The Sword of the Wormling Read online

  As Watcher bobbed, Owen grabbed her, cradling her head in both hands. She hooked a foreleg around his arm as a wave crashed, knocking the book into the water. Owen shouted, not just because he had lost the very thing he was supposed to protect, but also because Watcher let go and dropped back into the murky depths.

  Without thinking that he did not know how to swim or that he might sink, considering nothing but his friend and the book and the scroll (and Mucker, of course, who was inside the book), Owen plunged in. He struggled to keep his head above water, finally realizing he needed to hold his breath and go along for the ride.

  Watcher went under again and resurfaced downstream, near the floating book.

  Suddenly a terrible roar met Owen’s ears, as if a million screaming demons lay ahead.

  Watcher struggled, then turned and with a hoof lifted something heavy and dripping over her head.

  The Book of the King!

  Owen slapped the water and laughed, but his joy turned to horror as Watcher rose before him on a wave of unbelievable height and plunged over a cliff. In the next instant Owen was swept up in the wave. At the peak of it, just as he was about to plunge, something caught him—a hand, an arm—and warmth flooded his body as his feet skimmed the surface and he was carried to a flat rock.

  Owen crumpled there, shaking his head, spitting water, and straining to look over the precipice for any sign of his friend. The remnants of a house floated past, then plunged over. Owen watched, helpless.

  He heard the voice again. “The journey is long, Owen. And a man who finds a friend finds a good thing.”

  He recognized the words from the book. As he leaned out, he spotted Watcher on a ledge below, clinging desperately to a tree limb and to the book.

  “Watcher! Hold on!” Owen scrambled over the bank to where debris had washed up. He quickly fashioned a coil from tree bark, tied one end to a tree, and yelled to Watcher, “Hang on! I’ll get you out.”

  When Owen pulled Watcher from the water and up the falls, she didn’t even look like herself. Her matted coat stuck to her body, making her appear about a third of her size, like a cat that has emerged from a pond, its fur having shrunk.

  She nudged the book and the scroll toward Owen with a hoof, thanked him with her eyes, and stumbled into the forest. There she coughed up a sizable amount of water and shook herself, spreading a stream from her fur.

  The book was in good shape for having been submerged, and the first thing Owen did was check on Mucker. He seemed fine, even invigorated. The book’s animal-skin covering had protected the pages, and though they were wet, the writing hadn’t faded or smudged.

  Owen gathered armloads of wood and started a fire. His backpack had been firmly strapped to him, and inside he found food and brought it to Watcher.

  She devoured it, licking her lips and sighing. “How many are dead?”

  “I’m not sure yet. Many are meeting on the ridge. Let’s hope the villages heard the warning and made it to high ground.” Owen stirred the fire with a stick as it slowly dried the wood and began roasting it. “Watcher, why could we see Dreadwart but not those monsters that attacked the lake?”

  Watcher closed her eyes. “Dreadwart wanted us to see him. He was part of the council. He could have remained invisible, but he knew the sight of him would frighten us even more. Others from the Dragon’s world have the ability to change form and appear as animals or even humans.”

  “I think I met one of those.”

  “These demon flyers are cloaked with invisibility so they can attack without warning. Others are smaller and can be seen. There are many types. They fill the people with terror.”

  “And kill and destroy, just like their leader.”

  Watcher nodded.

  Owen pulled the parchment from a stick near the fire, where he had placed it to dry. The writing was in script he could not decipher.

  Watcher’s ears twitched and she sat up. “Someone’s coming.”

  Owen hid the book and the parchment and grabbed a long stick—a crude weapon but better than nothing.

  The figure, shrouded in darkness, approached slowly but appeared unafraid. It was Bardig’s wife.

  “I hoped I would find you,” she said, appearing ready to drop from fatigue. She handed them some crusts of bread and some fruit, then rubbed her hands over the flames, her eyes heavy. “Connor blames you for what happened. They’re coming for both of you.”

  “I can’t believe he survived,” Owen said.

  “We tried to warn them,” Watcher said.

  “Some listened,” the old woman said. “Most are looking for someone to blame.” The light of the fire danced in her eyes. “You must leave, but I need to tell you something before you go. Bardig and I enjoyed a full life together, and I do not regret one moment of it. He had two goals in life. One was to raise a son who loved the King and would follow him selflessly. And the other was to live long enough to see the Wormling. That was always on his heart. Always a part of his soul. Often on his lips.”

  Watcher touched her arm. “He lived to see the fulfillment of the prophecy.”

  “Yes. Now, Wormling, your success depends not just on yourself. An army follows a leader because a battle looms, not just for the exercise.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You play an important role here, but so do we. It does not surprise me that a Wormling would find himself without honor in the very country he comes to help.”

  Owen had read a passage strikingly similar just the night before.

  “My son is against you,” she continued. “I hope that will change, and I will try to persuade him, so that when you return with the King’s Son, he will embrace you as a brother rather than an enemy.”

  “I’m sure the King’s Son can use a warrior like him to fight the Dragon.”

  “It’s impossible to defeat such an enemy,” Watcher said. “You saw what happened today. How do you fight an enemy you can’t see?”

  Bardig’s wife smiled sadly. “‘With the truth in your heart that was written long before the Dragon ever drew breath.’ Bardig used to say that.” She tilted her head back as if trying to remember. “He also often said, ‘Greater is the one who creates than the one created. And if he is with us, why do we care who is against us?’”

  “I miss him,” Watcher said.

  The old woman leaned over and kissed Watcher’s forehead. “I know, child. It will not be easy without him, but what good thing is easy?”

  “Where do we go?” Owen said. “Bardig was the only one familiar with the initiation rite.”

  “Bardig always said it was imperative that the Wormling be given the initiation exactly as written in the scroll. Evidently this will give you some special power or ability, or perhaps it will reveal some ability you don’t even know you possess.”

  “But, please,” Owen said, “hurry. Tell me what you know of the rite itself.”

  “Bardig said it was a shame he was the only one left who could perform the initiation—that the only other person who even knew the language was Mordecai.”

  “Mordecai?” Watcher said, sitting up straight.

  “Yes. The King himself had Mordecai deliver the parchment. This, of course, was before the fire and the attack. It was almost as if he anticipated . . .”

  “Who is Mordecai?” Owen said.

  Watcher and the woman exchanged glances. “Mordecai was here in our village before his . . . banishment.”

  “Banishment,” Watcher said. “You can’t be serious. You say he is in exile. Guilty of high treason.”

  “Regardless,” the woman hissed, “you need him. It is the only way. I would never suggest you walk unprotected, let alone to the islands of Mirantha—”

  “Islands?” Owen said.

  “Not a nice place,” the woman said.

  “You’ve been there?” he said.

  “I’ve heard.”

  “I don’t see what this Mordecai can offer. I just want to find the King’s Son and get
back to my world.”

  “Be careful to do what the book tells you.”

  “The book says nothing about this.”

  “Yes, but it is part of what we know to be true. And it comes from the King himself.”

  “So this Mordecai delivered the parchment. If he was exiled for treason, we might be walking into a trap.”

  Bardig’s wife closed her eyes. “Wormling, the people here do not believe. Make this journey. Fulfill in every way the mission the King has for you. Study and discover. I will consider it my mission to convince those here to support you upon your return.”

  From the woods behind them came whispers and footsteps.

  “You must hurry,” the woman said. “And may neither of us fail in our mission.”

  After Bardig’s wife left, Owen and Watcher covered the fire with wet leaves and moist soil.

  “Follow me,” Watcher said. “I know a quick way down the other side of the mountain.”

  It is impossible to relate all that goes on in the mind of a young man sent into another world and given a task—the importance of which he cannot hope to comprehend—while feeling as alone and estranged as a human can feel. All Owen had for comfort, other than the book, was Mucker, the worm that wriggled inside the book, and the cute but cautious Watcher. Faces and places filled his memory: his father, the evil Karl, his friend Petrov at the Blackstone Tavern. Plus the people at his school and Clara. Blessed Clara. Owen couldn’t help but dream that one day he would return, and Clara would be waiting for him. He fell asleep nights thinking of her, wondering what it would be like to talk with her uninterrupted by Gordan and his gang. Owen could talk with her for hours.

  * * *

  Equally impossible is to do justice to the mind of the being beside Owen, who had been content with living in one place her entire life, listening, sensing, devoted to the task of simply waiting for something to happen. A week. A month. A year. A lifetime. Watcher did not care, for she was committed to her craft.

  Now, with the sound of footsteps behind them, other questions invaded Watcher’s mind.

  How long will the journey take?

  Are the islands of Mirantha as scary and desolate as I’ve heard?

  Is this Wormling really the one I have been waiting for?

  And what of the Kerrol that is said to live in the waters? Should I tell the Wormling about it? And if I do, might he turn back?

  These would have to be answered in due time. Meanwhile, sending a chill down her spine and making her stomach prickle were the questions of whether they would find Mordecai on one of the islands, and if they did, whether he would perform a ceremony for a King he had disowned.

  Mordecai held a mythic place in the stories of the Lowlanders, and it was difficult to separate fact from fiction. Some said he had turned into a cannibal, attacking unsuspecting travelers from the tops of palm trees or high rocks (though it was unclear who those unsuspecting travelers might have been). Others said he was strictly a vegetarian and killed travelers only for sport, separating them, then hunting them with arrows or spears (again, the storytellers did not elaborate on the identity of these travelers). Those he did not kill he tied to anthills and slathered with wild honey or dangled over shark-infested waters surrounding the islands.

  He was supposed to have invented other unspeakable tortures, and Watcher was inclined to believe all of them. Part of her assumed these were just stories to keep people from the islands, but on the other hand, she knew of no one who had journeyed there and ever returned.

  Watcher sensed the Wormling’s fear and thought it best not to divulge too much about Mordecai. She had little doubt that if Mordecai was still alive, they would find him. Her gift was to sense things, to be aware, but she had no idea if their destination would lead to a bright discovery or a painful death.

  With only the pack that had survived the flood and food Bardig’s wife had brought from the ruins above her home, these two misfits set off in the pitch blackness, with just a few deep-set stars to accompany them.

  Those and the 10 people pursuing them, thrashing about in the woods, carrying torches, and trying to stay quiet.

  * * *

  Owen followed as closely as he could, at one point grabbing Watcher’s fur, now dry. She moved deftly and without wasted steps, as if she’d played on this hillside as a youngster. Watcher had to know the hills and trails as well as Owen knew the stacks back home at Tattered Treasures.

  Owen was quickly spent and tugged her to a stop. “Why so fast?”

  She turned, eyes fully dilated, no doubt seeing things Owen couldn’t and probably never would. “Connor and the others trailing us are angry. They speak of death.”

  “Okay,” he said. “Just don’t lose me.”

  * * *

  It is tempting for us to go into detail about the flora and fauna of the Lowlands, the various deciduous and nondeciduous trees, the fertile soil, and the animals scurrying about in the night. However, let us leave that to your imagination—the theater of the mind—and not bore you with information unless it affects Owen and his companion.

  That said, understand that the rains and the torrent of the breached lake had changed the land. It was difficult to walk, let alone run, through the forest and over the hump of a hill where Watcher now pulled Owen like a large dog dragging its master by the leash. And when she came to the top of the not-so-well-worn path, instead of feeling the fronds of the familiar ferns that grew along it, all she felt was the mud that became thicker as she scrambled up the slippery path.

  Suddenly Watcher’s hooves flew from beneath her, and with Owen holding tight, she fell headfirst into the slimy mess. Both plunged down the slope like it was a flume and they were the logs. She screamed and heard him doing the same as the goo covered them.

  * * *

  Owen quickly shut his mouth, trying not to swallow any mud as they cascaded faster and faster. Watcher seemed to be frantically reaching for anything to grab on either side of the path, but the plants and trees had been washed away. They were speeding into the darkness when Owen felt the ground give way to nothing but air.

  Like cartoon characters suspended in midair, the two windmilled arms and legs and feet and hooves. Owen was aware that daylight might have shown exactly what it was they were falling into, and at that instant he decided it was just as well he didn’t know.

  They plunged into a deep body of water with a huge splash, and Owen’s world became a gurgling, dark cave. With The Book of the King secure in his pack, he struggled against the water’s icy pull and sucked in a lungful of water. The shock sent his body into spasms; then he fell limp and sank.

  * * *

  Watcher soon surfaced and searched for Owen. “Wormling!” she cried. I’ll have to teach him to swim.

  She dived into the murky depths, feeling with her hooves for his body. She had descended nearly a hundred feet when she felt his backpack and realized it was still wrapped tightly across his chest. She pulled him to the surface and helped him to the shore, positioning him faceup, his feet still in the icy water.

  Convinced the Wormling was dead, Watcher wept. She felt responsible. Now he couldn’t fulfill the prophecy, and the villagers would never know true freedom.

  But Watcher’s ears suddenly stood at attention as her hooves, resting gently on his chest, were pressed hard in a pumping motion, as if some other being had taken charge of the rescue.

  Owen began to cough and sputter, making Watcher laugh through her tears. She laid her head on the Wormling and sighed.

  Above them in the distance, along the ridge that stretched all the way to Mountain Lake, Watcher saw the torches of villagers who searched for them in vain.

  “Rest easy, Wormling,” Watcher whispered. “That fall assured we won’t be caught tonight.”

  Reaching the islands of Mirantha would not have been easy at any time of the year, but this being the rainy season in the Lowlands made it especially difficult. Rivers were swollen and difficult to cross. Owen could hardly
believe that, even this far from Mountain Lake, many villages had been destroyed by the flood, scattering families to higher ground.

  His lungs now free of water, Owen was rejuvenated. He and Watcher discovered a cave where they rested, carefully venturing out occasionally to hear the voices of Connor and the others echo through the valley.

  At nightfall they set out again through the muddy tangle of trees and plants. As they walked, Owen tried to explain his world, and he could tell Watcher was mystified.

  She seemed most astounded that the animals there couldn’t talk. “Was it a big change getting used to—me?”

  Owen nodded. “But I don’t think of you as an animal. You’re more of a person to me. You remind me of someone from home, but I can’t think who it is.”

  “I remind you how?”

  “You know, your sense of humor, the way you talk. The things that make you you.”

  “Is it someone you like?”

  “Well, I like you. How could I not like someone who saved my life?”

  Watcher, leading him through the wilds, turned and walked backward, her stubby tail wagging. “There was something about that, which I didn’t tell you. Something strange.”

  Owen stopped. “A voice?”

  “No, but I heard one at the lake, earlier in the day, telling me to warn everyone of the flood. Then, when you couldn’t breathe, I felt hands on mine, pressing your chest. It had to be an invisible.”

  Though Owen had told only his father about the voice, he now told Watcher about the arm in the night and that voice—strange yet comforting.

  “Exactly,” she said. “Every other invisible I’ve encountered has scared me. They either attack or they’re stalking, planning an attack. But this one helped, as if he was on our side.”

  They slept in hiding during the day and continued their trek each night, speaking in hushed tones, Watcher pointing out landmarks by the moonlight.