by C B Samet
“Troubled night?” Joshua asked, sitting beside me in the early morning.
I nodded, hiding my hand. He put an arm around me. “We’ll get through this, Abbey.”
I nodded again. Swallowing, I tried to force down the lump in my throat.
Joshua kissed my cheek and left.
I followed him with my eyes, and then surveyed our surroundings. The elephant fire had faded to superheated embers and the smoke dissipated in lazy swirls from under our invisible veil.
Joshua prepared breakfast with the last of our fruit—a sack of raisins—and warm, moist oats.
We ate with more levity; perhaps the thought of leaving the desert wasteland was lifting our spirits. Joshua eagerly shared our plans with Inok. We would head north through the Meridian Forest and on to Karnelik. Somewhere in the icy mountain peaks lay the Warrior Stone. It and the Ballik blade were the last steps between us and the Avant Champion. Even on my few hours of sleep and haunted by Malos, I felt encouraged by Joshua’s enthusiasm.
We busied with packing the camp; there was no time to dwell on my dreams—or nocturnal excursions.
I readied breakfast for the Queen.
“Abigail,” she said, taking the tea and nuts from me, “you are leading us now. Inok can see to any service needs I may have.”
“Yes, mum,” I replied. I looked back at Inok, who nodded solemnly to the Queen then gave me a flickering look of anger. My promotion had been his demotion.
I performed my usual routine with the horses and ox while Allis and Inok gathered the ashes in the coal sack. Joshua packed up the rest of our belongings.
Atop Phobus and leaving the barren desert behind, I felt my mood lighten. The Meridian Forest lay between us and Karnelik, where the last artifacts resided.
Setting out north, we were all grateful for the onset of an overcast sky that shielded us from the brutal Optato sun. The Queen ventured to sit in the driver’s seat beside Allis. It occurred to me the Veil Stone had given her new freedom. She didn’t have to hide in her carriage from spying Scouters.
I rode Phobus on one side and Inok walked on the other. He was offered a ride by Allis, and I overheard some lofty reply about how man’s legs were intended to be used and were a far safer means of travel than any beast or contraption beasts may pull.
I was certain his avoidance of me, by walking opposite the carriage, was some sort of statement of dislike or distrust of me, as though he had not made that abundantly clear enough earlier.
“Joshua mentioned that you have been troubled by dreams,” the Queen said.
I felt my face flush. A flash of betrayal coursed through me, and I shot Joshua a look of disbelief, which he didn’t notice. “Yes, mum,” I murmured.
“Of Malos,” she added.
“Yes, mum.” I wondered if she would think that I was susceptible to his mind control.
“I need to tell you the entire story of Malos,” she began slowly. “The Malanook were created in the year one, when the calendar was reset at the end of the Hundred-Year War. Before then, mankind was entrenched in war with itself. Plundering, raping, and murdering were a part of everyday life. Countries were at war with each other and with themselves. Dictators engaged in genocide and conquest. The evil within every person dominated, and chaos reigned.
“A council formed with the aspiration of stopping the death and destruction. It was led by Isabel Dallik, the Queen of Karnelik back when they were ruled by royalty. She is heralded as the first Avant Guard. She had lost six children and her king to war and famine. In desperation, the Avant Council united their Chevorik Ambria to create a power the world had never seen. They could have become a ruling power themselves and conquered the known world, but that was not their purpose. They created Malos and the Malanook.”
I shot her a surprised glare.
She continued, unperturbed. “They extracted enough poisonous evil from mankind to enable them to live together in relative peace. But evil must have a nesting place. Therefore, it lies dormant in the Malanook, exiled to Mulan, so we may have peace for a thousand years. Our evil accumulates over time and erupts like a boiling volcano in the form of our current enemies. Paradoxically, when we fight against them, we are fighting against our own evil. We are conquering the worst part of ourselves. It is not surprising that you might dream of Malos—he is a part of you. He is a part of all of us. We must destroy him, which will destroy our own evil.”
“Our evil has been extracted?” I tried to understand. “Doesn’t that take part of our soul and our free will?”
“Some of us believe that the soul of a person is only comprised of the good in them. People still have free will. They still choose to do good deeds or bad deeds. So, the answer is no and no.”
I thought of the men in the alley at Taxco. They had chosen bad deeds.
She added, “The difference is that enough evil is leeched out over time so that it can never be as bad as it was.”
“But what if the Avant Champion fails?” I asked desperately. “A thousand years of accumulated evil descends on all of us?”
The Queen frowned, as though to express I was being melodramatic. “There have been times when the Champion has either not succeeded immediately or died trying. It takes its toll on mankind, but he or she eventually succeeds or another Champion is summoned to the occasion.”
I realized the Avant Council’s grand plan was not foolproof. There was no guarantee of our victory. Malos knew that and reveled in it.
I didn’t know what life had been like in the Hundred-Year War and I couldn’t imagine losing six children and a husband, but unleashing the burden of stored evil didn’t seem like a lasting solution. Then I thought that the generations who lived in peace for the thousand years before now may disagree with me.
“Can he be permanently defeated?” I asked.
“To do so would doom us all to eventual never-ending war, again,” she said sadly.
Hearing her tone, I regretted asking the question, but noted that she didn’t say it couldn’t be done.
I lapsed into silence, trying to digest this new information. Malos was the manifestation of the evil within all of us. He had been created by us. As a part of me, he could somehow intrude on my dreams, my subconscious! Or I intrude on his. But there was some inexplicable intertwining of dream and reality, as the knife prick on my finger suggested.
As we left the desert behind, grasslands sprouted beneath our feet. We snacked on the last of our food en route. At nightfall, we stopped and fed the animals but went to bed without dinner for ourselves. We had only a half-day supply of water left.
The next morning I tried to push the gnawing hunger in the pit of my stomach from my mind. It proved hard to watch the horses and ox eat without wanting to stick my head into their bucket and chomp on their oats.
Joshua, Inok and Allis packed all of our supplies for the road.
By midmorning the following day, we were already weary from traveling since dawn. Conversation was mute. Then, the air changed.
Moisture.
A faint humidity embraced us. We reached the lush greenery outside Meredith and entered the Meridian Forest. The forest was awe-inspiring, with enormous trees left to flourish over centuries intermixed with petrified wood that was still standing at attention, giant guards over their lovely home. Although forging our own way off the beaten path would have been more covert, we were forced to take the trail given the size of our party and the large carriage and ox.
I walked rather than rode, which enabled me to find and pick wild figs, providing a much-needed snack for everyone.
We made camp early so Inok and Allis could hunt. A refreshing drizzle of rain began not long after we had erected the shelters. After days in the desolate wasteland, I would have enjoyed pouring rain for weeks. I felt like a sponge trying to soak in the water.
I piled up the Queen’s laundry to wash, waiting for the deluge that the clouds above were promising to unleash. I set the laundry down near Joshua, who was e
ngrossed in carving a piece of wood.
“Joshua, will you teach me to fence?”
“What makes you think I know how to fence?” he asked, still intently carving.
I sighed in frustration. “Paul told me you were on his fencing team in college.”
He nodded. “I’m not sure I remember how to fence. That was a while ago. You sure I’m qualified?”
“Stop being difficult.” I threw up my hands. “Yes or no?”
He laid down his stick and looked straight into my eyes. “All right,” he finally said, walking away into the woods.
I couldn’t understand his reluctance. There were dangerous creatures searching for us, and I needed to know how to protect myself—in reality and in my dreams.
He returned with two fairly straight branches and tossed one to me.
“Now?” I asked, catching the stick.
“Why not now? You’ve got something better to do?”
I held the stick at the base. Drops of sticky sap improved my grip from the dampness of the drizzling rain. Wiping the dripping water out of my eyes with my forearm, I walked away from the pile of dirty clothes.
I was adjusting my stance when Joshua lunged at me unexpectedly. I managed to block his blow. The force reverberated through my hand and up my arm. He paused, and then made three more rapid sequential advances. I blocked each of them with my wooden sword.
“Not bad,” he commented. “Your stance is strong. You’ve obviously had training.”
“I had an older brother on a fencing team. Who do you think he picked on?” I retorted.
We toyed with the sticks back and forth until my arm was going numb from the shockwaves. I was relieved to remember the mechanisms to lunge, parry, riposte and recover. When we stopped, I noticed that Inok and Allis were watching. The rain turned from drizzle to a steady flow of larger drops. Thunder roared in the distance.
Inok walked toward us as Allis turned away, carrying what looked like a pheasant.
Food.
My mouth salivated in anticipation. He would still need some time to prepare it, and I still had laundry to do.
Inok motioned for Joshua to toss him his wooden sword. “I’ll have a go,” he said, catching the stick and standing in front of me.
Joshua walked to a nearby stump and took a seat.
“Do you really think you have what it takes to fight Malos?” he snarled. His voice was low enough he would not be heard by our audience through the noise of the rain and thunder.
The hair on my neck prickled at his hostility, but I glared back. I probably didn’t have what it took to fight Malos, and that was whole point of asking Joshua to teach me.
“Do you?” I challenged.
With that, he advanced and struck with such a powerful force the veins in his neck were bulging. I blocked him, though at a price my muscles would pay later. This was not gentle swordplay, and if we’d had real blades, I’d have thought Inok was trying to draw blood. I didn’t understand his anger, but I had to focus on defending myself.
He was so long and lean he could reach me with single, pointed thrusts. He was clumsy and untrained though, without finesse, and Paul could have beaten him. I, on the other hand, was much shorter than Inok and not as agile as he.
Blow after blow he weakened my defenses until he got through them with a strike on my thigh. I clenched my teeth to refrain from giving him the satisfaction of a whimper.
“Son of a Muglik,” I swore, swallowing the pain down to a dull throb.
“Keep your balance,” Joshua shouted through the rain and thunder.
I glared at Joshua briefly before turning my bitterness toward Inok.
He crouched near me, his voice came out in sneering disapproval. “You can never defeat your opponent if you’re always defensive, Cross. If you’re only protecting yourself, you will never strike a lethal blow.”
I was too angry to admit he was right, but then I wasn’t a warrior, so protecting myself had always been a sufficient enough aspiration. I rubbed briefly at my wounded leg before lashing back at him.
He blocked and then caught my hands. He loomed over me saying, “And you will fail if you only feed off anger and hate. You must be calculating and detached.” Then, he struck my forearms.
“Ahh,” I snarled, falling to my knees. Welts formed instantly and the rough bark had broken the skin in several places.
“Keep your composure,” Joshua called out again, still evidently unaware that a real fight was taking place.
I felt like hurling the stick at him. Then I thought of Joshua and his healing stone. He had forfeited shullby because he would play more ruthlessly knowing he could heal himself after the game. I had that same advantage right now.
Fine. I can do calculating.
A spike of adrenaline provoked by Inok’s seething and unwarranted maliciousness toward me surged through me.
I pushed myself with my stick to my feet. Wiping the rain from my eyes, I adjusted my grip and then took the offensive. I fired rapid blows, not aimed at his sword, but at his arms and legs and torso. I stayed close to his body so he didn’t have room to take full swings at me without making himself vulnerable.
He fumbled backward, trying to fend me off, but I was advancing too quickly. I managed a few strikes through his defenses, but he withstood the pain and did not falter. He whirled a blow back at me right at my waist, but this time I didn’t block. I accepted the full weight of the strike into my flesh and trapped his stick between my side and my left arm. The pain was fierce and biting. It took all of my will and composure to stay standing. Then, I crashed my wooden sword onto his forearm, and he had no choice but to let go of his weapon.
He stumbled backward in surprise. I struck his thigh in the same place he had hit me. Tripping on a log behind him, he fell backward and let out a surprised gasp.
The rain was now pouring down, and he was covered with mud. He had morphed from a dust ball to a mud ball.
My sopping wet clothes clung to my skin. With panting breath, I glared down at him, pointing my wooden sword at his chest. His eyes were wide in shock and surprise, but the victory gave me no satisfaction. We were supposed to be on the same side, yet he spurred antagonism between us.
I threw the stick at his feet in disgust and walked away to Joshua.
Sitting down beside him, I clutched at my wounded side. “Will you heal me?” I asked, ignoring his look of disapproval.
He pulled out his Che stone slowly and complied, but his expression was unchanged. “You shouldn’t be so reckless, Abbey.”
I felt the warmth of the stone spreading through me.
“He instigated it,” I retorted, gritting my teeth against the burning pain of the healing.
“With real swords, you’d be dead from the blow to your side.”
“I’m well aware of that.” My annoyance was mounting. Joshua was supposed to be my friend, but when it came to Inok, he was blind to his rancor toward me.
Suddenly, I felt the rising aggravation of all the times Joshua annoyed me over the years, sometimes in baiting me and other times in ignorance. I felt like his ignorance now was somehow intentional. The urge to snap at him was writhing in my throat, but I managed to keep my lips shut.
I murmured a thank you and left before he was finished healing me.
“Abbey,” he called.
I walked away without looking back.
Deciding to take advantage of the torrential downpour to wash laundry, I found a small opening surrounded by dense foliage, I shed my filthy clothes. The rain felt wonderful against my skin, washing away the Optato desert sand, bronze lignite, mud, elephant ash and horse sweat. I washed the laundry and hung it up on soggy, wet branches.
I wrapped myself in my red cloak, which was soaked as well. I was cold, but I didn’t care. I was clean. Returning to camp, I saw that everyone had taken shelter from the rain—the Queen in the carriage, Joshua under it, and Inok and Allis in a canvas lean-to unable to keep a fire going in the rain.
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I hesitated. I was still frustrated with Joshua, and I was afraid of saying something damaging in my current mood. Slumping under a nearby tree, I curled into a ball. I didn’t want to be near him when he was condescending and I was temperamental, even if it meant staying cold and wet and in pain.
With shivering restlessness, I slipped into sleep.
Standing before Malos, I was startled to see that we were in the Queen’s sitting room. It was remarkably untarnished. He sat on her floral lounge chair, reading a book in front of a large arching window with honey-colored drapes. In the daytime, the room had a magnificent view of the gardens, but now there was only blackness and half-moons behind him.
I curled my bare toes against the plush carpet beneath them. Across the room, a warm fire crackled. The heat radiated toward me. Often, I had thought about how pleasant it would be to sit in that chair and gaze out that window. Malos’s bulbous, blackened presence and pale, plump head were ruining that pleasant imagery.
“You look like a drowned rat,” he commented in a bored tone. He turned his gaze back to his book.
I looked down at my wet cloak and bare feet. My hands were still scraped and bloodied from the swordfight, and my side was still bruised and sore, since I hadn’t let Joshua finish healing me. His assessment of my appearance was probably accurate. I certainly felt like a drowned rat. At best, I probably looked like a squashed shullby ball. Nevertheless, I stood puffed up before him as defiantly as I could muster.
“Why don’t you give up this futile quest? Rest, here, in the castle by a warm fire. Be at peace.” He was oddly calmer than most of our previous interactions. His voice was still high and tinny but with a twinge of sincerity rather than his usual disgust.
“There’s no rest until you’re back on your island, your cage.” The words tumbled out of me angrily. “The Champion will defeat you. Marrin Beach. When the moons unite.” Did he think I was a child he could appeal to with sweets and toys?
Shrugging, he turned the page of his book. “Page thirty-two: Dillon is the handsomest boy I’ve ever met. He is charming and smart and caring. We are studying Introduction to zoology together. Page thirty-four,” he continued, turning the page, “Dillon kissed me today. It was the greatest first kiss of all time.”