One is Come (Five in Circle) (15 page)

The door flew open with a bang, and his eyes popped open a second later. His father stood there, looking around the room, a frightened look on his face. “Cadarn, Haylwen? Where are you? ” He took a breath, then stopped suddenly.

“Yeah, Dad.” Cadarn could tell his father was unnerved, but couldn't see why.

His father spun, squinting. “Where are you?”

“Right here.” Cadarn looked at Haylwen, who apparently had fallen asleep. He looked back up to see his father yell out the door for their mother. “They’re in here!” Cadarn was surprised that Haylwen hadn't woken with the yelling.

When their mother came in the door in a rush, Cadarn could tell from the look on her face that he had done something magical, but had no idea. He had been subconsciously holding onto the feeling, and now it slipped with doubt and fear.

His father yelped and pointed at him. “Wow! That's great!”

Cadarn, thoroughly confused, let the feeling slip completely away with an effort. It seemed easier to hold onto it.

His father noticed Haylwen, who was just starting to stir sleepily. “Cadarn, that was incredible! How did you learn to do that?” He turned to their mother. “Did you teach him that? How?” She shook her head, and he turned back to Cadarn. “Did Haylwen help you do that?”

Cadarn felt both complimented and insulted. “No, it was just me. I just did what Mom told me, well, mostly.”

His father was grinning and stood a little taller. “That was...” his voice cut off, and he choked in his exuberance to try to talk around it. After a moment, he said, “interesting.”

His mother looked at his father sideways and said so softly Cadarn could barely hear it, something about email magic? Haylwen gave a big yawn at that moment, so it could have been anything. His mother and father stepped into the corner of the office and asked for Cadarn and Haylwen to leave for a minute.

They both got up and walked out the door toward the living room. Haylwen stopped in front of Cadarn as he was just outside the doorway to the office, the door still ajar. She pointed at the pile of boxes sitting there and called over her shoulder. “Uh… Dad… there’s a box that is still... smoking,” She took a few slow steps toward it.

“What, sweetie?” Cadarn turned to look back into the office as their father and mother appeared in the office doorway.

“That box is leaking... something.” She pointed again, taking another slow step toward it.

Their mother and father exchanged a look and stepped out of the office together.

Haylwen took another slow step closer to the box, which suddenly burst open. Their parents stumbled forward, choking and fumbling. Cadarn saw Haylwen stumble back and sit down as something rose out of the box.

It started out like a cloud, but solidified as it grew. It had a rattlesnake head, but was bigger than a person’s face. Its fangs were as long as Cadarn's forearm, and its neck and shoulders were covered in feathers. It pulled itself out with immensely muscular arms. The box, though smaller than the creature, wasn’t even twitching as the creature struggled to squeeze out. Nevertheless, even as it worked, it had fixed its unblinking stare on Haylwen. She stood, dead-still, frozen.

Cadarn, realized what his parents were trying to do and failing. At the same instant, he knew what he had to do. He yelled, “Cumhachd!” punching with all his might at the creature. Nothing happened. The creature paused for a moment, fixing its glare on Cadarn for a moment. He could feel his body freeze. The creature then laughed, a hissing sound, before moving his gaze back to Haylwen and again resuming its climb out of the box. Cadarn looked at his parents, who were sputtering and choking on the floor. His father was turning purple, struggling against invisible shackles. He saw his mother scramble toward the kitchen and felt alone.

The creature, which had pulled itself out to its waist, leaned to reach toward Haylwen. As if triggered, the picture Haylwen drew of him with the cape jumped into his mind. He vividly recalled the feeling of protector that he had held onto in the office. Faster than thought, he called up the feeling of overcoming Graflo’s test and let it mix with the other feeling.

He took a breath and pushed the fear down as the creature got both hands on Haylwen. He called the feeling out of himself, and yelled, “Cumhachd!” throwing both fists at the beast.

The creature never saw it coming. Its head snapped back as if punched, and it dropped Haylwen. It shook itself, eyes slightly unfocused.

Cadarn, while somewhat surprised at his success, felt his confidence grow. He pushed down the twinge of guilt at hurting the creature. Trying to focus on feeling fully like a protector, a conqueror, he called the feelings even stronger, and felt his neck and shoulders tingle as he threw both fists at the creature again. “CUMHACHD!” he yelled.

The creature's snout was visibly crumpled by the impact, and its head snapped directly back before flipping to point up. Its arms went limp, and it started to slowly slide back into the box. Haylwen started, saw the creature only a few feet away, and scuttled back. Their mother came rushing out of the kitchen with a cleaver, and slowed to a halt when she saw the creature slowly sliding down into the box. Their father had rushed forward and picked up Haylwen to pull her back, but was still having trouble breathing.

The four of them slowly came together, and all watched as the creature slowly slid back down. No one moved when its fangs got hung up on the edge of the box. They all looked at it for a moment, then each other.

Finally, their father went over and carefully unhitched the fangs, allowing the creature to slip all the way down, out of sight. He closed the flaps of the box, and tried to pick it up. His face registered a momentary surprise at how light it was. He looked at their mother, who looked into the kitchen.

Cadarn had grabbed Haylwen's arm and was pulling her back to the office before his father even started talking.

“Kids,” he said, eyes fixed on the box in front of him, “get in the office and close the door behind you.”

Chapter 21

Books

Haylwen didn't like being dragged along, but was still dazed by whatever the snake-head monster had done to her. She fuzzily knew her brother was just trying to help, but she didn't like being forced to do anything. Besides, the anger seemed to be helping her think more clearly, so she allowed herself to really feel it.

“Lemme go!” she said, ripping her arm from Cadarn's grip as he shut the door. She fell back, stumbling into a stack of boxes. She tried to hold herself upright, but the stack of boxes was moving. Well, it seemed like it to her. She ended up pulling the boxes on top of herself as she fell to the side. She, the boxes and their contents tumbled against the several other stacks of boxes in the room.

Cadarn rushed over, and Haylwen's anger subsided when she saw the concerned look on his face. When he saw she wasn't hurt, he started laughing. Haylwen saw herself, sprawled on the floor amongst all the books and couldn’t help but start laughing too. Haylwen could hear that they were laughing wildly and tried not to think about why. All of a sudden, she saw something that served as a better distraction. In an instant, her fuzzy head was clear, and she sat up straight, still smiling. “Did you do that?”

“Do what,” Cadarn asked, “knock you over? No, that was all you.”

“No... make those boxes glow,” she said, pointing.

He shook his head. “What glow? I don’t see anything.”

She walked over to one stack, lifting the top box off. Cadarn came over and looked over her shoulder.

“Statues, very fragile,” he read. “Dad's very delicate art.” He looked at her, puzzled.

She opened the box, and saw densely packed books. She stared at them for a moment.

“What?” Cadarn said. “Crumpled newspaper for those stupid statues.” He looked from her to the box and back to her. “You see something else, don't you!” he half whispered.

Haylwen reached in and pulled out a large book. She sat down, putting the book in her lap.

“Hoy crap!” Cadarn half-whispered, half shouted. “How did you do that?”

“Do what?” Haylwen replied, distracted. She stroked the cover of the book, running a finger over the embossed lettering of the title. It was in a foreign language, but it looked familiar, somehow.

“Turn that statue into a book!” he whispered.

“Oh, it was always a book,” she said, then turned and looked at him. “Can you read this?” She pointed to the lettering.

He shook his head.

She opened the book and quickly flipped through its pages. She thought,
Maybe it was an encyclopedia of some kind?
There were pictures of monsters, old but in incredible detail, with that same strangely familiar, but unreadable language. They saw giants with rhinoceros snouts and rabbit ears, elephants and hippos on two legs, several kinds of dinosaurs, and what looked to be butterfly people. Other pages had apparently normal things, like cats and trees, and still others had scepters and jewels. They both gasped when they flipped to a page that showed a picture of the snake-head creature they had just seen.

“There it is!” Cadarn said.

“Yeah,” Haylwen echoed.

Neither could read the words, but they both stared at the picture. They had only seen the top half of the one in their living room, but now saw the rest of the creature. Its muscular arms were matched by just as muscular legs, and it had feathers all along its back. Its stomach was scaled, and it had a thick, scaled tail with protruding ridges.

“It looks like a wicked rattlesnake ostrich,” Cadarn said, standing up. “I wish I could read what it said.”

“Me too,” Haylwen said, as Cadarn was turning to walk away. She gasped as the words crawled over the page for a moment, then stopped. Haylwen stared at the page. “I wish I could read what these words said,” she said again.

“We just said that.”

Haylwen didn't bother trying to explain. “I know, just say it again.”

“I wish I could read what it said,” he said.

Haylwen zipped her eyes back to the page. Nothing happened. Maybe...

She closed her eyes tried to find the place where her breath came from. She didn’t even try to ignore the peripheral light, and a ball appeared quickly to her mind’s eye. But she didn't know what color to pick, so just watched as the light went through a rainbow, never slowing down. She opened her eyes and sighed, frustrated.

“What are you trying to do?” Cadarn asked.

“Use magic to read the book,” she said. “But I don't know what color to pick.”

“Color?” Cadarn said.

Haylwen looked at him narrowly. “Isn't that what Mom taught you?”

“No,” he said.

They looked at each other for a moment, eyes widening when they realized they had learned different things. “You first,” Cadarn said.

Haylwen quickly explained what she was taught. She mentioned the peripheral light as an afterthought. “But he didn’t mention that at all.”

Cadarn shook his head. “Well, that is the only part that matched what Mom taught me.” He explained what he had been taught to feel an emotion and let it fill out, and how it felt like it was coming from just beyond. Maybe that was the peripheral light. “But Mom didn't tell me about making a ball, or show me that punch, or yell, that was all me,” he said.

“Yeah, Dad told me to pick a color and command the energy out, but just letting it pick itself and guide what it wanted to do, that was all me.” She paused. “But that yell and punch does sound like a command…”

Haylwen looked at the book, then at Cadarn. “Let's see what happens if I combine what we learned.” She looked at Cadarn, then at the book. “What are you feeling?”

Cadarn came over and ran a finger down the page. He smiled. “I think it would feel great to be able to read this book!”

Haylwen nodded, and closed her eyes, imagining the excitement of reading the words of the book. She held onto the feeling until she started humming again, but she stopped suddenly, her eyes popping open, when Cadarn gasped.

“Wow,” they both said together.

They watched as the letters started crawling again. They wriggled into recognizable letters, then scrambled around, to form words. After a minute, the squirming stopped. They could read what it said.

“Baskilon,” Haylwen read, “magical being, no magic using ability beyond...” she paused.

“Intrinsic visual paralysis,” Cadarn finished.

“What?” Haylwen said, despite knowing very well.

“It means it can freeze you just by looking at you.” Cadarn knew she knew, but said it anyway. He wasn't really paying attention, reading the rest of the page quickly. “It says they are not very intelligent, fiercely loyal, and are often used as assassins. During the Great War...” he mumbled, looking away from the book. “I wonder if that means World War II?”

Haylwen didn't think to answer, and flipped a few pages, reading parts of pages. It was all readable, or at least she supposed it was, but it sounded like a science text book. There were a lot of words she didn't understand, and some she couldn't even pronounce.

She got up. Cadarn held onto the book and sat in her place, flipping back to the baskilon and reading more.

She watched him for a moment.
Yeah
, she thought,
we need to learn, and fast. I never want to be that helpless again
. She went back to the box and closed her eyes, recalling the joy of being able to read the strange language. This time, she saw the light just beyond her vision clearly shift into an orange-yellow. She thought about the bright yellow ball that appeared in her center, but didn’t pay attention to it. She started humming again, and the light grew brighter. She opened her eyes and could feel the yellow light grow brighter, move and trickle like water over the box of books. As the light hit the book spines, the lettering scrambled on them to become readable. She used her other hand to pull out a few books as she read their titles: “A History of Kings,” “The Foretold,” and “Leaves and Hides,” mostly at random. She put them on the floor and sat on the floor nearby Cadarn. She opened at random, “A History of Kings.” History class was the one class that was interesting in school, it was like a collection of short stories, but better than fiction as they were real. She flipped pages until she was captivated by one picture of a man with a great mustache, curling up at the ends to form neat circles. His sideburns had similar curls down both sides of his face. His expression was stern, but his eyes sparkled. He winked, and Haylwen rubbed her eyes, and looked again. Must have been her imagination. He looked like such an interesting man, if only she could read his story.

But the writing was the same. Where the light hit the page, she could read. It was a bit of a hassle to keep moving the book. Still humming, she thought about the yellow ball moving to the book, settling on it. The yellow ball then appeared out of nowhere, landing on the book. The words swam and all the pages of the book ruffled. The scrawl on the page danced, then settled into words she could understand, and the book lay still.

“King Faustas,” she murmured, reading the caption under the picture, “known as the Traitor as he betrayed the Conclave in an attempt to overthrow those honest, loyal people and replace them with his own evil faction called the Rogues. Only through the brilliance and discipline of Joslachar was the plot uncovered.” She read his sad story quickly.

She finished and turned the page, to see a picture of Joslachar, apparently the next king. His eyes were fierce, and he looked so familiar...

Then the door opened, and she yelped and slammed the book closed. Their father walked in. “Your mother and I took care of the... problem, but we wanted to know if you would...” He stopped mid-word when he saw what Cadarn was reading, staring at each of them in turn.

“Where did you get that?” He walked over and stood over Cadarn.

“Haylwen turned one of your statues into this book,” Cadarn said, looking up at him sheepishly.

Haylwen saw her father look at the opened box, the books next to her. He shook his head and smiled. “Well, I guess I can't be held accountable for what you learn on your own.” He then looked from Haylwen back to Cadarn, and his face contorted in confusion. “How are you reading that?”

“We used magic to translate it.” Haylwen thought it was her idea, her magic, really, but wasn't sure if she was going to get in trouble for it.

Their father gave a low whistle of amazement. “Wherever two or more are gathered...” Haylwen heard her father mumble, but didn't know what it meant.

“Well, come on, we have to go.” He helped Haylwen up, briefly glancing at the books she had taken out and shaking his head again. He motioned for Cadarn to follow, and left the room.

They went into the dining room, which smelled vaguely of sage and camp fire smoke. Their mother sat at the table, looking tired and angry. There was a slight humming coming from the stove fan in the kitchen.

They took their usual dinner places, side by side across from their mother. Cadarn pushed a box from in front of him to the side of the table. Their father sat in his usual chair, and looked at their mother. “They were reading my books,” he said.

“Oh,” she said.

“No, they were reading my
books
, he said.

Her eyes lit up, and she looked at Haylwen and Cadarn, then at their father. “What? How? That's impossible.” She looked back at them, then gave a slightly hysterical giggle. “Guess we can't be responsible for what they learn on their own.”

Their father smiled, then leaned over and gave their mother a kiss. “Nope,” he said.

Haylwen rolled her eyes as she heard Cadarn make a gagging sound.

“Yes… well… to business,” their father said. “We obviously can't stay here. And since the movers have… ah… been asked to leave, we can only take what will fit in the car.”

Haylwen noticed the smoky smell getting stronger. “What happened to my box?”

Her father looked at her. “We had to get rid of it. Sorry. Speaking of which, Hayl, once you two decide what needs to come, will you please look it over? For… ah… anything you might see with your necklace on?”

Their mother chimed in close on the heels of that statement. “And make sure you each have at least one week’s worth of socks and underwear in that, please.”

“How long until we can get the rest of our stuff?” Cadarn asked.

“Probably never,” said their father.

Haylwen looked into the kitchen and saw smoke coming from the back of the stove. “Um-mm, something is smoking.”

Their father eyes snapped to lock on hers. “Like last time? You can see a dark energy?”

“No,” Haylwen said. “I see regular smoke, from the oven.”

“Oh, right,” said their mother. She went into the kitchen and pushed a button. The stove fan hummed louder. She came back, and declared over the noise, “The stove is on self-clean. There might be some smoke as it has a lot to... clean.” She looked at their father, and sat down. “Nothing to worry about.”

The stove fan was a drone in the background. Haylwen could see the smoke was now a steady stream, growing thicker, deep black, with little bits sparkling here and there. It poured from the stove, and was sucked into the overworked fan. Cadarn looked from her to the smoke and back, eyebrows raised.