Great whoops of laughter burst from them. Master Robbie covered his mouth with his hands. Seeing him laugh that way, as if he could cram the mirth back in, made her laugh harder.
Their shoulders shook. Nothing was funny. A mountain was going to explode. People might die. Even now, His Lordship might be in danger.
But a laughing flower was funny. The muscles in Elodie’s sides hurt.
Finally, the daffodil subsided, exactly the way a person does. It was quiet until a fresh giggle burst out, and then it stopped, and then started again. The bursts became shorter and the intervals longer until it was completely silent. A few moments later it began to shrivel again. Another minute, and it was as they’d found it.
Elodie’s and Master Robbie’s laughter diminished, too, then ceased.
“If it’s touched again, it will start again.”
She wondered if she could make people laugh, too. Although the flower was magical, this seemed a mansioner’s sort of skill. She pushed a bubble of laughter out. Master Robbie smiled. She continued with another bubble.
He chuckled. “Whales and porpoises! You’re as good as the flower.”
She continued, and soon they were both roaring with laughter again. After a minute or two, Elodie, with difficulty, made her laughter die down. Gradually they both stopped.
Soberly, meeting her eyes, Master Robbie said, “Grandmother said I’d find surprising comforts.”
Me? Elodie blushed and wished she could mansion a blush away.
He was blushing, too. “Open another box.”
“Which?”
He pointed.
“Who showed them to you?”
“The high brunka took me and Master Uwald around the Oase the day after we came. I liked this room best.”
The next box was as long as the first and a few inches wider. “Oh!” Inside lay the skeleton of some small creature. Would it come to life, too, if she touched it?
But what did this have to do with the Replica and the danger on Zertrum?
She remembered her masteress telling her not to hurry. If you rush, you will bungle, IT had said.
She would be patient. She touched the skeleton as lightly as she could.
At once it quivered, shivered, trembled, fluttered, became a dazzle of motion that gained bulk, feathers, a beak, claws, and shiny eyes, and finally settled down. A nightingale.
It chirped, then broke into full-throated nightingale song. After a few minutes it stopped and sagged. She touched it again to keep it alive.
When it stopped for the second time and she reached out, Master Robbie caught her hand. “I doubt it’s really alive.”
His fingers were warm. She swallowed hard and nodded, trying to ignore the hand. “Do you think Brunka Harald put a spell on it and the flower?”
“High Brunka Marya didn’t know. She said he brought them with him to Lahnt.”
He let her hand go. “Try that one.”
This box was the biggest of all, square, probably a foot by a foot. A flower, a bird. What could this one be the remains of?
A wooden puppet had been folded in, facedown, ragged hat tilted up, a threadbare tunic clinging to its narrow back.
Master Robbie touched the puppet, and it popped up so that it seemed to be sitting in the box. Its long chin and even longer nose almost met. As they watched, its face became painted a cream color with scarlet spots on its cheeks and scarlet lips. Its eyes filled in with black, evenly surrounded by ivory white, like an owl’s eyes.
“It looks cheerful,” Elodie said.
“Or spiteful.”
The jaws moved. The lips were rigid, so its smile didn’t change. “I am cheerful.”
Elodie gasped. It sounded uncomfortably human, speaking with a deep, velvety voice that had a happy lilt, the pitch rising on ful in cheerful. “Ask me a question.”
She said, “Who took the Replica?”
Master Robbie said, “Where is it?”
It raised and lowered knobby shoulders. “The two questions I may not answer.”
“What’s my name, Sir Puppet?” asked Elodie.
“You go by more than one.”
“Say one of them.”
Its jaw clacked wordlessly. Then, finally: “Lady El.”
“Lambs and calves!”
“Who made you?” Master Robbie asked.
“A wizard. I have his voice.”
Elodie and Master Robbie both asked, “Do you have his powers?”
Elodie stopped breathing, waiting for the answer. Maybe the puppet could change the spell on Zertrum.
“I have knowledge but no power.”
Elodie cried, “You know who took the Replica and where it is but you can’t say?”
It sagged. Its paint began to peel. Quick as quick, she touched it.
It started over. “Ask me a question.”
She said, “Is it true that you know who took the Replica and where it is but you can’t say?”
“Yes. I know and cannot say.” The voice still rose gaily at the end.
Useless thing! Elodie wanted to punch the puppet back into the box and slam the cover shut.
Master Robbie, cooler than she, said, “Can you give us a hint?”
The head nodded bumpily. “A single hint. Lady . . .” It drooped.
They both touched it.
“Ask me a question.”
“Can you give us a hint?” Master Robbie said.
“About what?”