by T.A. Barron
Nodding anxiously, the machinist promised, “I shall find him, Great One. And I shall destroy him!”
“Heed my words. You cannot destroy him by yourself. He is too powerful. You must capture him and deliver him to my immortal servants, warriors of darkness who will seem to you only a mass of shadows.”
The voice grew louder. “Do you understand?”
“Y-yes, yes, I do.”
“Good! Now get back to work, you wretched mortal. Prove your worth to me and . . . you shall thrive. Fail me and . . .”
As the voice from on high paused, Reocoles shuddered. His sweaty hands grasped the flying wheel, high above the endless ocean where once Atlantis had flourished. Nervously, he awaited the god’s final words. When at last they came, they smote the sky like terrible thunder.
“You shall perish forever.”
CHAPTER 7
The Bridge to Nowhere
At the same time that Reocoles, in another part of the City, dreamed of his encounter with the all-powerful god, two young people strolled together down a cobblestone street. Lit by the flickering light of oil lamps, the stones under their feet gleamed subtly, like stars through rising mist.
“I jest can’t forget,” said Shangri sadly, “the first sight o’ that mining operation. It was a week ago now, but it feels like jest a few seconds. Giant pits, hills stripped o’ every last tree, an’ those huge wagons belchin’ smoke an’ tearin’ away at the ground. Plus that horrible yellow pond where Reocoles’s soldiers tried drownin’ me.”
She frowned at her companion, Lorno. He looked at her with real compassion, crinkling his nose in that special way of his. “Sure glad Atlanta came in time to save you!”
Shangri nodded, bouncing her long red hair. “Atlanta an’ her faeries.” Her frown melted. “Ye should have seen them, little as they were, attackin’ all the soldiers.”
“Maybe someday I’ll write about that battle.”
“Or somethin’ better,” said Shangri with a playful wink. “Like that one great story yer still searchin’ to find.”
Lorno gave her a look of determination. “I will find it, Shangri.”
“I know ye will.” She took his hand. “It will be a story the world will never forget.”
They stopped walking at the intersection with the wide avenue that ran along the edge of the river’s deep gorge. Far below the rim, water crashed and pounded ceaselessly.
Looking at each other, their eyes glistened, maybe from something more than the street lamps. Despite her playful tease, Shangri loved Lorno’s high aspirations. Through all five years she’d known him, his dream of becoming a famous bard had remained as strong as ever. As strong as it had been on the first day they’d met—the day Promi had caused that great watery whale’s tail to rise out of the sea and save Lorno’s ship.
Of course, as Shangri knew well, it hadn’t really been Lorno’s ship. The vessel belonged to Reocoles, and Lorno was merely a lowly crew member, the apprentice to the assistant deck-mopper. But in the time since the shipwreck—when he’d landed right on top of Shangri’s father, the baker Morey—Lorno had become her best friend . . . and something much more than a friend.
Several months earlier, they’d been married by an old monk at the temple. Seeing the young couple’s delight at being wed, the monk had given them a wondrous ceremony, sprinkling colorful flower petals over them and chanting many blessings to bring them good fortune. The monk had even refused to take any payment—until, that is, Shangri’s father had offered him a freshly baked plum pie, still steaming hot from the oven. No one could resist that.
“The City has changed a lot since ye first came here,” she said softly to Lorno. “Yet despite all the ways we both wish it hadn’t . . .”
She paused to glance at a pile of discarded machine parts and packaging that someone had dumped on the street corner. “Despite all those ways, I sure am glad fer one special change.”
Lorno grinned, squeezing her hand. “I’m glad for that too.”
“So is Papa.” She returned the young man’s grin. “At least since his back healed from yer landin’ on top o’ him.”
“Right. I must have weighed almost as much as one of his triple-deep cherry pies.”
Shangri chuckled. “Not quite that much, thank the Divine Monk’s bountiful beard.”
“You mean his bountiful belly,” corrected Lorno mischievously. “That’s the most bountiful part of him. Except maybe all his many chins.”
“Shhh,” cautioned Shangri—though she couldn’t keep herself from laughing out loud, even as a trio of monks turned the corner and walked past. The monks, wearing brown robes and sandals, chanted in worshipful monotones as they padded down the street. They marched in unison, stepping in time to the small prayer drum one of them struck rhythmically.
As the monks turned another corner and disappeared, Lorno said, “Back to the subject of my writing—”
“Ye mean yer paper crumplin’,” teased Shangri. “Last time I looked in yer room, there were more crumpled pages than anythin’ else, takin’ up more space than yer bed.”
“I know,” he said, lowering his gaze. “The writing hasn’t been going well.” Suddenly brightening, he said, “But I do have a new writer’s name.”
She rolled her eyes. “What, again? I gave up countin’ how many names you’ve tried.”
“Which is why you still call me Lorno, the name I had when we first met.”
“An’ the name fer ye I told the monk who married us,” she remembered with a chuckle.
“So you really do like that name?” he asked.
Shangri sighed. “Well . . . no, to tell the truth. But if I didn’t keep callin’ ye that, I’d totally lose track o’ yer name!”
“Well,” he began hopefully, “how about this new name I just thought of this afternoon?”
“An’ it is?”
“It is . . .” His voice trailed off, and his expression darkened. “Zeus’s thunderbolt! I, well—I um . . . forgot it.”
Shangri stifled another laugh. “Guess it wasn’t goin’ to last anyway.”
“Nothing I’ve created yet is going to last,” he said in a forlorn voice.
She gave him a sympathetic hug. “Ye’ll find yer true name. Jest like ye’ll find yer one great story.”
“You think so?” he asked hopefully. “A story that will reach across time and distance, touching people everywhere?”
“Yes. Yer one great story.” Then, whispering in his ear, she added, “But whatever yer name as a famous bard . . . to me, ye’ll always be Lorno.”
He nodded gratefully, then whispered, “And to me . . . you’ll always be a prayer that was answered.”
She caught her breath. “Speakin’ o’ prayers—oh, Lorno! Last night, jest before I fell asleep, I heard a voice inside my head. Promi’s voice!”
“Are you sure?”
“As sure as there’s plenty o’ freckles on my face.”
“Well,” he said wryly, “that’s very sure.” But seeing that she was now in no mood for humor, he pressed, “What did he say?”
Shangri concentrated, calling back the whole memory. “He said he got the prayer I sent him from the old bridge that’s fallin’ apart.”
She pointed to the river gorge where the barest outline of the dilapidated, half-finished bridge could be seen. The Bridge to Nowhere, Promi had called it. Mist, rising from the thundering river below, billowed all around. From every plank and post, lines of silver leaves inscribed with prayers fluttered in the breeze.
Lorno crinkled his nose in doubt. “So the old legends are true?”
“Yes! I’m sure o’ that now. He said my prayer came to him on a wind lion, jest like the legends say. An’ then he told me what I needed to hear.”
“Which was?”
Shangri swallowed. “In my prayer to him, I told h
im about Reocoles an’ the mines. An’ all the troubles we’re now havin’ on this island.”
Again Lorno asked, “What did he say?”
Her steady gaze bore into him. “That he’ll never abandon us. Never. An’ that . . . he still loves Atlanta. Even if they can’t ever be together.”
Lorno blew a long breath. “Being immortal isn’t all that easy, I suppose.”
“Not,” added Shangri, “when the one person you most want to be with is livin’ on another world.”
His voice very quiet, Lorno said, “I’m glad we’re living on the same world.”
“Me too.” Her face seemed to harden. “But we can’t wait for Promi to come back an’ help us. We’ve got to do somethin’ ourselves to stop Reocoles.”
“You already did that,” objected Lorno. “Even though you almost got yourself killed in the process.”
Shangri shook her head vigorously, sending up a puff of flour from that day’s long hours in the bakery. “Atlanta an’ I—we only stopped him fer the moment! He’s already put out the call fer more workers. Offerin’ them twice the old wages. Plus a bonus fer startin’ right away.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Sure as can be. Heard lots o’ folks talkin’ about it at the bakery today, while ye were up in yer room, writin’ away.”
“Crumpling away,” he said morosely.
Lorno scanned the avenue by the river, where several abandoned vehicles cluttered the rim of the gorge. Furtively, people were even now looking the vehicles over, searching for any objects they could sell. Despite their common purpose, none of those people spoke to one another, or even nodded in greeting as they would have done just a few years ago.
“You know,” he observed, “all those inventions and machines that Reocoles has made for the City do some useful things. Convenient things. But they also hide a lot of troubles—and those troubles are spreading, like a disease.”
“Which is why,” Shangri declared, “we’re goin’ to do somethin’ about it.”
“What?”
“I’m not sure yet.” She tugged on his arm, spun him around, and started to walk back up the cobblestone street. “But by the time we get back to the bakery, I’m hopin’ to know.”
CHAPTER 8
Graybeard
Yer plannin’ to do what?”
Morey the baker roared at his daughter, his round face as red as a strawberry tart. Facing Shangri and Lorno at the back of his bakery, he glared at them, his mouth open as wide as one of his ovens.
“I told you, Papa. We need to stop him! Before it’s too late.”
Morey planted his fists on his ample hips, smearing on his apron some of the cherry pudding he’d just been stirring. That hardly mattered, though, for the apron already wore everything from raspberry syrup to flecks of dough to sprinklings of flour—signs of a typical day’s work.
“I won’t hear of it!” he bellowed, this time loud enough that he startled the three or four evening customers on the other side of the counter.
Although those customers had come to the bakery as their last errand of the day, hoping to gather some pastries before the shop closed, they immediately changed their minds and went straight home. Only one person remained on that side of the counter—a tall, gray-bearded man wearing a ragged old coat. Even as the man studied the pastries on display on the shelves, his dark eyes glanced furtively at the people in the back.
Seeing the red-haired girl, the young man beside her, and the plump baker, the man grinned knowingly, as if the three of them fit some description he’d been given. Surreptitiously, he took another look at Shangri, watching her closely. Then his grin broadened.
Meanwhile, trying his best to stay calm, the baker said to Shangri, “Tell me again this crazy-brained idea o’ yers. I thought ye’d just gone out for an evenin’ walk, the two o’ ye. An’ then ye come back here plottin’ a bloody revolution!”
On the other side of the counter, the bearded man raised an eyebrow.
Shangri stepped closer to her father and gently touched the apron that wrapped around his wide waist. Under that colorfully stained apron, she could feel the bulge of his belt buckle—which was, as she knew well, the sapphire-studded buckle that Promi had stolen from the wicked priest Grukarr and then given to her father.
Promi had called that generous gift “a small payment” for one of the baker’s sweet and gooey cinnamon buns. Its valuable jewels had freed Morey from needing to bake for a living. So why did he continue to run the bakery, getting up every morning two hours before dawn to start preparing the day’s treats and working until late every evening? Fer the simple pleasure o’ doin’ it, he would answer. And Shangri knew that, for him, that pleasure came mainly from seeing others enjoy his baked goods.
“Listen, Papa,” she said softly, “ye know what happened to me when I went to see Reocoles’s mines across the gorge.”
“I do indeed!” he thundered. “An’ it made me want to pummel that evil man like a big mound o’ dough.”
Morey punched the air vigorously to illustrate the point. “An’ then I’d slice him into pieces like one o’ me pies.”
“I know, Papa, I know. It’s only because I made ye promise not to do it that he’s still alive.”
“Right, dumplin’.” He sighed. “An’ it’s only thanks to that brave young woman from the forest that yer still alive. I owe her a mountain o’ me best pastries, I do! What was her name again?”
“Atlanta.”
Across the bakery, the bearded man leaned over the counter to listen.
“An’ yer right, Papa. I’m only here today because o’ her.”
Ruffling her carrot-colored hair with one of his hands, Morey asked, “So why do ye want to put yerself in danger again? Yer dealin’s with that hooligan will only make ye more likely to get hurt. Or worse.”
He peered into her eyes. “An’ dumplin’ . . . I jest couldn’t survive that.”
Shangri glanced over at Lorno, who frowned, and said, “He has a good point, you know.”
“Ye bet yer last drop o’ cookie dough, I do!”
“O’ course, Papa.” Shangri bit her lip. “But if we can stop Reocoles now—before he gets that whole minin’ operation started again—we jest might stop him forever.”
“But how,” her father demanded, “could ye possibly do that? Short o’ bloody revolution, I don’t see how ye can hope to succeed.”
He paused, grimacing. “I’m not saying there aren’t plenty o’ folks feelin’ angry about him an’ his cursed machines. But dumplin’ . . . ye won’t be able to find enough people who’d be willin’ to risk life an’ limb fer that cause. There’s jest too many folks needin’ Reocoles’s money—or his water fer their homes.”
“Exactly as he planned,” said Lorno.
“I know that,” declared Shangri. “An’ that’s why I’ve thought of a different way to stop him. One that doesn’t need any help from folks here in the City.”
Now the bearded man slipped around the counter, stepping quietly toward the back of the bakery, to make sure he didn’t miss a single word.
“Tell us, dumplin’.”
“All I need to do,” Shangri explained, “is go into the Great Forest an’ talk with Atlanta. She’ll understand! An’ I’m sure that she could convince the forest creatures to help! Why, with enough faeries an’ bears an’ monkeys an’ others, it’ll be as good as a regular army!”
Morey rubbed his forehead, knocking loose a clump of dough. “Ye know . . . that really could work, seein’ how effective jest the faeries were last time.”
“That’s right,” Shangri said with a bright smile. “Atlanta knows all those creatures. An’ they trust her.”
“Only one problem,” Lorno observed. “How do you find Atlanta? The forest is almost impassable unless you know one of the trails—and I don’t think
you do. On top of that . . . you don’t know where in that huge forest to find her! You could end up wandering around in the woods, totally lost, to the end of your days.”
Shangri straightened her back. “That won’t happen to me.”
“Why not?” demanded Morey and Lorno in unison.
“Because,” she announced, “I have this.”
As her father and husband watched, she drew from her pocket a small green bundle that looked like a crumpled leaf. Holding it in the palm of her hand, she said, “Open now.”
Instantly, the leaf unfurled, flattening out on Shangri’s hand. Shaped like a circle with deep indentations around the edges that looked almost like fingers, the leaf actually resembled a flattened green hand. In its center lifted a thin red shoot, clasping a tiny piece of honey-colored amber that narrowed to a sharp point.
“Beautiful,” said Morey. “Nature really is the best artist—an’ also the best baker.”
Still puzzled, Lorno asked, “How does this help?”
“Watch,” said Shangri. Then she commanded, “Show me the way.”
Right away, the piece of amber started to spin, turning rapid circles. Suddenly, it stopped, its point facing the bakery’s door to the street.
Morey gasped. “It’s a compass! A magical compass. How, dumplin’, did ye ever get such a treasure?”
“From Atlanta, jest before we parted. She told me to use it if I ever wanted to find her again.”
“That’s fantastic,” said Lorno.
“Amazin’,” added Morey.
“Most helpful,” said a melodic voice that none of the others had ever heard before.
Shangri, along with Morey and Lorno, spun around to face the source of the voice—the man with the gray beard. He had crept so quietly across the bakery that nobody had noticed him.
Morey drew himself up to his full height and rumbled, “Who are ye? This part o’ the bakery is jest fer me an’ my family.”