Winter's Rising

by Mark Tufo

  “I hope you are not saying what I think you’re saying. I will not leave this place, nor would I stay, without you. I thought you understood that. And remember you’re the one that first brought up the part of them keeping an eye on us. I don’t think I would have even thought of that on my own.”

  “It’s my life or the lives of the rest of the Dystancians. Without someone to lead them out, they will be slaughtered by the first enemy they encounter; or starve to death. There is no middle ground here, Cedar.”

  “Those other sixty-six aren’t my best friends, Winter. You can’t ask this of me.”

  “I already have.”

  “Get Tallow to do it. He’s the one in a rush to leave.”

  “He’s not a leader, Cedar, you are.”

  “Pah.” She blew out a large breath of air. “Can I think on it tonight?”

  “Tonight, but that’s it.” If I let Cedar have her way she’d debate about it until all options were forcibly removed by circumstances.

  “First, can we go back and check the cistern?”

  “That again? The glow was probably just minerals or something. It’s not worth risking your life over, Cedar.”

  “All the same I’d probably have a clearer mind to make my decision if I knew what was down there for sure.”

  “Are you forcing me?”

  “I’d like to consider it more crafty manipulation rather than brute force.”

  “Fine, let’s go check it out.”

  I hadn’t noticed who was following us that day, but they were stationed in the cavern hallway before we’d been in the sleeping chambers for more than a minute.

  I was getting better at moving through the crack, although I was no happier for it.

  “You ready?” Cedar asked, looking at me with trepidation.

  “For what? I’m not doing anything, and I don’t think you should be either. I’ve told you before I can’t swim. If you get into trouble about all I’m going to be able to do is yell loudly.”

  “I’ll take my chances.” She placed her hand on my shoulder before dropping into the water. She took in a large measure of air and then ducked under. I watched as some bubbles rose; after a moment those stopped. I’d been holding my breath as well to get an idea of just how long I thought she could stay down there safely. My lungs began to burn, my chest pulling tight. The periphery of my vision was darkening and still no Cedar.

  “Cedar,” I called, gulping in a blessed chunk of air. I carefully got into the water, making sure to avoid where Cedar had gone in lest I inadvertently step on her. I plunged my head in and looked around wildly for her. The lantern above did a poor job of illuminating the water past a foot down. I felt around for any part of her I could grip and pull toward the surface. I was groping wildly, constantly jamming my fingers and slamming my hands and elbows into the rock. The bottom couldn’t have been more than five feet down, but it was impossible. I couldn’t find her. “Cedar, stop this. Where are you? This isn’t funny.”

  When I realized I’d checked the small space at least three times and had sufficiently bloodied the water up from my futile efforts, I finally got up the nerve to poke around inside the damned hole. “Stupid, stupid,” I admonished myself, and her. Of course the opening should have been the first place I checked, not the last. If she was stuck in there she’d have drowned by now. Panic was welling up in me as I went back down and felt around. When I finally located the hole I reached my hand in. At first there was nothing and then with my outstretched fingers I felt her hair. It did not register with me at that point why she would have entered feet first; all I knew was that I wanted to get my friend out of the water. I wrapped my hand around her hair and yanked as hard as I could toward me. When I was confident she was free of the hole I pulled her upwards. It was then I noticed her hands had wrapped around my arm.

  “Ow, Winter! You’re hurting me!” she yelled.

  “Everything alright in there?” The guard asked from the entrance to our chambers.

  “Fine, fine!” Cedar shouted. “Cat fight!” she yelled for his benefit. For mine her voice dropped down and was laced with threat. “If you don’t let go of my hair I’m going to scratch your eyes out.”

  “I’m…I’m saving you!” I told her.

  “You…are…hurting…me!”

  Unraveling my hand was not easy; a significant portion of her wet hair was tangled in and through my fingers. She danced on her tip toes, wincing and crying out as I tried to pull free.

  “That’s my hair,” she said sadly as I dipped my hand in the water to get the offending strands off of me.

  “Are you alright?” I asked, her face quickly shifting from sadness to excitement. “You scared me.”

  “There’s definitely something down there.”

  “What is it?”

  “I couldn’t really see it properly, Winter. I knew you were going to start freaking out soon and I couldn’t take the chance of you going to get somebody. I know where the glow is coming from though. There are lights down there, hundreds of them.”

  “You mean, like, torches?”

  “No…more like those lamps in the library–you know, the ones with the glass balls? Only these are on.”

  “Yeah, I know what you’re talking about, I’m just having a hard time believing it. Did you maybe bonk your head on the cave wall and dream this up?” I desperately wanted to discount her find; something like that would mean rethinking my entire reality, again, and it scared me to the core. She’d found something that was supposed to remain hidden and I kind of wanted it to stay that way–hidden, I mean.

  “Come on, come and look for yourself.”

  “Cedar, I can’t swim and I hate ducking my head under water.”

  “Winter.” She grabbed my face in her hands. “Listen to me. I found something important and we’ve got to check it out. The hole is wider than the one leading into this chamber and it’s not more than five or six feet long. It opens up to a much larger pool and then beyond that is the light.”

  “I’m scared, Cedar.” It was time to admit it.

  “Winter is scared? I think I can safely say I’ve seen it all. I’ll lead the way. You just follow me and you’ll be fine. You won’t be under the water for more than ten or fifteen seconds. Okay?” she asked when she realized I still hadn’t come around to being comfortable with this.

  “No. Yeah…I’m good.”

  “Okay. Get some air and let’s go.” She dropped down under the water. When I didn’t immediately follow she pulled on my leg.

  I grabbed a breath and plunged down after her. Cedar’s entire body was through the hole before I even got to it. Now or never, I thought as I tried to calm my demons. I chose “now” and stuck my head through. I didn’t know whether to place my arms over my head or behind, but I needn’t have worried as there was plenty of space to move them about. I’d like to say I was swimming, but it was more like flailing. I couldn’t completely extend my arms but I did have great range of motion. Once I knew I could move, I kicked with my feet and propelled myself forward.

  I was not moving nearly as fast as I wanted to be. I was grateful when Cedar reached down and grabbed my hair, even if it was only for a little payback.

  “That does hurt!” I said, rubbing my head when I came up.

  “You think?”

  “Whoa,” I said as I finally looked around. “What is this place?”

  “What did I tell you?” She was wading towards the shore.

  “Isn’t this in any of your books?”

  “Not unless it’s a secret retreat for Jean-Paul and Heloise, which I seriously doubt.”

  “Who?”

  “Forget it.”

  “How are these lights working?”

  “Electricity, I think.”

  I had no idea what electricity was and it was likely she knew nothing more about it other than to call it that. Whatever it was, it seemed like magic. It was light that didn’t depend on the sun or flame. To call the room vast was an und
erstatement; from where we stood, I couldn’t see the other side.

  Cedar was smiling next to me.

  “You look guilty of something.”

  “I’ve got an idea,” she told me.

  “Am I going to like this?”

  “What if we bring our people here?” she asked.

  I immediately tried to think of all the ways that wouldn’t work, but I realized it just might. They weren’t being watched, so all I needed to do was lead the guards away and Cedar could bring the Dystancians here–maybe in ones and twos so as to not garner any attention. I told Cedar all this and she agreed. Suddenly I remembered Tallow. I knew I had to share this with him, but he had been so combative. What if he reacted negatively?

  “When I get everyone through you just need to follow.” Cedar interrupted my thoughts.

  I shook my head. “That won’t work.”

  “What do you mean it won’t work?”

  “Once they come in and realize I’m not in the chamber they’ll start looking for alternate ways out. They’ll find this hole for sure.”

  “Then we’ll just post guards on this side.”

  “And then what, Cedar? Are we going to continually kill people as they come through? It’ll get pretty gross in here pretty fast. If all the Dystancians disappear they won’t have a reason to look in here; they’ll just assume they’ve left with Tallow’s group.”

  “I’ve told you, Winter. I’m not leaving you.”

  “You’ve found a way to keep our clan safe. You can’t turn your back on them now.”

  “Fine. I’ll get them through and then I’ll come back for you.”

  “Tallow needs to be in on this. You think leaving him in charge is such a good idea?”

  I thought she was going to stomp her foot in frustration. “Dammit, Winter, you can’t do this to me! You can’t put me in this position. Wait…this might not even work.”

  “What do you mean?” She asked.

  “Well, first, we know nothing about this place. What if this isn’t the only entrance? What if we are not alone here? and how long can we hide in here without food? Even if everyone sneaks some through with them it will be wet, and at most we’d only have a couple of days’ worth.”

  I was trying to figure out a way to make this work when Cedar smacked me on the arm.

  “Come on–we at least have to check it out,” she entreated.

  “I think we should wait for tonight. If someone comes looking for us now they’re going to get pretty suspicious when we don’t answer.” I thought I was going to have to drag her by her hair again to get her away. She was reluctant, but we finally swam back.

  Chapter 19

  Into the Past

  MENNOT’S ADVANCE PARTY had been spotted and the cavern was bustling as people prepared. Haden and Tallow both avoided me, which was fine with me. I was so distracted by what could potentially be in that hidden room that even an arrogant pig-headed man would be able to see I wasn’t seeking attention from them. Haden had me and Cedar brought to The War council for final preparations. Nothing much had changed other than he wanted the Dystancians to be in the center so that they were protected on all sides. Protected, guarded…it was all just words. All I could think about was that we might have a real way to get them out of this, and at the edge of that hope was a glimmer that maybe we’d found the evidence that Brody knew had to be out there.

  “We don’t have much time,” I needlessly told Cedar when we pretended to go to bed that night. It was a little earlier than usual, but since it was possible we might not be able to get a good night’s sleep for many days, nobody thought twice about it.

  “If the room works out then we’re going to have to get everyone through before midday.” Cedar was figuring out the logistics.

  “If the room works out,” I echoed.

  Cedar was too anxious to wait much longer; I could hear her tapping her fingers and sighing endlessly. But we had to delay; I wanted our guard to think we’d had enough time to fall asleep so he would relax. Cedar couldn’t stand it. She was already halfway through to the cistern. I quickly followed. It wasn’t five minutes later we once again found ourselves back in the giant, lighted room. I had worried that when we went through this time the lights would be out, but it was a needless concern.

  As we waded out of the water and onto a platform the true enormity of the place struck me. There were large trucks parked over to the left.

  “There’s another way out,” Cedar said as she pointed to the big green machines.

  I almost asked how could she possibly know that and then I realized that those trucks hadn’t come in the same way we had. Cedar started running to a point down past the trucks.

  “What are you doing?” I called out softly. I didn’t want to shout because I wasn’t entirely convinced we were alone, although the floor told a different story. There was a heavy coating of dust, and in some places, chunks of rock had dislodged from the ceiling and smashed onto the ground. As orderly as everything else seemed here I couldn’t imagine that if the area was in use whoever it belonged to would have left the debris in place, unless of course they wanted to make it look deserted. My paranoia was kicking up.

  “It’s a…a plane!” Cedar was jumping up and down as she ran her hand alongside the body of a machine I’d never heard of or seen before. “It…this machine can fly!”

  “There’s such a thing?” It had wings like a bird but it was much, much bigger than any bird I’d ever seen. The wings didn’t look like they could flap.

  “People used to fly in these things, Winter!” She was climbing up a small staircase that led to a see-through shell on the top of the contraption.

  “Don’t touch anything!” I was afraid it was going to start flying around on its own.

  She pressed her face up against the shell. “I could fly this.”

  “It doesn’t fly itself?” I joined her on the top of the staircase. I was looking at an incredible amount of levers, pedals, dials, and a myriad of other mechanical looking things I didn’t even have names for. “You think you can fly this?” I asked incredulously.

  “Well, I’d have to do a little more reading,” she admitted. We stepped down and discovered there were more planes and a machine that we didn’t have a name for. It had something that looked much like large sword blades attached to the top of it. There was also a seat in it for a person. The dials and levers were plentiful in this one as well.

  “I think this flies, too,” I told Cedar.

  “How?”

  “I don’t know. How do you think that plane flies?” We both looked over at it. When we’d had our fill of the machines we moved to the far corner where a part had been sectioned off into small rooms. At first we both thought they were sleeping quarters but when we checked them out, only one had something that could be construed as anything to lay down on. Rats and time had made even that an impossibility.

  “Who do you think General Ginson is?” Cedar asked as she brushed dirt and dust off of a small nameplate attached to the door.

  I shrugged my shoulders. I went over to the next quarters but all I could see on the plate was Colonel T... the rest of the letters were coated in heavy grime. I didn’t see the point in finding out whose place it was. I was completely convinced that the people who had resided here were long gone. I went in the room. Inside were remnants of what appeared to be a stuffed alligator on the floor, along with a bottle of a liquid called Moxie. I picked up the bottle and saw that it was still full. It fizzed when I twisted the lid off but the sour odor it emitted was the only clue I needed to realize that whatever was in there was not fit for human consumption.

  “Ugh,” I said as I dropped the bottle on the ground.

  Cedar came in and picked up something off the desk. “What’s Germ-X?” she asked, sniffing at a bottle. She made nearly the same face I had. “Come on, there’s nothing in here. Let’s see if we can find some food–or the other way out.” Cedar grabbed my arm.

  It was the
lights that kept niggling at the back of my mind. There hadn’t been a person in this place in years, decades maybe, possibly even centuries, yet they glowed. Nothing I’d ever known my entire life could keep working that long. For now I was going to have to be content that they were just on. Better than off, I suppose.

  “What do we have here?” Cedar had led me to another area.

  “Meals Ready to Eat? In a box?” We were both staring at tall stacks of boxes.

  “Might as well see.” Cedar jumped up and pulled a box off the top. It split open as it made contact with the ground. I picked up a green, bloated-looking packet that had fallen out. I tore into the top of it with my teeth. That was a mistake. If I thought the Moxie had smelled bad, this had Cedar gagging and she was three feet away. I couldn’t toss the thing far enough away from me, the smell seemingly seared into my nostrils.

  “You going to open another one?” Cedar had turned away.

  “I thought we were friends?”

  “Maybe that’s what people ate back then.” She finally turned back to me.

  “Yeah and maybe that’s why they’re not around anymore.”

  “Good point. Probably shouldn’t mess with this stuff then.”

  “Nothing gets past you, Cedar.”

  “I think it moved.” Cedar was looking over the contents that had once been considered food.

  “What a waste. This looks like enough food for all of us for a long while.”

  “Just going to have to find the way out.”

  “What do we do then? We can’t go back to Dystance, if we even knew where it was.”

  “One problem at a time, Winter. Why so glum?” She was moving toward some heavy wooden crates.

  “This place just makes me anxious.”

  “What do you think M-16s are?” Cedar asked as she brushed away dust from the top.

  “I hope it’s not more food.”

  Cedar stepped back like I’d yelled snake. “Naw, it can’t be. Right?”

  “Open it and find out. I did the last one,” I said before she could back out.

  “It’s shut too tight.” She was straining as she pulled on the lip of it. She stopped to suck the tips of her now sore fingers. “That’s too bad. I can’t get it open.”