The Map Maker's Quest

by Matthew J. Krengel

  “It smells delicious,” Bella gushed. She accepted the small spoon Jacob had found. It was still almost half her height. “Maybe if you just get a little on the end and set it down. I don’t eat much.” They all laughed at that as Jacob blushed at the amount he had poured into her bowl.

  When they had finished eating and Jane and Jackie were cleaning up, Jacob walked from window to window checking for Adherents. By time the girls were done getting ready he had checked all four sides of the building. It all seemed clear, so they gathered at the front steps.

  “I didn’t see anyone,” Jacob said. It was less than two hundred yards to the lift bridge, and he pulled the straps of shield tight. “I’ll get there and cut the lock off. Then I’ll follow you guys up the ladder.”

  “Sounds fine,” Jane said. Together she, Jackie, and Bella huddled in the corner of the brick building and watched as Jacob started jogging towards the bridge. He made it there without any problems and so Jane picked up Bella who promptly faded from view, and she and Jackie started running.

  The ladder was enclosed in a steel cage and Jane started up after Jackie. Still the city remained quiet. It seemed the world was waiting and watching them, hoping for them to succeed. When they arrived at the top of the lift bridge, Jane looked out at the city before them and took a deep breath. Despite the destruction that had been rained across the waterfront area, the city looked to be in decent shape. The fires had died out during the night, and Jane only saw two buildings that looked like they had been thoroughly gutted by flames.

  “Look at this,” Jacob exclaimed. On the metal beam in from of them was a single hole drilled in the steel and caped at the bottom so that the staff would sit about the right height. The bottom of the staff had a groove cut in the wood and it would only fit into the slot in one direction. The lantern was flared out on the back and Uncle Ernie had bolted a holder to the back frame of the flat area atop the bridge.

  Jackie slipped the lantern into the holder and then flipped the top open. “We have to light the flame.” She turned the small dial on the bottom that would allow the oil to soak through the wick and turned to Jane. “Do you have a match?”

  “Let me,” Bella replied. She wove a small net over the wick and after a moment the oil soaked material burst into flame.

  Jane pulled the small glass shard from her pocket and slipped it into the holder on the end of the staff and stood back as Jackie closed the top on the lantern. For a few moments nothing happened but the flame in the lantern seemed to grow brighter and brighter. Then as they watched, a beam of light shot out of the lantern almost like a laser and entered the shard. The prism acted as a focus and in the half light of dawn the light traveled out across the city and struck the base of Enger Tower.

  “Should have guessed it,” Jacob burst out. “Enger Tower.”

  “Yeah, it doesn’t get more Duluth than that,” Jane agreed. “But there were a few structures that Uncle Ernie could have chosen so we had to be sure.” She reached up and flipped the lantern open and turned the oil off. Carefully she pulled the lantern from its perch and before anyone could stop her, heaved it out into the lake as far as she could.

  “What are you doing!” Jacob cried out. He grabbed at her arm but missed and could only watch as the brass and wood lantern struck the water and bobbed for a moment. After a couple of minutes it sank out of sight and was gone.

  “Making sure Cain can’t follow us,” Jane replied.

  “But . . .” Jacob stammered.

  “Let’s go. We need to get to the top of the hill,” Jane replied. “We need to steal a car if we can.”

  “Is it really stealing, I mean if the cars are abandoned anyway?” Jackie asked. She lowered her body into the metal cage around the ladder and started down. The street remained quiet for the entire jog back to the street, and they started searching for a car.

  “Nothing,” Jacob groaned. They had been walking carefully for about ten minutes and were already near Highway 35. Every car they spotted was either in too poor shape to drive or there was no sign of the keys. What made them even more nervous was the strange absence of any Adherents anywhere.

  “Where did they go?” Jane muttered. They kept jogging towards the distant image of Enger Tower atop the hill overlooking Duluth. They had not covered half of the distance and still there was an eerie silence hanging across the city. “Calm before the storm.”

  “Feels like it,” Jackie replied. She glanced around the corner of a small office building and saw the street was empty. She motioned them along.

  “I don’t like this waiting stuff,” Jacob muttered. He would have rather been forced to fight and run across the entire city.

  They climbed the hill and entered the woods on the edge of the park without seeing anyone. Even the animals were quiet and Jacob did not see a single bird or squirrel as they crept through the forest. When they finally arrived at Enger Tower the grass of the park was wet with dew, and the sun had just cleared the top of the trees. They were all breathing hard from the climb, and they stopped to examine the scene before them and catch their breath. It was a beautiful area of the city, numerous trees dotted the park, and flowers were landscaped about bringing dashes of color to the grounds.

  Jane and the others climbed over the stones and entered the tower, to her it looked like the laser light had struck the tower about half way up. On the third floor of the tower she circled the outside walkway and spotted the mark almost immediately.

  “Look,” Jane pointed. There was a stone in the middle of the wall that was marked with a small round circle. The light had struck it so powerfully, that the stone was permanently etched with a thick black burn.

  “Can we open it? Jackie asked. She slipped her fingers around the outside and noticed immediately that the mortar seemed softer than the other areas. “Here scrape the mortar out of the sides.” They all worked furiously until the stone was mostly clear and then Jane slid her fingers in and pulled. Slowly the stone began to give way. “Help me pull it out.”

  “One, two, three, pull!” Jackie said. Together they pulled as hard as they could and slowly the small stone slipped free of its spot and fell to the concrete floor. “What’s inside?”

  Jane reached into the opening and pulled out a bundle wrapped in leather and clear plastic. The layers were so thick on it that the contents were almost unrecognizable. With shaking hands, Jane started unwrapping the package.

  “What does it say?” Jacob asked. He stood ready with his back against the tower. Something felt wrong, and he could not say what but his brain was screaming warnings at him. “Better yet, let’s go downstairs and unwrap it. They reached the bottom and stepped out onto the stones. Slowly Jane pulled away the layers as the others looked on.

  Jacob kept a close eye around them, and suddenly spotted a dark figure moving through the trees. Jacob cried out a warning. The missing Adherents were here and moving towards them.

  Jane grabbed up the book, which was now only wrapped in one or two layers of packing material, and they dove back to the top step. The door was open and they jumped inside the main floor of the tower.

  “I think we have a problem,” Jacob muttered. He was standing next to the wall watching the park grounds out a narrow window. The single dark figure had grown from one to many, and now dozens of Adherents were emerging from the forest in a long line that stretched out as far in each direction as he could see. They were surrounded, cut off from any hope of help.

  * * * * *

  Cain motioned his men forward and a smile filled his face. They had waited for hours. When the beam of light briefly illuminated the sky, he had almost cheered. They had found the hiding place for the Golden Book, and he would let them retrieve it. Then he would take it from them and throw the lot of them in the deepest dungeon he could find.

  “Go,” Cain ordered his commander. “Make sure the entir
e area is surrounded.”

  “It’ll take every man we have to encircle the tower and the grassy area.”

  “I don’t care,” Cain replied. “This side is pathetic. The people are too busy running to worry about what we’re doing. By the time their military is able to respond, we will be back on board the Goliath and back to our side of the Divide.”

  He knew it was risky splitting his reduced force, but it could not be helped until the forces from Palisade head returned. With almost five hundred here, he had a third of his force guarding the approaches to the harbor and another third held in reserve still on board the ships. Already his hand-picked soldiers were on the way into the lands around Duluth on this side. They would scout the lands and build an accurate map of the area so when he returned his forces would sweep through any resistance.

  “Bring the two prisoners forward,” Cain ordered. He watched as his men led the two women up to where he was standing. “Order your men forward. I want this noose closed tightly.” There was a scramble of movement, and the Adherents fanned out, racing to make sure all the escape routes were blocked. When all was in place, he motioned his small escort forward, and they started towards the stone tower. It was time to end this game, as fun as it had been. He was ready to crush this rebellion.

  * * * * *

  “They have mom!” Jane cried out suddenly. She saw two tiny figures emerge from the scramble of activity and start towards them. “What do we do?”

  “We make the trade,” Jacob replied sullenly.

  “But he wins then,” Jackie retorted. It tore at her heart to see her mom held captive, but she wanted desperately to find a way around giving in to Cain’s demands but . . . there was nothing.

  “But . . .” Jacob started.

  “I know!” Jackie shouted. She stamped her foot. “I know! I spent a year of my life in his dungeon. I won’t sentence my own mother to the same thing. I am just saying . . . then Cain wins.”

  Jane finished pulling the wrapping off the book and her hands passed over it reverently. The words swam in her vision for a moment almost like the book was aligning itself for her to read. She turned over the first page and read the same inscription her grandfather had read all those years ago. The weight of what this book held hit her like a sledge hammer and she gasped.

  “Do you know what this contains?” Jane asked quietly.

  They all read the front cover and their faces paled. The mysteries that they could solve if they were given some time, and they had this one moment.

  “You’re going to give it to him?” Bella asked suddenly. She had silently slipped from Jane’s shoulder and was standing on the ground near the door.

  “We don’t have any choice,” Jacob replied. “That is my mom out there.”

  “A lot of us have lost family,” Bella replied. “And we were told we needed to press on and resist. Why are you different than the rest of us?”

  Jane and Jacob stared at each other as they tried to find an explanation to justify the trade. They couldn’t but neither could they see a way around it. Suddenly Jacob grabbed the book and strode to the door. He pulled it open and stepped on the stairs and was walked down to where Cain was standing.

  “Jacob!” Jane started. She wracked her mind trying to find a way around what he was going to do.

  “I gave up most of my family to try and stop him,” Bella said. “And not just for a year. My parents were taken almost fifteen years ago. They’re locked in a gilded cage in Cain’s capitol city.” Suddenly Bella vanished from sight and slipped out of the tower looking at the meeting about to take place.

  “Give me the book!” Cain demanded. He motioned his soldiers forward, and they pushed the two women to their knees and leveled their weapons at their heads. “You know what my new muskets can do. These are not set to stun.”

  “Stop!” Jacob shouted back. “Take your stupid book. Let them go and you can have it.” He held it out for Cain to see and then tossed it on the ground half way in between them.

  “Get the book,” Cain ordered. One of his men rushed forward and reached out to grab at the book. Oddly the man seemed to pause just for a second as the material under his hand seemed to elude his grasp. “Hurry up!” Cain shouted.

  The man shook his head and grabbed the volume, and then he rushed back to where the dwarf was waiting and held out the book and waited for Cain to take it.

  “It’s mine,” Cain laughed. He smiled broadly. The words swam in his vision for a moment and then appeared in ancient dwarven runes. A leather latch held the cover shut, but rather than open it here he tucked it under his arm. “Shoot them, get rid of them all and let’s go back to our side. We have what we came for.”

  “You promised!” Jacob shouted angrily. He struggled to align his shield with the muskets and repeaters pointed at them and finally gave up. No matter which side he faced dozens more Adherents had open shots.

  “A wolf does not promise a sheep not to eat him,” Cain said calmly. “You are not even worth my time.”

  Jacob watched and fumed as the leader of the Adherents turned and started across the grassy park. He pulled the book from under his arm and seemed to working with the latch. Then Jacob lost sight of him as the Adherents gathered around them.

  “Mom, are you all right?” Jacob asked. The two women were roughly shoved forward, and Jacob’s sword and shield was tossed onto the ground. His mother stumbled over to him and buried her face in his shoulder as Jane removed the ropes from around her wrists.

  “I’ll be fine, Jacob.”

  “Mom,” Jane said sheepishly. Jackie was pulling the ropes off her mom’s wrists and gave her a warm hug. “Sorry we couldn’t get to you earlier.”

  “It’s all right dear,” Mrs. Timbrill replied with tears in her eyes. “I’m just glad I got to see you one last time.”

  The Adherents shoved them all roughly against the stones that made up the base of Enger Tower and made them stand in a line. A line of twelve black-robed figures stood about fifty feet from them and held their weapons ready. When the commanding officer of the force had everything prepared exactly the way he wanted it, he barked out his order.

  “Attention!”

  The line of soldiers snapped to attention and shouldered their weapons.

  “Take aim!”

  Jacob grabbed Jane’s hand as the weapons came level and turned to face her. The world seemed to slow down around them as he looked into her eyes and spoke.

  “I know you haven’t been happy with me about Flying Cloud and I’m sorry about that. I just wish I’d have had time to make it up to you because I really wanted to. After all we’ve been through over the last few days I think I’m starting to fall in love with you.”

  Jane could no longer stop the tears that slipped from her eyes and she reached up and wrapped her arms around his neck. They shared a tentative kiss and then clung to each other as the repeaters came down and the oversized barrels suddenly looked many times larger.

  “Sir!”

  Jacob heard a shout from the north, and there was a nervous rustling among the firing squad. Several of the barrels shifted as many sets of eyes turned and followed the sound of the shouts.

  Suddenly a thick vine snaked out of the ground and wrapped around one of the soldier’s feet. He cried out as he was yanked to the ground. He struggled as the vines pulled him towards the forest. Two of the soldiers on either side jumped out of the firing line. They ran after him and used their belt knives to hack at the vine until it released its grip and vanished into the ground.

  “What’s going on?” the commander of the force shouted.

  “Goblins, sire,” a panting soldier shouted. “And rebels, thousands of them.”

  “Impossible,” the commander shouted back. “They were pinned down at Palisade Head by our superior force.” He brushed aside the sco
ut and started towards the north tree line. “Watch them until I return.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Here Comes the Cavalry

  Eriunia was panting from the run when they arrived at the hill overlooking Duluth. The city of this side of the Divide was a small shadow of the other side. The elves had ways of watching what happened in both worlds around them, and Eriunia knew what she was looking for.

  “Secure the hilltop and make sure the Adherents are dealt with,” Eriunia ordered. “I’ll need some time to prepare.” The run to Duluth had taken nearly three hours, and she needed the rebels to eat and rest. “We’ll be ready to move by morning.”

  Carvin nodded.

  Eriunia watched him go and knew her orders would be carried out. Already a few shouts of alarm rang out from those few Adherents left to watch the city. Instead Eriunia turned and began working her way along the top of the hillside. She knew Tasker’s workshop was still here, and she knew she could find it given the time. Among the items he had hidden, was a copy of the device used to create the Divide. Well, not a copy, she corrected in her mind. He had help create the machine that made and powered the Divide. The original device was here in Duluth, but it was hidden deep within the tunnels that pierced the earth.

  After an hour of searching she felt she was getting closer, but Tasker had hidden the workshop well, and she had only an hour before dawn. The rebels were mostly asleep except for the hundred or so going to remain behind to secure Duluth and arrange for an escape in case their plan failed. The shouts from the city had faded and she assumed that the rebels had made short work of the few defenders.

  Eriunia was walking slowly near the burned ruins of a small cottage, when her keen vision caught the outlines of a door concealed by dwarfen skill and a small bit of magic. She stopped immediately and stepped closer to the portal. Carefully she traced her delicate fingers along the edge of the door until she had traced the entire outline. Softly the line in the stone wall began to glow, and bits of dirt and leaves that had collected in the gaps fell free. She knew dwarves could use magic to seal doors they wished to remain hidden but elves were masters of undoing magic.