by Otto Schafer
Jack lifted his head and pointed at Garrett. “Starting with you!”
“Leave him,” the giant dragon said. “You are Garrett Turek, are you not?”
Garrett swallowed, looking up at the dragon. A truth he wouldn’t tell was that, somehow, he was less afraid of the dragon than of Jack. Maybe because he could see clearly the monster that was the dragon, but the monster that was Jack – well, that wasn’t all visible on the surface.
“Who’s asking?” Garrett asked, with a false confidence. They needed to stall long enough to make landfall. If they could make it to land, they had a chance. And why in the hell were his arms burning so bad? This was even worse than before, the sensation stretching all the way across his shoulders and down into his chest.
“I am Elder Goch. You are now my prisoner. If you resist, I will kill you. I would prefer to take you alive, but in the end, it makes no difference,” the dragon said.
“No,” Jack said. “You can have him after I kill him and everyone on this boat.”
“Then be done with it,” the dragon said.
Garrett heard something behind him and glanced back. Lenny, Pete, David, and Paul were there. Garrett smiled. “Yeah… well, I don’t think that’s going to work for us,” he said, drawing his sword.
Jack nodded toward the others. “Hey there, Pete, your mom says hi.”
“What? What about my mom?” Pete asked.
Something in Jack’s tone made Garrett’s stomach turn. “Jack, what did you do?” he asked, afraid of the answer.
Jack kept his eyes on Pete. “Hey, you remember when we used to hang out at Albert’s place, Pete?”
“I remember you used to. I only went because I had to go. What’s that got to do with my mom?” Pete asked, his voice shaky.
“Albert was really into guns. His dad let him have all kinds of illegal semiautos and even an automatic that was a blast to shoot. But Albert was also into snakes and lizards. He had a bunch, but my favorites were those two black-and-white tegus. You remember those, don’t ya, Pete?”
Pete didn’t answer.
“Come on, you got to remember! They looked like miniature dinosaurs, and Albert said they could grow up to four feet long. These weren’t that big, maybe half that size. But you know what I remember most? They hunted in packs. Did you ever watch them hunt, Pete?” Jack asked, a smile spreading across his face.
“Why did you say my mom says hi? You saw her?” Pete asked, taking several steps backward toward the snack truck as if afraid of the answers.
Jack ignored him. “Albert would throw a mouse in the cage and the tegus would team up and stalk the mouse until all at once they pounced, each grabbing one end. Then they would play tug-of-war, only in this game there were no losers. Well, that wasn’t exactly true for the mouse.” Jack barked out a laugh. “You see, Pete, the game ended when the mouse was pulled apart.”
Garrett watched as Jack took his eyes off Pete and stepped toward the starboard side rail. Ed was at the opposite end of the ferry platform with his back to everyone, using his ability to fly against the rail in an effort to try and steer the ferry toward land.
Jack’s eyes fixed on Ed and narrowed.
Pete was shaking his head. “I don’t understand… I don’t…”
Jack made a fist that seemed to shake uncontrollably as his smile hardened into a visage of hate. He turned back to Pete. “I thought you were smart, Petey. Don’t you see? Watching those little tegus pull the mouse apart was exactly what watching the young dragons fight over your mom reminded me of!” He held up two fists, touching them together before spreading his arms. “They just pulled and pulled and pulled and…” When Jack’s arms were spread wide, his fists popped open.
Pete’s face twisted in anguish. “No!” he screamed, collapsing to his knees.
In that same moment Ed also dropped to his knees, but for a different reason. The large man doubled over, grabbing his stomach and falling facedown onto the deck.
Garrett’s heart dropped into the pit of his gut. A wave of rage crashed over him like angry breakers over rocks. He charged forward, releasing a raw, inhuman roar that even he didn’t recognize. “Jaaaacccck!”
22
Jurupa
Thursday, April 21 – God Stones Day 15
Rural Chiapas State, Mexico
The arrow punctured the mustached man’s right eye, folding the already kneeling man backward onto his back. His wife and daughter screamed, as did the others – as did Breanne.
“Breanne Moore.” The woman spoke, never breaking stride as she walked toward them.
Breanne swallowed. The woman who knew her name was strangely all brown, with lines resembling wood grain running down her face and across her chest and torso. Her skin, her hair, her cloak, skirt, and tunic, everything – brown, broken up only by gnarled knots. But as she drew even closer, all that changed. Breanne stared, eyes glued to the odd apparition as it changed, the wood grain morphing into perfect honey-brown skin and the creature’s hair becoming silky black, parted perfectly down the center to feed into two long, braided pigtails. Her eyes were emerald green now and her cloak red, clasped with a pendant in the shape of a silver leaf, above which she wore a choker of turquoise beads. Her clothes were still brown, but now turquoise beads adorned her mukluks, leather skirt, and tunic. She was tall, too tall to be human.
“My queen requests an audience with the sage of the descendant. Will you comply?” the woman asked evenly.
“Your… queen? What?” Breanne stuttered, still trying to understand what she’d just seen.
The woman sneered, and before Breanne could say another word she nocked an arrow, aimed, and released. The arrow hit the wailing wife of the mustached man through her throat. She fell back, and the little girl screamed.
Breanne felt paralyzed by shock. Around her, everyone was screaming.
“Breanne Moore, sage to the descendant. My queen requests your presence. Will you comply?” the woman asked again, elevating her voice above the screams, as calmly as if she hadn’t just killed two people.
Breanne tried to work her mouth, but no sound came, her face like a fish out of water trying to gulp breath.
“The little one is next,” the cloaked woman said, reaching over her head for an arrow.
Finding her voice, Breanne shouted over the cries. “Stop! Yes! I will comply!”
“Too bad. I would have enjoyed killing more of them. Now come along – we have a long journey.” She turned away as the trees began to move.
“Wait,” Breanne said, shaking her head.
The woman stopped, but she didn’t turn around; instead, her head twisted to look back over her shoulder, but then it kept twisting, like an impossible corkscrew. “Speak.”
Breanne grabbed Gabi’s hand. “I won’t leave her!”
“Then I will simply kill her,” the woman said.
“Then kill me too! Because if you hurt one hair on her head, that’s what it’s going to take to keep me from killing you!” she shouted. She didn’t know where the courage came from but she’d take it, and by god she would keep hold of it.
Get behind me, Gabi!
The woman stared, a smile forming on her face. “Is naivete to be your shield then, Breanne Moore?” Her whole body contorted and stretched, changing strangely into twisting branches, and then she was something else. Something that resembled what Breanne imagined a werewolf might look like. The thing stood eight feet, maybe more. It was twenty paces away when it lunged forward, running toward Breanne on hind legs, its teeth bared to bite. A demon’s growl cut the distance between them, a prelude to the death bearing down.
Breanne dropped into a shooter’s stance, drew her pistol, and with zero hesitation she fired. Clack! Clack! Clack! Clack! She fired again and again, unloading the entire magazine into the werewolf, each shot producing splintering shards of bloodless, woody flesh.
The thing kept coming, a nightmare in motion.
Breanne released the magazine into the mud
and fumbled for the other one. But it was too late.
As the werewolf reached her, it changed back into the woman. Only now she was riddled with bullet holes.
Maybe she had hurt it?
But the holes began to glow green and move. The woman’s hand jutted out, grabbing Breanne by the throat, lifting her from the ground.
“I am to take the sages alive or you would already be dead, Breanne Moore!” the woman said, looking past Breanne to Gabi.
She tossed Breanne to the ground and reached back for another arrow.
Wit spun the loom of Breanne’s mind, quickly searching, frantic to sew a solution. “Wait! She’s a sage too! If the sages are to be taken alive, you can’t kill her!”
The woman hesitated. Her head cocked to the side.
I think she’s talking to somebody, Gabi said.
Breanne’s heart raced.
“No. There are already seven, you and five others, plus the descendant himself.”
“You’re wrong! Gabi is a sage!” Breanne declared.
“I hear your heart jumping, Breanne Moore. Your blood gushes even now, noisily, through your ever-dying flesh. Nervous. Panicked.” The tall woman’s smile withered into a thin line. “You lie.”
Breanne felt her heart banging too, and she tried to breathe, to slow the tell of her plot, but still it knocked against her temples. “You’re wrong,” she growled.
“Has she sworn herself to follow Garrett Turek, the descendant of Turek?”
Do it, Gabi! Swear it right now! Swear it to me on behalf of Garrett that you will follow him!
I swear! I will follow him! Gabi shouted.
“She has sworn it! She is a sage!” Breanne said, pleadingly.
The woman stared again for a long moment. “Very well, so one of those who travels with the descendant is not a sage. One is disposable.”
“Wait! What?” Breanne swallowed. What had she done?
The woman ignored her. “Gabi De Leon, my queen requests an audience with you. Will you comply?”
“And if I say no?” Gabi asked, crossing her arms.
Careful, Gabi! Breanne said.
“Little lion, no one denies a request from my queen. How you answer the question only decides how much pain you will endure along the way.”
At some point the surrounding screams had turned to moans. Breanne looked over at the death beside her but caught no more than a glance before slamming her eyes shut. “What are you?” Breanne asked through clenched teeth as she throttled back the strange kaleidoscope of fear and rage rotating through her bones and pricking her skin.
“I am what the splendid mother meant for me to be. I am unbound. I am liberated.” She paused and looked up at the other trees around her, then raised her voice and pointed at Breanne. “We are what this world needs and what your Turek tried to prevent.” She lowered her hand and lifted her chin, seeming to grow another foot. “You may call me Jurupa,” she said, looking past Breanne to Gabi. “Now, little lion, do you accept my queen’s request, or shall I begin inflicting pain?”
Gabi nodded reluctantly.
“Good. Let us depart this place,” Jurupa said. She turned and began walking north, away from the path that led to the cenote.
Bre, that’s not the way we need to go! Gabi said.
Gabi was right – they needed to get back to Sarah! “Wait, Jurupa!” she said, feeling the strange name on her tongue.
The tall woman turned back once again, her eyes narrowing.
“We have a friend not far from here,” she said, motioning to Gabi. Breanne quickly retrieved jars of herbs from Gabi’s pack. “Our friend, she needs this medicine, or she will die. I will meet your queen, but first we need to see her. Or at least send one of your trees to take this medicine back to her!” Breanne held the containers out pleadingly.
“Breanne Moore. I understand.” Jurupa held out her hands.
Breanne nodded, relieved, and handed her the containers.
“You mistake me for someone who cares about your friends – or for that matter, any human. You mistake me for someone whose brothers and sisters have not been slain and their bodies used to build fires for humans to dance around and roast marshmallows over!” For the first time, Jurupa’s voice broke and anger flooded her face. “You mistake me for someone whose family was not cut down by the hundreds of thousands to make room for more cows to shit!” She balled her fist, crushing the containers and spilling the precious medicine into the mud as all her knuckles groaned in concert, like creaking wood about to snap. She looked away from Breanne and to the other trees. “Kill the others!”
“What!? No! Wait!” Breanne pleaded.
Jurupa did not wait.
Gabi, don’t look!
Gabi turned away and shut her eyes tight as clenched fists.
Jurupa snapped her fingers and roots burst from beneath the cowering people, entangling them, pulling them beneath the muddy soil.
Breanne didn’t look away, even though she knew she should. The little girl whose parents Jurupa had shot was the last to go under. She screamed and screamed, the roots snagging her feet and pulling her down into the mud. God, please! Don’t let her die!
As the little girl sank nearly to her knees, her hands began to glow yellow. The air around her hands ignited as fire burst from her palms, scorching the roots.
The roots pulled back, writhing like salted slugs.
Breanne gasped.
The tiny girl crawled forward from the mud, pushing to her feet and running toward the ring of trees, but there was nowhere to go. She thrust out her palms and screamed as fire blowtorched forward in a great gush of flame. She was screaming and crying. The tree, fully engulfed in flame, writhed and screamed, then tipped and fell to the side.
Still the girl ran toward the burning tree.
Jurupa held out her bow and reached back for an arrow, nocked it, drew back, and took aim.
Breanne kicked the woman in the hip right as she released the arrow.
Jurupa pitched forward at the waist.
The arrow stuck fast into the mud not five feet in front of Breanne.
Jurupa stumbled sideways, but she didn’t go down and quickly regained her balance.
Before Breanne could get her hand up to protect her face, Jurupa backhanded her across the cheek so powerfully it shook her teeth and sent her down hard into the mud. She crammed pain back with her tongue as she felt tears start to her eyes. But she didn’t let them come, blinking them clear as she looked up from the mud, trying to find the fire girl. There! She was through the opening in the ring of trees. She made it!
Go! Please go! Don’t look back! Run, girl! Run! As the girl disappeared beyond the ring of trees, Breanne felt a hand grab her braids and drag her up from the muck. It felt like her braids were being ripped from her scalp.
“I should kill you where you stand!” Jurupa said, the wood grain appearing in her face as it twisted in anger. Then her head cocked to the side, and she went perfectly still for a moment.
Are you okay, Bre? Gabi asked.
Think so, Breanne said, rubbing her jaw. What’s wrong with her?
Someone is talking to her again, Gabi said. Look at her feet!
Breanne looked down at Jurupa’s feet. Long roots snaked down into the mud. I don’t understand.
I think it’s how they connect and talk.
Breanne listened for a moment, but her mind was quiet. You can hear them?
Yes, but I can’t understand what they’re saying yet, Gabi said.
Yet? But you think you’ll be able to? Breanne asked, her head ringing like a bell as the world around her spun.
I was able to with Ogliosh and Apep, but tree language sounds way different.
Hey, she can’t hear us, can she?
Gabi shook her head. I don’t think so, but I can’t say for sure. All those people… they’re under the ground, Bre, they’re dead!
Not all, Gabi. Not the little girl. She knew it was little solace, but it was something.
Bre? How did that girl do that?
The words of Mr. B came to her yet again. It’s the God Stones, Gabi. They affect everything and everyone, but not in the same way. Then she thought of expanding pineal glands and third eyes, but the roots pulled back from the mud and into Jurupa’s lower legs. She blinked, her eyes becoming focused where they had been distant a moment ago, and Breanne decided that conversation would have to wait.
The ground shook as the massive cypress moved forward toward them. When the immense tree stopped, Jurupa waved her hand. A soft emerald glowed from Jurupa’s hand as she waved it toward the tree. Wooden ledges, like stairs, spiraled up the side of the massive trunk as if they had grown there over the years.
“Climb,” Jurupa said, pointing.
Breanne looked down at the colorful herbs and crushed glass soaking into the soggy mud. Oh, Sarah! Oh, god, I’m sorry.
“Climb!” Jurupa ordered again.
Breanne and Gabi climbed up the enormous trunk until they reached the point where it split into many smaller branches.
Breanne paused, tilting her back to take in the stairs as they wound between the many branches, reaching higher and higher until finally disappearing completely into the canopy high above.
“Climb!” Jurupa ordered again, pressing her bow into Breanne’s back.
Breanne stumbled forward into Gabi, and they climbed for several minutes, making their way high into the center of the tree, the tall woman close behind.
We’re so high, Bre.
Don’t look down, Gabi. I’m right behind you. There were no railings on the narrow stairs, and they had to have climbed up way over a hundred feet. The warning was as much for herself as it was for Gabi – maybe more so since the tone of Gabi’s voice in her mind didn’t sound scared. The fearless girl sounded almost excited.
Soon they were standing atop a large platform made of tightly woven vines that stretched between El Tule’s many branches. The area was not much smaller than the hut they had sheltered in the night before. Peering out between El Tule’s leaves and branches, Breanne saw a view that stole her breath. They must be nearly two hundred feet off the ground. Way too far to jump. But the height wasn’t the cause of her gasp. All around them, trees moved. Hundreds of trees, maybe more, were walking with them.
