THE HIDDEN CITY
Pearl and the Sasquatches explored the green mystery of the rain forest. Woody and Peeler moved faster than Max and the Chupakabra, however, and after ten minutes the group of four divided itself into two groups of two. This was fine with Max, who was at least as interested in spending a little time alone with Pearl as he was in finding bananas.
“Dude,” he said, pointing up at the tall palms. Orchids grew from the notches in trees high over their heads; there were red and yellow hellonica flowers, cedar ferns, and manjacks. Ruby-throated hummingbirds hovered above the flowers of cabbage palms, and black moths fluttered aimlessly through the damp atmosphere. Tall bamboo trees moved in the wind and made a deep groaning sound, like the timbers of a wooden ship. In all his life Max had never seen so many shades of green.
“Pearl,” he said. “This is totally excellent. I wish Falcon could see this.”
“He shall,” said Pearl. “And yet—it is nice that there are some things which are seen at first by ourselves alone.”
Max looked at her, his eyes drooping with affection. “Oh, man,” he said. “I am totally crushin’ on the Chupakabra.”
“And I,” said Pearl, “I have this same noble adoration for your very large self!” She buzzed close to his face, hung there for a moment, and then they kissed. Max reached up with his huge hairy hands and touched her tiny back.
“My large friend!” said Pearl. “You make me buzz!”
“Dude,” said Max, “you totally make me buzz, too.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “You know what’s bogus, though?” he said. “How come Megan’s all nutso about Jonny Frankenstein?”
“Well, he has his charms, the reanimated one,” said Pearl. “After all, this is a man who can plug a guitar directly into his own neck! And he wears the jacket of the Spanish leather! He is a gentleman with a not insignificant style!”
“Yeah, yeah, but still. You’d think she could know that Falcon’s all gaga over her.”
Pearl shrugged. “She is not unaware of Falcon’s feelings, Señor Max. But the mysteries of love! They fly from us when we try to hold them in our hands. Who is to say why Falcon, for his part, could not see Miss Destynee? He was just as blind to her as Megan is to him. Was he not?”
“Yeah, but she was a slug, man.”
“Yes, and I am la Chupakabra, and you are a giant Sasquatch! It is not for those in love to question the boundaries of their affections! It is for us to celebrate the mysteries of desire!”
Max shook his head. “It’s a messed-up world, man,” he said.
In the distance, from the top of a tree-lined ridge, there was a sudden bloom of white light. It flickered against the green trees, then was gone.
“What is this light?” asked Pearl, uncertain.
“Yeah,” said Max. “That’s weird. Maybe Jonny’s showing off his lightning thing for Megan.”
“This seems unlikely,” said Pearl. “When he was last seen, Señor Jonny’s powers of generation seemed markedly diminished!”
“Well, it’s something,” said Max.
In the distance came the sound of the other Sasquatches’ voices, rising above the sounds of the forest. The boys were yelling, as if they’d found something. Pearl and Max looked at each other.
“Perhaps our friends have located an object of some interest,” she said.
Max raised his arms. “Yeah, maybe they found, like—a cheeseburger tree!”
“Let us proceed,” said Pearl, “so that we may find what has brought them this surprise.”
The Sasquatches’ trail was not hard to follow. Peeler and Woody’s tracks led through the rain forest, down one side of a gorge and up the other, past red hibiscus flowers and avocado trees and custard apples. There were giant philodendrons that towered over their heads, blowing in the breeze from the ocean. There was a hive of termites the size of a basketball clinging to the stump of a leather fern.
Peeler and Woody shouted again.
“¡Ai!” said Pearl. “What have they now discovered?”
She looked toward the high ridge. And there, bathed in sunshine, was a round platform, made of green stones, with a curved brown roof. The gazebo was surrounded by a delicate railing; four slender columns supported the roof above the Sasquatches’ heads. The boys were pointing to something that lay on the other side of the ridge.
“Look!” shouted Peeler as they drew near.
Max and Pearl arrived at the gazebo and gazed down into the valley that lay on the other side of the ridge. There, nestled between the mountains and the sea, was a city painted in the colors of the jungle. It appeared to be a heavily fortified place, with watchtowers and armories and forbidding-looking walls. The city was built on the shoulders of a mountain, and each of the levels of the city was separated from the one below it by a thick wall covered with spikes. At the top of the mountain was a vast palace with spires and minarets, all painted in ribbons of brown and green and tan. Given the clever design and colors of the city, it was hard to see exactly where it ended and the surrounding forest began.
“Whoa,” said Max.
Jonny Frankenstein, out of breath, arrived at the platform from a different direction. “What’s going on?” he said.
“We have discovered a mysterious metropolis,” said Pearl, and pointed at the city.
“Where’s Megan?” asked Peeler.
Jonny said, “She’s not with you?”
“Look at this place,” said Woody. “It’s like they don’t want anybody to…”
His voice trailed off in the middle of his sentence. For a second he just looked thoughtful, as if something had occurred to him that he had never before considered. Then his knees buckled, and he fell to the floor.
“Dude?” said Peeler. He kneeled down next to his companion and pulled a long blue dart out of Woody’s neck. He held it up to show the others. “Hey,” he said. “Somebody sho—”
But at this moment Peeler’s eyes grew wide in surprise, and then he too fell over, collapsing on top of Woody.
“What’s happening?” said Max.
“Get down,” said Pearl. “Señor Max!”
Another dart whooshed through the air and struck one of the thin columns, right next to the place where Pearl was hovering.
“Hey!” shouted Max. “Quit it! We surrender! We surrender!”
“We shall do no such thing,” said Pearl. “We shall fight!”
There was the sound of more darts in the air, and suddenly Pearl shouted. “¡Ai!” she cried as she fell to the floor. “¡Ai!”
“Dude,” said Max. “Can you zap them with the electricity?”
“What?” said Jonny.
“That electrical-charge thing you do,” said Max. “Give them the lightning! Hurry.”
“I’m sorry, Max,” said Jonny.
“What?” said Max. “Are you out of power?”
Jonny nodded sadly. “Something like that.”
“Duu—”
Max fell to the floor with a mighty crash. Jonny Frankenstein stood there for a long time, looking at his fallen companions curiously, the same way one might observe an unusual strain of virus through a microscope.
“Right,” said a man in military fatigues, holding a slender bazooka. “Well, if it isn’t Jonny Frankenstein. No lasting effects, I hope?”
“No, Cygnus,” said Jonny. “It is odd, though. You develop a certain sympathy, living with them day after day.”
“Sympathy?” said Cygnus. “For monsters? Are you serious?”
Jonny shrugged. “It’s just this thing I can do,” he said.
Cygnus walked over to where Woody and Peeler lay, then pointed a long staff toward them. A green stone at the staff’s head glowed magnificently and surrounded the Sasquatches with light. A moment later the two boys rose into the air, rays of energy shining from them as if from suns. As they rose, Woody’s and Peeler’s eyes opened in radiance, as if the boys were amazed by the way the world contained, in equal measures, both miracles and h
orrors far beyond their understanding.
20
SOLACE
“Yes, Falcon,” said the woman in white. “I was your mother.”
“Was?” said Falcon. “You still are, aren’t you?”
She looked at the child, uncertain. “If you still want me,” she said. Then she added, “Heavens, look at that eye!” She got down on her knees and looked at him carefully. “How long has it been like that?”
“This color blue?”
“That color black.”
“Since I was five or six,” he said. “The last month or two, it’s been more—pronounced, I guess. Since I went to the Academy.”
“One blue, and one black,” Vega said thoughtfully.
“Mom?” said Falcon. “Where are we? What is this place?”
“It’s home, Falcon,” she said.
Falcon’s brow furrowed. “I thought you were in Florida.”
“Florida,” said Vega with a laugh.
From the top of a nearby ridge there were two sudden explosions of light, and then two bright spheres rose from the mountain and into the sky.
“Whoa,” said Falcon. “What’s that?”
She smiled. “Let’s take a walk,” she said.
“What about my friends?” said Falcon. “They’re—”
“You’ll catch up with them,” said Vega. “Come on. You and I have a lot to talk about.”
“Are they all right?” Falcon said.
“Who?”
“My friends.”
“They are fine,” said Vega. “They are better than they’ve ever been.”
“But—”
“Come on,” she said. “You want answers, don’t you?”
Falcon nodded. “I do,” he said.
“Come,” she said, and they walked down the beach together. It felt awkward to Falcon, being with her. He’d been missing her his entire life, but now that they were together again, he just felt angry at her for the long years she’d been absent. He thought back to the miserable trailer in which he’d lived with Gamm, how he alone of his friends had never known what it was like to have a mother. His black eye began to burn and throb, and he looked at her with resentment.
“Ah, ah, ah,” said Vega. “Temper, temper.”
Falcon took a breath and held his anger in. He followed her to a small cottage about a quarter mile down the beach. It was a wood-frame home with large windows, facing the ocean. There were white linen curtains that blew languidly in the breeze off the sea. The house had wicker chairs and a cathedral ceiling; sunlight streamed through the windows and fell upon the floor. In one corner was a simple kitchen. In another was a comfortable-looking couch, surrounded by books. There was a small upright piano against one wall, and a porcelain clock that ticked softly atop a mantelpiece above a dark hearth.
“Are you hungry, Falcon?” said Vega.
And he thought, You have no idea.
“Sit,” she said. “I’ll make you a cheeseburger.”
There was a tall stool next to the kitchen counter, and Falcon sat down as his mother opened the refrigerator.
“Here, have some lemonade. I just squeezed it.”
She poured the lemonade into a glass, and Falcon drank it. He wasn’t sure he’d ever had lemonade made from actual lemons before. It tickled the inside of his throat, made his whole face feel like it was shining with yellow light.
Vega put a pan on the stove and lit the gas jet beneath it, which ignited with a short whump. Then she dumped a package of ground beef into a bowl. Falcon watched as his mother made cheeseburgers. She added Worcestershire sauce to the meat, and black pepper and kosher salt. Then she squeezed this through the meat with her fingers, and formed it all into two large, juicy-looking burgers, which she picked up with her fingers and put into the pan. There was a sharp sizzle as the meat met the skillet.
It seemed like such a simple thing, to watch your mother make a cheeseburger, the kind of thing that you wouldn’t even think about if you saw it every day. But Falcon had never watched his mother do anything that he could recall; he’d never seen her throw a baseball or read a book. She’d never listened while he played the tuba. He’d never seen her take the rope of a wooden sled and pull it to the top of a snow-covered hill and slide all the way down, her breath coming out in clouds in the cold air. They’d never fought about his clothes or his friends or his hair. He’d never watched as she took a box of matches and lit the newspaper beneath the kindling in the fireplace. He’d never seen her drink a cup of coffee.
“You still play the piano,” said Falcon, remembering some day in his early childhood, when he’d lain beneath the piano as his mother played, the music spilling over him like rain.
“Oh, I noodle around with everything,” she said. “Piano, fiddle, guitar, autoharp. I can play almost any instrument badly,” she said with a laugh.
Falcon nodded. “Can you play me something?”
Vega handed him the spatula. “You keep the burgers from burning,” she said, “and I’ll play you my bad piano.”
She sat down on the bench for a moment, then looked at the keys for a while as if trying to figure out what to play. Then she started in on an old-timey piece of music, both mournful and jaunty. Falcon listened to his mother play. The house was full of other sounds, too—the sizzle of the burgers in the pan, the tick of the porcelain clock on the mantelpiece, the crashing waves upon the beach.
I’ve been missing these sounds, Falcon thought, every day of my life.
When the song was finished, Vega turned back to Falcon and walked into the kitchen. For a moment they stood there self-consciously, together, mother and son. Then she put her arms around him, and Falcon put his arms around her. They stood there together for a while, awkwardly hugging each other, as the burgers sizzled in the pan.
“What kind of music was that?” said Falcon.
“It’s ragtime, Falcon. Don’t tell me you’ve never heard ragtime.”
“What was the name of that song?”
“It’s called ‘Solace.’ Oh, I have so much to teach you, Falcon. Music for you to hear. Books for you to read.”
After a while, Vega put the burgers on plates. The curtains on the windows that faced the ocean were billowing forward into the room.
A small dog walked through the front door. It stopped just beyond the threshold and growled at Falcon.
“Oh, look who’s back,” said Vega. “Falcon, this is Tippy. Tippy, this is Falcon—my son!”
The dog growled at Falcon, displaying two long fangs on either side of his hideous, tiny mouth. Vega picked up the dog and carried him over to the table, where he lay in her lap as she petted him.
“So Mom,” said Falcon. “Where are we? What is this place?”
“This is the Queen’s Beach, on the outside of the Hidden City,” she said.
Falcon looked at her, uncertain. “And this queen person doesn’t mind you using it?”
“Falcon,” she said. “I’m the queen.”
“Seriously?”
“I am,” she said, and smiled. “And you have found your way home, after all these years, where you will sit by my side, and join me in my quest.”
“Your quest?” said Falcon. “What’s your quest?”
“Well, what do you think?” she said. “To destroy all monsters, of course.”
21
THE CRYSTAL MUSIC
“What do you mean,” said Falcon, “‘destroy all monsters’?”
“What do you think it means?” said Vega. “It means dedicating yourself to freeing the world from fear, to declaring an unending war on horror.”
“Where are my friends?” asked Falcon. “What’s going on?”
“They’re fine, Falcon. Relax.”
“My friends are monsters,” said Falcon.
“I know, Falcon,” said Vega. “But—they’re still monsters, aren’t they? I know you made friends when you were at the Academy, darling. I’m not insensitive to that. But imagine a perfect world, Falco
n, a world without fear, a world where no one is afraid. Isn’t that the way you wish the whole world could be?”
“I want to know where my friends are,” said Falcon. “Now.”
“Falcon,” said Vega. “Don’t overreact.”
“Where are they?” Falcon shouted.
“I’ll answer that question if you’ll answer one of mine,” said Vega. “What do you mean when you say—‘friends’?”
“I mean—you know what I mean! They’re the people I—care about. “
“Ah, but they’re not people exactly, are they?”
“Where are Pearl and Max? Where’s Megan? Tell me!”
“Let me ask you something about these friends of yours. Have you ever seen your friend Pearl actually suck the blood out of a goat—someone’s pet, perhaps? How would you feel if your family owned a goat, and you woke up one morning to find this—this—thing—sucking its life out? And what about Megan—whom you think you love so dearly? If she’s your friend, why does she give her love to another, and then disappear, blowing away without you? If she’s your friend, then why did she leave you alone on the beach?”
“She wanted to take a walk,” said Falcon.
“Yes, she wanted to take a walk with Jonny. Whom you also know nothing about, really. Tell me this, Falcon. How is it possible to love these creatures when they’ve been lying to you all along about what they really are? Just like you’re lying to them.”
“I’m not lying to them,” said Falcon.
“Of course you are,” said Vega. “You’ve let them think, from the very beginning, that you’re a monster too. Which, you know in your heart, you’re not.”
“I’m…I’m…”
“Yes, Falcon?” said Vega. “What are you?”
“I don’t know,” said Falcon.
“You’re a guardian, Falcon. A guardian like me. A destroyer of monsters.”
“I’m not like you!” said Falcon. “I’m not!”
“Falcon,” said Vega. “Think of all the things you’ve done, acts of tremendous good, for no reason other than that these were the right things to do. Like when you took that girl—the little slug—to the dance. That can’t have been any fun. So why did you do that, Falcon? Why?”
Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror Page 22