Explorers_Beyond The Horizon

by C J Paget

  You need to see the miracle for yourself.

  With bare hands, open the spinning top and look under the golden flowerpot on the bottom shelf closest to the door of the greenhouse. You’ll know what to do next.

  I did my best to protect them, and now that I’m dead I need you to take my place. Love them, McKenna, and protect them. Please. I know I wasn’t there for you, and I hope that once you see what I’ve been doing, you can forgive me.

  Love you,

  Dad.

  McKenna held the note to her chest as she attempted to draw in air through her tight throat. Them? The plants? Heat born of rage swelled in her soul. She grabbed the toy and coiled her arm to throw it, but whispers once again broke the silence.

  “Please don’t,” a tiny male voice said. “Help us, McKenna.”

  She gasped, lowered her arm and searched the greenhouse, but found nothing she hadn’t seen before. Between ragged breaths, McKenna said, “Wha—who are you?”

  Silence.

  She palmed her forehead as if that would keep her mind from falling into the crazy pit that had claimed Dad. “You’re losing it.” Why did I even come here? This is insane.

  Her trembling fingers dropped the toy and note, and she ran to the door, but the vines had woven a tangled web across the exit. Unwilling to consider how that could have happened in such a short time, she pulled one of them, ripping it in half. A cry came from behind her. Adrenaline surged through her core in a scalding wave. Had she hurt the plant? When she turned to look for another way out, something flew at her, her hands rising to catch it out of instinct.

  Too stunned to move, she stared at the object in her fingers. It was the bag containing the top.

  “Please,” the same small voice said. “We’ll die without you.”

  The desperation and grief in the tone cut through McKenna’s anger like a serrated knife. She flinched, her fingers fisting around the toy.

  A tingling in her spine came with hope that she’d find answers if she followed Dad’s instructions. She’d never believed in anything supernatural, but with no body to accompany the one speaking, she’d either been wrong not to believe or her mind was slipping into the abyss. Either way, she had a sudden, burning desire to know what waited for her down there. That her fear and anger had vanished should have bothered her, but it didn’t.

  With bare hands, open the spinning top. McKenna turned the object over in her hands, then slipped her fingernails into the crack along the center. At first it didn’t give, but her need to solve the puzzle drove her to pry harder as she grunted with the effort. With a splintering sound, it finally gave, slicing her finger as it did.

  “Dammit.” McKenna shook her damaged digit, blood dripping from the wound. Look under the golden flowerpot. She located an overturned container of the right color, the only one that didn’t contain a plant. Her hand reached for the object before she could consider whether or not she should, as if by remote control.

  Beneath the aged, ceramic pot, she found an impression in the dirt that appeared to fit the two halves of the spinning top. Taking one half in each hand, she fitted the items into the slots, dripping her blood across the soil as she worked to make the pieces sit just right.

  The dark earth trembled and the crimson drops of McKenna’s life disappeared into it. As if someone had flipped a switch in her body, her senses awakened; brightness, sound, and scent overwhelming to the point of panic.

  Before she could think about how to escape, pain sliced along her back. Crippled by the agony, she flopped onto the floor, writhing so hard she slammed her head against one of the posts supporting the glass ceiling. Sparkling white stars danced in her vision, and unborn screams jammed sideways in her throat. Both of her legs snapped in unison, the terrible cracking sounds invading her ears like shards of glass. Her skin shrank and split, her hair fell from her head, and every cell echoed its pain.

  McKenna cried out inside her head. She could no longer speak.

  The pain stopped as quickly as it had arrived.

  I’m dead. Oh, God, I’m dead!

  Afraid to move, McKenna remained motionless with her eyes closed, gasping with sudden exhaustion and the adrenaline crashing around her body like an angry surf against the rocks.

  Sounds of fluttering wings beat against her skin, as though her entire body registered the noise, especially her legs. Vibrations traveled the length of them, giving her a sense of direction where the sound originated—directly in front of her. Trembling under the strange sensations, McKenna couldn’t make herself look.

  “After your father’s stories of you, it doesn’t surprise me your Shyll form is that of a dragonfly.”

  Shyll? That voice again, but what did he mean about a dragonfly?

  “He loved to wonder what you’d become, McKenna.” The smooth male tone drew nearer, along with the padding of feet. “Please don’t be afraid. You’re safe here.”

  Curiosity forced one of her eyes open a slit. A striking man stood before her with wind-tousled blond hair, eyes like summer night skies filled with twinkling stars, and wearing nothing but a bit of black cloth wrapped around his narrow hips. His pale hand, decorated with gray splotches up to his shoulder, extended toward her.

  Beyond him the greenhouse and everything in it had grown to gigantic proportions. Either that or she’d… shrunk.

  When she opened her mouth to launch a scream, nothing happened. McKenna tried to lift her hand to her throat, but she found a spindly black leg where her arm should have been. Something moved against her back. A twist of her head—farther than it should have been able to move—revealed a set of paper-thin wings with veins of silver running through them. Another set protruded from her other side. Terror ripped through her with crippling force. She thrashed and tried to run, but her legs, all six of them, didn’t work the way she remembered, and piles of fabric on the floor impeded her progress.

  “Whoa.” The man’s hands folded her wings back and held her against the floor with his weight. “It’s unnerving the first time, I forget sometimes. Just relax and think about your true form. Concentrate and you’ll shift back.”

  Shift back? What do you mean? The words rattled around in her head, but found no exit. His touch and calming words helped her to do as he said. McKenna imagined her reflection in the mirror that morning, her stormy gray eyes, her shoulder-length auburn hair. A splitting sound came with a few pops as her body contracted and pulsed, but no pain came along with it, just pressure. Her skin grew tight until it fit her properly again.

  Whimpers fell from her lips as she raised her shaking hands to look at them, uttering a gasp of relief that her fingers had returned.

  “That’s better.” The man crouched beside her, wearing a bright smile. “I’m Kendu.”

  McKenna tore her stare from the odd gray markings all over Kendu’s body to look at his face. “What are you? What happened to me?” She scrambled to her feet and discovered the material on the floor was her clothes. With her new size, she could have fit into the pocket of her capris. “I’m still small!” Her voice rose to a shriek and her hands attempted to cover her nudity.

  “There are things you must see before I explain everything. Put this on.” Kendu tossed a few strips of fabric to her like the one he wore, while averting his eyes.

  After struggling to wrap the material and tie the ends McKenna stared at Kendu. “I’m dead, aren’t I? I hit my head, and I died.”

  “No, you’re not dead.” His eyes shimmered with a touch of humor before turning serious again. “The artifact is designed to breech the skin of a new owner. By mixing your blood with our soil, you’ve become our new guardian.” Kendu’s smile appeared a little sad but nonetheless warming. “Please let me take you to the village, and I’ll explain everything.”

  My blood? So that’s why Dad said my hands had to be bare. “Your…guardian?” McKenna’s hands slid into her hair. “Is that what my dad was? You’re the ‘them’ he was talking about in the note.”

 
He nodded. “Your father was the very best we’ve ever had.”

  Tension sang through McKenna’s body. “So…you’ll tell me why I had wings and what happened with my dad, if I go with you?” Despite the urge to run screaming from the greenhouse, the need to reverse her size and the knowledge she’d sought for years kept her in place. “And then you’ll put me back to normal size?”

  “Anything you want to know. Once you see the village, I’ll tell you how to return to normal.”

  McKenna blew out a breath as if she’d been holding it all her life. “Okay.”

  “I’m going to shift, so don’t be afraid.”

  Shift?

  Her eyes widened as Kendu dropped to his hands and knees and the skin along his back opened. He never made a sound as giant gray wings with blue eye-like spots unfolded from either side of his spine just under his shoulder blades. The rest of him contracted into an oblong, furry moth body with two antennae protruding from his head. When he spread his wings, McKenna backed up a step, never having seen such a large insect.

  Kendu edged closer to her and flattened his wings, like a horse waiting for his mount. She scanned the area for any witnesses to her acid trip before climbing onto the moth and gripping a handful of the course hairs that covered him.

  With her nose pressed into Kendu’s warm, fuzzy back, McKenna inhaled his clover-fresh scent while his wings beat against the air, carrying them up to the third shelf of plants that had seemed miles away from the ground.

  When he landed, she climbed off and stared at what looked like a dirt road winding down the center of the containers. Overhanging foliage gave it the appearance of a shady path through a lush countryside, each leaf moving independently as if individual minds controlled them. Every flowerpot had at least one doorway and two windows, and some had more that looked like they would open to a second story. Some of the pots sported spots or stripes, some had hand-painted tulips and daisies, and some were plain ceramic in various shades.

  Was Kendu’s village in the flowers?

  Kendu grunted as he changed back, then wrapped his cloth around himself again. McKenna hadn’t noticed where he’d stashed it during the flight, and she didn’t ask.

  “Welcome to Shyllandra,” Kendu said from behind her. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

  Screwed up eight ways from Sunday, something out of Alice in Wonderland that had stolen her dad from her, but she supposed it was beautiful if she could get past all of that. Without turning to look at Kendu, she said, “I don’t understand any of this. You’re a moth. My blood dripped onto your magic dirt, and…are you saying I turned into a dragonfly?”

  “We’re shape-shifters that predate any the human legends cover. We were born with the earth itself, though we never needed a guardian until the humans began destroying our safe havens to build their parking lots and high towers. One of my ancestors developed a way to alter a human so they could be part of our world and understand who we are. Your form happens to be a dragonfly. Your father was a grasshopper. Normally we’d never recruit someone with a family, but we were desperate after our last home was destroyed. The seeds your father planted are the last we have, and once they’re gone…” Kendu rounded McKenna and stared down at her with shadows swirling in the depths of his eyes. “I’m so sorry we took him from you. He talked of you oft—”

  “Save it.” McKenna strode down the road, trying to outrun a lifetime of hurt. “This is all ridiculous. If he thought so highly of me, he wouldn’t have spent all his time with a bunch of freak bug shifters who live in flowerpots. Why didn’t he just tell me?”

  Kendu’s feet pounded the dirt until he caught up, then kept pace beside her. “It’s forbidden for a guardian to reveal us to anyone, a rule put in place when one of our original guardians tried to sell us to a circus. Even if they choose to, it’s physically impossible.”

  “Isn’t that convenient.” She uttered a low groan and walked faster. “Just show me whatever you need to so I can get back to my life.”

  Every time Kendu opened his mouth to say something, she feigned interest in the woman sweeping dirt away from her pink door with a fern leaf and the tiny child clinging to one of her legs. The little girl’s copper pigtails bobbed up and down with her mother’s movements, and she grinned at McKenna, her eyes sparking. A spark of recognition registered in McKenna’s thoughts, but she didn’t know why.

  As she wandered farther along the road, the overhead plants appeared more wilted than the first ones she’d seen, and her footsteps cast dirt into the air that was so dry it could have been a desert. Nothing green moved.

  McKenna stopped and stared at a black and yellow bumblebee that flew to the top of a blue ceramic container, transformed into a little round man with a belly like a beach ball, and went to work peeling away brown, shriveled stalks from the broad-leafed plant. A towering cone-shaped flower that rose above him had withered into something that resembled a dried cob of corn. His mouth folded down at the corners and filth caked his hands as if he’d been working non-stop for days.

  A glance at the other houses revealed similar circumstances, withered greenery, dead flowers littered everywhere, cracking pots and people scurrying around to repair one thing or another. Their expressions were all equally grim.

  “What happened here?” McKenna forced herself to look at Kendu. “It was so green and healthy back there, and the vines moved, but…everything’s dying, isn’t it?” Her hand went to her stomach, uncertain why it suddenly hurt.

  Kendu stared up at the glass ceiling that didn’t shine as brightly with sun as it had a few moments before. “We can’t turn on the water ourselves, and there are so many predators beyond these walls, it isn’t safe for us to try to carry water back from the lake. Your father died as he was watering the section we entered back there. The rest has been without water for a few days longer.”

  “Are you saying…is this my fault, because I took so long to get here?” McKenna glared at the moth man, unwilling to get sucked into the guilt trip she was on.

  “No!” He slid fingers into his hair, something near panic in his voice. “I promised your father I’d wait until you came. He found happiness here, and wanted the same for you. Life out there is harsh, but in here…” Kendu stopped in front of McKenna and grasped her face in his warm hands. “I know it must be hard for you to come here, and you’ll need some time to accept what we are, but we won’t survive much longer like this. If our host plants die, then so do we. We need you, McKenna.”

  Was that how the Shyll had sucked Dad into their world for days on end? Care for us, or we’ll die? Well, she wasn’t as gullible as dear ol’ Dad. Hell no.

  McKenna shook her head and backed away from Kendu, away from the forlorn faces of the people who picked up chipped pieces of clay from their homes and raked up once beautiful blossoms that had turned into wizened blobs of faded color. “I know what you’re doing, so just stop it. Dad might have fallen for all of this crap and lost his mind in the process, but I won’t. Now, change me back!” Please let me wake up.

  Kendu nodded and instead of the anger that McKenna expected, a deep sadness cast gloom into his features. “I guess it was silly of us to think you’d care after what we did to your childhood. You must have a good life out there somewhere.” He turned, his shoulders wilting as much as the vines winding around the yellow container beside McKenna. “Put the two halves of the spinning top back together and you’ll return to your normal size. He did love you, and for what it’s worth, I’m sorry.”

  Although she didn’t want to, she couldn’t help but watch him walk away, her throat swelling with guilt. Kendu approached a small group of men and women with every color of hair, wearing the same strips of fabric he did. When he shook his head at them, they all let out cries of grief.

  Unable to tolerate the weight of the world she’d found, McKenna turned away from the gathering Shyll and went back the way she came, concentrating to keep one foot moving in front of the other instead of turning around. She didn�
��t know how she’d get back to the ground, or how she’d manage to maneuver the two parts of the toy back together, but she had to get away.

  Once she made it back to the green part of the village, the vines once again slithered against one another like cats scent-marking. Their yellow and white blooms dropped petals around her like soft rain, caressing her bare arms and wafting her with their sweet perfume as if they too wanted to entice her into staying. No! They were just plants. Weren’t they?

  “You’re Neil’s daughter,” a soft voice called.

  McKenna recognized the pink door before she remembered the woman with the little girl attached to her leg. “Yes.” McKenna didn’t move any closer to the woman with her long, fair hair and twinkling blue eyes. She imagined butterfly wings protruding from her back, but had no idea why the image came to her.

  “You look so much like him.” Offering a smile, the butterfly lady limped to the end of her stone walkway with the girl perched on one foot, until she stood a few feet from McKenna. “I’m Meera, and this”—she ushered the girl forward—”is Naya.”

  McKenna studied the urgency in Meera’s stare, wondering what thoughts went with it. Was she trying to tell McKenna something? Why wouldn’t she just say it? Unable to decipher the look, McKenna turned her attention to the grinning child. Then, another young girl stepped out of the flowerpot and came up behind Meera, gazing at McKenna with the same eyes as her little sister, the color of storm clouds, a dark, slate gray. A mirror of McKenna’s own. And Dad’s.

  “This is my other daughter, Nadine,” Meera said.

  “No!” Gasping to fill her spasming lungs with air, McKenna stumbled backward in an effort to escape the truth that stood before her. “He didn’t.” She shook her head and cleared the lump from her throat. “Please, tell me he didn’t.”