helped herself to another drink and a few bites of bread. Then she sat down cross-legged, put her chin in her hand, and started thinking.
The pain in her wing had eased while she slept, but that didn’t help much. Her metal knife was gone. She was trapped in a box with walls too smooth and high for her to climb. How to escape?
Then an idea came to her, clear and irresistible as a voice calling her true name: The walls of her prison were made of paper.
Knife jumped up, grabbed the drinking bowl by the rim, and tipped it over. Water gushed out, soaking deep into the carpet at her feet. For a few moments she waited, giving it time to seep in. Then she squelched over to the corner of the box, crouched, and began to scratch her way out. The sodden pulp came away easily in her hands, and soon she had clawed a hole large enough to crawl through.
As she clambered out onto the shelf, she could just make out a bar of dim light: the edge of the wardrobe door. Cautiously Knife sidled up to it and gave it a shove. Nothing happened, so she leaned harder. The door flew open, and Knife tumbled out.
It was not a long drop, but the floor was hard. Clutching her bruised elbow, Knife rocked and hissed between her teeth until the pain subsided. When she looked up, the first thing she saw was Paul’s wheeled throne, sitting empty beside the bed. Its steely frame glowed in the moonlight, and she wondered again why Paul, of all his family, should be so honored.
Still, even if he was a king by day, he seemed ordinary enough in sleep: eyes closed, mouth slack. Knife watched him warily, but he did not stir, and at last she tiptoed away.
Hurrying down the corridor to the familiar sitting room, Knife inspected every crack and corner in search of an exit. It was no use. The doors were latched, the lone window closed, and the metal grille in the floor too heavy for her to lift. Heart drumming, she fled through the archway into the kitchen.
Crossing the tiled floor, she studied the glossy face of the oven, the smoothly varnished wood of the cupboard doors. If she could find a way to climb up onto the counter, she might be able to reach the window above the sink. It looked to be slightly open; if she could reach it, it would be easy to slip out.
Knife had not tested her wings since the crow wounded her, but she had to try them now. She would not be able to fly in a straight line, or for any great distance, but Holding her breath, Knife moved her wings slowly backward, then forward again. Her injured forewing felt stiff, and the air sliding across its ragged surface made her stomach lurch. She crouched and tried again, harder this time, repeating the motion until her nausea began to settle. Her wings beat faster and faster, lifting her from the ground.
Little by little she rose toward the counter high above, weaving drunkenly through the air, but flying nonetheless. It was working! Just a few more wingbeats, and she’d be there Intent on her goal, Knife neither saw nor smelled the cat until it leaped out from the shadows and its heavy paw smashed her to the ground.
Eight
Knife writhed away from the cat before it could pin her, but her head reeled from the force of the blow. Instinctively she grabbed for her dagger, only to find it missing. No weapon to fight with, no wings to fly away-what was she going to do?
Shadows rippled along the cat’s body as it paced around her. Knife dropped into a crouch, feinting to one side, then the other. But the cat was not fooled, and its paw lashed out again, flicking her off her feet. Grit seared Knife’s arms and legs as she skidded across the tile.
This was impossible, she thought wildly. How could she not have noticed that the humans had a cat? Unless it was a new arrival, and belonged to “Paul!”
She screamed his name as the cat pounced, batting her between velvet paws. Again she cried out while the cat tossed her up in the air and caught her again, this time in its mouth. Hot breath steamed over her, and the stench of fish made her gag. Near fainting, she gasped Paul’s name a final time and went limp.
“Vermeer!” hissed a voice from behind them, and the cat froze. Cringing, it dropped Knife and slunk away.
Knife lay winded on the tile, watching the ceiling swim in and out of focus. Her wounded wing felt as though it had been dipped in lye, and she could not move for trembling. But her rescuer made no move to touch her, nor did he speak again.
At last Knife’s fluttering heart slowed, and she felt her strength return. The room clouded, lurched sideways, sharpened into focus, and she looked up-so very far up-into Paul’s face.
“I owe you my life,” she said weakly.
“Yes,” said Paul, sounding tired, “you do.” He leaned over in the chair, reaching out to her; Knife pulled herself upright, staggered two steps, and collapsed into the hollow of his hand.
Knife was barely aware of Paul lifting her onto the counter, and the trickle of running water sounded muffled and far away. Only when he began to dab at her bleeding hands did she blink back to awareness, startled.
“Sorry,” said Paul, mistaking her reaction. “Is the water too hot?”
“No,” said Knife, “it’s just…warm.” She touched the washcloth wonderingly. “How did you do that?”
“Magic,” he said. “Or a hot-water heater, whichever you prefer. Here.” He handed her the cloth, and Knife rubbed it cautiously across her face, wincing as soap worked its way into the scratches.
When she had patted and rinsed herself clean, Paul held out his hand to her. The smell of sweat hung heavy around him, and she wrinkled her nose as she stepped onto his palm. Pushing himself about in that throne must be hard work-but why had he bothered taking the time to get into it, when she had needed his help so urgently? Surely he couldn’t be that proud?
“Do you want to go up or down?” said Paul.
“What?” asked Knife.
“I need that hand to steer the chair, so you’d better decide where I should put you. Unless you want to spend the rest of the night here in the kitchen, going in circles.”
“Oh.” Knife looked from his face to his knee and back again. “Then I suppose…down.”
Paul lowered her to the edge of the seat and waited until she settled herself beside him. Then with practiced movements of his hands he pushed the wheeled throne forward, gliding noiselessly around the corner and down the corridor to his room. He half-turned the chair as they entered, easing the door shut; then he rolled up beside the bed, and Knife jumped onto it.
“Why do you-” she started to ask, but Paul interrupted:
“How do you know my name?”
Knife toed the blankets. “Oh. Well. I’ve…heard your parents speak about you. And to you, sometimes.”
“So you live nearby. In the garden? The wood? Or…” He stopped, his eyes narrowing. “I know-you live in the old oak tree.”
Her heart plummeted, but she managed to stay calm. “We live in many places,” she said. “Sometimes we use the Oak as a lookout, but-”
“For a faery, you’re a terrible liar,” said Paul. “What are you afraid of? I’m not planning to chop it down.” His eyes became distant. “I thought I’d just imagined you, that day I climbed the oak tree all those years ago. But when I saw you again in the garden, with that white hair and those black eyes-I knew I hadn’t been dreaming after all.”
Knife sank down onto the mattress and put her head in her hands. So that was it: After centuries of secrecy, the Oakenfolk were no longer safe from humans, and it was her fault. If she had only listened to Wink at the beginning, or at least resisted the temptation to spy on the humans later on, none of this would have happened.
“So what’s your name, then?” asked Paul. “Or am I not supposed to know that either?”
I wish I knew myself, thought Knife unhappily. Without her weapon or her wings, the only name that truly belonged to her was the one she could never speak. Unless, of course, she went back to being Bryony-but no. Not as long as she still had a choice. “My name is Knife,” she said.
Paul looked incredulous. “Knife? As in, a thing to cut with?”
She nodded, and he made a noise halfway between a snort and a chuckle. “Your mother had quite the sense
