by C Lee Tocci
Her head was dizzy and hot; she laid it against the cold stone, breathing jerkily. The faintness passed, but her limbs and face were raw and aching from burns. She tried to pull herself upward, but her arms screamed rebelliously. Shivering, she gave up, letting the stone cool her wounds while her breathing slowed and steadied.
As the dust settled, a thin beam of moonlight speared its way into the fissure and with it, the faint sounds of movement and voices filtered from above.
“Begone, demon.” The voice was deep but breathy and trembling. At first, Lilibit didn’t even recognize it as Keotak-se’s. Did his voice waver because he was angry or because he was wounded? Perhaps it was a combination of both.
“So, Stone Warrior…” In his demon form, the voice of Syxx was high pitched and sibilant. Hoofed feet made scratching sounds as they shuffled across the gritty desert floor. “Has ten centuries of dead infants taught you nothing? The Infant Stone Voice dies tonight, as has every other doomed child you have so ineptly tried to protect. How many children must die before you learn the futility of defiance?’
Confusion overtook Lilibit’s fear. What was Syxx talking about? How would the Infant Stone Voice die tonight? And where? If the Infant Stone Voice died, what would that mean for her and the rest of the neophytes? She bit her lip as she listened.
“No Infant dies this day, demon Syxx.” Keotak-se answered scornfully. “Not this one. Not this time. Already she has returned from the morph and the Earth Stone grants to her sancturary beneath Her skin. She will rise to defy you. Run back into the shadows and hide, vile servant of the Dark; this child has bested you in the past and will defeat you in the future.”
Lilibit listened, stunned, as an inevitable truth finally dawned on her. A notion so absurd, so ridiculous, took hold of her mind. She shook her head as if to jar it out. But it was too late. The thought was in her head and it wasn’t leaving.
Dazed, Lilibit again felt the rap of a staff, struck three times against the Earth. This time, a wave of energy rushed up from beneath, flushing her body with soothing warmth. The Earth hummed urgently and a flare of light on the surface spilled into the crevice filling it with a glaring brilliance.
“Your game is played, Syxx.” Keotak-se’s voice sounded stronger. “You are finished frightening children. Begone.”
The light flashed even brighter and Syxx let out a howl of pain and fury. A misty shadow, like a black cloud, passed over the opening, plunging the crevice into darkness for a long moment, but then, she heard the voice of Syxx, hissing like a black wind. “And if you save this one, Stone Warrior, what difference will it make? Will it bring penance to your soul? Will it bring back Ballita?”
Keotak-se let out a growl like a wounded animal as the words of Syxx faded into mocking laughter before dying away into the breeze.
The night above was quiet; minutes passed without a sound. Lilibit wondered if Keotak-se too, had left, but the flare from the staff still lit the crevice. Finally, with a soft tap, the light extinguished and the gap dimmed to moonlight once again.
A new shadow blocked the moon and Keotak-se’s eye appeared in the crack above.
“Lilibit?[“ Keotak-se spoke with a strange hesitancy, but Lilibit had too many questions in her head to wonder about that. “Are you well?”
Lilibit tried flexing her arms again and immediately winced. “Not very,” she admitted in a small voice.
“Can you faunamorph back into a bird?”
Lilibit nodded even though she didn’t think he could see her. “Kissy-face!” she whispered
Re-entering her seared bird body was excruciating. She gave out an anguished tweet which turned into a cry of pain as she lost focus and turned back into herself.
“Um. Maybe not.” She said, her voice hiccupped on a sob.
“Do you have your stone?”
It was as well that Keotak-se couldn’t see her because he probably would have thought the expression on her face was rude. Of course she had her stone. She couldn’t imagine not having her stone. She nodded again, and then realizing that he couldn’t see her, she said, “Uh-huh.”
“Very well. Do you know how you call on the Earth Stone when you wish for Her to convey something?”
That was a different way to look at what she did. Did she call on the Earth Stone when she wanted gold or silver or oil? She hadn’t thought about it like that before; she would just place her hand on the ground and think about what she’d wanted. That she had been calling on the Earth Stone made it seem kind of grandiose; almost presumptuous. Again, she nodded in the dark.
Whether Keotak-se could sense her response, or just assumed that she’d said yes, he continued. “I want you to place your hands on the slabs around you and call on the Earth Stone. Use your mind to let Her know what you need.”
Gingerly, Lilibit placed her palms on rock faces that held her wedged in. Somehow, thinking about it as ‘calling on the Earth Stone’ made it more difficult than it had been when she’d done it without thinking about. She didn’t know how to start, so she just whispered her thoughts aloud. “Um. Hello? Earth Stone?”
She thought she sounded lame, but on all sides of her, the Earth strummed softly, as if to answer Yes?
“Um. I’m stuck in a hole. Can you help me?”
The Earth thrummed in response and a shower of silt began to fall on her head as the stone above her turned to dust. She had a flash of panic as the slabs on either side of her started to dissolve as well, but instead of slipping downward, the sand began to pile up beneath her, pushing her upward on a gentle fountain of dirt. In less than a moment, she was sitting on the surface, the ground beneath her solidifying back into stone.
She looked up to see Keotak-se standing, leaning hard against a wooden staff that was not his own. His face and arms were pocked-marked and scabbed. Half healed gashes could be seen on his neck and shoulders. His eyes narrowed as he stared at her.
“You are hurt badly,” he said crouching down to where she sat.
“You’re not looking all that healthy yourself,” Lilibit replied.
Lilibit wondered what she looked like. Keotak-se seemed shocked, but before she could ask, Keotak-se stood quickly and faced east, his staff at the ready.
She heard the patter of paws only a moment before the wolves leapt into the clearing. The black wolf in the lead stood as Todd; Donny and Marla morphed behind him. Ulex and Jeff stayed in their wolf forms.
Todd ran forward urgently. “Lilibit, what happened to you?”
“Am I mess?” Lilibit looked down at her arms and legs. The moonlight made it hard to hard to tell where the charred black skin ended and the bloody scabs began. She hurt all over, and the expressions of the others made her think her face must look really bad as well.
Todd reached out to help her to her feet, but moving her arm, even a few inches, made her scream in pain. Todd leaped back as if he had been the one burned.
“Do you think you can morph into a wolf?” he asked, his brow wrinkled as he stared at her. “Jeff says that pain doesn’t feel as bad when he’s a wolf.”
He gestured over to where the tawny wolf, Jeff stood. Lilibit hadn’t noticed before, but his right hind leg was bent at a strange angle and he kept it off the ground.
“Oh, Jeff!” Lilibit was feeling more and more guilty. Not only was she beaten up herself, but Keotak-se and Jeff were battered and hurt as well. All because of her.
“Her wounds are extensive,”Keotak-se said coldly. “She must heal first.”
Lilibit was surprised by Keotak-se’s words; it was true her entire body throbbed and ached, and, if she moved, it was so bad, she had to scream. But it still wasn’t the most horrible pain she’d ever felt. Her brain couldn’t remember when she’d felt worse, but her body seemed to remember some old agony, and, in comparison, this wasn’t nearly so bad.
“Lilibit has always healed fast,” Todd was saying, “but do you think we should wait for that? I don’t think we need to worry about Popokelli outside the forest
, but Syxx and his stooges from Endrune could show up any minute.”
Keotak-se again knelt down beside Lilibit. “She must heal first,” he repeated. “It will not take long.”
Lilibit shot a wary glance at Todd. There was a pained look on Todd’s face as he shrugged back. She must look really bad.
“Lie back,” Keotak-se ordered, his hand cradling her neck.
A screech of pain, cut off, sounded more like a squeak, as Lilibit’s back touched the ground. The pressure against her back felt like a bed of daggers digging in, and her shivering made them feel like they were twisting deeper. Her mind stopped working as she gasped for breath and stared up at the stars.
“Lilibit?” Todd asked in a hushed whisper. “Are you okay?”
Lilibit didn’t know if she should nod or shake her head, so it was just as well that the pain made her muscles unresponsive. She just laid there and trembled.
“Lilibit,” Keotak-se had spoken her names several times before Lilibit was able to focus on him. She wondered why moving and lying down had made the pain so much worse. And she wondered why he had asked her to lay down. Keotak-se continued. “Lilibit, call upon the Earth Stone. Tell Her what you need.”
Even if she could have made her lips work, there was no way that Lilibit was going to ask the Earth Stone aloud so that Todd and the others would hear. Instead, she closed her eyes and thought hard.
Earth Stone?
Yes, Lilibit? The Earth thrummed beneath her.
My body is all burnt up and it hurts real bad. Can you help?
The Earth Stone answered with a smile.
It felt like the ground beneath her was dissolving into fine sand. Then it felt like dry water, like she was floating. Lilibit’s body hung, suspended on a cushion of silt while Lilibit herself sunk down below the surface. She wondered if she would drown, but she found that when she had submerged and was completely separated from her body, she had no trouble breathing at all. In fact, as soon as she plunged into the Earth, all the pain fell away. She sighed. She always forgot how nice it was not to feel any pain at all.
How long she hovered there, between two worlds, she couldn’t tell, but the voice of the Earth Stone recalled her.
Up you go!
Lilibit fought against the command. It was much too nice, floating where she was, but the Earth Stone was insistent and Lilibit found herself rising back to the surface.
Reluctantly, she merged back into her body and waited for the pain to return. It was a little uncomfortable; her own body felt heavy and confining after being one with the Earth Stone, but the biting pain was missing. She opened her eyes and saw Todd and Marla staring down at her in amazement.
“What?” she asked, her voice scratchy. “What’d I do?”
Todd just shook his head and held out his hand. When Lilibit grabbed it, she noticed that, not only were all the scabs and burns gone, but her skin was different too; paler and softer, like a baby’s. She would have stared at it for longer, but Todd tugged at her insistently and pulled her to her feet.
“How do you feel?” Todd asked, his eyes still wary.
Stiff. Stifled. Insignificant. Overwhelmed.
“Fine,” she answered.
Chapter Fifty-Two
Stone Voice Balking
Their journey back to Kiva was notable only for the fact that little happened. They ran as wolves; Lilibit raced alongside Todd while Keotak-se, as a condor, patrolled overhead.
The sun had breached the horizon by the time the Sienna Sentries appeared in the distance. They might have better time, but Jeff, on three legs, wasn’t up to running at full speed, so they dropped their pace to match his.
Lilibit kept her thoughts to herself as they trotted along. Todd didn’t try to intrude. Something was eating at her but he figured that, whatever it was, he’d find out sooner or later.
It was too painful for Jeff to morph back and forth, otherwise, Todd might have asked him for an update on what the Duke and his people were doing back at the compound. All he could was keep one eye on the horizon, looking for an attack from either Syxx or the forces of Endrune, but nothing appeared, either above or below, that looked threatening.
At the foot of the Sienna Sentries, they changed back into themselves and watched as Keotak-se landed in front of them, morphing in mid-air so that he landed on his feet as a man. First chance he got, Todd was going to practice his bird morph so that he could land like that too. It looked very cool.
Lilibit was even more subdued than before, her lip jutting out as she stared without looking at anything, until Jeff let out a little gasp, then she shot a distressed look over at him.
Jeff leaned against a rock, looking green with pain; his leg twisted at an unnatural angle. After Todd had cut him loose from the killer trees, he had started to drop to the ground, but before he could morph into a bird, a vine had lashed out at him, striking his head and stunning him. He’d hit the ground badly, his leg twisting beneath him. The pain had kept him from being able to hold his bird morph, so they ended up strapping him to Donny’s wolf-back and fighting their way out of the forest on foot.
It wasn’t until they’d finally cleared the woods that they’d realized that part of the forest was on fire. Todd, flying above the trees to look for Lilibit, had seen the flare from Keotak-se’s staff in the distance and had quickly organized the others to follow.
Todd still held Keotak-se’s staff. “Here,” he said, handing it to him with a strange sense of reluctance. “And thanks.”
Keotak-se grasped the staff and stiffened as a faint look of surprise touched his face. After a moment, he handed it back to Todd. “It is yours now, young stone warrior. Use it well.”
Todd was speechless as he took back the ancient staff. The staff thrummed happily and, in his pocket, Tai-Kwee hummed back. He turned to thank Keotak-se, but the Stone Warrior was already speaking to the others.
“We shall fly over the palisades,” he said.
Jeff looked up anxiously and was about to respond, but Todd spoke first.
“Jeff can’t hold the bird-form with his broken leg,” Todd said quickly.
“I will carry young Jeff.” Keotak-se answered.
Jeff didn’t look relieved; if anything, he looked even more worried.
“Ulex hasn’t learned to do the bird-morph yet,” Marla said. Ulex was the only one still in wolf form. “It’s too bright out for him to change into his real body and burrow underground.”
“Could he find his way over Red Rabbit Ridge?” asked Todd.
Marla turned and looked at Ulex before answering, “He’s not sure, but I know the way, I could lead him there.”
“I can go with Ulex and Marla,” offered Jeff. Running another four or five more miles on three legs seemed preferable to being carried by a giant condor.
But Keotak-se didn’t seem to hear Jeff. Holding his staff with both hands, he droned “CHEE-ot-say. Toh-GEE-na. Sha-be-KAH.”
Dust sprayed everywhere as the condor flapped his wings and launched into the air. It circled once and swept down on Jeff, who, with only one good leg, could do little but stand there.
“Ayeee!” Jeff yelped as claws grabbed his shoulders and lifted him into the air.
Lilibit nodded. “I normally go with ‘Eeep!’” she said as they watched the two of them fly up over the palisades, “but ‘Ayeee!’ works too.”
Marla called out “Stupid Nov’m!” and morphed into a wolf. With a quick bark of farewell, she and Ulex bounded off.
As Lilibit watched them go, her face puckered with apprehension. She looked up at the Sienna Sentries with dread.
“C’mon Lilibit, let’s get it over with,” Todd said, giving her hair a rumple. “It won’t be as bad as you think.”
“Yes it will,” she said so softly he barely heard it. “You have no idea. It’s going to be worse than you can possibly imagine.”
Before Todd could ask her what she meant by that, she mumbled “Kissy-face!” and morphed into a hummingbird. Donny
echoed and launched himself into the air. He circled around her and waited for Todd to join them.
The sailed in close formation over the Sienna Sentries and glided down into the valley beyond. Relief flooded Todd. They were home. They were safe.
As they approached the Crescent Courtyard, Keotak-se veered off toward Old Marigold’s cottage. The healer would set Jeff’s bones and give him something for the pain.
Forgetting that none of the other neophytes knew they could bird-morph yet, Todd led Donny and Lilibit to the courtyard, landing in front of the Hall of the Flame Voice, morphing back before the eyes of all of the neophytes that were gathered there.
An astonished hush fell over the courtyard. Lilibit, her hair and clothes singed and burned, edged closer to Todd and kept her eyes on the cobblestones. Donny, exhausted and still not completely recovered from Syxx’s torture, wandered back to their hogan, oblivious to the gaze of the others, who parted before him as he headed for his bed.
Gil-Salla appeared at the entry to her hall, her eyes stony and cold. Behind him, Todd felt Lilibit tremble as she pressed closer. He reached back, grabbed her hand and pulled her along as they walked toward the archway. Gil-Salla stepped back to let them in, the tapestry falling back into place after they’d passed.
The hall was darker than the courtyard. Near a stream of light pouring through the chimney hole stood Cohanna, her hands clutched tightly together. When she saw them enter, she took a step forward, her hands beginning to rise, but then she stopped and her arms fell back to her side. She watched them coolly as they walked up to the hearth.
Silently, Gil-Salla joined Cohanna and the two of them stood, unmoving.
Nobody spoke. Todd waited for Gil-Salla to burst into flames or for Cohanna to ask questions or even for Lilibit to break down and apologize, but nobody said a word; they all just stood and stared. Gil-Salla and Cohanna stared at Lilibit and Lilibit, her breath catching in her chest, stared at her toes.
So noiselessly did Keotak-se enter that Todd didn’t even realize he was there until he stood at Gil-Salla’s side. Lilibit looked up and glared at Keotak-se. She seemed almost angry. Todd couldn’t figure her out at all.
