Billy: Messenger of Powers

by Michaelbrent Collings

  Then, a noise interrupted him and Ivy. A beating of great wings. A sound of wind and fire. They all looked up, and slowly, gracefully, a form that Billy remembered well dropped from the sky.

  Billy’s friends all gasped and gaped, and Billy had another one of those “I told you so” moments. This time, however, he actually gave voice to the sentiment.

  “See?” he said. “I told you that I’d seen a Unicorn.”

  And so it was. The magnificent flying horse with the horn of gold settled slowly to the earth beside them. It looked at the group, meeting the eyes of each one in turn, then turned to Rumpelstiltskin’s still form. The old man was breathing only with difficulty, clearly showing that he was not long for the earth.

  Mrs. Russet came running up, concern for her husband etched into her face as the huge animal stepped toward him. “What are you doing?” she cried, anguish in her voice. “What more can be done to him?”

  But Billy stopped her, standing in front of her before she could interfere with whatever the Unicorn was doing. “Wait,” he said.

  The Unicorn nodded at Billy, as though to thank him for his help. Then it leaned toward Rumpelstiltskin, just as the old man breathed one last breath, and then was still.

  Mrs. Russet let out a sob of grief, and then that sob turned to a wail of fear as the Unicorn leaned in even closer. Slowly, it dropped its head, until at last the horn touched Rumpelstiltskin’s forehead. Then the Unicorn moved, and the horn lightly touched each of the man’s closed eyes, then his gray and slack lips.

  And as the Unicorn did so, Rumpelstiltskin’s skin returned to its former pink color. He gasped and his eyes opened. He looked around at the company, clearly confused.

  Then, his gaze fell upon Mrs. Russet. “Lumilla,” he said. And with that, Billy saw the steely-eyed teacher disappear, replaced by a woman in love as Mrs. Russet threw herself upon her husband, and kissed him.

  The Unicorn pulled away, giving the reunited lovers their space. It looked at Billy, then it looked at Billy’s side, where the sword of the White King still hung, and nodded again.

  “I know,” said Billy quietly in response. “I haven’t forgotten what I have to do.”

  The Unicorn neighed and reared up on its hind legs. And with a great flap of its snow-white wings, it shot into the sky, and was gone.

  Billy watched it disappear from view, then turned away from his friends.

  “Where are you going?” shouted Vester. Billy ignored him, walking toward the river that ran over the top of the tower. “Hey,” said the fireman, “what’s going on?”

  Still Billy walked. He drew near to the river’s edge, and then pulled the sword from its sheath. It gleamed with that inner fire once more, with the enormous power that had called forth victory from the depths of defeat. Billy looked upon it, savoring its beauty, its majesty, then hurled the sword into the river.

  “No!” screamed Vester, launching himself toward the river, clearly intending to dive in and get the sword again, bad arm and all.

  But before Vester reached the water’s edge, a hand shot up out of the river. It plucked the sword out of the air, then both hand and sword slid into the river and were gone in an instant, though Billy thought he could see the flick of a coralline tail as they disappeared.

  Vester began wading into the river, but Billy put a hand out. “Don’t bother,” said Billy. “It’s gone. Taken by Blue.”

  Vester stared at him in horror. “What did you do?” he demanded. “We won the battle, not the war. The Darksiders are still out there, and you just threw away our best weapon.”

  Billy looked at the river, and the coolly flowing waters. He murmured some of the words of the Prophecy:

  “A sword, a spear, and armor strong

  A shield to wear, and dagger long

  To fell the Dark and bring the Light

  To call the spark that ends the night.”

  Vester stared at him. “What does that mean?” he asked.

  Billy smiled. “It means I’m the Messenger, and even though my message has been delivered, I don’t think I’m done with this world.” He drew himself up to his full height, all five feet nothing of him. “It means there are other weapons,” he said. “And I will find them.”

  CHAPTER THE THIRTY-FIRST

  In Which Billy must Go Home, and finds that there are still a few Surprises…

  The coming hours and days were filled with reconstruction. The Dawnwalkers had regained control of the island, but much needed to be done. And once again, Billy’s friends were at the middle of it.

  Fulgora was no longer needed in an immediate battle, but still she secreted herself away with Vester—whom she had appointed as her Knight Marshall—and insisted on planning a defensive strategy for the future. Vester had protested the appointment, pointing out that he was not one of Fulgora’s subjects, and besides that, he noted that he only had one working arm so he didn’t know what kind of Knight Marshall he could be. Fulgora, typically, had told him to shut up, be quiet, stop making a fool of himself, and get to strategizing with her.

  As for Ivy, she went to work with her father—whom they found under a pile of rubble, weak but alive—tending to the wounded and regrowing the island. Soon, the flowers were once again in bloom, and Powers Island teemed with life. There were still evidences of the fighting, but as the Earthtree grew and laced its tendrils and greenery over the whole of the island, even what remained of the destruction was changed, and made beautiful. The island had been destroyed, but out of the destruction had come life, at Ivy’s hands.

  Tempus was soon at work, too, flying over the island so that he could provide a bird’s eye view of the things that needed to be done. He clearly loved the job, laughing and playing as he flitted to and fro, calling down to those hard at work below, always ready with a joke—even though sometimes his jokes were meant to be serious comments, but just came out sounding a little off, or even just downright nonsensical.

  Terry was still weak and withered, and Billy knew that he would never again be the strong and tall man that Billy had seen in Mrs. Russet’s memories, but at least he was himself mentally once again, and Billy was glad to see his teacher so happy at the return of her husband, who had been lost but was now found again. The two stayed constantly together, mostly working side by side on the top of the tower, looking at sunrises and sunsets together, and making up for the years they had lost.

  But as for Billy himself, he suddenly found himself largely useless. The others tried to include him, he could tell, but there simply wasn’t much he could do. Once again, he was a non-Power in a world of Powers, like a blind man in a world of the sighted. But he tried not to let it get him down, mostly spending his time chatting with the elevators—who thankfully no longer referred to him as Boy Number 3583Q—and walking around the island. He walked its mountains and its valleys, forded its streams, climbed its trees, and felt of its power. But still, he was mostly alone, a bit homesick, and largely ignored in the press of work that followed the destruction of what was already being called the Battle for Powers Island.

  One night, he was feeling particularly lonely and useless. He sat at the edge of the tower, his legs dangling out over space, looking at the empty scabbard he still had strapped around his waist. A noise alerted him that someone was coming, but he didn’t look up. Then a swish of brown robe appeared in his peripheral vision, and with a creaking of old bones Mrs. Russet slowly sat beside him.

  They looked over the tops of the clouds for a time, then she finally said, “Are you all right, Billy?”

  He nodded, but Mrs. Russet clearly didn’t believe him. “What is it?” she asked. “What could possibly be bothering you?”

  “I don’t know,” Billy finally said. “I just feel like I’m not helping anything I guess.”

  “Not helping!” said Mrs. Russet, incredulous. “Billy, you above all others are responsible for saving this island, for saving the Dawnwalkers and the world of the Powers!”

  He looked at her
. “Was I? Was I really?” He looked away, then shrugged. “I don’t feel like I did much. I don’t have any powers, and the only things I really did were when I felt like someone else was guiding me. So it wasn’t me that did anything, not really.”

  Mrs. Russet pursed her lips. “Well, as for you being guided, just because you have a guide doesn’t mean courage isn’t required. Many a person who has been guided up a mountain has turned back before reaching the summit. And you never turned back, Billy.” She thought a moment, and then said, “Besides that, as for your not having powers…I wouldn’t be so sure.”

  Billy felt a thrill of hope. “But, I didn’t really pass the Test of Earth, and I haven’t done anything other than Glimmer a little that one day at school.”

  “Oh haven’t you?” asked Mrs. Russet, with a glimmer in her eye. “What about the Fizzle?”

  “Huh?” asked Billy.

  “Vester’s Fizzle. Prince,” she said.

  “What about it?” he asked.

  “Don’t you remember what you were told about Fizzles? That only a great Power can keep it around outside of that Power’s presence.”

  “So?” asked Billy.

  “So,” said Mrs. Russet, “as much as I like Vester, and respect him as a smart and good person, he is not a great Power. And there’s no way that he could have kept Prince alive to protect you the way that Fizzle did.”

  “Then how did it happen?” asked Billy.

  Mrs. Russet smiled. “You did it, Billy.”

  “Me?” said Billy, nearly dumbstruck. “But I didn’t mean to.”

  “No, you didn’t,” agreed Mrs. Russet. “But I theorize—I believe—that you did it nonetheless. Just as I believe that you were the one who turned Fulgora into a dragon each time you were worried she was going to come to harm. You wished her to be saved, and the Elements themselves moved to change her, to save her according to your will.”

  “But,” Billy stammered, struggling with these ideas, “but I didn’t want those things to happen. I mean, I wished for something to happen, but not those things in particular.”

  “That may be true,” said Mrs. Russet. “But I still think you did those things. You showed control of Red Fire, when you saved Fulgora and when you walked the halls of my Memory to save me from my Dread—something that no one else has ever done before. And when you were in the sea you were able to stay alive and call to Artemaeus to rescue you, with the Power of the Blue. You saw the future when you had a dream while riding with Artemaeus, and saw yourself wielding the sword of the White King, though you didn’t know it at the time. That’s one of the Powers of the Gray, to see the future. You wielded the White Sword, made of diamond, purest of the treasures of the Brown. And,” she continued in what was almost a whisper, “you saved my husband. You called forth the Unicorn, and it brought the Element of Life on its wings.”

  “What was the Unicorn, anyway?” asked Billy.

  “I don’t know,” said Mrs. Russet.

  “You don’t know?” said Billy incredulously.

  Mrs. Russet laughed. “Believe it or not, there are a great many things I don’t know, Billy Jones,” she said. Then she sobered. “The war has just begun. Eva Black was the real power behind this most recent struggle, and she is still at large, and no doubt angrier and more vengeful than ever. The Darksiders have grown more powerful than we had imagined, and Wolfen shows us that we cannot trust anyone to be what they appear. And most important, the weapons of the White King must be found so that the world can be prepared for his return. So though some things have been made clear, there are many mysteries still to solve, many strange things to understand.” She leaned in close to Billy, almost conspiratorially. “But I have figured out some things,” she said.

  “Like what?” asked Billy.

  “Like who the White King is,” she said.

  “Well, he’s the White King,” said Billy, confused.

  “Yes, but I think I have discovered his name. And I think you know it, too,” said Mrs. Russet.

  “I do?” asked Billy. He thought. “No, I don’t.”

  “You mean you haven’t figured it out?” she said, and laughed again. “Billy, don’t you realize what you did when you drew the White King’s sword from the Diamond Dais?” Billy shook his head. The twinkle in Mrs. Russet’s eye brightened still further, and she said, “Young man, you pulled the sword from the stone.” She waited, then said, “You held Excalibur, the sword of King Arthur, the White King who brought peace to the earth, and who will bring it one day again.”

  She laughed again at Billy’s expression. “But I thought he was a legend,” said Billy.

  “And so he is,” said Mrs. Russet. “But like many legends, this one has its roots in fact.” She nodded at the nearby river. “Haven’t you wondered why Blue the mermaid wanted the sword so badly?”

  “She said it was hers,” said Billy.

  Mrs. Russet nodded, “And so it was, once, long ago. I believe she was once the original Blue Power, one of the six Councilors who helped Arthur craft this island from raw Element. And it was she who designed the sword, and dipped it in the living waters of the Earthsea, so that it would be ever sharp and true and never broken, just as the seas of the world will never break. Then she cast it into Arthur’s hands, and now she holds it in her own, the sword returned to its maker, a woman who had a name long ago, now named Blue the mermaid, but once known as the Lady of Shallot.”

  Billy reeled, trying to digest all this information. Then he thought of something. “It can’t be,” he said decisively.

  “And why not?” asked Mrs. Russet curiously.

  “Because, well…wasn’t the sword only supposed to be pulled from the stone by someone who was going to be a king?” asked Billy.

  “Interesting, isn’t it?” was Mrs. Russet’s only reply, and she looked sideways at Billy with an expression he didn’t quite understand, but one that made him thoroughly uncomfortable.

  “So what do we do now?” asked Billy, changing the subject.

  “We look for the White King’s weapons. And then we try to find him, and bring him back to us to restore the earth to peace again.”

  Then Mrs. Russet’s expression sobered. “But before that happens, I’m afraid I have some bad news for you.”

  “What?” asked Billy, a sinking feeling in his stomach.

  “When the Darksiders arrived, you remember how Wolfen said they didn’t need to come through the Accounting Room anymore?” Billy nodded. “Well, it turns out that’s because they somehow managed to destroy—or at least weaken—the spell that separates Powers Island from the rest of the world. So they could just Transport in, rather than having to come through the conduits that were originally required for entrance to the island. And there’s been an…unfortunate side effect of that.”

  “What?” asked Billy.

  “Our time has slowed down,” replied Mrs. Russet.

  It took Billy a few minutes to understand what that meant. “You mean….”

  Mrs. Russet nodded. “Yes. Normally the time passed here would be as nothing back home. But with your time on Dark Isle, and the time you’ve passed here after the broken time spell, I’m afraid several weeks have passed back home.”

  Billy paled. “My parents are going to be worried sick!”

  Mrs. Russet nodded. “And that’s why it’s time to go home.”

  “But what are we going to do? They’re going to want to know where I was! What am I going to say?” He stopped a moment, then added, “And what about Blythe?”

  Mrs. Russet’s expression darkened a bit. “Blythe is a young girl. Perhaps she was a Darksider because her parents were, and she simply didn’t know any better. Perhaps she was a follower and believer, though I didn’t see her among the Darksiders whom we found after the battle. Either way, from what you said to me about her, she was someone that was good to you, and whom you cared about.”

  Billy nodded. “Then,” said Mrs. Russet, “let us see what happens, and not borrow tr
ouble. Perhaps you will return to find her still a friend. And perhaps,” she added as the twinkle returned to her eye, “perhaps even more.”

  Billy looked away, embarrassed. To change the subject, he said again, “But what about my parents? And what about school? I missed all that time. How are we going to explain that?”

  Mrs. Russet hugged Billy, and then, in defiance of all laws of the universe, his teacher kissed the top of his head. “Oh, Billy, I think we’ll find a way to take care of those problems.”

  “But how?” Billy insisted.

  Mrs. Russet laughed long and loud, seeming to find his expression deeply comical, then said, “How will we do it? Why Mr. Jones, hadn’t you heard? We can do magiq here.”

  And Billy jumped. Because he had heard the silent “q.”

  And he suddenly knew that he would one day do magiq too.

  EPILOGUE

  Billy sat and looked at the horror that hunched before him. It was oozy, slimy, something that had once been alive, at least theoretically, but now was only a man-made terror to be visited on those who least deserved it. But no matter how much he hated and feared what was before him, he knew there was only one thing he could do.

  He opened his mouth wide, stuck a piece in, and chewed.

  “Ugh,” he said to himself after swallowing. “I hate Salisbury steak.”

  He was sitting alone in the hall outside the cafeteria. Actually, not in the hall: he was sitting under a water fountain, hoping that no one would find him here. But someone did.

  He watched as a foot in a white sneaker walked into view and stopped in front of his hiding place. The sneaker was connected to an ankle, and the ankle—as Billy knew ankles tended to do—turned into a leg. Billy’s gaze followed the leg up. It was a girl’s leg, and a nice one at that.