A Prince among Frogs (17 page)

A froggy face rose above the back of the crowd and grinned evilly at Millie. He opened his mouth and snapped it shut with a loud
clack
. Even Millie could see how much he resembled a snapping turtle.

“I’m sorry they took your friend, but if he was a prince, he didn’t really belong here,” Millie told the female frog. “We’ll all leave as soon as we find my brother. He’s just a baby, you see, and can’t take care of himself yet.”

“A baby, you say? You should have mentioned that right away,” said the bullfrog. “Baby frogs aren’t frogs. Well, they are, but that’s not what we call them. We call them little squirts, although I’ve heard them called polliwogs and tadpoles.”

“I like ‘polliwogs’ the best,” said the little frog. “It feels funny in my mouth when I say it.”

Millie was so stunned that she let her legs drop straight down and she began to sink. She came back up spluttering and wiping the water from her eyes. “I never thought of that!” she said. “But it makes a lot of sense! I have to tell my parents. Thank you so much!” She started to swim away, then stopped abruptly and came back. “Where exactly would I find these polliwogs?”

“They swim in big groups in the shallows,” said the little frog.

“Thanks again!” Millie shouted as she started toward the middle of the pond.

“I said they’re in the shallows,” the little frog shouted after her. “You’re going the wrong way!”

“I have to tell my parents first,” Millie called over her shoulder.

“Suit yourself. Just watch out for Old Gray. He hangs out in the middle of the pond until the sun gets high.”

Swimming as a frog still wasn’t easy for Millie, but she tried the bend-and-kick style and found she actually made some progress with it. Every now and then she raised her head to look around and make sure that she was still headed where she wanted to go. Finally, she chanced to look down as well and saw a shadow following her.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t her own shadow.

“What is that?” she wondered out loud and stuck her face in the water for a better look. The shadow moved closer until she was able to see that it was a fish, not a shadow at all. It was hard to judge how far away the fish was or how big it might be, but Millie remembered the little frog’s warning about Old Gray and decided that she really didn’t want to learn any more about him.

She tried to swim faster, pulling her legs closer and kicking harder, and began to move at a better pace. Even so, when she glanced back down, she saw that the fish was drawing nearer and looked more threatening than before. Millie tried to swim faster still, but she had already been doing the best she could and he continued to come closer. Her heart pounded and her limbs felt like they were on fire when she realized that the fish was rising to the surface and was only inches behind her.

“Help!” she screamed. There was a
whoosh
and something enormous tore out of the sky. Millie shrieked and shot ahead as Audun plucked the fish from the water. “Thank you!” she shouted once she realized that it was him and that he held the flopping fish in his talons.

“No problem,” said Audun. “I was hungry, anyway.”

“Millie, are you all right?” her mother shouted, and she saw both of her parents swimming toward her, their eyes big with concern.

“I’m better than all right,” she told them, “because I know where we might be able to find Felix.” Her eyes shone as she told them about her conversation with the frogs, and by the time she had finished they were already swimming to the shallows.

They swam through the cattails edging the shallower water calling “Felix!” but for the longest time they didn’t see anything that even resembled a tadpole. “Maybe I was wrong and he is in a different pond,” Millie finally said.

“We’re not giving up yet,” her father told her with an encouraging smile.

Millie ducked when a blackbird darted overhead, and she bumped into something small and soft. A tadpole looked up at her with curious eyes before scooting off through a stand of water iris. Millie followed, pushing aside the iris as she forced her way through, and swam into the midst of the largest group of tadpoles she’d ever seen.

Startled, the tadpoles darted away, moving together like one much larger entity.

“I found them!” Millie shouted, and her parents hurried over to meet her.

“Felix!” called Emma as she drew alongside the tadpoles.

“Are you there, Felix?” his father called.

Millie glanced from one tadpole to another and shook her head. “It’s impossible to tell them apart.”

“It is, isn’t it? And none of them answers to ‘Felix,’” said Emma.

“Maybe we should try something else,” Millie said. “He’s ticklish when he’s human. Do you think he might be ticklish as a tadpole, too?”

Emma smiled. “What a good idea! When I was a frog, Grassina tickled me and knew who I was by my laugh. I doubt any real tadpole would laugh like Felix. You start at that end of the group and I’ll start at this end. Eadric, can you work your way out from the cattails?”

“How will we know which ones we’ve checked already?” asked Millie. “I know some have little legs and some are bigger than others, but I don’t think I can keep them all straight.”

“Dab some mud on each one after you tickle it,” said Eadric. “Unless you can think of a better way to mark them.”

“Mud sounds good to me,” said Millie, bending down to get a big glob.

Although Millie thought that tickling tadpoles might be fun, she changed her mind after the first few. Some tadpoles squirmed to get away, but most of them just gave the frogs bored looks and swam off. An hour had gone by and her froggy fingers were sore when a dark shape shot out of the deeper water, scattering the tadpoles in every direction.

“Hello!” said Haywood, his otter mouth grinning. “I came to see how you were doing.”

Millie didn’t know a frog could look as angry as her mother looked just then. “We were doing fine until you came and chased all the polliwogs away!” Emma said, her froggy eyes bulging even more than usual.

Haywood looked confused. “What do polliwogs have to do with … Oh, I get it. You think Felix is a polliwog now! That makes sense because—”

“We can talk about it later,” snapped Emma. “Right now I want you to get those polliwogs back. Go on, round them up and send them back here.”

Haywood ducked his head like a little boy who’d just been scolded. “Sorry,” he muttered. “I didn’t know. I’ll see what I can do.” He swam off and in less than two minutes a flood of tadpoles surrounded the three frogs.

“How did he do it that fast?” asked Millie as she reached for a tadpole.

“He probably used magic,” her mother said, trying to tickle two tadpoles at once. “Small magic has always been his specialty.”

Millie gazed out over the sea of tadpoles that didn’t show any sign of leaving. “He must have sent us every tadpole in the pond.”

“Good,” said Eadric. “Then Felix should be here somewhere.”

Millie was getting sick of the sight, smell, and feel of tadpoles when her father finally tickled one that chortled with glee. Eadric called Emma and Millie over to see the tadpole. They recognized Felix’s laugh even before they saw him and were both grinning when they gave the little creature a froggy hug.

“Now we have to get him to shore without losing him again,” said Emma as they all tried to hold on to the squirmy tadpole. “The problem is, we have to keep him in water until I can change us back. I’m afraid I’ll drop him if I try to hold him while I change.”

Eadric looked around until he noticed a depression in the mud at the edge of the pond. “We can trap him in a puddle,” he said. “Millie, come help me. We’ll build up the sides so he can’t get out.”

“Hurry!” said Emma with her arms wrapped around the tadpole. “I won’t be able to hold him for long. He’s too slippery!”

Working as fast as they could, Millie and her father splashed water into the depression, then slapped mud around the edges, building them high enough to keep in even the most determined tadpole. When it was ready, they helped Emma lug the wiggly little creature over the mud wall and dump him into his own private puddle. Millie glanced at her parents and laughed. They were covered in mud, and so was she.

“Step back, everyone!” said Emma. “I’m going to turn us back first, and we don’t want to step on Felix.”

Millie scrambled out of the water, adding another layer of mud to her arms and legs. The three of them moved away from the pond and took hold of one another’s hands again. The spell that Emma used was one Millie had heard before, only this time it applied to her, too.

Turn us into that which we

Long ago were meant to be.

Make us human once again

From head to toe and bone to skin.

Once they were human again, they stood beaming at one another for a moment before turning to look at the tadpole they were sure was Felix.

Emma knelt down beside the puddle to recite another spell.

An evil man has turned my babe

Into a polliwog.

Change him back to the boy I love,

A human, not a frog.

Millie waited, expecting the air to shimmer or lights to sparkle or something that would show the spell was working. Nothing happened, however, and the tadpole continued to swim in his little puddle.

“What’s going on?” asked Oculura as the witches gathered around.

“Felix was turned into a tadpole, not a fully developed frog,” said Emma. “I tried to turn him back, but my spell didn’t work.”

“Maybe you didn’t say it right,” said Dyspepsia.

“Mother always says it right and her spells always work,” Millie told her. “Something else is wrong.”

“Let me try,” said Azuria.

Millie stepped aside as one witch after another tried to change the tadpole back. Standing by the pond, she let her mind wander. The pond had felt right, and now the tadpole felt right. That was Felix, she was sure of it. Whatever wasn’t right wasn’t anything they had done, it was Olebald. It had to be.

“Mother,” said Millie. “Didn’t you tell me that normally only the witch who cast a spell can undo it?”

Emma glanced at her and sighed. “Usually, yes, although I’ve been able to undo most witches’ spells ever since I became a dragon friend. I was hoping that I could do it now as well, but it isn’t working. The only one who can undo this spell is Olebald Wizard. We’re going to have to find him.”

Thirteen

T
hey were flying over the enchanted forest when Millie slowed the beat of her wings so she could talk to her mother. Emma was riding on her magic carpet with Eadric, cradling the glass bowl that Grassina had created out of an old spell, a leaf, and a blob of mud. Pond water sloshed in the bowl, and the little tadpole swimming in the water sloshed with it.

Her mother was murmuring something to Felix when Millie appeared beside her. Emma glanced at Millie, then at Eadric, who was snoring softly, his head lolling at an angle. “My poor darling,” said Emma. “He’s exhausted. But then we all are today.”

“Mother, I have to ask you, isn’t your spell supposed to take us to Olebald?”

Emma was only half paying attention to Millie when she answered, “What’s that, dear? Oh yes, that’s right.”

“But it looks as if we’re going home,” Millie told her. “I can already see the castle beyond the trees.”

Emma frowned and looked up. “That’s not possible,” she said, her cheeks paling when she saw the castle. “This isn’t good. It can mean one of two things; either my spell didn’t work, or Olebald is here in Greater Greensward. I don’t know which would be worse.”

“If he’s here, at least we won’t have to go looking for him,” said Millie.