The Ravens of Solemano or The Order of the Mysterious Men in Black

by Eden Unger Bowditch

  Noah’s mother, Ariana Canto-Sagas, was unlike the other parents. She was the only parent not constantly distracted by equations and laboratories. She was never found smelling of sulfur or needing to wipe dried bicarbonate from her spectacles. Ariana Canto-Sagas was not a scientist. Ariana Canto-Sagas was an artist. She was a star. It was said, far and wide, that she had the voice of an angel and was even more beautiful. As a soprano, she reigned supreme. Kings and queens bowed to her artistic majesty. Her presence changed the molecular structure of the room as surely as an extra oxygen molecule changes water to hydrogen peroxide.

  So Noah was angry at himself for feeling the way he was feeling. Wasn’t it selfish of him always to want his world-famous mother to stay home, though he had indeed been thrilled the time his mother had been ill and couldn’t go on tour with the opera? His father had tried to raise his spirits then, but his father was gone now, too.

  Noah looked down at his plate. No, he was definitely not hungry anymore.

  After the sun began to go down, first on the right side, then on the left, they no longer knew whether they were headed east or west across the plains of America. And, in truth, it didn’t matter.

  As they walked into the salon to have hot chocolate, Miss Brett found that Lucy was yawning and rubbing her eyes. They were all tired and ready for the end of a rather harrowing day

  “Come on, sweet angel,” Miss Brett said softly. “I’ll help you into bed.”

  Jasper stepped toward them to help, but Miss Brett shook her head and smiled. The boy had enough to worry about. He didn’t have to be the only one to carry his sister, too. “You go have that hot chocolate,” she said. “I bet she’ll be asleep before her head hits the pillow.”

  Jasper nodded and went with the others to sit by the fire. He was just staring at the flickering light when Noah’s raised voice came into focus,

  “Why do you ask me?” Noah was saying. “Me? What I have learned? I don’t know any more than anyone else. I’d like to think I do, but I’ve got nothing.”

  “Well, you always have something witty to say,” Faye said. “I just assumed you decided you knew everything.”

  “Well, we will know, won’t we?” said Noah. “Once we have learned.” Noah was tired, and not ready to take on Faye.

  “‘Have learned’? ‘Have learned’?” Faye’s voice rose, and then was shushed by Miss Brett, who had just come back from Lucy. “When, pray tell, will we have learned, Noah? We get nothing from these men—and nothing from our parents.”

  Jasper had been trying to get his head around why his parents did not simply tell them why they had to go. Wallace was afraid to ask his father, but felt his father must have a reason. Noah was grappling with his own guilt for being angry at them, but Faye—she was just angry. How dare they, she thought. How dare they leave her.

  “I have learned . . .” Noah started, but realized this was not true. He had not learned anything. He simply let the idea fade on its own without adding to it,

  “Well, aren’t you the lucky one?” said Faye. “I would love to have learned . . . something. Instead, I know less than I did before.”

  “Well, perhaps real knowledge is knowing we know nothing,” said Noah, a sheepish smile on his face,

  “Sweet angels,” said Miss Brett, “we will look back upon this time, once we all have learned, and the mystery will seem . . .” But what would it seem? Miss Brett thought. Would it ever feel like they could make sense of it? Would it ever be all right? “It will seem like a long-ago dream.”

  “Or nightmare,” said Faye in a pout.

  A squeak came from the doorway

  “Is there any left?” asked the sleepy girl.

  “Any of what?” asked Noah. “Potatoes?”

  “Flern,” said Lucy with a yawn.

  “Excuse me, what?” Faye rubbed her ears.

  “I’d like some flern, too,” said Lucy.

  “What?” everyone said at once.

  “Flern,” Lucy repeated. “I want some, too.” She looked around, blinking in the firelight. “Don’t I? What is flern?”

  “What are you talking about?” Faye tried to get the grumpy look off her face, but Lucy was being so, well, Lucy. She could be as bad as those horrid mystery men. No wonder they could all understand each other.

  “Flern,” insisted the sleepy little girl. “What is it?”

  “I have no idea,” said Noah, yawning and rubbing his eyes.

  “Yes, you do,” demanded Lucy, rubbing her eyes as well. “Don’t hide it from me. I’m a big girl.”

  “Flern?” Noah shrugged. “Never heard of it, Lucy, like most of what you say. That said, I’ll sleep on it and see if I become enlightened.” Noah leaned over and closed his eyes, flopping his head onto Wallace’s. Wallace tried to push him off. Noah flopped the other way, pretending to sleep, leaning against the arm of the sofa.

  “But you said you had some. You said you have flern, or that we all will, and once we have flern, everything bad will be far away.” Lucy yawned again. “I’d like to know what it is. Maybe I don’t want any. But if it helps us look back at the dream . . .”

  “Oh, my.” Miss Brett’s hand went to her mouth as she stifled a giggle. “Sweet angel, you misheard us . . . we said, ‘have learned,’ and you thought . . .”

  But Lucy was already falling asleep against the doorjamb. Miss Brett stood up and again gathered Lucy in her arms. She looked back and saw that Wallace was fast asleep on the sofa. Noah, no longer pretending, had begun to snore, half hanging on the armrest. His snore seemed to dislodge him, and he more or less slid from the sofa to the floor, rolled over to the rug by the fire, and curled into a ball. Only Jasper and Faye were awake, though they both looked exhausted.

  “Jasper, Faye,” Miss Brett said softly, “do you mind putting a couple of the quilts on the sleeping boys? I think I’ll leave them in here. No point waking them.”

  Jasper rose to get a quilt for Wallace. Faye reached behind her and grabbed the one from the chair. While Jasper tucked the edges of his quilt carefully around Wallace’s sleeping form, Faye threw hers so that it covered Noah’s head. Then Faye swallowed hard, got up, and straightened the quilt, tucking it under Noah’s chin. His red hair was now mussed and in his sleeping eyes. Faye gently, and kindly, moved the hair aside.

  “Mama,” Noah muttered between snores, grinning in his sleep.

  Faye quickly withdrew her hand, then looked over at Jasper, who had been gently removing Wallace’s glasses. He looked over at Faye. Suddenly smiling, Faye and Jasper had to flee from the room at the risk of waking the boys with their laughter.

  As they headed toward their respective bedrooms, Jasper looked at Faye and smiled a different smile. “You were so kind to make him comfortable,” he said. “You must have reminded him of his mother.”

  Faye then did something so incredibly rare for her that Jasper thought it was just a trick of the light. She blushed. “I could do with learning kindness,” she said. “I’ve been horrid to him—to all of you.”

  Jasper reached out to put a hand on her arm, wanting to assure her this wasn’t the case. But at that moment, two things happened. One, he realized he couldn’t lie. She had been horrid. And, two, Faye reached up her hand at the exact same moment. Their hands touched, their fingers wrapped around, and their eyes met. Very quickly, Faye and Jasper lowered and separated their hands and looked down, warm faces full of even more blushes,

  “Um . . .” Jasper had no idea what he was going to say. It felt like the first day he saw Faye, when her beauty had shocked him before her vicious tongue lashed him out of his stupor. “We’d best head for bed.”

  Faye nodded and smiled. She opened the door to her room, then looked back and smiled again. “Yes,” she said, “it’s time for bed. See you in the morning.”

  It was time for bed, but sleep would be another thing. The feel of one another’s fingers around their own lingered as Faye and Jasper each lay in bed that night. But thoughts about what would co
me, and where they were headed—and according to Lucy, very soon— would keep them awake long into the night,

  As the night waned, the train headed into the morning sun. Miss Brett watched the breaking light reveal what the night had held in shadow. Her sleep had been disturbed all night long. She could not settle herself, having gone all those hours believing the children were lost to her. Worried, she woke in a jerk several times during the night. So she was up every hour or so, and every time, she went to check on the children.

  They, too, were tossing and turning—all except Noah, who lay so still she had wanted to check for breath. Luckily, he tended to snore, so she knew he was breathing. On every round she made, in the other beds, and on Wallace’s couch in the salon, she found blankets kicked off onto the floors and heads where feet should be. Once, as she tucked in Faye, she found the girl awake.

  “Miss Brett,” Faye’s sleepy voice said, “would you sit on the edge of my bed until I fall back asleep?”

  Miss Brett smiled. This was the fiercely independent girl, the girl who had been so desperate for her own room back on the farm. Faye had been mortified that she would have to share a room with Lucy. And now, she wanted company to fall back asleep.

  Miss Brett brushed the hair from Faye’s eyes, “Do you miss sharing your bed with Lucy?”

  “Mmm-hmmm,” said Faye drowsily, curling on her side and clinging to Miss Brett’s arm.

  And with that, Faye slept. Lucy was so warm and cuddly, and now you’re on your own, Miss Brett thought.

  Miss Brett eased her arm from Faye’s grasp and tucked her in. She caressed her cheek and kissed her forehead before leaving the room. But we are with you, she thought. We are with you, Faye.

  Miss Brett learned something in those nighttime hours. She knew now that the train was headed in a straight line for the first time since boarding back in Ohio. Until that night, the train had twisted and turned, wending a serpentine path through fields and plains, hills and hollows. Not an hour went by that the train had not made some turn or reversed direction. But through the whole of the night, there had been no turns, no reversed directions, no sudden alterations. Miss Brett was certain that something had changed. They were heading somewhere now.

  Exhausted herself, Miss Brett would let the children sleep late into the morning. Sleep, she believed, was the great healer. Even more than lessons, the children needed to rest their weary hearts and minds. She did, too, but that would have to come later. She would try to sit quietly and knit or mend, though she had found neither a helpful distraction in the night. She hoped the children, once awake, would find distraction in their laboratory. She would read to them, if they so desired. But she could not relax with a book of her own. She was finding it hard to focus, as her mind kept wandering back to the events of the previous day—and her unhappy discovery earlier that night,

  It had happened when she was looking for something to occupy her mind. She’d taken out her knitting, but it felt wrong in her hands. She then took out some sewing, but put that back as well. The light would soon be peeking over the horizon. With no more hope of sleep, she thought it would be a good time to write in her diary. So much had happened, after all, and she wanted to keep track of her own thoughts.

  However, when she went to her room and reached under her pillow, she had made a discovery that only added to her anxiety. She had not considered that anyone would enter her room. Nothing ever seemed out of place until that moment. But now her personal diary, her private journal, was gone. This was impossible, she thought, searching and searching again through her things. Could she have put it in a clothes drawer or in her writing desk? She looked, but she knew it would not be there. She knew exactly where she always put it, and it simply was not there. She bit her lip. Miss Brett had been keeping journals and diaries since she was small. This one she had been keeping since she first agreed to take this job. She had kept it throughout the strangest and most important chapters in her life. Suddenly, it was gone.

  And there was nothing she could do. It was maddening. It was a reminder that, however well-fed she was, and however comfortable her bed might be, she was at the mercy of these mysterious men in black. It had to be them. They had taken it.

  She had gone to the kitchen, where the man in the frilly apron was kneading dough for bread.

  “Why have you taken my diary?” she demanded.

  “It is kept,” he said.

  “I want it back,” she said, her voice quavering.

  “It is kept,” he said, without looking up at her.

  “Why did you take it?” she asked. “How did you know where I kept it? Are you spying on me?”

  The frilly apron man did not answer.

  She opened her mouth to protest, but realized, instantly, that it was a futile exercise—a useless waste of time. Instead, she turned on her heels and left the kitchen. But why her diary? She had been noting her thoughts and her concerns. Had she revealed too much? Angry and frustrated, she went back to her room and sat, watching the sun rise ahead of the train. They were heading east,

  Dressing now, Miss Brett decided that, with the coming of the light, she would go sit in the salon. She lit the fire herself and, once again, brought some knitting. This time, it felt comfortable in her hands and, as she counted stitches, she began to relax. She sat by the fire and tried to let her pearling and knitting ease her mind. She had begun a new project—a long scarf for Faye, who was not used to cold weather. She had knitted mittens for all the children, and hats, too. And she had knitted a pair of booties for Lucy’s bunny doll. She knew it was early, but she thought they might be nice Christmas gifts. There was always a chance they might be somewhere cold for Christmas.

  After a quiet breakfast late that morning, the children sat in silence in the salon. Again, it was a few moments before Miss Brett realized Wallace was not there. Miss Brett knew where he was. He was working on his electric torch. Miss Brett suggested the others might want to work on their experiments,

  “I don’t want to,” said Lucy, who returned her bracelet to her mouth.

  “We just aren’t in the mood, Miss Brett,” Jasper said, staring into the fireplace.

  “I just can’t concentrate,” said Noah.

  Miss Brett looked from one to the other. They needed something to distract them.

  “Well, you need to organize that laboratory of yours,” she said with a hint of sternness. “I have seen what a mess it can be—”

  “That’s Noah,” said Faye, without looking up.

  “Well, the whole place could use a tidying up.” Miss Brett took Faye by the hand and helped her up. Then she did the same for Noah and Wallace. Jasper stood, helping his sister up as well. “Off you go.” The lot of them started to leave, albeit reluctantly. She watched them go, noting that the shuffling didn’t really seem to be getting them out of the room. “Wallace has been working on a most fascinating invention,” she said.

  Suddenly they were off. Surely they would want to know what this invention was.

  Miss Brett knew there was not, in fact, much to organize. She knew she was making up reasons to get them into the lab. But she also knew the children were happiest, or at least most content, when they were working on their inventions.

  She waited a few minutes, then went back to see how things were going. They were as she had hoped they would be. Once the children were there, their minds filled with visions she could never understand. Miss Brett smiled and sighed. Seeing them consumed by their work meant they were not spending time fretting about all those things they could not control.

  Miss Brett, on the other hand, could not help but worry. She did not have a brain full of magical distractions. How could she protect the children against things she could not see? Things she could not hear? Things she did not understand? What kind of guardian was she when she could not keep the children safe? When it came down to it, the children had been forced to rescue her at the farm, at great risk to their own safety

  After fluffing the pill
ows and folding the throw blankets, she headed back to her room. Out of habit, she reached for her diary and, once again, fretted about its absence. She’d just have to start another one and hide it better, she thought. She busied herself arranging her pillows and refolding the clothes in her drawers.

  She looked out the window. Yes, the train was absolutely headed east. But to where?

  It was late in the afternoon before Jasper realized Lucy was no longer in the laboratory. He looked up through the tall windows and saw the sun was on the other side of morning.

  “She said she was tired,” Wallace said, pointing toward the bedrooms. “She left about twenty minutes ago.”

  Leaving Wallace among the growing piles of magnetic spheres and cylinders and dynamos, Jasper walked through the laboratory unnoticed by Noah or Faye, each deeply engaged in their work. He quietly opened the door to the Modest family’s sleeping cabin. Lucy was sprawled out on their parents’ big bed. Her fingers were curled next to her mouth, a charm from her bracelet between her lips.

  “Lucy” Jasper knew that Lucy would be famished if she didn’t have lunch or her afternoon tea.

  Lucy stirred and groaned,

  Jasper wiped away the wisp of hair from his sister’s eyes and gently rubbed her shoulder. As Lucy stretched across that big bed, Jasper found it hard to swallow for a moment. Moments like this, when he saw little Lucy in that big, empty room, on that great big bed, it hurt the most,

  This was their parents’ bed. Their parents had slept in that very bed, their heads on that very pillow. But their parents were not there now,

  The first night on the train seemed ages ago. That night, Jasper and Lucy and the others had come aboard and found the laboratories and the beautiful dining car, and the special rooms made up for each family. And there, on the train, in the salon, the five children had arrived and found Jasper and Lucy’s parents, Faye’s parents, Wallace’s father, and Noah’s parents, alive and well. And now they were gone again.