Clinging to his staff, Marcus was blown to the ground. His fingers clawed and slipped in the loose soil, but Kyja leaned into the wind—the thoughtful look still locked on her face.
“It’s just like the prophecy warned,” she said, her words whipped away by the wind that slapped her hair across her face. “You’re taking too much. You changed the weather to meet your needs. You took all the moisture you wanted, but you didn’t consider the other plants.”
Marcus grasped at a nearby root with his good hand, but it flicked him off like a bug, and he found himself rolling down the pathway.
“It may not be in my lifetime,” Kyja shouted above the gale. “But eventually, this entire forest will be gone if you don’t do something.”
A burst of wind actually lifted her off the ground, and, looking back, Marcus was afraid she would be crushed against one of the immense trunks.
“I can help you!” she screamed.
All at once the wind stopped, dropping her to the dirt, and a deep voice rumbled, “How?”
Chapter 29
A Dark Fate
You’re only a girl,” said the middle of the three trees. “What makes you think you know what’s wrong with us?”
Kyja got slowly to her feet, brushing the dirt from the front of her robe as Marcus pulled himself up with his staff and limped back into the clearing.
“I don’t know how I know, but I do,” Kyja said. She let a handful of dirt trickle through her fingers. Marcus saw that it was composed almost completely of dead needles. “Don’t you see? You created the perfect condition for your own kind. But you forgot one thing. You’re taking all the nutrients from the soil. You need other plants to absorb the food you leave and to create the food you need.”
Kyja walked to the closest of the large trees and rested her hands on its coarse trunk, like a doctor examining a patient. “I can feel it in you. On the outside it’s just a few spots. But on the inside you’re . . . weak. If you are attacked by bugs or disease or . . . whatever, you won’t have the resistance to fight back. Can’t you feel it too?”
“Frog squattle,” Olden said. “We’ve lived just fine for a thousand years. We’ll live a thousand more.” But Marcus noticed the other trees weren’t so quick to ignore Kyja’s words. He could hear them whispering quietly among themselves. Finally the middle tree spoke up.
“Perhaps there is something in what you say. We have sensed a certain . . . strangeness. But even if it is true, what can you do about it?”
Kyja folded her arms across her chest and lowered her head as though in deep thought. After a moment, she looked up. “The tower groundskeepers at Terra ne Staric. They know all about keeping plants healthy. I’m sure they could help you restore the balance in the woods.”
“And you can convince them to help us?” the tree asked.
“If not, I can,” a voice said from behind them.
Kyja and Marcus turned to see Master Therapass stride swiftly through the trees, his dark cloak flowing out behind him. He entered the clearing, winked at Kyja and Marcus, and dipped low in an elaborate bow before Olden.
“Your majesty, it is a pleasure to see you again. As always, you look magnificent.” He turned to the three large trees and performed the same bow, holding his cloak behind him with his left hand while clutching his right fist before his chest. “Council of Weather Guardians, if I may be of assistance, only say the word.”
The trees seemed to confer together, their branches rustling gently.
“How did you know all that?” Marcus whispered to Kyja. “About the trees dying?”
She frowned. “I’m not sure. I just . . . knew.” But how did she know? It felt a little like when she’d looked into the aptura discerna, or when she’d pulled Marcus from Ert. First there was a feeling in the pit of her stomach—she knew there was something wrong with the trees, and she wanted to help. Then it was just there . . . in her head.
As Master Therapass glanced down at Marcus and her, Kyja noticed his beard was freshly trimmed and less tangled than usual. She wondered if that was because of the business he’d been attending to in Terra ne Staric. “You two seem to have things in control here,” he said.
“Thanks to Kyja,” Marcus said. “I thought we were goners for a minute.”
“Goners?” Master Therapass raised an eyebrow.
“You know. Dead ducks. Something about the symbol on my arm and Kyja’s amulet really set them off. They would have sent us out to face the Fallen Ones if it weren’t for Kyja.”
“Really?” Master Therapass gazed down thoughtfully at Kyja.
“I just wanted to help,” she said.
The trees stopped their rustling, and Marcus, Kyja, and the wizard all turned in their direction.
“We have reached a decision,” the middle tree said in a booming voice. “It’s possible the girl’s words are true. We have noticed some changes over the last hundred years. Perhaps we miscalculated.”
Olden coughed, and Marcus wondered again how a tree with no visible mouth could do such a thing. “We will accept your help,” she said, “if it is offered freely. We will not be forced into making any alliances with you or taking sides in something that is not our concern.”
Master Therapass fingered the tip of his beard. “My help is offered freely, but it won’t be of much value if the Dark Circle overruns Terra ne Staric.”
Kyja started. Was it really possible the Dark Circle might attack the capital of Westland? If Terra ne Staric wasn’t safe, what was?
“The Dark Circle is not our concern,” Olden said with a trace of contempt in her voice. “Their quarrel is with humans, not us.”
Master Therapass threw back his cloak. Kyja could almost feel the wizard’s stature grow as he stared at the wasted tree.
“Do not underestimate the evil intent of the Dark Circle.” Master Therapass’s voice was every bit as impressive as the largest of the trees.
Kyja had never heard the wizard speak so forcefully before. He held his hands out, palms raised to the sky, and a clear globe appeared above his fingertips. As he spread his hands, the globe grew and rose.
“Disease and soil are the least of your concerns if the Dark Circle has its way,” Master Therapass thundered. “Behold your fate.”
An image appeared inside the globe. It was fuzzy at first, but soon the picture cleared, revealing a forest that might have been the Westland Woods. Birds chirped. Animals played. Everything looked just as it should, and Kyja wondered if Master Therapass had made a mistake.
“I don’t see what—” Olden began to speak, but Master Therapass cut her off with a single word.
“Look.”
The dark-cloaked figures Kyja had seen in the meadow appeared in the globe. Only this time, instead of two, there were dozens, hundreds—their dark mass blocked nearly everything else from sight. Each held a forked staff, and Kyja watched in horror as the figures raised their staffs and a wall of flame engulfed the trees.
“No!” Olden gasped, clutching her frail branches to her trunk. All around the clearing, the other trees were also covering their trunks and leaning as far away from the scene as they could. The entire forest seemed to tremble.
Popping sounds came from inside the globe as one tree after another turned into a pillar of flames. Kyja thought she could hear the sound of screaming, too—hundreds of voices crying out together. Birds and animals fled the burning mess as the cloaked figures swept deeper into the woods.
“Take it away,” Olden pleaded.
Master Therapass clapped his hands and the image disappeared at once.
“It’s a lie,” one of the trees said from the edge of the clearing. “The wizard is trying to frighten us.”
“I only wish I were,” said Master Therapass, his voice soft again. “But Olden knows the truth, don’t you?”
In front of him, the old tree seemed to wilt. “Where did you find that?” she asked.
“It was in the tower archives—stored away for centuries. The ent
ire forest was burned to the ground in less than three days. The only plants that survived were the seedlings, buried deep enough in the soil to survive the heat.” Master Therapass ran a finger gently across Olden’s nearest branch. “You were one of those seedlings, weren’t you?”
The answer was a barely audible, “Yes.”
“It’s why you sought to control the weather. You thought if you remade the forest bigger than before, if you could force the clouds to obey you, this would never happen again. But the fire that burned your forest a thousand years ago—that killed your mother and father, your brothers and sisters—cannot be put out with rain. When the Dark Circle returns, they will burn this woods to the ground, just like they did back then. Only this time, they’ll see that nothing will ever grow here again.”
“No,” Olden said—her voice fierce with determination. “Last time we got involved. This time we won’t. The Dark Circle will have no reason to harm us if we stay out of their fight.”
“That’s where you’re wrong. The Dark Circle is determined to destroy everything praiseworthy. You only have two choices. Stand against them and fight, or join them and look forward to this.”
Again Master Therapass held out his hands. This time the globe showed a forest of warped, black trees. Bare, twisted branches hung limply beneath a steel-gray, cloudless sky. The ground under the trees was an oily-looking swamp empty of any other life. The wizard turned to eye each of the trees around him, letting them see the carnage.
For once Olden was silent.
“What do you want of us?” she finally asked.
The wizard placed a hand on Marcus’s shoulder. “I firmly believe Marcus is the key to the future of Farworld. If we are to have any chance of holding off the Dark Circle, we must find a way to return him to our world.”
Marcus jerked under Master Therapass’s grip. “What do you mean, return me? I’m already here.”
“No,” the wizard said, an odd look on his face. “You are not.”
Chapter 30
Nowhere
Marcus tried to speak but couldn’t. His vocal cords seemed to have dried up, and the best he could manage was a sandy croak that would have embarrassed a frog.
Master Therapass touched Marcus’s forehead. “How do you feel?”
Marcus pulled away from the wizard’s touch. How did he feel? Confused, tired, and sick to his stomach. A few days ago, his biggest worry had been what Chet and his friends were up to. Now everything kept changing. How was he supposed to feel after learning he was from this strange world where magic was real and plants and animals could talk? He didn’t want nightmare creatures trying to kill him, and he definitely didn’t want a world full of people he didn’t know thinking he was going to save them.
“How do you think he feels?” Kyja said from Marcus’s side, as though reading his mind. She jutted out her chin and shook back her long, dark hair as she stared at Master Therapass. “He’s confused. And I’m confused too. Why can’t you stop talking in riddles?”
“Sometimes riddles are the only answers we have,” Master Therapass said. “By the time you’re my age, you’ll learn the clearest answers are often the most misleading, and the best answers are almost always the most difficult to understand at first. But this time I’m being as plain as I possibly can.” He raised his weathered face to the circle of blue sky high above them, where a beam of sunlight glowed down.
“Hold out your hand,” he said to Marcus. “Like this.” The wizard pulled the sleeve of his robe up to his elbow and held out his hand, palm down.
Marcus had no idea what the point was, but he held his hand beside the wizard’s wrinkled one. “Now what am I supposed to—”
His words were cut off by Kyja’s gasped, “Oh!”
Following her gaze, Marcus looked at his hand and felt his stomach turn over. Illuminated by the sun’s golden light, Master Therapass’s weathered hand wavered slightly, casting a dark shadow on the heavily needled ground. Beside it, Marcus’s hand was also lit by the sun. But somehow most of the light appeared to pass through his skin. He could see rays of sunlight glowing pinkly beneath the palm of his hand. And his shadow on the ground was a dim, barely visible, gray—the kind of shadow you might see under a full moon.
“As I expected,” the wizard said.
Marcus jerked his arm back as if afraid of being burned. Sweat trickled down the sides of his face, and his head throbbed. “What is it?” he whispered, suddenly aware of how quiet the forest had become. “What’s wrong with me?”
“Perhaps it would be better if we spoke of this somewhere else,” the wizard said, taking Marcus’s arm.
“No.” Marcus pulled away. “Tell me now.”
Master Therapass glanced around the clearing, then nodded slowly. “Very well. It might be better if we face it together at that. There’s still much I don’t understand.” He glanced toward the three large trees. “Do you mind? I’ve come a long way, and I’d like to sit for a while.”
“Not at all,” the tree on the right answered. At once, the ground began to rumble, and three roots thicker than Marcus’s waist rose out of the ground. Master Therapass lowered himself onto one of the roots with a sigh. “Go ahead,” he told Marcus and Kyja. “We may be here awhile.”
Kyja glanced at Marcus, shrugged, and sat on one of the roots. Marcus joined her.
“There is nothing wrong with you,” Master Therapass said, resting his chin in his hands. “As I told you, I realized I’d made a mistake after sending you to Earth. True, it may have been the only chance to save your life, but I quickly discovered there was no way to bring you back.”
“You were wrong,” Marcus said. “Kyja brought me here.”
“That’s what confused me at first.” The wizard rummaged inside his robe, and his hand emerged, holding a roll of fragile-looking parchment. He traced his finger down the page, shaking his head and mumbling under his breath. At last he looked up from the document.
“It’s impossible. According to everything I can find on the subject, there is a balance that must be maintained between worlds.” He set the parchment beside him on the Weather Guardian’s root and held out both his hands. “When I opened the doorway that sent Marcus to Earth, I unbalanced the Scales.” He raised his left hand while lowering his right.
“To rebalance the Scales, Kyja was sent here.” He moved his hands so they were even again. “You see? There is no way to bring Marcus back without sending Kyja to Earth. And since she is not there, you are not here.”
Marcus ran his fingers through his hair. As far as he could tell, this balance business was all a bunch of nonsense. “If I’m not here, than where am I?”
“Ah, that’s the question,” Master Therapass said. He tapped the parchment with one finger. “There is no record of anything like this before. But I think I might understand.”
The wizard began rummaging around inside his robe again. “Now where did I put that?” he muttered. He stuck his hands into his pockets and pulled out a ball of glittery, red string, something pink and slimy that began to ooze away when he set it on the root next to the parchment, and a jawbone filled with enormous-looking teeth.
“Don’t tell me I left it back at the tower,” he said, looking around the grove as though whatever he was searching for might be somewhere among the trees. “Wait.” He turned around and reached into the hood of his cloak.
“There you are,” he said, pulling out what looked to Marcus like a big, multicolored pancake.
As Master Therapass flattened the pancake on the ground in front of him, Marcus saw light shine up from it in multi-colored rays.
“The aptura discerna,” Kyja said, leaving her root and leaning over it. “This is how I saw you the first time, Marcus, in the room with the Thrathkin S’Bae.”
“Bonesplinter,” Marcus said, trying not to shudder. He leaned over the window too. “How does it work?”
Master Therapass tapped the aptura discerna with a white and silver rod, and the colors began
to spin together.
“Is that a real wand?” Marcus asked. The spinning colors made him feel a little queasy, but he watched closely anyway. In most of the books he’d read back on earth, magic spells always required some kind of secrets words like “hocus-pocus” or “eye of newt, wing of bat, turn this frog into a hat.” But he hadn’t heard Master Therapass say anything.
The wand disappeared from the wizard’s hand too quickly for Marcus to follow, and he glanced up Master Therapass’s sleeve, wondering if that’s where it had gone.
“Kyja,” Master Therapass said as the aptura discerna turned a cloudy pink, “remember carefully. Do you recall what you were thinking when you summoned Marcus here?”
Kyja nodded her head immediately. “I saw the snake trying to bite him, and I knew I was the only one who could help. I didn’t want him to die. I thought I would do anything to save him.”
A hint of a smile played at the corner of the wizard’s mouth as he nodded. Marcus thought he heard him mutter something that sounded like, “No magic indeed.”
“As you look into the aptura discerna,” the wizard said to Kyja, “try to recall those same feelings in your mind—even more importantly recall them in your heart.”
Kyja leaned over the swirling circle as Marcus watched from over her shoulder. At first there was nothing but the pink clouds. Then slowly, an image appeared. Marcus caught his breath as he recognized himself. It was just after he’d come to Farworld. He was sitting half in, half out of the brook, looking around with wide, scared eyes, like someone had just jabbed him with a cattle prod.
“That’s it,” Master Therapass said softly.
The image changed, and Marcus saw himself wrapped in the mimicker’s web, struggling and trying to fight his way out. Although no sound came from inside the window, he thought Kyja must have called to him, because he looked up from the dark and stopped struggling.
Again the image shifted. This time Marcus and Kyja were on Chance’s back as the horse raced toward the Westland Woods. Marcus’s body bounced limply in the saddle—held in place only by Kyja’s firm grip. As the image of Kyja in the aptura discerna turned to see a bolt of green light shoot toward them, the real Kyja staring down on the image whispered, “Help him.”
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