Out of the blur, a woman’s horrified face reeled into focus. It was a moment before Viven registered it belonged to Aunt Gina, who was on the edge of bursting from worry.
“This place has been attacked!” she said. “Tonkeytus just informed me!”
“What?” said Viven, the lame after effects of sleep quitting him fast. “Attacked?”
“Yes,” Aunt Gina replied, fighting to keep herself composed. “I’ve asked him to get us out of here right away.”
“But isn’t this House underground?”
“So what? They brought us to this place; they sure can get us out of here too!”
“Right,” Viven said, feeling stupid. “Is it morning yet?”
Aunt Gina nodded.“Yes, so we should be safe from the dark creatures of the forest.”
“Who’s attacking, though?”
She caught her breath, about to say something, and then shook her head.
“Um, the Macacawks’ enemies, I think. Anyway, whoever they are, they mean harm only to the Macacawks. It’s best we keep our distance.”
Aunt Gina then shook Manu and Dirita awake too.
“Dead . . .” Dirita whispered to herself, staring at her cat. Viven saw Manu look at her with some sympathy.
“Are we in danger, Mum?” he asked.
“Of course we are!” said Aunt Gina. “That’s why we are leaving.” She grimaced as she looked at the door. “Ugh! When is that Tonkeytus going to return?”
“We’ll get normal, right, once we get above ground?” Manu said. “I hate this tail!”
“Yes, he said that, didn’t Tonkeytus?” said Aunt Gina. “The gods know he must pay if we don’t become normal.”
At that moment, the unbolted door was pushed open, and Tonkeytus came in. His shoulders were hunched and his haggard face was occupied with thought.
“Are you people ready?” he said with little in the way of interest.
Aunt Gina replied they were and asked him first thing whether the Macacawk features would be lifted from their bodies. The latter assured her hastily, dismissive of the subject.
“Come on, then, fast,” he said.
For the next fifteen minutes, they tailed Tonkeytus through a number of long corridors, which were in a direction opposite from the Great Hall. Each contained no less than fifty to sixty quarters, all of them stuffed with Macacawks as they could make from all the talking noises they heard. They saw none daring out into the corridors, however.
Tonkeytus was silent in heavy brooding most of the time along the way. Only once did he say something about the Macacawks being turned weaker and weaker by their foes. He muttered to himself his son was too young to join the fighting, which explained his mood to the others. Otherwise, he was quiet as a mute plant.
They arrived upon a large metal portal that had two stone sentinels, one on either side.
“Inside is the Room of Steps,” said Tonkeytus, and Viven was under the impression he was forcing the words to come out of his mouth. “That links to the tunnel leading up to the Tropagian forest.”
He stepped forth and placed a gentle hand on the polished metal. Much to the awe of the others, the portal swung and made itself ajar.
“Only a true Macacawk can open this.”
The room disclosed was well lit with lines of red torches on the walls. On the farther side was a cascade of steps, each a bulky stone resting upon another twice as big. There were about thirty of them, if not more.
There was a circular door at the pinnacle of the cascade. It was so small, it was suitable only for a Macacawk to pass through; an adult human was fated to get stuck in any attempt of entering it. Luckily none of them were humans—at least for the time being.
They walked the short distance to the steps, and then Tonkeytus climbed to the top and got the circular door open.
“Come on,” he said over to Viven and the others, and went inside. They too climbed up and passed through the door one by one. As Viven, who was last in the line after Dirita and her cat, clumsily put his right leg on the other side of the door, he viewed the gargantuan portal creak shut by itself.
Viven was surprised when he saw that the other room was devoid of a ceiling. In fact, it was the last thing you’d consider calling a room! It was rather a vertical tunnel, tens of metres high.
“What now?” said Viven.
“We’ll be needing to do a bit of climbing,” Tonkeytus replied.
“Climbing?” Sarcasm was written on Aunt Gina’s furrowed brows.
“Yeah, how’s it possible?” said Manu, shaken, rolling his eyes up at the dark rim where the tunnel ended. “It’s so steep. No one can climb this!”
“Just wait a second,” said Tonkeytus.
He grabbed hold of the lower portion of the only torch available and pulled it to a horizontal position.
Red glowing metal rails popped out of the brick slabs that formed the tunnel’s wall; and in seconds, some fifty—sixty of them had appeared, forming a straight, ladder-like line to the top of the tunnel, illuminating its entire height.
“Will we go up by these?” Manu asked.
Tonkeytus inclined his head. “Yes. Now you people start climbing fast. I’ll start after you.”
“If we fall,” said Dirita with a small gasp, “our skulls will crack open and there will be lots of blood.”
“Wait,” said Viven. Dirita was right, but there was something more. “Our hands will burn if we touch any of them!” He pointed at the glowing red of the rails.
“Tut-tut,” said Tonkeytus, shaking his head, and caught a rail too. His hand didn’t turn to ash. “See that? It’s nothing hot, just for lighting purpose. Now quick! Get climbing; I don’t have the whole day!”
“You sure nobody would lose their grip and fall?” Viven asked, concerned. He was getting a tiny itch at the back of his mind at the prospect of climbing.
“I can guarantee that only if you never look down,” said Tonkeytus, indifferent.
“Okay,” said Manu as he came near the rail ladder, gathering his courage. “Let me try first.”
“No, wait,” Aunt Gina broke in. “Isn’t there any other safer way out?”
“Well, I don’t think I would have brought you here were there some other ‘safer’ way out,” Tonkeytus replied, dismissing the question. “A little bit of Luidhor’s teleporting powder would have come handy— which was how I first brought you here. But I don’t have the guts to steal from him again. Luidhor’s not a bad man, but he’s way too reluctant about sharing his magic powders with others.”
“Then I’m climbing,” said Manu, and he stepped up on the rails and climbed.
Dirita put her cat, Mr. Mekuri, inside her boy-shirt and buttoned it, so that only the cat’s head was visible, which poked out innocently.
“Is anybody joining me?” Manu called from above, already quite a few rails up.
“I’m coming,” said Dirita, and got onto the rails. As if Mr. Mekuri knew any disturbance might lead to a costly glitch, he stayed silent and well behaved inside Dirita’s shirt, not making any attempts to get out of it.
After Dirita went Viven, and then Aunt Gina, and at the end was Tonkeytus, who kept shouting at the top of his voice, “Don't look down! Don't look down!” without stopping for once.
Aunt Gina kept complaining in a low voice, saying it was very difficult. Viven found climbing difficult too and a fearful experience. He stuck to Tonkeytus’ bidding and refrained from looking down.
Viven was impatient to reach the top, but halfway up, his grip slipped on a metal bar once and, although he regained it with his other hand, a slight shiver caught hold of his limbs. It refused to leave however many deep breaths he took to calm himself. Added to that was Dirita, who climbed at a snail’s pace. Viven knew it was a safety precaution, since Dirita was also carrying Mr. Mekuri. But as his dread for the heights multiplied with the minutes, he prayed Dirita to better quicken.
The last rail brought indescribable joy to Viven. Hauling himself over the
rim, he fell onto his knees, a sense of relief blanketing his core, his muscles relaxing.
“We have nearly reached the forest now,” said Tonkeytus, catching his breath, the last one to get to the top.
It was only then that Viven took in anything of the place they had reached. It was a medium-sized chamber, bare and fogged in near absolute darkness. The lamentable volume of light from the metal bars of the tunnel below was their only help to make out and distinguish one shape from the other.
He noticed Manu gazing at him, or that was what he thought—he could never tell, but feeling his face flush, he stood up.
“To that nook,” said Tonkeytus. Following him, Viven’s now accustomed eyes saw a circular door akin to the previous one in size through the blurry black, having a wheel over it.
Tonkeytus steered it four times, twice clockwise and twice anti-clockwise. Then, summoning strength, he opened it.
The very next instant, charming white light gushed in, dazing Viven for a moment. The scent and beauty of fresh morning light was always cleansing, no matter what uncountable number of times you had experienced it already. And after such a long time underground, it energized them, lifting their spirits.
Tonkeytus went out first, and the rest of them followed suit.
“Hey!” Viven exclaimed, having a funny sensation about his body. His torso, legs, and arms lengthened, and his tail shortened too. It wasn’t happening just with him: Aunt Gina, Dirita, and Manu were changing to their normal sizes as well, shedding their Macacawk characters of short height and tail. What’s more, the hole in the back of his shorts magically sealed itself.
In wee minutes, they had transformed to their former human selves, and Tonkeytus was once again a dwarf in their eyes.
He furrowed and commented in a bored voice, “See, didn’t I tell you? You’ve become as before.”
Viven looked up at the sky, but his gaze fixed at something else.
It was a gargantuan tree, and although the little hole they had emerged from at its base was nothing much of a bother, the unnatural black colour all about the tree, be its leaves or trunk, made him uneasy.
“What kind of tree is this?” said Viven.
“The darned Assurs did this to mark it as one of our several entrances into the House. They did it with powerful dark magic that scars a place forever. But the part they are attacking is on another side and you have no immediate danger from them.” Tonkeytus gave a distasteful look at the tree.
Quietness reigned for a while. The melodious echoing of the wind dominated in unison with the ever-chanting rustle of the leaves. Viven revised, breathing in the morning air, all that Sezia had told them to do. It had seen easy back in the prison of Nascat. But now the forest seemed bigger, while he, Viven, was small. This would be hard.
Tonkeytus evidently thought it was time he delivered his note of farewell. Breaking the dominance of the forest’s music and keeping a formal hand on his chest, he said, “So, er, this is where I should leave you. I must go. My people are in need of me in this time of chaos. May you be safe.”
“Thanks for all the help.” Viven smiled.
Tonkeytus took a breath and, making a hesitant nod bidding goodbye, turned to disappear into the dark hole at the base of the cursed tree.
***
The Demonic Tree
It did not take them long to find out they were in around the same location from where they had been taken by Tonkeytus the previous day. After a few minutes’ search helped them rediscover their stream, they continued on their trek to the axe hill.
As the hours went by, the sky darkened and the clouds cloaked the sun so it appeared like evening, not noon, was about to set. The wind gave company, no longer the pleasant breeze as before but turning fiercer with the minute, blowing away leaves of trees such that the sky was full of them.
“It will rain,” said Aunt Gina after a resounding bolt of lightning thundered high above their heads.
Viven, who was cupping water into his mouth from the stream, said, “We’d better find some big tree for shelter before that happens.”
“I think we can reach the hill before it rains if we hurry,” Manu chimed in. “It’s less than half a mile away.” Just as he finished, a fat drop of rain fell on his nose, followed by a dozen more, the trend continuing. Manu took back his words.
“Let’s go find a tree fast; I don’t want to get all wet!”
The problem wasn’t about finding trees—the forest had them in numbers more than desirable—instead, the problem was of finding a tree that had an apt amount of leaves. Most of the trees, though very tall, were slender, and their tops were too small, providing negligible protection against rain.
By the time they found a generously leaved tree, the rain had developed and taken the form of a storm. Their group was already half drenched when they took shelter beneath its bright purple leaves.
The sky scowled, and the rain pelted down stronger, the heavy downpour coming in merciless torrents, gushing and roaring wild, splashing the muddy floor of the forest.
“These are mad rains,” Viven heard Aunt Gina say, her words barely eligible through the great blather the rain was causing.
Viven felt something light fall over his hair. Retrieving it, he saw it was a leaf. He leant against the trunk as he let it fall, unsure what length of time they would have to wait for the rain to recede. And what if it continued all day long? How would they reach the hill? The night was fated to bring perils of its own.
Viven realised that the trunk was warm like the body of an animal. Not usual for a plant, he thought, despite enjoying the warmth for a change of the rain’s cold. But then, this was the Tropagian forest, the very name symbolising the weird.
Viven looked up at the leaves above, all packed tightly and thick together. So thick, in fact, it was impossible to see any of the branches and twigs interconnecting them.
Also he had the creepy thought that the leaves had actually come lower some inches than when he had last observed them. And then he felt something—a distinctive thump.
Within the trunk.
Viven was forced to wear goose pimples. He was afraid. There was something wrong with the tree, his human instinct telling him so.
He considered talking about the matter to Aunt Gina, but did not want to look foolish since there was every possibility he was just fantasizing. It was likely to be the case. But the thump had been as real as anything real.
“Er, Aunt?” he said despite himself.
“Hmmm?” Aunt Gina turned toward him.
However, the next moment, her face became utterly pale, a look of sheer terror engulfing it. She let out a fearful shriek, her bulging eyes rooted at a spot over his head.
Appalled, he looked up and his eyes witnessed only purple. The tree leaves were clustered as one massive hand.
It was upon them in no time, swatting their bodies so hard that a ton of bricks might as well have fallen on them.
Viven heard the distant high-pitched meowing of a cat and the shouts of Manu and Dirita, almost made indistinguishable under the mighty bellow of leaves rushing all over his body.
Overridden by the crushing weight, Viven tumbled onto the ground, realising the intention of the live leaves—that of squeezing the life out of them.
They surrounded Viven on all sides and pressed with such brute force that his bones fractured. With eruptions of nauseating pain taking place everywhere in his body, he prayed to the gods to make him go numb.
Every split second passing made it all the more difficult to breathe, drawing him closer to inevitable death, while his lungs were punctured by his very own broken ribs.
Prostrated, he lost the tiniest idea of his being. What was happening? Just what was going on?
Viven’s vision became black due to the immense pressure on his eyes, rendering them nothing more than meek body parts that pained in the incongruous play of leaf and death.
Enfeebled and exhausted past bearing limit, Viven blacked out within the n
ext minute, and his subconscious was beyond grateful for that.
***
It was night when Viven returned to consciousness. The moon god was high in the sky, floating peacefully amongst the plentiful rolling clouds. May thee always reign, Viven thought in prayer.
The live leaves.
“No!” Viven gasped as he remembered what had happened. He looked down at his body, overcome by reflex, expecting a bloody mess.
Nothing.
“What?” he asked himself, shocked and gleeful at the same time. Nothing at all! No crumpled arms and legs, no bones sticking out, no trace of blood, not even a little bruise! In fact, his body’s condition was perfect—But how? And it wasn’t like he was in afterlife or something, right?
He cast a wary look around, just in case. He spotted a strange tree that although was bare of leaves above, had a heap of them at its base, withered dead leaves soaked in water from the earlier downpour. But oddly, smoke was issuing from them.
Since the night was dark, Viven couldn’t make out their colour, but just then, recollections flooded his mind.
The monster tree.
Yes, it was the one. Viven was certain. He picked a stone and got up, his clothes squelching as he did so. His shirt and trousers were sodden in water and mud, on the backside particularly.
He threw the stone at the leaves. No movement besides that created by the stone. Getting angry, he threw another, bigger this time, yelling loudly. No response. It was like throwing stones at normal leaves.
Viven didn’t understand; first they get attacked by these live leaves—wait.
They!
“Aunt! Manu! Dirita!” he shouted, his heart at his throat. “Aunt Gina! Manu! Dirita!” He stopped.
“No! No! No!” He rushed to the fallen leaves, praying himself to be wrong. This shouldn’t happen! This can’t happen!
He searched hastily amongst the leaves, half expectant that a limp limb or two would show up any moment. He had no idea how the demonic leaves had met their demise, not that he cared. All he wanted was to not find anything amongst them.
Viven exhaled when the search proved futile. But where are they? They had to be somewhere.
The Sword of Tropagia Page 8