The Druid's Guise: The Complete Trilogy (The Druid's Guise Trilogy)

by Michael J Sanford

  “Who?” Wyatt asked, his mind still on the toy store.

  “Athena.”

  “Where?” Wyatt asked.

  Lucy scrunched up her face. “I think I can show you.”

  “Really?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe,” she said.

  Wyatt smiled and grabbed on to her hand as she lifted it toward him. Ms. Abagail took her other, still silently crying.

  “Well, go on,” Wyatt urged.

  “Shhh,” Lucy said. “I’m trying. I just need to wake up in the right spot…”

  Wyatt watched as Lucy squeezed her eyes shut and screwed her face into a mask of determination. A sensation like being pulled up from the depths of an ice-cold lake washed over Wyatt, stealing his breath and his concentration.

  Wyatt gasped, lunged forward, and found himself sitting in a deep hole, beneath rays of sunlight split apart by a grate of thick iron a dozen feet overhead.

  Ms. Abagail bolted upright at his side, gasping for air. He looked at her. “Looks like we’re back where we started.”

  “Master?” asked a shrill voice from the far side of their prison pit.

  Wyatt started and turned to see a slight spriteling step out of the shadows. “Maia?” he asked, not believing his eyes.

  Maia smiled and raced across the space to wrap him in a fierce hug. He hugged back, squeezing as hard as he could.

  “Wait,” he said, abruptly pulling back. “Where’s Athena?”

  Maia’s smile melted, and she looked back at the far wall. Wyatt followed her gaze and saw Athena curled up against the cold soil, pressed into the corner of floor and wall. Her red hair was touching her knees, and both arms were curled around her legs. She wasn’t moving.

  “Athena!” Wyatt shouted.

  Before he could run to her, Maia flitted in front of him. “You must leave her,” she said.

  “Leave her?” Wyatt asked incredulously. “Is she all right? Athena!”

  He pushed against Maia, but the spriteling forced him back with the aid of her enormous wings. “She is alive.”

  “Is she hurt?”

  Maia shook her head.

  “Is she sick?”

  Another head shake.

  “Maia! What’s going on?”

  Maia hung her head. “She does not feel anything, Master. Since the Regents took us, she has been as such. She responds to nothing.”

  “I…I need to see her,” Wyatt said softly.

  Maia stared back for a time, but then nodded and stepped aside. Wyatt looked back at Ms. Abagail and found her wiggling beneath the still form of Lucy. Ms. Abagail looked up at Wyatt and smiled weakly.

  “Well, we’re all together now,” she said.

  Wyatt studied Lucy for a moment, wondering why she hadn’t woken with them. Then he turned back to Athena and felt his heart crumble anew. Whether they were together or not, those around him were still in peril. Would that ever change?

  Chapter Thirteen

  THE SUN ROSE with more hope than Wyatt had, though it did little to warm him, and only revealed more of the pain trapped within the icy hole. He sat next to Athena, not daring to touch her and only whispering her name on occasion, hoping for a reaction. She never stirred, locked in a fetal position.

  Lucy was half-awake, fading in and out of consciousness as Ms. Abagail cradled her as best as she could. Every so often Wyatt and Ms. Abagail would look at each other, say nothing, and return to their charges. Maia sat cross-legged in the middle of the pit, humming without pause. It brought some comfort to Wyatt, and he was grateful to have been reunited with the spriteling, though it was difficult to erase the image of her and Athena from his mind. He hadn’t gotten a chance to address it, even with himself. And now it seemed silly. Though it still hurt, he was thankful Athena had Maia. She deserved someone who wouldn’t betray her or leave her. Like I did.

  For hours they sat in stasis, having said little since Wyatt, Ms. Abagail, and Lucy had stepped out from Lucy’s memory and into Maia and Athena’s prison pit.

  Wyatt leaned over Athena, verified she was breathing, and sat back against the dirt wall. “She eaten anything?”

  Maia stopped humming and shook her head. “There is nothing to eat. I have melted snow past her lips, but nothing more.”

  Wyatt felt his own stomach twist with hunger and looked up at the grate keeping them trapped. He wondered if they could somehow move it if they worked together. Or perhaps they could dig their way out in some manner.

  “Hey, I don’t hear anything,” he said suddenly.

  “Shall I sing something?” Maia asked.

  “No, that’s not what I mean. Up there,” Wyatt said, pointing upward. “I don’t hear anything.”

  “And what is it that you expect to hear?”

  “The army,” Wyatt said.

  Maia frowned at him. “The Regency?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Wyatt replied.

  “He’s right,” Ms. Abagail added. “It’s quiet up there. Did they leave?”

  “Oh no,” Wyatt said. “Did they attack Sanctuary already?”

  “I know not,” Maia said. “But we are far from the Regency. We were left here before their journey was concluded.”

  Wyatt had assumed that they were housed in a similar location as they had been previously. After all, their prison was nearly identical. He should have been comforted by the silence and absence of the Regents above, but if they weren’t given food and did not find escape, then their fate was sealed.

  “Well, where are we?” Ms. Abagail asked.

  Maia hung her head and didn’t answer.

  Wyatt looked briefly at Athena, but shook off the sorrow-filled guilt he felt. He stood and rubbed his hands together. “How’s Lucy?”

  Ms. Abagail brushed a strand of hair from Lucy’s face. “I think her fever is gone, and her color is better, but she’s still out of it. I don’t know how much blood she lost. It might take time.”

  “And if she doesn’t get some food in her…” Wyatt said, not daring to finish the thought.

  “Well, she did get us here,” Ms. Abagail said.

  “True,” Wyatt admitted. “But there’s no telling if she can do something like that again. And if she does, there’s no way of telling where we’ll end up. Her mind may still be well, but that won’t last if her body—”

  “We can hope,” Maia said. “Whatever your young sister did to bring you to us, I am ever grateful. She has true power. Much as you do, Master.”

  “Did,” Wyatt corrected. “And it’s just Wyatt now, Maia. I’m no Master.”

  “Very well,” Maia said.

  “Thank you,” Wyatt said. “Now we need to work on a plan to get out of here. No telling how much time we have left.”

  “I’m all ears if you have an idea,” Ms. Abagail said.

  Wyatt studied the iron grate above them. “Can we dig out? Maia, you could fly up near the grate and dig around it, maybe.”

  “The soil is frozen,” Maia said.

  “Well, it’s not down here,” Wyatt said, moving back to the wall and digging his fingers into the dirt. He removed a small handful and looked back at his companions. “I could use some help.”

  “Think about it Wyatt,” Ms. Abagail said.

  Wyatt withdrew another fistful of dirt and cast it aside. “If we all work together, we can dig a tunnel straight to the—” He stopped himself, realizing his error.

  “Digging down here will not change the frost line,” Maia said.

  Wyatt shot her a look and wiped his hands on what was left of his pants. “Yeah, I got it now. Well, what are we supposed to do? Athena and Lucy need help.”

  “I believe our fate may rest in your sister’s hand, Ma—Wyatt,” Maia said.

  Wyatt ran a hand through his hair. He knew she was right. Lucy was the one with the power now. And he had vowed to trust in the others, but he couldn’t bear the idea of giving up control. Waiting around for Lucy to whisk them all into another maddening memory didn’t sound like the best ide
a, but Wyatt had to admit it was the only one they had.

  “Well, we better get Lucy closer to Athena in case she does…her magic,” Wyatt said.

  Maia and Ms. Abagail carefully carried Lucy to Athena’s side and set her down close enough that Lucy’s hair draped over Athena’s foot. Wyatt, Ms. Abagail, and Maia sat around the pair, boxing them in against the wall.

  Athena was as still as a corpse, but Lucy continued to twitch and moan. Neither was what Wyatt wanted to see.

  “She’s restless,” Maia said as she placed a hand on Lucy’s arm, her expression darkening. “She is frightened. Lost.”

  “And you know that how?” Ms. Abagail asked. Beyond a brief introduction, Wyatt hadn’t found the time or need to further explain Maia’s nature.

  “We messed up her favorite dream,” Wyatt said.

  Maia looked at him, clearly confused.

  “It’s how her magic works,” he said. “Well, one way. It also activates when she gets mad, or really any strong emotion, I guess. She doesn’t exactly have the best control over it yet.”

  “Not so different than how yours worked,” Maia pointed out.

  Wyatt had never considered the similarity. But now that he did, he didn’t see how it helped.

  “It’s also super unpredictable,” Ms. Abagail said. “Like her moods.”

  “Maybe we can, I don’t know, help her relax and better control her power? I thought I was getting the hang of mine near the end.”

  “When I was little, my dad used to sing me lullabies when I couldn’t sleep. Helped get me through a lot of thunderstorms,” Ms. Abagail said.

  Maia began humming in her eerily melodic and beautiful way. As she did, Ms. Abagail began singing, softly at first, but then with greater conviction. Wyatt leaned back, stunned. He had never heard Ms. Abagail sing, and didn’t think anyone could have rivaled the mystical ability with song that he knew Maia to possess, but as her voice filled their prison, he couldn’t help but get swept away not just in the melody, but in the words that Ms. Abagail sang with such bitter perfection. Words she shouldn’t have known.

  The night falls cool and silent

  When you are not watching

  It comes like a familiar stranger

  Do not fear when it comes

  The light and the crash

  The heavens call out with love

  The night hides the evil

  But the light takes their cloak

  And the thunder sends them away

  Do not fear when it comes

  The light and the crash

  It is the Mother above and below

  That chases the night away

  So, when the sky cries out at night

  You must know you are watched over

  No evil can withstand the judgment

  For it is the evil that fears the sky

  The light and the crash

  Do not fear when it comes

  Stillness fell over the dismal scene. Wyatt felt every muscle in his body relax. Lucy immediately stopped squirming and Wyatt felt himself being pulled to sleep, too. And if the dirt of the pit hadn’t shifted abruptly, he might have. The soil seemed to melt, falling downward only to vanish completely into a tile floor that hadn’t been there before.

  Wyatt forced his hands against it, expecting to disperse it like a puddle, but he found it solid. He looked up and saw a room full of dusty furniture, much of which was covered in white sheets and thin plastic. The air smelled musty and felt damp on his skin. The stone walls that now surrounded him gave one final tremor and fell to absolute silence. Ms. Abagail’s lullaby faded with the transition as well.

  “Wyatt?”

  Wyatt jumped at the voice and jumped again when he saw the source. “Athena!” he yelled.

  Wyatt ran at his lost friend and wrapped her up in a hug before she could stop him. With pure jubilation, he lifted her off the floor and swung her around.

  “Set me the fuck down, right now!”

  Breathless, Wyatt relented and released her. She dusted off her shirt and fixed Wyatt with a scowl. Then it melted as Athena looked over Wyatt’s shoulder.

  “Athena,” Maia said softly from behind Wyatt.

  The change of scenery had been so surreal that Wyatt had forgotten where he’d been just moments prior. And when he’d seen Athena, standing and well, he’d forgotten near everything else.

  Athena and Maia embraced.

  “So…this looks like Greenwood,” Ms. Abagail said, standing nearby.

  “Wait,” Athena said suddenly, pulling herself from Maia’s grasp. “Ms. Abagail? What the hell?” She looked back at Wyatt. “What is this?”

  “Uh, well, seems we’re back in Greenwood,” Wyatt said. “It’s…well, it’s a long story. Are you all right?”

  Athena screwed up her face for a moment. “What is this?” she repeated. “How are you here? And what is she doing here?” Athena gestured at Ms. Abagail.

  “Oh, she’s cool,” Wyatt said. “And another long story.”

  “Yeah, it’s a bit complicated,” Ms. Abagail said. “But it’s nice to see you, Athena.”

  “Uh, okay…” Athena said slowly. “Maia, what’s going on?”

  “We were captured by the Regents,” she said softly. “While still in the Plains, a strange storm arose, and…well, we ended up in the snow.”

  Athena’s eyes widened. “Oh fuck, that’s right.” She then shot a look at Ms. Abagail and mumbled, “Oh, sorry.”

  Ms. Abagail shrugged.

  “Well…shit. I remember the Regents catching up to us,” Athena said. “We were with the elves. Wyatt thought it was important that we try and get the Gazarians to help us, but the Regents caught us off guard at some point…” Athena looked up at Maia and shook her head. “I don’t remember anything after that. Where are we?”

  Maia slid under Athena’s arm and wrapped her arms and wings around her.

  Wyatt felt a tiny flare of envy, but forced it down. “Greenwood, like I said. Maybe not quite where we wanted to go, but it’s better than where we were.”

  “I’m not so sure this is the real Greenwood,” Ms. Abagail said, pointing past Wyatt.

  He spun to face a large line of windows. Early morning sun streamed in, outlining Lucy’s silhouette as she stood, face pressed against the glass. Bearsy hung from her hand.

  “Hey, who’s that?” Athena asked.

  “My sister.”

  “Your what?” Athena asked in disbelief.

  “Long story. And she’s the one that teleported you and the whole Regency army to Sanctuary.”

  “And where are we if this isn’t Greenwood, wherever that is?”

  “It’s a memory,” Wyatt said, eyes still locked on Lucy.

  The small girl waved her free hand at an unseen entity and said, “Yeah, yeah, I heard you the first time. Just a little further and I’ll do it.”

  “Wait,” Athena said. “What? Who’s she talkin’ to?”

  Wyatt could only shake his head. “Our parents,” he said. “Or at least a memory of them. Funny, I can’t see them here.”

  Lucy unlatched the window she had been leaning against, opened it, and tossed Bearsy out into the dawn light. “There,” she said. “I hope you’re happy. And I better get Bearsy back.”

  “Lucy?” Wyatt called out hesitantly.

  Lucy spun, regarded the crowded room, and crossed her arms. “Why do you keep following me? I had to find another good memory to hide in since you ruined the last one. Don’t you dare do that again.”

  “This is the day we first met. Well, sort of,” Wyatt said. “That’s your second favorite memory? You weren’t even Lucy that day. You remember what...the others did?”

  “Spanking you and hearing you scream is my third favorite memory,” Lucy said. She grinned. “But nope, I don’t remember it.”

  Wyatt blushed and turned so Athena wouldn’t be able to see his cheeks.

  “I think I need to sit down,” Athena said.

  “Go sit somewher
e else,” Lucy said sharply, smile gone. “I have a naughty boy to discipline. He’ll be here soon.”

  “We all need to get out of here,” Ms. Abagail said. “It’s great we’re all together, but hanging out in Lucy’s memory is not going to help anything.”

  “Wyatt said we need to remember things,” Lucy said, spinning back to the window. “Oh, look, Wyatt’s running and screaming.” She stifled a laugh.

  “The bad things,” Wyatt said. “Or the forgotten things. And that was just a theory, anyway. We need to get back to Sanctuary. There’s got to be some way we can help them fight off the Regency and find Rozen as well.”

  “You still haven’t found your princess?” Athena asked. She was leaning on Maia, but still swaying slightly.

  “Mas—Wyatt, are you saying the Regents have recaptured the Lady Rozen as well?” Maia asked.

  “She never escaped. It’s all been one big game for the Lord Regent. And now that I know the Bad Man is part of the magic they use, or whatever, I’m not surprised. One doesn’t want us to remember our pasts and the other wants to destroy the Realms.”

  “And let me guess,” Athena said. “We have to defeat them both.”

  “Something like that,” Ms. Abagail chimed in. “Lucy, we really do need to go. I know you feel safe here, and it’s good that you brought us together, but now we need to get back.”

  “No,” Lucy said.

  “Lucy…” Ms. Abagail said, taking a step toward the window.

  “No,” Lucy repeated, this time with greater venom. Wyatt could see her breath fog the window, obscuring the reflection of her scowl.

  Ms. Abagail stopped a short stride from Lucy’s back. “I know all of this is weird, but I think it’s best—”

  Lucy whirled around, snapping off Ms. Abagail’s words with an icy glare.

  Wyatt eyed the two for a brief moment, wondering if he should interfere. Part of him wanted to see which had the stronger will, but a muttered curse from Athena brought the gravity—or at least the uncertainty—of their situation to the surface.

  “All right, all right,” he said as he walked up to Ms. Abagail and Lucy.

  They were staring at each, both pairs of frowns deepening by the second. Lucy’s hands curled into fists. What had gotten into her?