Game World

by C. J. Farley

  The shadow stopped, turned, and she embraced it. Or tried to.

  Her arms passed right through it.

  The game was no game, said the shadow. The Baron tricked me into making his portal. He wanted to send agents to Earth—for what end I do not know. When I tried to stop the madness, he attacked. The Baron has mastered a terrible obeah. With it, he can separate his enemies from their shadows. Our shadows embody our dreams. Torn in two, our bodies wither away. He stole my shadow, and my body fell into a dreamless daze.

  “So Nanni isn’t behind the Confederacy of Shadows,” Dylan said. “It was the Baron all along.”

  “That must have been the flash of light I saw beneath your office door just before you collapsed,” Ines said. “The giant crimson feather must have been from the beast. The Baron is behind the beast, not Queen Nanni. But why is he stealing shadows? What’s he doing with them?”

  I left clues for you to find me. But my body is beyond all assistance. One word kept me: daughter.

  “Why didn’t you tell me anything before? About Xamaica?”

  I was trying to protect you. You are my greatest invention! That is why I created your show. So you could have adventures and never be harmed.

  “You just didn’t want to deal with me! You didn’t want to deal with questions about the company, which was a total fraud!”

  I thought that someday Mee Corp. could make the game without the Baron. I didn’t know we were part of a devilish scheme. I never tried to cheat anyone—you have to believe me!

  “Why should I believe you? Everything you’ve said is a lie!”

  Because I want to make it right. She can do that. She knew others would come for me. She released me when she could not save herself.

  “Who is she?”

  You must find her. You must find the Root. I’m so sorry.

  “Dad—you’re beginning to fade. Where are you going?”

  Do you believe in me? the shadow asked.

  Ines tried to grab hold of him.

  My little warrior.

  “Why do you keep calling me that?”

  It’s what you picked at your Toljabee. You fell asleep waiting for me, and when I came home, you had it clutched in your hand. You never knew, but you made your choice as you dreamt. An arrow. It meant you were a warrior. My little warrior.

  “So you came back! You did come back!”

  But then he was gone. Ines was left holding only water.

  Ines’s mouth opened into a soundless roar of rage and sadness.

  As the Watas swam around them, Dylan and the spider hugged Ines and held her tight beneath the waves.

  Dylan found his own thoughts drifting back to his sister. He had felt so angry at her, and now he felt ashamed and heavyhearted. Emma was gone, and Eli too. He had never felt grief like this, and it weighed down on his chest like the fathoms of water above him.

  Ines swam away.

  “Where are you going?” Dylan asked.

  “My dad said the book we saw was an illusion,” Ines said. “That means the real book is still out there—maybe in the Castle of Wonders. And maybe the Root—whatever it is—is there too. My dad is gone—but it doesn’t have to be forever. We just need the right magic. Maybe if we can find the book and the Root . . .”

  Dylan put a finger to her lips.

  Some creature was swimming toward them. And it was humongous.

  In the lower depths swam a huge glowing thing. The water around it bubbled like it was boiling. The beast had horns, a snout, and hoofs. Its eyes were flaming.

  Dylan and Ines began to swim frantically for the surface. Whatever was waiting for them up there couldn’t be worse than what was lurking down deep.

  “Dude!”

  Dylan stopped swimming and looked back.

  “What is it?” Ines asked.

  “It’s Eli!” Dylan answered.

  Eli had become a Rolling Calf.

  “Sweet!” Dylan gave his friend a fist bump. Or, rather, a fist-to-hoof bump.

  Nestuh gave Eli a warm embrace.

  “You didn’t really think I was gone, did you?” Eli laughed. “I still need storytelling lessons!”

  If Ines’s face hadn’t already been submerged in seawater, it would have been wet and salty with tears. “I’m so glad you’re alive!”

  “Of course I’m alive,” said Eli, who had obviously been cured of the Soucouyant’s vine spell. “I’m my true Xamaican self.”

  * * *

  Eli told Dylan and Ines his story. His snuglet had saved him. The new company that made them had a better safety record than Mee Corp.—now the snuglets were flame retardant. Plus, at the last second, Eli had had the bright idea to soak the snuglet in seawater to protect himself from the fireball. He hadn’t gotten burned too badly, but he was knocked into the waves. He had followed the book down through the deep water. He realized it was crazy doing what he was doing. He couldn’t walk much less swim. But Nanni’s book was just there at the tips of his fingers. He thought of his family—the images the Soucouyant had shown: the divorce, the derailment—and it was all because of money. He had to get that book. If he could only move a little faster, reach out a little farther. The book was glowing. He could see it pulsing just in front of him, all golden-green in the undersea light. Deeper and deeper they both fell—the book and the boy. He didn’t know if he was alive or dead. He was drowning as he sunk further beneath the waves. He let himself sink.

  That’s when he thought of his mama and papa. They never gave up. Not when Papá’s businesses fizzled and money was tight and things were hopeless.

  He realized he had to go back. His friends were still in danger, so the book would have to wait. He could sense watery creatures all around him. They buoyed him, and brought him to the surface. His lungs filled with air and the creatures swam away. Some sort of magic was in him. He felt like a tadpole becoming a frog, or a caterpillar becoming a butterfly, multiplied by the speed of light. His feet became hoofs, horns sprouted from his head, and a mane grew out of his scalp. Steam poured out of his nose and mouth. He was a Rolling Calf. Watas all around him, he dove back down deep looking for his friends.

  “So where do we go now?” Dylan asked.

  There was no time to celebrate Eli’s return. Ines was already swimming deeper.

  * * *

  Now they saw where the shadows went.

  Beneath the blue and green of the sea, past the yellow and green of the coral reefs, atop the tan and gray surface of the sea floor, there was a strange shifting spot.

  If Dylan hadn’t been looking for it, he might have swum right past it. But now that he’d beheld it, he would never forget it. “The Baron didn’t spend his riches on a Castle of Wonders,” Dylan observed, looking around. “He used it to build a prison of shadows.”

  The prison’s walls were tall and black and ever-shifting. The gate was wide, and topped with jagged spikes. Inside were endless rows of cells, each one enclosed by black bars which shimmered in the vagrant undersea light. It might have been elegant, perhaps even beautiful, had it not been so ominous.

  Behind every barred gate there was another shadow. These shadows were alive: there were long shadows and short ones, squat shadows and skinny shadows, shadows with long talons and ones with blunt hooves.

  Some shadows seemed in agony, and beat their heads against shadow walls. Others seemed in despair, and bent their heads back to howl shadowy screams.

  Many prisoners were fastened to dungeon walls with ebon chains. A few were held in dark stockades. Still others were pinned down in writhing masses by weighted nets.

  “I wish we could help these prisoners somehow,” Ines said.

  “They’re just shadows,” Dylan replied. “We can’t even touch them.”

  “The book is here somewhere,” Eli said. “I can feel the magic.”

  “After all we’ve been through, you’re still after that book?” Ines complained.

  Then, on some lower frequency, something entered their thought
s.

  (Krik krak)

  Dylan, Eli, and Ines exchanged glances. Something was broadcasting into their minds.

  It was a faint voice, but a sure one—it had a steady, meditative quality. It was like a whisper; not in the ear, but in the heart. Someone, something, was relaying important information to maintain a center in the midst of chaos, punishment, and imprisonment.

  (Krik krak)

  “A shadow has to anchor itself in one thought,” Ines said.

  “So whoever this is has anchored themselves in that phrase,” Dylan said. “My sister!”

  Rushing away, they tried to follow the voice. It seemed to be calling them in a certain direction. Dylan, Nestuh, and Eli, with the Wata Mamas all around them, passed through the shadow prison. Ines swam out in front. Every so often a shadow would swim up to them as if searching for its lost body and then drift away in wordless disappointment.

  (Krik krak)

  The prison was getting darker. Perhaps this was the high-security wing. The walls were as impenetrable as sleepless nights.

  “We have to keep going!” Dylan urged.

  “We’re close to something important,” Ines agreed.

  * * *

  At last, Ines stopped swimming. Whether she had reached her breaking point or their destination they did not know. All around was blackness.

  (Krik krak)

  “Emma? Emma?” Dylan called.

  There was something blacker than the surrounding darkness. There, up ahead. A tall shadow. It loomed above them.

  Dylan pointed to Nestuh.

  The markings on the spider’s back were suddenly coming alive.

  “Someone meant for us to come here,” Dylan said.

  The spider’s markings, which had looked like eyes, now became a face and a body, wrapped in a dark cloak.

  (Krik krak)

  Now the body and the shadow joined together.

  The eyes opened.

  For a moment Dylan thought he was staring into Emma’s eyes. And then not.

  Her appearance was balanced between youth and old age. She had full lips, high round cheeks, and an angled nose with deep creases around her nostrils. Her skin was the color of the red-brown dirt of Xamaica. Her gaze had the hard, cold glint of starlight. Her expression was still and sour, like a bowl of lemons. She could only be Queen Nanni.

  Dylan, Ines, and Eli recoiled in horror. Queen Nanni was almost certainly a villain, perhaps a murderer, and definitely alive. They should have seen this coming—if this prison held Nanni’s book, why shouldn’t it also hold Nanni herself? Now, unwittingly, they had released Xamaica’s greatest enemy. Now they were deep underwater, lost, alone, and completely defenseless. They had walked—or more accurately, swum—right into her trap.

  Dylan tried to launch himself at her, to attack, but some enchantment around her held him and the others in place. They were caught as easily as a fly on a frog’s tongue. The children could not hear what the sorceress uttered next, but they sensed her words in their hearts.

  (Krik krak) she said. (Nanni’s back)

  (Are you wizards?)

  Nanni’s words rang clear and cold in the children’s heads, like ice cubes clinking and clattering in an empty glass. Her crimson hair wrap, piled high on her head, made her seem even more towering, imposing, and witchy.

  “No, Your Majesty, them just kiddy-kids,” said Nestuh, who had recovered himself a bit and now stood between Nanni and her visitors from Babylon.

  “I’m Ines Mee. So far this year, my name is the 227th most searched-for term on the web.”

  “Is it just me or are your numbers falling?” Eli muttered.

  (By the Inklings! You are neither wizards nor warriors! Ahh—the shame of it) Her lips didn’t move, but everyone heard what she said, an instant message to the brain.

  “I keep hearing that name—who are the Inklings?” Eli asked.

  (They are the world-builders, the dream-makers, the ones that bridge the stars with thought. Had they loosed me, I might have been content. But I have been freed by mere mortals. Are you, at the very least, of royal blood?)

  “I hacked into Buckingham Palace once,” Eli said. “Fun fact about the Queen of England: Googles herself at least ten times a day.”

  (Oh—I see. You are jesters and fools, sent to amuse me!)

  “We come for a purpose,” Ines said. “I seek the Root of Xamaica.”

  (Then you have found her)

  “I don’t understand. You’re the Root?”

  “Fruit are some, branch is others . . .” Nestuh began.

  (. . . the Root am I) Nanni finished.

  “Why shouldn’t we attack you?” Dylan asked. “How do we know you’re not responsible for a whole variety of crimes?”

  (Because if I wanted to kill you, I would have done so already)

  “She has a point there,” Eli admitted. “A frightening point, but a point.”

  (Hold your tongues. You are babes, too young even for the Crimson Vision. The time has come for us to take our leave)

  “Where are we going?” Dylan asked.

  “What about your book?” Eli said. “What about Nanni’s book?”

  (Shut up! Speak when spoken to, jester. Now follow!)

  With a sweep of her black robe, Queen Nanni turned away.

  “Did we not just free her from a magical prison?” Eli said to Dylan and Ines. “A please or thank you would be nice!”

  “I know, right? I can’t believe I came all this way and the Root isn’t a thing, it’s a person,” Ines said. “And a really horrible person to boot. She’s like the Wicked Witch of the West Indies. How is that gonna help my dad?”

  “I don’t think your father was looking for help for himself,” Eli said. “I think he thought she could somehow help Xamaica.”

  “Don’t talk about my dad in the past tense,” Ines said sharply. “Eli’s back, right? There’s hope for my dad and your sister. We just need the right magic.”

  Dylan could feel more obeah in the air. “Something’s happening.”

  Nanni waved her right hand and the sea opened up. She raised her left hand and her sleeve slipped down her long, lean arm; a great filmy sphere formed, glistening like a soap bubble in a bath, but as large as a bus. Nanni dropped her arms and bent over in exhaustion. For a second, her years seemed to catch up to her, and she appeared to be unimaginably old. Then her youthful appearance reblossomed, if that’s even a word, and she slowly stood upright. With a grand gesture, Nanni motioned for the children to enter the bubble, which hovered slightly above the exposed seabed.

  “Dude—do we have to go?” Eli asked.

  “It’s either that or drown,” Dylan answered.

  “I’m not certain which is worse,” Ines said. “I have to admit, though, she looks beyond awesome for her age. I guess two thousand is the new twenty.”

  The children squeezed into the bubble, which closed behind them as each one got in. The bubble then rose above the seabed, above the water, and, quickly and silently, floated across the waves, through the air, and beyond the clouds.

  Below and behind them, the shadow prison was still very much intact. Nanni had great power, but even her abilities had their limits. Such a deep spell was woven through the walls of the jailhouse that even she couldn’t simply topple it. Instead, she and the others fled. The shadow inmates looked up from the depths mournfully as the children flew away.

  “What about the prisoners?” Ines asked. “Aren’t they your army? Why are you leaving them behind?”

  (Address me as Your Majesty!)

  “You’ve got to be kidding!” Ines said. “You’re becoming a royal pain in my . . .”

  Queen Nanni’s eyes glittered, chilly as starlight.

  “Nope, you’re so not kidding,” Ines said. “Okay, I’ll play this game. What about all the people that went to prison because of you that you left behind while you made your getaway—Your Majesty.”

  Nanni ignored Ines’s sarcastic tone. (Jester, there are th
ings you couldn’t possibly understand. To make them whole and lift them from this place will take deep concentration. I will need my book)

  “So your book isn’t lost!” Eli said.

  (Nothing is lost that cannot be found, jester)

  Dylan couldn’t trust this witch, but he had to ask: “My sister is missing. Have you seen a human girl?”

  (No) Nanni said. (But if she is gone, then it is likely the Baron has her. He seeks to intercept visitors from your world. There are so many missing in these times. She is but one of many)

  The words hit Dylan like a fist. His sister—a prisoner. They had spent all this time searching for her—and she was probably being held in the first kingdom they visited. He tried to push all his questions about his dad and the Xamaicapedia out of his mind to focus on the task at hand. A gloom came down on his brain like a curtain at the end of a play. He couldn’t bear to think of Emma hurt, or imprisoned. Many of the times he had yelled at her—or made fun of her—flashed through his mind. The time they had that mix-up at that stupid pirate party; the time when she correctly answered a question in math class that he had just gotten wrong; the time when—the time when . . . there were so many and they all seemed to mean so much then, but now they just seemed mean.

  “It’ll be okay, man,” Eli said to Dylan, sensing how upset he was. “We’ll find her.”

  The bubble kept floating along. The children peered through the glistening curved surface at the world below. This was the other side of Xamaica. This was across the tracks, how the other half lived, the lower frequencies. The blue waters and green hills were gone. The land was gray and dead. The trees were leafless or fallen or simply stumps. The rivers had dried up and the riverbeds were muddy and the riverbanks were littered with the skeletons of creatures that had perished from thirst. Fields that once boasted rows of sugarcane were now acres of dirt and weeds. The air smelled like the parts of the fish you don’t eat, and garbage that you forgot to take out, and armpits you had neglected to deodorize.

  “What happened here?” Ines asked.

  (When Xamaicans have a funeral, we invite neighbors to pay respect by gathering on the lawn—we call it the Dead Yard. The land here was lush. Now it is all the Dead Yard)