A Merric's Tale

by Margs Murray

  “Look, this was never a forever thing. This is what your life will be like. They’ll move you around to camps and... and... it’s not personal.”

  Not personal for him. I had feelings for him. He couldn’t have anything for me. If he did, he’d never be able to leave me.

  “Come on, Waverly.”

  I nodded once more. Hearing him say those words made my chest feel sickeningly sour. Greer might as well have stolen my heart from my chest and thrown it onto the fire. This was why he hadn’t told me his name. This is why he was so distant. I was a job. Still, I had to be strong. “Job. Got it.”

  “After the trial, the Galvantry will take care of you.”

  But I wanted Greer to take care of me. I wanted Greer and a cup of coffee and the couch. I wanted to stay at the cabin. “I rescued you for this purpose. I freed you from the Merrics so the Galvantry could help you.”

  I couldn’t listen to him anymore. I wasn’t free. One more word and no amount of staring off would help. My eyes were so full, I didn’t dare blink or tears would run down my face.

  I got up from the log. The last place I wanted to go was the tent, but I didn’t have a choice. If I walked off into the woods, I’d get lost or attacked, and if I stayed any longer, I’d tell him the truth about how I felt. He’d tell me how wrong I was, how crazy and stupid I was for feeling the way I did.

  I went into the tent without so much as a good night. I threw back the top of the sleeping bag and crawled in. Who was I fooling though? Greer had never said he cared for me. I was playing head games because he saved me, and we had spent so much time alone together and then the train and the waves and everything. God, I was so stupid.

  This was so much more. I kept the crying down, I did, but things got ugly fast. Greer heard me, but he didn’t come in. He knew I was crying, but he didn’t comfort me, and the realization of this made the tears even worse.

  Greer didn’t sleep in the tent that night. He never came in to get his sleeping bag.

  Chapter 35

  Find the Words

  The next morning, I woke up alone in the tent. We had hiking to do, but I couldn’t get out of my sleeping bag. I refused to cry anymore, so I concentrated on the necklace. I had to. If I thought only of the necklace, I didn’t have room in my mind to mourn the fact that Greer was so ready to leave me or the fact that he still hadn’t come in that morning.

  I had a long conversation with the stupid thing and calmly explained everything I thought of to the necklace. Nothing.

  I touched the ring to the pendant. I tapped it again. I knocked on it, like figuring out a secret code. Nothing. I cried again because, stupid crying makes for more stupid crying. Tears falling on the necklace.

  Nothing.

  I said every word or combination I could think of, but nothing happened. Nothing I did worked, just like that whole stupid, stupid summer. Like every stupid thing I’d ever done. I was a loser. No wonder Greer didn’t love me. I didn’t deserve love.

  I had nothing. I was nothing.

  No. I had to figure this out. I needed this win.

  This was all useless. Greer was leaving me in a few days. I’d never see him again.

  “Please,” I begged the necklace, but nothing happened. I wanted to unzip the tent and throw the stupid thing into the forest like I had thrown Greer’s favorite book in the library.

  Greer’s favorite book. The only line I remembered from it came from the inscription in the front.

  “There’s only one way through the vipers,” I said, and like magic, like beautiful happenstance when you need a win, the jewel split in two.

  A piece of paper fell out into my shaking hands. My eyes barely focused.

  The wind changes, weak at first and growing.

  The words. I’d found the words!

  “Greer!”

  I rushed out of the tent. “Greer!”

  Greer was leaning on the same log I’d leaned against last night. He stood up to face me. He looked exhausted, and his eyes were red.

  “Greer! Look. Look!” I ran to him and forced the paper in his hands. He read the words to himself, muttering the last line out loud. “Death will die again. You found it!”

  He picked me up and swung me in the air. “I can’t believe you found it.”

  “I know,” I said, and we both sat down to reread it.

  The wind changes, weak at first and growing. Marked by shadows, a tornado to purify the land. Leaves quake, the greatest smites an opposing world, securing the crown. Rise like blazes, set like frost, the silver cord is cut. The pearls cascade free from the poisoned well. Unruly night, unruly land stomped to dust. Death will die again.

  “What does it mean?” I asked.

  He laughed. “I have no clue. Do you?”

  “None.”

  “Ah. We’ve got to get this to the professor,” he said.

  “Call him. Call him!”

  “He needs to see it, and this stupid thing doesn’t have a camera for safety reasons.”

  “What do we do?”

  “I’ve got to get a copy of this to the professor.”

  “Are we going back to the ocean?”

  “No. There is a town close to here.”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “It won’t take long, and then we can be on our way to meet with the Galvantry.”

  “Galvantry? I thought finding the words altered the plan. I thought it would change everything.”

  “It… can’t.”

  “Why not? Why can’t you stay with me?”

  “I can’t.”

  Packing up the camp was painful. The walk was silent. A few times, Greer turned around and looked like he wanted to tell me something but each time, he stopped himself.

  Hours later, we arrived at the inn. The walls were white, but the lack of windows and natural light made it dark and cave-like. I shivered. People sat scattered through the room. I wasn’t confident in us not getting caught, but I was considerably more comfortable going into public than I had been before. I’d have felt loads better if I was back in my dress, but all I had was the stupid uniform again.

  Greer put an order in for something as I sat down at the table furthest away from everyone else. True, I needed to remain far away and safe, but it was more than that. I resisted the temptation to play with the necklace or the ring like I had a habit of doing. I still wore it even though Greer had the paper. The thrill of finding the words had worn off when Greer said he would explain the words to the Galvantry before he left me. So I sat there like a lump. I couldn’t say goodbye to him tomorrow or the next day or the next. I’d refuse to go. I’d demand Greer stay with me, but that wasn’t what he wanted and that wasn’t fair.

  I’d have to say goodbye to him. Just thinking about it made me feel sick to my stomach, but I couldn’t help it.

  While Greer sent the prophecy to the professor, I sat and waited at a table.

  The barman brought me an ice cream float. I leaned on the table, my head resting gloomily on my hand. Lazily, I scooped the food into my mouth, but food had no taste. I doubted food would have taste for a long time, maybe never again.

  A heavyset man with a bulbous red nose, straggly whiskers, and a thick neck, moved through the room to the chair across from me. He slapped down a bottle of liquor and roared with laughter.

  “Why is a pretty little thing like you so sad?”

  I sat back immediately.

  “You’re starving, aren’t you? What are you running from?” He pulled a shot glass from his pocket. Gross! And he filled it from his bottle. “A pretty little girl like you shouldn’t be so hungry.” He pushed me the shot and raised the bottle to his lips. “You need a drink, little girl.”

  Up and in, the bottle stayed at his lips longer this time. “This much alcohol, this here drink would be enough to kill another man. I’ve been drinking it for years, decades. Ten long years of drinking this, and you grow tolerant to it. Ask any man here, maybe living here is enough to make you im
mune. Want to try?” He held the bottle out for me to drink.

  I shook my head. “I’m not running away from anything. I am traveling with my...” Greer? Bodyguard? Friend?

  “If you can’t say what he is, then maybe you don’t know. A pretty girl like you shouldn’t be so hungry,” he repeated, and he pulled me to him. His pores and sweat smelled like stale alcohol and bile. “You don’t need to be so hungry. You stay with me. I have a safe home with lots of food.”

  “Move your hand before I break it.” Greer leaned over the table.

  “Not taking real good care of her, are you?” The man ran his finger along my collar. “Letting her know there are better-fed options.”

  And he leered down at me, pulling me even closer.

  In one swift move, Greer knocked the man off the chair and on to the floor, his foot hard on his throat. No one moved, too shocked to understand what Greer had done. He was fast.

  The man’s body jerked, straining to get up, but Greer’s foot was in the perfect position to hold him down.

  The barman was over the counter after he realized his patron was struggling for air under Greer’s foot. “We don’t want any trouble. Old Philly meant nothing by it. Let him up, and you can get going. No problems.”

  Asphyxiating under his boot, the man no longer attempted to get up. Foam sputtered from his mouth and clung to his whiskers down his throat, but as hard as he struggled, he couldn’t get air into his lungs.

  “Come on,” I said. Greer put more pressure on his foot. He was killing him. I took his hand and intertwined our fingers. Greer looked me in the eyes. “Please,” I whispered.

  Greer lifted his foot, and we ran out the door.

  The silence was deafening. Just two people in a tent staring at uneaten Cloverfield bars.

  It upset me terribly, but I needed to know what Greer knew about the prophecy. “What did the professor say?”

  “He won’t know anything until he studies the words, writing. It may take him a few weeks.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  “He said to keep you safe and...”

  “And what?”

  We lay in our sleeping bags, the glowing puck between us. A foot away, he gazed at the gray ceiling of our tent. I wanted so badly to hold him, to thank him. To say anything to him.

  “And what?” I asked again.

  “Nothing. I’m sorry about what happened back there. I’m not sure what came over me. I’ve trained for years not to lose self-control like that. I have no idea…”

  This was to be our last night together. Tomorrow, I’d be by myself with the Galvantry. I didn’t want to be talking about the idiot from the bar. “It’s fine.”

  “It’s not fine. You don’t understand how many years I trained, all for self-control. I’ve kept my head in battles. I… I have been a spy… what I’ve seen… all of it, unbelievable and horrible and still, I kept my feelings in check. I controlled myself.” He shook his head. “And then one drunk touches you.”

  He turned to look at me. His chest moved up and down.

  I went to my knees. I had to say something to him. It was now or never, and tomorrow he’d be gone. “Greer?” My voice was hoarse from nerves.

  Greer sat up so he could see me better.

  “I... I...” I couldn’t get the words out. I was failing and tomorrow would be goodbye and I had so much to say to him. “I... um... I was wondering... do you... um... know who we’re meeting with tomorrow?”

  “Not specifically, no. I know many Galvantry, but I can’t be sure they’re sending the people I know.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  “Was that all?” he asked.

  I shook my head. “No. I was wondering if... you… you’ve come up with any other ideas about the prophecy?”

  “No. None. I was busy.”

  I had to say this. “Greer, I...” I had to swallow down my tears. “I was thinking. I don’t want you to leave tomorrow. I… um… I know I am not part of your plans. I don’t want to do this without you.” That was as close to a confession as I could get.

  Greer went to his knees, so we were facing each other. “I know but, Waverly, none of this is simple.”

  I closed my eyes again. I didn’t want to see his face as he rejected me. “I get it. Okay. It’s just, I thought you should know and… and… never mind.”

  I turned away from him. With any luck, I’d be able to crawl under my sleeping bag and cover my head before the waterworks started.

  “Screw it,” Greer whispered from behind me.

  “Screw what?” I turned back to him.

  Without another word, Greer closed the distance between us. His hands took my face and lifted it up to his and his lips touched mine. The kiss was chaste at first but soon it grew in intensity as we clung together. The mint of his breath, the heat of his body. My hands went around his waist and one of his went to my hair, pulling me closer. So close. I moved a hand to his chest. His heart pumped wildly.

  He laid his hand over mine as the kiss ended and he leaned his forehead onto mine.

  “Is this goodbye?” I was tearing up again.

  Greer wiped a tear away with the back of his hand. “I won’t leave you. I don’t think I can.”

  “But… but that isn’t part of the plan.”

  He kissed me once more, much shorter this time. “I don’t have it in me to leave you.”

  My heart soared. I had a million questions to ask, a million things I wanted to say. But I didn’t. Because I’d heard the one thing I’d wanted to hear. Greer wasn’t leaving me.

  ~*~

  I was alone when I got up in the morning, but I wasn’t worried. Greer was always making phone calls, so I sat in the tent and replayed the events of last night. I couldn’t stop thinking of Greer, his eyes, the way he’d looked at me last night. It wasn’t one-sided. He liked me too. He had to. People don’t just kiss like that.

  Blissful. I was on cloud stinking 9.

  I wanted to kiss him again and again and again. When he got back, I’d go out on a limb. I would walk up to him and throw my arms around him and kiss him. As I thought this, I reached for my teeth cleaner. I swirled it around my mouth, feeling the particles from my teeth gather. I needed to spit, and I unzipped the tent and I got out. I wanted to be ready when I saw him.

  The morning was hazy with fog. Footsteps tromped the ground, and I looked up hoping to see him, but I only saw the trees.

  “Stupid inn!” a voice called, and my heart stopped. “We never should have said yes to Old Philly. He pissed the guy off. If some random man touched my woman, I’d beat the crap out of him.”

  “This is a lot of tracking for a two-thousand-dollar payout,” replied another.

  Crap. The man at the bar must have paid these people to find us. Greer. I had to get to Greer. No, I had to hide and wait for him. Panicked, I scrambled from the tent and ran under a pine tree. Greer never went far; I had to hide until he saved me because he would not leave me. He said he wouldn’t.

  “Over here!” one yelled, and then a shot echoed out into the woods.

  Five men ran into our clearing, circling around and looking for me. Tears of panic crept into my eyes. Where was Greer?

  One of the Libratiers went into the tent and emerged. “The girl has to be close by.”

  “Man, a lot of trouble for some measly payout. Let’s find her and go.”

  The tallest of the crew spoke into what I assumed was a phone or walkie talkie. “We found the tent but not the girl. How is the situation down the hill? Over.”

  “We found the man.” Static broke through the quiet fog and covered what was coming over the radio. “Captain, he’s dead.”

  And I gasped in such pain, I doubled over. Greer, dead. The men heard me and crowded around the tree, moving closer. I was too shocked and scared to move. No. I refused to believe what he said. Greer was not dead, and I’d stay hidden until he attacked them and saved me. Greer always saved me. He’d save me now.

  “Come o
n out,” one of them said. Another leaned under the tree.

  Greer would come from the woods at any moment. He’d rescue me like he had so many times. This wasn’t the end; it couldn’t be. We were too close.

  “It’s the girl from the paper.” An arm went under the tree. A cubox came near my face, and I swatted at it. No. No. I had to get away. I backed to the other side of the tree, and a pair of hands grabbed for me. I’d have to climb. I pulled myself up the branches of the pine. I just needed to get higher. I’d have to rescue Greer this time. Hands yanked at my feet, and I kicked them away. Higher I climbed until the branches swayed from my weight, higher to nearly the top.

  In the distance, I saw a white sheet covering a body. Cold metal touched my temple, followed by a boom, and everything went black.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you to my editors: Beth Balmanno, Andi Cumbo-Floyd, And Kit Duncan.

  Thank you to my fantastic cover artist, Carlo Giovani.

  Thank you to Kelly Concini. Without you, I would still be stuck in the cheese factory.

  Thank you to Melissa Hoobler and Beth Huff. The early drafts were awful but you both understood the importance of dreams and hopes. Thank you.

  Thank you to my students for your trust and blind faith. I didn’t deserve it, but it meant a lot.

  Thank you to my mother for always listening and keeping me awake.

  Thank you to my father for completing one last edit but more importantly, thank you for giving me OZ and Little Women.

  Thank you to my wonderful husband and daughters. Your love and imagination kept me going even when surrounded by the darkest shadows. I love you more than words can describe.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Margs Murray was born and raised in Pennsylvania. Reared on a steady diet of shows and movies from the 80s and 90s, she holds a special place in her heart for The Labyrinth and all things Jim Henson. Margs loves a good story in any format and enjoys nothing more than experiencing adventures safely from her living room couch or sitting next to a campfire.