He didn’t say anything.
“You’re here because this island, well, it moves around,” I continued.
“Islands don’t usually move around, love.”
“This one does. It moves through time. Do you understand? The island probably moved to a time before you got—” I covered my mouth with my paw.
He thought for a moment, trying to puzzle it out.
“I’m dreaming that you’re a rabbit and that I’m having a conversation with you about disappearing islands,” he said, chuckling.
Maybe it was my dream, except that I was certain I wasn’t asleep. No, I was here, on the far side of the island across the stick bridge, and my father was holding me.
I wanted this moment to last forever.
But my stupid curious mouth asked, “Where is your plane?”
He carried me half on his shoulder like I was a baby. We went out of the crumbling shack, through a dark forest, and into a clearing where his plane sat, bullet-free and very much intact.
“It’s here. Are your sisters here, too? And are they…rabbits?”
He wasn’t at all concerned. And that was when I knew he didn’t believe any of this.
And if he didn’t believe it, he’d never stay.
“Yes, Papa, they’re rabbits. But they left. And it was all my fault.”
“How can the fact that I have dreamed you as a rabbit possibly be your fault?”
“Because it’s not a dream!” I said forcefully, as much to myself as to Papa.
He laughed, a deep laugh that I used to love. But I didn’t think it was funny, so I bit him. Not hard. But enough to get him to drop me. Then I hightailed it into the forest for a good think.
Papa just stood there shaking his head. I saw him pinch himself on the hand, probably to see if he felt it. If it was real.
How could I convince him? The Magician probably could, but there was no way he’d come across the stick bridge, even if I begged. Even if he knew who was on the other side.
* * *
It was getting dark. Maybe it was the clouds blocking the sun, or maybe the sun was going down earlier than I expected. I wasn’t the master of time, since rabbits rarely wear watches (except for the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland).
As for the Howler, silence.
For the first time since…well, for the first time ever, I found myself wishing the Boy was here. For some reason, I thought he might have an idea how to handle this, but I didn’t think he was the kind of person to cross a forbidden stick bridge.
But maybe it was time for him to break some rules.
I found the Boy in the Magician’s garden, pulling up carrots and radishes. He gathered his vegetables and walked toward the castle, looking behind him at times to see if I was following. I was, stealthily.
The Magician met him at the door, balancing shakily on his cane.
“Any progress?” asked the Magician.
The Boy shook his head.
“You’re a persuasive boy. You’ll think of something.”
The Boy regarded the Magician closely. “If you’ll pardon my saying, sir, you look…unwell.”
“The outward is often a reflection of the inner. Always remember that,” he said, tapping the Boy gently on his shoulder with his cane. “Now come and sit. Standing makes me tired.”
They sat in the parlor. On silent paws, I followed, close to the wall. There was dark-stained wainscoting, and I was gray as a shadow, so I blended in rather nicely. The parlor was arranged with couches and daft-looking chairs.
I never spent much time in the parlor. Now, having scampered behind a velvet settee, I could see there were some important things that I hadn’t noticed before.
The woman in the large painting above the fireplace was smiling at me. The truth bloomed in my heart, she looked a bit like Mum but with different hair.
It had to be Murien.
Then something shifted. If I’d looked away for a second, I would have missed it. The blue of her eyes rolled like waves, swirling into an image of my mother, then me.
In her eyes was…the Sea.
The Sea was my grandmother.
How in the world had Murien become the Sea? That was magic I couldn’t begin to understand, but deep inside, I knew it had to be true. If a girl could become a rabbit, then maybe a woman could become the sea. Perhaps it wasn’t that different after all.
But I didn’t know what to do with this knowledge. I would think about the ocean tomorrow. Today I needed to figure out how to save Papa from getting shot down from the sky.
The Magician and the Boy blathered on and on about insignificant things—when radishes lose their sweetness and become peppery hot. I hoped the Magician would go to sleep soon so I could talk to the Boy. I’d have to point to letters in books so the Boy could write them down and string together words and sentences (since I couldn’t talk to him), and that would take a long time. I was getting restless in my spot on the bottom shelf of the bookcase, squeezed between a few old encyclopedias and a truly hideous vase.
“Listening in again, are you, Albie?”
Drat. The Magician always knows when I’m near.
“There’s not enough time for games anymore, little one. There’s conversations to be had. Come along out now.” Not a request. A command.
As I revealed my location, I knocked the vase a little with my tail.
“I knew you were there,” the Boy said.
Sure you did.
The Magician waved his cane over my head and said, “I suppose there are a few things you need to discuss.” Then he left me and the Boy alone.
“So he made it so you can speak?” said the Boy. “Isn’t really fair, since that’s one of the perks of the boat. Rabbits can speak on the boat. Makes the boat seem less special.”
“Follow me. I can’t talk to you here,” I said, liking the sound of my voice now that I really listened to it. Voices are wonderful things. Ever so useful. Some people don’t appreciate them. When they don’t speak up when they need to, bad things happen.
“Come,” I said.
The stick bridge was creepy in the daytime. I could only imagine how terrifying it would be at night. But now, right before dusk, when the shadows were at their longest, the stick bridge looked like the skeleton of a giant snake.
Maybe this wasn’t a great idea.
But the Magician was right: we didn’t have time to dawdle.
“I have a proposal,” I said.
“Well,” the Boy laughed. “This is a first. None of your sisters thought to marry me.”
I snorted in disgust.
“Not marriage, dolt. More of a bargain. You give me something, I’ll give you something.”
“There is only one thing I want, Albie—for my job to be done. And in order to have that, you’ll have to—”
“Yes. I know. And I’m willing.” My voice shook a little. Voices are also betrayers.
“You’ll come with me, on the boat, and discover your destiny?”
His eyes were alight. He really, really wanted this.
Made me wonder why, but instead of asking, I nodded. Then: “The condition is that you have to come across the stick bridge with me.”
He looked over at it. Now that the sun had almost completely set, it didn’t look so menacing.
“I don’t think it will hold me.”
“It’s stronger than it looks.” And so am I.
He pondered the bridge. “And what do we do when we get to the other side?”
It didn’t sound like he knew it was forbidden, which was probably a good thing.
I said, “I need to show you something. And I need your help.”
“Why?”
“I need to stop the island from sinking. There’s magic there, on the other side of that bridge. Big magic.”
“Big magic or not, it can’t be done.”
“Then I won’t go with you.”
He hemmed and hawed and paced. But he knew that few things are as stubborn
as a rabbit.
“This is a bad idea. The Magician forbids anyone to cross.”
“It’s not that bad. There’s something you need to see. Don’t you want to save the island? And the Magician, too?” I made my way over to the bridge and put a paw on its creaky steps. I could feel the coarse spray of the wild river below against my fur. Not the gentle spray of the Sea at all.
“I do want to save them, Albie. Believe me. But first I have to get you safely to your destiny. So even if we come up with a plan, we have to wait to implement it until you’re safe.”
Implement. Such a fancy word for a boy who rows a boat.
“You’re putting your chickens before the horse—or something like that. Let’s just cross the bridge and see, shall we?” I said. And I slowly started across the bridge.
He waited until I was all the way over before he stepped on it. He said if the bridge went down because he was too heavy (he was a string bean of a boy, so I hardly thought it likely), he didn’t want me to get hurt.
If the bridge wanted him to cross, I was certain he’d be allowed over. If not…
“I guess this is stronger than it looks” was all he said as he jumped off my side. “Now where to?”
I led the way past the woods to the clearing where I’d first seen my father’s plane. It wasn’t there.
“Papa!” I called out. “Where are you?” I scampered this way and that, searching for him. I sniffed the air, hoping to find his scent.
The air was cool and empty.
“Papa!”
“Albie, what in the world are you doing?” the Boy said, annoyed.
“I’m looking for something.” Someone, actually. Under the light of the full moon, the wings of my father’s plane would have gleamed impressively. There would be no missing it.
Except that it was truly gone.
That meant Papa was gone, too.
“Papa!” I cried once more, racing into the little shack.
“Your father? But he’s—” The Boy trailed after me.
“Here. Papa was here,” I said, jumping up on the table.
The Boy shook his head. “No, Albie. You must be mistaken.”
“And his plane was here, too. He flew it.”
“What? No, Albie, no. That would be…wrong,” said the Boy.
“He was here.” I stomped emphatically and threw my paws up in disgust. I knew what I’d seen.
The Boy sniffed the air. “Interesting.”
He scratched his head. “Albie, maybe you were dreaming or had a memory or even a vision. Yes, a vision, perhaps. But he couldn’t have been here, you know that. People don’t come back from the dead.”
“What makes you an expert on the living and the dead?” I asked him.
He was quiet, contemplating my question. “Nothing. I’m an expert on nothing,” he said sadly.
“I conjured him here. I had his medal, and I was at the magic table…” But the medal was no longer there. “I didn’t imagine it!” I leaped from the table and hopped out again to where Papa’s plane had sat.
The Boy followed me outside to the vacant meadow and bent to give me a comforting rub. I bit his finger, just like I had my father’s.
“Ouch!” Holding his finger, the Boy walked around the perimeter of where the plane had been. “I’m not saying you imagined it. I’m just saying that this is a very magical place, and all is not always what it seems.”
And then it began.
“Aaaaaaaaaaooooooowwwwww.”
The Howler was back.
“Albie, what in the world is that?” the Boy cried, placing his hands over his ears.
The Howler was much louder on this side of the island.
“It’s a long story!” I tried to shout. But it’s hard enough for a rabbit to be heard, even with a spell. He just looked at me kind of stupidly, trying to read my lips.
It’s impossible to read a rabbit’s lips.
We rushed back into that weird little shack and closed the door behind us. The howling didn’t stop, but it was quieter inside.
“Seriously, Albie, what is that?”
Hm. How much to tell?
As if in answer, I felt the island sink a few inches beneath me.
It was time for the truth.
I started out slowly, but then the sobs came and the words rushed out.
“I came here when I shouldn’t have, long ago. I stole magic by turning my sisters into rabbits, even though I didn’t mean to. Then something magical got mad and started sinking the island. And howling. Terrible, terrible howling. All because of me. It’s all related. Magically related.”
Maybe I was speaking another language, because the look the Boy gave me said, I didn’t understand a word you said.
“Think about it, if there’s enough magic to bring my father here, then maybe there’s enough magic to keep the island from sinking!” I was hopping up and down wildly, quickly getting out of breath.
He could believe or not, but I really wished he would believe.
He ran a hand through his hair, which made it stick up in a funny way, but I was too upset to laugh. “Perhaps your medal conjured a vision of your da because you love him so much. It’s not an unheard-of phenomenon. But it wasn’t him, not really. That could never happen. And, Albie, neither you nor your Howler are the reason this island is sinking.”
“How do you know?” I cried.
“Two reasons. First of all, this island has sunk before. If you paid any attention to the legends about it, you’d know it to be true.”
I wasn’t stupid. I knew the legends. I was about to interrupt, but he continued before I could.
“That’s what this place does. It submerges, then it reemerges. It has nothing to do with you.”
“And the second reason?”
“The island isn’t sinking because of you. It’s sinking again because of me.”
The Boy and I trudged back to the castle. I left a little part of my heart on the other side of the island with Papa, even though he maybe hadn’t actually been there at all. Still, one way or another, I’d seen him again. That’s a lot more than most people get when they lose someone they love.
I sighed like I was more ancient than even the Magician.
I felt a million years old.
Even though the Boy hadn’t helped me save my father, or the island, I would hold up my end of our deal. The old me, back when I was an angry girl, would have broken her word to the Boy. But I was learning.
Broken words can do lots of damage.
I would get in the Boy’s boat and sail across the Sea to the mainland, but I wouldn’t abandon my task. I wasn’t finished trying to cheat death and save the Magician. But unless I went with the Boy, he’d never tell me how Hybrasil sinking was his fault. Maybe the Boy’s secret might help me save the island after all.
Until I knew for sure, I’d have to settle for saving the Magician. And I’d need a place to take him.
The Boy wasn’t the only one with a secret.
There was also the Sea.
I had to tell her what I knew before we left.
I went alone to the beach.
“Farewell, adieu.
Until the final sun sinks
Until the last blade breaks
Until the words that complete
The ultimate story
Dance across the ending page,
I will be there.
You are not alone.”
I don’t know how she knew I was leaving, because I’d just decided, but she did.
I liked where this poem was going—because I was afraid.
“Thank you,” I whispered. “Grandmother.”
My voice was so quiet, I didn’t even hear myself. Perhaps I hadn’t said the word at all.
But I heard it, an echo murmuring upon the foam.
Grandmother. Grandmother. Grandmother.
But she didn’t say anything to me. Maybe she didn’t know what to say. Maybe it happened so long ago that she didn’t rememb
er being Murien or having a daughter or loving a Magician.
As unusual as it was, I had no words.
I had to say goodbye to the Magician. I couldn’t have him thinking he would actually see me again. That was my secret, if everything worked out as I hoped.
On my last morning, I hopped across the garden to the dilapidated castle for the last time. The Boy was gathering vegetables for my journey.
“Ah, Albie. Come to say goodbye?” the Magician said.
He was sitting in the parlor again, curled forward in a large wingback chair.
I hopped over and tried to speak, but the spell had worn off.
“I shall miss you, Albie. I shall miss you most of all,” he said, causing my eyes to fill and overflow. “Oh, how I loved your grandmother.” His voice cracked. “However, while the ocean might decide to visit, she can never stay. And this is something I should have known.”
It’s hard to watch an old person cry. Actually, it’s hard to watch anyone cry, except maybe for babies. They cry all the time. But for everyone else, it is like watching an egg crack and all the goo sliding out.
I wanted to tell him that I already knew Murien was the Sea. But sometimes there are things inside of you that you can’t share, even though they are bursting to get out.
He scooped me into his lap. “I didn’t think I would feel this sense of…of loss when you left. You’re leaving an empty hole inside of me. You’re the only one who knows I am your grandfather.”
I leaned a little against him then. He was my grandpa, after all.
“But you are a good girl, and it’s time for you to go.” He picked me up and placed me gently on the floor. “I’m sorry I won’t be able to see you choose your destiny and change back. But I can give you this.” He tapped my head with his cane, his body visibly weakening as he cast the final spell between us. “Even off the Boy’s boat, you’ll always have your words now.”
Thankful as I was to have been given a voice, I said nothing, because sometimes there just aren’t any words. I was actually going, by my own choice, on the dreaded boat. Leaving everything behind, hoping that things wouldn’t be worse wherever I ended up.
The Last Rabbit Page 5