by GARY DARBY
Cara’s hand flies to her mouth, and I can feel both Amil, and Helmar abruptly stiffen behind me. Phigby turns grim eyes on us. “It may not be ‘too’ Hooper. It may be that the Wilders are under Vay’s grotesque influence.”
“Phigby,” Cara says in a shaky voice, “you can’t be serious.”
“I’m very serious,” Phigby utters. He turns his eyes to me. “And Hooper’s witch?”
He shakes his head. “It wasn’t a witch. It was Vay, herself. For some reason, she’s not only after the golden, she’s after Hooper, too.”
I was wrong.
It just became much, much, worse.
Thoughts of Golden Wind
Drachs are such unusual creatures. They believe so much in what their eyes see, their ears hear, their sense of taste, smell, and touch.
Unable to accept beyond what their puny senses tell them they live such meager and limited lives. It is a wonder that any of them have survived this long.
So many turn their sight inward, caring only for the pleasure of the moment.
A few among them, such as Professor Phineas Phigby, he of the inquiring mind, understand that there is much beyond this world, much beyond what he sees and hears.
So much more.
Even when presented with the three queens, Hooper and the others still doubt. Granted clear direction, they waver. Given answers, they still question.
Even when faced by Vay herself, Hooper refuses to believe that which is happening around him, rather, he turns inward, in many respects a scared little boy.
The gemstone is his to carry, but he must face his task clear-eyed and not be clouded by pride, or vanity, jealousy, or greed.
He must begin to have faith, to believe in more than just himself, to want more for those around him, for those he knows and those he doesn’t. His vision must grow.
For some, faith is frail, easily slain by the slightest adversity. That cannot be in this company. Their conviction must never waver; tested by hardship, yes, but met by confidence in each other, faith in themselves, and a firm belief in the promise that what they do is for the right and good.
Not just for today, but always. If not that, then what is the purpose of faith?
Chapter 19
I shove the book into Cara’s lap and jump to my feet. I can’t help it. Terror sweeps over me, and I want to run, to hide. My adversary has gone from being a simple witch with skeleton claws for hands, eyes that glow like coals, riding on a broomstick, and eating little children, to being a wicked, powerful fairy “just below the gods.” I’m doomed. I’m more than doomed if such a thing is possible.
Phigby is quick to my side and grips both of my shoulders in his strong hands. “Easy, Hooper, she’s not here. Of that, I can assure you.”
Helmar snorts with a crooked grin. “Oh come now, Phigby, just what would an evil fairy want with Hooper, other than to eat him, maybe. And even then, he’d be a pretty scrawny meal.”
“That’s not funny, Helmar,” Cara retorts and turns to Phigby. “Seriously, Phigby, what would Vay want with Hooper?”
Phigby peers at me with a questioning, concerned expression. My heart is still thudding in my chest, and my hands have suddenly gone cold, even in the day’s warmth. I manage to swallow, give him a weak nod that I’m all right, and sit back down.
He steps away, draws a breath and as his usual custom when thinking through a problem he tugs on his beard. As much and as often as he pulls on his shaggy whiskers, it’s a wonder he still has any hair left.
“I don’t know,” he rumbles and vehemently shakes his head. “But Vay would not waste her energy on Hooper if he were as insignificant as you assume him to be.”
He steps back to scratch at his head as he peers at me. “Still, there must be a reason but for the life of me, I don’t know why Vay would have such an interest in Hooper.”
He begins to pace in a tight circle, his robe swirling about him. Today, it seems to have an azure color to it that almost blends in with the sky. “There is so little that I can remember,” he mutters as if to himself. He stops and lets out a long, melancholy sigh. “That companion book I mentioned, it might hold a great many answers.”
He whirls around, the hem of his robe scattering bits of leaves. Amil points at Phigby’s oversized haversack. “You seem to carry your entire library in there, you don’t have it with you?”
“No,” Phigby growls. “Of all the foul luck, I had it and then lost it.”
“Lost it?” Cara questions with a sideways glance at me. “How did you lose it?”
“In the fire,” Phigby snaps. “I forgot to grab the book when I fled my shop, and now it’s little more than ashes.”
He gestures wildly and says, “And I had it sitting right there, on my pedestal and I ran right past it. All I had to do was reach out . . . ” his voice ends in a groan, and he just stands there, angry and upset at himself.
Cara and I stare at each other. I lean toward her and say firmly, “You have to tell him.”
“Eh?” Phigby mutters, peering at the two of us. “Tell me what?”
Cara and I lock eyes in a hard stare and stay that way for several heartbeats before she abruptly jumps to her feet. “I’ll do better than that.”
Cara marches over to her sapphire, who’s lying down while Phigby turns and watches her. He turns his head to me with a quizzical expression, but before he can say a word, I answer, “Just wait, she’ll show you.”
Cara rummages in her nearest saddlebag before she withdraws the sealed book and comes striding back. She hands it to Phigby while his eyes widen in amazement and an enormous smile cracks his face. His grin is so big, I’m afraid that if he breathes in too deeply, he’ll suck in his beard and suffocate.
He holds the book up and turns it over in the sunlight beaming in delight as he holds the hefty manuscript. He continues to smile and then as quickly as his grin appeared, it disappears. He peers at us with a deep frown and glowering eyes.
“Wait,” he rumbles, “how did you — ”
Then he gapes at us, his eyes growing so large that I feel as if the moons Nadia and Eskar have taken their place. “You!” he sputters, his finger jabbing at the both of us. “It was you that I heard in my formulating room!”
“It was my fault, Phigby,” I quickly say. “I goaded Cara into sneaking into your house and taking the book. I’m the one you should be mad at, not her.”
“Oh, bosh,” Cara replies, giving me a sharp elbow in the side. “Phigby, it was no such thing. After Hooper told me that you were going to find an old book that you hadn’t read in a long time, I just had to have a look at it. Yes, I slipped into your house while Hooper kept watch, and borrowed your book.”
“Borrowed!” Phigby thunders. “You mean stole, young lady.”
“No,” Cara answers primly and brushes at her tunic as if she’d just found some imaginary dirt, “borrowed. When I don’t have the money to buy, you always let me borrow your books, knowing that I always return them.”
“That’s true,” I quickly add. “Remember, she was, uh, is, your best customer.”
“That’s right,” Cara huffs. “And what I borrow, I always return. So there.”
Cara is holding her head and nose up a little higher than usual as if Phigby’s accusation is somehow insulting and outrageous.
I keep my eyes on Phigby, just in case I need to leap away from his backhand. He wouldn’t hit Cara — I, on the other hand, am a different matter.
He’s never struck me before, but to Phigby, stealing a book is second only to murder. Then again, murder might be a close second.
Still keeping my eyes on Phigby, I hang my head low, like a cur dog with its tail between its legs.
Phigby’s eyes, narrow and hard, flick from Cara to me and back again. He stays that way for several moments before he starts to chuckle, then laughs, holding his hand to his mouth to muffle the sound as if he’s afraid to disturb the sleeping dragons. “Borrowed,” he laughs out loud. “They borrowed i
t.”
He reaches out and sweeps us both together in a bear hug. I look at Cara. Her smile is genuine. But not for me, for Phigby. I, on the other hand, I’m thinking Phigby may be laughing now, but it’s like the calm before the storm. When he lets us go, I’m still going to keep my head low, just waiting for his backhand to land.
Phigby releases us and to my surprise, declares, “Bless you both. I don’t know what prompted you to do what you did, but I am grateful.”
He lifts the book up. “This, I believe, holds many secrets, perhaps even the answers as to why we find ourselves in these circumstances and my heart was heavy with its loss.”
“But it’s not lost,” Cara replies. “You have it back now. Can you open it, Phigby? We watched you try before and you couldn’t.”
At that, he turns a severe eye on her so she shrugs and says, “We were in the tree outside your window watching you try to open the book. We were going to knock for you to let us in but you were in such a foul mood when you went to bed that we thought better of it.”
Phigby stares at us both for a moment and then, seemingly accepting Cara’s explanation, sits on the log and Cara and I slide in next to him.
He runs his hands over the book’s shiny surface. In the dying sunlight, the cover seems to change color in the sunlight, almost as if a rainbow played across the top.
His fingers tap on the orb that holds the clasp and he says in a distant voice, “Once I knew how to open it, but I can’t quite remember now . . . ”
As Phigby is speaking, I notice something unusual about the book.
“Phigby,” I say, “it doesn’t have a title. What’s it called?”
“Eh?” he replies and shakes his head. “I can’t recall that either.”
Cara leans forward eagerly. “A mystery book! Phigby, you’ve just got to remember how to open it.”
Curious, I run a hand over the front binding. “Phigby, what are these rounded depressions?” I count to myself. “There’s seven all total, and they make an arch from one corner across the top and then to the other corner. Are they significant in some way?”
I run a finger on the inside of one of the shallow scoops. There is something vaguely familiar about the indentation’s size and depth. Phigby lets out a long sigh. “Alas, Hooper, I’m afraid I’ve forgotten much. It’s been too long, but, yes, I believe that they’re meaningful in some way.”
“So you really can’t open it,” Cara says in a disappointed voice. “And that means we can’t read what’s inside.”
Phigby straightens himself and gently runs a hand over the book’s cover. “It will come to me, I’m sure of it, just not now.”
Helmar lets out little grunt. “I’m sorry, Phigby, but frankly, I think you’re filling our heads with more mystical nonsense. The Wilders, they’re real, as are our dragons and the golden. Not some mumbo jumbo fairies from fairy folk land.”
“It’s not nonsense,” Phigby retorts. “To every legend and lore, there is always a bit of fact, Helmar. Vay and her sisters are real. What? Do you think that what you experienced at the falls was, as you put it, some ‘mumbo jumbo’?”
“And as I recall,” Cara says curtly, “that ‘mumbo jumbo’ had you stumbling backward with your bow up.”
“As it did you,” Helmar returns.
“Oh, yes,” Cara answers. “I fully admit that I was close to running. Wilders are one thing, they’re from my world; fairies are not.”
“No — ” Phigby begins when abruptly, the dragons are on their feet, snorting and pawing the ground.
I snap my head up. “Dragon wings!” I yelp.
Helmar is quick to action. “Get deeper in the woods!” he orders. “Move!”
Cara springs away, with Phigby and Amil in close pursuit. I start to run, but Helmar’s hand flashes out, grabs my hood, and jerks me back so hard that I stumble backward. He holds me up so that I’m practically on my toes. “Where’s your bow and quiver?” he demands.
I swallow and point back at the cabin. “Get them,” he orders.
“But — ” I waver.
“No buts, Hooper,” Helmar growls, his hand on his sword hilt, “we may just need that bow and those arrows. Go!”
He shoves me toward the hut. I stumble forward, hesitant and unsure, trying to choose between Helmar’s sword and unknown dragon wings. Helmar is closer than the oncoming dragons, which makes up my mind for me, and I spin to scurry toward the shanty. An uncertain future death is better than certain death standing in the form of Helmar.
Behind me, I can hear our dragons lumbering away as they make for the thick forest. I swing my head around in every direction, trying to find Scamper, but the little tub is nowhere to be seen. I’m at the cabin door when I hear the dragon wings almost overhead. I duck into the cottage, grab my bow and quiver before peering outside.
Wilders!
Six reds are landing in the far meadow, their crimson scales shimmering in the sun’s last light. I start to ease outside when I hear Eeeett? behind me. “Scamper!” The little chunk has been sleeping under the bed the whole time. I snatch him, and bolt through the door, praying that the Wilders don’t see us.
I charge around the cabin to hide behind the back wall. I peer around the corner. The Wilders are talking among themselves. One points toward the creek, and while he leads several Wilders toward the hut, the others take the reds toward the stream.
That’s all I need to see. Using the shanty as a shield, I scramble low up the gentle slope, juggling Scamper, bow, and quiver. I slip behind the first large tree trunk I can find and peek out. The Wilders are almost to the tree line.
I put Scamper down and whisper, “Run!” He darts away, and I’m right behind him, trying to stay low and keep the tree trunk between the Wilders and me.
Scamper darts across the glade as if he’s scented a honey hive in the far trees. I finally manage to struggle into the first thick grove and just as I pass a large, knobby tree, a hand shoots out, grabs me by the front of my surcoat and hauls me behind the tree.
“Wilders,” I gulp to Helmar, “they’re headed toward the cabin.”
“I have eyes and ears, Hooper,” he mutters and peers around the tree trunk at the hut. “We left warm ashes in the hearth, a dead giveaway that someone’s been there.”
He scowls at me. “And fresh dragon dung in the meadow.” He says it in such a way as if to imply that I should have done my job and cleaned it up. “They’ll know we were here.”
He pauses and then says, “Did all of them make for the hut?”
“No, four to the cabin, and two took their reds to the stream to drink.”
He smiles grimly. “They split their forces, and they’re off their dragons. Just the opening we need.”
He pulls at me. “Let’s go, we need to find the others, and quickly.”
For me attempting to keep up with Helmar is like the sprogs trying to keep up with the golden when she’s on the run. It’s all I can do to keep his broad back in sight.
By the time I push through a last line of scraggly bushes, Helmar has already gathered the others together. Winded and out of breath, I stumble over to sink next to Scamper, who’s sitting next to the sprogs.
I only catch the last part of Helmar’s instructions, “ — when we see the smoke, that’s the signal for me and Cara to attack.”
The group splits apart, each evidently with a part to play in Helmar’s plan. “Helmar,” I croak, “what do you want me to do?”
He turns, disdain evident on his face. “Guard the golden and the sprogs, stay here, and keep out of sight,” he orders.
Helmar whirls away, and he, Cara, and Phigby climb aboard their dragons while Amil strides away in the cabin’s direction, leaving me behind without another backward glance.
“In other words,” I mutter to myself, “you’ll be of no use in the coming battle, so stay out of the way and let real warriors do the fighting.”
I hold up my bow. “Then why did I risk my life to go back for this
?”
I reach over and scratch Scamper behind the ears before shrugging, “Oh, well, I guess he’s right,” and I set the long shaft aside. “I can’t even use this thing.”
The golden settles down next to me and swings her head around. “Not all warriors carry swords or bows, Hooper. There are other ways to be courageous that don’t require the use of armaments, you know.”
“Humph,” I reply. “Not in Helmar’s world.”
I take in a breath and mutter, “Or Cara’s, for that matter. To her, you’re not a real man unless you can sky a dragon, wield a sword, shoot a bow — ”
“Or read books?” the golden murmurs.
I raise my eyes at that. Suddenly, the golden is on her feet, lifting her head. “Smoke,” she states.
I whirl around to gape toward the deserted cabin. “Helmar said that when they saw the smoke they’d attack. I — ”
Abruptly, the golden snorts and takes several steps forward, her head and ears turned in a different direction. She raises her head as high as it will go, staring and listening so intently that it’s as if she’s frozen in place.
She spins around to me and orders, “Hooper, get the sprogs.”
“Wha — ”
“Get the sprogs, now!”
You don’t argue with a fire-breathing dragon, believe me, you just don’t. I scurry over and grab a sprog under each arm. The golden dips her head. “Under my carapace, and hurry.”
I hobble as fast as I can, deposit the first two and grab the other two. “What is it?” I gurgle as I shove Regal and Sparkle in with Strider and Glow.
“I’ll tell you in a moment,” she responds. “You and Scamper, climb aboard.” Scamper takes a running leap, bounds off her leg and lands smack in the middle of the sprogs. That sets them to screeching at him and squabbling but I ignore them as I hesitate.
Helmar’s warning was clear. No one, especially me was to ride the golden. If I did . . .
Seeing me standing there, not moving, the golden swings her head around and demands, “What are you waiting for, Hooper?”
