The Girl Who Soared Over Fairyland and Cut the Moon in Two, Page 6

  “They look awfully like you,” September said, and not without disapproval. One of the Blue Wind was quite enough.

  The Blue Wind rolled her dark eyes. “I told you, this is the Blue Market. We’re all Winds here. Surely you saw them rushing about when old Greeny threw you over the world like a baseball. Or was he too busy dazzling you with poetry and nicknames? The world is too big for one Wind or six—there’s scads of us. One big, terrible, unreliable, tantrumy family. The Blues, well, he’ll have told you. We’re the cousins they don’t set a place for at holidays. Sneaks and dastards. Freaks and desperadoes. Bitter, freezing, furious gales. Think on the coldest day you can remember, when the icicles hung off your roof like snaggle-teeth, when you took one step outside—and the wind stole your breath. That’s me, that’s us, that’s our nature and our nurture. Can’t help how you’re made. Here’s where we ply and sell, where all the things we’ve stolen away end up. It’s the only place we can swindle fair and square. It’s too easy elsewise. Your lot thinks you’ve got hold of the right end of a deal if you get what you want at a fair price. That’s how we spell losing out. How much better to get what someone else wants and cozen them so sweet they pay you to take it! It’s a game, a sport, a contest—and the prize ribbons are all blue. And you just can’t play at our level.”

  “I can haggle just fine. I had the better of a Goblin in her own Market.” September crossed her arms with pride.

  The Blue Wind looked pityingly at her. “First off, the littlest lick of a Wind can get the better of a Goblin while sleeping in on a Wednesday. Secondarily, I’d bet you haven’t. The best cheats and chicaneries won’t drop you on your head until they’re good and ready and rested and ravenous. But go on ahead. Buy your little car. It’ll be precious. The going price is two hurricanes, a nor’easter, and a thundersquall.”

  “I haven’t got any of those!”

  “Wouldn’t be much fun if you did.”

  September looked helplessly as the Blue Winds started hollering at one another over the Model A. She heard cyclones tossed into the pot, then an ice storm. I can’t buy it, she thought, her mind racing to logic it out. I can’t steal it with all of them standing about like that. They certainly won’t give it to me…

  September smiled sweetly. It is easy to be sweet when you have figured out something to your advantage. “But you can’t sell it to just anyone. It’s a Tool and Tools Have Rights. Whatever that means.”

  The Blue Wind scowled. “It means you ought to stop saying it. It has a name.”

  “Oh, it does not! I’ve known it for ages, and if it has a name it’s Model A Ford and that’s the beginning and end of it.” September was quite tired of being told how a human car from the human world worked. She might not know much about Fairyland or Lines or magic or even money, but she knew about this.

  One of the other Blue Winds stared at her as though she had just said the sun was called Robert.

  “She’s called Aroostook,” the other Wind said. She pointed a long, indigo finger at the spare wheel’s burlap cover and the Aroostook Potato Company’s potato-flower logo. “Can’t you read?”

  “Of course I can read!”

  The Blue Wind picked at something on the furry hem of her rich sleeve. “You humans treat your Tools very shabbily. It’s not stealing at all so much as liberating. The Old Crab says: Use a Tool as you would use your own heart. Ask its leave, hold it gentle, keep it scrubbed, and put it away nice when you’re done.”

  “It’s not a tool, anyway; it’s a machine,” grumbled September. “It came off an assembly line at the Ford factory with hundreds of others just like it.”

  “Oh, and I suppose you weren’t born in a building with hundreds of others who look just like you?” a short, squat Blue Wind snapped, his beard as thick as ice cream.

  “That’s different!”

  “Only because you’re squishy and ugly and useless and it’s fiery and shiny and useful!”

  A little Blue Wind, hardly more than a child, his big blue eyes full of silver flecks, took pity on September.

  “It’s on account of the Pitchfork,” he piped up. “Happened in Parthalia, where the oyster-trees grow and the rum rivers flow black and deep and the Giants pummel their mountains into cities. A Giant’s pitchfork—more like a trident, the size of a cedar—woke up.”

  “Was it a hundred years old?” asked September, who recalled her friend Gleam, a Tsukumogami—a lovely festival lamp who came alive on her hundredth birthday.

  “Well, yes, but it didn’t hop up and talk and walk and complain about the state of modern literature. What I mean is a different sort of waking altogether. It didn’t stand up and run off to seek its fortune. It didn’t join the Giants’ country dances. It didn’t even move to a sunnier part of the barn. One day the Pitchfork just wouldn’t work. If Cundrie Cattail went to stick it in her hay, the prongs just bent aside and went dull. Once she let it be they sprang back into shape again. Cundrie wrestled with it all morning and into the evening but there was nothing for it. The Pitchfork would not pitchfork. Well, things in Parthalia go funny-side up sometimes. But by spring it had spread to her hairbrush—and a Giant’s hairbrush is as good as a Knight’s mace to anyone else. One evening it just sucked all its bristles up into its back and wouldn’t have a thing to do with Cundrie’s long mossy hair.”

  “I don’t know if that’s what I’d call waking up exactly—”

  But the little Blue Wind did not let her finish. “It’s saying no. That’s your first hint that something’s alive. It says no. That’s how you know a baby is starting to turn into a person. They run around saying no all day, throwing their aliveness at everything to see what it’ll stick to. You can’t say no if you don’t have desires and opinions and wants of your own. You wouldn’t even want to. No is the heart of thinking. The news went faster than a trade wind: In Parthalia, a Pitchfork said no. In the country of the Giants, a Hairbrush declined. When the Old Crab heard it heralded, he locked himself up in his Thinking Foundry for days and days. When he came out, he had built a new law. It still glowed red-hot in his royal tongs. Tools Have Rights, it said, and he hung it up on the wall of the Hue-and-Cry, which is what he calls the new Parliament most days.” A canny smile crossed his cerulean lips. “You can say what you like; machines are how humans do magic. They’re Tools as sure as I’m Blue. And the law says if you can’t deal fair with them, we have a moral duty to set them galloping. And just look at that poor thing. Hasn’t seen fair since the factory. Our cousin did a noble deed by liberating her. Don’t worry, one of us will continue her education—can a Tool say anything else or is no the limit of their notionals? All of Fairyland wishes to know.”

  September heard suddenly in her heart every sputter of the engine and backfire of the exhaust, every stubborn lever and screech of protest from the brakes, every broken part or sprung leak. Were those no’s she hadn’t even known how to hear? No, no, whatever the Pitchfork said, this was not a Fairy car, it was not magic, it was not alive, it was Mr. Albert’s second-best automobile and that was all. But those growls and snarls and wheezes and clutches and chokes would not stop echoing in her heart.

  “If all that’s true,” she said, “then it…then Aroostook knows I have taken good care of her over his years. My mother and I patched her tires and kept her fluids fresh and when she looked near to…to death, we made her well again. If you ask her, I am quite sure she would rather be with me than with any number of blue-in-the-face fellows who don’t know a gearshift from a grape.”

  “Too late!” wailed a tall Wind with a splendid plum-colored miter on his head. September’s own Blue Wind had slipped off and was now clapping him merrily on the back. “Two hurricanes, a nor’easter, a thundersquall, an ice storm in Perth, and a cyclone in Brooklyn. On the barrelhead, spit in hand, stamped and damped and done and deeded!”

  The tall Wind hopped up, turned a nimble flip in the air, and landed neatly in the driver’s seat. He looked flummoxed at the levers and pedals, pull
ing and pushing in a madcap whirl of blue hands and groaning metal. The Wind seemed to think just this was wonderfully exciting and well worth the price. September hid a smile with her hand—but she also winced, for she could hear the poor engine chewing on itself as the Wind mishandled all its parts. Finally, finally, he pushed the button and turned the key.

  Aroostook the Model A said no.

  Or at least she gave a loud splatting cough and refused to start.

  The little Wind who had explained about the Pitchfork darted away and leapt into the air, floating like a hummingbird, battering the tall Wind about the blue ears with his blue fists until he spilled out of the automobile.

  “If you can’t manage it, let a better bluster have a go!”

  The little Wind was not so rough; he moved gracefully and September only shuddered a little when she heard an awful whine as he forced the throttle lever all the way down instead of just the easiest bit. He gave the throng of Winds a triumphant azure smile and an even more triumphant, even more azure whoop. He turned the key.

  Aroostook the Model A said no.

  Or at least she gave an unhappy squeal that ended in a flabby sputter of smoke.

  September could bear it no longer. She stomped over, opened the driver’s door, and would have hauled the little Wind out by the lapel of his long-coat if he had not simply wafted up out of the seat, crossing his legs in the air to watch her attempt what by now was clearly impossible. The Winds had begun to drift off, looking for something more interesting and less stubborn. September dug the driving goggles out of the glove box and pulled them on. She closed her eyes behind them for a moment. She pushed in the brake. One eye, then the other. Then see what you see and face up to it. She opened her eyes and turned on the gas valve. She pushed the spark lever all the way up. It’s fire that makes a car go, my love, fire and fuel. She put the throttle smartly at four o’clock. Hardly breathing—would it work for her? Was it alive? Was this all a lot of silliness and you really couldn’t expect a Wind to know a thing about cars anyway? She turned the valve one full turn closed, then one full turn open and put the gear in neutral. Key to ON. Carburetor rod all the way back—and then let go. September waited for the engine to turn over, not daring to make a sound of her own.

  Aroostook the Model A said yes.

  Or at least she erupted into sound and life and the blast of exhaust blew several lingering Winds fluttering into the sky like autumn leaves. The engine quieted into a grudging idle.

  The Blue Wind, her Kaiser-hat glinting in the magenta starlight, looked down at her with a fuming frown pulling at her face.

  “Tools Have Rights,” said September brightly, though her body vibrated with relief. She could hide it. She was learning to hide it. To show a different girl on the outside than the girl she was on the inside. “You can’t have him back now, she’s made her preference quite plain.”

  But had she? September had known how to drive a Model A, that was all. It was nothing special. It wasn’t magic, and it wasn’t alive. She pressed on. “Now, I’m a licensed Criminal, but do you have a charter that says you can thump me one and break dear old Charlie’s new law across your knee? I don’t think you do. You seemed very attached to it a moment ago.”

  The Blue Wind colored with fury. A white flush like frost forked over her face. September looked the Wind in the eye and pointed at her blazing cheeks.

  “She who blushes first loses,” she said evenly. “I win and that’s the match.” September made her gaze hard and put her hands on the steering wheel. “Now get in.”

  CHAPTER VI

  EVERYTHING YOU HAVE

  In Which September Loses Her Savings but Acquires Unusual Cargo, and, at Long Last, Hits the Gas and Lights Out for Fairyland, Whereupon She Is Alarmed by a Flower, Abandoned by a Wind, and Awed by the View from the Top of the World

  The Blue Wind’s mouth twisted into a sneer—but then it untwisted, and unwound, and unfolded into a secret little smile. She walked around Aroostook’s rumbling front end and climbed into the passenger seat just as a person might who expected a nice Sunday drive. September’s heart banged and guttered all around her insides. Being stern was like being underwater—she could do it, but never for long, and how her whole body burned to come up for breath!

  The Blue Wind put her hand out the window and crooked a finger. In half a sigh, the Wind who’d tried to sell them the planets in his coat appeared at September’s side.

  “Now, miss. Now you’ll be wanting your Way,” he said firmly, soft and clear.

  He opened his coat again and the mingled light of the planets poured out its rainbows. On the other side of the coat hung little books with silvery purple papers in them—magic ration books! But surely there was no need for them any longer.

  “Collectibles, miss. Vintage. But that’s not your speed at all. You came to the Way Station. You need a Way.”

  “But I haven’t lost my Way—I’m only beginning! I lost it once, but that was on purpose.”

  “You haven’t met your Way yet. It hasn’t so much as kissed your hand. You haven’t even knocked at the door of the hall where your Way dances. But look here, look see, I’ve got them, I’ve caught them up just for you, a big bouquet of anywhere you want to go. Just pick a bloom, my girl, hold it to your pretty nose.”

  “I want to go to Fairyland.”

  The Blue Wind tapped the dashboard impatiently. “She’s very stubborn on that point, brother. Dense as a foot, this one. Personally, I detest Fairyland. Something is always brewing there, some frantic task that simply must be done, some despot who cannot be borne another moment, some bauble that demands fetching. It’s exhausting! Wouldn’t you rather have a nice race across Antarctica instead? Or a Grand Tour of the Gulf Stream? We could skip stones across the North Pole. Besides, no one ever asks me to go running off on a grand adventure. No one ever says: Blue, darling, wouldn’t you like to go away to Fairyland and skate on the clouds there? One does like to be asked.”

  But the squat Wind had already plucked a silvery, iridescent moon from his coat, a crescent hanging from a fine chain. Ruby starlight caught in its horns.

  “Fairyland’s on special tonight, as it happens,” he purred. “So cheap my little baby typhoons in Tokyo will have to go hungry. A bargain fit for a beggar.”

  “How much?” ventured September.

  The Wind smiled. His woolly, frozen eyebrows waggled. “Tonight only, my Midnight, Blue-Light, You-Heard-It-Right, Close-Out deal: All it costs is Everything You Have.”

  September looked down at her jar of coins, nestled in her lap. “That’s not a proper price at all. How do you know how much I have? What if all I had was a shoelace and a spare button?”

  The Wind’s smile got deeper and wider and bluer. “The point’s not what it costs; it’s what it costs you. Everything You Have. That’s my price, that’s my prize, that’s my ransom, and that’s my rune. The only price in the world that matters is the one that hurts to pay.” He let the Moon spin on its chain. “You want it; I have it. There’s no duel here. If you had a shoelace and a spare button, that’d be on the tag.”

  September sighed. She had saved it all for this, she supposed, to be able to pay her way respectably. She held her jar, heavy as all the days she’d spent earning it. She was paying with Hours again, she realized, just as she had with the Goblin Glasswort Groof. The coins didn’t mean five or ten or twenty-five cents, they meant time. They meant half a day on the Powell farm or four letters for Mr. Killory or every morning getting rooster scratches on her arm just for trying to feed the Whitestone chickens.

  All money is imaginary.

  September lifted the jar up and handed it over.

  The whispering Wind scoffed. “The rest, too, little holdout. I’m not your fool.”

  September grimaced as she handed over the book of Valkyries and mistletoe and hairy god-legs and her last butterscotch. Being more or less an honest girl, she would have given him the hammer and nails as well, but when she offered them,
the Wind hissed and recoiled, smelling their iron. He rose up into the air in a hurry and, turning slowly upside down, hung the Moon around her rearview mirror. It whirled and glimmered, cool and pale. But the Wind was not finished. He pulled something out of his coat—a huge, long, ornate box, perfectly white, with strange scrimshaw tangled up all over it: horns and crab claws and hearts and ears and stars and flowers and open, grasping hands. It was emphatically locked.

  “What’s this?”

  “I said it would cost you Everything You Have.” The Blue Wind in the passenger seat chuckled gleefully. “Take this to the Whelk of the Moon in Almanack—that’s a city. Ask anyone, they’ll point you. And no peeking.” The Wind waved his fingers at her. “You didn’t really think a jar of small change was all you had, did you? How sad.”

  He closed up his coat and stepped lightly up and away, as if climbing invisible stairs. September looked at her own Blue Wind uncertainly.

  “Well?” she snapped. “On your Way, then. Hoof it, or wheel it, or however your personal phraseology would handle the fantastical notion of getting a move on.”

  September gave Aroostook a little gas. The engine boomed; the rods shivered. The little moon hanging from the rearview began to swell up like a balloon filling with water. It got bigger and bigger, and brighter and brighter, and more and more silver, and the engine boomed again and again, each boom shaking September’s bones until she thought they would come apart.

  Then the Model A careened forward and Mercator, suburb of Westerly, slammed shut around them like a door.

  A howl of fine cold powder sprayed up and over the windshield like an ocean wave. It whipped across September’s lips, sharp, vicious—and sweet.

  It was snowing sugar in Fairyland.

  September and the Blue Wind found themselves driving along a high mountain road. Jagged violet peaks shot up into the night, dark silver cliffs dropped dizzyingly away on either side of the path, and if we are honest, the Model A was not designed with such conditions in mind. They shuddered and jiggered and teetered, and the journey would certainly have been cut dramatically short if the car were not somehow, valiantly, driving itself. We may be very grateful for this, as young girls who learn to drive upon the great plains are no more designed for wintry mountain roads than convertible automobiles for snow, and it is in our interest and September’s that novels last longer than their beginnings.