The Orchard of Hope (24 page)

“Hope is beautiful!” Maggie
exclaimed. “I’ve never smelled anything so wonderful.”

“I like the scent,” Kelsey agreed.
“No wonder the wolves are drawn to it.”

“I feel as if I recognize the
fragrance. I’ve never seen these trees before, but they smell
familiar.”

“Everyone has smelled it at some
point, but not in the strongest form, the way it is here,” Roland
explained. “Hope smells like a mixture of the future and a
promise.”

Kelsey paused to feel the deep,
rough grooves in the bark of a tree. She couldn’t help admiring the
orchard. It was something of a paradise and certainly worth
protecting.

When they had passed through a tall
iron portcullis and reached the large wooden door of the building,
Roland knocked on the door with his staff. The sound echoed much
more than it should have, given the density of the door. To her
ears, Kelsey thought the sound of the echo amplified rather than
tapered off in volume, but then she heard the sound diminishing.
After a few minutes, the sound eventually died off, and a small
window in the door opened a crack, but not wide enough to see
inside or to glimpse the face of the person addressing
them.

“We’re an abbey, a place of holy
retreat,” the voice from the shadows said quietly. “What do you
want with us?”

“The king sent us,” Roland
replied.

“I don’t think so,” the voice in
the darkness replied politely but firmly.

“You don’t think what?” Kelsey
asked. “We were told to come here to help you save
hope.”

“How do we know that you’re not
here to take it?” the voice inquired suspiciously. She wished that
the speaker would show his face instead of hiding behind the tiny
window shutter.

“Because the hope is outside near
us on the trees. We wouldn’t need to knock on your door if we
wanted to steal it,” Kelsey answered. She heard the baying of a
wolf in the distance and felt the urgency to get inside. The sun
had now set, and the cold air made her fingers tingle.

“I’m Roland the Red. His Majesty
the King has sent me,” Roland announced. “I have a letter with the
king’s seal.”

“It could be a fake,” another
voice whispered from behind the door. “He looks like one of them.
He’s a wolf.”

“Why would a wolf come to the door
with a fake letter?” the first voice asked. “Besides, I don’t think
he is a wolf. He doesn’t look like the others.”

“I don’t know. If I had all the
answers, we wouldn’t need help,” replied the second voice. “Maybe
the wolves are trying to get inside and kill us so they can live in
the abbey and devour our hope at their leisure.”

“It seems like
an awful lot of work to fake a letter, especially for
wolves
.
They don’t have thumbs, you
know,
”
the
first voice said.

“The other two have thumbs,” said
the second voice.

“The other two aren’t wolves.
They’re human,” the first voice retorted.

“I’m not a wolf,” Roland insisted.
“I’m a fox.”

“That’s what he wants us to
think,” the second voice in the darkness said. The two voices
proceeded to quietly bicker for a minute until they were
interrupted.

“There are only two of them,” a
third voice added his opinion to the situation. “Two humans. That’s
all I see.” Maggie smiled to herself at the thought that she wasn’t
the only one who couldn’t see Roland.

“There are three,” the first voice
said sharply. All three voices proceeded to argue for another
minute until they were interrupted.

“Let them in,” announced a new
voice in an authoritative tone. “There are no wolves out there, at
least not nearby.”

“Finally! Someone with reason,”
Kelsey whispered in a grateful tone.

“There’s only a grim reaper on our
doorstep,” the new voice added.

“You want to let the Grim Reaper
into our abbey?” the second voice asked. Kelsey was about to
correct the voice, but then she realized that they were about to go
inside, and it was to her benefit to follow along. Kelsey patiently
leaned against the cool stone wall near the front door as she
waited.

“It’s not the first time,” the
voice of authority replied in a resolute tone. “He’s no stranger
here. Let the visitors inside.”

After the seven bolts securing the
door were unlocked one by one, the oversized door slowly opened
with a loud creaking noise, and Kelsey looked inside to see a
candlelit hallway. It was beautifully shining with rows of yellow
lights flickering along both edges of the floor as well as along
the ceiling. The path was well illuminated with a welcoming
feel.

More than a dozen monks in brown
robes were standing around the entrance, and it took about half of
them to move the cumbersome wooden door. The large iron scrollwork
on the door made it appear even more formidable.

“As I said, I am Roland the Red. I
was sent here as a representative of the king. These are my
associates, Kelsey, a member of the king’s army, and Maggie, an
apprentice diplomat.” Roland said. He motioned to each person as he
made the introductions.

“You’ve been here before,” an
older monk said accusingly. “I’ve seen you. I’d recognize you
anywhere.”

“I’ve been here many times,”
Roland replied. “I’ve been coming here on official business for
years, since before some of you were born.”

“Yes, I remember you,” another
monk replied quietly, and the group seemed to relax at the
recognition. The monks took turns introducing themselves and
greeting their visitors.

“We don’t have much time,” Roland
said once the introductions had been completed. “We could hear the
wolves on our way here. I think they’re getting ready to strike
again, and I’d like to save this crop of hope.”

“Should we get the Sisters of
Mercy so we can make a plan?” the brother named Stephen
asked.

“Let’s not involve them,” Brother
Michael replied. He waved his hand in a dismissive manner. “They
don’t want to hurt the wolves. If we let them have a say in how we
solve this problem, nothing will get done.”

“Nothing except that our hope will
be eaten alive again,” a third monk said, nodding in
agreement.

“They may get upset,” Brother
Stephen countered. He raised his eyebrows as he waited for Brother
Michael’s response.

“Let them be upset. Their anger is
a much easier issue to deal with than the wolves,” the monk turned
to face Roland. “What’s the plan?”

“I have memories,” Roland
replied.

“We all have memories,” said
Brother Stephen. He exchanged glances with several of the other
monks and then turned to face Roland again. Maggie was glancing
around uncertainly. She couldn’t quite follow the conversation
since she was only hearing half of it, but she had already learned
that she would eventually figure out what was being said if she
could be patient to see where the conversation went.

Roland asked for the jars from
Kelsey’s backpack and then held up one of them so that the
candlelight enhanced the glow of the shimmering liquids. Brother
Michael took the jar and sniffed the top of the lid.

“It smells like hope,” he said.
“Is this is juice? Or an extract of hope?”

“These are memories of hope-filled
dreams,” Roland said. “My plan is to use this as a distraction. We
can pour the contents of these jars around the edge of the orchard.
The wolves that absorb these memories will begin to believe that
hope exists only in their dreams and will stop looking for hope in
real places, like the orchard.”

“And you think this will work?”
Brother Michael asked. “There are hundreds of wolves, maybe
more.”

“It won’t solve the problem
permanently,” Roland explained, “but it will temporarily thin the
pack and buy us more time.”

The monks looked skeptically at one
another and nervously shuffled their feet. The rustling sounds of
their subtle movements were amplified in the stone hallway, and
Kelsey felt awkward. She tapped her foot a few times, adding to the
reverberating noise in the hallway. When no one else spoke, she
became impatient.

“Do any of you have a better
idea?” she finally asked. “We’re not saying it will solve the
problem. We’re trying to keep this crop of hope safe while we find
a more permanent solution.”

“Excuse me,” Maggie said when no
one else replied to Kelsey, “but has anyone tried talking with the
wolves?”

The monks broke
out in laughter as they held their stomachs. The gold tasseled rope
on Brother Michael’s robe shook as his large belly moved rapidly up
and down, and the magnified noise of the raucous laughter was so
loud, it hurt Kelsey
’
s ears.

“Wolves don’t talk. They devour,”
Brother Michael said. “Have you ever tried to converse with
one?”

“No,” Maggie replied. She looked
down at the smooth tile floor.

“Then what makes you think you can
talk to them?” Brother Michael asked. Maggie studied the diamond
pattern in the tile floor for a few moments before looking up to
face him.

“Well, I’ve never talked to a monk
before today, and I’m talking with you now.” When Brother Michael’s
look of surprise faded, Maggie continued: “I’m thinking that if we
approach them the right way, they might want to talk.” She took a
deep breath and gazed firmly into Brother Michael’s eyes, but he
didn’t respond. Instead, he turned to the entire group and spoke
with conviction.

“None of us are getting close
enough to those vicious creatures to talk,” Brother Michael
announced. “Tonight we’ll pour the memories around the orchard to
make sure the wolves don’t get to the hope without crossing through
the memories. We’ll start right away before the wolves descend to
the orchard. Then tomorrow we’ll meet with the Sisters of Mercy and
discuss our next steps.”

Without further discussion, the
monks took the jars and set about the task in an orderly manner. It
was as if they already knew what to do, but Kelsey also noticed
that there was an order to this monastery: There were
higher-ranking monks who gave orders to lower-ranking ones.
Sometimes these orders were unspoken, and the lower-level monks
understood what to do by watching their superiors.

Several of the monks put on gloves
and tied kerchiefs over their mouths and noses to prevent
inhalation of the memories as they worked. They quickly began the
task of pouring the memories, making sure that the circle was
unbroken and that the memories were evenly distributed around the
perimeter of the orchard. Once the first circle was complete, they
created another circle of memories just outside the first one, so
that the wolves would need to cross two lines of memories to reach
the fruit of hope. The monks worked from the inside of the circle
toward the outside, so that they never crossed the line of poured
memories. Kelsey admired the orderliness and swift nature of their
work. It was like watching an army in battle maneuvers.

Once the task had been completed,
the monks went back inside, bolted the doors and waited. A smaller
group of them went with Kelsey, Roland and Maggie to a second-story
room. They snacked on small sandwiches and sipped steaming cups of
hot chocolate with whipped cream while they stared out the windows
overlooking the orchard. It was relaxing, and Maggie was nearly
asleep after 20 minutes of waiting.

Kelsey sipped the warm, creamy
liquid and was beginning to also feel drowsy from all the walking
she’d done in previous days, when she heard the approaching sound
of padded paws on the soft grass. It sounded like large kernels of
popcorn popping. She sat up straight and looked out the window. It
wasn’t long before she and everyone else in the room saw what was
making the dim thudding noise. There were hundreds of wolves, and
they lined up outside the orchard, as if waiting for a signal.
However, from her vantage point at a second-floor window, Kelsey
couldn’t see a clear leader among the group.

Without any warning, the wolves
began to snarl and drool uncontrollably. Something was working them
into a frenzy. It might have been the smell of hope, or some unseen
sign from the leader. Kelsey watched carefully, trying to determine
what was driving the madness. A few wolves began to howl loudly,
and more joined in the chorus of yelping and screeching. When the
noise reached a cacophonous peak, the group rushed forward. They
focused on the trees as they sped toward them, occasionally
snapping at one another to get out of the way as each wolf raced
into the orchard, oozing with hostility. Their teeth were sharp as
they glinted in the moonlight and appeared much longer than Kelsey
remembered seeing on a wolf. Kelsey glanced sideways at Maggie’s
open mouth.

“Do you still want to talk with
them?” Brother Michael asked. He raised one eyebrow and smiled in a
way that didn’t look very friendly. Maggie stared at the floor but
didn’t speak, and Kelsey noticed that Maggie’s hands were
trembling.

“Don’t worry,” Kelsey said kindly
as she took Maggie’s cold sweating hand and held it in hers, “I’ve
been wrong before, also.”