The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves

by Richard Heredia

  Mikalah giggled as Anthony answered back. “I asked if I can leave the table, because I have to study.”

  His mother looked around the dinner table, then at their father, who merely shrugged the way he did when he didn’t care one way or the other.

  “All of you can leave when you are finished. Do me the favor of rinsing your dishes before you leave them in the sink. Your father and I will clean up the rest,” announced Myelly Herrera, smiling at them. She sighed, then turned and spoke to Raymond, continuing her conversation as if nothing had interrupted her at all.

  Anthony looked at his sisters as he got up. He walked toward the kitchen, itching to get out of the dining room before he lost it completely.

  He walked directly to his room once he had fulfilled his mother’s request, went over to his desk and snatched up his Mp3 player once more. He promptly sat on the floor with his back resting upon the side of his bed, waiting.

  He didn’t have to wait long.

  She didn’t knock on the closed door nor did she ask entry, Elena just led Mikalah into Anthony’s room, and closed the door behind her. Once they were both in the room, they walked to sit in front of him on the floor.

  Anthony watched them with an unchanging expression, barely able to contain the urge to move, to do something. Anything! They had both changed into their pajamas, which meant, not only had they finished their dinner and put away their dishes properly, but they had taken their showers as well. A surprising feat, when he considered they’d it all in the twenty minutes Anthony had been waiting.

  They settled themselves before him. He took the ear-buds from his lobes, paused his Mp3 player with the same methodical thoroughness of a man 60 years older.

  Neither of his sisters stirred, which unnerved him, because they were never, truly motionless or remained silent for an extended length of time. They were serious and focused.

  Anthony figured it was his time to match their resolve and get this finished. Though, he was still struggling with where to start.

  It was Elena, though, who prompted him gently. He was grateful it was only a small nudge to get his rolling.

  “What happened, Tony?”

  A full minute passed before he spoke. At last, he inhaled expansively and exhaled hugely. “You won’t believe this when I tell you, but I think we are all in some kind of trouble. And, I’m not talking about your regular, everyday kind either. I think we’re in big, big trouble… I can’t even begin to think where to begin in order to explain it to you,” he rambled, already out of breath, though he’d only spoken a few sentences.

  “What kind of trouble?” asked Mikalah in her soft voice, imploring Anthony to continue.

  Somehow this gave him an idea. “Hey, Mikalah, what do you remember about that old, ugly guy you said was about to give you a dead kitten last Thursday?”

  Mikalah was somewhat startled by the question. She hadn’t thought about the old, squishy man more than twice, since he’d attempted to hand her that poor crushed kitten in their backyard.

  “Ummm, let’s see,” she began, thinking deeply, “he had a voice that sounded real gross, like he had the flu for long time and didn’t take care of it.” She put a finger alongside her mouth. “He kinda smelled funny. You know, like old, moldy clothes stuffed way back in the back of the closet for a long time. Then, when you pull them out, they smell something like that, understand?” She tilted her head to the right. “He wore all black, even the clothes under his robe, which was weird. I mean who wears a robe around outside, right?” She shook her head in consternation. “Also, everything he wore looked a little dirty like he’d worn the same things for a few days…” She shifted her weight, and then went on. “He… also talked kinda strange… like Nixy.” Her eyes brightened as the connection solidified in her young mind.

  That was exactly what Anthony was waiting to hear. “Do you mean he had an accent or he spoke with his words a slightly different order than we would use, maybe like someone much older than us?” he asked and watched as Mikalah eyebrows raised.

  She’d realized something significant.

  At her side, Elena frowned not sure what Tony was getting at, but knew the conversation was going somewhere just by the look on her sister’s face.

  “You know what, Tony, it’s both – he talked with an accent like Nixy’s and spoke with weird words just like she does too.”

  “Would you say this old fart and Nixy might be from the same place?” he continued.

  Elena’s eyes bulged with comprehension, finally understanding what Anthony was trying to piece together.

  Mikalah didn’t take long to answer. “Yes, I would, but that would mean –,” she began…

  …And, Tony finished. “…They are working together, possibly sent here, by someone, we haven’t even met yet.”

  “Sent by who?” piped up Elena, her uneasiness making her voice more shrill than usual. Anthony could see the dread she’d expressed last Friday creep back into her face.

  “Well, I was sitting here thinking before you guys came in… And, you guys are really going to have to trust me when I say this… If what I think is happening is actually happening, then this whole thing is going to get dangerous. I mean it could be real dangerous, possibly deadly, and not just us three. It could be bad for us all, mom and dad too, and maybe a lot more people as well.” Anthony took a deep breath to steady himself and went on. “Earlier when I left the house and Elena, you saw me go, I decided to go and pay a visit to your ‘friend’ Nixy.”

  “You did what?” said both girls loudly, in unison.

  Anthony sighed in resignation. “Yeah, I know now… a bad idea.” He fell silent, and then waved it away as though the quiet was a cloud of bothersome gnats buzzing about his head. “But, you see, I called Andrew, my old friend from Yorkdale, so I wouldn’t be alone. I wanted someone to back me up just in case, you know?”

  They nodded slowly, brows creasing.

  “Our intention was to go up there and talk with Nixy’s parents, to get them to tell her to leave the two of you alone, especially after she sort of threatened Elena after school today.”

  Elena gave Mikalah a “remember-what-I-told-you” look.

  The youngest Herrera sibling nodded gravely at the two others. She knew what he was talking about.

  They turned back to him, their eyes riveted. “When we finally figured out how to make it up to the top of the hill and discovered the new dirt road that led us up there. We walked it, until it ended. We came to some kind of clearing. At first, it looked like a construction site, where someone was thinking of putting up a house or something. Only there was no construction crew or anything like that. There wasn’t even evidence any type of crew had ever been up there. All we found was this doghouse.”

  They gaped incredulously.

  “Yes, yes, yes, I know it sounds ridiculous,” he pleaded the instant his sisters began to raise a fuss. “Let me finish, ok?” He got nods from both of them. They relaxed before him. “Now, this doghouse was huge, like three times bigger than on one grandma has for Kodie. So… umm, we see it and were as surprised as you guys were just right now. You know, totally clueless as to why a doghouse would be up there. We were looking for something more normal, like a pile of lumber or a stack of sheet rock, right? We thought we’d find something to give us the impression where on the site would they build a house. All we found was the doghouse. It was shocking, but sort of frustrating at the same time.

  “Then, the storm hit with all the thunder and lightning. The rain drenched us in like seconds, so we decided to wait out the worst of it inside the doghouse. At the time, it seemed like the logical choice, since it was the only place nearby to shelter us from the rain. So, we ran in all quick, not really paying much attention at first. We get inside and lightning flashes. That’s when we saw her. I could see Nixy standing all the way in the back, up against the wall.”

  “She was actually inside the doghouse?” blurted Mikalah.

  “Yup,” said Ant
hony, nodding avidly.

  “Dang, she was in there with you guys.”

  “As I said already, yes,” Anthony answered, a little bit more anxious than before, his vision blurring slightly from unbidden moisture. Don’t you freakin’ cry in front of the girls!

  “But, why was she in there? I mean, does she live there in a doghouse? Where is her real house, her stuff? Where does she go after school? What does she do?” These were all questions from Elena, each one adding ever more emphatic nods from Mikalah’s head.

  “Yeah, right?” began Tony, answering all of her question with a question of his own. He gathered his feet underneath him and began knee-talking closer to them. “Those were the same questions both Andrew and I had, almost exactly what you’re asking right now. Unfortunately, we never had time to fully figure anything out.”

  “Why?” It was Mikalah’s turn to question.

  “Because, there was something else up there were her.”

  Both girls frowned anew.

  Unbidden, Anthony’s eyes suddenly filled up with tears. They could both see the fear seep into his expression like water flowing into a dry sponge. His face seemed to swell with a myriad of feeling – fear and anger, disbelief and disgust. It was a twisted tangle neither girl could accurately explain what they saw squirming underneath his skin. Merely, it was dreadful. Moreso, because Anthony hardly ever cried, he wasn’t a big conveyer of emotion.

  “What kind of thing…?” prompted Elena.

  The girls seemed to be taking turns now.

  “Something…,” started Tony, but he stopped as if had fallen into some sort of mental void. His jaw slackened, his eyes glossed over. His thoughts were so intense, he needed all of his energy just to navigate through them. He had to keep it together. He had to get control. He had too, otherwise he’d lose his sanity. “Something, h-huge and white… with white fur…”

  “What, Tony?” Mikalah copied Anthony’s pose, placing her hands on her thighs, clearly uncomfortable with her brother’s inability to coherently describe his experience. She wanted a clear answer to her question.

  Anthony’s eyes locked on Mikalah’s with newfound intensity. “She called it an Isighünd, although, to me, it looked like an over-sized wolf with long white fur and long fangs coming out of a mouth. But, it was obvious to both me and Andrew that thing was way too big to be any kind of animal from around here. Its feet were black and ended in the biggest claws I have ever seen, even bigger than a bear’s. It had an elongated snout, equally black, with a large, sweaty nose dripping with mucus. Even though it was raining, I could still see it falling from its nose and onto the ground, which was bad. B—b-but what was worse, so much worse… it freaked me out. It still freaks me out when I think about them. It’s so… they’re so…” He trailed off, a retched sob constricting his throat.

  “It’s what, Tony?” queried Elena, curious, but not sure she wanted to hear the answer, her forehead etched with apprehension.

  Her brother looked at her through haunted eyes. “It’s eyes, Elena. It was its’ eyes. They were horrible. They were the worst.” He gulped, breathing raggedly, but somehow continued. “They were red, and not just reddish-pink like an albino, that’s not even close. They were completely red. They glowed. I could see them. I could tell, because, though it wasn’t entirely dark, it was dark enough I could tell its’ eyes were giving off some sort of light, like a light bulb only from within. They were glowing, red eyes with no iris or pupil just glowing, red eyes, looking at me with hunger. It was - I-It… was the most awful thing I have ever seen in my life.”

  “How… I mean, how, were you able to get away from it?” wondered Elena.

  Mikalah remained transfixed by the cast of her brother’s visage. She didn’t move.

  Anthony shifted to look at Elena, some semblance of the boy she knew returning. His expression softened, the angles and cutting lines disappeared. “That’s just it, kid. Nixy said something to it in some strange language and the thing just moved to the side. Andrew and I had a clear way to leave the area.”

  “But, why would she do that, though?”

  “She said we were to be unharmed. Actually, I think she used the word ‘unspoiled’. Yeah, that was it, we were to be left unspoiled for the Lord of the Storm, which I am guessing is a title for this dude she called, Nihhûs.” Anthony shrugged, looking overwrought. “She said there was something coming, something we had to survive, a ripping or tearing of something, but I know I’m getting it all wrong. I was so scared I really don’t remember exactly, but she did say it would happen soon. It would involve Andrew as well. She said it didn’t matter if she let us go. She said, whether it was now or later, we would all fail, that Nihhûs would watch us all die.”

  They were all silent for a long time, only the pounding rain, the occasional flash of lightning and the delayed peels of thunder were heard over their three thumping hearts.

  “Did you see anything else?” murmured Elena in the void, her query voiced as though she speaking from the bottom of a well.

  “Only her teeth, her sharp, pointy teeth had transformed right before my eyes, right after she told us to go. So, we booked the hell out of there no questions asked,” he replied as he glanced down at his Mp3 player, turning it off, tossing it up on the bed behind him.

  Silence befell the room.

  “I think it’s what all of this implies is the important thing right now. It’s this implication we have to focus on, at least, until this tearing or ripping thing happens,” surmised Anthony after wiping the tears from his face and staring up at the ceiling for a while.

  “I think you are right, Tony,” confirmed Elena, crossing her arms about her small chest.

  “Why?”

  “Because, Mikalah,” began Anthony for Elena, “this entire thing, when you put it all together, means only one thing. Out there, in the world right now, is a group of people or creatures who are allied against us. For some reason, they were put here, specifically to keep tabs on us on the orders of this Lord of the Storm. It doesn’t get any more plain than that. We have enemies that would’ve already tried to kill us, if Nihhûs hadn’t put his ‘hands-off’ tag on us. Quite frankly, I’m not so sure we even stand a chance against them the way things are right now.”

  “We’ll just have to be real careful, more careful than we are when are trying to careful,” stated Elena, adamant. Nothing was going to happen to her siblings as far as she was concerned.

  “Yeah, we will all have to keep an eye on each other,” echoed Mikalah, half-smiling, thinking of Anthony’s long-term reaction to having his sisters around him all of the time.

  Anthony smiled at Mikalah as if reading her mind. “I never thought I’d say this, but it appears like we are going to have to stick together on this, us and Andrew, and, of course, anyone else we might have to save.”

  Elena seemed to think hard for a spell, her small right hand cupping her chin. “Tony, how come you think this is going to involve more people than just us and Andrew, and maybe mom and dad?” she asked, her a typical determined demeanor expanding throughout her tiny frame. Once she had a mission, she was indomitable.

  “Not sure really, just call it a hunch, but I think something is coming, something big and mean. Whatever it is, it intends to enslave us all, maybe all of mankind as well,” he replied cryptically.

  “How come?” questioned Mikalah, pushing the subject.

  Anthony glanced at both of them, making sure they were paying attention. “If you two had seen the Isighünd this might be easier for you to understand, but I will try anyhow. Anything that could control a creature as terrifying and as massive has to possess tremendous power. Nixy did it with ease. Now take that thought one-step further and try to imagine something that could control Nixy. I’m here, right now, because something else, something even more powerful than her told her, ‘no, wait’. It commanded her not to harm either me or Andrew. What kind of power could something like that possess?” he asked rhetorically.


  Elena answered as if he had spoken literally. “Something like a god…”

  Anthony’s gaze shifted toward her quickly. “My thoughts exactly.”

  Mikalah’s eyes could bulge no further out of her head. A god…?

  ~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼ }>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

  ~ 28 ~

  Escaped!

  Tuesday, November 23rd, 4:55 pm…

  She had finished her homework and was eating her customary afternoon snack when the thought hit her like a ton of bricks. With all of the excitement and planning between her and her siblings, no one fed had Mr. Patas yesterday!

  Why are we always forgetting to feed him?

  Jumping up from the breakfast nook in the kitchen, she rushed over to the cabinet where they kept the rabbit food and began rummaging for Mr. Patas pellets and vitamins. She found them quickly, snatching them, making her way through the dining room and then the playroom. Eventually, she was out of the house, standing on the patio, peering at the backyard beyond. She looked both ways to make sure the way was safe. It was. Still, she waited another ten seconds before she moved again.

  Mikalah had just closed the sliding glass door, about to speak in the high-pitched voice she always used with Mr. Patas when she was going to feed him. Instead, she stopped. She looked at his cage. She noticed something was wrong with it.

  It didn’t look right.

  She leaned over to the light switch beside the glass doorway and turned on the backyard lights. All along the cinderblock wall, tiny spotlights came to life, illuminating the entire parameter of the yard. Overhead, two evenly spaced florescent floodlights bathed the patio in a soft white glow.

  She peered again at Mr. Patas cage, through the steady rain. It had continued to fall all through the night and day without any sign it was ever going to stop. She realized the problem. Their pet rabbit of four years was gone. His cage was empty.

  She was about to take a step toward the now vacant cage, when she noticed a second detail. This made her stop in her tracks, for the second time, in as many seconds.