The Last Stand of Daronwy Read online

  No one responded.

  “Mais, I swear. Any of y’all have ears? I said, do you understand?”

  Mumbles of “Yes, sir” and nods rippled through the white robed boys.

  “Okay, arrange yourselves by height; come on. We don’t have all day now, mais yeah.”

  They rearranged their lines. Deacon Thibodeaux led them out of the building, beneath the ashen sky to the church. It seemed even more filled with people than it had been earlier, if that were possible. The bishop stood with his tall hat and shepherd’s crook in the foyer. Father Boylston stood, holding an incense burner that assailed Jeremy’s nose with its bitter spices of myrrh and frankincense. The bishop made a motion and the music began. The column of acolytes began shuffling toward the altar. Jeremy followed the line out, the fingernails on his left hand biting into the back of his right.

  The altar had never seemed so far away. With every step, Jeremy wanted to bolt for the doors. If he didn’t see Father Pat, maybe it wouldn’t be real. His shuffle slowed to a crawl as he neared the casket. Jeremy’s heart fractured anew with each remaining inch as he neared it. Father Pat lay in the black coffin, hands peacefully clasped around a cross on his chest. His wispy white hair was neatly combed as it had always been. He wore the black suit and collar. He looked asleep. It had to be a mistake. It had to be. Jeremy fought the urge to grab the coffin and shake it, to wake him. Instead, he bowed and walked to his seat on the front pew.

  The bishop came last with his attendant priests and a nun to anoint the coffin with incense. Before she even spoke, Jeremy knew that the nun was Father Pat’s sister. Her old hands shook; her tears fell from the same Irish blue eyes. The bishop helped her up the altar steps. Tears streamed down Jeremy’s face, but he tried not to make a sound.

  The bishop said, “In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.” Jeremy made the sign of the cross. The Mass moved through the motions like any Mass. Jeremy wanted to yell that Father Pat was only asleep, that he would get up and laugh and joke with them all in just a moment. Father Pat’s sister spoke, but the Irish lilt of her voice just brought more tears to Jeremy’s eyes and he couldn’t pay attention to what she said.

  Too soon, the Mass was over, and the bishop was anointing the coffin with more incense. The heavy black lid came down, snapping into place. Jeremy’s fingernails cut into the wood of the pew, his knuckles white. This couldn’t be happening. God, don’t do this. Please don’t do this. But God did not intervene. Left with no choice, he filed out of the pew after the others and followed the coffin to the front of the church. As he walked, Mr. Leblanc began the eagle song, playing the Irish flute. Its haunting notes ferreted out every morsel of grief and love in Jeremy’s heart, pushing them through his eyes. They tasted salty on his cheeks. Father Pat’s coffin went into a black hearse. Jeremy was crammed into a white van with the other robed acolytes. He grabbed the wooden cross that hung around his neck, holding it tight, relishing the way the wood bit into his fingers and palm, trying to stop crying.

  It began to mist as they drove to the cemetery. The melancholy magic of the flute’s song played through his mind. When they stopped at the cemetery, the coffin was unloaded beneath a green-roofed pavilion. Jeremy started walking toward the pavilion.

  “Jeremy, come here.”

  He walked back. “Stand here. You stand there. Arrange yourselves by height,” said the Deacon. “Come on boys, this ain’t hard. By height, now.”

  They were arranged into a human cross on the wet grass twenty yards from the pavilion. Jeremy wanted to go to the coffin; he wanted to see Father Pat, he wanted to say goodbye, but he held fast to his place in the cross. Misting rain fell like giant teardrops from the sky, mussing the boys’ hair and drenching their robes. A tide of black umbrellas inundated the pavilion. He could hear nothing of what the bishop said, nothing of what anyone said. And then it was over. As suddenly as it had begun, it was finished. The black umbrellas swirled around the pavilion, drifting in ones and twos to their cars. Still the acolytes stood, a cross of white-robed boys pretending to be angels for the honor of a priest they loved. The mist changed to a constant, fine rain. Only the bishop and Father Pat’s sister were left under the pavilion. One of the men said something about loading up in the van. Jeremy glanced at him, then sprinted across the muddy grass. He didn’t stop until he was next to the coffin, surprising both the bishop and the nun.

  Tears and rain streamed down his face. “It can’t be right,” he said. “It can’t be right. I was chosen. It can’t be right.” He walked to the casket and put his hands against its metal sides. It was cold to the touch, and he pulled his hands away as though it were sculpted from ice.

  “Laddie,” said an Irish lilt as sad as the flute that still echoed in his mind. “Pat’s gone on ahead of us, now. He’s up in Heaven, and he’ll be a-watchin’ you and me, and ever’one here for all our lives ‘til we get to join him. So, he’s still here. In your heart and mine, and hearts of all the people that loved him.”

  Jeremy stared at her vibrant blue eyes—the same eyes as Father Pat’s. She held out a shaking hand.

  “But… it’s not right.” He took her hand.

  She pulled him to her and embraced him. “Little one, we can’t presume to understand God’s Will.”

  Jeremy wanted to say, “But He said I was Chosen,” but didn’t. His voice was drowned. He let the Sister hug him.

  “Remember, he’ll be a-watchin’ you, always. Always from up in Heaven.”

  Jeremy nodded and then walked to the casket, touched it briefly with his left hand. “Goodbye, Father.”

  He wished he had a flower to add to the dripping riot of color atop the casket, but his hands were empty. Jeremy took off the wooden cross and laid it against the icy ebony. He shuffled his feet through the wet grass, letting the rain soak him until he reached the spot where Deacon Thibodeaux stood, arms crossed.

  “Get on in the van,” he said, half-choking on the words and failing to seem angry. They drove back to the church in a wet, musky silence. He found his mom outside the cloakroom where the boys dumped their saturated, muddy robes. At home, Jeremy lay in bed and watched the rain pelt his window as the soft mist grew into a full thunderstorm. His heart felt hollowed out, empty. God had carved out his insides with a spoon, making him into a human jack-o’-lantern. He had been chosen, but it didn’t matter. He couldn’t save anything.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Like the painful throb of a broken bone, the hollow, haunting melody of the flute swept through his mind for days, an unending coda of loss. He wouldn’t have gone to Twin Hills, except his mom had made him get out of the house. He couldn’t save it, so he didn’t want to see it. He told himself that he didn’t care anymore, but his feet pulled him into what was left of Twin Hills. Blackened pyres of trees towered over him where Helter Skelter should have been. How could so much have changed in the week he’d spent in his room? He ran his hand over uprooted, dying trees. The trails had been destroyed; almost all of Helter Skelter had transformed into a chewed wasteland of bulldozer tread. Jeremy shuffled his hopeless feet into the remaining tumbledown bramble of Helter Skelter.

  It didn’t look right. The tallow trees were vulnerable gray things; the vines had lost their contorted malice. Jeremy picked his way through the underbrush, relishing the familiar scent of oil and rot as each step took him closer to the thicket’s dank, decimated heart. How long until the bulldozers tore through here? Would this be gone tomorrow, or the day after? He collapsed in a dreary jumble on the edge of Dry Creek, his head on his hands, elbows on his knees. Chosen or not, it didn’t matter. Tomorrow or next week, all of this would be trampled, uprooted, and burned. Jeremy sighed, buttoning his coat higher as he laid his head against a young pine on the edge of Dry Creek. He’d never get out. Not anymore. And beyond that, nothing mattered.

  Daronwy watched Jeremiah walk beneath the b
oughs. The tree could feel the sundered pain in the boy’s young heart. Daronwy wrapped the vines tighter around the remaining branches; he gathered the last of the magic that had not yet expired in clouds of soot and ash and bent it toward the sapling. Jeremiah felt the magic as warmth on the wind, a brush of sunlight on his cheek as he sat against one of the younger brethren. If it was a way out he sought, then a way out he would find. The sapling’s attention stirred when Daronwy cracked a twig at his back. As though the tree had called his name, Jeremiah came to investigate. Daronwy created a rounded opening in a mound. Jeremiah entered and walked into a blackness, each step taking him farther from the land of the waking, closer to the land of the unseen.

  The shadow of the hole in the mound called to him with slithering lips in a voice that itched in the back of his mind. Jeremy ducked through the low, muddy opening, feet squishing in the ooze. Gnarled tendrils tickled his hair. A gray light like the sun’s ghost through storm clouds glowed before him. He stepped toward it and almost cried out when his foot landed on something hard. He jumped back and hit something equally as hard. The gray light enveloped him, showing stone on every side. He whirled around.

  He was in a room with mortared stone walls, floors, and ceiling. Where was the doorway he’d just walked through? Where was he? Jeremy ran his hands over the ancient crevices in the wall, but it was solid. Heavy boots echoed behind him. Jeremy spun. This was wrong. He’d crossed over, but he was still himself. He was not Eaglewing. He was not taller. He had no wings. He had no armor. He had no sword; indeed, no weapon of any kind. It was wrong. He was just… Jeremy.

  The two pairs of boots walked out of phase with each other as they neared. His heart hammered in his ears and his breath came in gasps; he was only Jeremy and people were coming. There was only one way in or out of the room—through the long hall that opened in front of him, where the methodical sound of steps echoed toward him. Maybe the owners of the boots would be kind, would be on his side. The knots in his stomach said, No, no they are not. The hairs on the back of his neck urged him to find a place to hide. But there was nothing in the empty, square room.

  The owners of the boots rounded the corner and stopped, yellow eyes bulging, green fingers pointing. Jeremy stared back in disbelief. Ogres were even uglier than he’d imagined: green skin, boarish snouts, and long fangs. They dressed in ragged, oily hides and loose chain mail. One said something to the other, and they pulled rusty axes from their belts. Jeremy swallowed. They charged toward him, axes raised.

  One swung his axe. Jeremy dove forward, shoulder slamming into the stone. He rolled past them, but the ogre grabbed the back of his coat, hauling him to his feet. Jeremy struggled with the buttons. The ogre reeked like the tar pit and its greedy yellow eyes gleamed down at Jeremy while a long forked tongue licked over its fangs. The second ogre reached for him, but the first pulled Jeremy away from its grasp, barking a ragged warning. Jeremy popped his coat’s last button and tore his arms out of the jacket, sprinting. The ogres shouted, but he did not look back. There had to be some way out of here. Jeremy veered toward emptier hallways, losing count of the turns he made. Shouts and grunts told him the two pursuers had grown into many. Sweat burned his eyes, and each glance back held more terror than the last. The jackbooted ogres were gaining on him and any minute he knew an axe would bite down on his shoulder.

  The hallway opened into a large courtyard ahead. Jeremy urged his burning legs to move faster. He burst into the courtyard and stopped, his mouth hanging open. Ogres swarmed everywhere, some cracking whips over smaller versions of themselves. The courtyard was only half finished. Its pavestones ended in a jagged line where it met a forest, or rather, what had been a forest. Stumps and pyres stretched to a distant line of trees, but the trees were all black with no leaves. Ash sifted down through the air. Five hundred pairs of yellow eyes turned to him, forgetting their work. Jeremy swallowed.

  One shadow uncurled among the stumps, rising to its full height like a flower following the sun. It was a man wearing a long black coat. His hair was moss green and his skin pale. The ogres stepped backward, wary of this man. Jeremy ran toward him, toward the end of the unfinished courtyard. When the man’s bottomless black eyes fixed on Jeremy, though, Jeremy’s heart sank. Jeremy tried to stop his feet, but they slid on the ash-covered stones and he tumbled into the man’s legs. Jeremy glanced back at the ogres that circled behind him, axes crossed, drool dripping onto the flagstones. There was nowhere to go.

  Long fingers curled around the front of Jeremy’s shirt and lifted him. His legs kicked in mid-air. Up close, the man wasn’t exactly human: sharp ridges took the place of cheeks, his chin jutted too far forward, and faint scales patterned his skin. Pinning Jeremy with his demonic gaze, he said, “Why have you come?” The booming voice resonated through the plaza.

  Jeremy’s words dribbled down his chin.

  Again, louder. “Why have you come?”

  “I… don’t… know.”

  “You don’t know?”

  The long fingers uncurled from Jeremy’s shirt, dropping him. The man-thing turned and walked into the dead forest. The ogres shouted and charged.

  “No, wait!” Jeremy ran after the tall shadow, but it remained ahead of him even though it never sped its walk. Jeremy ran past black, leafless trees, leaving deep footprints in the white ash that covered the world. Ogres pounded after him, shouting and waving their axes in the air. Between the dead trunks, Jeremy glimpsed a large tree. It seemed to glow; a massive oak, easily three times the size of the other trees, with bright green leaves and rich, dappled bark. Jeremy followed the man into the oak’s clearing, then around the tree, but the man was gone. “Hello? Where are you?”

  The only response was grunting from the ogres. They stood around the edge of the clearing, clearly afraid to step within it. A low growl rumbled through the bones of the world. Jeremy walked around the tree, trailing one hand on the massive trunk. A gorilla-like beast squatted on the opposite side. It was twice the size of the ogres. It growled again, showing fangs as long as Jeremy’s hand. Jeremy left the tree and stepped toward the edge of the clearing, where the ogres were already retreating. The gorilla reared on its hind legs, howling to the sky. Jeremy turned and ran. He could hear the thok-thunk of its feet behind him on the pale ash. Jeremy ran between the black trees, his burning lungs gasping for breath. The beast swiped at him, tearing dead bark with each missed strike. Jeremy arrived on the top of a barren hill overlooking the sprawling, half-completed plaza and buildings below. He heard the gorilla’s feet pounding the ground behind him. Jeremy glanced back to see its paw raised, broken yellow nails silhouetted against the monochrome gray sky.

  Four hot knives raked across his spine as it swiped. Jeremy screamed and fell, tumbling headfirst down the hill. He rolled to the feet of the green-haired man. Jeremy’s eyes burned, his back ached, and his breath came in painful gasps. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. This wasn’t what crossing over was supposed to be like.

  Long fingers wrapped his shoulders, lifting him to his feet. The gorilla was gone, and the ogres crowded together in their paved courtyard. Jeremy stared into the bottomless eyes of the green-haired man.

  “Why have you come?” he asked.

  “I… I…” Jeremy glanced left and right, seeking some explanation in the dying world.

  The creature shook him. “Why have you come?”

  “I don’t know! I wanted to make things better, but I can’t, all right? I can’t save Father Pat, I can’t save Twin Hills, I can’t…”

  The being stared at him.

  “I can’t!” Jeremy screamed at his pale, scaly face. “I just can’t!”

  “So, that is why you come here while the brethren burn. That is why you do nothing. If you do not believe, you will not succeed.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I will show you what comes of this lack of be
lief. I will show you.”

  The green-haired man threw him onto the flagstones of the courtyard. Jeremy rolled to a stop. Ogres rushed forward. Jeremy clawed after the man, grabbing a fist of his black robe. “Don’t leave me.”

  The man turned; his jaw unhinged, revealing a palpable darkness inside a cavernous mouth as it roared. Jeremy’s spine turned to jelly. He scuttled backward and toppled over something. Daniel lay sprawled on the flagstones, a broken sword in one hand, a splintered staff in the other. Ogre boots thundered across the stone courtyard. Looking from them to his friend, Jeremy grabbed the broken sword and lurched toward them, swinging. Axes fell in a painful rain like hot silver running across his skin.

  The sword grew heavy. His legs were mired in quicksand. He watched the axes rise and fall, droplets of blood dripping from their blades. A golden light shown through a small opening between two ogres. Jeremy fought his way toward it, his body consumed in pain with each step. An ogre stood before him, axe raised. Jeremy punched it hard on the chin with his left fist. He felt the wind from another axe as it sailed overhead. Jeremy dropped the sword and careened across the plaza toward the receding light.

  Jeremy tripped on heavy feet. He smashed into a tree, spun off it, lost his footing, and fell, tumbling into the shallow black water of Dry Creek. He bounced up, wading to the opposite bank. His eyes scanned the thicket behind him. Nothing moved in the shadows among the trees. Drenched and cold, he pulled his legs to his chest, watching for ogres. No ogres or gorillas pursued him, no giant green-haired creature haunted him. Daniel was not sprawled dead in the needles. Had he dreamt it? If he had, why did he hurt so bad? He could see the scratches on his arms. The knuckles on his left hand were ripped open and bleeding. He shivered. His T-shirt was torn. And where was his coat?