He slipped unseen into the depths of the palace, using the memorized map to guide him, flattening himself against walls as servants rushed past, trays piled high with food in preparation for the feast a couple of hours hence. The map had shown where the King’s personal guards would be positioned, and where the soldiers, brought down from Moss-side specially for the event, were on guard. Finally he followed the echoes of far-off music through the brightly lit passageways until he came to the right door. He peered up and down the corridor. Clear. He pushed the handle and crept in.

The high-ceilinged room was empty, apart from a set of trestles set up along one wall, piled high with cutlery and clean platters. Looking down on the space was a small alcove set into the wall like a miniature minstrel’s gallery, and straight ahead of Ark were wooden double doors. In a few hours the lords and ladies of Arborium would sit down to their own feast in the inner courtyard just on the other side.

“What think yow?” said Flo, suddenly stepping out from behind a curtain.

Ark stifled a shriek. “Apart from nearly giving me a heart attack, this space should work well.” If Corwenna and her spying birds were right, they might stand a chance. “We haven’t got much time.”

“That be whoi Oi brought along a couple a good ’uns.” Three more Rootshooters appeared as if from nowhere. In their long arms they held bundled lengths of heartwood.

“Will it be noisy?”

“Yow keep a lookout. All this music they be practicin’ for the dancin’ is makin’ a right din. Don’t think no one will worry about a few hammers and saws joinin’ the orchestra!”

Flo was right. But worrying wasn’t an easy habit to give up. “And the others have brought up the magnets?”

“Yas! They be already in place. Us Rootshooters never forgets. Do Oi look loike a dreamy girl?”

“No. You’re right.” Ark suddenly noticed that Flo had hair. “Is that a wig on your head?”

Flo laughed and the wig moved.

“Oh! It’s alive!”

“Whoi, of course he is!” The wig suddenly sprouted eight legs and jumped off her head to land on the floor.

“Help! It’s a spider! It’s going to kill us all!” Ark backed into a corner. A mealworm might be bigger, but this thing made horrible clicking noises as it moved toward him. “Wahhhhhh!” he wailed.

“Quoiet down, yow scaredy-cat! He is nought but moi pet spoider, Harold. But yow can call him Harry. ‘E is going to help us get on the web!” The spider gave a single disdainful look at Ark with its multiple eyes and then scuttled through a hole that one of the Rootshooters made by levering up a floorboard.