Just over a mile later, I moved around the last bend and saw Delph’s cottage. I looked at the sectioned-off corrals and fenced paddocks. The creta’s huge silhouette loomed back at me from the far corner of his little enclosure. The young slep was sleeping standing up while leaning against the weathered boards of his home.
The adar squatted in one corner, its foot still attached to the chain and the peg in the ground. Its great wings were pointed downward and it seemed to be sleeping in a cocoon of its own body. There was no sign of the whist hound. I hoped it was in the house with the Delphias. Whists could make a racket when disturbed.
I pulled the book from my pocket and peered around. I needed something to put it in. The answer reached me as I looked over at the door in the little hillside. At the entrance was an old lantern, which I lit with a match from a box next to it.
There was a very odd collection of things inside. There were great piles of salted and skinned dead birds and small creatures, which I assumed were food for the beasts. The enormous skin of a garm hung on one wall. I gave that a wide berth.
There were animal skulls lined up on a large trunk, a creta’s and what looked to be an amaroc’s. The upper fangs were as long as my arm. On one shelf was a line of old metal boxes. I looked through them until I found an empty one. I slipped the book inside and closed the box tight. I grabbed a shovel from against the wall and went back outside.
I dug a hole behind a large pine tree and put the box in the hole. I covered it back over and then spread pine needles over the earth.
The creta was starting to stir in the corral and the adar’s wings were now open and it was staring at me. This was a little unsettling. The last thing I wanted was the thing talking to me.
I hurried off down the dirt path and around the bend. I had decided to wrap the chain around my waist once more in case I met someone along the way. I didn’t know how I could explain a chain flying next to me. Now that I had separated myself from the book, I felt both relief and concern. At least no one could take it from me, but I was desperate to read it too. I wanted to know everything that Quentin Herms had collected in the Quag down to the tiniest detail. I told myself that I would come back as soon as I could, dig it up and read it from cover to cover.
When I reached my tree, I climbed up. Settling down on the planks, I set my mind to thinking about things. I hiked my shirt and my sleeves up and my work trousers down and looked at the map again. The marks were still fresh and clear. From the map I could tell that the journey through the Quag would be long and difficult. It was vast and the terrain was harsh. It was fortunate for me, I thought, that I would never attempt the journey. But with that thought came a sudden depression that swept over me like a hunter’s net before the kill.
As I slowly pulled my shirt down and my trousers up, I felt a slight tug around my waist. The chain was moving.
I jumped up and tried to pull it off. It wouldn’t budge. I kept trying, my fingers digging painfully into my skin. It merely tightened around my waist. Duf had told me of serpents that do that. They squeeze the life right out of you.
Suddenly I stopped panicking. My heart stopped racing. My breath returned to normal. The chain had stopped squeezing and fallen limp. I couldn’t believe it, but, well, I think it was simply giving me a … hug. A reassuring hug!
I slipped the chain off and held it up. It was warm and my fingers felt good holding it. I went to the edge of my tree planks and looked down. A long way, about sixty feet in fact. I glanced at the chain and then looked around to make sure no one was watching. I didn’t think about it one sliver more. Despite what had happened last time, the confidence was there somehow. It wouldn’t let me down.
I jumped.
I plummeted down, the ground coming at me way too fast. Halfway down, the chain wrapped tightly around my waist and I landed gently, the heels of my boots barely making a dent in the dirt. The chain was still warm and the links moved slightly around my waist.
I lifted my shirt and covered the chain with it, then drew a long breath and had an impossible thought. I might never take the chain off again. I looked around. I knew I shouldn’t do it, but then again, how could I not? I was closer to fifteen sessions now than fourteen. I was female. I was independent and stubborn and headstrong and probably many other things that I didn’t yet realize or didn’t know enough words to adequately describe. I also had never had much in my life. But now I had the chain. So I had to do what I was about to do.
I took off running as fast as I could; I was light and nimble on my feet even with heavy work boots on. After twenty yards, I leapt into the air. The chain hugged me tight and up I went, straight up. I bent my head and shoulders forward slightly and leveled out into a horizontal plane. With my head up, my arms back by my sides and my legs together, I was like a metal projectile fired from a morta.
I soared over trees and open land. My breath came quick, my hair forced back by the wind. I passed a bird and startled the thing so badly it spun downward out of control for a few feet until it righted itself. I had never felt so free in my life. My whole world had been Wormwood. I had been rooted here, never able to rise above it.
Until now.
A view of the village spread beneath me. It looked small, inconsequential, when before it had loomed so enormous in my life.
And around Wormwood, like a great outer wall, was the Quag. I banked left and did a slow circle in the air. That way I could see the Quag all in one pass. It dwarfed Wormwood. But what I couldn’t see, even from this vantage point, was the Quag’s other side.
I flew for a long time and then landed. The sky was brightening and I figured it was nearing the first section of light. I needed to get John to Learning and then I would head to Stacks. I flew back toward Wormwood, landed about a quarter mile from my digs and fast-walked the rest of the way. When I got back to Wormwood proper I received a shock.
The cobblestones, which were usually quite empty at this time of light, were full of Wugs talking and walking in large groups.
I stopped one of them, Herman Helvet, who ran a very nice confectionery shop and sold things I would never be able to afford. He was tall and bony with a voice as big as his body.
“Where is everyone going?” I asked in confusion.
“Meeting at Steeples. Special called ’twas,” he said breathlessly. “Just got the notice fifteen slivers ago. Got Wugs outta their beds, I can tell you that. Nearly scared me to the Hallowed Ground when they thumped on me door.”
“Special meeting called by who?” I asked.
“Council. Thansius. Morrigone. All of ’em, I ’spect.”
“What’s the meeting for?”
“Well, we won’t know that till we get there, will we, Vega? Now I got to budge along.”
He hurried on to join what seemed to be all of Wormwood streaming out of the village proper.
A thought hit me.
John!
I hurried to the Loons and found my poor brother sitting in front of it, looking scared and lost.
When he saw me, he rushed forward and took my hand, squeezing it hard.
“Where were you?” he said in such a hurt voice that my heart felt shattered.
“I … I got up early and just went for a walk. So, a special meeting, then?” I asked, wanting to quickly change the subject so the shattered look on John’s face would vanish.
“Steeples,” he said, his face now full of anxiety.
“I guess we best get on, then,” I said.
Many reasons for a special meeting crossed my mind as we walked.
None of them would turn out to be right.
DUODECIM: The Impossible Possibility