A Hero's Curse

by P. S. Broaddus

  I choke as it shakes me up and down in the water. It must have my pack in its teeth. It turns out the rock basilisk isn’t big. It’s huge. Then it is dragging me back out, fast. Too fast. My left arm catches on a jagged edge of lava, and I stop short, searing pain running up through my body. My whole right side is yanked around and the pack is torn off my shoulder. The rock basilisk gives the pack a vicious tug, and I spin back into the pool.

  The water in front of me has turned into a thrashing whirlpool. I push along the wall again, half swimming, half kicking, scrambling back into the crack, and I feel the wall close in around me, but this time I claw my way forward for several steps, my pack dragging behind on my left arm.

  Whack! I grab my head with both hands and feel the stinging pain shoot through my body. I feel sick. I smell blood. I hear scrabbling above me and another screech from only a few steps away, but coming from above me, on top of the lava flow. I bite my tongue because the noise hurts my head so much. One hand to my head, I feel my way forward. Rock. My hand finds a tiny opening between the water and the lava. I push my foot forward and find that the opening extends to the floor.

  Not risking cracking my head open again, I submerge and swim against the current. The water is moving faster now, and it is natural movement, flowing past me as I grab the rock sides and pull myself forward. I go as far as I think I can go, holding my breath, my head throbbing angrily, my pack still dragging my arm backward and catching on snags. My lungs feel like they are going to explode. I gently move my hands upward to see if there is room. They break surface. I push my face out of the water and gulp in the air, stooping a little, both hands held protectively above my head.

  “Not bad for a blind girl,” says Tig.

  I jump and utter a little scream. He is right in front of me.

  “It can’t follow us in here. That tunnel is too narrow for a rock basilisk,” he explains.

  All my tension melts out of me, and I start to laugh and sob at the same time. Still chest deep in water, I reach out to find Tig. He is dripping wet, sitting on a shelf of rock that is as smooth as Mom’s red silk dress.

  I flounder forward and for a long time I stand in the water, slumped over the smooth rock and holding Tig. The pain in my arm is cooling, but my head still throbs angrily. I think of the red dress instead of the pain. I think of the way the deep red has its own inner fire. The dress seems to glow and the rest of the world is lit by its brilliant radiance. It’s my dress. I am wearing the dress, and I don’t have to be afraid anymore. In my imagination I’m laughing, but I’m looking away; I can’t see my own face. My mind doesn’t know what to insert for a face. I shake my head bitterly and push the whole scene away. I immediately regret shaking my head. My hand drops to my pocket and hunts the piece of silk. There it is. The trembling stops. It is as smooth as ever, even soaked. The pain in my arm levels off for a few moments, but then as the excitement fades the white hot fire crawls from my arm into my shoulder and chest. My breath comes in short gasps, and I can’t think of anything except how badly it hurts. Tig has trained me to ignore hunger or cold or sleeplessness, but this is too much. My pain is the only reality.

  Tig hisses at me, and I catch myself. I pull in a long deep breath, whimpering as the water laps around my shoulder.

  “Where are we?” I mumble, just taking note of the soft whispering echo that has been playing around us.

  “The Valley of Fire,” says Tig wetly. “Or under the Valley of Fire,” he corrects himself. “Drowning in the Valley of Fire during a drought. That would have been ironic.”

  My mouth twitches in spite of everything. “True.”

  After a pause he continues, “It looks like we’re in some kind of cave.” I can feel him looking around, craning his neck in different directions to get a good picture of where we are.

  “This is a pretty extensive pool. This room would probably be full when it’s raining,” he finishes.

  “I feel a current. Can you see where it is coming from?”

  Tig gets up from between my arms, and I hear him squish off a few steps. I almost panic again. I bite my tongue to keep from yelling, to keep from asking him to come back.

  “It looks like the river has carved out a tunnel,” says Tig. “It runs straight back under the rock.” He pads back over to me. I hear him start licking the water out of his coat with his rough sandpaper tongue. A vigorous operation.

  I feel the ledge. “Is this a good place to get out of the water?”

  “Sorry!” says Tig, and I hear that he means it. “I’m so—well, it’s just that when I get wet—” He is flustered. Then he’s quiet for a second. “I’m sorry I left you.”

  “I know. It’s okay.”

  He recovers quickly. “Over here, to your left,” he says. I move to my left, hanging on to the shelf, which is about chin high. “Right there.”

  I put both hands on the edge and am about to heave, when I think again about my throbbing head. “Nothing above me?”

  “Nothing,” says Tig.

  I heave and pull myself up on the shelf. My hands scream—I didn’t realize how torn they had gotten on the lava rock outside. The moment I drag myself away from the water I gasp and grit my teeth. The air hitting my arm reminds me of how bad it must be. Gritting my teeth makes my head split open again. I groan and pull myself into a ball, cradling my torn arm. Tig nuzzles my arm, but I jerk away.

  “Give me a minute,” I gasp. Tig sits down next to my head, and I hear him continue to dry himself, rasping with his tongue. He leans over and gives me a lick on the ear, and then he is back to washing. I try to play a game of finding somewhere on my body that feels okay not wet, or stinging, or throbbing.

  I sit in the dark and listen to Tig’s dry, scraping, coat washing. I wish I could just lick myself dry. I wish I could be a cat and see in the dark. I wish I could see anything at all. I wish, in the shadow of my mind, I could imagine having a face; but I am not of this world of color. It has been a long day, and before I can find a piece of me that is not hurting I drift into dark dreams of rebellions and fire and faceless dancers and a dress I can never wear.

  Chapter 7

  It is my strongest memory from before I lost my sight, and the one memory that keeps me anchored to this world of color: that elegant red dress. My mother is in the memory. I can see her profile; she’s beautiful wearing the dress with her sleek brown hair pulled back in an ornate braid. They say my hair is the same chestnut brown. She’s standing with a tall burly man who has short glossy hair, almost black in my memory. He is facing away from me. In my memory he leans in to whisper something to my mother, and I catch the murmur of his deep voice as she laughs. That’s my dad’s voice. Mom brings a white, gloved hand to her mouth. She turns and looks at me. Her eyes sparkle from the bright lights high above, and she blows me a kiss with the soft white glove.

  There are many other colors that swirl and mix with the sounds and people flowing through the blurred background of my memory, but the red dress drowns them all with its intensity.

  I love to sit and think about that memory. If I concentrate on the red dress I can see the silk the dress is made of, the jewels sewn into the fabric. If I concentrate on the background sometimes the people and colors become a little clearer. I might catch some detail in the memory I hadn’t noticed before. Mom tells me I’m lucky the image I can remember is one so beautiful, and I suppose it’s true. But I would take any memory to keep me tied to the world of color.

  I wake with a start. I must have bumped my arm in my sleep because the searing pain jerks me out of darkness into darkness. Sleeping has not helped. I feel worse than I did before. I groan.

  As I try to move Tig’s whiskers brush my face. “I wondered if you were going to wake up. We’ve been here for about six hours.”

  I only half hear him. I am trying to will myself into a sitting position, but my bad arm refuses to obey commands. It hurts with every motion. I whimper again and try to cradle my arm. I scream when I touch it. I feel
crusty blood down my whole left side. Tig puts a paw on my good shoulder as the echoes of my scream bounce around the room. I think of the rock basilisks again. They would have gotten us hours ago if they could get in here.

  “That good?” asks Tig.

  “I can’t move it,” I say. Tig comes around my side. I can feel him very close to my arm. I’m shaking again. At least I’m mostly dry. Still damp underneath. He brushes his whiskers on my arm, and I jump.

  “Easy, Ess,” he says. “I won’t kid you. It’s bad.” His tone is serious, with none of the usual dry humor left. “You’re going to have to move it, though. We have to try to get out.”

  I clench my teeth and nod. I turn and gingerly lift my arm. The burning sensation runs up the arm and into my head as I dip my fingertips into the water. New levels of pain shoot up the arm. I pull the arm back like it was bitten. I rock back and forth for a second, and then I try to sprinkle a few drops of water on the cut with my good hand. I yell again, and I feel my eyes watering from the pain.

  “It hurts to put it in the water, Tig.” I’m almost hysterical again. “I can’t do it.”

  “No problem,” says Tig. “Maybe there’s another way out. Those rock basilisks are probably waiting out there anyway.” I can tell he is trying anything to get me to move. We have to move or we’ll die. He’s saving us. That and he hates water.

  I struggle to my feet. “Which way?” I am afraid to move, because I don’t have my stick, and I don’t want to fall into the pool. I can hear it running gently behind me, but the echoes throw weird sounds around the room, disorienting me. I feel Tig pad over, and his tail brushes my leg.

  “Two steps forward, then two steps right,” says Tig. “And then just follow me.” I put out a hesitant foot and feel my way across the smooth floor. My foot bumps my pack, so I stoop and grab it with my good hand. The rock is rippled, as if it had been a gently flowing river that hardened overnight. I feel a cramp in my stomach. I try not to think about how long it’s been since we ate. My feet do their work, and I find my way back to Tig’s waving tail. I lurch once, bumping my arm against my side, and I feel a wave of nausea wash over me.

  “Good,” says Tig. “We’re at the mouth of the river tunnel. I suggest we try to find if it goes anywhere else, maybe another exit that feeds the Mar.”

  I give him a halfhearted “Okay,” and we start off. Some piece of my self-preservation insists Tig is right—we do need to move—but we have nothing to return to. No plan. No hope. Just keep moving. I know the hunt. I know that there is a moment when the prey gives up, lays down to die. Not yet.

  Tig occasionally lets me know if there is a change, a dip or low ceiling, but the going is mostly smooth and feels almost level. It must be slightly uphill due to the water gurgling past.

  We stop and drink after a little while, and the water is fresh and cool, but has a rusty taste—the lava.

  “Maybe I can see now,” I say after a long stretch of silence. My feet pick their way along the smooth rolling lava floor.

  “Maybe I can see whenever it’s dark. My eyes just can’t stand the light.” I’m holding my arm at an angle, bent at the elbow. It throbs too painfully to let it hang. I still won’t let it touch my body.

  “Maybe,” says Tig. “How many paw-fingers am I holding up?” I aim a smack at him with my good arm.

  “It’s not completely dark anyway. Even I can’t see in that. There are some glow worms on the ceiling—not a lot, but enough.”

  After another stretch the throbbing in my arm spreads into my whole side. “How much farther, Tig?”

  “How far can you go?” His question doesn’t scare me. He has just said aloud what I already know. We aren’t looking for a way out. We’re wandering until we can’t go any farther.

  It’s getting close for me. My pack dangles uselessly, bumping the tunnel floor with a regular rhythm. The irony of the idea of the darkness consuming me, swallowing me, is not lost. I hate the idea. It keeps me walking.

  My thoughts try to escape the dull shuffle of my feet and the gurgle of water by reaching out to my family. Where are they now? Are they safe? Is the revolt in progress? Did Uncle Cagney escape? Will Mom try to come back to the farm? Will she be caught? I let the questions tumble through my mind like a noisy stream over rocks. I welcome the noise. I don’t try to catch the thoughts, analyze them, and answer them like I usually would. I let them run, and they carry a part of my pain away.

  Dad. An often repeated memory jumps out of the flow, and my mind focuses. The memory is recent. Within the past year—last winter—there was a fire in the hearth. I can hear the cracks and pops from the wood burning and the sharp, sweet smell of cindertree in the house.

  I’m in my room, supposedly asleep—but I can’t sleep. Dad is talking, his low voice rumbling out of our kitchen and into my corner bedroom.

  “We’ve said before that we shouldn’t talk about it with her.” I immediately prick my ears and strain to hear more.

  I hear Mom sigh. “We said we shouldn’t talk about it then. Now is different. Things are moving, picking up pace.” There’s a pause long enough for me to wonder if I have fallen asleep accidentally. I am listening so hard, her voice, not loud, makes me jump. “How will we explain it then? Eventually they’ll ask us to be involved, and what will we say? Will we take her with us? Where will she be safe? You can’t wait until it’s all over to tell her.”

  “Why not?” Dad’s voice is low and earnest.

  “Listen to yourself!” Mom’s voice has risen, and I can imagine Dad making some hushing motion. She drops her voice to a whisper, and I have to lift my head to catch the next words.

  “You act like you’re afraid of her, instead of afraid for her.” There is question and accusation in Mom’s voice. There is silence for a few moments. My head is spinning. I thought they were talking about me until that comment. Afraid of her? Did she mean he is afraid of me?

  “Besides, who knows how long it will last,” Mom says. “It could be months.”

  Dad lets out a deep sigh and one of them, probably Dad, starts tapping the table nervously. “Not until it’s started,” he says. “She can’t know until it’s already begun.”

  The memory fades back into the fast moving stream, but I wonder about it again. I’ve thought about it many times since. I’m pretty sure they were talking about me. Pretty sure. Some things seem to fit perfectly. “She.” Sounds like me. “Keep her safe.” Sounds like me. “Shouldn’t talk about it with her.” Of course they wouldn’t want to tell me about things, they never do—to keep me safe, to keep me from worrying, or a hundred reasons. My family has a lot of secrets.

  “You’re afraid of her.” These words keep playing back in my mind but I can’t get the pieces to fit. That doesn’t sound like me—at least, I don’t want it to. I never shared what I heard with Tig. I think it is because I feel it is deeply important, and I don’t want him to make it less important with his sarcasm. So I have kept it to myself and wondered. Today’s events put the memory in a new light. They might have been discussing the rebellion. A new weight that has nothing to do with my hurts or my pack settles in my stomach. Dad is afraid of me; for some reason, he doesn’t trust me.

  We walk and walk. Tig says we are passing through a cavern now, or the river has widened, or now we are back in a tunnel. I can’t respond. Another memory surfaces from the swirling torrent running through me. This one was more recent, just a few weeks ago.

  Mom has the chest open. She catches me as I walk by, pulling me close. We’re both quiet for a long second. I am stiff, wishing Mom wouldn’t treat me like a little girl. She runs her fingers through my brown hair. It is past my shoulders now. The silence is only broken by Tig sharpening his claws on his chair. Mom finally releases me, and I feel her turn back to the chest in front of us.

  I am about to head for the door when I realize the smell of red is in the room. “Mom,” I feel for the wooden chest, “may I?”

  Mom takes my hand and places it on the
red dress, folded neatly to one side of the huge box. She knows I love that dress. I told her about my picture, and she said it was at the Year’s Beginning Feast, when I was almost two. “Mom, the picture is still there, but it’s starting to fade. Sometimes I can’t even get you to come into focus anymore.”

  Mom says nothing, but continues to guide my hand through the silky folds of the red dress. “I feel that if I lose that picture, I won’t have anything else from your world of color, and I’ll get lost in my world of darkness.” I say this all in a rush, as if I have been meaning to say it for a long time.

  “Maybe I’m not even a part of your world, Mom. Maybe I’m alone in my world, and the best I can do is sometimes reach out of my world to touch or feel a part of yours.”

  Mom picks my hand up from the silk folds and presses it to her mouth. “And now? Do you feel that you are dreaming now?” she whispers.

  I shake my head. “I’ve only ever smelled and felt the red dress here in the color world. I know this is real.”

  Mom pulls me close and wraps me into her arms again. “Ess, I know you don’t always feel that you’re part of, or even belong to this world of color, but listen to me,” she moves her lips close to my ear. “You are Essie Brightsday, daughter of Killian, daughter of Keira. According to the laws written about our world from the beginning of our history, to be named means ‘one with a part to play.’” Mom pauses and strokes my hair. “You’ll only play a role in this world of color if you accept that you’re a part of it, Essie,” she whispers. “Even if you can’t see it.”

  Her fingers whisper through the folds of the red dress and then they press a piece into my hands. “It’s called cloud silk. It’s very rare now. From the belt on the dress,” she whispers. I run my fingers over the perfect material—like water you can hold.