‘What? Well, she is not going to stay like that eh?’ Quixote replied.
Quixote could see they did not understand what he meant.
‘No problem,’ he said. ‘I’ll dash back and get a doctor’s costume.’ He bent down, took his boots off and pulled some green shaped shoes out of his pockets, and put them on his feet.
Ari knelt and felt them, fascinated by the small wings hanging off the back them.
‘What are they?’
‘Speed wings I think.’
With a flutter and hiss he vanished into thin air only to reappear seconds later holding a stethoscope, a white gown and an old fashion doctors head-light, plus a small leather bag. He handed them to Melaleuca, though she stared at him, none too impressed.
‘The unknown-age costumes?’
‘Yeah. Well, you see, I found them, before the lightening costume the other night, and well, was gonna say something, but you didn’t seem happy, and then Lex, well, you know, the little earthquake.’
He shrugged his shoulder and gave her one of his, I-can’t-be-blamed looks.
‘You really must tell Lexington all the costumes you have found and what they do. Those could have been really useful today.’
‘Oh they have been.’
Melaleuca ignored his comment, and along with Lexington concerned herself with the injured girl, though Ari picked up on what he meant.
‘You killed Lexington’s pigeon, didn’t you?’ he said.
Quixote nodded.
Kitted in the doctor’s outfit, Melaleuca bent over the girl examining her. She heard Quixote own up to the pigeon death, but had to ignore it.
She placed her hands on the girl’s body and straight away the costume took over. She poked and prodded her and then fished around in the medicine kit, removed the girl’s crusted blood and sowed her wounds together. She produced some surgical looking tools, and operated lightening quick on her shattered bones.
‘We have to cover her eyes!’ Ari said. ‘In case she recognises us.’
Quixote grabbed a bandage out of the medical kit and wrapped it around her eyes. As she came to, Lexington cheered up.
‘Where am I?’ asked the girl.
‘Safe,’ Lexington replied.
It did little to reassure her.
‘W..w...who is that?’
‘A friend.’
‘Friend? What’s that?’ she said, trying to pull the bandage off her eyes.
Ari took her hands away from it, though she recoiled.
‘Who are you?’ She felt her body and her face. ‘My head. My body. What happened?’
She jumped up, darting her head about like a frightened mouse.
‘This is the wasteland isn’t it?’
Ari came up behind her, grabbing her.
‘No one will hurt you? I will take your blind fold off and you can see for yourself.’
He motioned for the others to get out of the way, though Melaleuca stayed. With the bracelet on she would appear as a doctor. Ari pulled the blind up and the girl looked at Melaleuca.
‘See,’ Melaleuca said, ‘you are in the forest, not the wastelands. We healed you.’
The girl burst into tears sobbing that she wanted to go home.
‘We can take you home, but you must promise to tell no one about us,’ Melaleuca said.
‘I should have died. I wanted to die. I could not take it. I cannot take it. What will happen when I go back? How will I explain this? They will beat me again.’
She sobbed some more.
All at once it dawned on them, if they took her back there would be little to stop Task-Matron Bircher or someone else beating her again if she could not cope.
‘We have to hide her,’ Lexington said. ‘We can’t let her go back.’
‘I want to go home.’
Melaleuca, Ari and Quixote discussed the girl’s fate while Lexington tried to comfort her from behind.
‘What’s your name?’ Lexington asked.
Sobbing, she replied, ‘Bleph.’
‘What does it mean?’
‘It’s the noise a coward duck makes. That’s me a coward duck,’ she said with another burst of tears.
She tried comforting Bleph by placing her hand on her back.
‘Oh. Oh dear. Even I have to work at being brave.’
Melaleuca, Ari and Quixote fell silent, a decision having been made and turned to Lexington.
Bleph shook, cold and afraid, and as Lexington rubbed her back, her cousin’s quietness drew her attention. At once she saw in their faces they had decided to take her back and not hide her.
‘There must be something we can do.’
‘You are right,’ Melaleuca said.
Lexington relaxed hearing this.
‘You have been right all along. We need to wait until we know what we are dealing with. This girl ─ ’
‘Bleph. Her name is Bleph.’
‘....Bleph must go home. As you have said all along we do not know what we are dealing with.’
Lexington’s own logic caught her out and she felt torn between her gentle desire to save Bleph and the need to have all the facts before her.
‘But what will happen to her?’ Lexington asked.
‘That’s just it isn’t it. We don’t really know.’
‘It will be something horrid I bet.’
‘This decision is mine Lexington.’
‘If we take her back then... then...we should never have brought her here in the first place. This is cruel, fixing her up only to put her back in that brutal place.’
Melaleuca could now see sense in Task-Matron Bircher’s words about learning to watch others suffer, as this inability in Lexington now blinded her.
Trust, trust, trust. Trust beyond feelings and beyond emotion.
‘She must go back, Lex.’
‘Then I shall escort her back.’
‘Then we’ll all go with you.’
Wearing only their Vahn uniforms, they walked back down the forested hill toward New Wakefield, Ari and Lexington leading Bleph by her hand, blindfolded again.
As they entered the town, an eerie silence hung over it and the roads now lay damp. An unrecognisable, older teenager lay semi-conscious against a fence moaning, with his skin hanging off his face.
Ari stepped closer, peering at his disfigured flesh.
‘It’s a steam burn. Remember when Quixote tried to jump that geyser? It looks the same. And look! Steam vents.’
From tiny cracks all around the roads steam poured out in spent wisps.
Melaleuca and Lexington crouched in front of Bleph.
‘Bleph,’ Lexington said. ‘We are going to leave you here. Count to twenty then take your bandage off and go home.’
She bawled in reply.
Lexington stood and glared at Melaleuca; eyes accusing her. ‘You tell her to go. I won’t.’
Melaleuca nudged Bleph away from her.
‘Go now Bleph.’
Bleph cried and shuffled away. Melaleuca stood, refusing to catch Lexington’s eyes.
Ari leant closer to the burnt teenager.
‘It’s Gregand. We can help him!’
‘Leave him,’ Melaleuca said. ‘For all we know, the steam vent may be turned on again.’
Melaleuca urged the others to follow her back out of town, though Quixote pulled the winged shoes on again. He jogged past them, yelling out he was going to watch what happened to Bleph. Before any of them could yell back, he disappeared.
***
After learning that a town meeting had been called, Aunty Gertrude rushed to the Vahn, storming her way past the sentry on the western side, ignoring him, and marching into the large meeting hall brimming with people inside.
On a stage sat three doddery-looking Overlords with two empty chairs either side. White, wispy hair cascaded down from their pink scabby heads, past their ancient looking faces.
‘...without a doubt the scourge of the Marauders is back,’ said High Overlord Sector, with a sombre
voice.
Overlord Thgact, dosed off to sleep, and beside him with beady eyes sat Overlord Collectabulus.
Seeing them, Aunty Gertrude’s anger abated, and with demure steps she walked down a small set of stairs leading into the hall.
Overlord Collectabulus squinted at Aunty Gertrude.
‘Eh? Who is that? Who’s there? Approach.’
‘Forgive my lateness, Overlords, I was not aware that such as your greatness would be in attendance.’
‘You are recognised, join the others.’
She sat in the second of row of seats behind Sah Task-Master Carrion, Captain HeGood, Harshon, Task-Matron Bircher, and Sah Task-Master Keen. Behind her a multitude of people sat gathered from the town and the surrounding countryside.
‘What are we to do about these Marauders, then, eh?’ High Overlord Sector continued.
Captain HeGood stood, decked out in his finest regalia.
‘I will turn New Wakefield upside down until I root them out.’
‘Why not just do what you did last time,’ someone shouted from behind him.
Captain HeGood whirled around.
‘Different times need different methods. I believe these Marauders have infiltrated us. Perhaps some of you here are now hiding them.’
Murmuring rippled through the audience.
A large man stood.
‘It’s those outsider kids. I hear the stories of how they are behaving. These Marauders are the spirits of our deceased Discipliners coming back to warn us to stop being soft, like last time.’
Yelling and shouting started, though none could be heard.
‘The superstitions of the past have no consideration in this matter,’ Captain HeGood yelled. ‘Force and might will out in the end.’
Aunty Gertrude thrust herself to her feet.
‘Those children merely suffer from a lack of discipline. They have no power to conjure up demons of the past.’
High Overlord Sector banged hard on his table with a wooden hammer, waking up the sleeping Overlord Thgact.
‘Enough.’
He directed his gaze on Aunty Gertrude.
‘Can you explain the very nature of these children?’
‘Oh...heh...Ahem....Exactly what would your Overlords like to know?’
He opened his red-rimmed eyelids wide, staring at her with his pale blue eyes.
‘It is said they are not responding to discipline.’
‘My Lord, these children, they have many years of silliness to remove.’
‘A damn good week’s worth of flogging will do it,’ someone else yelled out, to which the High Overlord Sector banged his hammer again.
Aunty Gertrude shrugged her shoulders.
‘They must be taken care of before the High Thistle ceremony,’ another person yelled out.
‘And the Marauders.’
More talking started again, earning another banging from the High Overlord Sector’s hammer.
‘Captain HeGood. You have the confidence of the Overlords to weed out the Marauders. Do we have your assurance?’
Captain HeGood snapped to attention.
‘As ever.’
The large wooden doors to the meeting room opened and Daquan and Quesob strode in. A quiet voice protested they were not allowed in.
‘The children are to be tribulated a week from now,’ High Overlord Sector said. ‘If they fail, they will be sent to the Southern Wastelands.’
Both Harshon and Aunty Gertrude leapt to their feet, almost saying the same thing. ‘My Lord our ways state that in a failure at this place they are to be sent to the borstal.’
They stared at each other, surprised both wanted the same outcome.
Overlord Collectabulus thumped the table.
‘Today saw lawlessness destabilise us nearly to the level of thirty years ago. The decision stands.’
Daquan stepped forward, shouting, ‘The children stay!’
He walked down the steps, looking with disdain over the eyes following him.
High Overlord Sector struggled to his feet.
‘You are not welcome here!’
‘It matters not, for I am claiming my birth right under the old lore.’
‘We will not allow it!’
The crowd gabbled, and opinions and stories were exchanged about the legendary Daquan, the only man in living history to come back from the Southern Wasteland after years in exile.
He walked up the steps and stood on the Overlord’s stage shocking them.
High Overlord Sector shook his fist at him.
‘You are tainted.’
‘Maybe. But I doubt for all our ways, there are any here that aren’t.’
High Overlord Sector banged his fists together.
‘You shall not pass.’
Daquan pushed him back in to his seat and placed his foot on his chest. He pointed at the napping Overlord Thgact.
‘The occupant of the Chair of Phroshakt, sleeping.’
He pointed at Overlord Collectabulus.
‘The Chair of Pollovish, deaf and stupid.’
He pointed at High Overlord Sector, shoving him with his foot.
‘And the occupier of the Chair of Bhramzeu. At death’s door......Now...I demand my birthright.’
High Overlord Sector tried to push his foot off him, but his strength had left him years ago.
‘WE APPOINT THE OVERLORDS!’
Daquan knelt before him, and spoke so that only the Overlords could hear him.
‘I know what hides in the hills of the Southern Wasteland. I command the Ori. With one word, I will ransack Agorrah.’
Daquan stood to his feet, flinging his arms out in a wide gesture.
‘I claim this empty chair, the Chair of Ramathor in the name of my father, Past High Overlord Gamalang, who once occupied it and bequeathed it to me.’
Stunned inward breath-held silence greeted him, and then a slow foment of murmuring followed. High Overlord Sector stood and whispered to the other Overlords for several minutes, while the murmuring simmered into shouting, boos and threats against Daquan. Daquan ignored the insults, snarling back and pulling faces at them, and pretending to yawn and gesturing for the Overlords to hurry up.
The Overlords fell silent, and despite the evident hatred on their face toward Daquan, an air of being bested clung to them.
Finally High Overlord Sector wobbled upright, announcing with resignation that the council of Overlords accepted his appointment to which the audience erupted into shouting and yelling.
‘What is your first command?’ High Overlord Sector asked, amidst the din.
‘The children stay,’ he said ignoring the boos and hisses.
‘ENOUGH!’ High Overlord Sector shouted, coughing with the strain. ‘They will still be tribulated, but stay regardless of the outcome.’
‘No tribulation either!’
Once again protests and yelling erupted, though the High Overlords stood, and silence fell. They shuffled out, saying no more.
After the meeting cleared, Sah Task-Master Carrion, Master Saurian and Captain HeGood hung back discussing what had just happened.
Master Saurian cracked his fingers.
‘I don’t like what Daquan is up to.’
‘Highly irregular,’ Captain HeGood said.
‘Not to worry. All things work together for the greater good. We have dealt with worse than these kids,’ Sah Task-Master Carrion said.
‘You have an idea?’ Master Saurian asked.
‘We shall give the Overlords what they requested, and especially our latest Overlord.’ He cackled. ‘We shall embrace them and simply put them out the front of other students and ask them to lead. They will crumble of their own accord.’
Both Captain HeGood and Master Saurian urged Sah Task-Master Carrion to tell them how that would happen.
He bent close to them and whispered it.
***
Argus stood before the Harbinger, seething with fury. ‘You knew about the gold!’
&nbs
p; ‘It’s a good thing you weren’t seen waltzing in here,’ the Harbinger said, gazing out the window. ‘Stay here. No one comes to the Northwest wing anymore.’
‘The gold! There’s no way out. You sent me there to see the gold.’
The Harbinger shook his head.
‘You wanted to go. Anyway, only one thing that would speak to you. Gold. Disappointing but true.’
‘So I go to the Ori, you protect the kids and I get the gold.’
‘It’s now not that simple......Perhaps if you had been here, they would have stayed hidden.
‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning that instead of being here playing and learning to use the costumes and preserving their fresh innocence, they are out there.’
The Harbinger pointed to the door.
‘Where exactly?’
‘They have been sent to the Vahn. All of New Wakefield knows they are here.’
‘And that is...’
The Harbinger threw his arms up in frustration.
‘A hideous school of brutality.’
‘And those costumes and bracelets?’
‘Still hidden, though...though they used them already. Attacked some of the people here.’
Argus smiled at this idea.
‘Good. That’s the idea isn’t it? This is after all a revenge plot.’
‘What?’
‘In my line of work there are only two reasons to hire me, revenge or power. Myself, I have scores to settle back in the real world. Revenge you see.’
The Harbinger shook his head again not believing what he heard.
‘I’m suddenly not sure I want your help anymore.’
‘Why? Because I’m straight up about wanting the gold?’
‘No. Because you don’t get it! Each time force is used innocence is lost. That’s the key, defeating your enemy without force.’
‘You are right. I don’t get it.’
‘Pity. We seem to be out of time. As it is, the children need help and guidance. And we are the only two who can provide it. It must be done carefully though, they must still work it out for themselves. Come, I must now reveal myself to them.’
***
Quixote arrived back in the attic and found the others writing on Lexington’s paper sheets.
‘Well?’ Melaleuca asked.
Vahn and the Bold Extraction, The Page 10
