Read Online The Whatnot by Stefan Bachmann - Free Book Online

would ever use.
    â€œYes,” Hettie said, her boldness fading a little. Her hands went to her nightgown, and she looked down, suddenly shy.
    â€œAre you an accomplice to this faery?”
    â€œI— No. But I don’t want you to hurt him. What are you going to do with him?”
    â€œThis faery”—the lady said, waving a hand in the butler’s direction—“has been found guilty of murdering one of His Majesty the Sly King’s most valued servants. He will be put to death, of course. Drowned in a bog, I think.”
    â€œOh,” breathed Hettie.
    â€œAnd you?”
    â€œYes, miss.”
    â€œWho are you?” The lady punctuated the are with one sharply raised eyebrow.
    â€œI’m not anybody.”
    â€œYes, I can see that, but what sort of nobody? You are the strangest-looking faery I’ve ever seen. And no hair, or I’d think you simply a particularly ugly human.”
    Hettie knew better than to tell her she was a changeling. The daughter of a human mother and a faery father. Something in-between. English people didn’t like changelings, but she had always been told faeries liked them even less.
    â€œOh, I am a faery, miss. Only . . . See, I come from England and I’ve lived there my whole life, and—well, I s’pose I picked up a bit of their looks.”
    Twelve pairs of eyes met across her head. There was a long pause in which the frosty air seemed to fill up and become heavy with all sorts of unspoken words and laughter.
    Then the lady in the fish-bone dress let out a high, musical laugh that set everyone else to laughing, too, and the horse-people laughed, and the old woman laughed, and even the silver bells seem to tinkle with their own merry notes.
    â€œShe is so exquisitely funny,” the faery lady said.
    â€œEx- quisitely ,” one of the horse-people mimicked, and that set them all to laughing again.
    The fish-bone lady’s mouth twitched. Her eyes went a little blacker, and her brows seemed to become even sharper. Then she laughed again, too, louder than anyone.
    â€œJohn?” she said, turning to a horse-person with white hair and white skin that glittered as if with frost. “John, let her ride upon you. We shall take her with us.”
    â€œWhat?” The creature named John looked perfectly horrified. “That thing ? On me ?”
    â€œOh, no, I—” Panic gripped Hettie. It wrapped around her throat, made her breath escape in little gasps. “Please, I mustn’t—”
    They were all staring at her, all those black eyes, sparks of amusement in their depths, sparks of malice. She couldn’t go with them . She couldn’t be taken away from these woods, or the cottage. This was where the door had opened and where she had arrived, and this was where Bartholomew would find her when he came for her. But what will he do if I’m not here?
    The thought made her sick.
    â€œPlease, miss,” she said, taking a step toward the faery lady. “Please don’t make me leave.”
    The faery lady did not even look at her. “You must. You will be my Whatnot. Or I will snip out your tongue. Don’t be tiresome.”
    Hettie closed her mouth with a plop.
    â€œNow,” said the faery lady, whirling away. “Vizalia? Send a dispatch to the King. One of his Belusites has been killed. The wrongdoer has been dealt with. Nothing was found. You needn’t say anything of my little bauble.”
    And the next thing Hettie knew, she was on the back of a white horse with hair like wisps of snowy wind. Everything was confusion, stomping hooves and whispering cloaks. Her steed began to gallop, away into the woods. The faery butler. Hettie looked frantically at the other riders. Where is he? He isn’t here! With a little shiver, she glanced back over her shoulder.
    Three figures had stayed behind in front of the cottage. The faery butler was on the ground, kneeling, his