of bulbs at its base. The emerald lamp shone close to his chin, highlighting every crag of his face in white gold. “You continue your work and I shall continue mine.” The Bailiwick went back to tinkering and muttering. “Think they can outsmart me, do they...?”

  Figuring that she was still hearing him through the eelet, Joy decided not to comment. She turned back to the long list of official acknowledgment protocols on the tablet in her lap. Eye contact is mandatory excepting when bowing or curtseying to those greater than two stations above your current rank, whereupon eyes are lowered and lifted prior to attaining an upright position...bend at the knees, ankles parallel...hind in, chest out, don’t swallow as it is considered lewd...

  A flicker of movement caught her eye. She stopped typing, grateful for the interruption—any interruption—Joy would have willingly hugged Hasp for the chance to escape. The outcast aether sprite may have been an evil toady for Briarhook, but an unexpected kidnapping certainly wouldn’t be dull! She wasn’t sure if her eyes, her back or her hands hurt worse.

  Kurt opened the door and stepped inside without so much as a knock. That’s strange. Joy felt a prickle of premonition.

  Inq marched into the room, lifting her hand to her eye as the four-armed toad glanced up, brow furrowing in confusion. She spoke before he did, crisp and sharp.

  “I demand entrance to the Bailiwick of the Twixt.”

  Graus Claude froze. His icy blue eyes glazed over, growing milky like cataracts, his wide mouth open in midbellow. His great jaw yawned with the weight of gravity, unhinging with a tiny clack and opening impossibly wider, lips peeling back from the rows of sharp, pointy teeth. Joy watched in fascinated horror as the giant amphibian’s tongue curled back upon itself, pale pink and gleaming, and adhered to the roof of his mouth.

  Beneath the Bailiwick’s tongue were stairs, going down.

  “Guard the door,” Inq said without looking at Kurt. He moved to obey. She placed one boot on the edge of the bottom lip and gestured to Joy. “Follow me.”

  Joy gaped, attempting to make sense of what was happening, what she was seeing. She knew her eyes, at least, could be liars.

  “Are you kidding me?” she asked, looking at Inq, then Kurt. “I mean, are you freaking kidding me?” The Bailiwick showed no awareness of any of them, or, for that matter, anything at all. He didn’t look alive any longer—it was as if he’d become a statue, a piece of furniture, like a wardrobe with its doors thrown open, exposing his insides to the world. Joy waved at his maw. “What did you do to him?”

  “I’ve invoked his raison d’être,” Inq said simply. “And I’m entering the Bailiwick, as are you. I want to show you something.”

  Joy looked to Kurt. “Is this normal?”

  The muscular bodyguard did not so much as twitch. “He is the Bailiwick,” Kurt said, as if that explained everything. Which it didn’t.

  Joy pointed behind her. “There is a stairway under his tongue!”

  Inq smiled slyly. “Precisely,” she said. “Follow me.”

  And she stepped over his bottom lip, which zipped a line of blue fire just behind his teeth.

  “Don’t worry,” she said. “It always does that.” Inq winked. “Watch your step!”

  And she marched down, down, down into the Bailiwick’s throat.

  Joy looked desperately around the room. Kurt stood in front of the office doors, staring ahead, politely averting his eyes. She wondered if Kurt was there to keep people from coming in or to keep her from running out. She edged closer to the gaping maw—widened to the full height of a man—and tentatively placed a foot on the first step. It was solid stone, worn slightly smooth in the center, and was the first of many going down into darkness.

  Joy hesitantly shifted her weight, trying not to think too much about her head passing under the frog’s upper lip, stepping into his mouth, under his tongue. The line of blue fire zipped by her feet, changing to ruby red as it passed. Joy stumbled and nearly tripped on the stair. Her hand shot out to steady herself. Her fingers gave under the moist inner cheek.

  “Ew,” she muttered and wiped her hand against her jeans.

  “Come on,” Inq’s voice coaxed from somewhere down below. “It’s safe.” Inq’s words rose up, unseen. “In fact, it’s probably the safest place in the world.”

  “Small comfort,” Joy muttered as she swallowed her fear and took the next step down.

  The stairs descended into a dark tunnel with a yellow, misty light at the end. It didn’t smell like a dungeon and didn’t feel like a trap, but the stairway itself felt very old and the air was very still. The passageway brightened as she continued down the steps, growing slightly warmer, friendlier and smelling faintly of grass.

  Joy blinked as she walked into a verdant green meadow that spread out to the horizon under a soft, sunny sky. She and Inq stood on the edge of an ancient wood, shaded by towering trees and twisting, leafy vines. The ground smelled loamy and rich and brown. A clear, sparkling brook chuckled over smooth stones. There was a hushed whisper as a breeze tickled the grass and clapped the leaves, but Joy could not feel the air on her skin. Despite what her eyes were telling her, everything felt like a held breath.

  Inq squatted next to a patch of periwi
nkle flowers. She looked truly happy for the first time...ever. It was the look on her face that made Joy feel that it was okay to take those last, few steps into the impossible grove. She crossed the last riser and blinked up at the hazy suggestion of a sun.

  “Where are we?” Joy asked. “And don’t say ‘inside the Bailiwick.’ That doesn’t explain any of this.”

  “Doesn’t it?” Inq chirped, rising to stand. “The Bailiwick isn’t a title like a bailiff or a duke—it’s a place. The Bailiwick is the comptroller of the space between worlds. Specifically, this space.” She ran her flawless fingers over the tops of the grass. “Imagine this is a pocket sewn inside the Twixt. A little pocket universe, a tiny closet in space and time.”

  Joy turned around in a circle. The base of the stair floated behind them with meadow fading out in all directions into an indistinct blur. The horizon was the exact color of the sunlight overhead. It was as if the whole world bowed at the edges and slipped under itself like tucked-in sheets. The slippery perspective made Joy’s head swim. She squeezed her eyes shut momentarily. She could only manage one word:

  “Why?”

  Inq’s face grew serious. The pink-and-green sparks in her eyes flickered like flames. “To protect a door,” she said. “A door built between worlds—and shortly afterward, we had to use it to protect something else.”

  Her eyes flicked over Joy’s shoulder. Joy turned and saw a tall woman standing by a tree. She was dressed in a long, flowing gown belted low on her hips, and her arms were covered in purple-black glyphs, her hair long and black and shining. Her eyes were as old as centuries. And when she smiled, two dimples appeared over a tiny, button chin.

  “Hello, Joy,” she said. “My daughter has told me so much about you.”

  SIX

  JOY STARED AT the tall woman standing on the edge of a forest inside the belly of Graus Claude. Many things slid into place, but too many others slipped away, defying reason and sanity.

  “You’re...” Joy began, but wasn’t sure how to finish. “Ink and Inq,” she tried again. “You made them?”

  The woman drew her fingers down the bark of a tree. Calligraphy shimmered under her touch. “Yes, but they are their own persons now. Just as I designed them to be.” She gestured to Inq, who hurried forward and tucked herself into the crook of her mother’s arm, resting her heart-shaped face against her shoulder. The family resemblance—if that was what Joy could call it—was unmistakable.

  “You’re their mother,” Joy whispered. Inq and Ink shaped themselves to look like her. Joy glanced at Inq. No, she remembered, Inq was the one who shaped them both. She was older. She’d been first. She’d known all along.

  Joy swallowed, heart hammering. “Does Ink know?”

  Inq shook her head. “No.”

  The words echoed in her ears, boring into her brain.

  “What do you mean, ‘No’?” Joy snapped. “You can’t tell me you’re hiding Ink’s mother in a pocket universe for his own good!”

  “Of course not,” Inq said. “She’s hiding here to save her life.”

  Joy found herself strangely unwilling to take another step. She was trapped along the edge of this world in a secret corner of the Twixt, all but feeling her skin bubbling with nerves. She felt lost, caged, betrayed by both her frenemies and by her own, changing body, afraid that any one of her reactions might trigger something new.

  “Okay, stop. Just stop.” Joy took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Look, I’ve had a long, strange day, but this is beyond too much,” she said, rubbing her hands against her jeans. “We are inside the Bailiwick.”

  Inq nodded. “Yes.”

  “Why?” Joy crossed her arms. “Why bring me here?”

  The woman drifted forward. “I am told that you can help set us free.”

  “Oh,” Joy said, as if that explained everything. Which it didn’t. “Okay.” She glanced at Inq. Joy noticed that her eyes were the color of her mother’s sigils—a deep indigo-black. So were Ink’s. A family trait. “Can you elaborate?”

  “It’s complicated,” Inq said.

  “Really?” Joy said. “Try me.”

  Inq’s mother stepped to a nearby laurel tree and folded herself gracefully into its cradle of branches, curled to form a perfect seat. “It started years ago, back when our people and yours began forgetting their obligations and grew increasingly at odds.” She tilted her head back. “Many of our people had been enslaved, tricked into servitude. Retributions were swift and the death toll was rising, birthing a mutual sentiment of distrust and fear.” Joy glanced aside—it was a familiar story throughout history. “So the King and Queen decided to strategically withdraw, taking the bulk of our people out of harm’s way.”

  “Wait a minute,” Joy said. “What King and Queen? The Folk are ruled by the Council.”

  The statuesque woman turned her head. Unlike Ink and Inq, her eyes looked human, but they still had that cavernous, fathomless quality that she’d given to the Scribes. Joy felt like she was falling into them. “The King and Queen rule over the Twixt, the land which they cleaved from the elemental wild.” Her answer left no room for doubt. “When they chose to leave, they left behind a skeleton crew of loyalists in order to maintain our obligations and uphold our honor, fulfilling our pledge to sustain the magic inherent in the world and look after our own. They created a Council to rule in their stead, to be their voice while they were in exile.” Her smile faded like the sun slipping behind a cloud. “They chose a courier who would visit the door and ferry messages back and forth between worlds, bringing the King and Queen’s wisdom to their Courts.” Her words grew heavy. “The courier would also serve as the gatekeeper, the one who would tell them when it was time to come home.” The woman looked wistful. Her gaze lifted to the branches waving in a tousled breeze that Joy still could not feel.

  “Where did they go?” she asked.

  “They fashioned a door,” the woman said. “A door between worlds, and escaped to a safe haven on the other side.”

  Another world? Joy wanted to ask more, but Inq interrupted her thoughts.

  “The Council was supposed to open the door when it was safe to return,” Inq said from her perch in the grass. “Or, if the humans ended up killing all of the Council members, the strongest and wisest of the Folk, then the door would open automatically and the King and Queen would return to avenge their people.” She looked at her mother, fierce with love. “But the courier stopped coming,” she said. “And then there were whispers of a coup—that those who remained here could govern themselves and no longer had need or want for a king and queen.”

  “I suspect they were bitter,” Inq’s mother said softly. “They felt abandoned and afraid. It was not easy to stay behind in this world.”

  Inq swiped her fingers along the fluffy tops of weeds. “Just so, their loyalty should have been absolute.” She glanced at Joy. “Graus Claude and I decided to hide her inside the Bailiwick, the entrance to the hidden doorway, until we could identify the traitors and end the coup.”

  “I don’t understand,” Joy said to the regal woman lounging in her throne of branches. “What does this have to do with you?”

  The woman smoothed her dress over her knees. “Of all of my family, I was the only one who chose to remain in the Twixt,” she said. “And while I was not a full member of the Council, I was a convenient figurehead—the youngest descendant of my parents’ rule.”

  Joy coughed on her spit. “You’re a princess?” she said. Of course. I’m supposed to help rescue a princess of the lost King and Queen. How perfectly fairy tale.

  The tall woman smiled. “In a sense,” she admitted. “I felt that, of all my sisters, I could do more good here.” She gestured with her rune-painted arms. “Ca’cleuth me teer po’ur,” she murmured. “I write to remember.” Her dark eyes—deep, brown eyes—lifted as she gazed
at Joy. “When the King and Queen prepared to leave, we were already investigating the possibility of signaturae—binding the magic of our True Names to symbols which could not be said aloud and, thus, would keep us safe from those who would abuse us. I was in the process of creating both Inq and Ink for the purpose of delivering those marks in our stead and thought that it would only be a little while until we were reunited with our people once again.” She caressed the tree bough, leaving a trail of fading cursive, and slid her fingers over new leaves, each one lit up with spring-green script. “I thought that by remaining behind, I could help hasten their return.”

  Joy glanced between the two in the moment of stretched-thin silence. “But something happened,” she guessed. “Something went wrong.”

  “Yes,” the princess said softly.

  “When we discovered that there was a plot against the royal family, I brought her here, in secret, so she could be outside the bounds of the Twixt,” Inq said. “That way, no spell could touch her, let alone find her. No one else would know.” She glanced back up the stairs. “The only ones who came here were the courier and the other members of the Council—those who could locate and open the door between worlds—the traitor had to be among them. The Bailiwick and I thought that her disappearance would lure the culprit out or, at the very least, it would keep her from harm until we identified the conspirators.” Inq’s voice grew hard. “I waited here, certain that I would see the villain for myself, but no one came.” Inq drew her fingers through the water. “When I went back to report to Graus Claude, I returned to find that the coup had ended.”

  Joy frowned. “But that’s a good thing, isn’t it?”

  Inq looked at Joy as if she were an idiot. “There was no coup because suddenly no one remembered the King and Queen—or that there ever was a King and Queen—or nine princesses, or the rest of their people, or a hidden door between worlds. It was as if they’d forgotten everything but the Council!” Her voice hinted at old frustrations and anger. “And, worse than having forgotten, they could not remember. They could not be convinced that the King and Queen had ever existed. I could not convince the Bailiwick of his function, I could not find anyone who remembered the royal family or that there were thousands of our people sequestered somewhere else, in secret. Worst of all, if the traitor had forgotten about it as well, the crime would be wiped as clean as their memory—the conflict was neatly ended.” She glared at Joy with her startling eyes. “I could not risk anyone finding out that I still retained my memories, in case the traitor was still out there.” She looked at her mother. “I am her only eyes and ears outside of this alcove, out in the world. We have been searching for this traitor since before the Dark Ages. The crime itself has been long forgotten, we have no allies and the trail is cold.” Inq stepped closer to Joy. “Now you understand why I cannot risk being silenced or made obsolete or killed for making mistakes.” Her voice was a whisper. “She depends on me.”