Entry #645256, added on 05-12-09 @ 4:51 pm EDT
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| Chapter Seventeen: Universal Wolf | Entry #645256 |
Elkwater's King
  | ID: 998876 (Rated: ASR)
Elkwater's King 
Two brothers follow a wary white German Shepherd to search for the King of a secret realm.
by Basilides   |
Chapter Seventeen: Universal Wolf
"...or rather, right and wrong—
Between whose endless jar justice resides—
Should lose their names, and so should justice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, a universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce a universal prey,
And last eat up himself."
~William Shakespeare
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"Do we really have to do this?" I whined.
"Yes you do," said Mom, standing at the doorway which led to the family room, as if to block any escape. The way to the front door was clear, though.
"What do I say?" asked Michael, sitting on the counter stool next to me as Aunt Eva dialed the kitchen phone.
"She just wants to thank you for sending the things from Sunnydell Farm. You won't have to say much."
"Will we have to talk to Perry?" I asked.
"No, he is very sick. Hush now; it's ringing. Mike, you go with your mom to my bedroom phone."
"Why does he get to go to the bedroom phone?" I whined.
"Mrs. Alldredge?" spoke Aunt Eva into the phone. "This is Eva Heron: you asked me to call you tonight. How are you doing?"
There was a pause, and Aunt Eva put her hand to her mouth. "Oh no. I am so, so sorry. Obviously, this is a bad time--what? Are you sure? All right. Mickie, you can put Mike on and I'll give this phone to Timmy."
Aunt Eva handed the phone to me.
"What happened?" I asked.
"I'll tell you later," she said, "Mrs. Alldredge is waiting."
Reluctantly I picked up the phone and heard Michael talking. "Hello?" I interrupted.
"You must be Timmy," said an old lady's voice in a very thick German accent.
"I'm Tim," I said.
"I vant to thank both you boys for sending za money, leaf, and zat picture. Zat vas kind of you."
"Did Perry like them?" Michael asked.
There was a long pause. "Ya," came the answer, almost in a whimper.
I looked at Aunt Eva. I waited for Michael to say something. Finally, I asked, "So...how did you meet?"
It was so lame, but it got Mrs. Alldredge talking again. "He vas in ze American army, and stationed in my hometown at ze end of za fighting. He vas a medic but got hurt. He almost died. But vhile he vas recovering he came to my Father's bookstore. I vas an old maid; I never believed I vould marry. But he..." and she went silent again.
"I'm glad he liked the things we sent," Michael chimed in.
"Ya, please, I must tell you some zings. Important zings, just a minute." In a few seconds she resumed in a stronger voice. "I had placed your letters by his bed zis morning, but he does not talk or respond after his strokes. I read zem to him. But zen I saw him shudder and look bad, and I vent into za hall to find a nurse. I saw no one near. Zen I remembered he has a call button in his bed, so I vent back into the room, and... a miracle. He vas sitting up in his bed and smiling at me vith your letters and the picture in his hand."
"He's better?" said Michael, excitedly.
"Vait, listen to it all. "He said, 'Lulu', and I cried and hugged him. Zen he said zings to me not important to you. Zen he said, 'You must tell Mike and Tim I smiled at memories from both verlds...'"
"Both worlds?" Michael asked. "What does that mean?"
"I don't know, but Zen he said, 'Tell Mike zat it is possible to be happy in two places. And tell Tim zat I spoke vith a mutual friend, and I no longer doubt you to find vat you need to find.'
Holy crap, I thought: he knows about the gargoyle. How?
"Can we talk to him?" asked Michael. No, no, I thought.
"You cannot," Mrs. Alldredge spoke with a breaking voice. "He said to send the dollar to Mike, and zat he had something under his pillow for Tim. I asked vat it vas and he said it vas like a key. I tried to reach for it but he took my hand and said to get za nurse first. Zen I got vorried and forgot about za button and ran into hall. Ven ve got back...he vas gone...he had died..."
My heart went into my throat. I looked at Aunt Eva.
"No key under his pillow...just an empty nut of some kind I do not know...nurse said it is hickory nut. So" (and this last was very broken) "I vill send you dollar and nut."
"I'm sorry Perry died," Mike said, and sounded sorry.
"Perry vas his middle name. I never knew anyvun called him zat. All our time I called him by his first name, Varren."
"Warren?" I said, and it seemed that should be meaningful to me.
When we hung up the phone, Aunt Eva put her hand on my shoulder. "Are you all right, Timmy?"
"I...I need some time alone," I said.
"All right," she answered, and let me walk out the front door.
I didn't need the time for the reasons she thought, though. I had a gargoyle to retrieve.
******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
When I woke up, I was thirty-three feet in the air. Something was wrong with that. I opened my eyes to see the light of Tryst, the second setting moon, and the tops of the trees just below me. They slid by me as if pushed by the wind that pressed against my face. Something else pressed against my face, against my mouth. I tried to brush whatever it was aside with my right hand, but my hand was immobile and stuck to my side. No go with my left hand either. I discovered that the only parts of my body that I could move at all were my eyes and neck; the rest of me was wrapped tight like a mummy. Instead of bandages, though, fleshy cords held me transfixed.
My head swam and so I tried to remember what had happened. A few days before we had run into that wolf on the ridge. It turned out that he was an acquaintance of Cloud-Warrior, and he had disturbing news. Another pack of wolves were lying in wait for us a few miles west along the ridge, a pack known to Cloud-Warrior as one of the worst. The wolf that warned us, whose name was Sinew, offered the services of his own pack as escort and protection. Cloud-Warrior had paced for several moments before making the decision to take him up on his offer, over the objections of Kwotik and with the support of me and Michael. It seemed to be the right choice. For three uneventful days we penetrated the Yarbor Wood. The last I remember was Kwotik waking me up because it was my time to watch. I was annoyed because we had a whole pack of wolves watching for us - why did I have to watch? I sat there thinking dark thoughts, and I must have drifted off to sleep.
So...what had caused me to fly over the treetops?
I craned my neck to look above me, and immediately wished I hadn't. The monster that carried me was white as a cloud, wings almost noiselessly whirring through the air, legs dangling and swaying in the breeze. From its insectoid head a long proboscis wound its way to my feet and wrapped around me: the cord that bound me. I struggled with all my might, but this only served to draw the creature's attention. The end of the proboscis, which rested on my upper lip, sprayed some liquid at my nostrils. It smelled like pears. I don' t particularly like pears, and that thought barely crossed my mind when I slipped into a sickly slumber.
The next time I came to, nausea and dizziness threatened to put me under again. I was lying on a bed of soft moss. A canopy of tree branches over head let a little light through. I didn't try to sit up, but the sound of approaching footsteps in the form of crunching leaves made me turn my head to the left.
Gleed glowered at me from atop the shoulders of a cyclops. The eye of the cyclops was no bigger than normal, though the lid came up from the bottom of the eye rather than the top. It - or he, very obviously he - stood over nine feet tall and was covered with downy coral-colored hair up to his cheeks. The top of his head was bald and crusted over with some white substance, giving the top of his head the appearance of a cluster of rocks. At a command from above, the cyclops bent down so that Gleed could easily dismount, after which the creature sat on his haunches, waiting. Gleed strode forward a few steps, smiling darkly at me.
"Did you sleep prettily?" he asked.
"Where -- where--?"
"In my own little patch of forest. You know it as the Roth Wood, but I call it "Lift". Like it?"
"I -- I -- where --?"
"Your brother, the mongrel, and the minstrel are probably in a panic at this moment that you are gone, and are at this moment trying to decide what to do. There will be no tracks for them to follow, since you were snatched from the air."
"Wh...what...?"
"You were transported by means of a Kiffer. Did you enjoy the ride?"
"No."
"Sorry about the Kifferlyzer. They do that to paralyze their prey before sucking the fluids out of them. At least you are still full of fluid, right?"
"Why -- why did...?"
"I only have two Kiffers. I could only risk one. I told it to bring back one of the small humans; any more instruction than that would have confused it. Kiffers are stealthy, but stupid. If she'd brought back Michael, I'd have killed him. Problem solved. Since she brought you instead, I'll have to rely more on orphan-power to destroy your little band...unless I can pick them off one by one. One way or another, I'll make sure you choose the next King."
"And...I'm guessing...that would be you?"
Gleed laughed, his tongue lolling out of his mouth slightly as he did so. "It doesn't work that way. Wish it did. But I'm sure I'll be the next King's closest adviser."
"What about my things?"
"Just what you had on you: the stile and the shard - the important stuff."
"My sword?"
Gleed shook his head. "Too bad you don't sleep with it."
I felt naked without a sword. I tried to sit up. Big mistake.
Some time later I opened my eyes and found myself staring into the face of, well, something like a diseased lung turned inside-out, but with a face.
"Hunghughuhuaaag," it rasped, and which I understood to mean, "Little one wakes." Before I could respond, arms lifted me unceremoniously from behind. Downy-pink cyclops had me bundled under his armpit and carried me a long distance, perhaps nearly a mile through the forest.
That journey provided me with a glimpse of "Lift" and its menagerie of denizens. They were men (and women) of unnatural size and shape; they were strange reptiles with frilled necks and blue-feathered tails; they were apes with huge eyes and fingernails shaped like claws; they were car-sized ticks with black and red bodies; they were indistinguishable chameleon-like camouflage artists, though whether hominid or no I could not tell; they were wolves, lots of wolves: all the stuff of nightmares.
Downy-boy carried me up a tree-covered hill to a clearing with a spectacular view of a grassy plain below. Standing on the clearing and peering out over the plain was Gleed, but his vision was aided by a lens which hovered before him, glowing an unearthly blue. He smiled when he saw me, flicked his wrist, and turned from the glowing lens - which promptly disappeared.
"Hello again. Feeling better?" he asked.
"My ribs hurt," I said.
Gleed glanced at Downy, who dropped me on the hard earth. Gleed took no notice.
"I just had a very fruitful conversation with Her Majesty," he said with a grin. "Communication with her is a lot easier with that shard you brought along. It almost makes up for that damned Kiffer bringing the wrong boy."
"The shard is mine," I growled, red-faced and angry that this kid had any of Ari's attention. "Give it back!"
"Sure I will. In the meantime, luck is with us. Your friend the bard got separated from the group. Looking for you I think. The dog and the Target are pressing forward. So the first order of business is to eliminate the Storyteller."
"Don't," I said, my heart beating faster.
"Ari's orders," said Gleed with a shrug.
"Better if he just got lost or something," I tried to say in a casual way. If Michael died, he'd just wake up back at the Farm as if the whole Elkwater adventure had never happened. But if Kwotik died, I was pretty sure he'd just be dead.
Gleed looked bored. "Well, he's running out of time to get himself lost. I sent 12 orphans to dispatch him."
"No," I said.
Gleed looked at me with something not unlike compassion. "Look, Tim, sometimes you gotta be hard to get what you want. If you develop a soft spot, someone will find it and stick a dagger in it. Be hard, hard and cold. Later, when you have everything you want, you can be magnanimous. Not now."
"What I want is for Kwotik to live," I said.
"Hm. Maybe Ari picked the wrong Kingfinder. You don't sound like you have what it takes."
"Go to Hell," I said, and my cheeks burned as I said it because I'd never spoken like that before.
Gleed threw his head back and laughed. "Eventually," he chuckled.
(Chapter will continue) |
© Copyright 2009 Basilides (UN: basilides at Writing.Com). All rights reserved.
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