"I suppose we should all get some rest," said Howard.
"Is that safe?" asked Gregor.
No one answered. Their status in Regalia was foggy. Nerissa had cleared them, but Gregor had a feeling plenty of people still thought they were guilty.
"I have a large chamber that would accommodate us. It is reserved for my family at all times," said Howard. "At least we know we are safe with one another."
They all followed Howard back to his room. Gregor was glad he had offered. He didn't want to go back to the room he had always shared with Boots here.
"Where's your family?" asked Gregor.
"They returned to the Fount a few days after we left. I expect they are trying to travel here now, as I am...as I was on trial for treason," said Howard.
Howard's family actually had several chambers reserved for them. It was like a small apartment of connecting rooms. But they all gathered to sleep in one that the kids shared. Howard and Gregor took beds next to each other. Ares and Andromeda huddled together in the space between them.
"To sleep, then," said Howard.
The bats dropped off almost instantly. Howard tossed and turned awhile, but then Gregor could hear his breathing slow down and become rhythmic. He lay in bed wishing sleep would carry him away. But it wouldn't come.
What would happen now? He guessed he would be allowed to go home. Probably pretty soon. Then there would be his family to face. And life without Boots. It still wasn't quite real. It would be, when he was back in the apartment, looking at her bed, her toys, her cardboard box of books.
Gregor thought of her clothes sitting in the museum. He didn't want to leave them here for people to poke through. He grabbed a torch off the wall and left Howard's room.
A few guards saw him along the way, but no one tried to stop him. Nor did they greet him or say anything. He had the feeling they didn't know how they were supposed to treat him, so they left him alone.
He found the museum on his own. There, by the door, was the little pile of Boots's clothes. He pressed her shirt against his nose and could smell that sweet combination of shampoo and peanut butter and baby that was his sister. For the first time, his eyes welled up with tears.
"Gregor?" said a voice behind him.
He stuffed the shirt in the pack and wiped his eyes as Vikus came into the museum.
"Hey, Vikus," he said. "What's up?"
"The council has just adjourned what I believe to be the first of many meetings addressing 'The Prophecy of Bane.' I am convinced Nerissa's interpretation is correct, but there is dissension. This is to be expected, as it is a new idea. But until it is decided, her word stands. As that could change, I think it best if you leave here as soon as possible."
"Fine by me," said Gregor. "What about the others?"
"I believe charges will not be reinstated against Andromeda and Howard. Your testimony of their innocence was quite convincing," said Vikus.
"And Ares?" said Gregor.
Vikus sighed. "He is at greater risk. But if he is to be charged again, I will get word to him so that he may flee. He can at least escape execution."
Gregor nodded. That was about as much as he could hope for.
"Is there anything you would like to take back with you?" Vikus asked, gesturing to the shelves.
"I don't want anything but our stuff," said Gregor.
"If not for yourself, perhaps for your parents," said Vikus. "How does your father...does he teach again?"
"No, he's still too sick," said Gregor.
"How so?" Vikus asked, frowning.
Gregor choked out a list of his dad's symptoms. His father's health was just one more thing the Underland had stolen from them.
Vikus tried to question him in more detail, but he couldn't take it. "You know, maybe I will take that clock," he said, pointing to the cuckoo clock he had seen when he was collecting batteries. He had said it to change the subject, but he knew someone who might like it.
"I will have it wrapped for you," said Vikus.
"Great, so I guess I'll see if Ares is up for flying yet, and like you said, get out of here," said Gregor. He scooped up his clothes and left the museum. Vikus could learn a thing or two from Nerissa. Sometimes people just didn't want to talk.
He got all turned around on his way back to Howard's room. The route was unfamiliar, and the tears that had started back in the museum were streaming down his cheeks. Well, maybe it was better to break down here than in front of his parents. He turned left, then right, then backtracked. Where was he? Where was his sister? She had just been here, he had her clothes, he could feel her in his arms...Boots!
He gave up and pressed his forehead into a stone wall, sobbing as he let the pain in. Images of her swarmed back into his mind. Boots on the sled...Boots showing him how she could hop on one foot...Boots's eyes, upside down, their foreheads pressed together....
Two rows Tiny, tiny toes
Boots ten ...wiggle my nose Whew!
He could even hear her voice trying to do the silly bath rhyme Howard had coaxed her out of her tears with.
Wiggle nose Nine, ten toes
She couldn't get it right. The words were too complicated....
Give them bath so ten toes goes.
And then she gave a sneeze.
Gregor looked up. That didn't make sense. He heard a second sneeze. Not in his head. In the palace. He started to run.
Two rows Tiny, tiny toes
Either he was completely losing it...
Boots ten ...wiggle my nose Whew!
...or that sound was real! He flew down the halls, crashing into walls and a couple of guards who called for him to halt. He didn't.
Wiggle nose Nine, ten toes
Gregor ran into the room just in time for the last line.
Give them bath so ten toes goes.
She was sitting on the floor, surrounded by six big cockxoaches, rubbing her toes with both hands to show how she washed them. He stumbled across the room and grabbed her up in his arms and held on tight as a happy voice squeaked in his ear. "Hi, you!"
CHAPTER 27
"Hi, you," Gregor said, thinking he would never let go of her. "Oh, hi, you! Where've you been, little girl?"
"I go swim, I go ride. Flutterfly," said Boots.
"Okay, all right," laughed Gregor. "That sounds great." He'd have to ask the others what happened. "Hey, Temp," he said, turning to the roaches, and then he realized something was wrong. Before him stood six roaches with two perfect antennas each and six solid legs. Maybe he was finally learning to tell them apart, because he knew, anyway, that none of them was Temp.
"Where's Temp?" he asked, and six pairs of antennas drooped.
"We do not know, not we," said one of the roaches. "I be Pend, I be." Gregor turned in a full circle, just to be sure. It was the room where you could ride the platform down to the ground. Temp wasn't there. Neither were Luxa and Aurora. He tightened his grip on Boots.
About this time, Vikus came hurrying into the room, followed by several guards. His face lit up when he saw Boots. "They have returned!" he said to Gregor.
"Just Boots, Vikus. I'm sorry," Gregor said, and watched the color drain out of the old man's face.
Vikus turned to the roaches. "Welcome, Pend. Many thanks for the return of the princess. Tell us, will you, tell us the fate of the others?"
Pend tried to fill him in, but the roaches knew very little. A moth — that must have been Boots's flutterfly — had arrived in their land carrying Boots. It had been flying in the Dead Land when it had discovered the little girl and Temp hiding in the rocks. Temp was very weak and unable to travel farther. He begged the moth to take Boots back to the other crawlers. Since the moths and cockroaches were allies, the moth had agreed. When the crawlers sent a party back to rescue Temp, he was nowhere to be found.