“Mom’s got no use for them anymore. I’d hate to see them go to the moths.” No tears. Just a matter of fact.
“Thank you so much.” I eagerly wrap myself in a knitted sweater and pull on some thick socks. The perfume of his mom mixed with fragrant cedar wafts from the box and the clothes.
That evening, we feast on our first solid meal in three days. We try to be sensitive to the boy and curb our jubilation. Still, it’s pretty obvious that we’re enjoying ourselves. English is drunk from downing an entire flask of potent honey wine he found in one of the houses. We all have raided the houses for clothes, blankets, and a few comforts such as a sack of hard licorice candy. Flip doesn’t seem to mind.
Theo comes up to Flip and wraps a blanket over the boy’s shoulders. “Philip. We’ll look for your father and brother. They may still be in the woods, hiding.”
“Theo, sir, they’d never leave the town. They didn’t come back from the mill, so they’re certainly dead. The fog got ’em just like everyone else.” The boy’s either surprisingly level-headed or in complete shock.
English is now drunk enough to leap past tact. “Boy, how’d you not end up with your feller village people, dead in that pit?”
Samuel stands and grabs English by the arm. “Goodness man. The boy just lost his entire world. It’s one thing for us adults to lose so much, but he’s just a boy.”
Flip’s face goes blank. “They told me to hide in the cellar under the bodies.”
English dribbles wine. “Who…exactly…are…they?”
The boy looks at me for help. We don’t want to tell them about the green ones. I stammer, “English, leave Flip alone. You needn’t interrogate him. He’s lucky to be alive and was very brave.”
Bets gets up. “I’m going to lie down in a real bed. I presume we’ll be off in the morning?”
“Yes, we need to head north,” Theo replies. “Flip, you’re coming with us.”
We all shift uncomfortably. English throws down his flask and walks into the darkness beyond the hearth. Now they have two problems to deal with: me and the kid.
“I’m not going with you,” the boy responds. “You’ll be riding right into the monsters’ land. They’ll rip you apart. Why aren’t you going down toward the flats where you came from?”
Theo smiles sadly. “We’re searching for a place up the mountain where we’ll find answers.”
“Well, the only answers up there are to stupid questions. You people are touched.” Flip gets up. “I’ll see you off in the morning. Doubt you’ll ever return.” He looks at me. “Are you sure you want to go?”
“We have to go,” Theo responds noticing the boy’s gaze. “The reason we’re going up is for her.”
Flip gives me a puzzled look and leaves.
I’m sleeping deeply on a bed by a dying fire when Flip shakes me to consciousness. “Miss Amy, we’ve got to go. They’re coming back for both of us. I can see them at dawn.”
My first thought is strangely not of danger. Rather, I’m annoyed that these creatures from the north won’t let me get sleep. “Flip, go tell the others. What time is it?”
“About an hour until sunrise.” He’s gone in an instant.
I pack my bag quickly, making sure to include extra blankets and as much hardtack and jerky as possible. Shouting outside suggests that Flip’s message has been heeded. I emerge into the dark, damp, cold to see Bets, Theo, and Samuel saddling up their horses. English is not there. “Where’s that shit at?” I ask them.
“I dunno,” Bets exclaims. “But if that boy’s making us move for no reason, he’s going to end up with the rest of his village.”
Flip is right, though. I can see three greenlings, as he calls them, standing on a hay bale pointing toward the south wall. I presume that this is where the fog will enter the encampment. The scent of lamp oil, manure, and decay drifts into the commons and the horses begin whinnying. “Flip, are you still planning to stay?” I ask.
His face is pale and his eyes wide with fear. “No ma’am. I’ll go with you for a bit.”
“You can ride with me on Phineus.”
The smell grows stronger. Dim, greenish light appears and Samuel shouts for English, with no response. The first tendrils of greyish-brown mist descend the south wall when we hear rustling underground. The sound emanates from the large root cellar and the fog moves toward it. Then the groans begin. At first I think it is English trapped in the ground, but I instantly realize that the moans are increasing in number — a symphony of dead throats singing to our doom. The alien fog is waking the dead and apparently, the bodies are animated enough to scale the ladder because the door is rattling. The large iron ring is flipping back and forth ominously. I don’t want to see what might pop out.
“We need to ride,” Theo exclaims. None of us protest. We exit the north gate and head up the road toward the clear morning light, riding hard for quite some time. The air’s clear and calm and the horses are settled. We pause to rest at high noon. We left English’s horse in the clearing in the town. I suppose we’re all expecting to see him galloping toward us. Neither he nor the fog and its allies appear to be pursuing.
Theo is chewing on a piece of hardtack and studying the elder’s book. I hand him a blade of grass. “Do you think that idiot English will find us?”
“English may have drunk himself silly last night. But he’s mighty capable in a fight. He’ll catch up to us if he can. We need him.” Theo takes the grass and ties it into a knot. “I’m leaving him markers to know where we’re going.” He points to a small cairn on the side of the road. “We use these during hunting trips to find the best lots. They’re hard to notice unless you’re looking for them.”
We ride two more days in brilliant, optimistic sunshine, making frequent stops to allow Theo to check his book and read the landscape. We arrive at another fork in the road, with a rusted green sign hanging by a single bolt. It screeches as it swings in the wind. “By the symbols on this sign and the lay of the land, we are to head east here.” Theo stacks a few flat rocks and we are on our way again.
We’re in the high desert now. A small, ruined city lays ahead, dark and angry looking. I see my first skeleton in the dust, looking as if was recently uncovered by the winds. At the outskirts of the rusted buildings and scattered rubble, we again head north into sparsely wooded hills, following what used to be a paved road. Theo slows Silius considerably and searches earnestly for some landmark. “All of you, we’re looking for a large metal tower with a plate on top. The trees here might be hiding the view. The structure should be on a ridge.”
We fan out and shortly Bets exclaims, “Over here”.
She’s standing before a vast metal lattice reaching above the trees. A few straggly vines hang from it. Otherwise, it looks well maintained, as if it is still in use. Of course, none of us know what the purpose of such a strange thing might be. Perhaps the ancients used it to climb and search for approaching enemies. It appears that they are still using it, which makes me nervous.
Theo hops off Siluis and gives him a pat. “From here we walk.”
“How far?” Bets asks.
“An hour, perhaps less. Look for a metallic door in the hillside with a red circle on it. It was meant to be hidden, so we need to look carefully.”
Three hours pass. We’ve walked up and down the hillside several times. Samuel and Flip have given up and Bets is cursing and kicking small rocks. Theo is perched on a reddish boulder, rubbing his forehead, patiently reading the leather book, and sipping a little flask of shine. I continue to walk around, more curious about the plants and animals I see than finding the door. I marvel at the variety of life in such an apparently dry and desolate place — very different than the moist, warm gardens of my home. I’m chasing a tiny tan lizard through the brush and trip over a long, braided metallic cable, unlike anything I’ve seen before. The metal isn’t corroded and was clearly buried at one time. I follow it up the hill, as it snakes in and out of the ground. And then I see an indentation on the side of a small outcropping. I touch it and a sheet of dust, sand, and rubble falls away to reveal two metal doors, both with faded red circles on them, and a box that resembles what I’ve seen in so much of the junk in the rubbish piles. There are nine symbols on squares, each representing a number from 1 to 9 in the writing of the ancients, according to Teacher. I presume that these numbers represent some sort of puzzle that will open the doors. I hope desperately that the answer to Eliza’s disappearance is in there. Maybe Fromer, father, and Wenn are waiting for us.