Night fell, and those villagers not burned in the conflagration fled, as Fire took one house after another, until he had consumed half of the village.
But when the morning came, there was movement in the ashes, and a tall man of green and brown stood once again.
“I am still here,” the Oomgosh said in his great slow voice, “as all things grow, and all things must die.”
Fire only laughed. “How can you challenge me? Not even your great strength can stand against someone like me!”
“You take,” the Oomgosh replied, “but you cannot learn. Now I have seen you destroy both the village and its people, I have found pain and suffering.”
“What good will that do you?” Fire chortled, ready to bum the tall man all over again.
But the Oomgosh thought of the pain, and felt the suffering, and he began to cry.
And Fire screamed, for the Oomgosh’s tears fell from the sky, and the rain came down in torrents to kill the bright one’s flame.
And where the fire had been, there was nothing, but where the trees and houses had stood, new green shoots rose from the ashes.
“This, too, is good,” the tall man said. And then he returned to the wood.
Fourteen
Todd was ready to kill something.
He felt like he was trapped again. These new soldiers held them prisoner as surely as those earlier troops who had been leading them to Nunn. Sure, they acted friendly enough, but Todd was sure if he tried to leave he’d end up with an arrow in his back.
There was no way to get away. And the soldiers were taking him back to his father.
Even on this broad dirt road that they traveled, he felt like the woods were closing in around them. Every step seemed darker than the one they had taken before, the wind above their heads no longer giving a glimpse of the sun, but only shifting layer on layer of dark branches and leaves.
“About this dragon,” Wilbert said abruptly. “We talked about the mumbo jumbo, wizards telling us the dragon was to blame. Didn’t tell you the important part, though.”
Todd looked ahead and realized that Wilbert and the others, Bobby included, were already twenty steps in front of him.
No one was paying much attention to him. He glanced over at the moss-covered bank by the side of the road and what looked like another path to a brand-new clearing. Maybe, if he was quiet enough, he could get away, after all.
“Todd!” Thomas called sharply. “Don’t leave the trail!”
Todd froze, waiting for the arrow. None came. He still almost stepped off the road, just to piss them off.
A rough hand pulled him back to the center of the dirt pathway. “Lord, Todd!” Stanley shouted in his ear. “Can’t you see the Man Trap?”
“If he could see the Man Trap, he wouldn’t be wandering off by himself, would he?” Wilbert ventured.
Wandering off? Todd was sick and tired of these guys patronizing him. “Man Trap?” he demanded. “What the hell are you talking about?”
Stanley looked around quickly, then picked up a good-sized branch that had fallen from above.
“Watch,” he instructed as he tossed the branch four feet in front of Todd. The moss-covered ground collapsed. There was a pit down below, maybe six feet deep, filled with sharpened spikes.
“Man Trap,” Stanley remarked.
“Hey,” Wilbert added. “Wolves have got to eat, too.”
“Wolves?” Bobby called out in a voice every bit as upset as Todd felt.
“Clever things,” Wilbert continued by way of explanation. “Vicious, too, when you get them in a fight. Not that they like to fight.”
“Wolves are all cowards, hey?” Stanley said. He turned away in disgust and paced back up the road.
“They’d rather kill their prey through tricks like this.” Wilbert paused to scratch at his beard. “At least they do around here.”
“So stay close!” Thomas called from up ahead. “We want to keep everyone alive as long as possible.” He turned away and marched on, as if used to having the final word on a subject.
“But about these wolves,” Bobby insisted. “You mean they build these traps themselves?”
The wind stirred the branches above them, not so much a breeze as a whisper. Todd thought about clever wolves. He had already accepted them, and he knew why.
“Bobby,” he called. “Think about Raven.”
Maggie, Stanley, and Wilbert all groaned at the mention of the bird’s name.
“Not that bird!” Wilbert exclaimed.
Maggie laughed. “Oh, he’ll be in the middle of it. He always is—”
“Is either of you any good with a bow?” Thomas interrupted as he scanned the forest before them. Todd wondered what Thomas could see that he couldn’t. “Or a sword?” He glanced back at Todd. “We may need to use them shortly.”
Todd shook his head. There was an archery team, and a fencing team, at high school, but he had never found much use for them. He guessed he never expected to find himself—well—here.
“I’ve tried them some,” Bobby admitted. “Bow and arrow, that is. Jason’s sister, Mary Lou, showed us how. She’s really good. She came in second in an all-state championship.”
Thomas waved for the others to follow as the road they traveled narrowed to a path. They would have to walk single file.
One Man Trap was enough for Todd. He decided he would keep up with the rest and deal with his father when they came face-to-face.
Wilbert followed Thomas. Todd and Bobby took up the next two places in line, then Maggie, with Stanley watching their rear.
“There’s other ways to defend yourselves, too,” Wilbert offered. He tugged distractedly at his matted beard. “I was going to tell them about the dragon’s eyes.”
“Damn the dragon eyes!” Stanley objected with a surprising vehemence. “You remember what they did to Douglas?”
“He was one of us,” Maggie explained to the newcomers. Todd glanced back at her and saw her looking from Wilbert to Stanley and back again, as if willing the both of them to calm down. “A dragon’s eye killed him.”
“He was our leader, hey?” Stanley snapped. The anger seemed to rise in his voice with every word. “Eye didn’t kill him. Used him up!”
“But he went out blazing,” Wilbert replied with a firmness of tone Todd hadn’t heard before. “Not left behind like us, to eke out whatever miserable existence we can manage.”
Thomas stopped abruptly at the head of the line. “We will get back to our homes,” he stated firmly. “Never forget that.” His voice held the kind of finality Todd’s father used when he didn’t want an argument. Thomas pulled a flat-bladed sword from his belt and turned away from the others. He gripped it with both hands, hacking at a mass of vines that blocked their way. His next words were shouted over his own effort and the screams of the vines: “We will get back to our world!”
“And pigs can fly!” Wilbert retorted. He paused and looked at the top of the trees with a grin. “Well, actually, around here, maybe pigs do fly. Haven’t seen it yet, but you can’t take anything for granted.”
“Exactly,” Thomas agreed as his arm swung down toward the greenery. The vines separated with the same pained cries Todd had heard before. “You can’t assume anything. Not even about the dragon’s eyes.” His arm rose again, the sword rising in a great arc above his head. “We’ll be more careful than Douglas, but we’ll use them if we must.” The sword fell again. “We’ll use anything to get back to where we belong.”
Thomas stopped abruptly, his sword suspended in the air. “Hold it!” he whispered.
Todd looked around the trail, waiting for wolves or dragons or God knew what. In the distance, he heard a high, bloodcurdling wailing. It lasted for about a minute, and then faded away.
“Sounds like the Anno,” Wilbert said after another minute had passed.
Stanley shook his head. “That’s not the Anno. Least not the way I’ve ever heard them.”
“Maybe,” Maggie added, “
this place has some other new visitors.” The noise had gone as quickly as it had come. Whatever it was,
Todd wasn’t looking forward to meeting it. The forest was quieter than before, as if even the small animals and insects were waiting for what might come next.
“Prepare for the worst,” Thomas ordered. He pointed to Todd and Bobby. “Give them a couple of knives. Make young Bob a bow when we get the chance.”
Stanley lifted the dark animal-skin pack from his shoulder and pulled loose the rope that held it together. The pack unrolled on the ground before him. There, in a couple dozen pockets, were knives, short swords, hatchets, a whole arsenal. For some reason, Todd found himself thinking that the pack had to weigh a ton. Maybe skinny Stanley was stronger than he looked.
He pulled out two more or less identical knives and handed one each to Todd and Bobby. Bobby curled his hand around the leather-clad handle. The knife felt remarkably light for something with that large a blade. It looked something like a Bowie knife. That was one thing that Todd knew something about; he had seen The Alamo three times.
“Use them to defend yourselves,” Thomas said to the boys, “only if you have to.” He paused and listened for another moment to the woods around him. Satisfied, he unsheathed his sword and attacked a new mass of vines.
“Often—the best thing—to do,” Thomas continued as he cut, his words matching his rhythm, “is to run—so that you—can fight again.”
He waved for the others to follow. “Let’s get through here before the vines close up!”
The others moved swiftly and silently to follow, only Todd and Bobby making noise walking over the fallen leaves and branches. Todd was glad for the quiet. It gave him a moment to think about what had happened to his anger.
One thing this place had showed him: He was becoming very aware of the possibility of death. His death. Anybody’s death. Death constantly surrounded them, waiting.
Todd felt the weight of the knife in his hand. Maybe he could give as well as receive. Maybe there was some way he could learn to survive, to go beyond orders given by parents or soldiers or volunteers. The leather hilt felt warm in his hand. Maybe, Todd thought, he could kill something, after all.
For the first time in a while, it was easy to smile.
Fifteen
Mary Lou opened her eyes. Someone had shaken her shoulder. She realized she was still in the clearing where she had met the People, except that now the small folk were gathered on the far side of the open space, beneath the trees. With their pale, bald heads, they reminded her of nothing so much as a field of mushrooms. They were marching to the edge of the clearing, toward a mass of vines between two of the larger trees. Dozens of them turned, one after another, and waved for her to follow. For some reason, Mary Lou thought of The Wizard of Oz.
The little people must have shaken her awake. She shivered, and felt embarrassed because she had. There was something about their small, wrinkled bodies that still made her want to keep away.
In her dream, she had thought she had been woken by the prince. She wished it could have been his hand on her shoulder—if only her insubstantial prince could actually touch things. She looked around as she stood, hoping to catch a glimpse of him, but he seemed to have disappeared.
Where could he be? Mary Lou was surprised how much she missed him. He was the only one she could talk to in this place.
Maybe, she thought, someday, somehow, they could do more than talk.
“Mary Lou!”
Startled, she turned and looked at the People. One of their high, thin voices had called her by name.
The prince must have told them. Just as he spoke for the People, he had to speak to the People as well. He must have introduced her to this tiny tribe. She found herself smiling. In a way, he was still helping her, even though he wasn’t here.
“Mary Lou!” The way they said it, quickly, breathlessly, her name sounded like a single word. “Mary Lou!” Merrilu.
The People called her name over and over, much as they had called Nunn’s name, but there was a difference, too. Their cries of “Nunn! Nunn!” had been frantic and angry. The way they shouted her name was gentler, almost playful. She smiled all over again.
The first of the small folk had reached the vines, climbing them with surprising speed. Those still on the ground continued to wave for her to follow. As she walked toward them, a pair of them pulled a vine free from the rest. They brought it toward her, calling her name even more excitedly than before.
“Mary Lou! Mary Lou!” (Merrilumerrilu!)
They wanted her to climb up with them, like scaling a rope in gym class.
But the thought of leaving the ground made her hesitate, as if, in taking this step, she’d be at the mercy of these small creatures.
What should she do? She wished the prince were here to help her make a decision.
Maybe, if she stayed with these creatures, she could keep from being recaptured by Nunn. No matter what they looked like, the People seemed to have her best interests at heart.
Best interests? She was starting to sound like one of her mother’s lectures.
She reached out for the vine they offered her, grabbing it firmly with both of her hands. Before she could even begin to pull herself up, she found her feet off the ground as the vine was yanked from somewhere up above. She almost let go in her surprise but found herself gripping the vine even more firmly as the ground grew farther and farther from her feet. She was hoisted quickly aloft, maybe a hundred feet in the air in a matter of seconds. She looked away from the ground, suddenly so far below, afraid she might fall if she panicked, and saw herself lift past the lowest level of leaves.
There was a mass of branches directly above her. On one of the broadest of the limbs was a line of the People, all pulling on her vine, which they had looped over another, slightly higher branch to give them leverage.
Small hands grabbed at her legs and arms, pulling her back onto another massive branch, as wide across as one of the paths in the forest below.
“Mary Lou!” Those same small hands plucked at her sleeve. “Mary Lou!”
She turned and saw a dozen or more of the three-foot-high People scrambling from branch to branch in front of her. They waved again for her to follow. The branches grew so close together here that it was easy to move from tree to tree, like climbing a slightly uneven set of steps. She strode carefully up to the next tree, using another, higher branch to grab for support, as the People raced forward like mountain goats along a cliff.
They climbed that way for a while, Mary Lou slowly gaining confidence as she stepped from branch to bole to branch. In places where there was a gap between the trees, the People had used the vines to tie together bundles of branches into rough bridges.
She stepped carefully on the first of these. She stopped as it swayed with her weight.
“Merrilu!”
Three of the People stood at the far side of the bridge and beckoned her on. Their dark eyes seemed very concerned as they stared out from their wrinkled faces. Maybe, she thought, she might trust them, after all.
She placed her other foot on the bridge. Her penny loafer slid a bit as the bridge swayed, but the ropes that held the logs to the tree trunks showed no sign of breaking. The People held their hands above their heads and screamed in delight.
And so she rose from bridge to bridge, branch to branch, tree to tree, with the excited calls and laughter of the whole tribe around her, until she noticed that the world was brighter than before. Soon, as she climbed, she caught a glimpse here and there of the sky, and once a corner of the bright red sun above. She and her escort were nearing the top of the trees.
She followed the branch path around another large trunk and stopped abruptly. There, before her, was a whole expanse of the tied logs, entire platforms, some with other structures built atop them: tiny huts, she guessed. She saw a central area where stones had been piled upon the deck of logs, with smoke curling up from the middle of the pile. It must be an oven.
She was surprised that the People had control of fire.
But what did she know about the People, except what she had heard from Nunn’s Captain and the prince? Here was a whole village, hundreds of feet above the forest floor.
“Merrilu!” the People called. She stepped onto the edge of the first platform. She had expected it to sway like the branch bridges, but it felt very firm beneath her feet, wedged and tied between the trees. The People continued to wave her toward the center of their village. She stepped forward and realized that she was walking fully in sunlight. The branches ended here, and she could see the almost blue sky stretch before her. She looked out beyond the far edge of the platform and saw the whole of the forest spread below.
The trees seemed different from up above. In places they appeared like leaf-strewn hills; in others, where the branches grew sparse, they looked like intersecting clouds of green. It seemed to Mary Lou that this place was almost a whole magic kingdom above the earth.
The People called and waved for her to join them at the edge of the platform. There was a row of log stools with a triangle of branches at their back. All seven stools faced toward the village, six of them proportioned for the three-foot height of the People. The seventh and central chair was much larger, so big that Mary Lou might almost have fit into it herself.
As she approached, seven of the People climbed onto the stools. The one in the center gained a boost from a couple of his fellows. He wore a necklace of leaves and stones around his neck. Besides the small breechcloths that they all wore, this was the only article of adornment Mary Lou had seen on any of these creatures. She must be getting an audience with their chieftain.
“Merrilu,” the Chieftain said.
“Merrilu!” all the rest of the People echoed. “Merrilu!”
The Chieftain made a high, keening sound, and all the People joined in as well. It was so shrill it hurt Mary Lou’s ears. She tried to smile, and not let them know that she would much rather run away.
The Chieftain and the rest of the People stopped their shrill cry, all at the same instant. Mary Lou took a deep breath, worried about what might happen next. There was no way out of here if something went wrong.
Dragon Sleeping (The Dragon Circle Trilogy Book 1) Page 13
