The Wicker King

by K. Ancrum

  She slid the plate holding the remainder of August’s apple pie to her side of the table and took a quick bite.

  “Basically, there is an object, the so-called Rapturous Blue, that has been taken from its home. And that’s not a good thing because without it, everyone and everything in the story is going to die. Because of some other evil Cloven King. The Wicker King—that’s you,” she said to Jack, “has to go and find the Rapturous Blue and bring it back so whatever the Fortentook is doesn’t happen. So I’m assuming that whatever Jack is seeing is following that basic narrative.”

  “That doesn’t … sound … good,” Jack said.

  August leaned forward and put his elbows on the table. His heart was racing. “What do you suggest we do?”

  Rina shrugged. “Personally, I’d take him to the hospital.”

  “We’re not doing that,” Jack said quickly.

  “Why?” Rina frowned.

  “Because I said so. We’re going to fulfill the prophecy.”

  “Are you fucking crazy?” August spat.

  “Why are you so afraid of a little adventure? Nothing cool ever happens in this stupid town.” Jack grinned mirthlessly. “Besides, we’re already playing one game. Why not add another? Do you think you can’t handle it?”

  “What game? The one from when you were kids?” Rina asked. She looked suspicious.

  “No, not really,” Jack said vaguely. “We’re too old for that one. This one is different.”

  August drummed his fingers on the table. He couldn’t even begin to think of how to explain what had happened at the river earlier that year. Much less illustrate the concept of “games” and what they had grown to mean. He thought about Jack’s fingers at the back of his neck and tasted a bit of shame. “Quit baiting her, Jack. Rina, it’s nothing. I’ll tell you later,” August lied.

  BESTIARY: BEASTIARY

  “It was a bright place,” Jack said. Everything was hyperrealistic and detailed. The only way he knew something was real sometimes was if it was unspeakably drab. “But it’s almost a closed circuit now.”

  Before, he’d mostly seen people in drab, but these days it was all reds and yellows and greens. The clothes were different, rustic. They were running out of time.

  “If things get too far, like I know they will, write down everything I say and describe. Everything that happens. Everything,” Jack said.

  Of course August would. Of course he did. It was too good a story for him not to.

  August purchased ten notebooks and thirty pens. Slotted a pen into each notebook and bound the rest with a rubber band. Now he never left the house without a pen and notebook.

  ORDINARY

  The woods were still the woods in Jack’s world. Most areas without urban alteration were basically the same. The older something was, the more likely it was to remain exactly as Jack had remembered it from before; he couldn’t tell the difference.

  The oldest thing in town was the river. It flowed over nearly the exact same path as the river in the other world, and August figured it was comforting to Jack because of the regularity with which he demanded to go there these days.

  Based on what he’d described, wherever Jack was, was somewhere in the East around the heyday of the Silk Road, maybe earlier. At least that was about the level of technological advancement that there was to deal with. Jack had taken objects from this other world and stashed them in the corner of his room. He described them in detail; some had parallel histories here. For a while, August suspected that it wasn’t so much where Jack was but when Jack was.

  “So what about the Rapturous Blue?” August asked, pulling his pen out of the spirals of the notebook. “What is it?”

  Jack closed his eyes. “It’s like … it’s like a star. Or like a god made of … rock? It’s difficult to describe … but it’s small enough to hold in your hand. And so bright that you can barely stand to look at it. Like … a very small star? I don’t know. I don’t have all the answers, August. It’s a big, shiny magical star battery thing and everyone is dying now that it’s gone. It’s causing their version of the apocalypse, I think.”

  “Annnd … how are we going to find it?”

  “I don’t know, but I’ll find it. I have to.”

  NULL HYPOTHESIS

  Jack held Rina’s hand as he pulled her up the hill.

  They wanted to show Rina a bit more of what Jack was seeing so they could test the validity of their theory. They agreed that Rina was enough of an impartial observer that her opinion would have more impact than August’s. Jack had brushed his knuckles across August’s chin in a parody of a blow and said, “I’ve gotta know that you’re not just telling me what I want to hear.”

  August’s eyes were locked on Jack’s hand grasping Rina’s. It made his stomach feel so …

  “You can see the whole town from up here,” Jack said.

  The hill put them just high enough that they could see the lights of the buildings fading into the dark beyond the town.

  “What do you see?” Rina asked.

  “Everything. There are stone buildings in the middle of the town that turn into wood ones, then into mud ones the farther from the center you go. Over by where the toy factory should be there is a larger building made of white stone. It’s like a church or a town hall or something. There are a couple of fields where animals are grazing…”

  “At night?” Rina scrunched up her nose.

  “They can see in the dark or they’re being guided,” Jack finished.

  From their hilltop, they could see a few people walking their dogs at the dog park below.

  August came shoulder to shoulder with Rina and nudged her gently. She looked sad.

  “It’s okay,” August whispered.

  Jack turned suddenly to look at them.

  “The birds like you,” he said to Rina, dropping her hand. He reached forward and cupped some air near her shoulder. “They’re fluttering near.”

  He shifted his dark eyes to August, and August’s heart thudded like the monstrous march of time. Jack tilted his head to the side and stared into the depths of him.

  “Everywhere you go, everything is wilder around you. You brought the birds, but they’re staying for her … I think. It’s a good omen.”

  He offered a smile, then looked back out at the town.

  “The buildings fade to trees, the trees fade to bramble, the bramble fades to dust, and beyond is the land of forgotten kings. The Wastes. Where nothing lives, nothing grows, and nothing dies.”

  “Nothing dies?” Rina asked, huddling closer to Jack.

  He slipped his hand back into hers. “Nothing dies. At least that’s what they write on the walls. They write all sorts of things on the walls of stone buildings—prayers, jokes, news. But mostly warnings. They say that beyond the wild woods, which is the area closest to the town, there are large, rabid beasts and swarms of gore crows. Those are like dead birds that eat living flesh.”

  Jack shivered.

  “They say that if your milkbeasts get lost in the wild woods, you should just leave them there. That it is less costly than going out to find them and paying with your life.”

  “How do you live like this?” Rina whispered.

  Jack shrugged.

  “Where we are, it is light.” The wind blew hard from the east and the trees rustled their branches.

  “From where I’m standing … it is warm enough.”

  Frost

  Winter break was coming up.

  Daliah was really riding his ass about deliveries. More and more kids were getting pinched, and she had more supply than people who could hawk it. Honestly, August wanted to just quit, but his mom’s disability benefits had been cut and he really couldn’t afford to.

  Along with that looming over his head, his notebooks were getting pretty full and it was becoming clearer than ever that Jack’s condition was getting worse and worse every day. It was good to feel like they were doing something proactive about it, though. They’d nearly ma
pped out the entire town and a bit of the woods.

  It was also good to have some other people around who knew what was going on. The twins had been remarkably helpful when August wasn’t there to watch Jack at all times, even though Jack still deeply resented their involvement. Peter was still an asshole about it, but at least they hadn’t told anyone yet.

  DUST

  “We need to find a way for you to interact with my world so you can put the Rapturous Blue on its stand and have it actually work. The Cloven King rides closer every day and the city is decaying all around me. I can’t do it by myself.”

  “Yeah. I know.” August kicked at a pebble as they trudged to the toy factory. “Do you have any ideas?”

  Jack grimaced sheepishly. “I have a couple, but none of them are good.”

  August pulled out a loose panel of glass and they scrambled inside the factory. Jack climbed down from the windowsill and offered August a hand. August ignored it and leaped down instead, landing hard and rolling to his feet. Jack watched appreciatively.

  “You’re getting good at that.”

  August shrugged off the compliment. “Where is the stand?”

  “Is there anything in here that’s in the middle of the room? I can remember there being like some kind of—”

  “The only thing in the middle of the room is one of those water coolers that people have at offices that give cold and hot water,” August interrupted.

  Jack lit up. “Really? Oh sweet! I’m pretty sure the Rapturous Blue goes in the area where you’d put a cup. I see it like a really decorative metal tower thing with a square slot in the middle. Also, for your information, we’re in the city’s town hall–slash–church-museum thing. It’s really fancy in here.”

  “Even if we find the Rapturous Blue, we can’t put it in now because…?”

  “It won’t work, August. We’ve gone over this,” Jack said, sounding annoyed. “There needs to be, like, some conduit that allows you to reach through this world into mine. Otherwise, it would be like putting a dead battery in a flashlight and expecting it to turn on.”

  August scoffed in exasperation. “Okay. So, what we’re looking for is something that would give enough of a charge? All right. At least that’s an achievable goal…” He walked around the room looking at all the machinery. He casually picked up a plastic doll head off the floor and tossed it in the air, catching it deftly in his hand.

  “Can … we leave?” Jack asked, sounding suddenly cagey.

  “Why? We just got here.”

  Jack didn’t respond. He just fidgeted a bit.

  August didn’t even sigh. He walked over to the window, climbed the wall, and pulled out the glass. “Woods, river, or field?”

  “Field. I want to run.”

  GONE

  They ran until it hurt to pull the cold air through their teeth. The snow had melted, and the grass was frozen and crunchy. They tumbled to the ground, panting hard. Jack coughed, then winced, grasping the side of his head.

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah. It just hurt for a minute … but I’m fine.”

  August curled toward him, and Jack grabbed August’s jacket, pulling him closer. He rested his forehead against August’s.

  “Do you want to know how I see you?” Jack’s voice was roughened from the run. August nodded. “I see you the same. I don’t think it will ever change.… It doesn’t matter if you’re wearing my colors or dressed like this. You’re always just you.”

  “What does it mean?”

  “I don’t know. But I don’t want that to go away.” Jack swallowed. “If it does, I don’t think it would be good.”

  “I’m not going anywhere,” August insisted, curling his fingers into the grass.

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  INDIGO

  Jack lay on the floor of Rina’s apartment. He threaded his fingers through the dingy carpet. August sat next to him and quietly watched as Rina pulled her stockings up her legs and clipped them to her garter belt. She shimmied into her uniform and zipped it up the back.

  His favorite thing was watching her put on her makeup. He liked the dark liquid she spread around her eyes to make them deeper. He didn’t really know what everything else she used was, but the way she slathered it on was like an art. She was stunning in the dim yellow light.

  Rina waited until the very last to put on her lipstick. It was like war paint, red and vivid, smeared across her mouth.

  She smiled at August for effect.

  He shivered.

  SCARLET

  Rina puttered around the apartment as she worked, washing dishes, picking up clothes, quickly eating a bowl of Shredded Wheat. It was startlingly domestic.

  “We have to go on a trip,” Jack said suddenly.

  “Why?” August looked up at him from where he was lying on the carpet.

  “To find the Rapturous Blue,” Jack said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

  “Where?” Rina asked.

  “Not that far. We don’t have to do it right now, if that’s what you were wondering. I just need to go and dig it up.”

  “In our world or in yours? And how do you even know where it is?”

  “Mine. And I just know. I can feel it,” Jack replied flippantly. “It’s kind of like when someone is staring at you and you’re not looking back at them, but you just know that they’re looking at you. I know what direction to head in to get close to it because I can feel it. It sounds dumb, but just go with it, okay?”

  August took one more drag of his cigarette and looked at Jack suspiciously. “When was the last time you hung out with any of your other friends?” he asked.

  Jack looked nervous. He picked at Rina’s carpet awhile and looked out the window. “I don’t remember. I’ve been phasing them out slowly. I can’t deal with it, you know? The pretending. It does my head in.”

  “It would do mine in, too, if I had to do what you do,” Rina said. “You’d probably make a good actor if this ever gets fixed.” She started heavily powdering over her makeup.

  “Rina, could you do me next?” August joked, putting his cigarette out on a nearby plate.

  “No, you tart, I’m busy. I have a reading in fifteen minutes.”

  “At that same shitty café?” He laughed.

  Rina pushed him playfully and kissed them both good-bye before she left.

  BOLT

  August lit another cigarette in the gloom. He looked over at Jack, who was sitting very still. The curve of his head was round in the light through Rina’s cracked, yellowed lampshade.

  Sometimes they waited for her to get back from work or from reading poetry at the café. Just passing the time lying on the carpet or playing cards or watching crap TV on her tiny fifteen-inch box.

  Jack picked at his jeans nervously, then went still again. He was like this marvelous creature. It was impossible not to scrutinize him if given the chance. Jack was like a deer now, poised as if about to run. August wondered what would happen if he touched him—just reached out and dragged his finger up the side of his neck …

  Before he could even make real contact, Jack spun around lightning fast and gripped August’s wrist hard. Grinding the bones in his fist. August made a sharp sound of hurt and pulled back.

  He’d forgotten his place.

  Jack loosened his grip and peered at him curiously. “Sometimes I don’t understand you, August. You’re very bold.”

  August swallowed, but didn’t look away.

  THE BEGINNING

  “So. The trip. When is that happening?”

  “I’m thinking we could go out during winter break. Of course we’ll be back by Christmas, but I think we need at least a day or two.” Jack headed down August’s street with his headlights on dim.

  “What are we getting?”

  “Something that I think will help us. I’ve been talking to her—”

  “Rina?” August asked.

  “Oh my God, yes, stop interrupting. Anyway, she expla
ined things a bit more succinctly, and I have a pretty good idea of what we need to do now.”

  August looked tired. “And what is that?”

  Instead of answering, Jack bit his lip and turned smoothly into August’s driveway.

  “I’m not going to like it, am I?”

  “Probably not.”

  August sighed.

  KEEP WARM

  August went downstairs. He didn’t do so very often because he didn’t like it—the stale smell of old, decaying furniture, stifling muggy air, the tinny buzz of the Game Show Network. But she was down here and he needed her permission.

  “August?”

  “Hey, Mom…”

  He couldn’t remember when she had begun spending most of her time down here. It had been sometime when he was in middle school, after his dad left. August leaned down to kiss her on her blond head and ignored the scent of old sweat and medicine.

  “I want to go on a trip with Jack this Saturday.”

  “When will you be back?” Her eyes never left the screen.

  “Monday. Winter break is starting, so I don’t have class.”

  “Oh. That’s nice…” Someone was guessing how much a blender cost. August stood there for a couple of minutes, watching over her shoulder. Then he pulled the quilt up and tucked it around her.

  “Did Dad send the check yet?” he asked. “It’s getting cold out—the gas is getting more expensive.” He put his hand on her forehead to check for fever, just in case. She nodded under his fingers but didn’t look up at him.

  The audience cheered. “Okay. I love you,” August said.

  She didn’t hear him.

  FOND

  Jack drove up at 6:00 a.m. “We’re going to Iowa,” he said excitedly, letting himself into the kitchen.