House of Many Ways (Howl's Moving Castle 3)

He shuffled away down the damp corridor, beckoning Charmain to follow. Before they even got to the corner, to the place where the stone stairs came down, Charmain could hear the voice of Jamal the cook, saying, “And how is a person to know what to cook when guests are always leaving and not leaving and then leaving again, I ask you!” This was followed by fruity growls from Jamal’s dog and quite a chorus of other voices.

Sophie was standing in the space below the stairs, holding Morgan in her arms, with Twinkle clinging anxiously and angelically to her skirt, while the fat nursemaid stood by looking useless as usual. Princess Hilda stood by the stairs, more intensely royal and polite than Charmain had ever seen her. And the King was there too, red in the face and obviously in a right royal rage. One look at all their faces and Charmain knew that there was no point in mentioning logs here yet. Prince Ludovic was leaning on the end of the banisters, looking amused and superior. His lady was beside him, looking disdainful, in what was very nearly a ball dress, and to Charmain’s dismay, the colorless gentleman was there too, respectfully beside the Prince.

You wouldn’t think he’d just been robbing the King of all his money, the beast! Charmain thought.

“I call this an utter abuse of my daughter’s hospitality!” the King was saying. “You had no right to make promises you don’t intend to keep. If you were one of our subjects, we would forbid you to leave.”

Sophie said, trying to sound dignified, “I do mean to keep my promise, Sire, but you can’t expect me to stay when my child has been threatened. If you’ll let me take him away to safety first, then I’ll be free to do whatever Princess Hilda wants.”

Charmain saw Sophie’s problem. With Prince Ludovic and the colorless gentleman standing there, she dared not say that she was only pretending to leave. And she did have to keep Morgan safe somehow.

The King said angrily, “Don’t give us any more false promises, young woman!”

By Charmain’s feet, Waif suddenly began growling. Behind the King, Prince Ludovic laughed and clicked his fingers. What followed took everyone by surprise. The nursemaid and the Prince’s young lady both burst out of their dresses. The nursemaid became a burly purple person with glistening muscles and bare, clawed feet. The Prince’s lady’s ball dress peeled away to show a thick mauve body in a black leotard that had holes cut in the back to make room for a pair of useless-looking small purple wings. Both lubbockins advanced on Sophie with big purple hands outstretched.

Sophie yelled something and whirled Morgan away from the clutching hands. Morgan yelled too, in surprise and terror. Everything else was drowned out by the high yapping of Waif and immense fruity growls from Jamal’s dog as it charged after the Prince’s lady. Before the dog could get near either lubbockin, the Prince’s lady, little wings whirring, had dived on Twinkle and snatched him up. Twinkle screamed and flailed blue velvet legs. The nursemaid lubbockin put herself in front of Sophie to stop her trying to rescue Twinkle.

“You see,” Prince Ludovic said, “you are leaving, or your child suffers.”

Chapter Sixteen

WHICH IS FULL OF ESCAPES AND DISCOVERIES

“This,” said Princess Hilda, “is an outra—”

She had got this far when Twinkle somehow got away. He twisted out of the lubbockin’s purple arms and went racing away up the stairs, shrieking, “Help! Help! Don’t let them touch me!”

Both lubbockins pushed Princess Hilda aside and charged upstairs after Twinkle. Princess Hilda reeled into the banisters and clung there, red in the face and suddenly far from stately. Charmain found herself racing upstairs after the lubbockins, shouting, “Leave him alone! How dare you!” Afterward, she thought it was the sight of Princess Hilda looking like an ordinary person that did it.

Down below, Sophie hovered a second and then shoved Morgan into the arms of the King. “Keep him safe!” she gasped at the King. Then she hauled her skirts up and raced upstairs after Charmain, shouting, “You just stop that! Do you hear!”

Jamal loyally labored up after them, yelling, “Stop—thief! Stop—thief!” and panting hugely. Behind him clambered his dog, as loyal as its master, uttering huge rasping growls, while Waif ran backward and forward at the bottom of the

stairs making a soprano thunderstorm of barking.

Prince Ludovic hung over the banisters opposite Princess Hilda and laughed at the lot of them.

The two lubbockins caught Twinkle near the top of the flight, in a blur of uselessly fanning wings and shiny mauve muscles. Twinkle surged and kicked mightily. For a moment, his blue velvet legs seemed to be big, strong man-sized legs. One big leg landed hard in the nursemaid lubbockin’s stomach. The other came down on the stairs and braced him while Twinkle’s right fist landed on the second lubbockin’s nose with a meaty man-sized smack. Leaving both lubbockins in a heap on the landing, Twinkle sped nimbly on upward. Charmain saw him look earnestly backward and down as he whirled on to the next flight of stairs, making sure that she and Sophie and Jamal were still following.

They followed, because the two lubbockins picked themselves up with incredible speed and pelted upward after Twinkle. Charmain and Sophie pelted upstairs too, and Jamal and the dog toiled on behind.

Halfway up that next flight, the lubbockins caught Twinkle again. Again there were hefty smacking sounds and Twinkle got loose once more and once more sped upward, into the third flight of stairs. He made it most of the way to the top of those, before the lubbockins reached him and threw themselves on top of him. All three went down into a walloping, writhing heap of legs, arms, and fluttering purple wings.

By this time, Charmain and Sophie were flagging and nearly out of breath. Charmain distinctly saw Twinkle’s angelic face emerge from the tangle of bodies and watch them carefully. When Charmain had toiled across the landing and started on that flight, followed by Sophie, who was clutching a stitch in her side, the bundle of bodies suddenly exploded apart. The purple bodies rolled aside and Twinkle, loose again, went fleeting up the final flight of wooden stairs. By the time the lubbockins had picked themselves up and started after him, Charmain and Sophie were not far behind. Jamal and his dog were a long way in the rear.

Up the wooden stairs they clattered, all the front five. Twinkle was climbing quite slowly now. Charmain was fairly sure this was artistic. But the lubbockins gave shouts of triumph and put on speed.

“Oh no! Not again!” Sophie groaned, as Twinkle banged open the door at the top and shot out onto the roof. The lubbockins shot out after him. When Charmain and Sophie toiled their way up there and stared out through the open door while they tried to get their breaths back, they saw the two lubbockins sitting astride the golden roof. They were about halfway along and looking very much as if they wished they were anywhere else. There was no sign of Twinkle. “Now what is he up to?” Sophie said.

Almost as she said it, Twinkle appeared in the doorway, flushed and laughing angelic laughter, with his golden curls in a windblown halo. “Come and thee what I’ve found!” he said gleefully. “Jutht follow me.”

Sophie clutched her side and pointed out at the roof. “What about those two?” she panted. “Do we just hope they fall off?”

Twinkle grinned enchantingly. “Wait and thee!” He cocked his golden head, listening. Down below, the growling and scrabbling of the cook’s dog was getting louder. It had overtaken its master and was now snarling and clattering its way up the wooden stairs, panting horribly. Twinkle nodded and turned toward the roof. He made a small gesture and muttered a word. The two lubbockins perched out there suddenly shrank, with an unpleasant squelching sound, and became two purplish small flopping things, wagging about on the ridge of the golden roof.

“What—?” said Charmain.

Twinkle’s grin grew, if possible, even more angelic. “Thquid,” he said blissfully. “The cook’th dog will thell itth thoul for thquid.”