The Last Stand of Daronwy Read online

  Lightningbolt’s eyes opened. He blinked at the other wizards. Fire rained down on the shield above them; heat seeped through the shield as its magic crumbled. The tower they stood on shuddered with the attacks of the dragons. People screamed, soldiers shouted orders, and spells and flaming arrows lit up the night as desperate defenders tried to protect the inner keep. The usual radiance of the Stones had dulled, as though exhausted. Niritan, his voice quiet but audible to them all, said, “And that is why we need the Red Stone. Kronshar unconsciously called on all the Stones when your adept attacked him.”

  Dust drifted in long clouds over half the outer keep as it crumbled from the power of the blast. “We have to retreat,” said the Midnight Wizard. “This way, hurry.”

  “Wait,” Lightningbolt said. “Where is Kronshar? Where’s Mayflure?” Both dragons had vanished. He scanned the red clouds, reflecting the burning palace.

  “There’s Kronshar!” The Midnight Wizard pointed. Kronshar floated in mid-air, Red Stone still clasped in his hands, the other four Stones rotating around him. He looked insignificant without his dragon. But the brightness of the blue orbs that circled him suggested otherwise. The wizard floated toward the wall, raising the Red Stone over his head.

  “We must go!” shouted Niritan. They ran into the palace, away from the battlement. Lightningbolt stopped and turned back to the sky. He crafted his own shield against Kronshar, halfway through the air. He left the spell in place, running after the others with burning legs and gasping for breath.

  “Let’s play that my shield held and we ran down the secret escape tunnel that leads out of the castle.”

  “Okay, and let’s say that Kronshar gets to your shield and feels it.” Jeremy mimed the wizard’s confusion.

  Daniel ran, throwing his legs wide in an unnecessary parody of exhaustion, sweat running down his face in rivers.

  “And Kronshar gets to the shield and raises the Capstone.” Jeremy raised the Red Stone overhead and mimed slamming it down.

  Daniel stiffened and collapsed as the power exploded through his mind, while the buildings of the inner castle fell like flattened dominoes.

  “Let’s play that Niritan runs back for you, picks you up, and keeps running,” Jeremy said.

  “And when Kronshar hits my shield, some of the Red Stone’s power passes into me. So now I have a little bit of control over it too.”

  Jeremy nodded. He wiped the sweat off his forehead and sat on the edge of Twin Hills. He pulled his soaked shirt away from his body and wrung the sweat out of it.

  Daniel wiped the sweat out of his eyes. “It is hot.” He sank down next to his friend. “There won’t be much left of Hrad’din.”

  “No, not much.”

  Chapter Twenty

  School smelled like an antiseptic cross between an ammonia refinery and a chalk mine. Still groggy, Jeremy trudged down the hallway, slipping further into despair with every step. In his backpack was the collection of notebooks and folders that the teachers had mandated every student have, and stuffed surreptitiously between these folders was Mr. Leblanc’s copy of The Two Towers. Jeremy couldn’t wait to sit down and escape back to the fight at Helm’s Deep. Suddenly he tripped on the tile, pitching forward, vaulting his Trapper Keeper through the air. The Velcro broke, and his collection of folders, pencils, and paper scattered across the floor. Everyone laughed. Daniel stopped to help him pick everything up, and a thin boy in a baby blue Houston Oilers baseball cap bent to help as well.

  “Thanks,” Jeremy said.

  “You’re welcome,” said the boy, handing him the last of the notebook paper.

  Jeremy nearly jumped back as he recognized the brown eyes. “Travis?”

  “Yeah. Hey.” The rail-thin boy smiled. The cap could not disguise that his curly hair had disappeared. He seemed shorter too, as though he had shrunk since the last time Jeremy had seen him. “Uh…” Jeremy didn’t know what to say. “How are you? Are you better?”

  Travis shrugged. “I’m good. How’re you?”

  “Good. Thanks for the help.” Jeremy tried to flash a smile and walked around Travis. Above the classroom door, Mrs. Livingston’s name was written in yellow and green letters, colored with jagged lines. It looked like the breath of a dragon, and Jeremy decided it was not a good omen.

  “Travis looks different, doesn’t he?” whispered Daniel as Jeremy opened his book.

  “Yeah. He’s been sick a long time. I didn’t see him all summer.”

  “Me neither.”

  Mira walked by with a gaggle of girls. When had he last seen her? “Hi, Mira!” Jeremy said, jumping to his feet.

  She pretended not to notice him, turning her back to Daniel and him. Jeremy questioned Daniel with his eyes, nodding in her direction. Daniel shook his head, smoothing the air with his hand as if to say, “Forget about it.” Class began and the rotund Mrs. Livingston called them all inside. She went through the roll, making corrections on people’s nicknames. And so another school year ground into motion. English was the first subject they covered, and Jeremy completed the worksheet she handed out, separating subjects from verbs from objects in five minutes. He sat back, pulled out The Two Towers, and was up to his neck in Uruk-hai, fighting on the wall of Helm’s Deep with Aragorn. He didn’t notice that Mrs. Livingston towered over him.

  “Jeremiah Trahan, what is that you are reading?”

  Jeremy blinked up at her. Her dark eyes were narrowed, her mouth pursed. “The Two Towers. It’s part of the story about the one ring. I already finished my work. See?” He flipped the paper on his desk over and showed it to her.

  “I will not have you reading that filth in my classroom. Give me the book.”

  “But it’s not mine.”

  “Give me the book, young man, or I’ll put your name on the board. You can get it at the end of the day, and you can take it home, and not bring it back to class. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” He handed her the book. She snapped it shut before he could give her the bookmark, losing his place.

  “I ought to just throw this away, but I’ll let you have it back. Next time you bring it, it will go into the trash, you understand?” Jeremy nodded, ears burning. “If you want something to read, I recommend any of the books over there under the windows.”

  Jeremy glanced at them. Several were church stories: The Travels of Simon Peter, John the Baptist, and an entire assortment of Little House on the Prairie, flanked by the World Book Encyclopedia. He sat back at his desk, doodling on the back of his worksheet.

  “Don’t sit there and draw on that. Get a book and read!”

  Jeremy sighed, going to the encyclopedias. He chose “C” for castle.

  At recess, Mira drifted away with the clique she had been with that morning. Jeremy hovered on the edge of the group until one of the boys, a new guy named Josh, told him to leave. Josh stood almost a head taller than Jeremy, and the girls giggled when he said it. Jeremy crossed the playground to Daniel, who was picking up a soccer ball.

  “Hey, what are they doing over there? Does Mira want to play?”

  Jeremy shook his head. “They’re in two clubs: the girls are the Pink Ladies and the boys are the T-Birds. They don’t seem to do anything, though.”

  Daniel chuckled. “Like Grease.”

  “Huh? What does it have to do with grease?”

  “Grease, you know.” Daniel peered into Jeremy’s eyes. He sighed, explaining, “It’s a movie.”

  “What’s it about?”

  “These girls who have a Pink Lady club and some boys who have a club called the T-Birds. The T-Birds all ride motorcycles and impress the girls. And they all sing a lot.”

  “Sounds boring.”

  Daniel shrugged. “Here, kick it to me.”

  They kicked the ball back and forth. Jeremy’s mind drifted to
think about the castle, and the ruin that Eaglewing would wake up and find. Would it look like the pictures of the ruins in the World Book? Or would it be grayer?

  “Hey!”

  Jeremy looked up. Travis ambled toward them, still wearing his hat.

  “What do you want?”

  “Can I play?”

  Jeremy looked from Travis to Daniel, Daniel to Travis. It had been a different morning. Travis had sat through class, even through lunch, without being called on once. Jeremy had noticed it. In fact, the only person that Mrs. Livingston had called out was Jeremy. He held Daniel’s eyes, but couldn’t tell what his friend was thinking. It was not the first time he’d wished for Eaglewing and Lightningbolt’s telepathy.

  “No. We’re just playing together,” said Jeremy.

  Travis looked down at the grass, kicking it with his toe. “Please?”

  “No. Go find Tim and Lee if you want someone to play with.”

  Travis sighed. “I don’t want—” He grabbed his stomach for a moment, then turned and walked away.

  “What happened to him?”

  Jeremy shrugged. “I don’t know. Here, go long.”

  After class, Jeremy marched to Mrs. Livingston’s desk and asked for his book back. She handed it to him. “But you ought to know that I’m going to call your parents about this. They ought not to let a boy of your age read that kind of stuff. You need to read some good stories. I expect you to do your next book report on a nice wholesome book.”

  “Can I do it on a book about castles?”

  “No!”

  “Egypt?”

  “No! Read about the pioneers.”

  “How about the dinosaurs?”

  “Heavens, no. Sweet Jesus, where do you get all these ideas? Pioneers. You will do it on the Little House on the Prairie books.”

  “Can I please do it on something else?”

  “No.”

  He watched the small town slide by as the bus drove him home. “I hate Mrs. Livingston,” Jeremy said, turning away from the window.

  Daniel nodded. “She gave us lots of math homework.”

  “Yeah. And she’s going to make me do a book report on a Little House on the Prairie book.”

  “Can’t you just watch the TV show?”

  “It’s a TV show?”

  Daniel stared at him as if he had two heads. “Yeah. It comes on right before Transformers.”

  “What channel?”

  “I dunno, maybe eight?”

  “Cable.”

  “Oh. Well you can come to my house and watch it if you want. I’ll see you.” He got off the bus.

  Jeremy trudged up the walk to his house. The summer sun had started to set, draining his hope and carrying it over the golden horizon. The short days of fall still held their cold breath, but soon they would exhale, trapping him in another dark winter. Somewhere in Twin Hills was a way out. He had to find it.

  Part 4: Autumn

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Mrs. Livingston did not throw away their homework, but she did assign plenty of it. All of it was graded and sent home once a week in a folder that had to be signed and returned. Jeremy’s backpack permanently included a math book, a social studies book, a library book for book reports, a folder of mimeographed English exercises, and a science workbook. Posters had to be made for the book reports, books had to be read, math problems had to be completed. As the days grew shorter, Jeremy found himself bent over his desk longer and longer.

  It was a Thursday. The first cold front of autumn battled the warm Gulf of Mexico air, creating thunder that rattled the glass in his bedroom window. Rain cascaded along the orange-lit street, sweeping in and out of shadows. In a frolic only visible when arcs of lightning cut through the clouds, the trees of Twin Hills danced in time to the storm. Jeremy sat at his desk, math book open and pencil in hand, watching.

  He jumped at the knock on the doorframe, startled to be caught daydreaming.

  “Jeremy.” His mom sat on the bed. Her eyes were red, her nose stuffy. Had something happened to Grandma? He sat forward, elbows on knees. “Jeremy, last night… um… you know Travis Broussard, from school?”

  Of course he knew Travis.

  “He… he died last night.” She faltered into nurse-speak. “He had liver complications due to chemotherapy, aggravated because they couldn’t get him a bone marrow transplant in time.”

  It had to be some kind of mistake. Travis was his age—he couldn’t die. Only old people died. What did that mean? He stared at the carpet, uncertain what to say or what to feel.

  She crossed the small room, embracing him. “It’s so hard when a child dies. I’m so glad you never swam in that pond.” She pushed him away, holding him at arm’s length, fixing him with an interrogator’s hard gaze. “You didn’t, did you?”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Good. Good.” She pulled him back into her embrace and he felt her tears drip into his hair. Travis… Travis with his bald head and Oilers cap, asking to play with Daniel and him just last week. Why hadn’t they let him play? And now, he was gone. Gone to Heaven—did Travis go to Heaven?

  “He’s in Heaven?”

  “Yes, baby, he’s in Heaven.”

  “Well, that’s good.”

  “I’m sorry to have to tell you this.”

  Why should she be sorry about that? “It’s okay.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “Yes, ma’am. Think so.” Jeremy crossed his arms, frowning at the floor.

  “Do you want to talk about it, Jeremy?”

  He shook his head.

  “Okay, I’ll be in the living room with Dad if you need us, okay? You come get us if you need us.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  She left the room. Jeremy put down his pencil and stared at the storm. Travis was dead. Dead. Dead like old people who went to Heaven. It didn’t make any sense. He had been in class last week. It was impossible for him to be dead. But his mom had said so. How did that happen? How could the pond kill him? A murderous stab of lightning ripped through his heart: what about Father Pat? He had cancer too, and he was old. Would cancer kill him? Jeremy flinched as thunder exploded against his window. What did it mean?

  In class the next day, Jeremy glanced at Travis’ desk. It had been emptied of all the books, papers, pens, pencils, crayons, folders, and notebooks. It was the only empty desk. He glanced at the other students, all of them staring straight ahead at the chalkboard. All of them were oblivious to the empty desk, as though it were invisible. Only Mira and Daniel returned his gaze. Only Mira and Daniel’s eyes held an aberrant reflection of what he knew must be in his own. Only they could see the empty desk and know what it meant, what it was.

  “Jeremy, stop daydreaming.” He swiveled his neck back to the front of the classroom, where Mrs. Livingston stood, hands on her hips. “Look at the blackboard and tell me the answer to this division problem.”

  Jeremy stared at the confessional door as though it were the entrance to a doctor’s office. He glanced at his mom, standing behind him in line, arms crossed, still glowering. They had argued the entire way there. He didn’t want to go in, but she’d catch him if he bolted. A woman left the confessional, tears glittering on her cheeks. Father Boylston was in there, no doubt. He’d probably slapped her knuckles with a coat hanger. Jeremy shoved his hands deeper in his pockets. The old man in front of him shuffled into the confessional. Jeremy held his breath, hoping that they would run out of time, that he would be spared, that he could just go home and forget about this, and not have to walk in there under Father Boylston’s fiery gaze.

  The man came out. Jeremy watched his stuttering feet find their way to the nearest pew, watched him painstakingly kneel and look up at the stained glass window behind the altar. Jeremy’s eyes follow
ed. Jesus, please, please, don’t make me go in there. His mother’s hand grabbed his shoulder and steered him toward the confessional door. Jeremy swallowed, took a breath, opened the door, and stepped inside the dim room.

  The wicker screen was closed. He did not kneel. Instead, he stood behind the chair in the tiny room, flattening himself against the wall, barely daring to breathe. “Father… Father, it’s been three months since my last confession.” He braced himself between the chair and the wall, pressing his back into the wood paneling. “I have sinned.”

  “What is it, lad?”

  Jeremy tumbled over the chair, careened into the kneeling bench, and threw the wicker screen back. “Father Pat!”

  The old priest laughed, a hoarse, coughing laugh. One hand went absently to his throat. “Hello, Jeremy.”

  “How are you, Father?”

  “I am well as can be. Well as can be. But m’voice is going, so ye should tell me what brought you here on this fine day.”

  “I think I did something really bad.” He stared down at the shelf, wondering where to start.

  “Go on.”

  “You see, there was this turtle. The boys in the neighborhood were torturing it. It was just a red-ear, not a snapping turtle or anything, and they were poking it with sticks and kicking it and laughing. When I got there it was already bleeding. And Loren took my gun from me and started shooting it. And he kept shooting it. And I didn’t do anything. The turtle just wanted to get to the pond, it just wanted to get away, and it couldn’t.” A brick of tears formed in the back of his throat. “It couldn’t get away, and I didn’t say anything. Loren kept shooting it, and the other boys kept poking it. And it died. Then they made me pick it up and throw it into the pond.” He looked at his hands, spread flat on the shelf before him, among the copies of prayers. “There was blood all over my hands. I didn’t do anything, Father.”