by C Lee Tocci
“The old man went back into the cabin and put away all his good dishes. He took all the delicious food he made and threw it out for his friends of the forest to eat. He took off his fancy clothes and put on his rattiest work clothes. Then he sat down at the head of his empty table with nothing for his dinner but brown bread and baked beans on a rough wooden plate. When he finished eating, he laid his head against the back of his chair and fell into a deep sleep. Now the old man dreams and waits for the day that the raven would come and take his soul out of his body. When the raven comes, he will carry the old man up to the sky to his father’s table. There, his father has prepared the most delicious dinner on the most beautiful table filled with the most wonderful people who will laugh and talk and eat with him. And then Uncle Mesa will be happy at last.”
There was an appreciative pause before Jeff spoke. “Aren’t you going to tell us what they ate?” he asked.
Lilibit’s eyes twinkled as she opened her mouth to begin another long list of menu items, but Todd was quicker. He reached over the table and clapped his hand over her mouth.
“I think we get the idea!” said Todd.
They all laughed as Lilibit mumbled her laundry list of food into Todd’s muffling palm. When she finally stopped, Todd waited a moment before gingerly withdrawing his hand.
“…and baked beans and brown bread!” Lilibit ended merrily, with much laughter from the others.
“Where did you hear that story?” Todd asked, shaking his head.
“From Uncle Mesa!” answered Lilibit, as if it were obvious.
Marla leaned over to whisper in Todd’s ear. “Either her memory’s improving and she remembered that story from before, or she has a very, vivid imagination!”
While Todd was inclined to believe the latter, he did wonder. In the soft morning light, Todd thought the skull of the old man smiled, peacefully enjoying the laughter of the children gathered around his table. He shook his head as if to rid himself of the silly thought.
“And we’re out here, again, why?”
The sounds of the helicopter drowned the voice of the man sitting in the cockpit, but from where he stood on the ground, a half a mile away, Keotak-se read his lips.
“Because we’ve got orders. Now keep your eyes open,” answered the man behind the controls.
“I doubt even an experienced mountaineer could have survived that storm. Does he really think a pack of kids could have made it?”
“We’ve got our orders,” repeated the pilot.
Keotak-se watched the helicopter pull away, weaving its surveillance pattern over the mountain range. He was encouraged by their presence, since it meant not only did the Enemy believe Lilibit survived the storm, but that they had not yet located her.
Yet, what heartened him even more than the helicopters was the song of Branken humming faintly around his neck.
Gliding low over the terrain, and with the advantage of keener and better-trained eyes, Keotak-se also searched, but he could find no trace of the children.
Chapter Twenty Four
Adios de Tío
By the following morning, all their tunnels had dissolved into paths. If today was going to be as warm as yesterday, the mountains would soon be thawed enough for them to travel.
Todd felt the temptation to stay here at Mesa del Tío, but he knew the cans of food they found might only last them for another week or so, and winter would soon be full on them.
Closing the door, he turned to look at the others, who sat waiting for his direction. He was about to suggest they should start packing up when he heard the distant chatter of a helicopter.
Lilibit froze, then flew into a frenzy, running for the door, than changing her mind and dashing around the room before darting under the table. She hugged one of the table legs in terror. The others watched her in growing fear.
Todd looked out the door and realized that the thawing tunnels now appeared as branching fingers of paths in the snow, visible from the sky, and pointing directly to their hideout. The helicopter wove a search pattern across the southern sky and Todd guessed they had only ten or twenty minutes before it was close enough to detect their cabin.
“Pack it up! Now! We’re moving!” Todd barked, the edge of panic in his voice spurring the others to action.
Marla grabbed the canned food and loaded them into Todd and Donny’s packs.
“Got the can opener!” Nita piped.
“Good girl!” said Todd. Nita beamed in pleasure.
Todd grabbed a coil of rope from behind the oak chest. He looked around to see what else they could take from cabin. Jeff was scooping the dinner knives and Devon stuffed the ratty blanket into his backpack.
Todd ran to the door. The helicopter was still too far away to notice them, but it would be only a matter of minutes before it was upon them.
“Okay! Let’s move out! Head into the woods, they won’t be able to see our tracks from the air!”
Todd sent Donny first to wade through the waist-deep snow and break the trail. The others followed quickly.
Todd took one last look at the cabin and found Lilibit lagging behind. Surprisingly, she seemed to have momentarily forgotten the threat of the approaching helicopter.
“Good bye, Uncle Mesa, and thank you,” Todd heard Lilibit whisper to the corpse. Taking a small glittering stone out of her pocket, she slipped it under his bony fingers. “I hope you like your new table.”
“Lilibit!” Todd roared. “Now!”
Lilibit turned and raced out the door to catch up with the others. Todd stole a quick glance back at their lonely host before closing the door and hurrying into the forest.
For a long, silent moment, the skeleton sat at the head of his again empty table, alone in his again empty cabin. A soft breeze pushed open the door and a flurry of snowflakes danced into the room. The skull dipped gently as if it were nodding off to sleep, before falling with a placid thud onto the table. As if released from a spell, the bones of the old man lightly dissolved into a puddle of dust.
A raven flew in, a fleck of grey barely visible under it’s right wing. It landed nimbly on the table and picked at the remains of the breakfast with a finicky air. Then it hopped to the head of the table and, finding the Old Man’s shiny stone, picked it up in its beak and flew out the door and into the morning sky.
The gust from the Raven’s wings sent the puddle of dust flying into the air. Picked up by the breeze, he waltzed on the wind and out the door, never to dine alone again.
Chapter Twenty Five
Into the Nether Rock
Todd ran to catch up with others. Lilibit’s dash out the door had carried her past the others. She plowed through the snow and ran ahead of Donny. Todd was astounded at the path she carved. They all knew that Lilibit gave out a lot of heat; they’d never lit the fireplace in the cabin, it had been warm just from her body heat, but that didn’t prepare him for the sight of her blasting through the snow like a blowtorch. Jeff and Marla looked back at Todd as they ran, flabbergasted. Yet Lilibit didn’t seem to be aware that she was doing anything unusual.
Their path led to a streambed. Normally, the stream would be a gentle babble of water that they could have hopped with a leap or two, but with the extra feed of the melting snow, it was a chasm of rapids, too treacherous to ford.
The group pulled up, gasping, at the bank. Looking back over his shoulder, Todd realized Lilibit had laid down a trail so vivid, their pursuers would be able to track them easily and with their all their modern equipment, they’d soon be overtaken. They couldn’t see the helicopter through the web of pine trees towering above them, but they heard it getting closer.
Todd thought if they ran along the edge of the stream, they’d leave less of a trail, but which way to run? The others stared at him as he wavered. Downstream led them out of the mountains, but would their pursuers expect them to go that way?
A flicker of black skittered above the trees to his right. It wasn’t Grey Feather, it was just a crow, but T
odd had nothing else to go one. He pointed upstream and Jeff headed that way, the others following close behind, Todd in the rear.
Along the shallows, their feet grew numb from the frigid water but not even Jeff wasted his breath on complaining. They didn’t know who chased them, or why, but instinct overrode their sense of body and they ran like a herd of gazelles, chased by wolves. If they’d thought about it, they would have been amazed at their own stamina, but there was no time to think, only to run.
Still masked by the tree cover, Todd heard the buzz of multiple helicopters. He realized the enemy must have discovered their trail. And there were a lot more of them than he first thought.
They couldn’t hold up this pace much longer. He looked frantically for someplace safe to hide.
Suddenly, with a small yelp, Marla slipped, fell and disappeared.
They’d been running in single file when Marla lost her footing on the icy stones and spilled into the rapids. Since they were behind all the others, Todd was the only one to see her fall, but even before he could call out to her, she was gone.
Todd yelled out to the others to stop. He rushed to the spot where he last saw her. There in middle of the streambed, a small sinkhole had opened, about three feet across. The stream began cascading down into a dark underground cavern. The streambed beyond the sinkhole quickly ran dry.
“Marla?” Todd’s voice cracked as it echoed into the cavern. “You okay?” He froze, listening, but heard nothing but the babble of the stream running underground.
“Stay back!” Todd barked as the others moved to crowd around the opening. He didn’t know how sound the earth around the hole might be. His eyes met Devon’s, who looked pale and grave.
One shall fall.
“No!” Todd spat the word defiantly. Dream or no dream, he couldn’t stand by and lose one of them, especially Marla. He shrugged off his pack and grabbed the rope he had taken from Mesa del Tío. Tying one end around his waist, he ran the rope around the nearest pine tree and, holding on to the other end, cautiously approached the hole. He turned to see the rest looking at him anxiously.
“I’m going down to find her. Jeff’s in charge.”
Jeff puffed back his shoulders in pride, but then glanced at the others and realized just what being in charge meant. He looked back at Todd, a glimmer of panic in eyes. Todd shot back what he hoped was a confident smile, but he doubted it was that reassuring.
Clinging to the rope, Todd lowered himself into the sinkhole. A sharp beam of sunlight lit his legs, but nothing beyond them. Hand over hand, he descended, calling out Marla’s name and waiting in vain for her response. The lower he went, the more he worried, could she have survive the fall?
Then even his sunbeam failed him and the hole was nearly pitch black. The rope was almost full out when his feet felt water. The current pulled at him and he flailed his legs, looking for some safe footing. Using his staff to push off from the streambed, he swung his body like a pendulum over the underground stream. He let out a little more rope and his feet found a rocky ledge. Standing on the bank, his eyes slowly adjusted to the gloom.
The sinkhole’s newly formed waterfall fed into an existing stream running through an underground cavern. He could see the roof of the cave about twenty feet above him, but he saw no trace of Marla.
“Todd!” Jeff hissed from above. “They’re on the ground! They’ve got dogs!” Faintly, Todd heard barks echoing down the mountainside.
“I can’t find Marla!” Todd choked back the tremor in his voice. “We’re going to have to go look for her! Throw down my pack, then send the others down the line!” Todd wiped away hot tears of fear that stung his eyes before the others could see.
One by one, they climbed down the rope as Todd anchored it. Jeff was the last one down. Todd untied the rope from around his waist and left it hanging.
Todd was groping the ground near the streambed, looking for any sign of Marla in the darkness, when he noticed a glow coming from behind him, not from the opening in the roof. Turning, he saw something glimmering brightly from inside Lilibit’s pocket.
“Lilibit?” Todd stared at the glow. “What’s that?”
Lilibit reached into the pocket where she kept the stone she had plucked from the Obelisk a week earlier. Though she frequently kept her hand in that pocket, she rarely took it out.
Now, as she pulled it out, it glowed with a bright warm blue light. Todd, after asking a silent permission with his glance, tried to pick the stone from her open palm.
An unseen force slammed his hand back away from the stone so strongly it almost wrenched his arm out its socket.
“You hold it,” he said unnecessarily, rubbing his shoulder
The sounds of the dogs grew louder. Todd peered down into the stalactite-draped tunnel. He had no time to appreciate the peculiar eeriness of the cavern, he pulled the rope down into the cave, hoping he wasn’t leading them into a dead end. With Lilibit holding her stone over her head, they followed him downstream, looking for some trace of Marla.
Three sets of gleaming black eyes watched the invaders creep into the depths of the labyrinths. Moving with a bulky grace, they stepped into the chamber. The tallest placed a quartz white hand on the wall nearest the opening in the roof and from his fingertips flowed a stream of crystal that traveled up the side of the cavern. It wove a web of stone over the breach, and as it solidified, it resealed the cave.
The sanctity of the chamber had been restored. There remained one final factor requiring remediation.
Wordlessly, the trio followed the trespassers.
The boots of the Director crunched over pristine snow. He had to examine the location himself. Syxx would not be pleased, but it was apparent the field teams had not exaggerated. The children had disappeared as if the earth just swallowed them.
He suspected it would be fruitless, but as he turned to walk back to his waiting helicopter, he ordered the reclamation teams back into the air to continue searching the mountains.
Syxx would not be pleased.
A huge, ugly bird perched on a low hanging branch and watched unblinkingly as the Director stomped near his pine tree. It flapped its wings as the Director passed underneath, upsetting the snow pack balanced on the branches. The heavy cascade of wet snow fell onto his head, unleashing the Director’s precarious temper. He pulled out a twenty-two Lugar and emptied a clip into the branches of the tree.
The ground team members still finishing their site investigation glanced at each other nervously and hurried to complete their work.
Within minutes, the site was deserted.
With a smug little squawk, the condor descended from the tree unscathed and a moment later, Keotak-se stood where the bird had landed. Although the site was well trampled, he noted the rope scars on the pine tree and he could distinguish the children’s footprints from the later traffic. A quick examination of the streambed showed him the exposed vein of quartz, which, to the inexperienced eye appeared to be the top side of a deep slab of bedrock. Yet Keotak-se knew of the forgotten legends of the mountains, and what he remembered stirred a strain of dread through his spine.
He knew of only one human who still spoke to the people of the Nether Rock, but whether she still lived, he did not know.
“CHEE-ot-say. Toh-GEE-na. Sha-be-KAH.”
The shadow of the condor passed over the deserted mountaintop, soaring to the wastelands that lay north of the mountains.
Chapter Twenty Six
The Stone Cage
For the umpteenth time, Todd held up his hand to halt the group and listen. Perhaps the extra sounds he heard were just the echoes of their feet clattering through the caverns, but Todd felt they were not alone.
His scalp tingled.
They followed the water downstream, calling out Marla’s name with echoing whispers. The longer they went without any sign of her, the more anxious he felt. If she had walked away from the fall, she wouldn’t have gone far, but if she was injured, it was possible the current might
have carried her.
They reached a point in the tunnel where the walls grew close together and the stream pushed through a channel so narrow not even Lilibit could have squeezed through.
Jeff groaned when Donny again asked, “Is this Kiva?”
“No, Donny,” answered Todd. “This is a dead end.”
With a sigh, Todd turned and led the group back upstream. Maybe Marla wandered into one of the grottos that split off from the main cavern.
They had only walked back a few hundred yards when Todd froze. Something blocked the tunnel ahead. Brandishing his staff, he waved the others behind him.
For a long, breathless moment, they waited for whatever it was to attack. When nothing moved, Lilibit raised her stone higher above her head. As if in response to their panic, her stone flared, clearly lighting the tunnel ahead.
There, in the opening through which they had passed just minutes before, now stood three imposing stalactites. They poured from the roof, puddling into stalagmites on the cavern floor, leaving bare inches between their stony pillars.
Todd took a few hesitant steps forward, and then sprinted to the newly formed pillars that blocked the opening. He struck at the stones with his hands, testing their existence, unwilling to accept their reality. With a groan, he turned and looked at the others, who stared in shock.
They were trapped.
Chapter Twenty Seven
Molly Coppertop
Keotak-se strode the deserted dirt streets of the abandoned village of Coppertop, a burlap bag hanging over his shoulder. He passed boarded up storefronts and ruins of vacant shacks and did not stop until he stood at the opening of the derelict ore mine that was once the heart and soul of the town. When he’d walked far enough into the tunnel to escape the glaring desert sun, he paused, peering deep into the shaft. The echo of his footsteps faded into silence. Placing the sack on the floor of the cavern, Keotak-se stepped back, squatted on his haunches and waited.
