“I did.”
Both of us look down. On the ground, the dragon head on the human torso morphs with a strange sucking sound. It turns into the face of an old man with long white hair.
As we stand there gaping, two human legs rapidly sprout out of the bottom of the torso. The old man waves his hand at us. “Help me up, children.”
We take his hand—a human hand—and he stands, a bit unsteadily, on his twig-like limbs.
“Arigato.” He bows, and we bow in return. “I am Daigon-gen. The protector of the mountain.”
“Protector?” I jerk my head up. “Do you know Fudō-Myōō?”
“Of course.” He shuffles over to a fallen log and lowers himself with a huff, like my grandmother always does, as if sitting takes a huge effort. “We have coffee every Tuesday.” The protector shimmers like a mirage.
“Really?” I ask.
“No.” Daigon-gen chuckles. “I cannot call him for you, either. He is not like a dentist’s office that’s open from nine to five.” He shimmers again, fading from view for a moment. “But I’m here to help you now.”
“What’s a Fudoō-Myōō?” Jinx says.
“I’ll tell you later.” I’m afraid the protector will disappear any second. “How can you help us? We’d be grateful for anything.”
Daigon-gen peers up at me. “Where is the other?”
“Over there.” I point at Peyton, who hasn’t moved this whole time. Well, I guess sleeping that deeply can come in handy sometimes.
Daigon-gen’s brows furrow, and he purses his lips. “Well, I suppose because the two of you did so well, he gets to come, too.”
“Come where?” Peyton raises his head, blinking sleepily. “What’d I miss?”
“Through the arch.” Daigon-gen gestures to a spot behind us. We turn.
A tall gate has appeared in the forest. It’s a rectangular opening made out of logs too big to wrap your arms around, tall as a two-story house, and painted in lacquered red finish. Like the kind you would see in Japan.
I close my mouth, which I realize has been hanging open. I turn back to Daigon-gen, but there’s nobody on the log now.
Of course there isn’t.
“Thank you!” I say to the air, just in case, because Obāchan says good manners never hurt.
Jinx has gone over to help Peyton to his feet. “So we’re walking through there?”
“Seems that way.” I assist her. Peyton looks like he’s been up for two weeks straight, with purple-blue circles under his eyes. “Dude, you look like you just lost a really bad fight.”
He yawns. “I did. The sleep monster got me. But I’m good now.” We chuckle at his little joke. “Ungh. Did you bring any candy?” he asks me. “I need sugar to keep going.”
“Just walk, will you?” Jinx eyes the gate and swallows hard.
“What’s the matter?” I ask.
She sucks in a breath. “It’s a torii. Those are gates to the underworld, you know.”
I nod as though I totally knew that. “Underworld, or other world?”
“Guess we’ll find out.” She runs her fingers through her tangled hair, which somehow makes it even messier. “I followed my father through a torii gate and ended up in that jungle by the snow woman’s cave.” Jinx pulls her mouth to one side. “It kind of…hurt. To go through it.”
“Hurt? How much?” I ask sharply, but Jinx doesn’t answer.
She faces the gate and bends her legs, bouncing as if she’s in the Olympics and waiting for the starting gun of a race. “Only one way to do this. As quickly as possible.” Her leg muscles clench and she takes off, bent over, sprinting toward the torii.
“Wait!” I don’t even have my backpack on.
But it’s too late. She’s through.
She’s gone. Nowhere to be seen.
Great.
I peer through the gate. It looks the same on the other side as it does here. Tall pine trees. A path covered by fallen needles, browned by summer sun.
I lean toward it. Just seems like a normal structure.
Peyton ambles up beside me and, without stopping, goes right on through the gate.
“Peyton!” I grab my backpack and lurch after him.
As I pass through the gate, I feel sharp, stinging pain all over, like a thousand burning matches flickering against my skin. Before I can react, the sensation evaporates as quickly as it started.
I slow to a walk. The landscape has completely changed.
Gone are the tall pines from the forest near my house. Instead, leafy trees stand branch to branch like soldiers lined up shoulder to shoulder. I gawk up at them. Their leaves, in varying shades of magenta, blue, and gray, form a vast, endless ceiling. I stop and pick up a cobalt-blue leaf that’s perfectly round. Other leaves are the shapes of stars and moons.
Peyton slouches against an ashy gray trunk that looks like it’s covered in lizard skin. It seems as though the tree is the only thing preventing gravity from crushing him against the ground. “Took you long enough,” he croaks when I reach him. One side of his mouth twitches up in a weak, un-Peyton-like smile. He could use a bowl of hot chicken soup and some antibiotics. His eyes are crusty with sleep, and his cheeks are drawn. This is definitely not the Peyton who could normally pass as the lead singer of a boy band.
“What do you mean? I came in like two seconds after you did,” I say. “Have you seen Jinx?”
He shakes his head. “No sign of her.”
Great. Leave it to her to run off. “Jinx!” I shout. “Where are you?”
“Here!” she calls from someplace high above. Of course. She’s the monkey girl.
Relief poofs out of me like air out of a balloon. Without her, there’s no way Peyton and I would be able to make it. “Where? I can’t see anything but forest.”
She scrambles nimbly down a tree near us, as though the smooth trunk has invisible handholds. “Hey, slowpokes, I thought you guys were right behind me. I was up there forever.”
“We were right behind you.” I don’t know what she’s talking about. Talk about learning patience—these two could both use some.
Peyton rips off his hoodie and then his shirt with a burst of energy I haven’t seen since the day before yesterday.
“What’s the matter? Do you have ants on you?” I watch him with concern.
“My wings. I think they’re back. Can you see them?” Peyton cranes his head over his shoulder.
“Hold still.” I examine him. There are two flesh-colored lumps, like fists under his skin, on either side of his spine. I touch them, feeling the hard bone underneath. “They’re trying to sprout, I think. Can you flap them?”
The nubs sort of twitch, like earthworms on concrete trying to find their way back to dirt. But that’s it.
I hand him his shirt, hoping he won’t be too disappointed. “Guess they’re not growing back right now. Maybe they will later.”
Peyton pulls his shirt on, not meeting my eyes. “I shouldn’t have come. I’m a burden.”
My throat closes. If he gives up now, we all might as well give up. “You wouldn’t be a burden even if I had to carry you.”
“You don’t have to be nice to me.” He pulls on his hoodie. “I’m going back. I’ll see you on the other side of the gate thing.” He turns and starts walking, but he can’t move very fast.
“Peyton.” Jinx bounces over to us. She reaches out to him. “Come on. If you guys could put up with me after the snow woman cave, we can put up with you being slightly slow.”
He covers his forehead with his hood, screws his eyes shut, and frowns. I haven’t seen that expression on him since we were seven years old and he got scared by a raggedy mall Santa. “I don’t want to go.”
I hate seeing Peyton like this. I’m so mad at myself for causing all this trouble that I could punch myself in the face. If I could go back in time, I never would have used that stupid baku charm. I would have just lived with my nightmares. “Peyton, Jinx is right. You’d help us if the situation were r
eversed.”
His face contorts more, practically melting. “But I can actually carry you guys. Me, I’m too big for either of you.”
Jinx and I exchange a glance. It’s true. If he was healthy and I wasn’t, he could easily throw me over his shoulder and cart me around.
“Xander and I will help you together, then,” Jinx says. “You can’t go back now. You might not even be able to.”
He inhales and opens his eyes, eyeing her warily. “Why are you being so nice?”
Jinx crosses her arms. “I’m always nice.”
Peyton and I both bark out a laugh at the same time.
“You guys aren’t exactly Miss Congeniality to me, either,” Jinx points out. “Come on. You know I’m good at this other-world stuff.” She waves her hand around at the trees. “I’m more comfortable here than I am in the real world.”
“She’s right,” I tell Peyton. “And I’m right. So let’s go.” I nudge him.
He nods, his face still screwed up, and shuffles forward as though he’s a zombie.
That’s a start.
We begin walking. “So you know where we’re going, right, Xander?” Jinx prompts. “Exactly what did you learn?”
I think back to the cave. “Not that much, I guess.” I repeat what the Daruma character said about Fudoō-Myōō.
“Why didn’t you tell me that before we went through the gate?” Jinx kicks a bunch of leaves out of the way, and they fly about in a confetti of colors. “I would’ve gone to the waterfall and asked Daruma myself.”
“First, Daruma wouldn’t have shown up for you. Second, you took off before I could tell you everything.”
Jinx shakes her head. “Xander.”
I shake my head back at her. “Jinx.”
“Angry Lord of Light, huh? Sounds like a charmer,” Peyton drawls, pulling the strings of his hood so it cinches even tighter around his face. “I don’t feel afraid. But then, I don’t feel anything.”
“It doesn’t matter if his name is the Angry Lord of Light or the Fearful Duke of Pooping—we just have to find him!” I look around the forest. I don’t see anything but trees. And more trees. And then a few more after that. I kick a branch aside gently. “He could be anywhere. In a tree, on top of the mountain…”
Jinx bares all her teeth as she gets in my face. “That’s exactly the kind of information you were supposed to get from Daruma, Xander. Your interviewing skills need work.”
I refuse to back away from her. “He wouldn’t tell me.”
“Did you ask?”
“Of course I asked. Stop second-guessing everything I do.” I scowl at her. “Why don’t you trust me?”
Jinx laughs bitterly. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because you’re the one who used the baku too much, and because you were using your powers when you weren’t supposed to. Maybe it’s because you created this whole mess in the first place!”
I swallow hard. “You wouldn’t be talking like that if you were having my nightmares, Jinx.”
She stomps on. “A nightmare is just a nightmare. It’s your body’s way of waking you up to go to the bathroom.”
No. These were worse. Way worse. I think of that shadowy figure with the silver face. “Of course I don’t expect you to understand.”
“You guys.” Peyton drags his feet forward. “If anybody should be mad at Xander, it’s me. But I’m not.”
“That’s only because you’re numb, Peyton.” Jinx turns to deliver this line. “If you could feel, believe me, you’d be plenty furious right now. Enraged. Violent. Discombobulated.”
“Discombobulated? Pretty sure that’s not a synonym for anger.” I keep walking.
Peyton yawns so wide I can see his tonsils. I take a can of iced green tea out of my backpack and offer it to him. “Here, this will help. Chock-full of antioxidants.”
“Thanks.” Peyton tries to flip up the tab on the can, but his fingers fumble. “Unnnnh.”
“Give me that.” Jinx grabs the can, cracks it open, and hands it back to Peyton.
“I would’ve gotten it,” he says to her gruffly.
“I know,” Jinx says. “I’m just helping.”
“Can’t you ever help without making someone feel bad about it?” I ask her.
“No. It’s my job to make people feel bad. Totally my intention.” She marches ahead. I can’t tell if she was being sarcastic or not.
We continue on. The path winds downward, into a little mountain valley. My stomach growls, and I start dreaming about food. Real food, not just granola bars and beef jerky. I didn’t eat properly before we left—I just grabbed a bag of chips. I should have had a bowl of oatmeal or something.
Turns out Dad was right about food being fuel and all that.
I hope he and Mom and Obāchan and Inu are all doing okay. They’re at least as healthy as Peyton, I figure. Only my grandmother is in bad shape because she’s super old. And she wouldn’t have sent me on this quest if she thought she was going to die.
Would she?
I wonder if Mr. Phasis came over looking for Peyton, and what my parents said to him—I mean, they are currently pretty out of it. We’d left Peyton’s parents a note saying we’d all gone camping, but I’m sure that hadn’t made Mr. Phasis very happy.
“Peyton,” I say, “do you think your dad will call the police?”
He shakes his head. “I don’t care. He didn’t listen when I said I was sick. I mean”—now he’s breathing hard, trying to walk and talk at the same time—“can’t he see how not right I am?”
“I thought your dad had, like, softened since spring break.” A few months ago, Peyton couldn’t do anything right as far as his father was concerned.
Peyton shrugs. “He’s about as soft as a frozen stick of butter.”
I take out my own green tea. It’s warm, but that’s okay. I drink it quickly and belch, the sound echoing through the forest.
Jinx cracks open another. “You call that a burp?” She belches, too, and pretty soon we’re having a burping contest. Peyton even joins in for a second, and hope blooms in my chest. Maybe this place will make him better.
As we walk on, the trees change, getting shorter and squatter. Ripe fruit hangs heavy on some of the branches. Apples, I think. I jump, trying to get one, but my fingertips barely graze the plump sphere.
“Want me to climb up there?” Jinx offers. “You’re a little short.”
“No kidding.” I hop again, determined to reach. “I’ve got it.” My fingers close around a ruddy specimen, and I yank it off. “Success!” I polish it on my shirt, then lift it to my mouth.
Two white circles appear on the skin. The apple blinks at me.
I drop it and leap backward. “Ahhhhh!”
“What, did you find a worm?” Jinx asks.
The apple lies among the leaves. Black eyebrows seesaw above the eyes. “Onamae-wa?” it says.
Onamae-wa? That sounds like…“Daruma?” I bend down to it.
The apple giggles shrilly, the sound as loud and annoying as a preschooler after too many cupcakes.
“Xander.” Jinx grabs my arm, pointing up.
All the apples have faces, and all of them are laughing at me. “Momotaro-san!” they jeer. “Going to pick another?”
“I volunteer!” one squeaks, causing the others to fall into helpless guffaws again.
“Oh no.” I take a step back, not sure whether I want to run away or set all the face apples on fire. “This has officially gotten too weird. Even for me!”
“Momotaro-san!” the faces yell. “Momotaro-san!”
“Useless Momotaro-san!” one shouts in a deep voice.
“Powerless Momotaro-san!” another apple squeals.
“The Momotaro-san who will be defeated soundly by our master, Ozuno!” another apple says.
The hair on the back of my neck rises. I run over to a tree and chop at its trunk with my sword. “Ozuno?” I yell. “Is he here, too? Let him come out!”
My sword clangs uselessly, as if it�
�s hitting a lamppost. Why won’t it cut?
More laughter from the apples. “Kawaiso Momotaro-san! Poor little Momotaro-san!”
Grinding my teeth, I whack the tree again.
Jinx grabs my arm. “Sheesh, Xander, calm down!”
Then apples begin raining down on my head, pummeling me like softball-size hail. “Kawaiso! Kawaiso!” they hiss as they thud against me. The smell of rotting apples fills the air.
“Ewww!” I bat the fruit away, catching glimpses of grinning faces as they pass by. Trails of slime coat my skin where they touch.
I shield my head with my arms and start running through the orchard. The trail forks, and I take the left because the other way leads through more of those laughing trees. I can still hear them calling, “Momotaro-san! Come back!”
Um, no thank you. I speed up.
“Xander, wait!” Jinx yells from behind me.
I stop running but don’t turn around. “I’m over here!” I yell to Jinx. I can’t see her, but she can come to me. There’s no way I’m walking back through a whole forest of apples with human faces that yell insults and throw themselves at me. I shudder. I’ll take a haunted house over that any day.
Finally, my friends appear, Jinx supporting Peyton, the two moving as slowly as two elderly people with walkers.
“Xander, I know you don’t eat a lot of fruit, but I didn’t know you were scared of it,” Peyton says with a glimmer of his old self.
I laugh and leap forward to help prop him up. “There’s a first time for everything.”
“Ah. Those were only jinmenju,” Jinx says. Once I have a grip on Peyton, she extracts a packet of trail mix from her pack and rips it open. “If you didn’t want to eat one of those, I would have given you some of this.”
I make a face. “People actually eat those apple things? But they’re alive! And not nice.”
“I’ve heard they taste kind of like oranges.” The corners of her mouth turn down. “I wouldn’t know, though. Who wants to eat a moving face? But they’re harmless—all talk. Literally. They have no powers.”
“That one I saw looked like Daruma.” I shudder again, just thinking of it.
Xander and the Dream Thief Page 9