Ralph and Dinah came in next and lined the wall along the window. I stood up and balanced on my cane, hoping the ceremony didn't last too long.
Finally, Dr. B. arrived with a bird colonel and a photographer from the Cape Cod Times.
I saluted as best I could, the first time in over four months. The bird took a felt box out of his briefcase and opened it. Inside was a Purple Heart within a gold border, surrounding a profile of General Washington. Above the heart appeared a coat of arms between sprays of green leaves. He cradled it in his hand to show me and then turned it over. On the back were the words, "For Military Merit."
The bird cleared his throat and read from a cue card he tried to hide in his palm.
"Lieutenant Frederick Williams." At least he got my name right. "I'm pleased to award you this Purple Heart for being wounded in action against an enemy of the United States in an IED assault on your convoy in An-Nasiriyah, Iraq on July the 22nd, 2008."
For being wounded. Everything I'd done in Iraq, the guys I'd served with and the things we accomplished, even just those I could remember were worth more than being wounded. But I accepted the medal and thank-you-sir'd the bird.
"Is it okay if I sit now, sir?" I gestured to my bad leg.
"Can you hold on a bit longer, Lieutenant? I have one more." He took on the look of a parent playing Santa at Christmas. "A special award. A Silver Star for valor during a roadside ambush in Al Anbar province, where . . ."
The machine in my head whirred and clicked. It had found its slot. I began to smell smoke and burning flesh, to hear the sounds of dogs barking. An image emerged from the fog of my mind-a dime-store greeting card, with the corners charred and a single white rose in its center.
I tried to focus on what he was saying. My quick actions, courageous leadership. The remnants of my squad. Four men had died. But his voice became garbled as if my head were underwater, and the room began making slow circles like a carnival carousel slowing down. I looked past the bird to the audience around me and wondered why they weren't spinning as well. I caught Becky's smile fade. Everyone else nodded approval. Freddie the hero. But Becky knew something was wrong.
After the speech was finished, the bird colonel propped me up by the elbow, while I held the Silver Star between us and did my best to look proud. The photographer from the Cape Cod Times crouched in front of us and clicked his camera, then asked us to hold the pose while he checked the picture.
When the bird finally let go, I collapsed onto the bed, while everyone else in the room applauded. Only one thought rattled around in my brain.
Four men had died.
***
When the ceremony was over, they stood in line to congratulate me. The bird shook my hand, then Dr. B. and Ralph. Dinah bent over with her plump cheeks and Coke-bottle glasses and gave me a kiss. But Becky held back, simply patting my arm. Then the bird and his entourage exited, leaving me alone.
I waited until their voices merged with the clamor of the corridor and faded away. Then I tossed the medals on the bed, pressed down on the head of the eagle, and struggled to my feet. At the closet, I slid out the olive drab box and flipped off the cover. I fumbled inside. Notebooks and pictures, Gloria the mermaid and the music box. Where the hell was it? And finally, at the bottom, a Ziploc bag with an envelope inside.
I tried to unzip it with one hand, but to no avail. It felt like peeling away layers of my brain. Then I leaned against the wall and let the cane drop to the floor. Now, using two hands, I fumbled with the plastic. But the bag slipped from my fingers and floated down alongside the cane.
It taunted me there, only three feet away, but I was too unsteady to reach for it. Then a hand appeared, a hand I knew so well from weeks of rehab.
Becky grasped the Ziploc bag and held it up to the light.
"What is it, Freddie?"
"The white rose."
"What does that mean?"
I stared at the bag, straining my brain. All I could think of was the ambush, the four men who had died, the Silver Star I didn't deserve.
"I don't know," I said.
"Do you want me to open it?"
When I kept glaring at the bag as if it were an IED, she picked up my cane and handed it to me. Then, always the physical therapist, she led me back to my bed, encouraging me but letting me get there by myself. I sat down, rested my hands on my knees, and studied them like I'd never seen them before.
"I'll open it if you want," she said. "All you need is to say yes." Then when I still had no answer, "Do you want me to leave?"
I looked up at her. Leaving was the last thing I wanted her to do.
"Stay, please. I don't want to see it alone."
She settled on the bed beside me and undid the Ziploc bag. Inside the envelope was a card with burn marks at its edges and a painting of a white rose in its center. She opened it and studied its contents, then turned it toward me. A photograph of four soldiers wearing full battle gear in front of their vehicle. Underneath, the words: Humvee three.
Becky watched, waiting for me to react. When I said nothing, she turned the picture around and looked again.
"Who are they, Freddie? The four who died in the ambush?"
I tried to answer, but my throat had gone dry. She offered me a glass of water. I drank half of it and set the glass down gingerly as if afraid it would shatter. Then the words spilled out.
"I always took pride in my attention to detail. First in basketball, then in World of Warcraft. I'd frequent blogs, research every raid. But it was as a soldier and leader that I left no rock unturned. My men trusted me, a trust I didn't take for granted. I had one priority-to get them all out alive."
I looked away at the Silver Star half-hidden in the folds of the bed sheets. Becky reached out to touch my cheek but her hand stopped short, poised in the no man's land between us. She waited, her lips pressed together, her question unspoken.
I turned back and my eyes locked with hers.
"I failed, Becky. And now I don't even remember their names."
Chapter Twenty-Two
A World with No Soul
The next morning, I sought out the gardener, though she hadn't planned to be there that day. I'd come to imagine she was an enchantress who could sense my need from afar and appear. Her make-believe rose had led me to the archangel's key. And despite the encroaching gloom, she was always in good cheer. Might she possess magic enough to help me solve the second trial?
But when I found her in the garden desperately drizzling water on the parched flowers, she looked as if the mists of Golgoreth had seeped into her soul.
When she saw me approach, she set down her watering can and stood. She ran her fingers around the inside of her skirt to check that her shirt was tucked in, and patted down her hair. Then she focused on the ground and bent at the knee, a curtsy too deep.
"Milord," she said, without looking up.
"Is something wrong, Rebecca?"
"Oh, Milord, I tried to do something good and it turned out all wrong."
I took her by the hand and helped her up, then led her to the bench.
"Tell me about it."
"I only wanted to help. You bear such a burden, yet all you ever asked of me was a white rose, and I had none to give. So I bought a piece of parchment with the few coppers I'd saved and drew a picture of a white rose. I thought to give it to you today."
A foolish notion. How could an image of a flower possess such magic? But her action moved me.
"How kind of you," I said, trying to be gentle, "but a drawing of a rose is unlikely to save the world."
She looked up at me with fire in her eyes. "Then why did the demon try to destroy it?"
The blood rushed to my cheeks. This was my battle. Let the dreadlord and his minions attack me and stay away from this innocent girl. I glanced about the garden, past the hydrangeas and up to the high windows in the castle wall. We were alone.
"You were visited by a demon?" I said, hardly able to control my words.
"Aye, Milord. I'm sure of it. He had a voice one might imagine coming from a snake and his eye sockets were hollow."
The assassin. "And what did he say?"
"He said," She lowered her chin to her chest and deepened her voice to add a gruff sound to it. "'Where is the white rose?' When I refused to answer, he brushed past me as if I were a feather. As he grazed my arm, I felt as though I'd been touched by death."
An encounter with a demon and exposed, beyond the protection of Stormwind's walls. I grasped her by the shoulders and made her face me.
"Did he harm you?"
"No, Milord. But he found my drawing on the kitchen table and cast it into the fire."
I forgot the trials, so relieved she'd been left unscathed that I found myself clutching her to my chest. She slipped into my arms and let me hold her for some time before remembering the circumstance and pulling away.
"Forgive me, Milord. I had no right."
"No right? You faced down a demon for me. Thank the Goddess you were unharmed. And as for the picture, it was well intended, though now it's lost."
"Oh no, Milord. Not lost. I was able to save it from the demon."
She reached into her apron pocket and pulled out the parchment with the picture of the rose. Its corners were blackened and its surface charred, all except for the image of the flower in the center.
I stammered. "But how?"
"Fool that I was. I reached in with my bare hand to pull it from the flames."
"Your hand?" I checked both her hands. Aside from the dirt of the garden, they were unmarked.
"I wanted so much to save it," she said. "My gift to you. And seeing that, the Goddess protected me. I felt neither heat nor pain as I plucked the parchment from the fire."
"And what did the demon do?"
"He laughed. For as I dropped the parchment on the ground, it continued to burn."
"Then how did you stop it?"
"That's where I went wrong."
"But you must have done well, because the picture of the white rose is here within my grasp."
"Aye, but I had to do something terrible to save it. I was so upset at that demon, standing in my kitchen and laughing as my gift to you burned. I went blind with rage. Without thinking, I grabbed the first thing at hand and smothered the flame. I'm so embarrassed to tell what I chose. But by the grace of the Goddess, it worked, soaking up all of the demon's evil and leaving my drawing intact."
I pictured the grotesque little man laughing in her kitchen and Rebecca furious at him, tiny fists on hips, conjuring up enough magic to save the rose.
"But why embarrassed?" I said.
"Because the first thing at hand was your gift to me, your mother's flowered shawl. And now it's gone."
She stood and walked away, afraid to face me. But I grabbed her, spun her around, and kissed her. The white rose. What magic it must possess to defy the demon twice?
"So happy, Milord. But why?"
"Because at sunset this evening, your drawing shall accompany me to the watchtower."
***
The charring of the flower had scarred its surface, leaving blotches where the parchment had thinned. When I draped it over the rim of the bejeweled disk, the rays of the sun shone through, giving the petals of the flower a mystical glow. As the wheel began to spin, the light weaved a pattern that spiraled across my face. I watched, captivated, and drifted into the dream.
But the dream quickly turned to a nightmare. I was in a chamber like the second trial in the crypt. In its center, where the four coffins had lain, a hole gaped in the floor. I inched toward it, my boots scraping the stone so they sent pebbles skittering ahead. As the pebbles tumbled over the edge, I listened for the sound of them hitting the bottom. Only silence.
Then a crackle behind me and a tingling on my skin. I turned to see the voidwalker reaching a tentacle toward me. I backed away, lost my footing and fell into the hole.
At once, I was plummeting downward into a dark chasm. I lunged for the sides of the walls, clawing at each crack and crevice, anything to slow my fall. The speed of the wind increased with my descent, and I sensed a smell like sawdust after a rainstorm.
Then a firebird flapped by and circled my head, lighting up the abyss. I steeled my courage and looked below. Something was approaching fast, the bottom and my doom. But then I realized it was not the bottom at all but a dark mass rising toward me, memories flying up like a volley of arrows piercing my mind.
After the wheel came to rest, I stayed on my stool in the watchtower, unable to stand, hardly able to breathe. For these past days, I'd longed to remember the dream, and at last my wish had been granted. But now, all I wanted was to forget.
What had the wheel shown me? Evil more foul than anything the dreadlord could conceive. My nostrils stung with the stench of burning flesh. My ears rang with the crash of thunder. Voices crackling in panic, iron dragons raining down flame, the sound of dogs barking and then silence. I'd been to a place without honor, a world without soul.
My teeth clenched and the muscles around my jaw began to cramp. The back of my head pounded so hard I thought I might go blind. But the dream had opened my eyes. I no longer needed a voidwalker to remember the heroes. I could embrace them now on my own.
I rose unsteadily, anxious to leave the watchtower behind. But when I took my first step, my right leg buckled beneath me, and I collapsed to the floor. The candle in the sconce at the top of the stairs burned low as I writhed there in pain. Fool that I was to stumble so.
At last, I withdrew my sword and planted its point in a crack in the stones, then pressed with all my might until I could stand. I scowled at the cursed wheels, blaming them for my woes. Then, with a hand to the wall and my sword as a crutch, I staggered down the hundred and one stairs.
Chapter Twenty-Three
By the Banks of the River
Since receiving the medals, I'd turned inward, and Becky was unable to reach me. When she stretched my knee and measured the bend I kept quiet-aside from the screaming-not even bothering to ask how I did. So on the third day, when I limped into PT, leaning on the eagle cane and wearing my army jacket, she seemed unsurprised.
"What is it, Freddie?"
"No PT today. We need to get out of here. Someplace outside where we can be alone and no one will disturb us."
"The courtyard?" she said.
"No. Away from the hospital."
No argument. She made a quick call and had someone cover her appointments for the rest of the afternoon.
A few minutes later, after a short drive, we found ourselves on a park bench, nestled among the trees on the banks of the Charles.
It was late November-a watery afternoon when the paths in the park rustled with leaves. The cold blue of the sky was marred by streamers, clouds mounting from the west and promising rain. We sat in silence. She knew me well enough to wait for me to start.
"By the banks of the river," I finally said.
She eyed me like I was a TBI patient.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It's what my mother used to say near the end. Early on, before she began to fail, I'd try to get her to come down from the garret for dinner. 'Come down, Mom,' I'd say. But she never came. Later, when her mind was going, she'd parrot it back to me.
"'Take me down, Freddie,' she'd say out of nowhere. And I'd answer, 'Down where?' Then she'd start singing in that little girl voice of hers. 'Down by the banks of the river, the river Jordan.' Her brain was addled like mine is now."
Becky looked at me with that optimism that made me feel bad for feeling bad.
"Your brain's not addled, Freddie. You've just been through a lot. If your mind's hiding some of it from you, it's to give you time to heal."
I reached out and took her hand, pulling until she slid closer to me, not speaking until I could feel the warmth of her breath.
"Dixon, Anderson, Martinez, and Jones."
Her eyes widened.
"The four men in the picture?"
>
I reached into my pocket and pulled out the charred card with the white rose and the photograph of my squad members. Humvee three. Four boys from Georgia in full battle gear. They looked menacing with grenades and ammo hanging from their flak jackets and night-vision goggles strapped to their helmets. Anderson was up in the gunner's hatch as they posed for the picture. Like the photo of my family at the gingerbread house. All gone.
I must have spaced out, momentarily forgetting about Becky, because I suddenly felt her hand on my cheek. She turned my head until our eyes met.
"Tell me about them, Freddie. I want to hear everything, to know them as well as you did."
I looked away from her and stared at the river, almost expecting their stories to flow across its surface like film on a screen.
"I may have been the officer, but the whole squad was close, more like a family. When we weren't sleeping, we were doing something together, whether in the real world or World of Warcraft. In the real world, we trained, we planned, and we risked our lives on patrol. But in the game, we were the Lightbringer guild, our way of escaping, I guess. I was a warrior, fully armored, leading them into battle, with each of my buddies supporting me. I'd take the first hit. The mages and hunters would pick off enemies that tried to gang up on me, and the priest would heal me if my health got low, even resurrect me if I got killed.
"Dixie was a Druid, Anderson a mage. Martinez was a paladin and Jones a hunter who rode a timber wolf.
"It was like they chose roles that matched who they were in real life. Martinez fancied the call of the paladin: to protect the weak, to bring justice to the unjust, and to vanquish evil from the darkest corners of the world. His favorite weapon was a demonslayer, a sword that shot out flames.
"Dixie's character was called the keeper. Some of us called him the keeper of minds. He was a hulking guy, six foot four at least. But he was always calm and grounded. If one of us started to lose it in the real world, if our minds stopped being operational, guys would yell, 'Get the keeper over here.' He'd be the one to pull us back to reality. 'You gotta move on,' he'd say in that slow southern drawl. 'You gotta keep going.'"
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