Terrible Beast of Zor Read online

  Reluctantly Alex nodded. “Yes, they are.”

  “And that will soon be you. You are the one who should be out leading the people even now.”

  Alexander clamped his jaws together and stood staring out the window again. The silence grew until a knock came at the door. Whirling around, he yelled, “Come in!”

  The door opened, and a man entered, a small pale-faced man wearing the castle uniform. “A special treat for you from the kitchen, Prince.”

  Alexander walked over to him and stared down at the tray. It held breads and silver goblets and a silver pitcher.

  “Who are you? I haven’t seen you before, have I?”

  “I am new to the castle service, sire.”

  “All right. Get out.”

  “Yes, sire.”

  The little man scurried out, and the door closed behind him.

  Alexander glanced at Sarah. “You might as well eat this. They feed me well enough here, and I’m not hungry.”

  He poured some wine out of the pitcher into the two goblets. “I guess they knew I had a visitor. Here. Have some of this wine.”

  “Not for me,” Sarah said. “But thank you.”

  “Suit yourself.” The prince picked up his goblet and walked to the window to look out again, silently holding the silver cup.

  Sarah joined him there. “It’s a beautiful day. Oh, look, they’re practicing archery over there.”

  “I saw you the other day with Alcindor. You’re very good. Where did you learn bowmanship?”

  “I’ve always liked archery.”

  The prince studied her. “Tell me about some of the battles you’ve been in.” He set down the goblet on the windowsill.

  Sarah hesitated, then thought, At least he’s talking. Perhaps this is a good way to gain his confidence.

  “Well, there was the time we were engaged in a battle with dinosaurs.”

  “What are dinosaurs? Here, sit down.”

  They sat in chairs by the window, and Sarah briefly told the story of when she and the other Sleepers had been trapped in a land where there were dinosaur-like creatures. He listened intently and, to her surprise, asked that she tell another one.

  When she finished, he said slowly, “You’ve certainly had a more adventurous life than I have—and done more good, too, I suppose.”

  Sarah said, “We try to help wherever we can.” She did not want to make much of herself, but she spoke warmly of the other Sleepers.

  The prince finally reached for the drink he had set down on the windowsill and said, “Well, here’s to you, Sarah. Are you sure you don’t want a sweet roll?”

  Sarah glanced back toward the tray that he had left sitting on a low stool. Then quick as a flash and hardly thinking, she struck the prince’s hand. The silver goblet went flying, and the wine splashed on the wall.

  “What are you doing?” the prince cried. “How dare you slap me!”

  “Look, Prince!”

  Alexander did look. Then, with a cry he ran and knelt beside the small golden-haired dog. “Shasta! What’s wrong?”

  Sarah stooped down by him and laid her hand on the dog. “She’s dead, Prince Alex. I’m so sorry.”

  “How can she be dead?”

  Sarah’s mind was working quickly. “See? She ate some of the bread. And perhaps drank from the other goblet.” She picked up the goblet and saw that it was nearly empty. “That’s what it was,” she whispered. “She drank this, and it had poison in it.”

  “Poison! How could that be?”

  Gently, Sarah pulled him to his feet. “You’re in danger here, Prince Alex. That poison was meant for you.”

  “I don’t believe this!”

  “You have to believe it. Your dog is dead.”

  The prince looked down with sorrow.

  Sarah knew she had to take action. “We must get you out of here. You’re at the mercy of … of anyone.”

  “But … but they guard my quarters. I can’t go anywhere.”

  “Alex, you’d be dead if you had swallowed whatever was in that cup. Many people can get access here. Guards can be bribed. You’re not safe. Someone wants to get you out of the way.”

  “You—perhaps you’re right.”

  Sarah said, “I’ll tell your father at once.”

  Sarah left the prince’s rooms, but she did not go directly to the king. First, she sought out Josh and took him aside.

  After Josh listened carefully to all she said, he nodded his head in agreement. “You’re right, Sarah. We’ve got to get the prince out of here. He’s the only hope of Madria. If he’s dead, it’s all over.”

  “Let’s go to the king.”

  They went to the king’s quarters but were told that he was too ill to see anyone.

  “I know. Let’s go to Dethenor,” Sarah said. “He’s the highest power under the king.”

  They found the old man in his office.

  He took one look at their faces and admitted them at once. Then he listened while Sarah explained what had happened, and his own face turned pale.

  “I knew it!” Dethenor whispered. “I knew it! We must do something quickly to save the prince’s life.”

  “We think that the prince should be taken out of the palace and concealed where no one can get at him.”

  “I agree. But he’s carefully watched. He can’t leave his quarters …”

  Josh smiled. “We’ll find a way, Dethenor, with your permission. We’ve become pretty good at breaking out of jails.”

  “Very well,” Dethenor said. “Do it. Tell no one what you’re doing. We can trust nobody for a time.”

  “What about Alcindor?”

  “Yes, you can trust him,” Dethenor said instantly. “But no one else. Now, go quickly. There’s not a moment to lose. If anything happens to the prince, the country will come under the authority of the Dark Lord, and I myself would rather die.”

  7

  The Big Escape

  Josh looked around the circle at the serious faces of his six friends. The thought passed through his mind, We’ve done this before—quite a bit.

  He and Sarah had called them all for a quick war parley, and everyone had expressed shock at the attempt on Prince Alex’s life—and Sarah’s. Josh let them talk for a while, then broke into the hubbub of voices. “Wait a minute. We’ve got to make a plan, and I mean like now!”

  “I’ll tell you what I vote for,” Reb said. “Let’s buckle on our weapons and go charging in and get the prince out of there.”

  “That won’t do,” Dave said immediately. “There are guards on every floor. And even if we got out of the palace, we’d still have guards to contend with. And we don’t know which ones are the enemy.”

  Reb argued valiantly that they could do it.

  But Josh shook his head and said firmly, “Dave’s right, Reb. We can’t fight our way out of this one. Now, does anybody else have another idea?”

  The talk went on for some time, and nothing workable seemed to come of it.

  “Who do you think sent that poisoned food?” Abbey asked. “Whoever did that is the enemy.”

  “I know who it was,” Wash said. “I’ve been watching that fellow Rondel, and he looks like a suspicious character to me.”

  “He looks suspicious to me too,” Jake said. “He looks like the villain in an old gangster movie.”

  “It doesn’t do any good to talk about who might have done this or that,” Sarah said. “We’ve got to do something for the prince—and right away. Now, let’s just be quiet for a moment and think.”

  The silence that fell over the room then seemed to stretch on and on. Occasionally someone would start to speak but then shake his head as if deciding some idea would not work.

  All at once Jake sat straight up and slapped his hands together. “I know what! I’ve got it! I’ve got a master plan that’ll work for sure!”

  Reb looked at him with some doubt. “I’ve seen some of your master plans that didn’t work too good,” he said.

  �
��Well, this one will work fine,” Jake snapped. “See if it doesn’t.”

  “So what is it, Jake?” Josh asked.

  “It’s real simple. The prince just walks out of his room, down the hall, down the stairs, across the courtyard, and out the palace gates.”

  “Oh, that’s a wonderful plan!” Dave said sarcastically. “Only thing wrong with it is it won’t work.”

  “No, wait, Dave. There’s got to be more to your plan than that, Jake. Isn’t there?” Josh asked. He studied the smaller boy, knowing that inside his skull was a keen brain, one that had often gotten them out of serious trouble.

  “Now you listen to your Uncle Jake.” He smirked. “I’ll tell you how we’re going to get Alex out of this. The first thing to understand is that people see what they want to see.”

  “What does that mean?” Wash demanded. “‘People see what they want to see.’”

  “Did you ever see a magician? Of course you have. What he does is get you to looking at his left hand. Then he does something with the right hand that you can’t see because you’re looking at his left hand.”

  “Stop talking in riddles,” Josh growled. “What’s the plan?”

  “OK. Here it is. These big old chimneys take lots of cleaning, and they have chimney sweeps here just like they used to back in old England. I’ve seen them. You’ve all seen them around here—filthy and dirty, faces black.”

  “Sure, we’ve all seen them, Jake,” Josh said impatiently. “What about it?”

  “I figure this,” Jake said slowly. “One of us that’s about the same height as the prince gets into an outfit like that, black from head to foot, face all smeared, and he goes to clean the chimney in the prince’s apartment.”

  Instantly Josh saw it. “I got you! When he gets in, he gives the prince his chimney-sweep clothes, and Alexander comes out and walks away, so dirty and black that the guards don’t see any difference.”

  They talked about the plan for a while, and everybody liked it.

  Josh said, “It’s going to be difficult for the one who stays. He’ll have to stay in the prince’s quarters after Alex leaves, and when they find him they’ll know he helped Alex make his escape.”

  “Well, it won’t be either of you two girls,” Dave said. “And it’ll have to be Reb or me. We’re the only two who are nearly as tall as the prince.”

  “I’ll do it, Dave.” Reb grinned. “And I know how I’ll get out of there, too.”

  Reb would not reveal his plan for making an escape, but finally Josh said, “All right. That’s what we’ll do, then. Let’s get at it.”

  The two guards standing outside the prince’s apartment looked up as Sarah and her two companions approached. They had often seen the Sleepers and even knew their names. “Hello, Josh. Hello, Sarah,” the guard Jent said. Then he grinned. “Who’s that fine looking fellow with you?”

  “He’s come to clean the chimney,” Josh said. “And we’re going to visit the prince a little while.”

  His own mother would not have recognized Reb. He was clothed in the dirtiest possible, tattered clothing. His face was black, and he had a cap pulled down over his ears. It was also black. He grinned back at the guard. “Orders from the top. Clean the chimney in the prince’s chambers, they said.”

  “Then go on in,” Jent told them.

  The three entered, and Alexander came toward them. “What in the world—”

  Josh put a finger to his lips and held up his other hand in warning, as Sarah closed the door. “Be quiet,” he whispered.

  “What’s going on here?” the prince whispered back. Then he looked at the sooty figure before him and said, “Who are you?”

  “You know me all right, Prince,” Reb said. “Just never saw me so dressed up before.”

  “Reb, is that you?”

  “It’s me.”

  “What’s going on here?” the prince demanded.

  “We talked to Dethenor,” Sarah said quickly. “He agrees with us.”

  “What did my father say?”

  “I’m afraid he was too ill for us to talk with him, but Dethenor says this is the wise thing to do.”

  “What is? And how am I going to get out of here?”

  Reb laughed. “You’re going to get out the way I came in. As a chimney sweeper.”

  The prince saw immediately what the plan was. But he began to argue. “I can’t put myself in that kind of garb.”

  “It’s better than being dead,” Sarah said, “which is what you’ll be if you stay here. Now what will it be?”

  The prince flinched at her direct speech. “All right,” he finally grumbled.

  “Come on, Prince,” Reb said. “You shuck out of those clothes and into these.”

  The boys changed clothes while Sarah turned her back. When Reb said, “OK,” she turned around—and laughed.

  Reb was a comical sight. His face was still black, although he had worn his own clothes underneath the rags. He went over to the wash basin, saying, “I’m going to wash this off. You put some of that soot on the prince, Sarah. Make sure he’s as dirty as I was.”

  “Come on, Alex,” Sarah said. “You’ve got to look just like Reb did.”

  It was not easy to persuade the prince. He was very fastidious, but Sarah insisted on smearing his face, his neck, and his hands with soot and even throwing more onto his filthy clothes. Then she frowned at his hair. “I really ought to cut that off,” she said.

  “You aren’t going to cut my hair!”

  “I think it’d be better, Prince Alex,” Josh said.

  “No! I’ll put it under this cap. Nobody will see the difference.”

  The prince pushed his long hair under the floppy cap, and Josh and Sarah walked around him, looking him over.

  “I guess he’ll do,” she decided.

  “You’d better get on your way,” Reb said. He was standing at the window.

  “But what’s your plan, Reb? How are you going to get out of here?” Sarah asked. “They might hang you for kidnapping the prince.”

  Reb reached down into the bag that held the tools he had brought for cleaning the chimney. “I got this and this.” In one hand he held up a file and in the other a long rope. “I cut the bars with this and shinny down this rope. There won’t be anything to it.”

  “Well, we’re not leaving until the bars are cut,” Josh said firmly.

  They took turns filing through the two bars. Fortunately, the file was very keen. When they were filed through, the prince proved to be the strongest of them. He bent the cut bars upward so that there was room for Reb to squeeze through.

  Reb grabbed the rope, tied it firmly to the bunk, and tossed the coil out the window. He looked out, then said, “You go on downstairs. I’ll be behind the palace waiting for you when you come out.”

  “I guess we’d better go,” Sarah said nervously.

  The prince straightened up. “I feel like a fool in this outfit,” he grumbled.

  “You look fine. And we’ll take the attention of the guards away from you. But don’t say a word to anybody,” Sarah warned.

  “All right.”

  As they went out into the corridor, Sarah at once engaged the guards in conversation. “My, they must choose the best looking soldiers to be the guards to the prince!” she began with a smile.

  The guards both grinned and did not pay one moment’s attention to Josh and the blackened figure moving rapidly away from them and down the hall. As soon as Sarah saw them disappear around a corner, she said, “Well, you men do a great job. I hope you get your proper reward.” She hurried after Josh and Alex, leaving the two guards grinning foolishly at each other.

  As soon as Sarah caught up with them, Josh said, “I hope we get out of the palace as easily as we got out of Alex’s quarters.”

  But all seemed to be going smoothly, just as Jake had said it would. People are careful about those coming in, Sarah thought, but they don’t pay much attention to those leaving. Every guard merely gave them a nod, and
they walked out of the palace.

  “I just hope Reb is down safely,” Josh said. “I’d break my neck if I tried to slide down a rope like that.”

  They turned immediately to their right, hurrying along in the falling darkness. As they turned the corner to the back of the palace, a voice said, “Well, you took your time. I’ve been waiting here for a week.”

  “Reb! You made it all right!”

  “Slicker than goose grease,” Reb said cheerfully. He looked up at the rope still dangling from the window. “Easier coming down than it would be going up.”

  “We’d better get moving,” Josh said.

  They hurried to the stables, where they found the other Sleepers ready and waiting.

  “Did you get a good horse for the prince?”

  “I want my own horse,” Prince Alex said.

  “Not a chance,” Sarah said quickly. “It would be recognized right away. What you need is a good, solid homely horse with no attractiveness whatsoever.”

  “Just the one I’ve got.” Dave patted the rump of a mousy brown animal. It looked strong but certainly not flashy.

  “Quick, then. Everybody mount. We’ve got to get away from here,” Josh urged.

  They swung into the saddles and rode out. The gates were opened for them without a question, and they passed out of the palace grounds and thundered down the road. Josh led the way at a full gallop, wanting to put as much distance as he could between the prince and the palace.

  “Where are we going?” Sarah asked him.

  “To a place called the Deep Forest. It’s a place Dethenor told me about it. Hardly anybody goes there, he says. People think it’s haunted.”

  “Good,” Sarah said. She was leaning over her horse’s neck. When she looked back, she could see the prince riding bolt upright. The moon was coming up, and she could even see the soot on his face. “We’ve got the prince out, but what good does it do us in the long run?”

  “Don’t know. At least we’ve got time now.”

  Sarah kept even with Josh, and the others followed closely. Finally she said, “And it gives us time to work on Prince Alexander. He’s got to learn the hard way how life is—just like us ordinary mortals do.”