“What tracks?” Bobby asked over Todd’s shoulder. Todd was glad he wasn’t the only one having trouble here.
“You’ll figure that out sooner or later,” Stanley replied. “That is, if you manage to live long enough. Hey?”
“Stanley’s such a cheerful sort,” Maggie said with a snort. “But he’s right. Most of the Volunteers died before they could learn a thing.”
“Nunn killed them,” Thomas announced abruptly. “Or they died trying to escape. Nunn was responsible, one way or t’other.”
The others increased their pace without a word. So they weren’t simply helping Todd and Bobby out of the goodness of their hearts. They had a score to settle with this wizard.
“Douglas Nutman,” Maggie said, talking more to herself than anyone around her. “Lieutenant Nutman. He was our commanding officer. Nunn tortured him to death.”
“In front of the rest of us, hey?” Stanley added. He spat. “Wizard wanted us to know how serious he was.”
“Now we have to show him how serious we can be our own selves,” Thomas summed it up for them all.
“Truth be known,” Wilbert said easily, “we’ve avoided him till now.
Didn’t think we stood a chance against him.”
“Dragon eyes and all, y’know.” Stanley grunted as if he still didn’t believe in all that mumbo jumbo. “But things have changed.”
“They have?” Bobby asked.
“Yep,” the bearded man replied. He scratched at his neck for a moment before he continued. “We got a chance of winning this time around.” Wilbert offered Bobby and Todd his biggest smile. “After all, you’re here.”
This was the second time Todd had heard this sort of thing. He was already getting tired of it. It sounded like he and the other neighbors from Chestnut Circle were expected to save everybody. Why should he be responsible for a bunch of losers and freaks in someplace nobody had ever heard of?
He’d already managed to leave his father behind. If only he could figure out some way to get rid of the rest of these guys— And do what? Todd reminded himself that meeting these guys was probably what was keeping him alive. And how could he possibly hope to rescue Mary Lou?
The Volunteers were moving more quickly now, gliding through the dense growth as if it were a city sidewalk. Only Todd and Bobby made noise as they crunched through leaves and stumbled over branches that the others missed without effort.
Somehow Thomas managed to find a path where Todd could have sworn a second before that none existed. And Thomas did it all without slowing down.
Perhaps there had been a road here before the trees and vines had taken over. Todd thought about how all the neighborhood houses had just been plunked down in the middle of this forest, and, how, within hours, they were half covered with those dark vines that draped from the trees. By now, the houses were probably completely lost beneath the undergrowth. Maybe other houses and bits of streets were lost here, too. This island might not just be full of people from other places, but little parts of all the places as well.
They broke into another clearing. Birds sang back and forth in the late afternoon sun.
“Even if we can’t stand up to Nunn and his tricks,” Wilbert began, as if the sunshine was a signal to restart the conversation, “one of you newcomers can.”
“Wilbert is right,” Thomas said. “‘Twould seem you are your own best defense. One of you, at least, controls a great deal of power. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here. Simple as that.”
“In other words,” Maggie explained gently, “you can be our shield.
Nunn doesn’t dare kill you.”
Todd thought of the silent lightning storm but didn’t say anything aloud.
“I know how difficult it can be, being someplace so far away from home.”
Todd looked up, surprised that Maggie was still talking to him.
“It’s happened to me a couple of times, you know,” she continued. “I came from quite a good home, in Boston. A complete public schooling.” She brushed at her pant leg. “You wouldn’t think that, to see me now. My life changed twice. First when I left home—” She hesitated before adding, “And then this—”
She paused and smiled self-consciously, as if she realized she was talking more to herself than to Todd.
“We’re glad to see somebody from the States, after all this time,” Maggie resumed in a brighter voice. “We’ve been here for months.”
“At least,” Wilbert snorted.
“It’s hard to keep track of the time,” Maggie admitted.
“Weather never changes, hey?” Stanley grunted. “No seasons at all.”
“It was as cold as hell when we left New Jersey,” Wilbert added.
“Well,” Maggie said, “it was almost Christmas.”
Todd told the Volunteers it was August in the neighborhood. “Eight, maybe nine months?” Stanley said. A moment later, he grunted again. “I suppose it could have been that long.”
“Sometimes seems like it’s been years,” Wilbert agreed. “You know, there were more than twenty of us when we started.”
“Twenty- one,” Maggie added. “We told you what Nunn did with most of us.”
“Six, maybe seven months?” Maggie said softly, almost to herself. “It still doesn’t seem so long ago.”
“It was December 19,” Wilbert offered. “Middle of the afternoon.”
“Isn’t that Pearl Harbor Day?” Bobby asked.
Todd glanced at the other boy; he could never remember that sort of thing. Like his father said, he was a lousy student.
“Pearl Harbor?” Wilbert asked with a frown. “Who’s she?” Todd glanced even more sharply at the bearded Volunteer. That had to be another one of his wisecracks.
“Hold it!” Thomas called, one hand upraised.
The line stopped so abruptly that Todd almost plowed into Bobby. In the distance, he heard a high, bloodcurdling wailing. It lasted for about a minute, then faded away.
“Sounds like the Anno,” Wilbert said after another minute had passed.
Stanley sniffed at the air. “I’d say we’re getting close to the wolves.
Human smell here, too.”
“Mary Lou?” Bobby asked.
“Too soon to tell,” Thomas replied. “If it is, we’d better get to her soon.”
They were going after Mary Lou. The handle of Todd’s knife was damp. His palms were sweating all over again.
“Keep your knife ready,” Thomas addressed him directly. “We’ll tell you when we need it.”
Now they were ordering Todd around. Well, they could, he guessed, until they found a way to rescue Mary Lou. But these Volunteers were going to do some things for him, sooner or later. No matter how strange this place was, he’d figure his way around here. He’d been on top before, he’d be on top again. Todd the boss, the guy who could figure out any angle, anywhere.
After all, he usually won.
He dropped his knife hand to his side so nobody else could see the way his hand was shaking.
Twenty-One
She didn’t know when she had felt so sick.
The People—or the Anno, as the red-furred creatures had called them—were chittering happily around the cooking pots. A number of them waved to Mary Lou. Some of them held hanks of raw meat in their hands.
“We have vanquished the enemy, behind your example.” The prince smiled at the calm and good cheer. “Now it’s time to eat.”
Mary Lou couldn’t. The things that had attacked them had been fierce, their weapons had been terrible, but they had talked! Even with their fine red fur, they had been almost human.
Mary Lou made no move to join the others around their cooking pots. At the moment, she didn’t want to go anywhere.
“Mary Lou!” the People called, even more wildly than before. “Merrilu! Merrilu!”
“You should eat something,” the prince said softly.
“I suppose—” Mary Lou said hesitantly. “It’s only polite.” She sounded like h
er mother.
“Politeness has nothing to do with it,” the prince replied. “It’s part of the initiation.”
“Initiation?” She turned to look at him. The prince seemed fainter than before, more transparent. She could see the outlines of the leaves behind him through the folds of his cloak, as if he was slowly fading away. Maybe, Mary Lou thought, it was a trick of the late afternoon light slanting through the trees. After all, the prince was never solid at the best of times.
He still had the most reassuring of smiles. She wished she could really tell the color of his eyes.
“You fought by their side,” he explained. “To the People, that makes you one of them. A few formalities, and you are a part of the tribe.”
“Formalities?” she encouraged. She still had the feeling that the prince was avoiding speaking about something.
“Only when you eat the enemy have you truly vanquished him,” he explained with that same smile. How could he smile when he talked about something like this? She wanted to shiver. It was almost as if the prince was trying to fool her somehow. But he had been trying to help her. She had to remind herself of that.
“You would only have to take a bite,” he continued, his voice soft and reasonable. “It could help you in a place like this. The People are fiercely loyal.”
“Are you going to stay for the meal?” she asked. She would feel so much better if he was here, but she had no right to insist.
The smile actually disappeared from his face. “I’m afraid—I’d rather not. If the People allow it, there are certain things I’d rather avoid.”
Mary Lou felt a rush of relief. No matter what the People had asked him to say, she knew the prince would understand. “So you feel it, too? The way they’re eating their enemy—it’s almost like cannibalism.”
“I’d never thought of that.” The prince seemed to grow paler still. “Actually, I’d like to avoid eating altogether. I don’t need to do that anymore, you know, eat or drink. And I don’t like to be around others who do. Sometimes it’s too painful to watch things that remind me that I was real.”
Too painful? She looked away from him, out over the tops of the trees. The leaves had turned a russet brown against the brilliant red of the setting sun. Maybe she didn’t understand the prince as well as she had thought. She would try to do better.
“You’re real to me,” she said quietly.
“The celebration is coming to you,” the prince’s voice called back to her over her shoulder, so soft it was almost a whisper.
She turned back to the encampment and saw the Chieftain striding toward her, a large bowl carried in each hand. Steam rose from the bowls into the cooling evening air. Mary Lou was all too sure what was in those bowls: the victor’s stew, full of what was left of the vanquished.
“I can’t,” she whispered to the prince as she turned back to him. “How can I tell—”
She stopped. The prince was gone.
She didn’t know what to do. She wished he wouldn’t disappear like that. Still, from what he had told her, his comings and goings weren’t entirely in his control. But who did control them? The People?
“Merrilu!” The Chieftain’s smile was so broad that his face looked like nothing but teeth. Before now, Mary Lou had never realized how sharp the People’s teeth were, sort of like a whole mouth full of fangs.
The leader of the People held the bowl under her nose. Mary Lou had expected the stew to smell terrible. Instead, the odor reminded her of meat loaf.
She wished the prince were still here. She wished anybody could be here to tell her what she should do. But the prince had already encouraged her to eat this stew. Just one bite, he had said. It was important to the People. And the People had protected her. She didn’t know how she could survive in this strange place without them.
Only one bite. That would be all she would have to take for the People to be happy. How different was this from all those times her mother had ordered her to clean her plate? If she could get past lima beans, she could eat anything.
The Chieftain handed her the bowl and a squat wooden utensil shaped like a broad spoon.
“Merrilu!” he cried.
“Merrilu! Merrilu! Merrilu!” the People called from the surrounding trees.
If she could just close her eyes and think of anything but those red- furred creatures. She smiled and nodded at the Chieftain, which seemed to please him no end. All the People called her name, over and over again.
Merrilumerrilumerrilu.
Her stomach growled. She hadn’t eaten in quite a while. The smell of the stew filled her nostrils. Her mouth was watering.
The Chieftain bowed before her, and then retreated, walking backward toward the rest of his tribe.
She looked down at the stew, scooped out a single piece of meat with her spoon. The piece was coated with thick brown gravy. She turned the spoon to her mouth.
Don’t think about it, just eat it.
Merrilumerrilumerrilu.
She opened her mouth and placed the stew on her tongue. The gravy was surprisingly pungent, spiced with something Mary Lou had never tasted before. The People were going wild around her, screaming her name ever more loudly and quickly.
Merrilumerrilumerrilumerrilumerrilumerrilu.
She took a deep breath and sank her teeth into the meat. It was hardly cooked at all. Sour juices spilled out over her tongue.
She gagged. She couldn’t have this thing in her mouth. She felt whatever was left in her stomach rise up in her throat.
She dropped the bowl, spitting out the barely chewed piece of meat. She was going to throw up. Whatever happened, she didn’t want the People to see that. It would be like spitting in their faces.
She had failed the initiation. She had let them down.
She ran to the edge of the platform. The People were still chanting.
Merrilumerrilumerrilu.
Hadn’t they seen what had happened? She wanted to hide, like she used to run to her room when her mother started to accuse her. But the camp was all one flat platform, completely open on this side. Maybe, she thought, if she found the place where she had climbed up, she could go down to someplace quieter among the trees.
She saw one of the swaying bridges off to her right. Why didn’t the People stop chanting her name? Maybe, if she could just step out onto the branch here, she could cross over to the trail through the trees without having to go back and face the People on the platform. She’d explain this to the prince, somehow. She just didn’t want to be here now.
She waved back to the People, hoping her gesture could somehow mean “I’m all right. But don’t follow me.” And she stepped from the platform out onto the thick tree limb.
Merrilumerrilumerrilu!
The People’s chant was growing closer. She looked over her shoulder and saw they were moving as a group, one great wave of creatures that would surround her and pull her back into their middle.
Couldn’t they understand that she wanted to be alone? She almost laughed at the thought. Without the help of the prince, she and the People didn’t understand each other at all.
Maybe there was some way she could show them that she wanted to be by herself, someplace quiet. Sign language, maybe, could tell them how upset she was. Or maybe they’d simply recognize the misery on her face. She turned around on the branch so that she could see the approaching tribe.
Her loafer slipped on the bark. Her shoes were never meant for climbing. She grabbed a small branch to steady herself. The new branch bent strangely as she shifted her weight. Her foot shifted under her. She felt as if she might slip down both sides of the limb and land on her rear end. She pushed her right foot toward the top of the broad limb, pulling again on the supporting branch to regain her balance.
Leaves ripped free in her hand as the branch snapped away from her.
She couldn’t keep her balance. Both her feet slid from the limb below her. She was falling.
Merrilumerrilu. The People’s voices fol
lowed her down as she crashed into another mass of leaves immediately below. Another good- sized branch whipped into her stomach, knocking the breath from her. She grabbed at the branch as she fell again. She held on, gasping for air, as her body swung beneath her. But her fingers held no strength. They slid down the smooth bark, and she crashed, back-first this time, into another mass of leaves.
And she stopped.
She lay on a bed of branches, limbs from two or three trees intersecting so thickly that they easily supported her weight. She groaned. That meant she was getting her breath back. She shifted ever so slightly to get a better look at where she was. She could no longer hear the People call to her. She guessed she had fallen maybe thirty or forty feet, although the branches and leaves above her had broken her descent into a number of small falls rather than one big one. She was surprised that nothing felt broken or torn. She hated to think how many scratches and bruises she’d have.
Maybe, she thought, it would have been better to face the People, after all.
She laughed. It hurt a little. She still didn’t have much air in her lungs, and she might have bruised her ribs in the fall. She groaned a second time.
Still, all the groaning in the world wasn’t going to get her out of this. It was too quiet here; the only sounds her breathing and the wind. She wished now she could have heard the People’s nonstop chatter in the distance. She shifted again, ready to grab onto one of the thicker limbs if this set of branches gave way like the ones above.
Her resting place held as she turned herself over. There, perhaps ten feet farther down and ten feet to her right, were the worn bark and tied vines of one of the People’s tree trails.
She would have to crawl across her temporary resting place, then push herself through the jumble of branches to drop down to the trail. From there, she could climb back up to the platform, and safety.
Another noise, the howling of an animal, rose from below. She hoped it came from the ground and not the nearer trees. She wondered if the People would come looking for her, or if she had offended them so much that they wanted nothing more to do with the strange girl from Chestnut Circle.
Dragon Sleeping (The Dragon Circle Trilogy Book 1) Page 17
