He glanced over at Leopold, who was hunting through their saddlebags.
"What are you looking for?" he asked with irritation, producing two toads and a big bullfrog.
"Paper. And something to write with. I thought of a rhyme for shadow."
It was going to be a long night.
The next day, Leopold was in the depths of despair because he didn't have anything black to wear, and there was no rhyme for ensanguined. Siegfried had to push him to do anything, he lost his temper multiple times, and another flood of toads marked every word.
That was when he got more avian advice. "You might not have noticed," the bird observed, "but the angrier you get, the more hoppers you produce. Maybe if you concentrate on feeling sorry for Leopold, you'll be able to take two steps without squashing a frog."
Siegfried stared at his bird blankly, then slowly nodded. He couldn't imagine how he had missed that simple fact, but there it was. He concentrated very hard on feeling grateful to the bird, and sorry for losing his temper. "Thank you. I'm sorry," he said humbly, and was rewarded by dropping a baby toad scarcely the size of a beetle.
"You should be," the bird said smugly. Siegfried's temper flared again, but he reined it in and managed to get Leopold to saddle and bridle his horse and swing up into that saddle without having to say another word. Now his best hope was that he could just get them to the pass and the cave without Leopold deciding to start composing sad songs instead of poems. He wasn't sure he would survive songs.
So far there were only seven Princes on the way to the pass. Desmond was in the lead — he'd gotten the rather common curse of boils, and they'd broken out all over his face. Almost as soon as the affliction had occurred, he'd gotten his horse and ridden out.
With the collusion of Jimson, Rosa was watching him, and Siegfried and Leopold, in Jimson's mirror. Normally it was a good week of hard riding to Sharpstone Pass, but Lily had taken pity on the poor fellows, and she'd cast the "All Paths Are One" spell to shorten their journey. Their map routed them all over an obscure little trail that almost no one ever used, which they would encounter early on their second day. It was drawn to look like a shortcut, which would guarantee that they would use it. That was where the spell had been placed.
Prince Desmond, however, had been so desperate to rid himself of his affliction that he had pressed his horse onto that path late in the evening of the first day. As a consequence, at this very moment, with a pack on his back, he was climbing up one of the mountains at the pass —
Not the mountain that the dragon's cave was in, but one opposite it, which puzzled her more than a little.
"What do you think he's doing?" she asked Jimson.
"I confess myself baffled," the Mirror Servant replied, as the mirror showed Desmond making his way up a narrow goat track. "Utterly baffled. I thought maybe he was going to talk to Gina and ask her to deliver the object, which is perfectly within the rules, but no. Wait, look, he's settling down — "
And so he was. He removed the pack and pulled out a crossbow and a handful of blunted bolts, arrows that had a round ball-like head. With practiced ease, he cocked the bow, inserted a bolt and took aim at the entrance to Sharpstone's cave.
"Oh, of course!" Rosa exclaimed as the bolt fell short. "Oh, that's clever. As soon as it's in the cave, it's part of the hoard, of course. And with the head blunted, those bolts wouldn't do more than bruise a man at the distance he's shooting. If they hit Sharpstone, he probably wouldn't even feel it."
"Likely not. Itis clever," Jirnson agreed. They both watched as the Prince sighted on the cave, made sure of his target by getting three bolts in succession inside the entrance, then took his object — a gold coin — and affixed it to the front of the blunt head with beeswax. This was risky; if he fell short, he was going to have to climb down, find the coin, climb back up and try again. Finding the coin was going to be the trick. There was a lot of mountain out there....
As Rosa held her breath, he sighted and let fly.
The bolt sailed in through the mouth of the cave, just under the upper rim.
"Oh, well done!" Jimson exclaimed, as a moment later Prince Desmond's plague of facial boils began to fade. "Good shot!"
"I hope some of the others think of that," Rosa said. "Let's check Siegfried and Leopold."
They left Desmond clambering back down the mountainside and found the Northerner and his companion within sight of the pass. The two of them were still on horseback, but the track was right in the mountains now. Pines clung to the steep slopes on either side of them. Siegfried was on the lead horse, slumped over the saddle, looking miserable. Leopold — was singing.