Jodi charged up to his side just as Ridgerunner’s body gave a shudder. Then the old wolf took a deep breath, and his body went still. Jodi stared at him, horrified. She knelt down, touching his thick, coarse fur. “Big brother?” she said quietly. Hot tears streamed down her face. “Brother, are you okay?”
Ridgerunner didn’t respond, and Jodi knew from his touch that the wolf’s spirit was gone. She turned to face Gabriel, fury burning in her lupine eyes. “What did you do to him?” she shouted. “What did you do to my brother, you freak?”
Gabriel winced. He rose to his feet and turned his back to her. His face disappeared in the shadows under his hood. “You shouldn’t have come,” he said quietly. He began walking towards the trees.
Chapter 37
Jodi leaned forward, pressing her face into Ridgerunner’s fur. Emotion overwhelmed her, and she began to weep. She threw her arms around Ridgerunner’s warm body, holding him, pleading with him not to die, begging him to come back to her. This went on for a minute, until she felt a warm nuzzle against her cheek. She pulled away, and wrapped her arms around Frostpaw.
We must go, he gently urged her. We must leave him now. It is our way.
Jodi wiped the tears from her cheeks and looked into his eyes. Where? she thought. Where are we going to go?
Frostpaw raised his eyes to the woods. Your friend waits for us. We must follow.
My friend? Jodi thought. He’s no friend of mine.
Nevertheless, we must go. We cannot survive here alone.
Jodi sighed and rose to her feet. Frostpaw was right. They couldn’t stay here. They were surrounded by shadowcreatures. They wouldn’t survive an hour without Gabriel’s help. And unfortunately, they couldn’t go back home, either. They didn’t know how. For the time being, they were stuck in the Shadow world.
“It’s just as well,” she muttered. “At least this way I can keep an eye on him.”
As they walked, Gabriel stayed twenty or thirty yards ahead of them at all times. If they slowed, he slowed to match their pace. If they found a trail and made good time, he increased his speed. This went on for about an hour, until they reached a deep part of the woods. Jodi immediately noticed a change. The place felt different, and it smelled different as well. The scent of the Shadow was weak, and she began to recognize other scents. She remembered the smell of the trolls she had been following; the trolls who had helped Gabriel move the clockwork machine. They were somewhere nearby.
Gabriel finally stopped and waited for Jodi and Frostpaw to catch up with him. “You will walk with me now,” he said. “They must know that we are together, or they will kill you.” He led them down the trail and across a narrow bridge. Jodi caught the scent of a campfire in the distance, and heard the soft echo of voices. Then, a minute later, she saw something that would change her life forever.
Jodi could only stare in disbelief as they entered the troll village. She saw the old men at the campfire, telling stories and carving things out of wood with tiny, sharp knives. She saw the old women at the cooking circle, laughing and making fun of the old men. She saw the youths up in the trees, moving deftly from branch to branch as they played games and practiced their hunting skills. Then the trolls realized they were there, and everyone fell silent. Jodi could feel their eyes on her as she followed Gabriel through the middle of the village to the cooking circle.
The old women stared at her, and at Frostpaw. Then they looked to Gabriel. “We weren’t warned,” she said. “You bring friends.”
Gabriel nodded wordlessly.
“Come,” said one of the old women. She motioned Jodi closer. Reluctantly, Jodi circled around the cook fire and stood next to her. The old troll woman grabbed her arm and pulled her closer, examining Jodi’s wound. “Kesha val tomara!” she shouted in a harsh, guttural voice. Nearby, a young male jumped up and vanished up into the tree branches. The old woman turned her attention back to Jodi. “Sit,” she commanded.
Jodi hesitated. She was uncomfortable and somewhat frightened. The old troll smiled. “Sit, we no harm.” She pulled on Jodi’s arm, and Jodi reluctantly settled onto the ground next to the old woman. She glanced at Gabriel.
“Stay here,” he said in an authoritative voice. “You’ll be safe.” Then he turned away and disappeared into the woods at the far side of the village. Jodi was tempted to get up and leave just to show him that he wasn’t her boss. Unfortunately, she couldn’t. She didn’t dare offend the old troll woman who was trying to help her.
A few seconds later, the young male returned with what was apparently the old woman’s medicine bag. It was made of leather and covered with strange drawings and words that Jodi couldn’t understand. The old woman opened the bag and withdrew a small pouch filled with pungent smelling herbs. She twisted some of these into a compress and put it to Jodi’s wound. She held it there for a minute, waiting. After the first few seconds, Jodi began to notice a tingling sensation around the wound. Then the pain steadily began to subside, until eventually her entire arm felt numb. Suddenly Jodi felt so relaxed that she could barely keep her eyes open.
The old woman smiled. “Good, yea?” she said.
Jodi nodded. “Yes, good,” she said. Her tongue was heavy and her lips felt tingly. Suddenly it was hard to hold herself upright. She started falling towards the ground and the old woman caught her. She guided Jodi down to the cool, musty earth.
“Good,” she said again, pulling a needle out of her bag. “Rest.”
Jodi woke some time later with only a vague of idea of where she was and what had happened. She’d been dreaming of fangs and blood, and sharp, piercing spears. Then she remembered Ridgerunner and she bolted upright. She was in a hammock. She stuck her leg out to stand up and realized with considerable horror that there was no ground beneath her. She was dangling between tree branches more than thirty feet in the air. She clutched desperately at the strands of woven fiber as the hammock rocked precariously back and forth.
Calmly, Frostpaw’s voice said in her head. Jodi peered over the edge of the hammock and saw him lying at the base of the tree below her… far below her.
How did I get up here?
The trolls. The young ones took you up there to rest. The old woman told them to do it.
Where is Gabriel?
With the village elders. He spent most of the night watching over you.
Jodi frowned. She stared up through the branches at the dark sky. Is it daytime?
As close as it gets, in this place, Frostpaw said grumpily.
Cautiously, Jodi twisted out of the hammock and set her feet on the narrow branch beneath her. She reached out to stabilize herself and winced as pain shot up and down her arm. The old woman had apparently stitched her wound shut, and the skin felt tight and hot when she touched it. She hoped it wasn’t infected. An infected wound in the real world was no big deal. It might require some ointment or some antibiotics, but that was it. Here, without the advantages of modern medicine, such a wound could easily kill her.
I’m coming down, she thought. Frostpaw didn’t respond, but she could feel his eyes on her as she made her way from one branch to the next, slowly working down towards the base of the tree. A few painful minutes later, she reached the lowest branches and realized she had to drop. She stared down at the ground a good eight feet below her, wondering how they’d got her up there in the first place.
“Here goes nothing,” she said. She lowered herself as far as she could, hanging from the branch, and then dropped. The ground rose up to meet her violently and Jodi fell over backwards, landing hard on her rump. She heard a snort behind her and glanced up to see a young male troll watching her. She recognized him as the one who’d brought the medicine bag to the old woman.
“I’m not exactly a monkey,” she said sarcastically. “Wolves don’t belong in trees.”
The troll laughed. “Look,” he said, pointing. Jodi followed his gaze and saw a rope ladder attached to the backside of the tree. She hadn’t even realized it was there.
>
She rolled her eyes and giggled. “You could have told me about that before I looked like an idiot,” she said. He smiled and offered her a hand up, which Jodi accepted.
“Come,” he said.
“Where?”
“Elders.”
He turned and began walking down the gentle slope into the village. Jodi followed him, and Frostpaw fell in behind her at an easy lope. His tongue lolled happily back and forth as he walked. So you’re a wolf now, are you? his voice said in Jodi’s head. She ignored him.
The troll led them across the village to a large hut. He pulled the door flap open and motioned for Jodi to step inside. Frostpaw followed her in, and the young troll eyed the wolf curiously, but he said nothing.
It took a moment for Jodi’s eyes to adjust to the darkened room. At first, she only saw dark shapes huddled around a circular table. Then she began to recognize them. Most of them seemed to be the old trolls who’d been huddled around the fire when she arrived. They had seemed harmless and even a little silly at the time, but now they were different. Their faces were serious and they watched her with dark, shining eyes.
“Have a seat,” Gabriel said. Jodi glanced across the table and realized he was standing in the far corner of the hut.
“I’ll stand,” she said defiantly.
“Suit yourself.” Gabriel stepped forward, standing directly across from her, and crossed his arms over his chest.
“What are we doing here?” Jodi said.
Gabriel nodded at one of the male elders. The troll uncovered a lantern, and the flickering light danced across the surface of the table. Jodi saw dark lines and three-dimensional shapes rising out of the surface, and realized it was some kind of a map. “We are here,” Gabriel said, pointing to a small circle in the woods to the far west of the map. “The Black Palace is here.” He pointed to a three dimensional likeness of a castle halfway across the map. It appeared to be positioned in the middle of a broad plain.
“The Black Palace?” Jodi said.
“Yes. It’s the home of the Shadowlords.”
Jodi’s eyes widened. She glanced at the map and then at the faces around her. They were all staring at her. “I don’t understand. What are you doing, Gabriel? Is this a war plan?”
Gabriel pursed his lips. He didn’t look like himself. He looked… he almost looked like a man. “We have no choice,” he said. “Many of us will die. I don’t expect you to stay here, Jodi. I can transfer you back to our world.”
“Oh no, you don’t! I’m not going anywhere until I find that machine.”
Gabriel glanced at the elders’ faces. “The machine is safe,” he said. “You don’t need to worry about it, Jodi. Trust me.”
“Trust you? Hah! That’s a laugh.” Jodi regretted her words when she saw the pained expression on his face.
One of the trolls spoke up. It was the elderly woman who’d tended to Jodi’s wound. “The girl is spoiled,” she said. “She will slow us. Send her home.”
Jodi put her hands on her hips. “I am not going home,” she said firmly.
The room was silent for a moment. Finally, Gabriel spoke. “Fine. You can stay with us and keep an eye on the machine, but stay out of our way.”
“Fine.”
“Good. Now sit down.”
Jodi glared at him. “I’ll stand,” she said again.
Gabriel drove his fist into the table so hard that it jumped. The elders around him flinched. “You’ll sit,” he said angrily, “or you’ll find yourself lost in the Sierra Nevada Mountains a hundred miles from the nearest truck stop.”
Jodi gulped nervously. There was definitely something different about Gabriel. He’d always been different from the other kids but now he was different. He wasn’t like a kid at all. He didn’t even seem like a young adult. It was like he’d gone from almost fourteen to twenty. She pulled her gaze away and settled into an empty seat.
Gabriel continued talking as if nothing at all had happened: “We’ll need at least two dozen fighters here, and here,” he said. “The Shadow King’s forces are strong, but they’re weak in the flank. When we draw them into the plain, they won’t even guess what we’re up to.”
“So few of us left,” one of the old men said sadly. “This plan… is good, but many die. We must do this?”
“We must,” Gabriel said. “I know how few of you are left. I think if we’re careful, most of your fighters will escape.”
“And then?” said another elder, an old woman with a missing tooth. “If you succeed, they will follow.”
“Yes, but they will follow me,” said Gabriel. “They won’t waste good men chasing your fighters into the woods. They’ll chase me, especially because they’ll know I have what they want.”
“What they want?” Jodi said. “Are you talking about the machine?”
“Yes.”
“But you can’t do that! I don’t know what you’re up to Gabriel, but if they catch you with that machine it’s all over! That’s exactly what we’ve been fighting to prevent all this time.”
Gabriel frowned as he turned away. He pulled the door flap open and then paused. “Have the fighters ready,” he said stiffly. “We leave at full dark.”
Chapter 38
Jodi had a few hours to wait, but all she could do was nervously pace back and forth through the village. Gabriel had disappeared without another word, and none of the trolls would talk to her about his plan. She tried several times. “It’s crazy,” she told one of the old women who was knitting next to the fire. “You understand that, don’t you? If the shadowfriends activate that machine, they’ll destroy the world!”
The old woman simply continued knitting. Jodi rolled her eyes in frustration and went back to pacing. Eventually even Frostpaw got tired of watching her. He stretched out next to the fire, yawned lazily, and closed his eyes. A few minutes later, his eyes blinked open and he found Jodi standing over him.
What? he said in an irritated tone.
“You’re a lot of help,” Jodi said. “Isn’t anybody on my side?”
Not long after that, the women called everyone in the village together for stew. They came to the fire with wooden bowls and then sat around the circle, listening intently as the old woman spoke. It was all in the troll’s language of course, so Jodi didn’t understand a word of it. She liked the soup, though. Finally, the old woman ordered them off and they went into a flurry of activity. To Jodi’s surprise, they began disassembling the huts and pulling their hammocks and canopies out of the trees.
“What are they doing?” Jodi said. “Are you going to leave?”
“Not safe,” the old woman said. “Every moon, the Shadow come deeper into woods. Now, no woods left.”
Jodi cast her gaze around the village, trying to understand. “Where will you go?”
“We will hide,” she said.
“Hide? That’s it? How can you hide? Where?”
“We hide. We hide until Gabriel saves us, or we die.”
Jodi stared at her, horrified. Then she glanced around the village. She saw the young males and females first, all working diligently together. Then she noticed the children. They were so small, so human. She saw them chasing each other, playing a game of tag. She saw the toys they were playing with and realized what the old men had been making with their knives around the fire.
She saw the huts coming down and saw the sadness in all of their eyes as they tore their village down. Apparently, they had done this many times before, trying to escape the Shadow. Only now they were running out of places to go. They were counting on Gabriel to save them. But how? What could Gabriel possibly do against an entire army of shadowkind? It had to be the machine. Whatever he was planning, it had something to do with the machine.
“We go now,” one of the old women said. Jodi hadn’t even noticed the troll standing next to her.
“Go where?”
“To hide.”
“No,” Jodi said flatly. “I’m going with Gabriel.”
T
he old woman looked her up and down. “Then maybe Gabriel save you, too,” she said. With that, she began walking. She joined the rest of the elders on the far side of the circle. The youths fell in behind them, carrying the villagers’ belongings in large packs, and pulling small wagons with wheels carved of solid wood. They looked heavy. All around them, the children followed along, some of them crying for the loss of their homes, others simply making a game out of it.
Jodi stood there for several minutes, watching them leave, until she felt a presence behind her. She turned to see Gabriel standing there. He looked tall and dark, almost frightening. “It’s time to go,” he said.
Jodi nodded. Deep inside of her, she felt something breaking. Her heart ached as she gazed at the smoldering fire pits and the empty spaces where the village huts had been. With a sigh, she gave way to the wolf. It rushed up from inside of her, consuming her with strength and power, until there was almost nothing left of Jodi but a small memory. She gazed up at Gabriel and saw surprise sweep across his face. A smile tugged at her lips, revealing sharp canine fangs.
You frightened him, Frostpaw said, coming to her side.
Good. He frightens me.
Jodi’s wolf-mind lost interest in the doings of Gabriel and the trolls as they traveled, and she became intent on exploring this new terrain. In the back of her mind, Jodi knew that she had to stay with the group, that she had to keep an eye on Gabriel, but she also wanted to understand this new place. She made large sweeping circles through the woods, following the group as they went to a nearby cave and brought the machine out of its hiding place. They loaded it onto a wagon. After that, they walked for several hours to the east, over hills and around mountains, and eventually across a long, barren plain. By that time, the stink of the Shadow was heavy across the land and the Black Palace was clearly visible in the distance.
“Jodi!” Gabriel whispered. He was off to her right, near the trolls and the wagon with the machine. She eyed him curiously and then loped up next to him. “There’s a guard,” he said, pointing off into the darkness. “He must not see us.”
Shadow Rising (Shadow Born Trilogy Book 2) Page 20