Of course, Mara and I couldn’t meet up right away. Too much had happened all at once with the “sleepover” and Grammy and I’s sort-of fight, and Jask arriving, and Kalgyrad trying to teach me magic—and once Grammy and I reconciled, we silently agreed that we were both sorry and neither of us wanted to talk about it anymore. So I didn’t want to push my luck.
I was also worried she’d think Mara was a bad influence on me, so I tried to casually bringing her up every now and then, and share bits and pieces that I actually could talk about from the “sleepover,” and hope that this would paint a more… positive picture of what all happened. Stuff like how Mara had helped me understand my literature homework, or how her family had been nice and accommodating during my stay.
But none of that was enough to justify why Mara and I needed to meet up again. Maybe I could say I’d left my shoe at their house? But, while true, would hardly be a helpful lie, since neither of us knew where the shoe had actually ended up, and sending Mara to comb the woods by herself was a less than stellar idea.
Briefly, I considered sneaking out of the house, but that was almost sure to go wrong as soon as I tried it. Grammy stayed home most of the day, so it wasn’t like I could just disappear from my room. And assuming I snuck out of the house, where would I even go? We were miles away from Mara’s place, let alone any place Mara and I could meet.
But Grammy solved the problem for me before I could waste too much time wondering and worrying.
You see, something big was clearly going on with the Wardens.
Grammy hadn’t given me details, for multiple reasons, but it wasn’t hard to catch on to the fact that the Wardens were mobilizing. Even though I didn’t have any confirmation, I suspected that it had something to do with the shadow creature, and maybe even Jask and Kalgyrad (I could hope, at least, that Kalgyrad was getting some proper investigation). I’d overheard a bit of a phone call, too, discussing the idea of reaching out to some of the out-of-state Wardens, just in case, making this the biggest operation I knew of in my (admittedly short) lifetime.
The idea of a large-scale Warden operation would have been exciting if it wasn’t terrifying, or if I’d been allowed to participate (which would also have been terrifying), or if Mara and I weren’t already secretly involved and in over our heads (definitely terrifying). But if all this got the shadow monster taken out of commission before it could track down Mara or I, then I was all for it.
More immediately helpful, though, was the fact that Grammy had, overnight, become much busier. Now, Grammy is retired, but she was still the matriarch of sorts of the area, and, well, when like half of the Wardens in the area are your children or grandchildren, that naturally gives you a bit of extra authority. Her experience, advice, and general knowledge were now in demand, which this meant less scrutiny for me (and a very slight easing of my training).
And so, a few days after Jask arrived, Grammy came into the kitchen where I was eating breakfast and puzzling over Mara’s new creature, and rested her old knotted hands on the back of the chair across from me.
“It seems as though I’ve been requested in town,” she said, patting the chair. “It also appears that I may be gone for most of the day. How do you like the idea of going to the library this morning?”
By which she meant: I don’t want to leave you here alone, so I’m dropping you off at the library while I work on other things.
I tried not to respond too eagerly. “Yeah, that sounds good. As long as I take my drawing book I should be fine to wait for a while.”
“Shouldn’t you also take a look or two at your homework?” She asked drily, less a question and more a reminder that I had other, more important things to be doing.
Which I did. I just couldn’t let her know about what those really were. Instead, I just gave her a thumbs up.
“You can skip your Mithae homework for the day,” she added as she left. “But I’ll look forward to your progress tomorrow.”
She didn’t like me working on magic in a public space, and that was lucky for me, today, because Mithae homework took the longest for me finish. Math took a while, but I was good at least good at it, even if my processes were apparently unconventional. But somehow, even though I could memorize rewrites decently well, the whole theory and language behind it all made no sense to me. Either way, skipping Mithae homework meant more time to meet with Mara and figure out what was going on and we were going to do in response (if anything).
As soon as Grammy disappeared deeper into the house, I was texting Mara.
[I’ll see what I can do on short notice] Mara messaged back.
[Can u just say u need to do school?]
[idk if that would get me enough time]
[OK. I’ll be there all afternoon, probs.]
[Should we meet at The Place?]
I paused to consider. If we were going to try and talk about sensitive topics, best to be private. And if we wanted to meet our new friends, like I hoped, that would definitely have to be private.
[yes. see if u-know-who can come]
Which was another thing to arrange. How to bring Jask? Could he just follow me? I doubted I could convince Grammy to let him ride in the car with us. She was still keeping a wary eye on him, and I got the sense she was just waiting for him to mess up. I’d noticed, too, that she’d taken to carrying weapons around inside the house, which she never did.
My phone buzzed. [I’ll see what I can do]
I sent back a thumbs-up symbol.
Gobbling down the rest of my eggs and potatoes, I headed back to my room to prepare—and try to talk to Jask. It’d been a little over three days since he’d showed up, and so far he hadn’t spoken since then. He still seemed able to understand me, so we’d had exchanges where I asked him questions and he nodded yes or no, but I’d kept those to a minimum. I didn’t know how Grammy would react to finding out about his level of sapience.
So far, I’d confirmed that he would be able to talk again, and probably soon, and that he’d met dragons before (I couldn’t tell if he’d met Kalgyrad specifically or not). Apparently, he was originally from the dragon world, but hadn’t come over with Kalgyrad.
This was all very concerning, and part of me wondered if he’d been sent to warn us about Kalgyrad. But I avoided mentioning that until I knew what his stance on dragons actually was. Kalgyrad had vouched for him—was that because he considered pikurs to be a non-threat and/or beneath his notice, or was it because he knew or liked pikurs? Did that make pikurs active allies of dragons, or did it mean nothing?
Jask had acted like a friend, so far, but he was still an unknown illdýr and an unknown person. And, well, there was Mara’s new friend to consider, too, and their shared traits. Was there a connection between them? Or was I just being paranoid?
Jask loafed on his blanket in the corner, eyelids half closed. Despite being sapient, he was still an animal, and seemed to prefer making a blanket nest to, say, a mattress. He fully opened his top eye to watch me, and I tried to not overthink my own motions as I gathered up loose bits of paper, my drawing book, school books, notebooks, pens and pencils.
Once I filled my backpack, I turned to face him, unsure of how to proceed. He just looked at me, opening the rest of his eyes.
“We’re going out for the day,” I said. He nodded. Maybe he’d overheard Grammy and understood the implications. “I would invite you along, but I don’t think Grammy would let you in the car.”
He gave a little snort that might have been a chuckle.
“Do you…” I hesitated. It would be a lie to say I needed him there for security reasons, and I didn’t know if he’d buy the act, anyway. “Do you want to come, anyway?”
That might not be a better way to approach the subject; I wasn’t trying to form an alliance against Grammy or anything, I just… couldn’t let her know what was going on.
Jask cocked his head, his almost bunny-shaped ears twitching. Then, slowly, he nodded.
“Is that possible?” I asked, lowering my voice. “Like, can you follow us? Or get where we’re going or something?” I would have offered to let him ride in my backpack, but Grammy would clock it instantly.
He nodded.
I’d have to ask about that later, for sure. “Do you think you’ll be able to talk today?”
He nodded again.
“Great!” I crouched down closer, lowering my voice further. “Grammy is going to drop me off at the library. Behind it and a little further down the road, there’s this abandoned building. It used to be some kind of recreational place. But it’s kind of easy to get into. I have to do homework and stuff first, but if you can make it, meet me there. I’m going to leave my room now to finish getting ready.”
The eyes under his main eye had narrowed a bit. I didn’t know what that meant. But before he could somehow protest or insist on accompanying me into the library or something, I stood up and left the room. I’d have to see if I could figure out how he followed us (if he did). Over the last day, I’d started sensing extra… power or presence or magic from him, which concerned me. Or maybe that just meant he could talk soon.
But first—
I’d been wanting to show Mara the amulet and see if she might know anything about it. Unlikely, but worth a shot. And she was kind of the only one I could talk to about it, anyway, since talking to Llewellyn would just loop back around to telling Grammy, which would bring up the question of where I’d gotten it, which would violate the deal we’d made with Kalgyrad. And I’d been too worried about getting caught to try and take a picture of it. So, I’d have to show it to her in person.
Double-and-triple-checking that Grammy was in her room, I snuck the amulet out of its hiding place in the hall, and slipped it into the bottom of my backpack, under a blanket I’d packed. When she emerged a second later, it just looked like I was readjusting my books. She passed me without any indication of suspicion, went to the kitchen, and made two sandwiches. She handed me one, plus some snacks and a little container of canned pawpaw (a family recipe). And we were off.
I really only ever came to the library for study club, which happened once a month, and rare occasions like this when Grammy was too busy to either watch me herself or hand me off to a relative for babysitting. So the place was just familiar enough to not be anxiety-inducing, but not quite home-like enough to be comfortable. Still, there were plenty of little corners to tuck myself away in and hide, so once Grammy had left and no one was paying attention to me, I hunkered down by a step-stool in the foreign language section, and started in on my homework.
No sign of Jask yet. I hadn’t seen or sensed him at all since leaving the house, and I couldn’t tell if that meant that he hadn’t come or that I just needed to get better at this sort of thing. It’d been hard to tell what Grammy’s perceptions were, either, since she looked just generally preoccupied.
Halfway through homework, my phone vibrated.
[Will u still b there in 1 hr?]
Short of either a miracle or natural disaster, probably. But I just responded with another thumbs-up.
[OK. Bro is dropping me off on way to town]
Another positive development. From what I knew of the family, he was less likely to care what Mara was up to, and therefore less likely to ask questions if, say, she wasn’t in the library if he came back early.
[there or here?]
She texted back a moment later: [there]
I should have time to finish up my homework and then make my way out—with, of course, appropriate phone checks to show that I was definitely going outside because I was meeting someone and not for any other reason. It’d be a pretty easy escape, though—this far from town, there wasn’t much in the way of cameras or anything, except for a lone security guard who supervised the library and the nearby convenience store during business hours, and looked horribly bored whenever I saw him. But he wouldn’t be bothersome, and he paid more attention to whatever he was reading than his surroundings, anyway.
So, about a half-hour after the text, I pulled my bits and pieces together, and headed out.
Once you got past the parking lot, there was a thin trail through the woods that cut directly to the Lucky Strike Bowling Lane (whatever that meant), which meant you could avoid the empty, open, and conspicuous driveway that ran past the library. It being winter and all, the woods, unfortunately, offered much less cover than usual, but that would be more of a problem for Mara than for me.
The woods were gray and patchy, a slim finger almost entirely cut off from the rest of the woods. It was the work of a minute to slip noiselessly through them; arriving a second later at the Lucky Strike (a cinder-block monstrosity swathed in peeling beige paint), I pulled my coat closer around me and crept to the boarded-off side door. The bottom half, though, only looked nailed in place. I carefully moved aside the wooden sheet and ducked in.
The whole place looked weird, wide open and exposed once you got past the rooms for storage and cleaning equipment. On my left there was a counter that I assumed had once served drinks or food, due to the kitchen equipment scattered around the space. Further toward the middle of the front wall, on this side of the wide glass doors (now broken and boarded up), there was another counter, behind which were shelves for what seemed like shoes (we’d found a stray one in a corner). On the side of the building across from me, you could go through a door and find more rooms in a row down the rest of the building. There were at least two offices. Most of them were locked, and Mara and I had decided to get to it later. To my right was the bulk of the building, made up of clusters of seats around low tables, which were divided from each other by machines that held or distributed huge heavy balls (we’d found one in the storage area, and it seemed to fit with the machine). Beyond the seating lay long, wooden “lanes” divided by some kind of shallow trenches.
And all of the floors that weren’t wood were covered in the ugliest, multi-patterned carpet I had ever seen.
The place was echoey and empty, and smelled like socks and sweat and mildew and rotting wood. The surprisingly low ceiling was made of grids of some white, crumbly material, and whole squares of it hung down at angles, reaching for the floor. Overall, the space felt deceptive, like the openness was trying to trick you into thinking you could see everything, into thinking you were safe—but you’d never see the creatures hid behind the counters and doors, or in the fragile ceiling.
As best as I could tell, the Lucky Strike Bowling Lane’s titular game involved pushing or throwing heavy balls down the lanes into a hollow cubby, but I figured there had to be more to it than that since that sounded kind of boring, and I couldn’t figure out what the “strike” part of the title referred to. Once the balls ended up in the cubbies, they somehow get transported back to the sitting area (the seats of which were now the wrecked victims of local wildlife). But what was really important about all this was the little corridor stretching behind the cubbies.
There were indications that other people had also, at some point, snuck into this building, but, as far as I could tell, no one ever went to our corridor—probably because it was too tight for adults to find comfortable, and because it was the creepiest place in the building. I’d only managed to go down it with Mara pushing and prodding me from behind to “go see what was there” (nothing, thankfully). We’d returned to it later because it was private, isolated, and small, making it easier to stay warm in winter; the building’s heating had died ages ago with the electricity.
Mara and I didn’t come here often, but, well, sometimes parents and guardians took a long time to pick their kids up, depending on what business they were up to in town. So sometimes we explored after study group, and sometimes Mara just wanted to get away from other people. She said she felt like she stood out a lot, and people always seemed to be looking at her. Which wasn’t untrue. Frankly, I didn’t like being around strangers, either, so it was nice to have a back-up plan if we were too bored or too uncomfortable. We’d improved the place, too, by stashing a number of games back here, and some pencils and pens. We’d thought about leaving a notebook or sketchbook or something, but we’d figured squirrels or rats or something would find it and tear it up for nesting.
We’d also left a flashlight, a couple of food cans and a can-opener, a small knife, flint and steel, an empty water bottle (we didn’t come by often enough to keep the water fresh), some iodine, and a light canvas rucksack. Our thought process was “what if the library got attacked and we needed to run off into the woods.” Neither of us thought it was super likely, but I liked having something to fall back on, and Mara thought it was fun.
The kit definitely needed a blanket or two, but, again, nesting materials. The ripped up covers and foam of the buildings seats were a clear warning. So we always brought our own.
I made my way half-way down the corridor, got out a plastic bag to sit on to lessen contact with the layers of dust choking the place, and wrapped my blanket around me while I waited for Mara.
I had my sketchbook, so I wasn’t bored, and what little time was left passed quickly. I didn’t end up drawing anything particularly interesting (basically just geometric patterns), but it felt soothing to go through the motions and watch lines spring to life on the page—even if my fingers were pretty cold. My back was getting sore, too. Still, just sitting there and focusing on the simple lines helped my nerves relax, if only a little.
Closer to when Mara was supposed to arrive, I started looking at my phone for time, and keeping an ear out for any sound of footsteps. Not to brag, but I’m usually great at tracking someone’s approach just through sound and vibrations (even if I’m less skilled than most of my family). It was one of my only abilities I had any confidence in. So, when I turned to flip my phone open for the umpteenth time, and found Jask crouched down beside my backpack, I flailed backward, sketchbook and pencils clattering to the ground, and let out a single, high-pitch squeal in a semi-successful effort to not scream.
“Ah,” he said, bobbing his round head in the air. “My apologies. I didn’t mean to startle you, but I wasn’t quite sure how to approach you in this space.”
Clenching my teeth around any response to avoid either snapping or wobbling, I tried to relax my muscles and take a deep breath. This was fine. Everything was fine. I knew Jask (sort of). It wasn’t at all disconcerting, uncomfortable, alarming, concerning or generally disturbing that he could just pop up beside me without any noticeable indication of his arrival.
“Sorry,” I replied after swallowing a few times, and sat up to better brush dust and grime off of my elbows. “I’m just… I’m not very good with surprises.”
He kindly didn’t point out that yeah, he could tell. “You’re friends with the dark-skinned kid with the poofy hair?”
Unless we had some new people in the neighborhood I didn’t know about, that probably meant Mara. “Yeah. Why?”
“I suppose that’s alright, then, since they’re coming this way.”
“They?”
A single ear flicked in what I assumed was the equivalent of a shrug. “I can’t tell if it’s a boy or a girl. And there’s a ridgex there, too, so that makes two.”
“Uh, well, Mara’s a girl,” I said, unsure of what else to do. “And I’m a boy, in case you were wondering.” I was going to say that it was simple: girls have long hair and boys have short hair, but there were plenty of exceptions on either side of the spectrum. Llewellyn’s girlfriend’s brother, for example, had long braided hair. Something to do with his heritage or culture.
Then, as I picked up and wiped down my sketchbook (only slightly smudged), my brain caught up to the rest of the sentence. “Wait. What’s a ridgex?”
Before Jask could reply, there was a soft knock on the wooden “door”—two short beats, two long, echoing through the stark silence like hail on a tin roof.
“Mara’s here,” I whispered, and shoved the rest of my stuff in my backpack. “Do you know how long you’ll be able to talk today?”
“Not quite,” Jask replied. “A bit, but not forever. I haven’t done this enough to know exact figures.”
“And weren’t you trying to tell me something urgently the other day?”
Jask sighed. “Yes. But it may have to wait. I think you know enough for now.”
I wanted to double down and ask “enough about what?” when Mara appeared at the end of the little corridor.
“Rhys?” She said, as if uncertain. “Is someone with you?”
I stood up. “Yeah. It’s, uh, it’s Jask. I told you about him.”
Mara came closer, squinting in the semi-darkness. “But I heard talking.” Behind her, the tip of an unfamiliar snout poked hesitantly around the corner. The “ridgex,” probably.
“Oh, yeah, I was talking with him.”
“Yours can talk? That’s pretty cool.” Mara was next to me now, and crouched down to look at Jask. “Oh, he’s cute! Almost like a bigger, better guinea pig.”
Jask twitched his ears. I couldn’t tell if he was gratified or annoyed by being called cute. “Yes, I can talk,” he said. “But I don’t know for how long. Now that you’re here, why don’t you call the ridgex over and we can go and chat somewhere a tad more comfortable? What do you say?”
Mara and I exchanged glances. I know that I, at least, was instantly skeptical of this idea. Meeting with a kind-of stranger was different than following them off into the unknown.
“Where might that be?” she asked.
Jask hopped up into one of the cubbies, through which you could see the “lanes” and the rest of the building. “Don’t worry,” he said, “it’s still in the building. Just follow me.”
And it looked like he smiled.
Jask led us to one of the mysterious doors on the other side of the building. It was firmly locked, and the door was solidly built—a contrast to the run-down state of the rest of the place. When we got there, Jask told us that he knew how to open it, but that he didn’t have the body mass required to pull the operation off, since something was blocking the door from the other side. His solution: point me to the ventilation shaft near the floor, the one with the loose grill, and assure me that I would fit.
Before I could start protesting, Mara backed him up, and before I could continue protesting, she oh so helpfully pulled the grill the rest of the way off, opening the hole further.
Unfortunately, they were both right, and I did (barely) fit once I took my coat off. Fortunately, it was a lot simpler than I had feared, since the vent opening I was aiming for, the one in the room, was just on the other side of the wall, meaning all I really had to do was kick off the room’s grate and crawl through a single, relatively clear hole. The worst I could really say about the experience was that the metal of the shaft was bitingly cold, even through my long sleeves.
And then I was worming my way through, and under a large, wood-and-metal desk. Once I made it to my feet and dusted my clothes off, I saw that this was what was blocking the door; presumably it had been pushed against the wall by the fall of the filing cabinet, which lay length-wise on the floor with its drawers half-open, slightly cushioned by the chunk of the desk’s edge it had taken with it.
Besides that, there was a remarkably intact stuffed chair in the corner opposite the filing cabinet, and an oddly comfy-looking desk chair. It all looked grimy and run-down, but with more an air of an old storage closet than the crumbling confusion of the abandoned building we had just come from. There was only one small window, near the top of the outside wall, and still intact. Through it, the winter light filtered in unenthusiastically, leaving the place dim and gray.
Other bits and pieces were scattered around—a broken lamp, a couple of sagging boxes, a pencil stub, some haphazard pieces of blank paper, a contraption that looked like a space heater toppled to the ground—and I wondered why none of the previous owners had bothered to come by and collect the furniture. Maybe it had already gotten blocked, and they decided it would be too much effort for too little return.
But, regardless, I had work to do. Deciding it’d be a waste of time to set the file cabinet upright again, I dragged it around, pointing it towards the further wall, leaving enough room to similarly haul the desk away enough that Mara should be able to come through the door alright. Before I could update them, there was a scrabbling at the carpet by the door, the sound of little claws on wood, and then Jask’s nose appeared on my side of the door.
I jumped back, staring as Jask’s head followed.
By all appearances, he was crawling his way under the door, but that was impossible. There had been no space between door and carpet to even stick a finger, much less a super-sized guinea pig hybrid creature. For a second he wavered with just his head and forepaws visible, straining, weirdly large and real with the rest of him simply not there—and then his other half popped into existence, and he stood up and shook his fur out like a dog shakes off water, as calm as if he had simply crawled through a crack and not, you know, broken the laws of physics. It hadn’t looked like he’d flattened himself, either; it had looked more like he’d been… squeezing himself into the room, like he’d shoved his way through by sheer willpower.
I knew wendaways could mess up your perception of space and time, but I couldn’t quite remember anything that could actually rearrange those without some significant rewrites.
“I will say that I’ve encountered nicer carpets,” Jask said, sniffing at the jumbled colors and patterns that were an extension of the rest of the building. “Can you give me a boost? I’m afraid I can’t reach the lock now that the desk has been moved.”
Without saying a word, I knelt down and picked him up, supporting him on my shoulder where he was level with the lock.
Sure. Why not. What did I know about any of this.
He reached his paw inside the keyhole (which should not have fit into something so thin), and there was a click, the handle turned, and Mara and the ridgex peeked through.
My resigned confusion must have been visible, because Mara’s eyes bounced around the room before landing on Jask, her grin widening. “Nice work, Mr. Jask.”
“Oh, please,” Jask waved a paw magnanimously, “no need for a title.”
I set him down on the floor as the others came in, and shut the door behind us. Mara handed me my coat (which I gratefully put on) and my backpack. “Okay, so I think we all have a few quest—”
“One moment,” Jask said, gesturing vaguely at the room. “You may prefer to sit down, since I believe this will take a while. I’ll take the desk, I think. Sorrel, if you wouldn’t mind…?”
I prodded the cushions of the stuffed chair, and once they proved to be decently intact, not stinking, and somewhat clean, I put down another plastic bag on the seat and settled in. Mara, I figured, would want the desk chair so that she could spin around.
Meanwhile, the ridgex trotted over to where the space heater lay. She nosed at it, and Mara put it upright for her. Before I could point out that we didn’t have any electricity, Sorrel nestled down on the floor, wrapped her long, bushy tail around her haunches, then used her startlingly long tongue to pick up the power cord and bite down. The space heater whirred and sputtered, and a faint glow came from the depths of its grid-encased bulbs. Mara clapped her hands gleefully, while I stared at Sorrel and tried to calculate how long her tongue could possibly be.
“Is it some kind of control over electricity?” Mara asked, crouching down, as if trying to get a better look in the ridgex’s mouth.
“It’s… complicated,” Jask said. “As long as she can establish a firm enough physical connection with things, she can will them to work, in a way. But that’s grossly oversimplifying things. The heater works because it’s not broken, and because it only needs a small push to start running. And it’s connected to her will, but it’s not mind-control, either, it’s… it’s a sort of applied mental metaphysics, but that’s not quite right, either.”
“What exactly can the both of you do?” I interjected, before Mara could get too focused on the space heater thing specifically. “And how? Or if that’s not a feasible answer, since it seems difficult to describe, what can we rely on you for?”
Mara nodded her agreement to the question, lying on the floor in attempt to get a better view of the ridgex; Sorrel looked away from her, staring awkwardly into the middle distance.
“Sorrel and I are from the same sort of… I suppose you’d call it a subtype of mithecal being,” Jask said slowly, chewing his words. He was on top of the desk now. I had no idea when that had happened. “We’re good at hiding and slipping through cracks, and spaces in between magic and rewrites and that sort of thing.”
A very vague answer, but it was at least consistent with what he’d told me at first. I hoped I’d remember to follow up on why he was separating “magic”and “rewrites.” “Is that how you got under the door? Or through our protective wards?”
“Yes, in a way,” Jask said, his under-eyes squinting. “I can’t really exactly explain how, anymore than I imagine you’d find it easy to explain how walking works to a fish. But certain aspects of both Mithae and Aedrir don’t really… bind to us.”
“So you’re immune to magic?” Mara piped up, now sitting cross-legged beside Sorrel, who had relaxed now that she was not being stared at.
He hesitated. “Certain types, yes, but it’s mostly related to spacial rewrites, you see. Very specialized. There are a few outliers, but those really shouldn’t be counted towards the whole of our kind. Well, ‘kinds’.”
“And you can do magic, yourselves,” Mara added.
“Technically we have access to the same rewrites that humans do,” he said, “but few of us go in for that sort of thing. Much more of a hassle without proper hands and balancing abilities.”
“But Sorrel can do magic,” Mara countered.
Jask and I looked at her inquiringly.
“She can communicate with me, kind of,” Mara said. “And also, she is ‘willing’ the space heater to stay on, or whatever you’d call it.”
“Ah, that.” Jask hummed. “We do possess innate sorts of Mithae manipulation, you could call it; it’s not exactly cast or spelled out in the way a rewrite is. But Mithae is actually how I’m speaking to you now.”
I had meant to ask about that. “Like, via a rewrite?”
“It’s complicated, but basically. It’s a sort of… renewable rewrite. But it takes time to recharge.”
“Which is why you can’t talk all the time.”
“Which is why I can’t talk all the time.”
“Okay, but where do you come from?” I asked, looking from him to Sorrel. “You seem to have some sort of connection with the dragon, but I’m not exactly sure where he’s from, either. Something that big would have certainly been noticed by some Warden, unless it was, I don’t know, the middle of the ocean.”
Jask paced the desk in a slow sort of skitter, as if trying to figure out what to say. “How much do you know about… other worlds?”
I chewed on my lip. “There are theories about them. The old forces we called ‘gods’ back in Iceland, or Wales depending on the ancestry, came from somewhere and disappeared to somewhere. There are also theories that Mithae can be visited as its own world, like… a separate, non-physical realm. But I’m not sure how that works.”
“You never told me that.” Mara narrowed her eyes accusingly at me, but I ignored her.
Jask nodded, and I noticed Sorrel echoing the movement. “There are many other worlds, similar to each other but distinct, almost like modified copies of each other. We typically call them dimensions, but the idea of different worlds works just as well.”
“Other worlds.…” Mara leaned back against the wall, forehead creased. “I suppose… I never thought about it. And here I just got used to the idea of hidden haints in the hills.”
“It does make things make sense, though,” I pointed out. Maybe I should have reacted more strongly to this… idea or revelation or whatever, but, well, it did make things make sense. “That explains where a dragon came from, without us knowing that there were any more dragons. And why we keep running into so much new stuff. Like you guys, and the shadow monster. Which—” I turned to stare very hard at Jask—”do you know anything about that?”
He stopped his pacing, and his ears twitched upright. “You may have to be more specific. What exactly do you mean by ‘shadow monster’?”
Mara chimed in before I could, apparently having filed away the “other worlds” news to react to later. “Big, fast, lots of eyes, surprisingly strong. Monstrous and seems to be made of shadows, but like, hard ones.”
“Can it speak?”
“Unfortunately,” Mara replied. “And it laughs.”
“It seemed decently intelligent,” I added. “I don’t know the full extent of it, but it was clearly hunting us, and it had intentionality to its pursuit. And it was… mean.”
I tried very hard not to think of anything further, like how it had been toying with us and trying to make us scared, and its quick and accurate understanding of me as a coward. And my poor performance in general nearly getting us both killed.
“I think…” Jask sat back on his haunches. “I think I know what that is. They appear sometimes in the world where I’m from, but they don’t belong to it. We call them…” he struggled for a moment, clicking his teeth together. “I think the closest translation would be ‘boneshade’.”
“Oh, a nice, cozy name for sure,” Mara muttered. Sorrel pawed at her leg, as if offering comfort.
“They’re hardly nice, cozy people,” Jask replied.
I didn’t like calling them people. Somehow that turned the shadow into something more solid and personal. Not just an illdýr following its instincts, but a person with malice. And people are complicated, difficult to predict. They can hold grudges and memories and goals—like maybe hunting down two teenagers.
Stuffing my hands into my coat pockets, I was reminded of the amulet. I wondered if it was safe to bring up with Jask and Sorrel there—though, I had to admit, Jask was cooperating fully. This was more information and trust than we’d been given by anyone else so far.
“The boneshades are actually why we’re here,” Jask continued.
Mara and I exchanged glances.
“Sort of. You see, the world I live in is ruled by the dragons for the most part. There’s… a council of sorts, with the different beings represented, elves, humans, rangarn, and so forth. But the emperor is a dragon, and has to be, since their magic is very deeply connected to the land itself. It’s… it’s complicated and there’s a lot of history there. This council and cooperation is somewhat new, actually, only started about 500 years ago, which, it is is said, isn’t long for immortals. Of which I am not one, I might as well add, so it does seem rather long to me.”
Different beings? Like the silveries? I wondered if they knew about the other worlds. “Elves” sounded familiar, but I wasn’t sure from where.
“There was also a war, a long time ago, much before the council was founded, between the dragons and the rest of the worlds. You see, dragons can move between the worlds with impunity. Something to do with the way their bodies interact with Mithae. Dragons can be quite greedy, and, well, the ones that tended to travel between worlds were more often that sort than the scholarly, friendly type. Anyway, long story short, a treaty was made that the dragons would keep to their world unless passage was otherwise negotiated, besides diplomats, and the rest of the worlds wouldn’t involve themselves in their affairs.”
“So is that why dragons more or less disappeared from the world?” I asked. “Or at least, this world.”
“And what does this have to do with the boneshades?” Mara added.
Jask shifted his ears towards us in acknowledgement. “I can’t comment with certainty on the timeline, but that could very well be the reason. In some worlds they were killed out, and I think there was even a world or two where their stay was actually requested and negotiated, in cases where the locals and the dragons got along well—but those were rare occasions. Anyway, the dragons are under oath to stay within their borders unless something particularly big happens.”
“So is Kalgyrad breaking the treaty?” I asked, trying not to sound too excited, even though dealing with the consequences of that would be terrifying in its own way.
“Ah, no, actually,” Jask said.
I deflated.
“So, since the dragons can’t really leave, is that why they work with you and the ridgex-es?” Mara asked. “But there’s also something big going on? And it has to do with the boneshades?”
“Ridgexi,” Jask replied. “And yes. We’re granted special privileges, and are more or less only beholden to the Emperor and his family. With the boneshades moving, and other nasty customers about, and a few other difficult political matters happening in the High Court—well, the Emperor wants eyes on the outside.”
“So, you’re here to see what’s up with the boneshades,” Mara said. “And report back.”
“Yes. And do something about it, if we can. The current Emperor sees himself as a protector of sorts, and, well, there have been accusations that there’s a dragon working with the delegation including, but not limited to, the boneshades—a claim which, naturally, requires careful investigating.”
“So are you here under Kalgyrad?” I asked, deciding that asking that was safer than nominating him as the primary suspect. “Is he part of the royal family?”
“No, Kalgyrad is here on another matter,” Jask said. “And, admittedly, the royal family is a rather large tree to keep track of. I can’t say I know his exact position in court.”
“A lot going on over here for a place that doesn’t regard dragons and multiple worlds as common knowledge,” I pointed out.
Mara nodded. “And if dragons are so secluded and all, what is Kalgyrad doing here? What happened?”
Jask hesitated, sorting through words. He also looked a little scattered, his multiple eyes flicking about the room, as if our dual line of questioning was becoming harder to keep track of. “I think it’s precisely because this world is more cut off from the others that there is such movement here,” he said finally. “There are other forces at work in the universe besides dragons, forces that monitor the borders and safeties of the worlds. So a place where they are not known is attractive to anyone seeking to hide. And as for what Kalgyrad is doing…” he paused again. I wondered how confidential of a matter it was. “He’s on a parallel assignment, one that isn’t my job. There was a strange matter that happened recently in the High Court. One of the Emperor’s nephews has been accused of treason as a result, but has since disappeared. Kalgyrad is with a group trying to find him and return him to Court.”
“And because this is a good place to hide out…” Mara said.
“Exactly.”
That would also explain why Kalgyrad kept asking about where dragons were. “So… why exactly are you guys attaching yourselves to us?” I asked, gesturing broadly to indicate Mara and I. “We’re kids. It’s not like we have a lot of influence or information.”
“No,” Jask admitted, “but you seem to already be involved. Other Wardens have seen evidences of the strange goings-on, yes, but as far as we can tell, you the only ones so far who have met the boneshade and lived. And while we had suspicions, your testimony is the first confirmation we have of what is here. So, on one hand, it seems a logical choice, and, on the other, if we’re hoping to do any good in this world, part of our priority will be to keep you two safe. Since you’re likely in direct danger.”
And lived? Had someone died? No, I would have heard about something like that. Right?
“But, also, because of the danger, you’ll be in direct contact with the problem, too. On top of that, you, young Rhys, are connected to one of the heads of the Wardens in the area, which is good for information.”
I wondered if he meant I could ask Grammy for information, or that it’d be easier to eavesdrop. I didn’t know how I felt about either option.
Sorrel made a little sound, almost like a muffled cough, and stared meaningfully at Jask.
“And, well,” Jask relented, lying his ears flat. “From a practical standpoint, we doubted we’d get much traction with the adults in charge, considering they don’t know who or what we are, and so are likely less open to hearing our point of view.”
Mara half-snorted, half-chuckled.
Again, I wasn’t sure how I felt about being used, but, well, considering Grammy’s reaction to him, it did seem like a valid precaution.
“They don’t trust Kalgyrad, though,” I pointed out. “Or at least, I’m pretty sure they don’t. But he’s working with them directly. Or at least Grammy directly.”
“They know what dragons are,” Jask replied. “And they have enough of a healthy respect for them that they know not to brush him off. I would guess that is the crux of their cooperation.”
“Speaking of which, aren’t the Wardens investigating, too?” Mara asked. “Have they found out anything?”
“Not that I know of, but it’s possible that they’re researching this the wrong way.” I chewed my lip. “If they don’t know about other worlds enough to factor them into their calculations, they’re going to be either trying to find local sources, connecting with other Wardens from other counties and countries, or doing reconnaissance, all of which will be a slower process.”
“The reconnaissance would be… unsafe,” Jask said after a pause.
“Wardens are competent,” I said, looking away from him. “We might not be capable of traveling to other worlds, but we know our own pretty well.” I hugged my backpack and thought of Llewellyn. He was probably exhausted, having to balance college with this new trouble going on in the mountains.
“But they don’t know the boneshades,” Jask replied. He coughed, suddenly. “What I’m—” his voice broke, pitching to a high squeal.
Sorrel shifted, ridge-spines standing on end, while Jask tried to clear his throat.
“I think my time is up,” Jask said. He sounded more normal, but still thinned out. “One more question, quick.”
One more question? There were so many things we still need to know. How do we fight the boneshades? Was anyone else with the boneshades? Was there any confirmation on if there was a dragon with the boneshades? How many enemies were there? Any idea of their goal? When could he talk to us next? If we got in trouble, how much could we rely on the two of them? Was there any way to share information to the Wardens without breaking my deal with Kalgyrad? How far could we even trust Kalgyrad? What was his opinion on him?
“Is there anyone we could contact for help or information, besides the Wardens?” Mara jumped in before I could even pick a topic to ask about. “Like the stone people—silveries? And if we end up in the woods, how do we stay safe?”
Jask narrowed all his eyes at her. “First of all, stay out of the woods. There’s something going on in there, beyond what we’re aware of.” He gave a little squeaky cough. “If you really need to be in there for some reason, make sure one of us is with you, and you have plenty of light available. As for the other—” a fit of squeak-coughing interrupted him. “I’m sorry, I don’t know. And I’m afraid that’s all I have for now.”
“Do you know when you’ll be able to talk again?” I asked quickly, sitting bolt upright. Maybe we could slip something else in. “And if boneshades come after us, how do we fight them?”
Jask had another fit of coughing, shaking his head. “Light—” he managed. “Hard—specialized—” And then his voice cut out, fading into a squeak.
I sank back into the old chair. “Did he mean it’s hard to say, that we need specialized light, or something else entirely?”
Mara shrugged. Jask was still coughing in the background, and Sorrel flexed her spines.
I looked Mara over. She was still settled on the floor, and she had pulled her backpack off to rest in her lap. There was a distant, thoughtful look on her face, mouth scrunched to the side. This worried me.
“Why do you want to find someone outside of the Wardens?” I asked.
“If the Wardens are limited in their knowledge of what they’re dealing with, maybe there’s someone else who might know stuff. I… I kept getting distracted so I didn’t remember until the end, but I was going to ask him about this, and if it or its owners were connected to this whole adventure.”
She zipped open her backpack in a single decisive tug, and rifled through its contents. As she did so, I remembered the amulet, and slowly started worming it out of the bottom of my backpack. Part of me was still reluctant to show anyone other than Mara, but, unless he was lying through his teeth very convincingly, Jask did know a lot about what was going on, and could be helpful in deciphering what it was.
A second later, Mara pulled out a small rectangle of black leather and handed it to me. I let the amulet fall so I could focus.
It was a cover of some kind, and on it was a sharp-edged “C,” with a straight back and triangular angles instead of curves. Thin, spidery lines criss-crossed inside it, and below it, lines like echoes of the angles were repeated, like it was hinting at unseen copies of the “C.”*
“It looks… official,” I said, for lack of a better term.
“Sorrel found it,” Mara said. “Open it.”
In it was a badge. It was circular, with an open book engraved in the middle of it, a dagger thrust down its spine. On the right side of the book was the same sort of “C” that had been on the cover, and the other was a reversed “C,” in cursive script. There were also oak leaves and keys flanking the open book, a bat beneath it, and a banner that said “Minstrare. Ducere. Custodire.” I wasn’t sure what language that was. Around the edge was a script. Turning the badge to better catch the light, I read out the words: “Corporation for Extra-Normal Creatures and Activities.” Each capitalized letter was boldened, as if it was supposed to spell out an acronym. After a moment to piece the letters together, I added: “CENCA.”
To be continued…
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