by Jason Letts
“There’s nothing you can give me, but there is one thing you can do for me. When we’re out there during the Final Trial, that’s when you pay back my help. Not only will you not do anything to hurt me, you’ll come help me if it looks like I’m in trouble. How about that for a deal?”
A look of wonder and trepidation swept over Mira’s face after hearing Rowland’s proposal. The expectations she had for what would happen as she tried to win seemed so improbable with this extra responsibility thrown in.
“You’re saying you want me to protect you? Isn’t that against the rules? It’s a free for all after all.”
“Look,” he began, laughing to himself. “I’m going to give this one away as a freebee. If you don’t think every other student in this class is working their own chain of secret alliances, then you got another thing coming. You’re jumping in at the end of it, but we’ve been preparing for this for our entire lives. Now I’m happy to help you, if I can count on you when the time comes.”
After the initial shock of this arrangement faded, Mira started to think that living up to an agreement would not be so difficult. Since fifteen of them would be out there, what were the odds she would be in a situation where she would need to act on his behalf? Even then, taking someone on with Rowland could be better than doing so alone. The service she requested would make her drastically more formidable too.
“Alright. You’ve got a deal, but I’ll need you for the rest of the afternoon, depending on how fast you can work. And if it gets down to the end, you have to know the only person I’ll be defending is me,” she said, growing more serious.
“Of course, of course,” he grinned. She watched Rowland approach Sophie, who still stood in the doorway. She had grown impatient, and Rowland’s news that he would not be coming with her made it worse. He tried to lean in and kiss her, but she stormed away. Picking up his bag, he returned to Mira.
“Don’t worry about her,” he said, but his unconfident tone made Mira think he questioned his agreement. Without saying any more, she led him home and instructed him to wait in the backyard. She emerged from the house first with a glass of cold water and second with several sheets of irregularly shaped and dented metal.
She set them on the ground in front of him, and he picked them up and ran his hands over them. He felt the cracks in the metal and the jagged edges.
“How does it work, the bending?” she asked. Rowland looked up at her, squinting with the sun in his eyes.
“It all just feels like putty in my hands, but that’s only the beginning. It took me a long time to learn how to touch. You’ve got to be soft and gentle, like with a newborn baby. Getting impatient and rushing will make it snap and break. Even these solid objects have a flow inside of them, and that’s what I can tap into and use.”
Exerting a slow, constant pressure, he took the metal sheet and folded it in half. He pressed it against itself, and soon the fold disappeared and the sheet became half as long and twice as wide.
“So what is it you need me to do?”
“I need two wings, like the wings of a hawk. They need to be identical, they need to be this long, solid, and they need to have a hinge at the top joint. And this piece has the right oval shape, but it just needs to be smoothed out. Can you handle that?”
“How long did you spend abusing this poor piece of metal?” he asked, picking up another sheet. “Yes, I can do it.”
“Let’s get to work then.” Mira directed Rowland’s every move. She watched him as he measured the sheets to the appropriate length. She told him how many indentations to make for the feathers. Most importantly, she helped him construct a hinge at the top that would allow the wing to rise and fall.
Rowland listened carefully to her directions and peppered her with questions. Mira could understand why he wanted to gain some insight into the mechanical creations she’d devised beyond just what he needed to correctly perform his task. Without a clue of what these wings were for, he saw that their complexity far outstripped any of the tools he had made, and her answers contained few details as well. As he molded and carved, a smile of excitement and wonder struck his face.
By the time he finished and Mira gave a satisfied nod at the beautiful and elegant handiwork he had wrought for her, he started asking her about some of his own ideas for new creations.
“I’ve never had to think so hard about this stuff before. I always thought it was just using my hands. I’ve got to know, Mira. What’s this for? What aren’t you telling me? I can’t put it together.”
“You’ll just have to wait and see,” she said. He looked at her pensively, and she knew he wanted to pry for better answers, but he said nothing more. He accepted her thanks, declined another glass of cold water, and decided to set off now that his work had finished. He had intended to remind her of their agreement when he departed, but at the moment he could only muster a serious look and a nod.
Soon Mira found herself alone with her pieces. She hauled them back through the house to the basement stairs. A broad smile peeked between the metal.
“What’ve you got there?” Kevin asked.
“I’ll show you soon. I’m almost finished.”
Setting the pieces down on her basement table, Mira got down to work putting the finishing touches on her machine. Taking the smooth shell, she covered the egg’s internal motors, circuits, and batteries. She attached the wings’ hinges to the outside of the shell, near the top. They hung down around the egg’s curves, and Mira tested them by lifting them up until they stuck out straight.
The last thing she did was stick on two large circles for eyes, making the final product look like a baby chick had broken through with its limbs.
All of this took some time, but Kevin hadn’t moved from his spot upstairs when she dragged her creation up to find him. He looked at the thing in her hands and scrunched up his face.
“We didn’t mean this when we told you to make friends.”
“Very funny, but you won’t be making jokes for long,” she said, gesturing for him to follow her outside.
Kevin took his place out in the yard under the budding trees. Mira set her footless chick on the green grass and took several steps back. She held the feet in her hands.
“Ok, you know what to do,” she shouted to him. “Try to attack me, but beware that you do so at your own risk.”
Kevin looked down at the metal hunk of junk on his lawn, which looked equally pathetic though more ridiculous than her last construction, and nodded. He directed his eyes to a puddle over near the garden, and Mira watched him salivate with likely thoughts of dunking her in it.
He took a step forward and Mira clicked the button on her control. Kevin stopped abruptly when the top of the machine began to spin. It gradually picked up speed, and Mira watched with breathless anticipation as the force of the spinning began to lift the wings.
“What’s wrong? You don’t want to give it a taste of your boot?”
“I’m not going anywhere near that thing!” Kevin said, unnerved yet engrossed. They both watched the spinning wings and listened to the steady whir. The wings reached the highest point the hinge would allow and stuck out straight, curving downward slightly at the back.
Time stopped for Mira as the sight of the rapidly spinning wings absorbed her. The machine started to totter, and then it gradually left the ground, hovering a few inches into the air. Kevin clapped his hands and laughed, and Mira raised her arms in success. The machine continued to gain altitude, climbing up to their waists, chests, and just over their heads.
Mira walked underneath the flying contraption and looked up at the sky through the spinning wings. A hawk soared above them, gliding beautifully and majestically just like on the day Mira had first been exposed to the wide world.
Collecting both feet in one hand, she reached up with the other at the stumpy legs above her. Without much effort, she pulled it down a few inches. Letting it go, she shook her head and came out from under it. Pressing another button, the m
achine began to slow down and sink. A few inches above the ground, it dropped suddenly and fell on its side.
“It’s still not good enough,” she said with a pained look. Kevin come up beside her and put his arm around her.
“You’ve still got some time, and, besides, this can’t be your only form of defense. As cool as this is, it’s not going to knock anyone over. Only you can do that. You’ve got to think about what you’re up against and what you’ll need up your sleeve to come out on top.”
“I know,” Mira said. “You have to knock people out to win, and I still need to figure out how I’m going to do that.”
“Just put your mind to it. The answers will come to you. Haven’t they always?”
Chapter 12: Dustfalls
After peering at the clear mucus caught in a rag, Vern once again brought the rag to his face to unleash a powerful sneeze. He wiped his face and tried to sneak a glance back at the row of students following him. Though they marched along in unison directly behind, he scolded them all for being slow and barked at them to catch up.
Blossoming trees hung overhead, offering some shade from the bright sun. The outpost shrunk behind them in the distance. It faded back just as the mountains before them grew taller and more threatening. They had started before the sun came up and wouldn’t reach their destination until it had risen to its peak.
Fortst walked impatiently alongside his charges, frequently passing them and then stopping so they could catch up. His head twitched back and forth, trying to look in all directions at once. He kept vigilant, and they all wondered what kind of danger Mr. Bogger had referred to.
In the middle of the line, Will swatted at the mosquitoes that casually attacked him. He had slapped his right cheek so many times that it had taken a distinctive red color. To retaliate, Will stuck his foot out to trip Jeremy, who walked in front of him. Will felt something tickle the back of his neck. Reaching back to slap it, he grumbled when he found some blood and a dead mosquito in the palm of his hand.
“You’d think you would care a little more about your flies, Jeremy, and not send them off to their death one by one.”
“If they can provide me with a little amusement, their lives were well worth it,” he said.
Elsewhere in line, Roselyn and Mary chatted incessantly. If they had to spend all this time walking along, they might as well entertain themselves while doing it. Fortunately for them, they never seemed to run out of things to talk about. From people in town, to their hair, to stories from the capitol, their conversation shifted fluidly without the slightest interruption.
“If you don’t stop that idiotic gossip right now, I’m going to reach down your throats and make sure you never speak again,” Aoi said.
Having been so absorbed in their conversation, it startled them to find they weren’t alone. They looked back at Aoi’s bloodthirsty glare and clenched fists. She wanted to make good on her threat.
“You know, you might have better luck if you weren’t so mean all the time,” Roselyn said to her. Aoi blinked and scrunched her brow, confused.
“Better luck at what?”
“Any number of things, boys, people in general, life, being happy,” Roselyn said.
“You do realize we’re going off to war, right?” Aoi asked, strands of her black hair hanging over her hard eyes.
“What better place to meet boys than a war,” Mira said.
“That doesn’t mean you have to be angry about everything and miserable. Don’t you think it’s better to let minor irritations roll off your back rather than kicking up a fuss every time things aren’t quite how you want them? You might find it’s possible to actually enjoy things that way,” Roselyn said, her curls rolling over her shoulder as she faced forward.
“I’m not miserable…” she whispered to herself after a time.
They left the edge of the forest behind, and ventured into rockier territory. The barren stone mountains wrapped around their point of view, and a cool breeze swept down into their faces. Their path inclined gradually, and they struggled to walk over loose gravel. Fortst now led the group by several paces. He tried to scout ahead for signs that they headed in the right direction. He looked down every diverging trail for the narrow chasm. As they walked through the maze of fissures, caverns, and craters between the two mountains, it dawned on them that getting lost with little water and no food could easily come to pass.
The group wound through the passageways with the sun beating down overhead. A few began to complain of being tired, which only served to make the rest feel tired. They arrived at an indentation in the rock that would shield them from the sun and decided to take a break. Sitting down, they let their heart rates and breath settle while Fortst dashed around the rocks in an attempt to figure out where they needed to go. Rowland broke the silence.
“I heard at Cypress Mill Academy last year they all agreed upon their final rank beforehand, and all the students just laid down in that order without any kind of a fight.”
“Sounds good to me,” Vern said. “I know you all won’t mind letting me have the top spot.” Every student who entertained thoughts of winning laughed, and the sound echoed a quarter mile away.
Shuddering from an impressive leap, Fortst caught a ledge and pulled himself up a steep rock face. His chafed hands and strong arms had no trouble scaling to the top. The students watched him from their spot in the shade, waiting for him to give them some kind of signal.
“I don’t think we could do something like that. Do you know how they did when they came back from The Shadowing and went off to fight?” Will asked.
“I guess they just worked like clockwork, everyone doing exactly what they were supposed to perfectly, and they’re all still alive and fighting,” Rowland said.
“Wow,” someone muttered as the grimmer likelihood of their own future took hold of their minds.
Pulling himself over the top onto a flat ledge with a few grassy tufts, Fortst got to his feet and surveyed the wide expanse around him. Between the two mountains, the outpost appeared to be nothing more than a tiny speck. Underneath him were natural stone pillars, boulders, and the mountains’ roots that they navigated through.
Walking off to the left around a bend, a breathtaking sight stopped him cold. Behind the mountain, another peak in the chain rose, one he had not seen before. Unlike the other stone behemoths, worn into strange shapes by water and wind, this one looked like a giant anthill, and about as solid. It took a perfect cone shape all the way down to its base, right above a basin and a narrow chasm.
“We’ll be fine,” Vern said. “You’ll just have to trust me.”
“Why do you always assume it’ll be you leading us?” Aoi sniped. “Do you think if you just insinuate it often enough we’ll all forget how terribly that would work out?”
“It’ll work out a whole lot better than if we all had to follow every crazy impulse that crosses your mind. If it couldn’t be me, I’d much rather see someone like Rowland get it, at least he has some idea about strategy.”
“Crazy? I can’t believe you just said that. At least I wouldn’t just be looking out for myself!” she said, jumping to her feet. Jeremy watched from the corner, smiling, shaking his head, and musing about plans of his own.
“We’re going to decide this the same way it was always going to be decided,” Roselyn interjected. “We’ll have the Final Trial on the Vernal Equinox, and whoever wins will be our leader, for better or worse. Getting into shouting matches now won’t do anything.”
Mira peeked her head out from the cavern and caught a glimpse of the sun’s location high in the sky.
“It’s only days away now,” she said.
Fortst ducked around a corner and came into view.
“Break time’s over! It’s this way. Let’s get going!”
The students reformed their line, with Vern at the front, trudging along behind Fortst through the mountain pass. They crawled around mysterious stone pillars as the path dove down into the rock.
The walls surrounding them grew taller, and the students marveled at the distinct layers of stone from eons ago that they could reach out and touch.
A slight breeze, like a breath, blew into their faces. It distracted them from the rocks and the silence. Passing more rock embankments and curving around more stone pillars, the breeze grew stronger. They no longer stepped on solid rock but traversed a sandy surface. Just as the students began to lean into the wind to keep their footing, they came upon a narrow path to the left from which the breeze gusted with fierce intensity.
“Not much farther now. Come along!” Fortst shouted from the front. By the time his voice traveled to the end of the line, it had been altogether consumed by the wind. Walking onward required great effort now, and every student ducked just behind the one ahead. They seldom dared to look ahead. The wind carried sand and grit that pelted them from head to toe. It collected on the ground, and their progress went from a walking on a beach to heaving through a nasty sand trap.
Fortst took the brunt of it himself, scoffing at this puny obstruction. He lunged forward with a long stride, his boot sinking into the sand like it was snow. Momentarily losing his balance, he reached out for the wall with his hand. Soon the entire group huddled against the sidewall, looking for easier passage.
After what seemed like an eternity, Fortst looked up and caught a glimpse of the chasm’s end. The wind and the sand spat at them, and several students slipped and fell to the ground. Only when they joined hands did they make it to the end.
They exited into the opening and immediately felt relief from the wind pressure, which the narrow chasm intensified. A few of them laughed, and the rest enjoyed being able to hear again. Once everyone had been pulled out of the wind tunnel, they could finally take stock of their surroundings.
The most impressive feature of this basin, which they marveled at with a never-ending fascination, was the sand waterfall that poured down from the top of the gorge. The billowing stream originated at the bottom of Anthill Mountain, which towered overhead. Millions of tiny grains of sand slipped down the mountain every second. They tumbled down the dustfall and either caught the wind and rode away or trickled to the students’ feet.