Dandelion Fire

by N. D. Wilson

  She could see the blanketed door on the other side, but she didn't bother walking around. Instead, she pulled the curtain all the way open and stuck her head in the window.

  The man, whistling through his teeth, pulled the pan off the fire and began to sing in a soft, throaty voice.

  “Bacon, bacon's all I'm takin'

  Tap the ale, pour out the wine

  You bring ten hens what all are layin'

  And I, my love, will slice the swine.”

  Henrietta coughed.

  Eli didn't look up from his work. He was scraping the egg mixture onto a wooden plate.

  “Well,” he said, with his head down. “Are you going to come in and eat, or would you rather go for another swim?”

  looked up into Henrietta's startled eyes.

  “I won't spoon eggs into your mouth through the window. The door's on the other side. Or can you walk through walls?”

  Henrietta stepped back and let the curtain fall. She was confused. But she was also very hungry.

  She walked around the leaning shed, pushed aside the blanket door, and ducked inside.

  Eli was sitting cross-legged on the dirt floor. He was already eating from a wooden plate on his lap, lifting eggs on the flat of his knife. His forehead shone, and the firelight reflected off his glasses.

  Another plate, with a small, steaming mound of food capped by four strips of bacon, sat in the dirt waiting for her.

  Without speaking, Henrietta dropped to the floor, picked up the plate, and tore a bacon strip between her teeth. It felt at least a quarter of an inch thick.

  “Thank you,” she said. She had to. It was hard to remember the last time food had tasted so good.

  Eli nodded. “I thought you'd get here sooner, but girls are so wretched with direction.”

  “What?” Henrietta asked. “It was pitch-black. I was running through hills. I'm just fine with direction.”

  Eli lifted a piece of bacon off his plate and held it up, examining it in the firelight. He didn't say anything.

  “How did you know I was here, anyway? Were you following me? If I was so lost, you could have at least helped me out.”

  “I knew you were here when I saw the philosophers trundle you by, tied up on the wagon.”

  “The philosophers?”

  Eli raised his eyebrows. “Oh yes. They are very astute. The deepest of thinkers. To them, the mysteries of the world are an open book. If only they could learn to read.”

  “You're joking, right?”

  “You are as insightful as they,” Eli said. “As to why I didn't help you sooner, the truth is, I only just decided to help you at all. You should eat in silent gratitude.”

  Henrietta pinched a lump of egg and potato between her fingers and popped it into her mouth.

  “You're going to take me back to the ruined hall?” she asked.

  Eli chewed thoughtfully. “No,” he said. “I don't see the good in returning there. You've seen the night-haunting once before.”

  “You know what I mean,” Henrietta said. “I need to get back to Kansas.”

  “You can't,” Eli said. “The doors have been reset. I checked soon after you met with the great and magnificent queen of the FitzFaeren. She also keeps goats.”

  “The doors are really reset?” Henrietta asked. She tried to see past the flicker on Eli's glasses. She wanted to see his eyes when he talked.

  “They are indeed.”

  “Will you take me back and show me? I want to see.”

  Eli laughed. “No. I will not. But you are free to leave as soon as you finish your meal. Or sooner. Wander off in the darkness and find your way home.”

  Henrietta wavered between doubt and disbelief. She thought Eli was lying, but then she didn't know why he would. He didn't seem to like her. He wouldn't just want to keep her around. She wasn't sure if he was capable of being purely malicious. Probably. Magdalene had called him a traitor.

  “You said you were going to help me,” Henrietta said. “What are you going to do?”

  “Were you hungry?” Eli asked. “Are you eating? Thus, I am helpful.”

  Henrietta looked at him. “But I can't stay here. How am I going to get home?”

  Eli shrugged, chewing.

  “What did you give my grandfather?” Henrietta asked suddenly. “What did he take that destroyed this place?”

  Eli dropped his plate to the ground. He looked at Henrietta, and then he looked up and watched the smoke writhe out of the broken roof.

  “She probably talked about how it ruined her coronation, too, eh?” He looked at Henrietta. “It's hard to have a conversation with her without it coming up. ‘Maggie, how's the corn doing? How's the goat?' ” He pitched his voice higher. “ ‘Oh, fine. But it would all be so much better if my coronation ball hadn't been ruined by my wretch of a brother.' Is that what she said? Something like that?”

  “She said she was going to get the things back. She was going to go into Kansas and dig up my grandfather's coffin and look for whatever it is.”

  Eli cocked his head. “She said that?”

  Henrietta nodded.

  “Why would she say that?”

  Tucking eggs into her cheek and licking her fingertips, Henrietta spoke. “She said she needed whatever they were in order to protect the rest of the FitzFaeren. She said that Endor was drawing power again and was going to swallow them all up like weeds.”

  Eli rubbed his chin. “I'm surprised she felt it. Most things blaze right past her and never get noticed.”

  “You mean, it is happening?” Henrietta asked.

  “Oh yes,” said Eli. “It is happening. Soon fish will be floating in the streams. Grass will curl and slowly turn to ash, never seeding again. Stick around, and you'll curl up, too.”

  Henrietta set her plate down. “What are you going to do about it?”

  “Me?” Eli laughed, took off his glasses, and polished them on his sleeve. “What am I going to do about it? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. A long time ago, I was told that my people, excuse me, the people I once led and that I am no longer a part of, did not need my assistance or leadership. I will do nothing.”

  “I don't get all this,” Henrietta said. “You told me that I would curl up if I stayed here. Did you really mean that I will die? Will you die if you stay?”

  With his glasses back on his nose, Eli reached over and took Henrietta's last piece of bacon. She let him. “I'm sorry,” he said. “I was unclear. After the grass dies and the fish begin to bake on the banks and the insects dry out and float on the death-breeze, then you will grow very tired, your fingernails will twist and peel back, and your gums will recede. You will lie down or stumble and be unable to rise again. The same will be the case for the larger animals. Dying on the ground, you will be unable to sleep. The life will gradually drain out of you, joining the currents that have been drawn out of the rest of the dead and are being swallowed up or stored by whatever immortal carcass you and your weak cousin set loose through the worlds. Your body will not rot. You will dry and curl and drift away on the breeze. I will die as well. Sometime after you and before the stronger trees. So I do intend to do something. I intend to leave.”

  He folded the bacon and stuck it in his mouth.

  Henrietta swallowed. “You're serious?”

  Eli raised his eyebrows. He didn't answer.

  “How do you know?”

  “I have felt it before. And I have walked through the dead-lands beyond old Endor.”

  “What about your sister?”

  “The queen? You tell me she knows. Let her make her own decisions, for herself and her people. All twelve of them.”

  “How many are there really?” Henrietta asked.

  “Some scattered hundreds,” Eli said. “No more than that.”

  “And you're just going to let them die?”

  Eli snorted. “I'm not the one letting them die. They don't have to ask my permission to do that.”

  “You're awful,” Henrietta said.
“Where are you going to go?”

  “To a place I know by the sea—horrible-smelling fishing village, really.”

  Henrietta had stopped eating. Eli picked at her plate.

  “Why are you going there?”

  “You mean, why are we going there. I said I was helping you. Of course, I'd forgotten what a plague you are. You may still be on your own. We are going because it is by the sea, and because I know it—I kept a library there for years. Your grandfather was a regular—and because places by the sea have boats.”

  Eli stood and picked up a rumpled sack from behind him. Without cleaning it, he dumped the large frying pan inside and picked up the two wooden plates, shaking Henrietta's leftovers onto the floor. He slid the plates inside as well and slung the bag over his narrow shoulder.

  “What are you doing?” Henrietta asked.

  “Oh, gracious stars above.” Eli rolled his eyes. “What have we just been talking about? Your incessant questions would almost be bearable if you actually listened to the answers. I am leaving. I am going to attempt to travel to a safer place than this open tomb of a country. And, as I am as magnanimous as Saul, first king of all FitzFaeren, I am taking you.”

  Henrietta's mouth hung open.

  Eli leaned down and looked into her face. His beard grazed her chin. “Shall I write you an invitation and eagerly await your reply?”

  “Now?” Henrietta asked. “We're leaving now?”

  “Yes. Now. Not later. We act in the present.”

  Henrietta reached down and rubbed her legs. “But I walked all night. My legs are killing me.”

  “False,” Eli said crisply. “But in five hours, both will be true. Come now, or stay forever.”

  Eli pulled the blanket down out of the doorway and the cloths out of the windows. He crammed them into his bag and, without another word, walked out of the little shed and into the night.

  After a moment, Henrietta jumped to her feet and followed him. The moon was hidden again. She was blind.

  “You said King Saul?” she yelled. “Your sister said you only had queens.”

  “Ha,” said a voice from the darkness. “Ha.”

  She tried to move toward it, slipping on dewy grass. “I'm really thirsty!” she said.

  “There's a drink sliding right past you. You already washed your feet in it. It's cold, too.”

  “Will you wait while I drink?”

  “No.”

  Henrietta licked her lips and swallowed down her thirst. Her toe collided with a rock, and she staggered through the grass and fell to her knees. The sky lightened, and the moon emerged.

  Twenty yards away, she could see the cool light glowing on the back of Eli's bald head.

  She jumped up and ran after it.

  Henry stood, with his backpack against the wall, and watched people open their post-office boxes and retrieve their mail. Apparently, in this place, mail was for the upper classes. Men strode by him wearing multiple capes, each one a different color, and they were always in tall boots. The women were far more frightening. Most of them entered with servants, walked to their box, gave the servant the key, allowed them to open it and retrieve the mail, and then took it all back from them, looked at it, and handed it back to the servants to carry out.

  He would have been even more surprised if he had known that most of the women were servants themselves, with under-servants assigned to them to help with the arduous task of mail collection.

  A door in the wall opened, and Ron stepped out. He wore a long tan coat that Henry had thought extravagant when they'd left together. But now, after watching a steady stream of overdressed preeners, Ron's coat looked more like a bathrobe. Henry didn't want to think about what he looked like. He was wearing long brown slim-legged pants made out of something velvety and a white oversize shirt with bunchy sleeves and no collar. It didn't really work with his backpack, but at least it wasn't a dress.

  Ron smiled and beckoned for Henry to come.

  Six women in enormous skirts walked slowly between them. Probably to collect three postcards. Henry waited for them to pass, and then he hurried, wobbling, over to Ron. He was wearing boots—the only shoes Ron had been able to find in a close size—and he was not at all used to them. He didn't think he ever could be.

  Ron held the door open, and Henry stepped inside, then stopped suddenly. The room was small, square, yellow, and very full of men in gray uniforms. As Henry entered, they all bowed at the waist and forgot to straighten. Ron looked at Henry and winked.

  One man stepped forward, still bent, and gestured toward another door.

  Ron turned to Henry and hugged him. He smelled real, like a tree. Henry grunted. And he was as strong as one.

  “Stand,” Ron said. “No one can ask more.”

  Henry smiled, but he felt a surge of something inside him—sudden worry. He wasn't just going back to Kansas. Something else was happening. Something else was going to happen. He pulled in a deep breath, blew it out, and watched it rustle in Ron's beard.

  “What did you tell them?” Henry whispered, nodding his head at the bent men.

  “The truth. That you were the owner of the magic box.” Ron gripped his shoulders. “There is more of your blood in the worlds. You will find it running in veins stronger than yours.”

  “Are you sure?” Henry asked.

  Ron shook his head and smiled. “May it be so. But I am sure of this—the fire in you is the dandelion's, the strength in your new sight is like it, sudden, sure, and strong, though it falls quickly to downy dust. But once fallen, it is quick to rise again, reseeded, doubled and trebled and more. It wins by inches and sprints, by both ash and flame.”

  Henry nodded. He thought he understood. At least as much as anyone could.

  Ron slapped his shoulder and turned him toward the new door. The men in gray were still bent.

  “You all can stand up,” Henry said.

  The leader glanced at him through his eyebrows and ducked back down.

  “All right,” Henry said. He opened the door, waved to Ronaldo Valpraise, and stepped through.

  When the door clicked behind him, he was alone in another yellow room. The yellow room. This was the place he had first seen, where he had watched gray pantlegs walk around through his attic wall. Suddenly, he hoped Ron wouldn't leave too soon. He wasn't quite sure what he was supposed to do now.

  Well, he told himself, I guess I should start by finding mine.

  The room was long, and the entire right wall was made up of the open-backed boxes. Occasionally, he could hear someone unlock one, slide out their mail, and slap the door shut.

  Each box had a little metal tag tacked onto the bottom edge, some with paper slips bearing handwritten names.

  Next to him, the numbers were all in the nine hundreds. Henry began walking the room, watching the numbers drop as he did.

  He slowed in the one hundreds and then stopped. There, below his waist, was the little open square labeled 77. Two paper tags were tacked beneath it. The top one was blank. Henry lifted it with a finger. The paper beneath it was covered with names, each one scribbled out.

  Henry crouched, cupped his hands, and tried to look through. There was nothing to see. Still crouching, he slid his right hand in and felt for the back of the door. This was his fear. There would be no way to open the box from the inside, and no one would hear him yelling. He'd be left banging on the inside with a broomstick and hoping someone heard.

  But his hand didn't find the door. Henry slid against the wall up to his shoulder. Laughing, he pulled his arm out and put his mouth over the hole and yelled.

  “Richard! Henrietta! Wake up!” If it was light in the post office, it had to be night in Kansas. Richard would be closest.

  “Richard!” He got louder. “Richard! Richard!” It was a little embarrassing. Everyone in the post office had to be able to hear him.

  Finally, Henry stood up and stepped back. He couldn't keep yelling indefinitely. And the cupboard was already open. But why wo
uld it be open? How could it be open? Henrietta was the only one who would have done that. And that meant that she had to be there. Ignoring him. She was probably even watching him. He knew that she could see through. They had watched the postman together.

  He swallowed hard. His ears were buzzing. If she was just sitting there laughing at him, he was going to be very angry.

  He crouched back down.

  “Henrietta!” he yelled, and felt his throat burn with the volume. “You have to be there. Who else opened this? Anastasia? Say something if you're there. Right now! Reach through. Show me your hand. Do something!”

  He stopped and rested his forehead against the top edge of the box. He could feel something tingling against his skin. And in his fingertips. Leaning back, he looked at his hands.

  A whispering motion drifted around their edges. He straightened up and moved away.

  He stared at the wall and felt his eyes shifting, growing wet. He was seeing everything. Twice.

  The wood in each of the boxes had its own crawling signature, but it wasn't hard to pick out his. In all the crawling, his was a gap in the magic, a black swirling funnel. The slow motion from the other boxes moved around it and disappeared inside. It was like looking at a hurricane on a weather map. If a hurricane could be black, and if a weather map could look real.

  Henry's head hurt, but he didn't look away. He looked deeper. He saw more. Beyond the movement in front of him, he could see the wall in his bedroom. Not his wall. The trailing threads and dry, dusty, tired words that made up his wall. His teeth started hurting. Badly. Like something was sliding his gums back and icing the nerves. Hot tears were running down his cheeks. He could taste their salt as they crept in the corners of his mouth, and his nose was running.

  Still, he didn't look away. He could do this. Quickly, Henry slid off his backpack. After a moment, he held his breath and tossed it at the hole. It vanished.

  Henry stepped forward, wobbling in his boots. Ignoring the backs of all the boxes, he reached into the tiny hole with both hands.

  * * *

  The pressure in his ears was unbearable. He yelled as loud and as long as he could. But he heard nothing. Something burning and sticky bubbled in the corners of his eyes, and his skull throbbed. The pain moved on, bending his clavicles and bowing his ribs.