Rumi's Riddle

by Eliot Schrefer

  “He might have bonded with the grouper we met under the sea,” Rumi says. “I really will go find it after this is all over.”

  “You always were true to your word,” Sky says. “We’re lucky to have you among the Protectors of Caldera.”

  “Nah, I’ve decided we should go with Rainforest Squad,” Lima announces.

  “Anyway,” Gogi says, yawning and stretching his arms over his head. “The ziggurat is far away still, and we don’t want to overexert ourselves. How about a power nap before we—whoa!”

  Mez lets out a high-pitched squeal as Gogi leaps into a thicket. “What are you doing?” Rumi asks, but then he sees what set Gogi’s reflexes firing.

  The very leaves of the trees themselves have become sharp teeth, ferocious sharp teeth—

  Mist has Mez’s neck in his mouth.

  Mist has pounced right into their midst.

  Mez is trapped in his jaws.

  Blood trickles down calico fur as Mist crunches down.

  “No, no!” Rumi tries to cry, but his voice won’t make a sound, the shock is too great, he can do nothing but stare at Mist with Mez in his mouth.

  How can this be happening?

  Is this a dream?

  Rumi realizes it’s not, it’s definitely not, when Gogi hurls a fan of fire at Mist’s tail, setting the white fur ablaze. Mist yelps and rolls away, and instantly Mez whirls to the attack, claws out and jaws open. As Mist skulks away, slapping his smoldering tail against the ground as he goes, Mez leaps on him. Her cousin is slowed by his awkward position, and she’s able to lunge onto his back, teeth locked around his neck. In a moment, the ambush has turned.

  Rumi sends out a blast of air, but he can’t get a direct hit on Mist without striking Mez too, so he can only watch, mouth agape, as Mez and Mist go tumbling. They’re a blur of white and calico, leaves and dirt flying.

  Gogi’s the first to mobilize, racing toward the combatants. He skids to a stop. It’s not until Rumi’s hops have allowed him to catch up that the frog can see why Gogi has held still.

  Mez is on top of Mist, pinning him on his back. They’ve rolled over Sky in the process, and he lies off to one side, motionless. Mez howls as she prepares to make the fatal bite. “You followed us,” Mez says. “You tailed us and waited for the moment to sneak attack. You could have joined us at any time, but you didn’t. You would have burned up with the rainforest, but we saved you—and then you ambush me from out of nowhere.”

  Mist struggles to break free, but Mez is too strong. “Of course I couldn’t let you defeat me and not try for revenge,” he spits. “I’d sooner die.”

  “That you will. This is the last time you betray us, cousin,” Mez says. “I’m all out of forgiveness. Now I only ask that you forgive me for what I’m about to do.”

  After one agonized yowl, she clamps her teeth around Mist’s throat. He flails, using his last energy to try to get free, but he can’t. Beneath Mez’s ferocious grip, he seems beyond even using his magic. Finally he goes motionless, his head lolling to one side.

  Still Mez doesn’t release him. She thrashes, the muscles of her jaws clenching tight. It’s too gruesome; Rumi has to look away.

  “Shh, Mez, it’s over,” Gogi says. Rumi allows himself to look, and sees Gogi with his hand on Mez’s haunch. She’s released her cousin’s still body and is panting with exhaustion, her eyes closed.

  Lima’s next to Sky, helping him up. “Sky will live!” she says. “He got clawed a bit when the panthers rolled over him, but it’s not too deep. I don’t think he will even need any healing magic.”

  Sky caws weakly. “I’ll take some anyway, if you’re offering.”

  Rumi hops over to take a good look at Mist’s motionless body. “You did all you could, Mez. You gave him every chance.”

  She nods. “I promised myself I would put a final stop to him if he attacked again. That I wouldn’t give him another chance to hurt the ones I love. But still, I hoped I wouldn’t have to kill my own cousin.”

  Mez is interrupted by eerie laughter. “No, it can’t be,” she sputters, springing to all fours.

  Rumi’s brain struggles to catch up: Mist’s body is not dead. Mist’s body is laughing. Mist is not dead. Mist is . . . still alive!

  Mist continues his chilling laughter as he sits up. He’s bloodied around his neck, but otherwise he seems . . . fine. Impossibly fine. He growls at Mez. “You’ve failed at every promise you made. You were banished from our family. You let the Ant Queen get away so many times. And now you can’t even kill me.”

  Mez hisses and prepares to go back on the offensive.

  “Save your energy,” Mist says. “I can no longer be killed. Didn’t you wonder why the nightwalker cult worshipped me as a god? Because I am one, cousin. I’m immortal.”

  “But . . . how?” Gogi asks.

  “The lunar eclipse released the magical energies that resided in the Ant Queen,” Rumi says as the horrible truth dawns on him. “The two-legs imprisoned her because she couldn’t be killed. Just like he received some of our magic, Mist must have also received the Ant Queen’s power to live forever.”

  Mist laughs again. It’s a hollow, self-mocking sound, the unhappiest laughter Rumi has ever heard. “You should listen to your little frog friend, Mez,” Mist says. “You’ll never be rid of me.”

  Mez’s ears go flat, her whiskers pull alongside her cheeks, and she closes her eyes.

  When she opens them, though, there’s a fiery resolve in her eyes. “Maybe you’re right, and I’ll never be rid of you. But Caldera will be.”

  Rumi’s eyes go wide. What does that mean?

  “First,” Mez says shrewdly, staring Mist down with flat ears and bared teeth, “we have to subdue you.”

  Though he’s not sure what Mez has planned, Rumi takes a hop toward Mist. The white panther’s brows rise. “What do you think you’re going to do, tree frog? Kill me with breezes?”

  “Why, you big—” Gogi starts to say, flames licking on his palms.

  “No, Gogi,” Rumi says. “Let me take care of this.”

  He opens his mouth. He closes his mouth. Time to try out the full new extent of his magic.

  Rumi lifts his hands up to the sky. Mist watches him, confused.

  There’s no holding back, not anymore. That nagging guilty voice that tormented him for so long has disappeared.

  “See you on the other side,” Rumi says.

  He brings his hands down.

  With them comes a concentrated wind, a cylinder of gale, a column of cyclone. It smacks Mist right on the top of his head and sends him sprawling on the earth. He rolls to a stop, his tongue lolling.

  The wind holds for a moment, flattening Mist’s white fur, then it dissipates.

  Rumi hops over and listens for breathing. “He’s unconscious,” he reports, satisfied. “Wow. That worked even better than I hoped. And if he acts up again, I’ll smash him with another column of air.”

  Rumi waits for an answer. “Did you all hear me?”

  He looks over to see his friends staring at him slack-jawed, dumbfounded in amazement. Their wind-mussed hair and feathers stick out in all directions, making them all look a little crazy.

  “Nifty, huh?” Rumi asks.

  “Rumi,” Gogi says, hands over his mouth. “That. Was. Amazing.”

  SUNLIGHT STREAMING ALL around, Zuza shoulders open the rigid bands girding the ark and presents the cool, dark inside to the shadowwalkers. Rumi hops in, revived by the chilly air. It smells of the insides of trees: bracing, crisp, slightly minty. “It’s lovely in here, guys!” he calls. “Come on in!”

  As his eyes adjust, he sees that the interior of the ark is elegantly banded in thin reeds, broad banana leaves, and a layer of mud that’s hardened to become a sort of plaster. Rumi gives it an experimental rap. Firm and unflaking—it just might hold up against the conditions of the open sea.

  Beak over claw, Sky picks his way through the opening and pauses, silhouetted by the sunlight behind him. He
inspects the walls, floor, and ceiling closely before giving a nod of approval. “It’s like a really clean cave in here.”

  “THAT’S JUST WHAT I WAS THINKING!”

  Rumi and Sky shriek and go scrambling, only slowing when Lima flits down from the ceiling. “Sorry, did I surprise you? I spent the morning in here, because it’s so cool and dark. It really feels like the best bat cave I could imagine. I made myself right at home.”

  Heart rate finally returning to normal, Rumi taps a puddle of bat guano with two fingers, the only blemish on the ark’s clean floor. “Yes, I noticed.”

  “Hey, dropping guano is a sign of respect and hospitality in bat culture,” Lima sniffs. “It’s good luck for our coming voyage.”

  “Yeah, poop plays a very important part in both our societies,” Gogi says reverentially as he enters the ark. He’s moving slower than usual, as his arms are full of supplies. He drops them in a heap on the ark floor, then rubs his aching biceps. Rumi knows that the leaf-wrapped bundles contain nuts, fruits, greens, even a mass of delicious water bugs they skimmed off the surface of a nearby pond—enough supplies to keep them fed for a long trip.

  “It’s so dark and cramped in here,” Gogi says, frowning. It appears monkeys have their own tastes in ark accommodations.

  Rumi lays a reassuring hand on his friend’s tail. “Sky, show him the trick you managed.”

  “Yes, check it out,” Sky says. He bows his head and ruffles out his tail feathers.

  “Is that . . . it?” Gogi asks. “That’s, um, super cool, Sky.”

  “No,” Rumi whispers. “Just wait.”

  The ceiling of the ark glimmers and then fades, to display the beach all around them, the calm blue ocean waves to one side. It’s like the whole top half of the ark has been removed—but when Gogi lifts his arms, they still strike the ceiling. “Oh, wow, you’ve come a long way in your visions, Sky,” he says. “We’re contained and dry, but still have a great view. Best of both worlds!”

  “Precisely!” Rumi says.

  “I embedded a few feathers into the woven fibers on the outside of the ark,” Sky explains, opening his eyes. “Since the directives are this close, it’s even easier to channel them. I can move around and talk and not break the image.”

  “This is going to be amazing,” Lima says. “I hope this trip takes forever.”

  “I don’t,” Mez says as she appears in the entrance. She’s backing in, dragging something large behind her. Once she clears the lip of the craft, she tumbles into the pile of leaf-wrapped food supplies.

  Mist tumbles after her. He’s in full daycoma, but even so they’ve bound his limbs with strong liana vine. None of them wants to risk having a powerful enemy out and about an enclosed vessel.

  “I can’t even stand to look at him,” Gogi says, turning his back on their captive.

  “I’d recommend you get over that,” Mez says. “If there’s anything I’ve learned about Mist, it’s that he’ll need watching until we’re finally rid of him.”

  A sloth’s head peers in the opening, next to Zuza’s sweet, questioning eyes. “Are you guys . . . all ready to go?” Banu asks.

  “Yep!” Lima says. “I still wish you were coming with us.”

  “I wish . . . I could,” he says. “But I’ve definitely . . . overextended myself.” With that, he topples over to one side on the beach, snoring away.

  “Don’t worry, everyone,” Zuza says. “We tapirs will take good care of him until you’re back. He deserves some pampering.”

  Rumi looks around at his friends, hands on his frog hips. “Are we ready, everyone? Any final doubts or questions?”

  “Nope,” Gogi says. Together with Mez, he rolls Mist’s comatose body until he splashes into the container they’ve fashioned for him—they’ve tied up a broad banana leaf to make a bowl, and filled it with seawater. Mist will be traveling up to his chin in liquid, just in case he tries any fire tricks. Not that they expect him to, after Rumi’s column of air knocked him out.

  Rumi lets his gaze linger on Mez, whose ears are flat against her head. She clearly can’t be rid of Mist soon enough.

  Zuza closes the door to the ark with a thud. Gogi uses the vines on the inside to bind it shut.

  “Find something to hold on to, everyone!” Rumi calls as he moves toward the rear of the craft.

  Gogi looks around the ark’s smooth surface, scratching an armpit. “Um, Rumi, there isn’t anything to hold on to.”

  “Oops. Well, I guess just brace yourselves, then!”

  Rumi presses his fingers against the wall of the craft, then generates wind on the opposite side. It’s the latest trick he’s managed with his magic. Ever since he got his big secret off his chest, he’s been able to play loose with his power, even detaching the wind source from his body itself. He watches through Sky’s image of the outside as the sand of the beach kicks up a zephyr. Zuza faces away, shielding Banu with her body.

  The ark begins to tip and rock, then skates down the beach. Rumi hears his companions scrambling in the ark, but focuses on the wind, shifting it as needed to keep the craft headed toward the ocean.

  Then—splash—they’re floating on the water. The ark moves much faster now, and Rumi’s same volume of wind sends it shooting and skimming across the waves. “Woo, woo!” Lima cheers.

  Rumi lets the wind relax so they’re moving at a calmer pace. He turns to see his friends jumbled in the middle of the ark, a big pile of indistinguishable paws and noses and wings and claws and tails. “Is everyone okay?”

  Lima pops out of the huddle, clapping her wings. “That was awesome!”

  Gogi looks less thrilled as he picks himself out of the pile. In fact, he looks a little green. “Is it going to rock like this the whole way?” he asks, his hand braced against the side of the hull.

  “I think that’s probably unavoidable,” Sky says as he pops out from under Mez’s legs. “Believe me, I’m not feeling so good about it, either.”

  Mez has all four legs spread wide, tail thrashing as she sways from side to side. “Maybe we’ll get used to it?”

  “I think you will,” Rumi says. He pauses. “Hopefully you will.”

  It’s not too long before the shadowwalkers have arranged their foodstuffs back into neat piles and made sure Mist is secure in his watery restraints. Mez sits at the front of the craft, peering out at the horizon, newly calm—if a little ill-looking. Gogi sits next to her, draping an arm across her shoulders and a tail across her haunches. That extra limb makes him an especially good comforter. “We’ll sight another land soon, I’m sure of it,” he says.

  “And then we’ll set Mist up and skedaddle out of there,” Lima says, taking up her recent favorite spot, upside down under Mez’s chin. “Operation Immortal Exile is going to be a success.”

  “Maybe we could explore any new land we find a little bit first, though?” Rumi asks. “This could be our one chance to get to know someplace that isn’t Caldera. I wouldn’t want to waste that opportunity.”

  “I second that,” Sky says. “Who knows what we might discover out there?”

  “We will come home eventually, right?” Gogi asks. “Alzo would kill me if I left Caldera without saying good-bye.”

  “Yes,” Rumi says emphatically. “We’ll banish Mist somewhere, and then we’ll come home.”

  They draw quiet as they gaze out at the sunstruck ocean. The watery light casts glowing interlocking lines across the walls and floor of the ark, like Banu’s bubble did when they were walking along the bottom of the sea.

  Rumi taps the wrapped leaf bundle closest to him and, making sure no one is looking, delicately unfolds a corner and peers in. There they are—three little green growths, each with a clod of soil to keep it moist and alive. If it comes down to it, they can plant them in their new land. He’s chosen representative species, at the base of every jungle ecosystem. If they have to settle somewhere that’s not already rainforest, they can make it into one over time. Only if it comes to that. Ideally they’l
l be able to return home without needing to re-create the rainforest elsewhere. But it never hurts to be prepared.

  Rumi wraps the little growths back in their protective leaf, and then hops to join his friends. He snuggles under Sky’s wing, and stares out at the magically displayed expanse of sea. The skies are so bright they’re almost silver. They might be the first inhabitants of Caldera ever to see another land. Who knows what they’ll discover!

  “Rumi,” Sky says. “Look. There on the horizon. It got our message!”

  “What is that?” Mez gasps.

  A large shadow has emerged from the ocean depths. Its giant bulk turns the ocean an even darker blue, then black, and finally its fin crests the surface. The titanic fish keeps pace with the ark’s bow, and then swivels to look back. “Hello there,” the grouper says with its deep voice. “My name is Kay.”

  It smiles. Doing so causes it to reveal its giant teeth. “Gah!” Lima shrieks.

  “It’s our new grouper friend!” Rumi says. “Hi, Kay!”

  “Kay, really?” Gogi asks. “Is that a grouper sort of name?”

  “It’s been a very long time since I took a journey,” the grouper says. “I’m ready for an adventure.”

  Mez nods warily. “This is the fish friend you told us about? You hadn’t mentioned it was so . . . big.”

  “I’ll scout ahead and then check back in as the Veil drops,” the grouper says. “If that treacherous friend of yours gives you any trouble whatsoever, you can send him my way.”

  A grim smile plays across Mez’s features. “We’ll be sure to. I think I’m going to like you, Kay.”

  “Well, well,” Gogi says, cracking his knuckles. “A sturdy craft to travel in, loyal friends, magical powers, calm seas, sunny weather, a whole world to explore, and a sea monster on our side! Life is looking pretty good.”

  “Thanks to Auriel’s sacrifice, it is,” Sky says quietly.

  “Yes,” Gogi says, chastened. “Thanks to Auriel’s sacrifice.”

  “I’m glad that I have you all by my side,” Rumi says.

  “I’m glad that we packed so many snacks,” Lima says. “Lots and lots of snacks.”