The Humming Bird's Choice

by Samuel J Fox

  My dad wraps his long arms around me, I can feel his heartbeat still pacing.

  “Quick come with me, it’s Monni!” I run back inside the house before I can even ask what happened and why there is a secret hole in our back garden.

  I run back into the room where we found Monni, Dad and Pell shortly following. Monni now sits on one of the chairs in the middle of the room, with Sparky kneeling next to him cleaning his wound on his head with a damp cloth.

  “You’re okay Monni!” My dad says with relief, he walks over and lays the palms of his hands on Monni’s chest. “I didn’t know where you went when they arrived. What did they do to you?”

  My dad runs his fingers from Monni’s forehead to his cheek.

  “Who arrived?” Sparky asks, putting the wet cloth back into the bucket. “Did some thugs come in and steal our stuff? I’ll kill em’!” Sparky clenches his fists together, his knuckles cracking individually as he does.

  I don’t think any Centaurs did this, it’s too random to occur in Barndale.

  “Minotaur’s” Monni divulges, he painfully groans as he leans forward. “When I arrived home from collecting some herbs they were already infesting the house. They were smashing up chairs and crockery, and obviously, I didn’t know what was happening so I just went with my instincts. I had to defend our home!” he screams out the last few words.

  “That was very brave of you Monni, I just wish – “

  Sparky interrupts my dad, “Forget about Bravery for a second! The smart thing would have been to run away and get help!”

  In a sense, I also believe that calling for help would have been the smart thing to do, especially when my dad and Pell were safely held up in that hole in the garden. It was so sneakily hidden I couldn’t even see it.

  “Run away?” Monni now stands with his arms held out in front of him. “I can’t just run away when strange Minotaur’s are destroying our home. They shouldn’t even be this far north of the wasteland they call home! On top of that I didn’t know where your dad or Pell was!” Dry blood stains the right side of his face, covering his entire ear. “I couldn’t just leave them here to fight off those savages.”

  Pell still stands cautiously in the corner of the room, playing with her long ginger hair.

  “Why was they here?” I ask. “Did you speak to them by any chance?”

  “No,” his tone lowers. “Well kind of, before one of them hit me round the head with their club. One of them was wearing an eye patch and he was speaking about how this was the right house.”

  An eye patch.

  I think to myself that it may be Olark who hurt Monni, after I threw the bottle in his eye not so long ago. But how does he know I live here, unless he followed us to the bridge.

  Monni screams in agony and holds his head in his hands, falling back into the chair with my dad’s support.

  “This is why you should have run away!” Sparky shouts at Monni in anger, but I can sense it’s more because he’s worried about his safety. Sparky also holds his head as he squints his eyes tightly shut. “I could have died tonight and so could have you Monni! That’s nearly half the family gone already, gone!”

  My dad slowly stands, the fire behind him radiates of his skin making him glow slightly.

  “You could have died Sparky?” he looks from Sparky then to me in confusion. “What happened? Are you boys ok, I thought you was just hanging out with some friends tonight?”

  Pell is now kneeling next to Monni with the wet cloth, dabbing the stained blood on his shirt. Monni looks pleased to see her.

  “We were stopped...by Minotaur’s on the way,” I say.

  My dad rests his hands on his waist and looks to the ceiling. He takes in a deep breath and releases.

  “This is not good,” he whispers. “You boys alright? They didn’t hurt you, did they?”

  “No, we’re fine,” I reply. “Just was a little shock that we managed to get away in one piece,” I don’t want to worry my him too much about the details of how we escaped.

  “You could say one piece,” Sparky lets out a smug laugh. “He blinded the Minotaur’s after threatening to skin us for repayment of all the deaths Centaurs caused to them. Without Felix’ quick thinking we probably wouldn’t be here right now.”

  The thought of me defending ourselves doesn’t make me feel proud at all, more scared now I know it could happen again.

  “That’s odd,” my dad replies, odd is probably one word to describe the night. “Monni mentioned one of the Minotaur’s with an eye patch. You don’t think that was the same one, do you?”

  “I’m not sure dad,” I say. “But they came here for a reason, and I’ll find out why.”

  +++

  I start clearing the living area, even though the majority of items are either broken or gone. I pick up a fallen book that’s been mauled in the process. It was one which Monni finished reading last month, he wants me to read it because it’s a tale about a young Centaur wanting love. Monni tells me that this book will teach me about the importance of self-reliance and why your soul deserves more care than anything else.

  “So, what are we going to do now?” I ask.

  “There’s nothing we can do Felix, apart from alert the guards and hope that they’ll sort it,” Sparky replies.

  “They’ll do nothing,” Monni quietly speaks from his chair by the fire. “Our only hope is the Kunzite stone, maybe that’ll put a stop to these unrestrained Minotaur’s.”

  This reminds me that next week King Helfer will decide who will be participating in the Hideout. I can picture the huge crowds of anxious Centaurs awaiting their fate, a sickening process I’ve always dreamt of.

  For the past year, it’s been the first thing I think of when I wake up, and the last thing before I go to sleep.

  11

  ‘Put the house down and come here right now you banana stealing baboon.’

  A long agonizing week of anxious waiting finally passes and the day has arrived. The Humming Birds anniversary will commence today to ignite the painful start to the gruesome voyage for the Kunzite stone. Although, no one has ever returned to tell the stories of what lies beyond Barndale, there have been tales of what awaits the six travelers. Dark and magical creatures left behind from the battle between Centaur’s and Minotaur’s. Hurk once told me the stone was swallowed by a giant worm and the only way to get it was to cut the belly of the beast open. I still don’t believe him.

  As I lay in my bed of hay, I try to remember that the chances are slim of any of my family being chosen. But there is still a chance.

  I hear the banging of pots and pans in the kitchen, my dad must be cooking breakfast. He tends to cook frantically when he’s nervous, but I’ll never understand why. The thought of leaving my safe bed to attend the anniversary at the great hall feels like an itch in the back of my head that I can’t get rid of.

  Peach briskly enters the room, jumping straight onto my chest and climbing up the window above. Pell shortly follows in, her face bright red from chasing Peach for whatever reason, and comes to an abrupt stop as she sees Peach hanging upside down from the ceiling of my room.

  “Peach!” she shouts, only to be greeted with a high pitch squeal followed by a smile. Peach is only a small monkey but she can be a handful to care for. Ever since we found her by herself, abandoned in the bog, she’s taken to us very well, which can be difficult when housing a pet monkey. “You’re going to have this bath whether you like it or not!” Pell continues to speak to Peach as if it was her child.

  Peach screeches again, sounding similar to a laugh and continues swinging back and forth using her small, yet strong tail.

  “Fell in the pond again?” I ask, knowing the answer will be yes due to the potent smell Peach brought in with her.

  “I can’t be dealing with this today,” Pell says. “I need to bath Peach, wash my hair, eat breakfast which dad is dishing up now, and since school has been cancelled today I need to catch up on my homework.”

  S
he abruptly stops talking like someone has put a plug down her throat. She slaps her cheeks and squishes them together, letting out a loud sigh.

  “I’m sorry Felix, today just isn’t my day.”

  Pell must also be nervous about the anniversary, I think everyone in town would be. Her eyes are bright red from where she looks to have been crying before she came in, although she cannot be chosen to take part, the thought of anyone close to her being picked probably hurts the same.

  “Don’t be sorry,” I reply. I sit up and rest my back on the wall, letting my legs dangle over the side. “I’ve just woken up and I can already feel the today is not going to be my day either. For once I would rather be going to school today, and we have Ms. Specklebridge today teaching History.”

  Pell laughs a little as she stares out the window. A lot must be rushing through her mind right now, and Peach isn’t helping. I lift myself out of bed and reach for Peach, at first, she slaps my hand away which startles me, I wasn’t expecting a contest.

  “Little bugger!” I say under my breath. I reach for her again and this time she swings towards the chest of draws on the other side of the room, slapping me in the face with her tail. The sheer force knocks my head backwards. I slowly turn my head to see where she is, hoping not to startle her as I plan to charge to regain authority. Peach stands on the chest of draws holding a sculpture of a house I made in class, the cello tape binds together part of the house from where Jessy broke it in half once I finished building it.

  “Peach,” I say gently, in hope she doesn’t react badly. “Put the house down and come here right now you banana stealing baboon.”

  Peach makes another shriek and begins to raise the house above her head.

  “Oh, so you’re going to throw the house at me, are you?” I begin to laugh a little. “If you throw that at me I’ll post you off to the Minotaur’s so they can have a mid-day snack!”

  Before I can react, the house is hurled towards me, hitting me square in the nose.

  “Little shit!” I hold my nose from the pain of the sharp edge hitting it.

  I turn to see Pell laughing at me.

  “Stop laughing at her!” I shout through my hand. “She’ll think we’re playing!”

  Another object smacks me on the back of the head, this time a pencil. I turn to see Peach screeching and jumping around, excitement leaks from her as she picks up more of my belongings and launches them at me from across the room. I dodge the incoming missiles and start to throw some of them back. I slowly make my way through the danger zone where Peach has the most accurate shot at me, and dive towards her, but she jumps out the way and runs into my wardrobe in the corner of the room.

  “Can’t believe you’re getting beat up by a monkey!” Pell mockingly says.

  “Can’t believe you’re getting-” I reply in a whiny tone. “Shut up no one’s beating me up!”

  I stride towards the closet, rubbing the back of my neck from where Peach threw a book at me. Before I open the wardrobe door I prepare myself for the energetic monkey. I swiftly pull the doors open to see nothing but a pile of clothes and old boxes.

  “I’m sure she went in here,” I say.

  But Peach is nowhere to be seen.

  Then a box begins to shuffle slightly, I stare at it for a few seconds to see if it was my imagination or not, but I can’t tell. Peach did throw the house at me pretty hard. I slowly lean towards the box, prepared for Peach to leap out. I grab the edge and throw it open. But as I look inside I see nothing but a pile of old photographs.

  “That’s funny I thought I-”

  Suddenly Peach jumps out from the top corner of the wardrobe and grabs hold of my face. I scream and thrash my arms around in the air from the sudden attack of the monkey, and before I can chuck her off, I can feel Pell pull the excited monkey off me.

  “If I knew a monkey could beat you in a fight then I would have trained her when we first got her,” Pell says, holding back her laughter.

  I struggle to gain my breath back to reply, but instead I just hold my hand in the air.

  “No need to thank me,” I say. “I’m glad my pain brought you some sort of joy,”

  “It did, thank you!” Pell grins with her bright white teeth, the sun shining through the window reflecting off her skin, causing her freckles to show clearly.

  I brush myself down and begin to pick up the objects Peach threw at me, who now sits on Pell’s shoulder.

  “You know it’ll be fine, right?” I say. “No matter what happens, we’re here for each other, family stick together,” I stop picking my belongings off the floor to look at Pell. “Don’t be afraid, Pell. Face these things head on and be brave, as scary as a day like this might be, it’s always an opportunity to learn more about yourself.”

  Pell gently strokes Peaches head with her finger, I can hear her fuzzy hair rustle and her face begins to relax after all the excitement.

  “I’m trying to Felix,” Pell replies, her face looks tense and worried. “But what happened to Monni last week, it frightens me that I could lose him. It all now feels real; my dad being attacked has made me realise that nasty things can happen to good people.”

  Good people don’t deserve to be mistreated, but within the vast population, there will always be a small group who will treat you like dirt on the bottom of their hoof. But that’s what makes me and my family better, to be humble enough to know you are more kind-hearted than some, and that is enough to make me remember to not let those destroy my spirit.

  “Monni didn’t deserve to be attacked, and you shouldn’t let that worry you,” I say. “Your dad is a strong man, and I know you’re scared you could lose him, but don’t exhaust yourself over something which hasn’t happened yet.”

  I feel like I’m only saying this because I know deep down I will volunteer myself if anyone in my family is chosen. I will not let anyone I love die for this senseless stone.

  “Thanks, Felix,” Pell says, her voice begins to pick up again. “The quicker this day is over the better. Come on, breakfast is nearly ready and I can’t wait to tell everyone you lost a fight to Peach!”

  Pell laughs as she heads out of my room and downstairs.

  “I didn’t lose a fight, I was just playing with that stupid fuzzy monkey!” I shout downstairs, I hear Pell laugh from the kitchen.

  As I shut my wardrobe door I notice a picture glimmer in the light. I pick it up and turn towards the window to get a clearer view. It’s a picture of me, Sparky and my mum when we were younger. We stand outside the gate to our school with both our backpacks on and our ties neatly tucked into our shirts. It was the first day we started school together and she was determined to get a photograph to remember this special day, as she called it. Her short brown hair sits perfectly on her pretty face, I always thought she looked nothing like me and Sparky, but everyone else thought otherwise. I remember my dad taking the picture, telling Sparky to smile even though he hated his photo being taken, his glum face tells it all.

  I lay the photograph back down into its box and uncontrollably smile at the thought of mum being with us again.

  +++

  Our family is late to almost everything, late to school, late to parties and one time we were late to a live theatre in the town hall. Karma ran up on us because we had to stand at the back to watch the entire play. Today is probably not the best thing to be late for.

  “Come on kids we’re going to be late! If we miss the Kings speech that’s fine, I’ve had enough of him chatter on about how he’s doing all this for the good of the Centaurs. But I’m not missing the anniversary choosing!” My dad shouts up ahead of us, about five meters in front near enough galloping to the Kings Dome.

  “Not like we’re already late,” Sparky whispers into my ear.

  Dust flies towards us from the sheer force of my dad’s heels in front. The nerves must be getting to him and I can feel them transferring to me. Thankfully, we live fairly close to the dome so it won’t take us long to get to.

&nbs
p; The rest of the walk there is silent, I feel scared enough about the anniversary today that the last thing I want to do to talk about it. My thoughts are bare and empty, filled to the top with scenarios of how the day might go, mostly horrible. I start to think how life would be like if none of us were to be chosen, happy and filled with relief I expect. Only to be reignited ten years late where another crude anniversary will occur, obviously unless the Kunzite stone is retrieved by then. I’m not sure how I feel about the King finally gaining possession of his beloved stone that he has always had a lust for, as long as it stops further Hideouts I can’t complain.

  But the thought is pushed out of my mind as we turn the corner and finally gain sight of the gigantic glass doors which stand open before us.

  I hear Pell gasp at the sheer size of the doors, they look a lot bigger when you stand in front of them. Intimidating as they are, we still have to pass through.

  As we edge closer to the doorway, the beat of distant drumming and shouting can be heard in the distance. I feel my muscles tense up at the thought of huge crowds cramming into the hall, all pushing and shoving to get a glimpse of the King. Who will be standing at the front with the names of everyone in town at his fingertips.

  Two guards with dark silver armor stand at either side of the entrance. One holds a large curved sword by his side while the other paces forwards and backwards, whistling a childhood hymn that I’ve once heard before. I can’t help but sing the song in my head as we walk past the guards into the dome, making no eye contact as we do. The smooth glass door is as tall as a house, but they seem to open by pushing a tiny golden door handle.

  As we cautiously enter into the dome, we’re hit with the smell of fresh, misty air, surrounded in rotting vegetation engulfed within a warm thick atmosphere. Condensation builds up at the bottom of the glass doors from the warm air colliding with the outside. I look up and follow the golden beams that line the glass wall, all the way to the top, where the six beams meets a small golden dot at the highest point.