Slowly, the pool began to quiver. Oh, please! September thought desperately. A fuzzy, warped image flickered on the surface of the water, like a broken movie reel. September watched a small version of the iron gate coalesce, with two small lions on either side. They were not really blue, but sort of green and wriggly, like mold. A tiny green something walked up to the lions. Behind the tiny green something floated an even tinier round light, like a Will-o’-the-wisp. September turned her head to one side, trying to see what was happening in the tide pool. The tiny green somethings, which were surely herself and Gleam, walked boldly up to the gate. Herself took something out of her coat and held it up high. After a moment, the lions lay down before the tiny green September and put their paws over their eyes.
The Wrench, September thought. They recognize the Wrench! Of course, they do: It’s Queen Mallow’s sword! They must still be bound by some feline fealty to it, even if she is gone.
Just then, Gleam came spiraling back down the rain-slick towers. She tucked in behind the boulders and kept her golden letters dampened and dim.
Your friends are in the highest cell.
I think the red one is sick.
“Oh, Ell! I’m coming!” September whispered.
Together, September and Gleam approached the gate. September tried to be as bold as the little green version of herself in the tide pool. But of course, tide-pool girls don’t sweat and breathe very fast and worry about their Wyveraries. The lions were ever so much bigger than she remembered. A line of silver light shone under their furry blue eyelids. September wondered if they were always on the verge of waking if they ever did wake, and if, perhaps, they were kind and dear when they did, and not vicious at all. She held up the copper Wrench, and it flashed in the lightning-shadows. The waiting was horrible-September winced, prepared for the blow of a great paw. But they lay down gently, the left one first, then the right. They put their paws over their eyes.
September ran at the door and hauled it open, her bare feet slipping in the rain. She slipped inside, and Gleam behind her, chased by three thunderclaps, all in a row: crash, boom, crack.
Warm firelight turned the Lonely Gaol cheerful and ruddy. A great white hearth crackled and snapped with fresh logs. Filigree silver torches shone on the walls. A long, rich rug of every possible color swept over the grand floor. The lumpy glass walls showed the storm still raging outside, but instead of a terror, it had the effect of a beautiful painting hung in a fine hall. The boiling clouds were quiet and brilliant, blue and violet and pale gold all bleeding into one another. Rain spattered the buttresses and left sparkling drops like cast-off diamonds. A few stars even peeked through the ceiling, their light filtering down through many thin, spiral staircases.
A door at the far end of the hall burst open. September started and steeled herself to fight if she had to. All that mattered was getting up the staircase and finding Saturday and Ell, whoever she had to go through to do it.
A peal of delighted laughter echoed through the glass room, and a little girl in a frilly white dress ran full tilt across the many-colored rug, her golden curls bouncing. She embraced September like a long-lost sister, still laughing and exclaiming with joy.
“Oh, September, you’re safe! I’m so happy you’ve come, finally, and not a scratch on you!” The Marquess pulled away and cupped September’s face in her hands. “What fun we are going to have!” she exclaimed.
“Fun?” September cried, still dripping, sopping wet. “Fun? You stole my friends and set the Tsukumogami after me! I broke my leg, and I almost died, and I almost froze in the storm! And you cheated! I could have gotten the Wrench back to you in seven days and none of this would have happened! And now Ell is sick and he needs me and this is fun?”
September could not help it. Before she even knew she had done it, she slapped the Marquess across the face. But the Marquess’s hair flushed pale blue, and she just laughed again. She used her laugh like a little knife. September’s handprint flushed on her face.
“Of course I cheated. Why wouldn’t I cheat? If I hadn’t cheated, you would have brought me the sword like a good little questing knight, and it would have been of no use to me whatsoever. I can’t touch the ridiculous thing. I needed you. Here, in this place, with your loyal blade at your side.”
“Then why tell all that furniture to kill me?”
The Marquess cocked her head to one side. Her black hat bobbed merrily.
“September, I had to make it look real. Otherwise, you would have suspected that you were doing my work all along. Oh, just everyone has told you what a wicked beast I am-you’re quite biased against me. And more importantly, you had to see how dangerous Fairyland can be. How quickly these darling little creatures with their funny habits can turn on you and destroy you. Otherwise, you might not do my work. I am not really wicked at all. They are nasty and cruel. But I can be so terribly kind, September.”
September looked into the Marquess’s shining blue eyes. “But I would have. To save my friends. I would have done whatever you asked.”
“No,” answered the Marquess ruefully. “Not this. Not even to save them. Believe me, September, I have thought on these matters a great deal. I have made calculations that would beggar your soul. What is it that villains always say at the end of stories? ‘You and I are more alike than you think.’ Well”-the Marquess took September’s hand in hers and very gently kissed it-“we are. Oh, how alike we are! I feel very warmly toward you, and I only want to protect you, as I wish someone had protected me. Come, September, look out the window with me. It’s not a difficult thing. A show of faith, let’s call it.”
September allowed herself to be led to one of the sheer crystal walls. Gleam followed silently, flashing with anxiety. Below them, the sea crashed away, sending up spray and spume. The Marquess held up her hand-and the sea calmed, drew aside, all in a moment. The sky cleared in a widening circle, like an iris. Stars beamed through-and half a moon. And where the sea had been were huge stone shapes in the water, turning at a creeping pace. Click. The shapes had wide square teeth like gears. Gears of ancient stone, enormous and inexorable. Click. They turned against one another. Click.
“What are they?” September asked.
“The Gears of the World. We are within the secret heart of Fairyland, September. The current that moves through the sea begins and ends here. And more than that-so much more.”
The Marquess raised her hand again, and the sea drew farther away. September watched as the stone gears ground into something else-iron gears, more deliberately made, sharper.
“This is the place where your world joins ours. Where the human world touches Fairyland, just for a moment. This place is all that allows folk to travel-only occasionally and by strange roads-from one place to another. The touch of the iron makes Fairies weaker, so that they cannot storm over your world and subdue it. The stone keeps humans at bay. But some can pass through. Without that brief kiss of iron and stone, the worlds would uncouple and separate entirely. No one would ever get trapped here or in the human world. No child could be stolen and replaced with a goblin, or worse, replaced with nothing and her mother left to mourn. No one would ever get lost.”
“Oh…”