by GARY DARBY
I groan and twitch from the eerie touches when from far away I hear a ghostly, Run, Hooper, if you can, but I shall find you and have what is mine.
At that, my eyes pop open with my heart thudding in my chest. It’s early morn with just a bit of pale sunlight upon the glade. I turn my head to one side to see Cara adding a few small twigs to the smoldering fire. My movement must have caught her eye for she hurries over and kneels beside me. “Hooper, how are you feeling?”
I don’t immediately answer as I can still hear the unnerving voice in my head. Then, I nod and say in a croaking voice, “Better, but thirsty.”
“Easily solved,” she quickly says and holds the leather water jug to my lips.
I drink long and deep to quench my thirst. “Thanks, Cara.”
She nods and then says, “I wish I could offer you something to eat, but we don’t even have squirrel soup. Sorry. Amil and Helmar have already gone out to see what they can bag; perhaps in a bit, we’ll have something to munch on.”
She leans a little closer, her eyes suddenly concerned. “Hooper, is your wound worse? You look a bit feverish.”
“No, I just didn’t get much sleep is all.”
“In that case, go back to sleep but if you need something, let me know. While Phigby’s napping I’ve got camp duty.”
I lie back, and it’s then that I notice that I’m actually lying on a bed of leaves that cushion and soften the ground.
My wound aches but I have to admit, being tended to by Cara and not having to sleep on the hard ground goes a long way toward easing the pain, especially the part of being tended to by the most beautiful girl in the world.
It almost makes it worthwhile having taken that Wilder arrow. Wait, what am I saying? Even having Cara tenderly look after you is not worth taking a Wilder arrow in the shoulder.
I close my eyes and try to doze off, but I’m not feeling all that well. I’m feverish, and my shoulder has begun to throb, waves of pain that seem to be building by the moment. I don’t want to appear to be an absolute coward to Cara, so I don’t say anything.
I drop in and out of slumber but each time I begin to relax the dark dreams come again and each time the feeling of being pulled into a black abyss becomes stronger.
At some point, I’m awakened by Scamper, who bounds up to me, putting his paws on my chest with his face practically against mine.
His eyes are anxious, and he chitters sympathetically. I knuckle his head weakly and say, “I’m all right, Scamper. Go find some nice juicy grubs or worms.”
He hesitates before his stomach wins the moment and he’s off. I lean back and drift off to sleep. In my dark dreams, I’m running, stumbling through the forest. Behind me is a woodsman’s hut. Fire leaps from its thatched roof and from the flames come fiery arms, reaching out to grasp me in their writhing tentacles.
I stumble through the trees only to fall painfully to the ground. From behind I hear, Run, Hooper! Run!
I glance back and in the roiling black smoke, Vay stands with a chilling, triumphant smile on her face. Oh yes, she sneers. Run, Hooper, only you can’t for I shall find you each time you flee!
She glides through the air, reaching for me. I try to run, but I’m too exhausted. I ready myself for the death that I know is coming from her evil hands.
Suddenly, at the last instant, three emerald dragons appear. They stand between Vay and me before they turn and fix their cruel green eyes on me. I understand. It’s not Vay who will slay me but these three emissaries of death that she’s called to do her dirty work.
“Hooper!” the blast of sound jerks me awake. I open tired eyes and peer upward. The golden is standing over me. “Hooper,” she says urgently, “try to stay awake until Phigby returns.”
I try to keep my eyes open, but it’s no use, and I drop back into darkness. My nightmare forms again, only this time it’s not a dragon that sends spears of dragon fire into the cottage, my former home, it’s Vay.
She rides the clouds, fire spewing from her ghastly hands. Once again, I’m running, but it’s not my mother’s voice urging me on, it’s Vay’s laughing cackle, Run, Hooper, run. Run as far as you can . . . Only, I’ll still find you.
I jerk awake to find the golden, her head lowered, and her cat’s eyes peering intently at me. My face is covered with beads of sweat, and I’m trembling. My body is on fire. I moan and clutch at my shoulder. I glance around, but other than the dragons, no one else is in sight.
“Where is everyone?” I rasp.
“Helmar and Amil,” she answers, “search for food. Phigby and Cara seek water.”
She comes closer, her eyes clearly concerned. She sniffs at my shoulder and her head jerks back as if she’s breathed in the smell of a week-old goat carcass that’s been left out to rot in the sun and is full of maggots.
A low growl rumbles from her throat. “Hooper, you’ve got to get up, find Phigby.”
I wave a hand at her. “Go away, I’m not going anywhere. If Phigby wants to find me, he knows where I am.”
I drift off to sleep. My nightmare comes again. I’m running, stumbling through the forest. The woodsman’s hut is a heap of shattered, smoking ruins that I’m trying to escape.
I stumble through the trees only to fall a last time, exhausted from my effort and the pain. I hear a noise and lift my head, only it’s not three dragons that come for me, it’s Vay.
She glides across the ground, her claws outstretched, and this time, I know that no green dragon is going to save me.
“Hooper!” the blast of sound jerks me awake. I open groggy eyes and peer upward. The golden is still standing over me. “Hooper,” she says desperately, “listen to me. When Phigby returns, you’ve got to say to him,
Foul worms there be, both land and sea
That claim the mind and to it bind
Away life’s spark, forever in the dark
Until the light shall end the blight.
I have no idea what she’s talking about. “Go away,” I demand, “and leave me alone. Can’t you see that I’m sick?”
I shiver one moment, and then I want to throw off my tunic the next as I feel as if I’m on fire. I writhe in pain, the agony coursing down my arm and through my shoulder as if Malo is piercing me with a dozen Proga lances.
Waves of darkness pass through my mind, but I fight them off, not wanting to face Vay again, even if it’s but a dream.
I hear voices. It’s Vay, she’s coming for me. Somehow, I rise to my feet. I try to run but all my legs can manage is a staggering, stumbling gait. Vay’s behind me, coming closer. I can hear her footsteps crunching leaves under her clawed feet.
I can’t move fast enough; I can’t get away. All around me is darkness, closing in, pulling at me as if to suck me into the blackness.
Then Vay’s claws are on me. I try to fight but I can’t. She spins me around to face her, and I know it’s the end. Here, in this place far from Draconstead, I die.
“Hooper!” I struggle against her grasp. “Hooper!” I try to push away, but I’m caught fast.
“Phigby! Come quick, he’s delirious!”
“Hooper,” the voice is gentle, soft, definitely not Vay’s harsh cackle. “Hooper, open your eyes, and look at me.”
I keep my eyes closed. It’s a trick. Vay has turned herself into appearing as Cara. If I open my eyes, she’ll have me. “Let’s get him back to bed,” another, deeper voice says.
A moment later, I’m back on my leafy bed, twisting, turning in my torment. A gentle hand presses on my face. “Oh, Phigby,” Cara murmurs, “he’s burning with fever.”
Phigby is kneeling beside me. His hand is rough on my face. I reach up to push his hand away. “G’way,” I mumble, “leave me alone.” I much prefer Cara’s smooth, tender touch.
I retch, sending another painful round of Proga lances coursing through me. “Hooper, look at me,” Phigby demands. Cara has a wet rag on my cheeks, my neck. The coolness feels good, but only where she touches, the rest of my body burns as
if I were walking across a fire pit.
I barely open my eyes against the light. I can see the golden standing, peering over Phigby’s shoulder. Her eyes are imploring, fearful. I can tell she’s not going to leave me alone unless I repeat her silly ditty.
I wet my lips, trying to remember what she said. “Worms,” I mumble.
Phigby leans closer, his eyes big and round. “What did you say, Hooper?”
“Something about worms,” I repeat, trying to recall the golden’s lyrics. If I can just remember, they’ll all go away and leave me alone.
Abruptly, I can see the words, glowing gold and bright in my mind. Another wave of darkness starts to close in on me before Phigby’s rough shaking brings me back to the light.
“Hooper, what’s that about worms?” He’s practically yelling at me. I get mad. He shouldn’t be bellowing at me, I don’t deserve to be shouted at, and I’m sick and tired of it; especially the sick part.
With lips and jaws set tight, I grind out,
Foul worms there be, on land and sea
That claim the mind and to it bind
Away life’s spark, forever in the dark
Until the light shall end the blight.
Phigby’s intake of breath is so loud that it makes me open my eyes a bit wider to stare at him in surprise. “Phigby,” Cara demands, “what is it?”
“I’m a fool!” he bawls. “A complete utter, doddering fool. Get more wood,” he orders. “I need a fire, now.”
I close my eyes tight as the sunlight is now too much to bear, but I hear the fear in Cara. “Phigby, what’s wrong, what are you going to do?”
“Something,” Phigby replies, “that I haven’t done in quite a long time. But if I’m successful — ”
“Successful at what, Phigby? What’s happening to Hooper?”
Phigby’s voice is worried, anxious. “Hooper’s dying. His body holds a Wraith Worm. If I don’t remove the vile thing in time, he’ll turn into a wraith and become a slave of Vay.”
That opens my eyes.
21
“I need water and wood for a fire,” Phigby snaps at Cara. “Leave the one leatheren with me that still has some water in it and get the others filled. Now!”
Without another word, Cara snatches up the water flasks and heads off at a dead run. I raise a weak hand to Phigby. My voice gurgles from the foam that forms on lips and tongue. I don’t know if it’s the spittle or my natural inability to speak clearly, but out of my mouth comes, “Wraaath wrrrm?”
Phigby eyes me, and takes a cloth and quickly wipes my mouth. He shakes his head in answer to my question and holds my head up for me to drink from his flask.
My throat feels as if I’ve a dirt clod stuck in it, and I choke and sputter, but somehow I get some of the liquid down. The rest just drools off to one side of my mouth.
Phigby sets the flask down and begins pulling objects out of his bag. I try to raise my head to see what he’s doing, but then the darkness comes at me again. I know what will happen if I succumb so I fight back.
I’m not sure how I know that if I give in, I will no longer be Hooper, puny and low as I may be, but something — someone else entirely and under Vay’s dominion.
I’ll become Vay’s slave, and she’ll grind me under her feet until I’m less than the maggots that burrow into rotted, stinking meat.
I grab leaves, dirt, anything I can lay my hands on to give me a feeling of something real, something firm to hold onto. I thrust my feet into the ground and with what little strength I have left, try to push myself away from Vay’s dark world.
But it’s no use, the darkness starts to close about me, swallowing me up in its infernal ebony curtain.
Somehow, I reach out to Phigby, clawing at him. Phigby jerks around, takes one look at me and places his hands on my shoulder. His face looms close. I can see his mouth moving, but the words are faint, distant. “Hooper, hang on, don’t give in . . . ”
Through blurry sight, I see Cara running up to dump her firewood. She takes one look at me, her mouth sags and her eyes go wide as if she’s seen Vay.
She throws the wood together for burning and this time, Phigby doesn’t toss anything into the kindling for it to catch fire. His hand makes a chopping motion, I hear, “Blazen!” and the arm-sized branches burst into flames.
Then Cara and he are tearing at my tunic. They practically rip it off, but at this point, I don’t care, I just want the pain, the anguish to stop. It’s stronger than I am, it’s beating me down until I have nothing left, no willpower to fight back.
I wish I were stronger and had Helmar’s or Amil’s, or even Cara’s strength. But I don’t.
I — can’t — do — this. I can’t save myself.
If entering the bliss of Vay’s shadows is the answer, then that’s what I want. I stop squirming, stop fighting and lay my head back to let the darkness, let Vay claim me so that I can be forever rid of the pain.
Cara’s slap across my face is every bit as rude and hurtful as Malo’s swift kicks to my backside back in the barn. My eyes pop open, and Cara’s angelic nose is practically touching mine.
An angry angel, nevertheless, a saving angel to me. “Hooper!” she yells. “Don’t you dare leave us!”
That I heard, loud and very, very, clearly.
I think to myself, “Don’t you dare leave us,” is nice, it means that Cara believes that I belong in our company. “Don’t you dare leave me,” however, would have been so much better.
It means I belong to her. But still, “don’t you dare leave us,” must mean that she cares, right? And if Cara cares even a little, then that’s important.
A quiet voice, sounding remarkably similar to the golden’s, interrupts my thoughts; If you won’t fight for yourself, then fight for Cara.
The darkness pushes at me again, stronger, harder. I feel myself slipping back into the blackness. I’m standing on the brink of a swirling, ebony whirlpool.
One more step and I’ll drop into the void and be lost. Whatever and whoever I am will be forever gone, swallowed by Vay’s dark will.
I hear Phigby’s voice — it’s powerful, forceful, calling me back from the edge. With every bit of self-will I can muster, I slowly turn from the spinning blackness. Parting the churning black clouds is a sliver of light, it grows, changing into a shining arch; a rainbow arch.
Striding through the colorful bow are Phigby and Golden Wind. Phigby’s dark robe is gone, replaced by a brilliant silvery mantle that billows as if from a breeze. In one hand he holds a gleaming staff with a knobby end that he holds out as if to push away the roiling, dark curtain.
The golden’s eyes are on me, they hold me so I can’t move, keeping me from toppling over into the black pit of doom. Phigby reaches out, and his voice is like thunder and lightning combined, Summonis, abjurate, Hooper — to me!
His free hand touches my tunic right on my arrow wound. For an instant, I feel as if a lightning bolt had pierced through my body and I jerk upright. I suck in breath after breath as if all the air had been forced from my body.
It takes a moment before my eyes clear and then I see Phigby, standing over me, but what he holds causes my heart to almost stop beating.
He’s holding long, blackened, smoking tongs as far away from his body as he possibly can. Caught in the pincers is a writhing, tiny wormlike creature. I watch wide-eyed as Phigby turns and strides a few steps out into the open meadow.
From the tree line, Cara appears, holding dripping wet water flasks. She stops to gape at Phigby for an instant before she starts to take another step.
Phigby’s voice booms in the glade, seeming to echo off the swaying trees. “I told you to stay away!”
He swings his arm at her as if he would push Cara out of the glen. Then he commands, “Get back, for this brings the living death.”
A shaft of morning sunlight breaks through the overhanging tree limbs to form a bright beam in the meadow’s center. Phigby paces to the brilliant ray of sunlight and hol
ding the tongs in one hand, reaches up with his other hand as if he were trying to touch the sun.
Then he cups his hand between the squirming wormlike thing and the sun and holds it there for a moment. Ljos Hata Mykyr! he exclaims in a loud, penetrating voice.
Either my eyes deceive me, or I see a beam of light shoot from the sky into Phigby’s open palm. Then, as if his hand were channeling the light, the ray bursts out of his fingers with such brilliance that I have to jerk my head away.
As the light dissipates, I turn back to see that all that’s left of the wormlike creature is a small, dark, wispy column of smoke that rises into the air until it entirely disappears.
When I look back, Phigby has lowered his pincers and is slumped over as if the exertion had drained him of every bit of energy in his body.
Cara hurries over and asks anxiously, “Phigby, are you all right?”
He straightens, and glowers at her. “I told you to stay away. Someday your curiosity will be the death of you, girl.”
“I’m sorry, Phigby,” she replies meekly and holds the water flask up. “I thought that maybe you or Hooper needed more water.”
“Humph!” he answers before his face softens and he directs her towards me. “Go to Hooper, he needs to drink deeply.”
Cara hesitates for a moment before she hurries over, kneels, and holds the water skin for me to drink. I practically down its contents in one swallow.
“Here,” she says, “let’s get your top back on. After what you’ve been through, the last thing we want is for you to catch the shivers.” With her help, I slip my tunic over my scrawny ribs and lie back.
“How’s the shoulder?” she asks.
“Much better, thanks,” I reply.
She reaches out to lightly touch my wounded shoulder. “That’s amazing,” she murmurs. “Hooper, I saw your wound.” She makes a face as if she’s just stepped on a squishy bug. “It was ghastly, like a big black spider with yellow pus, and — ”
“I get it,” I quickly answer, my stomach rolling at her description. “When Phigby was getting that thing out, did you see — ”