“Oh, uh yes. Justin and Emily,” I answered. ‘The last thing I needed now, was to be delayed,’ I thought. Just appease her and get to the merboy before he leaves. I glanced at the store across the lane. “I’m terribly sorry Miss, but...”
“MISS?” she snarled. “Is this how you address me?” her words darted out.
“I’m sorry mam,” I looked at her and wondered how it was that I was supposed to address her. “I was just in a hurry, and I...”
“Oh, of course!” she interrupted with a sickly-sweet voice and walked over to where the three of us now stood. She removed her lacy white gloves one finger at a time. “You’re in a hurry are you?”
She was at least a foot taller than me with the help of her boots and her dark brown eyes pierced the air. Locks of red hair escaped from her bonnet like flames from a torch against her perfectly pale skin. She was stunningly beautiful and yet thoroughly hideous all the same. She was enchanting and terrorizing.
“And what are you in such a rush for that you’d run out in front of my steed, spooking him and nearly causing me to fly off?” She snarled.
“I...I...” I stammered to find the words.
“I don’t think she meant to!” said Justin.
“Really?” she looked at Justin who suddenly buckled to his knees.
“Stop!” cried Emily.
“Oh but I’m just getting started!” the woman laughed and Emily fell to her knees. “Your friends are admirable,” she smiled at me. “But you must respect the fact that the Maker can write you out in one easy sentence, and he will, if I ask him to.” She leaned forward and whispered in my ear, “Don’t underestimate my influence over him.”
“But....I...I”
“Oh, but WHAT?” she said and then in a laughing manner she continued, “What’s the matter? Has the cat got your tongue?”
My tongue fumbled for words to respond and yet nothing came. My mouth felt oddly not my own, as it began to tremble and stutter out of control, “L.....L.L...”
“Say it!” she laughed, “For even a cat would know how to address me.”
The woman’s face contorted, robbing her remaining beauty and leaving a hideous smile that curled horribly on her grimacing face. Her pale skin glowed and her brown eyes were dark voids that sucked the light out from under the brim of her hat.
“L...Lu.......” What was happening to me? How was she doing this? “Lu.....Lu..Lu.Lusss,” my mouth continued against my will. I frantically glanced down at Justin and Emily who had their faces pressed against the ground as though they were bowing to her.
“Don’t look away from me!” her pale hand grabbed my chin and lifted my face up and under the bonnet with hers. “Say my name!” she hissed slowly and smiled wickedly, like a woman possessed by pure evil.
“Lusssss...Lustro...Basilicus,” the breath was pulled out of me and my legs gave way, causing my body to collapse on the ground in front of her.
Gasps from the newly formed crowd of people echoed around us and as fast as a red light turns green, Lustro’s demeanor had changed. She pulled her white gloves back on and said in a pleasant voice, “You should try to be more careful when crossing the street. I’d hate for one of you to get hurt.”
Climbing back up into her saddle, she flicked the reigns. “Giddyup,” she commanded, and her horse trotted off leaving us in a plume of dust.
I coughed.
“What just happened?” panted Justin.
“It was Ludo,” I stammered, still short of breath. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the boy with dirty blonde hair come out of the store. He looked around and then quickly ducked around the corner of the building, into an alleyway and out of sight. I still had a chance!
“Hurry, he’s leaving!” I grabbed Justin and Emily’s shoulders, lifted myself to my feet and looked both ways this time as I took off running for the alley.
“Who’s leaving?” hollered Emily, running to keep up to me.
I made it to the corner of the building just in time to watch the man with green eyes disappear down a back alley and behind a screen of hedges.
“Quickly! We can’t lose him,” I said running. The sound of our footsteps clamoured against the cobbled lane, as we came around the hedge to find him gone.
“Hello?” I called out, slowing my pace. Where could he have gone? I looked around and noticed a small wooden gate tucked neatly between the hedges. Peeking over it, I saw that it led to a quaint little park with a pond surrounded by a bed of flowers, several trees and a single bench that overlooked a shady patch of grass. And there he was. He had stopped at the base of a large maple tree. I saw him glance quickly around and then slip into the trunk of the tree.
“This way! Hurry!” I said to Justin and Emily.
“Aren’t we supposed to be looking for Henry?” huffed Emily, trying to keep up.
“This will only take a minute,” I assured her and clicked open the gate.
When I reached the large maple in the middle of the garden I quickly spotted a narrow opening in its trunk, but it appeared too shallow to accommodate a person.
“I don’t understand where he went!” I exclaimed. I reached my hand inside and felt only the solid trunk of the tree. Looking around, I was stumped as to where the boy had gone.
“Let me take a look,” said Justin who slipped easily through the narrow opening and disappeared.
Shocked, I looked at Emily who seemed equally surprised. There was nothing to do but follow Justin straight inside.
—
As soon as I slipped past the narrow opening I found myself in a larger than expected room inside the trunk with Justin. The round space was lit by a single oil lamp that hung from a knotted root in the ceiling. Its flaming wick flickered dimly off the gnarled wooden ceiling and walls, the dim light revealing no other exits but the one we had come in. The merboy was mysteriously gone.
“Where’d he go?” I asked Justin.
“I’m not sure who we’re even looking for anymore,” he said.
“Aren’t we’re supposed to be looking for Henry?” asked Emily entering the room.
“I was just hoping... Ugh!” I sighed. What was I hoping for? A reunion with the merboy? Maybe I just wanted the chance to finally talk to him and find out who he was. In any case, he was gone. “You’re right, we have to go back and find the Maker,” I said, realizing that I had already wasted too much time chasing the merboy instead of the one person we had come for, and possibly our only hope of getting home.
“So much for sooner rather than later,” said Justin.
“I’m sorry, okay?” I grumbled. “Let’s just go.”
I stepped back out through the narrow opening we had come in, and was instantly overcome by complete darkness. Blackness surrounded me, thick and opaque. There was no garden, pond, or anything detectable. It was as though the blackest night had suddenly fallen over the entire town of Lockhart and left me blind.
I turned back around quickly, but I couldn’t even see the light from the room in the tree that I had just left. I stretched my arms out in front of me, fumbling to find the tree, as my heart began to race inside my chest. Where’s the opening? The darkness smothered and confused me, leaving me claustrophobic in its grip. I began to panic.
“Justin!” I hollered. “Emily!” But my voice was muted and I could only hear it inside my head. What was going on? I was dizzy, suffocating in the dark void that seemed to be lacking air as well. I began to pant, finding it hard to breathe. I had to find the light and get back inside the tree before I passed out, but there was no light to find. I didn’t even know if my eyes were open or closed as my hands blindly searched for the tree. Instead of the trunk I felt someones hand. It grabbed hold of mine and pulled me forcefully back into the lamp-lit room.
Instantly my laboured breath became audible, and I heard Emily crying.
“W
hat’s going on?” gasped Justin, letting go of my hand.
“I couldn’t breathe!” cried Emily. “Why is it so dark out there?”
“I don’t know!” I panted. It didn’t make any sense.
“How are we gonna get out of here?” Emily’s tears filled her face.
“It’s like Lockhart’s been sucked into a black hole or something,” said Justin. “No light, sound, air... nothing.”
“What if it’s a trap?” stammered Emily.
“We should have just stuck to finding the Maker,” said Justin.
“You and your stupid fish-boy!” cried Emily. “You had to take us on some wild goose chase and now we might never find the Maker. Did you even think about that? We’ll be stuck here forever!”
I felt sick. They were right. I don’t know what I had been thinking. I looked around the empty room for answers. There had to be another way.
“Look for a latch!” I said, trying to be optimistic. “Maybe there’s another exit after all. I scanned the gnarled walls, grazing my hands along the bumpy wood, but I couldn’t find anything.
“There’s nothing,” said Emily. “No other way out.”
“I just don’t get why it’s so dark outside,” said Justin, still searching the walls.
“One minute it’s day and the next thing it’s night,” I said. “A really dark night!”
“Wait a sec! Maybe we can use the lamp?” said Justin standing on his toes to reach the lamp hanging above us. “If I could just get this down then we might be able to see outside after all.”
It was a good idea and Emily and I waited patiently, watching him wrestle to get it down, but the handle had somehow been looped firmly through the thick root, which seemed to have grown down out of the ceiling and back up, only inches away. It was impossible to unhook the lamp without removing its handle.
“How the heck did this lamp even get here like this?” he said trying to wriggle it free.
But then I noticed something. “Wait! Don’t move!” I said. “Check it out!” I pointed to the wall above the narrow exit, where three glowing vertical lines now flickered.
“Is that from the lamp?” asked Emily.
“It looks like it,” I said looking back up at the lamp. “Do you think it’s some sort of symbol?”
“It reminds me of the three lines that Yeri drew in the mud,” said Justin.
“You’re right!” I said. “It was his symbol for Saltus.”
I reached up to study the lamp and found there were two round metal sleeves that loosely fit the bottom of the lamp. Each one had perforated shapes cut into it. When Justin had moved the lamp in his attempt to remove it from the root, he must have shifted the sleeves and caused the cutouts to overlap. I walked to the doorway and looked back at the lamp. Sure enough, the light from the lamp was visibly brighter near the bottom where it passed through the three small lines and projected just above my head on the wall.
“Try and turn them some more,” I said.
Justin reached up and slowly slid the two sleeves in opposite directions. I glanced at the wall above me and the three bright lines disappeared.
“Keep turning,” I said.
Then suddenly a new shape appeared.
“Stop!” I said.
We all looked at the new shape glowing on the wall above the doorway - a circle over a horizontal line.
“That’s the symbol for Tesqua,” said Emily.
“Do you think all the symbols on the lamp are just different places here in Evoluii?” asked Justin, who was already shifting the two metal sleeves again.
“That’s what I was thinking,” I said.
Justin turned the metal sleeves on the lamp again, and once more the glowing symbol disappeared from the wall. He continued to turn and just like before, a new symbol appeared. This time it was the shape of a shell with a wavy line above it.
“That’s got to be Lily Palus!” said Emily.
“Guys, what if there’s a reason why those symbols are projected right above the exit,” said Justin.
We all looked at the one doorway in the room with the symbol of Lily Palus lit up directly above it.
“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” asked Emily.
“Oh I think he is,” I smiled, knowing exactly what Justin was thinking. “And there’s one way to find out,” I said eyeing the dark entrance that appeared the same no matter what symbol was above it.
“Wait!” said Emily. “How are we going to know what symbol represents Lockhart?”
“I don’t know. Let’s just try to figure it out,” I said.
Justin reached up to the lamp again and twisted the sleeves until a new symbol appeared. It was the shape of a tree.
“I haven’t seen that one before. It could be it,” I said. “We are in a tree.”
“Yeah or it could be the tree back in Green,” said Justin.
“Where the bird tried to eat us?” squealed Emily.
Justin shrugged.
“This is stupid!” sighed Emily. “If you think I’m going to risk going through that entrance with the possibility of ending up way back in Green and having to face that monster bird again, you’re nuts!”
“Well, what else should we do princess?” I asked.
“Princess?” she stammered. “If we hadn’t followed you here in the first place, we’d probably already have found the Maker and be on our way home. Instead we’re stuck here trying to choose which symbol won’t lead us to our death, but hopefully back to town, where the Maker is probably long gone anyway!”
She was right. She may be a princess, but I was the fool. Even if we found our way back to town, the old man was probably long gone by now. As I was about to give in to despair a thought came to me. “What if we go straight to Lily Palus?”
“WHAT?” snapped Emily.
“Geez Tal,” sighed Justin. “Sorry would have been the choice word of the day, not - well, we’re all screwed anyway so let’s go chase down fish boy.”
“I’m not after the boy,” I assured them. “The last scene depicted of the Maker shows him with Ludo at Lily Palus before he disappeared, right?”
“So?”
“So if the shell symbolizes Lily Palus, then we go there now and wait for him to show up.”
“I see where you’re going with this,” admitted Justin.
“It’s probably our best chance at finding him.”
“And what if we end up in pitch darkness again?” asked Emily.
“Well then, we’re no worse off than we are now,” I said.
“We can hold hands,” suggested Justin. “And I’ll go first. If it’s still dark out there, I’ll use your hand as a guide to find my way back inside.”
Emily looked at Justin’s open hand that he held out for her, as if contemplating whether or not it was her only option. Then with a short sigh she took it, intertwining her fingers with his.
“Okay, you take Tali’s hand now,” he had to remind her. She turned towards me and rolled her eyes before she grudgingly held out her hand towards me.
“I’ll go first,” I said taking her hand firmly and pulling her towards the narrow exit. “If it’s dark, I’ll make sure I’m back before your precious little feet cross the threshold.” I smiled a terse grin. Then I took a deep breath and stepped through to the other side.
Chapter Nineteen
The Maker
A white light charged towards me like a train in a tunnel and as I took a second step, I could see the sky and I continued to climb out onto a grassy mound under an umbrella of branches. Emily followed closely, pulling Justin at the rear. We had exited a sizeable weeping willow, whose graceful dappled tendrils bent down over us, licking the water’s edge. We were in Lily Palus.
“Ha, we were right!” laughed Justin. Then realizing he was still holding onto Em
ily’s hand, he quickly tried to let go, but Emily pulled him into a full hug.
“Thank God!” she sighed, giving him a small peck on the cheek.
‘Oh brother,” I groaned, but I had to admit, I too was glad to be out in the open daylight, breathing an abundance of air again. A delicious breeze floated up from the salty shore, and wafted through the long slender pillars of purple lavender that hedged around us and I breathed deeply, savouring the scent. Then rounding the trunk, I noticed something. Crouching down low behind the trees earthy mound of roots, I crawled up to get a better look.
“Hey guys, come here,” I whispered.
“Is that Ludo?” whispered Justin, crawling up next to me.
There, about twenty yards away, on a yellow blanket in the field of lavender sat Ludo, with her skirt sprawled out around her. She was laughing. I couldn’t hear what she thought was funny, but her childish giggles repulsed me.
“That’s her alright,” I groaned.
“And it looks like we don’t have to wait for the Maker,” whispered Justin.
My eyes shifted to the person sitting across from her, but it wasn’t the Maker, it was the merboy. The same boy I had seen in town, who had somehow grown legs where his fish tail had been, was having a picnic with none other than Ludo.
What’s HE doing here with HER? I blinked, hardly believing what I saw. Had I been mistaken about him?
“They’re having a picnic,” whispered Emily. “Just like in the picture back on the wall of the temple.”
“It’s not the Maker,” I stammered, horrified by what I witnessed and could barely bring myself to admit. “It’s the merboy.”
“The merboy?” Emily turned towards me. “He has legs.”
“I know, it doesn’t make sense,” was all I could say, with my eyes never leaving the pair on the picnic blanket.
“Well you sure know how to pick’em!” snickered Justin. “Guess your merboy has already found himself a mermaid. Kind of a poor choice though, if you ask me.”
“We’ll have to wait here for the Maker to arrive,” I reasoned, trying to get a read on the body language between the two.
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