“Where’s Fetter?” Astrid shouted with a furious expression as she strained against Teofil’s grip. “What have you done with my brother?”
Isadora sighed. “Growing up with you all these years, I’ve always known you were a little slower than the rest of us, Astrid. But really, this does take the cake.”
“It’s been you all this time,” Teofil said, his voice low and laced with an undercurrent of anger. “All these years, ever since the attack on the village.”
“Oh, the special gardener wins the prize,” Isadora said, taking a step toward them.
Teofil moved in front of them all and put his arms out, shielding Thaddeus, Astrid, and Dulindir.
Isadora stopped and tipped back her head to laugh. Then she fixed him with an icy glare and put her hands on her hips. “Always the noble one, aren’t you? Mum and Dad’s favorite, the one they shipped off to live with that doddering old fool Leopold.” Her lip curled up in a sneer. “I wanted to slit his throat so often over the years. I lay awake some nights devising how I could get away with it, too. But then I realized I’d never find out the secret we all discovered last week. Finally, after so many years, it’s all out in the open.”
“All those years?” Astrid said, her quiet voice full of grief. “All the years we grew up together were a lie?”
“All. Those. Years,” Isadora said slowly, savoring every painful word as she stared at Astrid over Teofil’s shoulder.
“You are the most awful, wicked person I’ve ever met,” Thaddeus said.
“Oh, look who pipes up. The dragon’s child.” Isadora took another step closer, and Teofil matched her with a forward step of his own, keeping himself between them.
“It’s okay,” Thaddeus said as he placed a hand on Teofil’s back. “I’m okay.”
“I don’t trust her,” Teofil said.
“And you shouldn’t,” Dulindir added.
Isadora kept at least twenty feet away, maybe more, but she fixed her cold, hard gaze on Thaddeus. He couldn’t have moved if he wanted to. “I tried to kill you back on that fateful day, you know. You were just a baby, and it would have been so easy and so gratifying. But your mother distracted me, and your father ran off with you.” She lifted her chin and looked at the others quickly before pinning him in place again. “If it weren’t for the rest of them, and the fact that I needed this well water to change back to my true form, I would have killed you out here in the forest. Nice and slow.”
“Stay back,” Teofil said with a growl.
“I could still do it,” Isadora said as if Teofil hadn’t spoken, continuing to hold Thaddeus. His heart pounded, but he couldn’t look away. “But it would ruin all the fun of having you watch me control your mother and command her to blast you with fire. Then I’ll listen to you scream while your skin turns black and crisp and your organs boil inside you, and you’ll die knowing it was good ol’ mummy who burned you alive.”
“How could you…” Astrid asked in a quiet voice. “When?”
Isadora turned her attention to Astrid, and Thaddeus felt a shiver of relief from her cold, black eyes.
“That day in the village, those who resisted put up a greater fight than expected. After I’d dealt with Claire, I was cornered by them, trapped with Azzo Eberhard while the villagers searched for us. I knew I needed a way out.” She looked between Teofil and Astrid, a small, wicked smile curling her lip. “Your brother happened by on the path, carrying you, Teofil. Just a wee baby yourself.”
Thaddeus glanced at Teofil and saw, even beneath his beard, the flex of his jaw muscles as he ground his teeth.
“Azzo saw Fetter running along a path and grabbed him. We thought we could use him as a hostage or something. But then I had a better idea. I assumed Fetter’s appearance, and Azzo hid him. I picked up Teofil again—I was tempted to leave you in the woods, but figured it was best to look like a responsible brother—and I met up with Mum and Dad and they took me home, none the wiser.” She laughed, then shook her head and made a disgusted face.
“And there I lived all the years since, like a damn garden gnome. Eating Miriam’s terrible food, dealing with Rudyard’s ridiculous house rules. And living underground. Why do gnomes have to live underground? And don’t get me started on the songs. Ugh!” She shuddered.
“But it was the perfect place to lay in wait. I learned so much about those who resisted, and I passed that on to Azzo when I could. But in all that time, I never learned where you and your father had escaped to, Thaddeus.” She fixed him with her hard stare once again.
“I didn’t think my spell had killed your mother, and I wanted to learn her fate. But no one was talking, at least not right away. So, I decided to remain in hiding as a gnome and see what I could learn.” She sighed and shook her head. “Unfortunately, the spell dug in deeper as the years went by. Before I realized it, I became stuck in his form.” She sneered and ran her fingers through her hair. “Living among you, smelling you, eating your slop, listening to your banal conversations, it nearly pushed me over the edge.”
“That’s why you could never grow a garden,” Astrid said. “You weren’t a true gnome.”
Isadora glared at her. “I was gnome enough to share a room with you all that time, and you never suspected a thing. I think I did all right.”
“Where’s Fetter?” Teofil asked. “Where have you been keeping him all these years?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know?” Isadora said. “I wondered sometimes if everything I was living through would be worth it in the end. But when I saw the magnificent beast Claire had become, I knew I would get my just rewards.” She smiled at Thaddeus. “And finally end the Cane bloodline once and for all.”
“Enough!” Dulindir shouted. “Stand back, you evil witch.”
Isadora frowned at Dulindir. “Or what? You’ll do some elf magic and hex me? You know I can deflect whatever you throw at me.”
“Oh yeah?” Astrid said. She had stepped back behind them and now swung her slingshot high over her head. “Can you dodge this?”
The stone Astrid released hit Isadora square in the forehead. She cried out and put a hand to the wound as she stumbled back. Blood trickled down her face and into her eyes, blinding her.
“You evil little troll!” Isadora shouted, wiping the blood away. “I’ll skin you alive for that!”
“I’m a gnome,” Astrid shot back as she seated another stone in the slingshot. “I would have thought after living with us for so many years you would have figured that out. Talk about being slow.”
The second shot glanced off Isadora’s temple, spinning her around. She fell to the ground with a cry.
“Get her!” Teofil shouted, drawing his sword.
Before any of them could advance, however, something big crashed through the undergrowth into the clearing. It had the build and body of a bear, but the nose and jaws of a wolf. A long, scale-covered tail with small spikes along its length snapped back and forth behind it as the beast snarled and roared, shaking its big, furry head.
“The Bearagon!” Thaddeus shouted, terror running through him like ice. “Look out!”