The Owl Keeper (23 page)

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CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

[Image: Max and the owl.]

Max stared down at Mrs. Crumlin, sprawled in the tall grass, her eyes turned to downward-slanting slits, the side of her face raked by claw marks. Her coat was rumpled and torn, her sturdy shoes coated in layers of mud.

He knelt on one knee, struck by an icy numbness, frightened and yet relieved. She would have chased him to the ends of the earth, he knew, to carry out the High Echelon's orders. Now, at last, he was free of her.

He looked closely and could see her breath was coming fast and uneven. At least she was still alive. Eventually the pilot of the

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wind-borne vessel would get tired of waiting and come looking for her. Anyway, that's what Max hoped would happen. Though he also knew there was an after-dark scenario, one in which the Misshapens would come out and find her. He didn't want to think about that.

He stood up, feeling a tremendous weight slide from his shoulders. White fog, thick and silent, drifted around him, erasing Mrs. Crumlin's features and turning her into a lumpy blur. She reminded him of those dead people in Egypt called mummies, wrapped in white shrouds and buried in golden tombs. He'd seen pictures of mummies in Gran's
Wonders of Ancient Times.

Where was his silver owl? He called for her, but there was no reply. Perhaps she'd flown back to the bridge. The bridge--why was that important? He struggled to remember.
Rose!
Rose was waiting for him at the bridge! How on earth had he forgotten her? But he already knew the answer: he had swallowed the poisoned muffin.

He pulled a sweater from his rucksack and shook out the crumbs. It would keep Mrs. Crumlin warm until help arrived. He lowered the sweater, but as he leaned nearer his insides curdled.

Her shape was recognizably human, and yet as he got closer he saw that Mrs. Crumlin was changing into something very different. He could see knotted veins pulsating beneath the slimy gray skin of her face. And on each hand her sausage-shaped fingers ended in sharp, pointed claws.

He staggered back, sickened to his core, watching two scrappy wings tear through the shoulders of her coat, shredding the fabric to pieces. Horror-struck, he dropped the sweater and raced off.

***

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Max ran wildly, searching for the stone bridge and Rose and his silver owl, confused by the shifting fog. At one point he found himself beneath a wing of the wind-borne vessel. In a corner of his pocket he could feel Gran's shell. Was it stained with Dr. Tredegar's blood? He couldn't bring himself to look at it. The drowned doctor was one more thing he didn't want to think about.

At last, after what seemed like hours, he saw the outline of the bridge in the distance. Exhausted, almost crying, he staggered toward it, struggling for breath.

"Who is it?" shouted Rose. "Stop where you are!"

Max could hear the dog growling.

"Rose!" he shouted, racing across the bridge. "It's me!" Through the mist he saw her sitting cross-legged, the dog curled at her feet, his silver owl gliding protectively above her head. Max smiled to himself, thinking how these two animals were keeping his friend safe.

As he stumbled toward Rose, the owl floated down and fell limp on his shoulder, tucking her bad wing close to her body. "Are you all right, little owl?" Seeing how tired and bedraggled she looked, Max patted her gently. "Thanks for saving my life," he murmured. "You know, you're the most amazing owl in the world." She crawled to her sleeping spot beside his neck and settled in.

"Max!" cried Rose. "Where have you been?"

He ran to his friend, pulling her to her feet. "My owl saved my life!" he said excitedly. He noticed a smear of dried blood on Rose's cheek. "And Mrs. Crumlin is, like, a giant skræk! She got the extra big dose meant for me and--"

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Then he noticed Rose's eyes. They looked muzzy and blurred, like two glazed marbles. "Your eyes!" he gasped, holding her at arm's length. "What happened?"

Her grimy fingers fluttered before his face. "It's a white fog that comes and goes," she whispered. "I see shadows and wispy images, moving real slow, like ghosts. Then after a while it goes away and I can see again. But I'm scared, Max, I don't know what's happening!"

He felt his stomach twist. "Rose, I know what it is," he said, feeling terrible that he hadn't told her earlier. "Remember when the Dark Brigade chased you with an arrow?"

"How could I forget?" said Rose hotly. "The arrow went right into my arm and stuck there and I had to pull it out!"

"The arrow was tipped with an experimental drug, Rose! Tredegar shot it at you! I heard Einstein telling Mrs. Crumlin-- he said they used some vision gene--"

"An
experimental drug?"
Rose went pale. "What's going to happen to me?" she whispered. "At first I thought it was the fog, but then I realized-- Oh, Max, did my eyes get wrecked? Am I going to go blind?"

"I--I don't think so," said Max, though he really had no idea. Seeing her frightened expression, he added, "But you're alive, right? You're still Artemis Rose Eccles, yeah? And we're still together: you, me and the silver owl! Don't worry, the Owl Keeper will heal your eyes. He can do stuff like that!" Rose looked a bit cheered up by his words, Max thought. But deep down he was worried.

"Don't forget Helios." She ruffled the dog's fur. "He's--
Max!"

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She turned to him, startled. "You're out in the sun! You didn't burn up!"

"I was never allergic to sun particles, Rose," said Max. "They lied to me! They made me think I was this sickly kid who was different from everybody else!" He thought wistfully of those years of anxiety and isolation, the years when he'd had no friends at all.

"I knew it!" Rose jumped up and the dog leapt up with her. "Those evil, wheezy bloaters, I hate them! Everything they said was lies! They tried to keep you from being ordinary, Max, they tried to take everything away!" She squared her shoulders and jutted out her chin. "But you stood up to them, didn't you? You were really brave!"

"Yeah," he said, feeling a rawness in his throat as the sadness returned. "I guess I was." The thought of being brave suddenly made him think of Gran.

"Rose, want to hear something amazing?" he said, a childish joy bubbling up inside him. "My granny's alive! The authorities told everyone she was dead, even my parents, but it wasn't true-- Gran's in prison! Mrs. Crumlin admitted everything!"

Rose gave a joyful shout and threw her arms around him, waking the sleeping owl on his shoulder, who fluttered into the air. "I'm so happy for you!" she cried. "It's even better than not going up in flames!"

Max hugged Rose back. Through her shabby wool coat he could feel her heart pounding.

"Hey, Max, what if your gran met my mom in prison?" said Rose, looking hopeful. "Maybe they're plotting to escape this very minute!"

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Max nodded, hoping that it might be true. "Maybe, Rose."

The silver owl flew into his coat pocket and a chill fell over him as he remembered the wind-borne vessel, waiting in the field for Mrs. Crumlin. They were, he knew, in terrible danger. Any minute now the Dark Brigade could show up. "Let's go, Rose," he said, clasping her hand. "We've got to get away from here!"

The two children ran from the bridge and uphill, to a path strewn with leaves of burnished gold. The black dog raced behind, sniffing the air. Bursting out of Max's pocket, the silver owl soared into the trees. Max saw with growing dread that the path ran straight and deep into the forest.

He knew they had no choice but to follow it. If they went in any other direction they risked meeting the Dark Brigade or the pilot and crew of the wind-borne vessel. He longed to go home, to find out whether his parents were safe, but he knew he'd be arrested and sent to Children's Prison. There was no going back, he realized: the way to Cavernstone Grey was closed to him forever.

The owl wheeled above their heads, leading them on, stopping every so often to rest her wing. Cattails waved, etched with frost; branches clattered in the wind. Snow crystals floated through the frozen landscape. Rose stamped by Max's side as they clambered higher through the trees, the path glistening before them.

"What do you see now?" Max asked Rose as they hurried through the woods. She seemed to be stumbling more often and veering off the path. "Can you see where we're walking?"

"Everything's turning white again. I see shadows and outlines

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of things that come and go and flicker out of reach, and I hear leaves crunching, but I can't see them. Are the leaves dead, Max?"

"No," huffed Max as they headed up a steep incline. "Not at all!" He wondered if there was some way to counteract the drug on the poisoned arrow. "The leaves are golden, Rose, like the poem," he said, trying to sound upbeat. "This has to be the path to the Owl Keeper!" He scooped up a leaf and gave it to Rose.

"Gold is lucky, Max," she said, twirling the leaf as they ran. "It's the color of your owl's eyes." Then she ground to a halt. "What's that noise?"

Max froze, listening to a deep droning high above the trees. It sounded like a huge whirring insect. He looked up to see the underbelly of a wind-borne vessel, then a second one close behind. "It's the Dark Brigade!"

They began running again, crouching low at the edges of the path to avoid being seen. How powerful were the Dark Brigade's binoculars? Max wondered. Mrs. Crumlin once said they'd invented computerized spyglasses that could see through buildings and trees, but he suspected she'd made that up to frighten him.

As they wound their way higher, Max scanned the forest for signs of shelter. They needed somewhere to hide; they couldn't run from the Dark Brigade forever. And he was worried what would happen once the sun went down--and the Misshapens came out.

Maybe, he thought, we'll find one of the old makeshift villages Gran used to talk about. Cloistered in the forests, the villages had been built by resisters and outcasts and hard-thinking visionaries. Moving from one settlement to the next, the resisters had

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eluded the High Echelon for years, never staying in one place long. Max always liked to think they'd made it across the border.

The path grew agonizingly steep and a freezing wind stung their faces. He could see the silver owl hopping from branch to branch and the dog shaking icicles from its fur. His nerves jangled, Max could hardly think straight. To calm himself, he began singing softly:

"Owl in the darkness, silver in the leaves,

Blind child comes leading through the fog and trees.

Through the haunted forest, beyond the aching hills,

Darker grows the eventide, deeper grows the chill."

He swallowed hard. He hadn't given much thought to the "blind child" part before. Was the Prophecy talking about Rose?

"We need a plan," he said, steering Rose around an upturned root. A plan, he thought, would make him feel less anxious, more in control. "Too bad we don't have a map like the one your dad drew. That was so cool."

Rose went quiet and he knew she was thinking sad thoughts about her father. "My dad never has plans," she said at last. "He makes things up as he goes along. That's because my dad likes to be open-minded and flexible. He likes to be surprised."

Max sighed inwardly. He hated surprises.

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Black branches towered overhead, rising against a pewter sky. Sleek and insidious, the wind-borne vessels glided just above the trees, buffeted by the wind. Each time the droning grew louder, Max and Rose dove off the path and into the forest.

Snow lashed at their faces as the path curved, and Max glimpsed a roof shrouded in icy mist. "Rose, there's a house ahead!" he said excitedly.

"Hurray!" cheered Rose. But Max could tell by the way she squinted her eyes that she was having trouble seeing.

As they neared the structure, he saw snow-laden branches straggling out through broken windows. The building stood solid and round, glistening with ice, its battered doorway facing them. Over a shuttered window hung a sign with faded letters. It reminded Max of the ticket booth at Cavernstone Grey's train station, where he'd once gone with Gran.

"'North Forest Railway--northbound from Tigris to Port Sunlight and environs,'" he read aloud. "This town must be Tigris." He frowned, thinking how the railway station in Cavernstone Grey would one day be deserted like this one.

Rose took off her hat and shook it out. Her long red hair was powdered with snow. "I always wanted to ride on a train," she said in a dreamy voice. Her eyes went wide. "Hey, my dad talked about Port Sunlight! I think he was headed there next!"

Max blinked at her in surprise. If this train went north, that meant Port Sunlight was in the Frozen Zone. "Why would he go to the Frozen Zone?"

"Search me," she said, brushing ice off Helios. "My dad doesn't tell me everything, you know."

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