Forts Special Edition: Fathers and Sons

by Steven Novak

  Fellow could remember very clearly his final moments and could recall the instant when he had been brought back to life with equally stunning clarity. It was the spaces in between that seemed to elude him. The girl, the sweet, innocent little girl had powers – incredible powers – powers he could not begin to understand. As a rule, Fellow had put little faith in the prophecy of the Fillagrou people. It simply did not seem realistic, and in a world as harsh as the war torn one he lived, there was little time and patience available for things not clearly real. He had prided himself on believing in that which he could see only with his eyes, on the quantifiable, the obvious and the explainable. He had no time for the concepts of magic and fate– strange ideas better left to others. Now though, all of this had changed. Not only was magic real, it had touched him. It was something he had experienced. He was now the living embodiment of magic – and fate. Every injury he had suffered over the course of the long war with the Ochan nation was gone, wiped away as if they had never existed. The bad back he had tolerated after an accident suffered as a boy was also healed. Every muscle in his body felt alive, strong and young. It did not make sense, yet at the same time it existed. Looking past the intoxicating feeling of his rebirth, his mind wandered to the safety of the children in the cell across from him. The Prince had witnessed the little girl’s powers firsthand and he no doubt understood, just as Fellow did, exactly what they implied concerning the future of the Ochan nation. While the Prince may not have taken the children seriously at first, he was forced to after this incident. Fellow understood that he had to do something, though he had no idea exactly what. He had to protect these two strange children somehow since they theoretically represented an end to the war. He also owed the little girl his very existence, a debt he could never hope to fully repay.

  No matter the cost, however, he was going to try.

  Crawling on his hands and knees toward the steel cell bars, Fellow’s voice was hushed, but deep with seriousness. “We have to get you out of here. Prince Valkea isn’t going to let you live for long, especially now that he knows what you’re capable of.”

  Staci was still staring blankly at her hands. Raising them in front of her face, she began twiddling her fingers back and forth as if they were something completely foreign to her. Nicky Jarvis, on the other hand, listened intently to the creature in the opposite cell. Nicky crawled over to Staci and put his hands on her shoulders, trying to gently shake her out of her trance.

  Every prisoner in every cell along the long hallway of the dungeon had also witnessed Staci’s powers, each of them trying desperately to hear what Fellow was saying to the magical little girl. Some among them were familiar with the prophecy and had understood the magnitude of the recent happenings. Those unfamiliar with the stories, though, had been no less impressed by the strange girl’s powers.

  Nicky shook Staci harder, to no avail. Despite his attempts to coax her back to reality, she remained stoic, lost in the lines and contours of her palms. Realizing that the child was unable to understand a word he was saying, Fellow altered his game plan, turning his attention to the rest of the prisoners in the dungeon.

  Painfully he wedged his head through the bars and screamed, “LISTEN! ALL OF YOU! WE MUST NOT LET THESE CHILDREN BE HARMED! DO YOU UNDERSTAND ME!? IF YOU REALIZE WHAT HAS JUST HAPPENED HERE, YOU KNOW THAT WE MUST NOT LET ANYTHING HAPPEN TO EITHER OF THESE CHILDREN, NO MATTER THE COST!”

  The guard at the end of the hallway quickly closed the distance between his post and the screaming Chintaran.

  Drawing his sword from the sheath on his back he grumbled angrily, “QUIET, PRISONER!” With his free hand he struck Fellow on the side of the head, sending the fish-man tumbling into his cell. “One more word out of you and I guarantee it’ll be your last!”

  The guard turned to the children’s cell and stared at Staci for a moment. Strangely, he found the tiny, frail-looking female a little frightening after what he had seen earlier. Though he tried to disguise how he felt, he failed. Turning her gaze away from her hands, Staci glanced at the Ochan.

  Immediately the heavily armored soldier stood in a battle-ready position, tightening the grip on his sword. “You just stay where you are, creature! Don’t think even for a second that your magic frightens me, because I assure you it does not! Make even the slightest movement and I guarantee that you will taste the end of my blade!”

  The door at the end of the hallway opened abruptly and General Gragor stepped through with three soldiers in tow. The group quickly made its way to the children’s cell. Turning toward the dungeon guard, General Gragor laid one hand on his shoulder, with just the slightest bit of squeezing pressure. “Lower your weapon, soldier. Be proud. You have served your King with distinction and your contribution to the empire will not be forgotten.”

  Though a bit confused, the guard slowly lowered the sword . “Thank you, General, but I’m not exactly su…”

  Before he could finish the sentence, General Gragor snatched a dagger from his side and sliced open the guard’s neck. The movement was quick and precise, the cut deep and fatal. The the guard’s blood was sent spitting across the room as if shot from a fire hose. In less than a second, his body fell limp to the stone floor with a heavy thud.

  The children’s cell door creaked open; two guards rushed inside, picking up them up. Nicky struggled to break free from the grip of the guard holding him, but the large creature’s arms felt as if they had been carved out of stone. With her mind still far away, Staci made no attempt to struggle. She did not cry, she did not scream. She simply stared blankly ahead, unaware of her situation.

  With the side of his face still sore, Fellow stood up and ran to his cell bars. “LISTEN TO ME, EVERYONE! WE CANNOT LET THEM HURT THESE CHILDREN! WE HAVE TO DO SOMETHING! WE CANNOT LET THEM HURT THESE CHILDREN!”

  General Gragor violently shoved his boot through the bar, kicking Fellow in the chest. The blow was heavy and precise, fracturing three of his ribs which caused him to collapse yet again. Fellow immediately clutched his chest, gasping for air.

  Fellow’s ribs that had been magically repaired earlier were broken again. Had the situation not been so dire, he might have laughed at the idiocy of it all.

  The two guards carrying the children walked to the end of the hallway and exited through the massive door.

  General Gragor turned toward the remaining guard. “Lieutenant, I want every single creature down here killed immediately. No pomp or circumstance. I simply want them dead, and I want them dead now. Bring as many men as you need to get the job done. Understood?”

  The soldier nodded and pulled the sword from his back as he licked his lips, anxious to carry out the orders.

  General Gragor turned toward the cell of Fellow Undergotten, his eyes filled with a mixture of disdain and disgust.

  With a deep, heavy voice he growled, “Start with this one.”

  *

  *

  CHAPTER 33

  THE TATTLE TALE THUGS

  *

  For hours Chris Jarvis sat unmoving, comfortably reclined on an old green chair in his living room. Were it not for his occasionally blinking eyes and the soft, slow rise and fall of his chest, it was almost impossible to tell if he were still alive. On the mantle above the fireplace, a picture of his wife Megan with his two young sons stared back at him. Try as he might, he could not bring himself to look at anything else. Their faces were frozen in time, their smiles carved forever, silently judging him. Their eyes, red from the flash of the camera, cut through him and into his chest as they peered through the bones of his ribs, examining what little remained of what once had been a proud man’s soul.

  At one point in his life Chris Jarvis had been a good man, or at least he once believed this to be.

  Chris could remember a time when the sun, the moon and the stars revolved around Megan. He had breathed her air deeply every night before drifting off to sleep. It was the milky blue of her eyes in which he had bathed and the softness of her skin that
had instantly transformed the day’s troubles into faint remembrances. It was the wondrously soft, beautiful and warm light that she had emitted from inside that illuminated his world. She had given his life purpose and reason. He had never met anyone quite like her and he knew that he never would again. When she passed away, her light and her warmth had left with her. Shrouded in darkness by the reality of life without her, Chris had lost his way. He had neglected his job, his family and his friends. He had brushed aside responsibilities in favor of an endless and unyielding process of grieving that encompassed him fully. When even that became too unbearable he had enlisted the aid of a bottle, drowning what little remained into its wholly numbing liquid.

  Now, with both of his boys missing and possibly dead, he found himself sitting in quiet reflection of his life, not being sure that it deserved to be called such.

  What would Megan think of him if she could see him now? What would she say if she could see the way he had treated Nicky or the things he had done to Tommy? What if she had found some way to do just that? What if she was staring at him right now, using the photo on the mantle across the darkened living room to watch his every move, shaking her head in disgust and wiping tears from her eyes? The idea chilled him to the core.

  Inside his head he softly whispered the words, “I’m sorry” hoping that wherever she may be, she would hear and possibly forgive. In his heart he knew that she would not – and he honestly did not blame her.

  A knock at the front door pulled Chris away from the photo and back to the world of the living. Another heavier, more insistent set of knocks splashed against his brain like a bucket of cold water, causing him to leap to his feet. He made his way to the door and opened it. Standing stiffly on his front porch was a tall, thick man in a trench coat, with dark hair and a neatly trimmed goatee. Two local sheriffs stood at the foot of the porch. Behind them, Chris noticed a row of cars parked along the street, two of which bore the markings of the local police department. The man with the goatee reached into a pocket and removed a badge, flashing it at Chris.

  With a steely look on his face, he asked in a deep voice, “Christopher Jarvis?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m Detective Myerson. I’ve been working on the disappearance of your sons and a few other local children. Could I come in and ask you a few questions?”

  For some reason a shiver of fear traveled up Chris’ back, caught the muscles in his neck and caused his head to jerk straighter than it had been in years.

  Through a set of dry lips he managed to stutter, “S…sure. Sure, come in…”

  Stepping meekly aside, Chris motioned for the detective to enter. Myerson turned and gestured toward the officers behind him, letting them know that their presence was not necessary. After the detective moved past him and into the house, Chris closed the door. He followed Myerson, who walked into the living room as if he had lived in the house his entire life. Myerson stopped and took note of everything around him, cataloguing it in his brain for future reference.

  Chris eyed the man intently. The detective was clearly looking for something, but he seemed unsure as to just exactly what it was.

  “Do you have news on my boys?” Chris asked, breaking the uncomfortable silence.

  Slowly Myerson turned to Chris. He took a deep breath and motioned for him to sit. “Actually, yes. You might want to have a seat, Mr. Jarvis.”

  Every muscle in Chris’ body froze. His legs locked up and his back turned to solid concrete. He could inhale but found it almost impossible to exhale, which caused irregular breathing. Myerson again motioned for him to sit. Chris again brushed off the offer, indicating that he would rather stand. Out of the corner of his eye, Chris caught a brief glimpse of the photo on the mantle. He could still feel Megan’s eyes looking at him from across the room, watching his reactions and judging his every move.

  Content with the fact that Chris wished to remain standing, Myerson reached into his jacket and retrieved a small notepad.

  Flipping it open quickly, he continued to speak. “A couple of local boys confirmed for us this morning that they had seen four of the five missing children…two of which were your sons…near a stream about a mile from here. They claim that your eldest son, Tommy, was engaged in a fight with a local boy by the name of Donald Rondage. They told us that both your son and Donald fell into the stream while wrestling and that neither ever came up.”

  Were it not for the fact that his muscles appeared to have been frozen, Chris Jarvis would have toppled over.

  What had he done? All those years, all those mistakes, all the things he had said – and now this. His brain tried to formulate an appropriate response to everything the detective had just said but it failed. His mouth opened but little more than a small puff of hot breath escaped his lips.

  “Mr. Jarvis, we have teams checking every square inch of that stream right now. If your boys are in there, we’ll find them.”

  Chris turned away from Myerson and from the picture on the mantle. His breathing became significantly more awkward and labored. Myerson took note. The air around Chris tasted stale and vile, every breath feeling as if he inhaled a fire so old that it had existed since the dawn of time. The slightest movement of his eyes caused them to well up. The furniture, the walls, the carpet, the action figures Nicky had left strewn across the kitchen floor, everything in his home was taunting him. Everywhere he looked at harsh reminders of what he had done to his wife and his boys – of how he had failed them.

  From behind him came the voice of Detective Myerson. “There’s one other thing, Mr. Jarvis…”

  Chris turned around just in time to see the detective pull a plastic bag with several pieces of paper out of another pocket. After holding it up in front of his face for a brief second, he tossed it onto the coffee table near Chris. Tentatively Chris reached over and picked up the bag. He cautiously examined it.

  “We found those taped to the walls inside a tree fort near the stream where your sons were last seen.”

  Chris pulled the papers from the plastic bag, slowly riffling through them. They were drawings – Tommy’s drawings – crude drawings depicting the cause of Chris’s greatest shame. There, recreated and brought to life by rubbing colored pencil and crayon against paper, were images of him hitting his eldest son.

  Myerson glared at Chris from across the room. His eyes burned a hole in the center of Chris’ skull. “I was wondering if you wouldn’t mind answering a few other questions for me, Mr. Jarvis.”

  *

  *

  CHAPTER 33

  THE PASSING OF THE SIGHT

  *

  Zanell ran for what had seemed like forever through the nearly black, tight and crowded southern passage. Every single muscle in her legs ached and burned, protesting and begging for her to stop. It had only been an hour since she had stopped crying. She was quite simply cried out. The image of her grandfather buried in the rubble as her friends and family were slaughtered all around her was something that she would never forget and something that would bring tears for years to come. At the end of the dank corridor, she stopped to catch her breath. Above her was the hidden passageway leading into the forest. Once she left the safe walls of Tipoloo and its many passages, she would be completely exposed. From here on out she would be an easy target for the Dark Army’s patrols. From the time she was little, Zanell had been told repeatedly to stay out of the red forest. She had occasionally watched friends, neighbors, and local toughs who ignored the warnings fail to return. Every single inch of her being told her that she should, even now, heed those warnings, but where else was she to go? Traveling back to Tipoloo was impossible. There was no Tipoloo to return to. This reality caused her tired eyes to once again attempt to produce tears; it would prove to be a fruitless undertaking.

  In her heart Zanell knew what must be done. Her grandfather had instructed her that she needed to run and keep running until she was in the forest and that was exactly what she intended to do – what she had to do �
�� no matter how scary the proposition. Despite her fear, she would do this because she owed it to him.

  From somewhere behind her, nestled in the darkness of the southern passage, she could hear the distant voices of the King’s soldiers – they were tracking her. Quickly moving toward the dirt wall, she climbed to the camouflaged hatch. Pushing it open with one hand she pulled herself up into the forest. A steady stream of rain poured through the trees above her head, blocking out the slowly darkening evening sky. For the life of her, she could not remember the last time she had felt actual, real-life rain. Every droplet on her skin brought with it a million childhood sensations long since forgotten. Lifting her hands, she let it cascade down her arms, and seep into every dry, burning pore. Trickling into her dry eyes, it moistened and healed them. Still unable to cry, she decided to let the rain do the crying for her – to cover her entire body in tears, ensuring that she would never forget this day and the things she had left behind.

  The hatch on the ground beneath her feet began to move as someone pushed against it. Zanell ran. She did not know where she was going, but it really did not matter. Her muscles were sore and her heart was beating faster than it ever had in her life. Her lanky, awkward, leggy form sprinted across the forest floor with graceful speed. She flew over fallen lumber and around large rocks, darting in and out of the enormous gray trunks of trees like someone who had spent a lifetime nestled in the bosom of the forest. Somewhere behind her the voices of the King’s guards, still hot on her trail, were slowly fading. In the open air, she simply moved too fast for them and the storm had made it even more difficult for the soldiers to keep pace. When she no longer heard their footsteps, Zanell slowed to a trot, glancing briefly over her shoulder. There were no guards now, only trees, heavy rain, and a thick layer of fog slowly rising from the ground to aid in her escape.

  Had she not known better, she might have thought the forest itself was helping her get away.