by Beca Lewis
“Aren’t we supposed to be stopping Deadsweep?” I asked, thinking how much I would like to go to the village, but worried it was taking us away from our work.
“Yes. We are,” Niko answered. “And going into the village might yield us some answers.”
“I’m in!” I said, raising my water glass. I looked across at Zeid ready to ask another question. He made a slight gesture with his head which told me to be quiet for now. Yes, that gesture told me there is more to this than meets the eye, but wait and see what it is.
My curiosity was going full blast, but I was exhausted. I could wait until the next day to find out what no one was saying out loud. I thought that it was probably a good thing I didn’t know yet. It turned out that for once I was right.
Deadsweep Twenty-Three
If I thought I would escape my training sessions the next day with Niko, Aki, and Professor Link, I was mistaken. But this time it wasn’t brutal. They had made their point about being too tired to think and how vulnerable it had made me. How being too tired made everyone vulnerable.
Instead, the training felt good. Zeid and I had a chance to practice our sparring skills together. I didn’t fall on my face as much as I used to and I even earned a high five from Niko, something I had never gotten before.
Aki gave me new exercises to increase my flexibility which at times made me feel as if I was going to break in half. I didn’t need a high five from Aki in her class to feel good. I loved it enough to go without being told to. Besides, she knew how to do something I dreamed about doing—levitating.
Although I now knew how to fly very short distances, I couldn’t levitate the way she could.
On the other hand, I didn’t know anyone else who could either. Maybe it was specific to Aki’s people. I planned to find a way to ask her all the questions that friends ask each other, but I wasn’t at all that sure that she would answer them. But I had to try.
Link spent time in class reviewing how to close our mental doors and communication channels. He kept sending mental suggestions to Zeid and me, and we were supposed to keep them away. It was so hard. It’s actually easier to block a physical weapon than a mental one. One is easier to see I guess. I thought it was great information, but I wanted to know if he really believed that Deadsweep would get into our heads that way.
“It’s a good point, Kara,” Link said. “We don’t know how it is happening. But it never hurts to get better at recognizing false suggestions.”
By the end of the session, I managed to stop him a few times, but that was because I began to recognize his pattern. Although he used different “voices,” he still spoke in a certain way and used the same kind of phrases. Once I recognized that pattern, I could detect his influence.
After class, Link sat on the edge of his desk and addressed Zeid and me. I used to call him Professor Pinhead because he was so long and lanky. Link often wore his black hair slicked back like a helmet. When he wanted to make a point, Link would squint his greens eyes at you.
Sitting on the edge of his desk, he started squinting before speaking. “Both of you did well with this, but that’s because you now know me. That’s a good thing. On the other hand, that’s a bad thing. Someone could use my pattern of speaking to you to make you think it’s me.
“Plus, we don’t know the voice, or pattern, that Deadsweep’s suggestions take.”
I tried not to be disrespectful when I asked, “How come you don’t? Shouldn’t you have some idea by now?” But even I could hear the hint of sarcasm in the question.
I almost said, “Sorry,” but Link held up his hand to stop me. “Yes, we should,” he said, and walked out of the room.
“Don’t,” I said to Zeid, as he turned to speak. “I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sure everyone has been working hard on this question.”
“And with no answers,” Zeid replied. “But that’s why we are going into the village. There have been some disturbances. We’re going to investigate them, and perhaps get a clue as to what is going on.”
*******
I wanted to start for the village of Dalry that very minute, but it was another few hours before we gathered outside the Castle and began the walk to town.
Last time we walked this way I had been clueless as to how people in Erda did things. I had forgotten so many things while living in the Earth Realm. This time was different. I knew more. However, I felt as if I knew too many things that didn’t fit together. We were in the phase of too little knowledge, which I knew was dangerous.
Leif and Sarah weren’t walking with us. I hadn’t expected them to come into town. They were continually disappearing and reappearing. I suppose they had other things they needed to do.
Teddy also wasn’t with us. He scared some people, so it was better he stayed away. It was funny because of all of us, Teddy was probably the most gentle. Like the Ginete, he didn’t fight, he provided. He and his friends built the tunnels that we lived in when we needed to escape the Shrieks.
Although they didn’t look like each other, the Ginete and the Whistle Pigs were cousins. They both lived underground, and it was the Whistle Pigs who built their underground homes and tunnels. The Ginete stayed in the Whistle Pigs’ tunnels and rooms while keeping us safe, but I knew that the Ginete preferred their home in the sides of hills and mountains.
I had never seen those homes, but Sam had said they looked similar to the rooms where we had stayed. Above ground, the tree roots were hidden in the walls. Underground, they were visible as they held the dirt walls together and provided the light and energy needed.
The Ginete and the Whistle Pigs were also the technicians that had built the shields we needed to stun the Shrieks. After the last battle, we had left the shields with the Whistle Pigs. If we needed them again, they were available, but I didn’t see how they could help with Deadsweep’s mental virus.
Only Pita came with us to the village. I still didn’t know the story why sometimes the villagers both respected the Ginete and were a little standoffish too. But I figured that’s why only one Ginete came with us.
We were a motley crew strolling down the road. High above us, Lady circled along with two other pileated dragons. I couldn’t tell all of them apart except for Lady, probably because Lady was also Suzanne. I knew that once we got to town, the two dragons would keep watch while Suzanne came into town with us.
Ruta and Beru walked behind us. Zeid was on my right, and Cahir having made it to the Castle the day before, now walked on my left. I loved dropping my hand into his fur and leaving it there while we walked.
Cahir never indicated whether he liked my hand on him or not, but I assumed if he didn’t he wouldn’t hesitate to let me know. Besides, he seemed to enjoy the Priscillas riding on him. La likes to sit on Cahir’s head and hold on to his ear. Pris likes to fly ahead and come back to check on us. She has a hard time keeping still. Cil loves burying herself inside Cahir’s fur so that sometimes she isn’t visible at all. Except every once in a while the tip of her wing peeks out and catches the sun turning it into a petal of rainbows.
Link, Aki, and Niko took turns walking in front and then in the back. It looked like a casual walk but watching how alert everyone was behaving gave it away. The four men from Kinver guarded the two sides and the back.
Yes, it was a pleasant walk, but not for a minute did anyone think that we were safe. We had no idea what form Deadsweep took to infect. We didn’t know if it was one thing or many. We didn’t know if one of us was already infected. No wonder although we laughed and chatted, we weren’t relaxed.
I hoped that the village would bring the answer to at least one question.
Deadsweep Twenty-Four
We did get one question answered. We found out what the aftermath of infection looked like. After seeing it, and discovering that it was the result of only three people, th
e terror of the Deadsweep began to sink in.
The once quiet town of Dalry, with its well-tended lawns and gardens, was gone. Oh, it was still quiet. Very quiet. Nobody was out. Instead of neighbors chatting together or strolling the streets there was no one in sight. The way the town looked, it appeared no one had ventured out for a long time. All the windows and doors were closed, and I was sure that for the first time, they were locked.
What had caused the fear was not readily apparent. Link turned on the communication channel between all of us, in case we would need it. Everyone gave him a thumbs up when he asked if we were all on. Lady landed beside Cahir and then turned into Suzanne. Forgetting the channel I spoke out loud, “What the zonk?”
“Well said,” Suzanne answered, which caused a titter of laughter.
The tavern’s sign was still squeaking as we headed there. As we got closer, we could hear voices, loud voices and breaking glass. In the Earth Realm, this might have been a normal sound coming from a tavern as people drank too much and started fighting. In Erda, no one drank too much, and before Abbadon began his campaign of destruction, no one fought either.
The martial arts forms that Niko had been teaching us were used for physical conditioning in Erda, not for fighting. Niko had fallen in love with them as a youngster and studied with a master who had moved away years before. Now, we learned those forms to defend ourselves. As we heard more glass breaking, I was happy I had at least learned the basics.
Niko had told us to split up on each side of the tavern door. One group would go in first, and the other group would cover them. It was possible that what was going on was all being done as a bit of fun. Not likely, but possible, and we didn’t want to stir up trouble if it was innocent.
Just as Niko gave the signal to go in, the tavern door banged open, and a man flew out, landing on his back in the street. Two other men followed him with what looked like small tree trunks in their hands. It was obvious they were heading to the man on the street who already looked as if he had been beaten with something.
Before we could stop what was happening, the Priscillas attacked the two men’s faces. Pris took the lead man and punched him in both eyes. Cil and La each took an eye of the other one.
I was stunned. I didn’t know that the Priscillas were fighters. Although I should have realized, given how many times they had pulled my hair or berated me for my idiocy. Still, it was awesome to watch the two men drop, screaming.
Suzanne had turned back into a dragon and landed on the men in the street. Her talons held two of them down, and she pinned the third under her wing.
When I went to help, Zeid yelled, “Don’t touch them!”
Beru pulled a fine net out of her pocket, which I had never seen before, and we all helped spread it over the men as Lady backed off of them.
Niko had taken the first group into the tavern and reported that there was no one else in there, so we pulled the net tight and led the three men back in.
We stared in shock. Inside, the tavern was destroyed. Everything was broken or shattered into tiny bits.
“Do you like it, smartass?” one of the men yelled, snarling at Niko. “We did it. You think you have stopped us, but you haven’t. There are a lot of us. You can stop us three, but you can’t stop the army that is forming.”
These men talking that way was so out of context of everything I knew about Erda that I couldn’t speak. But then no one else did either. What was there to say?
Aki had left and returned with a man who we had met the last time we had been here. Although now he looked entirely different. His face was pale, and his clothes hung on him.
“Ah, Mayor!” the younger man shouted. “You little coward. What’s your town going to do now, huh? What if there are more of us out there, just waiting to explode. What if you are one of them, and you don’t know yet?”
Mayor Tom blanched and ran out of the room, which only caused the men to taunt him more. It didn’t matter that they were firmly bound up in a net. They had one thing on their minds. Make us all afraid. They were doing an outstanding job of it.
Niko looked up as Pita entered the room with his brother Sam. They were carrying a container filled with hoses, and what looked like a tarp. Niko nodded at the Ginete and shooed the rest of the team out of the tavern.
“Do you know what’s happening in there?” we all asked Professor Link.
“The Ginete have prepared a gas that will put those men to sleep. Once it is all set up, they will come out here and wait until the gas disperses.”
Looking at our shocked faces, he added, “No, it won’t hurt them. We just need to get them to a safe place without any of us touching them, and the Ginete suggested this.”
“What if it doesn’t work?” I asked. Leave it to me to ask the question everyone was thinking.
“We’ll make it stronger.”
Pita, Sam, and Niko came out looking as terrible as the rest of us. These were people, not green globs and a metal robot.
We all moved to the other side of the street just in case some of the gas leaked. Mayor Tom invited us to his house to wait, which most of us were happy to do, including me.
Once the gas was gone, the Ginete, Niko, and Zeid slid a wagon under the soundly sleeping bundled men. They pulled the cart into a side street. Right before it disappeared underground, I saw the ring around the circle that the Whistle Pigs had developed. Those magic circles had saved us more than once. Now they were going to save us in a different way.
“Now what?” I asked.
“Now we interview everyone, but first, since we don’t know how the infection spreads, we need to take precautions,” Aki said.
“For me, too?” squeaked the Mayor.
“Yes, for you, too,” Aki assured him.
Who could blame him? His town was under attack by an unknown and unseen enemy. I was trying to keep a brave face, but from the moment I saw the men, I was terrified. Evil had come to Dalry.
Deadsweep Twenty-Five
We set ourselves up in the Mayor’s home. His wife asked if we were hungry, and although I knew everyone was, we all turned her down. We suspected that their food supplies were short due to the invasion of Deadsweep into their town, and we didn’t want to deplete them further. Later I thought that perhaps it was also because we thought the food might contain the infection. Anything was possible.
We were all wearing something that looked like a spacesuit, but it wasn’t clumsy like the ones I remembered our astronauts using. They were comfortable and fit like our regular clothes. The Priscillas were the ones responsible for the material, but they wouldn’t say what it was or where they got it. I had a suspicion it was from the fairy community, and that meant we might never know. Fairies keep their secrets.
The Whistle Pigs had fitted us up with one of their technology gadgets that we were to breathe through. Once again, they were coming to our rescue with their technical wizardry.
“Shouldn’t we have had these on when we first came in?” I asked, smarty pants me thinking of something after the fact.
I got the evil look I deserved from Pris. Well, actually from everyone. So I shut up and listened.
It was hard to coax the villagers out of their homes, but the Mayor assured them that the men were gone and that we were there to stop any further infection.
He was lying of course. We were there to stop any further infection, but we had no idea how to do it, or if it was already present in people. The hope was by asking about the three men we would get a clue as to where they had picked up the Deadsweep virus, as we were calling it. Of course, we were guessing again. Was it a virus? Or was it an injection of something?
We questioned everyone. Although we tried to make it as pleasant as possible, the fact that we were wearing protective clothing and they weren’t didn’t help our public imag
e. But most of the villagers understood we were trying to stop what was happening and gave us as much information as they knew, which wasn’t much.
All three men were loved and respected in the community. One of the men had a wife, Letha, and two daughters. They were devastated. It felt as if one minute they had a loving father and husband and the next he was angry and throwing things.
It was that man’s family that was the most helpful because they had an eye on him every day. One of his little girls mentioned that a few days before he had started getting mean, which wasn’t like him at all. It scared her. He would snap at her for simple things that he usually loved to do, like read her a book before bed. Once she heard her daughter mention her husband’s irritability, Letha said she noticed those things too. Tiny things, but not the way he usually acted. And, yes, it had been a few days before it got worse. Before he stormed out of the house and started terrorizing the town.
After hearing that, we went back to the friends of the other two men and heard basically the same story. It wasn’t an overnight explosion into anger. It was a progression. They didn’t have a context in which to put the irritability, so they ignored it. People in Erda were not easily irritated. At least they weren’t before.
By the time we had questioned everyone, we were exhausted. And we knew we had to interview everyone again. However, we had to figure out how to interview for the appearance of irritability without suggesting it.
The other thing we were looking for was rifts within relationships. But once again we were worried about causing something by suggesting that it might be present. If we suggested they were irritable wouldn’t that start a rift? And if that was what let the infection in, wouldn’t we be the ones that caused it?
