The Seelie King's War by Jane Yolen

Author:Jane Yolen
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Young Readers Group
Published: 2016-10-10T14:53:18+00:00

THE BOWSER WAS drowsing uneasily on the floor of the twins’ room in the last wagon, the one in which Aspen had slept. Little runnels ran along his coarse hair, and every now and then he made a growling sound, as if dreaming of prey, though she doubted he ate anything.

The twins also drowsed, standing up in the semi-dark, looking just like two long capes hanging on separate pegs. Snail knew little would wake the two of them until nightfall, when they would rouse, eat, walk about by the backside of the wagons. She’d never understood why they were part of Odds’s troupe. They neither performed nor helped set up for a performance. They didn’t make the kind of magic that quieted mobs or turned away snoopers. They just . . . were.

She wondered if they would fight. Indeed, she wondered if they could.

Sitting down next to the bowser, which was much more than a simple animate rug, she thought about how he’d greeted her originally—with a snarl and the baring of almost a hundred teeth.

The bowser, so Odds had warned her that first time, didn’t ordinarily like females, though she and the rug had become friends of a sort soon after. Right now it was hard to believe he had any teeth—or any mouth—so hidden were they in the greasy grey folds of his body.

She put her hand on his matted fur. “Who left you in this awful condition?” she said softly. “Has no one bathed you since the king and I went with you through those first skirmishes?” When there was no response, she added, “Want a bath now?”

The bowser shifted, or rather he scrabbled on the floor and pushed a section of his dirty, grey, limpish body onto her lap.

“I’ll take that as a yes,” she said, trying to push the filthy creature down. “But first I’ve got to get some water and some soap, and then you and I will have a wash.”

The bowser still didn’t move, so she stood up quickly, and he tumbled back onto the floor of the wagon. “Back soon.”

She got her riding clothes out of her saddlebag. She had to save the m’lady clothes for addressing audiences and speaking to toffs. And that meant the first thing she had to do was brush off some of the filth the bowser had left on the skirt.

Then she changed back into her smelly, unwashed clothes and went outside. There she found a big wooden bucket and filled it to the brim with tepid water from a barrel. She uncovered a stiff brush—probably used for the unicorns’ manes—and some yellow soap.

When she returned to the bowser’s room, the twins were hanging from hooks closer to the door, possibly to avoid the inevitable splashing water.

The bowser had spread himself out flat so that she could reach every bit of his body.

“Good,” she said, dumping some of the water in the very center of his back—or front. Without the teeth showing it was impossible to tell. Then she got onto her knees, scraped some of the rose-scented soap onto the brush, and got to work.

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