Polly Shulman - The Grimm Legacy

Next we went around behind the fountain, ducking under two torrents this time to the winter side. The stream from the fountain froze into complicated icicles. Shivering, we found witch hazel, winter sweet, and white, waxy bells on an evergreen. None of them disenchanted Doc. The bird didn’t wake up when we hit the crystal ball with a flower and made the ball flash light—it just stirred uneasily on its perch.

“Any luck?” asked Jaya, coming back from the spring sector with her arms full of daffodils and crocuses, tulips, branches of forsythia, and hot-pink azaleas.

I shook my head.

Aaron came back from his search with armloads of summer flowers, which he tossed on the grass beside the globe. He started poking it systematically.

“Roses don’t work,” I told him helpfully.

“Oh. You can have this one, then.” He thrust the rose he’d been hitting the crystal ball with under my nose and wiggled it.

“Stop it! That tickles!” I said, shaking my head to get away.

He went on wiggling the rose. I grabbed his wrist. He twisted it away from me. “Hold still,” he said, and tucked the rose in my hair.

“Thanks,” I said.

“Will you guys quit it with the mushy stuff and concentrate?” said Jaya.

“What mushy stuff?”

“Just test the flowers already.”

None of them worked.

“I guess we better go find more,” said Aaron.

Andre had gone back to playing with the grass near the fountain. “Pretty flower,” he said, waving a minty-looking weed with tiny white blossoms on a tall stalk.

It wasn’t particularly pretty, in fact. I doubt I would have noticed it myself.

“What’ve you got there, Andre?” asked Jaya.

“My turn,” he said. He ran over to the crystal ball and thumped it with the flower upside down in his fist.

The bird gave a loud squawk. The ball burst open like a popped bubble. Drops flew everywhere and sprayed the grass. Doc sprang upward like a spaghetti pot boiling over, regaining full size so fast that I could barely see it happening.

“I popped the ball!” said Andre.

“Well done, young Merritt,” said Doc. “ Circaea lutetiana, yes? Enchanter’s nightshade?”

Andre nodded solemnly.

“Thank you. I was getting very uncomfortable in there.”

“Wow! Way to go, Andre!” I exclaimed. “Welcome back, Doc. Are you okay?”

“Yes, I think so, thank you. You’ve brought the kuduo, I see. Good job! Ah, and there are Anjali and Marc. He makes a great-looking mrammuo, doesn’t he?”

“What’s a mrammuo ?” I asked.

“An Akan brass weight. The Akan people measured their gold by weighing it against mrammuos, brass weights in the shape of men and animals, so naturally one of their princes would take that form. Interesting subject, the gong beater. A symbol of dutiful public service. I wonder if it’s prophetic?”

Something was different about Doc’s face, but I couldn’t figure out what. “How did you get stuck in that bubble?” I asked.

“Someone trapped me.”

“But who?”

“I didn’t see—they came up behind me. One of the librarians, I think. I was in my office.”

“So Mr. Stone was right! He told us not to trust the librarians. He told us not to trust you, ” I said.

“I bet it’s Ms. Minnian,” said Aaron.

“Why,” I said, “because she wears her hair in a bun?”

“Because she never smiles.”

“I would hate to think it was Lucy—or Martha, or any of them,” said Doc. “But I’m afraid it probably is. I imagine Wallace Stone had some hold over whoever it was.”

I stared at Doc’s face. Doc’s freckles! That was what was different—they were gone.

“We’re safe here for the moment,” continued Doc, freckle free. “Let’s deal with Anjali and Marc first.”

“Let me do it,” said Andre. He ran over to the brass figurine and hit it with the enchanter’s nightshade. Nothing happened.

“Good try, Andre, but it’s not that kind of spell,” said Doc.

“Enchanted princes and princesses are a special case.”

“How do we disenchant them?” I asked.

“The customary method is the Kiss of True Love.”

Aaron and I looked at each other. “You better kiss Anjali,” I said.

“If you kiss Marc.”

“Elizabeth! Are you in love with Merritt too?” said Jaya.

“Even though he’s dating my sister?”

“No!” I said. “Anjali’s my friend, and Marc—well, Marc’s a prince. I would never dream . . .”

“Go ahead, kiss him,” said Aaron. “You know you love him. All girls do.”

“You first,” I said.

“Both at once, when I count to three,” said Jaya. “One, two . . .”

I lifted Marc, hot with embarrassment. In spite of being a little brass weight, he looked so much like himself that it felt like one of those dreams where you’re doing something you would never do in real life with someone . . . well, one of those dreams.

“Three!”

I closed my eyes and kissed. The metal was cold on my lips.

I opened my eyes. The brass figurine of Marc hadn’t changed.

Aaron was holding the puppet Anjali. “Did you kiss her?” I asked him.

“You weren’t lying. You really don’t . . . ,” he said.

“Did you kiss Anjali?” I asked again.

“No, not yet.”

“Cheater! What are you waiting for?”

“I was watching you. I wanted to see if—I wanted to know—”

“Go on, Aaron! Kiss my sister already! I want her back,” said Jaya impatiently. “Even though she’s really annoying and bossy,” she added.

Aaron shrugged and lifted the puppet to his lips.

I found I was holding my breath.

He kissed Anjali.

Nothing happened. She stayed a puppet.

I let out my breath slowly. My heart, I discovered, was pounding. Aaron looked at me. I looked away.

“Not just any kiss will work,” Doc said, “only the Kiss of True Love.”

“Great,” I said. Despite myself, I felt my heart soar. Aaron didn’t truly love Anjali after all! “The Kiss of True Love—where are we going to find that ?”

“The Marc Merritt fan club?” suggested Aaron.

“He said the Kiss of True Love, not the Kiss of Puppy Love,” I said.

“What if Andre kisses Marc?” I asked. “He really does love him.”

“That won’t work,” said Aaron. “He already did, and it didn’t. We need the Kiss of True Love, not the Kiss of Brotherly Love.”

“You know who loves Anjali and Merritt? They love each other !” said Jaya. She picked up the two figurines and smushed their faces together. “Mwah, mwah, MWAH!” she shouted.

“Oh, like that’s going to work,” I said, rolling my eyes.

“No, wait—look!” Aaron grabbed my arm.

The air around Anjali and Marc grew thicker, like a fog of diamonds. I felt the rose stir in my hair. A smell of roses filled the air, as if all the roses in the Garden of Seasons had hurried over to watch. Colors swirled in the mist. It intensified, slowly, slowly, until I could hardly stand to look, and just as slowly it dispersed.

There stood Marc and Anjali, full size, holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes. They looked perfectly human—or, at least, as human as a couple in love can look.

“Butter!” Andre threw himself at Marc’s legs. Marc looked down. He didn’t say anything, just opened his arms wide and swept Andre up in a huge hug, grinning his head off. What I felt for Marc might not be true love, but I had to admit he was incredibly handsome, especially with that smile on his face.