“They weren’t weapons.” She pointed at the sword hanging from his belt. “That’s a weapon. Dad said Fire Dragons burned everything.”
“Fire Dragons?”
“Great dragons of glowing orange fire slept in hidden caves. The people made them because they were big and powerful, and the people loved having lots and lots of dragons. Each tribe of ancients kept trying to have more Fire Dragons than other tribes. The people did something bad, and the Fire Dragons got angry. So angry, they flew out of their caves and turned the sky orange.” She held her hands up and made ‘fire breathing’ noises. “From the sky, they spat burning down on everyone, sending almost all the humans to the Other Place. Because the people made the Fire Dragons, they destroyed themselves by getting rid of all the people. That’s why it’s bad to be angry.”
Falo dusted his hands of crumbs. “I think your dad was telling you the same thing, just saying ‘fire dragon’ instead of missile.”
She narrowed her eyes. “What is a missile?”
“I don’t know exactly, but my grandfather used to tell stories about them. Sounded like huge arrows, like you’d shoot from a bow. Only these sat in ‘silos,’ underground… and they flew way up to the stars, and came back down before blowing up and destroying entire cities.”
“Sounds silly.” Wisp shook her head. “People couldn’t have destroyed the whole world. They don’t have as powerful magic as dragons. Dragons are still kinda like animals, so they don’t think. People wouldn’t be that stupid to burn everything.”
He opened his mouth, closed it, then smiled. “Yeah. You’re right. Stupid fire dragons.”
She smiled, but something didn’t sit right. His smile felt like a lie. Dragons lived in caves, but these ‘missiles’ also sounded like they sat in caves. Could Dad have learned wrong? Again she thought of the people stuck in havens and wanting to get out, how they told her cages keep people from escaping. No… she couldn’t accept that Dad had been ‘keeping her from escaping.’ Why would he? And why did this man think he wasn’t really her Dad? Simply because he didn’t look like her? How stupid! Falo didn’t know her. Didn’t know Dad. Didn’t know Mother.
Dad loved her. He’d always loved her. He loved her so much he’d get upset if she walked too far away from him. She stared down at her hands, pale, but not quite as pale as she’d been most of her life. Over the past few days, she’d seemed to have gotten some color. But, she couldn’t argue that Dad was a lot more brown.
That didn’t mean anything. She’d gone from almost snow-white to kind of a dark beige. Apparently, she could change color. Maybe Dad just did a lot of changing.
“You’re wrong.” Wisp held up her hand. “I’m darker.”
“What?” asked Falo, flinching.
“At home, I was lighter than I am now. I got darker. Dad got darker darker darker.”
“You’ve been in the sun a lot. You’re from the deep woods, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Spend most of your time inside?”
She shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Not much sun gets through the trees, and even less inside your house. You’ve been out here in the scrub a while. Nothing between you and the sun. That’s normal.” He glanced back at Dad, sighed, and smiled at her again as if he’d caught himself doing something silly. “But maybe he just spent way more time in the sun.”
She wiped at her left ankle and shin, clearing away a spritz of blood from the monster that tried to hit her with the axe. This man said mean things. All the people she had helped said mean things. Havens were good. Dad made it to protect her. He loved her. They even saw how much he loved her because he fought so hard to get away from the marauders―who had put him in a cage so he couldn’t get away.
Tears brimmed at the corners of her eyes. It made no sense at all to suggest that Dad had locked her up so she didn’t ‘escape.’ She couldn’t ‘escape’ her home because she wanted to be there. And the lies calling Fire Dragons missiles, and the horrible burying people like poop! She needed Dad to explain everything to her, but he couldn’t talk to her anymore.
She gasped, tears stalled cold. Will Dad only speak to me if I’m bad?
Overcome by guilt and confusion, she scrambled over to Dad and sat beside him. Despite being barely able to breathe with the smell, Wisp snuggled up to his arm and rested her head against his shoulder. His skin squished a little strangely, and his stomach had gotten bigger.
“Aww, man, kid. What are you doing?” Falo cringed, covering his mouth. “Get away from there. You’re gonna make yourself sick.”
“I need Dad!” she yelled, her voice teary.
Falo let out a low whistle. “Okay then. You do your hugging the dead guy thing. I’m gonna sleep over here.”
Not that he could see in the dark, she stuck her tongue out at him and whispered, “Don’t listen to him. He’s only saying stuff to trick me.”
Dad didn’t smell like Dad anymore. Truth be told, the stink alone brought tears.
Wisp closed her eyes and snuggled tighter to the rigid arm, pretending that he only fell asleep and hadn’t really gone to the Other Place. She had her protector back, and soon, she would finally be home again.
Abandoned
-30-
Nausea dragged Wisp out of sleep.
Her eyes opened to dusty, grey painted concrete. She’d slumped over sideways with her back to Dad, curled up with one arm under her head for a pillow. Half a breath triggered a convulsion in her gut. She scrambled up onto all fours, gagged, and threw up a puddle of sickly yellow liquid. Not until she’d vomited three times did her brain process the awful foulness in the wretched, hot air.
Still choking and retching, she crawled forward, her body demanding to breathe. She didn’t stop going until her fingers dug into sand. There, she stayed for a few minutes, taking deep breaths until the storm in her gut fell back from imminent eruption to an angry bees’ nest.
She wiped a tendril of yellow drool from her lip and sat back on her heels, listening to the distant howl of the wind. Dust clouds blew around in whorls, rising and falling here and there out across the landscape.
“Sorry,” she muttered. “You were right… I got sick.”
A moment later, when Falo didn’t say anything, she looked back.
He―and the buggy―were gone.
Two one-gallon bottles of water remained by her backpack and rifle. She turned her head, staring at the ground along the path the buggy would’ve rolled out on, at tire marks in the dirt. He must’ve pushed it out so the engine noise didn’t wake her up. He left her here―and kept her can of coins.
He lied.
He never intended to help her carry Dad all the way home.
“You… you… bad person!” Wisp pounded both fists into the dirt. “I’m gonna shoot him!”
She jumped up and stormed around in random path, kicking sprays of sand into the air while fuming. “I’m gonna shoot him in his stupid face. He lied to me! He lied to Dad! Ooh! Mother is gonna get him!”
Out came the pistol.
She aimed at the desert. “I’m not even going to talk first.” Wisp let her arm drop at her side and yelled, “He left me here!”
Her voice echoed twice over the desert.
“How could he just leave me here alone? I told him I wasn’t gonna shoot him.” She jammed the gun back in the holster. “Dragons… don’t be angry.”
She closed her eyes and took deep breath after deep breath, trying to let furious thoughts go away. Shooting Falo wouldn’t help her. She’d only waste a bullet she might need to protect herself from a threat. Clenched fists relaxed to open hands. She walked back and forth, thinking about how stupid the Fire Dragons had been for lashing out with their anger.
Dad wouldn’t want me to destroy myself.
Wisp looked over at him. His stomach appeared even larger, and more of his skin had purpled. Overnight, an army of flies had come out of nowhere, settling on him. A few even checked out what she threw up.
She cringed
away. “I have to bring him home.”
After a minute (or six) to build up the determination, she held her breath and walked over to Dad. His skin squished under her fingers as she grabbed his wrist in both hands and tried to pull him up.
No matter how hard she struggled, she couldn’t lift him off the floor. She adjusted her stance and tried again, but his skin began to slide off like a glove. She shrieked and spun away, refusing to look at that. Shivering with disgust, she fast-walked back out into fresh air, near to puking again.
Once the second wave of nausea faded, hopelessness set in. She’d been a complete and total failure. She couldn’t find Dad fast enough to save his life, and she couldn’t even bring him home to the shrine.
She crossed her legs and hung her head in both hands, elbows against her knees. Sniffles grew to sobs, and she wept all over again as though she’d found him lifeless for the first time all over again.
“Dad, please tell me what to do?” She sniffled and sobbed harder. “I don’t know what to do without you. Please?”
Dad didn’t say anything.
“Pleeeease!” she wailed. “Dad, I need you!”
He didn’t reply.
Eventually, she quieted to fits of erratic breathing and sniffles. Amid the grief swimming around in her head, the thought emerged that Dad hadn’t been in the Other Place long enough to figure out how to help people still here in the people world.
“Mother? What should I do?”
She listened to the wind.
“I need help,” said Wisp. “Where should―?”
Wisp ran to the backpack and pulled out the Mother Twig.
She let it dangle, but it kept pointing straight out in front of her as she had been holding it. Wisp rotated her body left a half turn, but the stick turned with her, still pointing straight out in front. No! It can’t be broken. She started to gear up for an explosion of tears, but a loud gust of wind off in the hills gave her an idea. Maybe this old building is in the way? Or maybe I’m too close to Dad? The stick’s trying to listen to him and he can’t move it.
“Coming, Mother!” She ran outside. “Where should I go?”
Her hair fluttered in the constant breeze, and the twig drifted around in a continuous circle. She frowned at it. “It’s only blowing in the wind.”
For a fleeting instant, she wondered if the twig had ever really worked, or if it had always been the wind or random chance. No! It led me right to Dad! She clenched her eyes shut to hold back tears. Mother’s been watching me for my whole life! Kit’s joyful cry when he first got to hold his mother after she’d let them out of their havens replayed in her mind.
She hated him for having a living mother.
An upwelling of rage made her tremble.
No… She took a deep breath.
She hated not having a living mother, not some innocent boy who still had his.
It’s not his fault.
The twig kept spinning, the same twig that had brought her to Dad refused to work. But had it? She’d stumbled across that buggy completely by chance. If a marauder hadn’t gone to the well at that moment, she’d never have found Dad. She hadn’t found him―the marauder drove her there. If he had taken ten minutes longer to arrive at the well, she would have given up and walked back to Zen’s.
Had the Mother Twig been a lie? A lie she told herself?
She frowned at the stick.
Either Mother had abandoned her too, or she’d never been there to begin with.
Wisp collapsed to her knees and cried into her hands. Both of those options stank. Even having a mother watching over her from the Other Side beat having nothing. People didn’t die, did they? Zen tried to tell her dead people don’t watch over anyone. She wouldn’t believe it.
No. Mother is real.
She wiped her tears on the back of her arm. “She loved Dad so much she had the strength to reach out from the Other Place and guide me to him. She made a wish, and it’s over. I found him. Now, I’m too far away for her to talk to.”
While she had no way to bring Dad home on her own, she could ask for help. Wisp got up and walked to the door, looking out over the scrubland. The tiny bushes didn’t appear edible, but perhaps the giant plants with spikes on them would be. Dad’s book had pictures that came close to the tall, green stalks.
“Prickly pear cactus,” said Wisp. “Yes, you can eat it.”
She squinted off to the left, back east. Nothingness covered the world as far as she could see. Zen’s place could be anywhere out there. Without Mother guiding her, she’d go in circles and wind up in the Other Place when the water ran out. To her right, the forest appeared much closer. She wouldn’t run out of water there, though even with the two big bottles Falo left her, it would be close. Of course, the forest and the mountains it grew on, were impossible to miss. She simply could not get lost going that way. If not her cabin, she would definitely be able to find the forest where she knew how to survive.
Once she reached the forest, Mother should be able to guide her home.
“I’ll go home and ask Mother what to do. She’ll want to talk to me even if I’m not bad, because she needs to tell me how to help Dad. And making a twig spin won’t do that.”
She turned on her heel and marched over to Dad. The flies all over him burst into a cloud, but settled back in seconds. “I have to go talk to Mother to find out what to do. I know you understand that I’m not strong enough to carry you. I’m sorry that man lied to us. I was foolish for trusting him.” She fidgeted, almost-but-not-quite thinking she’d lied to Dad. “Maybe… maybe he would’ve helped us but I scared him, so he ran away. I shouldn’t have threatened to shoot him. I’ll find a way to bring you back to Mother, so you can be with her.”
Wisp backed up a few steps so she could breathe easy for a moment, then hurried over to kneel beside him and kissed him on the forehead. “I love you, Dad. Thank you for everything you have taught me, and for protecting me.”
A few tears fell on him before she forced herself up and gathered her things. With the rifle slung over her shoulder, pack on her back, and a gallon bottle of water in each hand, Wisp walked out into the scrub desert, heading west.
Food could wait.
She had absolutely no appetite.
Buggy
-31-
To spare her feet the scorch of sunbaked blacktop, Wisp kept to the sand along the edge of the road. For hours, she walked westward with the sun at her back, heading toward the looming shadow of the great forest. Eyes downcast, she spared little thought to where she went, using only the haze of pavement gliding along the edge of her vision to steer.
Every so often, a bush, rock, or car part broke the sameness of the ground, forcing her to go around or step over. While she hoped Mother would be able to give her an answer once she returned home, guilt at leaving Dad behind weighed heavy on her heart. He had always told her how dangerous anger could be, but she’d lost control. Falo had said something mean about Dad, mere words, but she screamed and threatened to shoot him. Maybe if she’d stayed calm, she wouldn’t have had to abandon Dad.
Though, she hadn’t trusted that man much. Something about his false smile made her suspect he would’ve ditched her anyway, ever since his reaction to her not wanting to bury him. Dad did smell far worse than the Mother Shrine. Even Wisp couldn’t help the urge to keep back and avoid the stink. Falo probably didn’t want to touch Dad again. Why would a man she’d only known for a few hours put up with that smell once she’d already done what he wanted? She’d let them all out of their havens, so they didn’t need her anymore.
“Cages,” said Wisp, while punting a dirty plastic bottle that happened to be close.
It hit the pavement, bounced, and rolled to a halt, spraying sand onto the road. She stopped walking and looked around at the desert, enjoying a momentary breeze. At her best guess, midday had passed less than an hour ago, yet only now had any trace of feeling hungry started.
When she happened upon a giant, rectang
ular box beside the road, she took advantage of the shade and sat cross-legged near its wheels, drinking warm plastic-flavored water from one of the gallon bottles and feasting on three Twinkies plus her last two roasted cockroaches. This wheeled box hadn’t flipped. A huge car with an open, flat back end had run off the road into a ditch on the left side. A skeletal arm dangled from the driver’s side window above the words ‘Swift Trucking.’
Wisp stared at the bones, wondering how long ago the person had gone to the Other Place. It had to have been before Mother, since her fingers still looked more or less like fingers, only dark grey and dry. She opened and closed her hands, picturing the bones inside. At the thought Dad would never again hold her hand while walking her to the outhouse (or any other time), she let her arms drop into her lap and sighed.
“I can’t stay out here long. There’s nowhere to hide from monsters.” In the forest, she knew how to stay out of sight from anything bad―except Tree Walkers, but if she went home, she’d have the Haven. She stretched her legs out straight, rolling her feet around to chase away the soreness. “But I can rest a little.”
Eventually, she resumed walking. Hope that Mother would help, plus the welcome idea of being home again in a place she wouldn’t roast alive or run out of water, elevated her mood. While she remained far from smiling, she no longer stared at the ground.
Hours later, with the sun creeping behind the distant mountains, she crested the top of a long, shallow hill. Off to the right lay the crushed remains of an ancients’ settlement, little more than squarish outlines of rubble, and one stalwart stop sign. Closer to the road, a tiny cabin near the paving somehow managed to remain upright. The minuscule dwelling had a brown metal frame with clear panels, but the wall nearest the road had gone missing. On the narrower wall, a fading picture of a woman’s face half hid behind her hand, displaying inch-long fingernails in a bright shade of purple.
Wisp walked up to the odd cabin, stopping in front of the picture. She stared at the woman, unable to imagine what could possibly turn someone’s nails that color. A picture of a bottle occupied the lower right corner of the image, labeled ‘Revlon.’ Dad sometimes used a brush to take a liquid from a can and spread it on the outside walls of their cabin, and this made her think of someone doing the same to their fingernails. Why people had made such a thing, or put a picture of it on the side of a tiny cabin baffled her.
The Forest Beyond the Earth Page 28