by R. G. Thomas
“What?” Teofil asked. He glanced up at Aisha, and then back at Thaddeus with a concerned expression.
Thaddeus sighed and shook his head. “Nothing. It was a wasp, or a hornet. I can never tell them apart. Either way, it had a big stinger and it was buzzing me. I guess I lost my footing.”
“Wasp?” Aisha frowned as she looked up the ladder. “I don’t see a nest.”
“Maybe it was looking for a place to call home,” Thaddeus said, then gave Teofil a look that he hoped let him know they needed to talk.
“I came out here to check on how you were doing, and I saw you fall,” Teofil said. He looked up at Aisha. “Did you see him fall?”
She shook her head. “No. I was really into the scraping. I think I got kind of hypnotized.”
Teofil nodded, and from his expression Thaddeus could tell he was relieved, but he didn’t understand why.
“Are you hurt?” Teofil asked. “Can you stand?”
“I think I twisted my ankle,” Thaddeus said. “But other than that I’m okay.”
“Let’s get you inside and my mum can take a look at it.”
Teofil stood and reached down to help Thaddeus stand. Thaddeus put a bit of weight on his foot and then winced and grabbed on to Teofil for support.
“Ouch,” he said. “Yeah, we’ll need your mom to look at it.”
“His mom is a nurse?” Aisha asked.
“Sort of,” Thaddeus replied.
“Mine’s a nurse too,” Aisha said. “Well, sort of. She works at a nursing home about an hour away. That’s her second job. First one is cashier at a gas station just outside of town.”
“Sounds like you’re alone a lot,” Thaddeus said.
Aisha nodded and shrugged. “I am now. Used to have my brothers around, and my dad. But now it’s just me and Mom.” She dropped her gaze to where Teofil had curled an arm around his waist, then looked back at Thaddeus. “I’d offer to stay and help, but it looks like you’re in pretty good hands.”
Thaddeus flashed a smile. “Yeah, I am. Thank you, though.”
“You’re welcome. I hope your ankle feels better. Maybe I’ll see you around town.”
“Thanks,” Thaddeus said. “For the good wishes and the help today. We got a lot done working together.”
“I didn’t know we were allowed to have helpers for our chores,” Teofil said with a grin.
“I guess you chose the wrong chore,” Aisha said, following it up with a cool stare.
Teofil smiled and nodded. “I guess I did.”
“It was really nice to meet you, Aisha,” Thaddeus said. “I hope we see each other again soon.”
“Oh, I’ll be around if you will.” Aisha lifted a hand in a wave and turned for the gate.
“I think she’s got a crush on you,” Teofil whispered as he helped Thaddeus limp toward the porch.
“What? No. She’s just lonely.” Thaddeus looked over his shoulder and found Aisha looking back at him as she walked away. He smiled and she waved, then turned away and ran off down the sidewalk, her braids bouncing with each step.
“What happened to you up on the ladder?” Teofil asked.
“I had some kind of vision or something,” Thaddeus replied.
Teofil helped him sit in the shade on the porch steps and knelt to untie his shoe.
“What kind of vision?” Teofil asked.
“I’m not sure, but I think it might have been some kind of vision of what’s happening to my mom.”
Teofil looked up. “Really?”
Thaddeus nodded, then flinched as Teofil eased his shoe off. He sighed as he looked down at his rapidly swelling ankle.
“Wow, I really twisted it,” he grumbled. “I hope it’s not broken. Once my dad has enough money I need to be ready to climb the mountain.”
“You might be able to fly up there,” Teofil said.
Thaddeus frowned. “What’s that mean?”
“When I came around the corner, you were levitating off the ladder.”
“What?”
Teofil nodded. “You had floated up off the ladder and drifted a few feet back from the house over the yard.”
“Oh my God.” Thaddeus twisted around to look at the ladder, then turned back to Teofil. “Did Aisha see me?”
“I don’t think so,” Teofil said. “I’m sure she would have mentioned it if she had.”
“Yeah, I hope you’re right.” Thaddeus let out a breath. “All I could think of was escape. There were people around me, horrible and cruel people, and all I wanted to do was get away from them. They were hurting me and then laughing about it. I bet it’s Isadora and Logan and they’ve found my mom.”
“You don’t know that for sure,” Teofil said.
“Not for sure,” Thaddeus agreed. “But it’s a good bet they’ve already found her and are trying to turn her evil.” He bowed his head and shook it slowly back and forth. “We have to get to her, and soon.”
Teofil took his hand and squeezed it. “We will. But first you need to stay off this foot. Let’s go to the kitchen entrance, where there are no steps.”
Thaddeus put an arm around Teofil’s shoulder. Strong back muscles shifted beneath his hand, sending a pleasant thrill through him. Even as his ankle throbbed, he whispered, “I like feeling your muscles move like that.”
Teofil smiled. “Digging in the dirt does some good, I guess.”
“I guess it does.”
They rounded the front corner of the house, and once they were in the side yard, Teofil paused to give him a quick kiss. “Better?”
“Much.”
Teofil adjusted his arm around Thaddeus’s waist and they continued on into the backyard.
Chapter SIX
MIRIAM GINGERLY turned Thaddeus’s foot to inspect his swollen ankle. “Good news is it’s just a sprain, not a break.”
Nathan let out a breath. “That’s a relief.”
“Should we get an X-ray?” Thaddeus asked.
His father’s cheeks darkened with a blush, and he looked away, out the window. Thaddeus didn’t understand for a moment. Then it hit him. His father had lost his insurance coverage when he’d walked away from his job at Superstition Sporting Goods, after they had discovered the manager was aligned with Isadora. And they had no money to pay for lodging, so there wasn’t money to pay for an X-ray. Thaddeus felt stupid for asking.
“You know, it feels better now that I’ve iced it,” he said, trying to make amends for putting his father in a tough spot. “I think it will be fine in a day or two.”
“I’ve got some herbs that should help with the swelling,” Miriam said, and got to her feet. “Keep it elevated and stay off of it for now.”
“Oh no, no more scraping?” Thaddeus said with mock disappointment.
Miriam shook her head as she left Thaddeus and his father alone in the kitchen. Through the open window above the sink, they could hear Teofil humming as he worked in the flower beds.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” Thaddeus said in a quiet voice. “I know we don’t have insurance or money for an X-ray.”
Nathan gave him a sad smile. “It’s not your fault, Thaddeus. We’re at this point because of me and the choices I’ve made over the years. I never gave us a chance to settle down and build a life, and I sure as heck never managed to find a job that would pay enough to start some kind of savings.”
Nathan sat in the chair beside Thaddeus and took his hand, holding it between both of his own. Thaddeus felt the familiar rough calluses on his father’s palms and started to say something, but Nathan shook his head.
“Let me finish, please. I need to say this.”
“Okay, but you don’t have to.”
“I know, but I’ve been feeling this way for a long time and with everything that’s going on now, you need to hear it.” He took a deep breath and let it out.
When he finally met Thaddeus’s gaze, there were tears in his eyes.
“I have failed you as a father.”
“What? No.”
“You were keeping us safe.”
“I was running, and there’s a difference. If I’d have stopped and thought about it at all, I would have raised you to understand and appreciate magic. You would be able to use it to full effect by now, and we’d stand a much better chance of defeating Isadora and saving your mother. These instances of magic coming out of the blue—like the levitating today and the ball of light at the river—would have come earlier, and we would have dealt with it together.
“And given all that, even if I had kept the magical background secret, I should have at least been saving money for you to go to college. But here we are, broke and uninsured, with school starting in a few weeks back home, and we’re stuck here at the foot of a mountain looking to go up against impossible odds.” Nathan shook his head and lifted a shoulder to wipe away a tear on his cheek. “I have more to tell you, but I wanted to let you know how sorry I was for all of it.”
“You did what you thought was best at the time, Dad,” Thaddeus said, fighting back tears of his own.
“You’ve always been too easy on me.”
“Well, I do wish you had been more upfront about the magic, and the reason for all of our moves. But I understand why you kept it all a secret.”
Miriam returned with her bag in hand. “Here we are. The magical bag of healing and wonder—oh. Am I interrupting?”
Nathan squeezed Thaddeus’s hands before he got to his feet. “No. You’re fine, Miriam. I appreciate you tending to Thaddeus.”
“Of course.” She smiled at Thaddeus. “Feels like he’s one of my own now.”
Thaddeus smiled back and felt a warm rush of love.
His father smiled as well. “I know, Miriam, and I thank you for it.” He waved a hand toward the back door. “I’m going to get back to work on the scraping.”
Thaddeus watched as Miriam mixed some herbs in water and created a thick paste that she smeared around his ankle. She grabbed an old shirt from a bucket of rags under the sink and tore it into strips that she wrapped tightly around his ankle. Miriam hummed as she worked, a different tune than he was used to hearing from Teofil, but the sound of it made Thaddeus feel more relaxed. When she was finished, Miriam washed up at the sink and instructed him to stay off his foot for the time being.
“I can’t just sit here in the kitchen,” Thaddeus said.
Miriam sighed. “I see your point. How about Teofil and I help you outside and have you sit in the shade to keep him company while he gardens?”
Thaddeus nodded. “I’d like that.”
Miriam called for Teofil, and with a lot of grunting and some mumbling from all of them, Thaddeus was finally seated in a plastic lawn chair in the shade of the house. Teofil handed him some plants growing up from small bundles of roots. The leaves were slightly wilted from having been out of the ground, and they sported a few dark, nearly black flowers.
“Where did you get these?” Thaddeus asked. “I’ve seen flowers like this before, right when we were coming into town.”
“I found them around the foot of the mountain,” Teofil replied. “I dug them up and brought them back here.”
“Are they wildflowers?”
“I don’t know what you mean by that,” Teofil said.
“They could be protected,” Thaddeus explained. “In one of the cities I lived with my dad, there were signs posted against cutting or picking certain flowers. Hannah might get in trouble if you plant them here.”
Teofil sat back and smiled at him. “The police patrol people’s gardens?”
Thaddeus shrugged. “I don’t know. I guess not.”
“I think these will look good along the side of the house here,” Teofil said and went back to digging holes that were so evenly spaced Thaddeus would have sworn he was using a ruler.
Dulindir approached with plastic bags of groceries dangling from each hand. He and Astrid had been sent to the store with a long list Hannah had written out the night before. To help Dulindir blend in more, Thaddeus’s father had given him a baseball cap to wear, and Astrid had styled his long blond hair in such a way that it covered his pointed ears. Dulindir nodded to Thaddeus on his way to the back door but stopped when he saw the plant Thaddeus held.
“Where did you get that?” Dulindir asked in a sharp tone.
“I… I didn’t get it,” Thaddeus stammered. “I’m just helping.”
Teofil got to his feet and situated himself between Thaddeus and Dulindir. “I got it, and a bunch more just like it.”
Dulindir dropped the bags onto the ground and walked right up to Teofil. A shiver of fear that the two would begin to fight ran through Thaddeus, and he struggled to his feet despite the ache in his ankle.
“You cannot plant those by this house,” Dulindir stated.
Astrid came around the corner holding more grocery bags. When she saw Dulindir and Teofil squared off, she hurried over. “What’s going on?”
Teofil kept his gaze fixed on Dulindir’s face as he replied to Astrid. “The Wood Elf is telling the Garden Gnome how to garden.”
“You cannot plant these flowers by this house,” Dulindir repeated. “It’s too dangerous.”
“Why is it dangerous?” Thaddeus asked as he braced himself against Teofil’s shoulder. He could feel the tension in Teofil’s muscles and wished he knew what to say to make everyone take a step back.
“Because it is nacht macabre,” Dulindir replied. “It acts as a beacon for all manner of dark and deadly beings.”
“Nacht macabre?” Teofil repeated. He looked at the plant Thaddeus still held cupped in one palm and then back at Dulindir. “I’ve never heard of it.”
“That’s because it’s not used in gardens,” Dulindir said, “but it’s often found in the woods, especially around those places where truly corrupt creatures gather.”
Thaddeus felt Teofil’s shoulder tighten once more.
“Okay, he didn’t know that,” Thaddeus said. “He didn’t know. Okay? We’ll dig them up and find something else to plant here.”
Dulindir stared at Teofil a moment longer, his expression hard. Then he looked at Thaddeus and gave a single nod.
“Good. The last thing we want is to summon a band of trolls or more of those goblins to our door.”
“You don’t have to worry about that,” Teofil said through gritted teeth. “I will take care of it.”
“Come on, Dulindir,” Astrid said and tugged on his arm. “Let’s take the groceries inside.”
Dulindir turned away and followed Astrid back to where he’d dropped the grocery bags. He scooped them up and, with one more look at Teofil over his shoulder, followed her inside the house.
“Well, that wasn’t tense at all,” Thaddeus said, easing himself back into the chair.
Teofil was silent as he dropped to his knees in front of the row of flowers he had planted. With quick, angry movements, he jerked each one from the ground and tossed it aside. Thaddeus watched in silence as Teofil undid all his work. He had no idea what to say to make everything right again. Dulindir was a part of their group, but for some reason, Teofil seemed to feel threatened by him. There had to be something he could say to break this tension.
“Teofil—”
“Don’t say a word.” Teofil’s tone felt like a blade to Thaddeus’s heart.
“I was just going to say that—”
Teofil pushed up to his knees and turned to look over his shoulder at Thaddeus, his angry expression cutting off Thaddeus’s words. Thaddeus pre
ssed his lips together. He gave a single nod and pushed up out of the chair. As he hobbled past the pile of flowers Teofil had pulled up, he dropped the plant he still held on top and continued to the door without a look back.
He struggled to hold back tears as he limped through the kitchen and past Astrid and Dulindir, ignoring Astrid when she asked if he was all right. He climbed the steps as carefully as he could and entered the bedroom he shared with his father, closing the door behind him. Falling onto the bed, Thaddeus finally broke down in tears and buried his face in his pillow. Why had Teofil acted that way? Was this the end of their relationship? What had happened to get him so angry so fast? Bad enough he was stuck in this town, unable to search for his mother, and had injured himself again as well. It would really suck if he and Teofil were to start having problems on top of it all.
After a time, his tears waned and finally stopped. He could hear the sound of his father scraping paint on the front of the house. At least his father didn’t know about the arguments. A bird cawed from somewhere close by, and Thaddeus lifted his head from the pillow. His face was hot and sweaty, and he had a bit of a headache. So far their stay in Iron Gulch had been a pretty crappy experience.
He sat on the edge of the bed and adjusted the canteen to a more comfortable position on his belt. A thought struck him, and he froze in place. He could heal his ankle with just a sip of water from the Well of Tears. The canteen was half-full. Surely a small swallow wouldn’t detract from the ability to return his mother to her true form?
Thaddeus sat very still as he contemplated his next step. Miriam had said his injury was just a sprain, not a break. He had twisted his ankle once years ago during gym class and, if he remembered correctly, it had taken about a week to heal completely. This felt more like a sprain than a simple twist, so it would most likely take longer. Since they still needed money for supplies to continue their search, Thaddeus decided he should give himself time to heal and avoid wasting the precious water inside the canteen on his ankle.
