And while Pie is a very powerful… whatever she is, she is not mean. Or spiteful. Or… well, anything other than cute, to be honest. So no one takes this threat seriously.
Still, it’s my role as her man to reassure her. So I put my arm around her and pull her close. “He’ll be fine, I promise. But we need your help, Pie. You don’t understand what’s really going on in Tarq’s world. But once you do, you’ll agree with me.”
We all—me, Tarq, Pie, and the monsters—go into the cathedral and up to the upper great hall, which is now the monster dining room. We sit. Tarq talks. Everyone listens.
And by the time he’s done, even Pie has to admit, she must help him.
She slinks back into her chair and closes her eyes. Like she’s tired.
I get it. This place, and the magic, and the curse, and the debt—it’s a lot. And now we want her to save a whole bunch of wood-nymph strangers who literally live in another world.
Finally, after several minutes of anxious silence, Pie lifts her eyes to meet mine. “I don’t know if I’m even capable of doing this, Pell.”
I look around the table at the monsters and Tarq. “Can you give us a moment?”
They all push their chairs back and wander away. Not out of the hall, but far enough away to give us the illusion of privacy.
I turn in my chair towards Pie, then grab hers and pull her as close to me as I possibly can. I take her hands. Look her in the eyes. “Pie, you are the most powerful person in this room. You have skills we don’t even understand yet. But you and I both know that you can do this. You can make up a spelling, take us through a door that leads to the palace, and then bring us back. That’s all this is.”
“That’s it? That’s all I have to do? Just open and close doors?”
“That’s it.”
She sighs. “Fine.”
And just as she says that, Tarq calls out, “Hey. What is this?” We both look in his direction. He’s standing in front of the apothecary looking up at the words over the doorway. “‘A horn, a hoof, an eye, a bone. A man, a girl, a place of stone. They fight, they fall, they rise again. A brand-new dawn, a new domain.’” Tarq turns to look at us.
Pie and I get up and walk over to him. “It’s the curse,” Pie says.
And even though before this moment I didn’t realize that. It suddenly makes so much sense. “Holy fuck,” I say. Turning to look at Pie. “It is, isn’t it?”
She nods. “Yeah. I only just figured it out myself. The curse is a spelling. And it changes. I don’t know how, or why. But it’s definitely the curse.”
“Huh,” Tarq says. And he’s in a little bit of a daze. But then he snaps out of it. “OK. So? We’re on the same page now? We’re going to go save my woman?”
“And the girls!” Pie snaps.
“Yes,” Tarq snaps back. “All of them.” But then he mumbles, “But most importantly, my woman.”
“Fine,” Pie says. “But do we have to do it tonight? So much has happened and—”
“Yes,” Tarq barks. “Tonight. They are all at the palace for the Fireday gala. They will not all be in the same room for another week and there is no way in hell I can keep you secret from the queen for one more hour, let alone one more week.”
I take a softer approach. “Pie, it really does have to be tonight. But look at it this way. In a few hours, it will be over. And your debt to Tarq will be cancelled. Plus, he gave me the book. We have the source code now. We can do all the magic we want. And we end this curse for good.”
Pie perks up. “You have the whole book?”
I nod. “It’s in my tomb, safe and sound with all the rings.”
Then she looks at Tarq. “And my debt to you is cleared?”
Tarq nods. “After this one favor, it is.”
Pie blows out a breath, which makes her hair fly up over her face. “All right. Where do I need to take us?”
Tarq describes the palace and the harem room. But we decide not to enter directly into the harem room. Instead, we will come out in one of the kitchens, where his allies are waiting and keeping it secure.
“OK,” Pie says. “Give me a moment to come up with the right words.” She paces in the grand hall, back and forth for several minutes, kinda mumbling to herself. Then she looks over at us and nods. “I’ve got it.”