Guardian of the Fountain (10 page)

Brant
had to duck to go through the door. The light on the other side was blinding.
As Chrissie stepped into the light and her eyes began to adjust, vibrant colors
materialized, filling every space. She was standing in a garden paradise. The
smell of fresh greens and tropical flowers greeted them at the door. Flowers of
every variety crowded, spilling out onto grassy pathways. Rich, dark soil peeked
through the edges of the flowerbeds. A bright red macaw perched up in a branch
above them. The garden was perfectly manicured, and she thought that this is
what heaven should be like.

“I
tend to everything in this garden. It sits in the base of an inactive volcano.
The volcano walls keep it from being seen by the outside world. But the most
important part of the garden lies in its center.” Brant beamed like he was
showing her his pride and joy. “People think this volcano is a mountain. It
makes the perfect secluded spot to hide a secret.”

The
mansion wasn’t really built on the side of a mountain but on an ancient,
inactive volcano?

 
He led Chrissie down a grassy path. She didn’t
know what to focus on. There were so many things she wanted to take a closer
look at and explore, such as the stone ruins built into the walls and the gold
dragon-like creatures peeking out from the vegetation in the cliffs. Hidden
treasures lay just behind overgrown vines and enormous blossoms. Every inch of
the space seemed to be a story waiting to be told.

 
Chrissie could hear water trickling in
the distance.

“I
finally get to show you this.”

“I
didn’t see it already?” Chrissie asked, confused.

“No,
the most important part is just a few steps away. I was going to bring you here
before you got sick.” Excitement began to build in Brant’s voice.

As
they rounded a heavily flowered corner, a deep pool of crystal-clear blue water
stretched out before them. Water shot out of a rock face, splashing into the
pool below, aerating the water. Chrissie could see all the way to the bottom of
the volcanic crater, where water bubbled up from the bottom of the pool. The
pool itself was twice as big as an Olympic-sized swimming pool, and was just as
deep.

The
air hung heavy with an invisible cloud of magic. It pulsed like it was a living
thing and the water was its blood. She could almost hear a chant with the
rhythm of the water.

“You
are now looking at the Fountain of Youth,” Brant said as he presented it with
his arms stretched out wide, almost like a proud father.

“Like
the one in Florida? With the theme park and all?” Her joke fell flat. It almost
seemed irreverent to comment in such a manner. She immediately felt remorseful.

“I’m
sorry. I shouldn’t have said that,” she apologized to whatever spirits or magic
protected the fountain.

“No, this
is the real fountain. The very one kings and queens sent explorers to find. But
they never found it—just legends. The Indians here kept it a secret until
a Spanish priest was introduced to it by the natives. He had won over their
affection and trust after he wandered into their village, sick, and they healed
him. He promised to keep the secret and guard it from harm. That was in the
year 1706. He tended to the garden and built the mansion with the aid of the
Indians.”

“That’s
quite a story. I would say you’re crazy, but I saw your bullet wounds heal
before my eyes. How did you become the Guardian?”

“I
left my home in England when I was sixteen to work on a merchant ship. It
sailed here, carrying supplies. I came down sick with a fever and was on my
deathbed when the father found me in the village. He brought me back to the
mansion and healed me. The ship left me here, and so I stayed and worked for
Father Delgado alongside María and Arturo. They were both children when the father
came to the village. I was somewhat still a child when he found me too. We’ve
been raised here by Father Delgado. I miss him almost every day.”

If Father Delgado was here in the year 1706,
then
…“Wait. How old are you?”

“I
came here in 1912.”

“You’re
over a hundred years old? Holy cow! You’re really old!” Chrissie felt like her
eyes might be bugging out and had to make a conscious effort to close her
gaping mouth. “Did I know this before? Really, this is huge. That means that María
and Arturo are even older. This explains why you’re still alive after being
shot, and why María is so strong, she can carry me. If you had told me before,
I would’ve thought you guys were all nuts, but seeing all this?” She opened her
arms wide and turned around. “This, and actually starting to feel better, has
convinced me.”

“The father
was over two hundred years old. He passed the responsibility of the garden to
me when I was about twenty. However, I didn’t actually drink any of the water
until my thirtieth birthday, when I was sure I wanted to stay here forever.”

“Where
is Father Delgado now?”

“Father
Delgado just walked out into the jungle one afternoon and didn’t come back. I
imagine he died a long time ago.”

“The
water doesn’t make you live forever?” Chrissie reached down and dipped her
fingertips into the pleasant water.

“It
can if you keep on drinking it.” Brant shrugged. “It makes the old reverse
their age by the amount and frequency they drink it, but once you’re away from
it for very long, its effects wear off and you begin the aging process again. I
drink the water every five years to keep me in the condition I’m in, and I
don’t have any desire to look thirteen, either. María and Arturo only drink the
water every twenty years so they age slowly. I don’t think I could’ve done this
all these years without María and Arturo sharing the burden. They’ve cared for
me like their own son and have been my closest friends. I never knew my father,
and my mother died right before I turned fifteen. So you can see, we’re a
pretty close-knit family.”

“Wouldn’t
the townspeople be suspicious that you guys never age?”

“They
would be, but they know about the water from ancient legends. They are very
superstitious, and it is their tribal duty to keep it a secret. The young
people don’t believe them, and usually leave to live in the larger cities
anyway.”

“Did
I drink the water?” Chrissie looked up from her crouched position into Brant’s
eyes, searching for the answer.

“No.
You were going to, though.” His eyes dimmed with sadness. “When a person
decides to drink the water, they make a commitment to care for the garden. So
you understood that and were going to do it after we got back from our trip.”

Chrissie
gave him a questioning look. “A trip?”

 
“We went to Caracas one day for an
overnight getaway. I left while you were sleeping to go order us some breakfast
for the next morning. When I came back, the room was ransacked, and both your
vials were gone. I found you lifeless in bed. I thought someone had murdered
you. But you were alive, just very sick, burning up with fever.” Brant
shuddered at the painful memory.

Chrissie
had always felt like she was a nobody. Why would anyone want to harm her? She
didn’t have any enemies that she could remember.

“For
centuries, people believed in the fountain’s existence. It wasn’t until
recently, when the largest drug cartel leader in the area was given information
about it, that a new search began. He knows this village protects the valuable
secret. The village will not speak of it to anyone. They don’t know exactly where
it is, for their safety, but they get the benefits of the healing water in
return for their silence. I bring them bottles of water when anyone is sick.
They promise not to drink it, but to only bathe affected bodies with it.”

Brant
sat down next to Chrissie on the water’s edge. “See, life has a natural
progression, in most cases. We don’t want to mess with their lives like that.
That is God’s job. We only drink the water to protect it. If you do drink it,
there’s sort of a ceremony for the occasion because it’s so special. This is
how it has gone on for hundreds of years. Only the people who directly care for
the garden and the fountain drink the water. The drug cartel sees the water as
a way to rule the world and make billions. If they gain control, they won’t
need cocaine money anymore, and they could be invincible. Could you imagine if
they never died and always had limitless time, money, and resources? That is
unfathomable power.”

“I
can see how the water would need to be protected. It could start wars.”
Chrissie relaxed as the sun shining down the volcano crater warmed her back.
Looking up, she saw a canopy of plants obscuring the view from airplanes. She
pulled up her legs and rested her chin on her knees.

“The
cartel knows that I am the Guardian now. It will only be a matter of time
before they can attach my face to my name as the Guardian. I have a feeling
Margarita tipped them off.” Brant shook his head. “She was acting too dodgy not
to be involved.”

“I
can understand that logic. Is that why you had Arturo babysit me?” Chrissie
said sarcastically as she flicked water at Brant.

“Exactly!
I’m glad you remembered him. It made it easier to convince you to come back.”
Brant flicked water at Chrissie and smiled.

“So
what am I supposed to do now?” Chrissie’s tone came out more serious than she
had intended.

“Stay
here and get better.” Brant’s expression softened. “After that, you may choose
to leave, if you wish. But I can’t promise you the protection of the water and
from anyone who thinks you might know about it. I also don’t have any
guarantees that you are healed, either. But you haven’t done anything by the
book from the very beginning. You might go back home just to have your symptoms
return.”

“So,
do I need to drink the water to get better?” Chrissie picked up a small white
flower and twirled it between her fingers.

“I’m
not sure. Just bathing in it should be enough.”

“Well,
the skin is semi permeable, and the largest organ in the body. It would make
sense that the water could penetrate enough for the body to use it to heal.”

“If
you ingested the orange powder, you should have died. I don’t know how you’re still
alive.” Brant grabbed Chrissie’s hand, stopping the flower from twirling, and
gazed into her face.

“Why
would I take the powder?” Chrissie whispered, perplexed.

“I
assume it was to protect the secret.”

“Well,
I promise to keep the secret. But I can’t promise I’ll stay forever.”

“Fair
enough,” Brant said sadly.

Chapter
13

Brant
and Chrissie climbed to the top of the stairs and entered the library.

“Thanks,
Brant, for telling me the truth.” Chrissie smiled.

“How
did it go?” María asked. “She came back. She must be pure of heart.”

Brant
shot a stern look over to María. “Well enough. She now knows everything and can
decide for herself what she wants to do. She promised to keep the secret.”

Arturo
let out a sigh of relief. “That’s good.”

“Her color
looked a little off, so I brought her back. It might be time for another bath, María.”
Brant was worried.

“I
feel fine,” Chrissie said, but Brant could tell she was lying by the way she
bit her bottom lip and looked away.

“Tell
the truth,” Brant said sternly. “You’re completely worn out.”

“I
hate being high-maintenance,” Chrissie admitted. “To tell the truth, I think a
nice long soak might do me some good.” She paused, and Brant could see the
wheels in her head turning by the way she furrowed her brow. “Why wouldn’t I
have come back from the garden?”

“It’s
nothing. Just an old native legend that the garden protects itself by letting
in only the pure of heart.” Brant brushed off his statement like it didn’t
matter much. “I’ve never actually seen anyone try to get into the garden,
though. I just chalk it up to being a story.”

“Mija
went through a lot today. It will be hard for her to adjust to it all in one
afternoon. Let’s not give her more. Un poco a la vez.” Arturo patted Chrissie
on the back comfortingly.

“I’ll
get her bath ready.” María hugged Brant before she left. “Give her some time,”
she said as she put her arm around Chrissie and guided her out of the library.
“It’ll come back.”

Arturo
and Brant began looking over the books scattered liberally upon the expansive
desk. Some of the books were so old that the pages were brown and brittle. Most
were hand-sewn by Father Delgado himself. His seal was branded into the leather
on the back.

“I’ve
spent hours every day poring over Father Delgado’s journals, and I haven’t
found anything about people living after ingesting the orange powder,” Brant
said.

“When
I was a small boy, the people in my village would lace their arrows and spears
with the powder to make a quicker kill during war.” Arturo started to close the
journals and stack them.

A thought
occurred to Brant, “Has anyone who has drunk the fountain water ever had the
powder as well?”

“The
Guardian before Father Delgado took the powder to die. He was three hundred
years old and wanted to leave this earth. It took him a week to die, but he
finally did.” Arturo scratched his head. “But he stopped drinking the water
long before that, and I never actually saw him after he took the powder. Mis padres
just told me about it.”

Brant
sat down on his chair and propped his boots up on the desk. “Something doesn’t
make sense.”

He
raked his fingers through his hair as he mulled over the facts. “One question
remains the same. Why isn’t she getting better? She has two more symptoms—excessive
eating, and sleeping for days at a time. The water should’ve made her better after
the first bath.”

Arturo
stared at the bookcase for a moment. “Have you ever read that one?” he said,
pointing to the only book that didn’t have a title on the spine.

“No,
I haven’t. It’s written in an ancient Egyptian/ Hebrew hybrid. I sent a copy of
a page to a professor in the States and that’s what he told me it was. I can’t
read it though.” Brant walked to the bookcase, retrieved the book, and carefully
opened it. The edges of the pages seemed to crumble under his fingertips. He studied
the page that had the image of a large orange Delphne blossom. “I’m sure this
is it, but I don’t know how it works in Chrissie’s case.” He sat down and
quietly looked over it. Arturo sat patiently while Brant pored over the ancient
book. A piece of paper slipped out and floated to the ground. Brant stooped
down to pick it up. “Hey, this is Father Delgado’s handwriting. It looks like
some sort of a decoder.” Brant began scribbling on a piece of scratch paper as
he read from the book. “It says something like, ‘it rapidly ages someone to
death.’”

“The
exact opposite of the water.”

“Have
you ever seen it work on anybody?” Brant asked.

“No,
I’ve never been in any of the battles or around any of the Guardians who
ingested it. But I vaguely remember my father telling my mother that it turns
the poisoned person’s hair stark white, and they die instantly.”

“I
don’t see an antidote here,” Brant said glumly.

“Everything
has its opposite. Good or evil. Happy and sad. The water is its opposite,” Arturo
said. Brant knew that Arturo was his wisest and truest friend, and that he was
right.

* * *

Chrissie’s
feet once again moved like she wore lead boots. Her body was always tired.
Exhaustion loomed around the corner, and found her more frequently than she
would like.

“It’s
time to take another dip in the pool of weird.” She sighed. “Whatever . . . at
this point, nothing would surprise me.” Chrissie walked into the large room,
and the smell of the water instantly comforted her. It was becoming her drug of
choice. She was dependent on it. One day she’d ask Brant to show her the path
the water took from the garden into the pool in the mansion.

María
stood at the pool’s edge, sprinkling rose petals across the water and pouring
oil into it. “Rose, gardenia, and sandalwood are magnificent for the skin. I hoped
I would be gone before you came for your bath. I wanted to give you time to
think about things.”

“Oh, María.
I’m not mad at anyone. Just very sad. I’m grieving.” Chrissie’s eyes filled
with unshed tears.

“Why?”
María’s face softened with sympathy.

Chrissie
slipped her clothes off to enter the pool.
 
The water felt a little warmer tonight. “I’m sure Brant was the perfect
boyfriend. As kind and handsome as he is, I’m sure all it took was one look
before I was head over heels for him. I just wish I remembered it. How do I
know he loved me?”

“Let
me tell you what happened after he found you, mija.” María put away all the
oils, sat in the wicker rocking chair, and picked up some knitting, “When he
came back to the hotel and found you seemingly muerta across the bed, he
thought he had lost you forever. When he found out that you were still alive,
he carried you down to the street and hailed a cab to take you to the hospital.
They took you in right away and began trying to bring you back to us. He never
left your side from the moment you were there until just before your padres
came. Arturo met your parents at the hospital as Brant waited out in the
parking lot to catch one last glimpse of you.” María paused, “How was he to
explain himself to your parents? It would’ve put them in danger as well, knowing
of his existence.”

“My
dad would’ve flipped if he found out about a secret romance with a guy over a
hundred years old.” Chrissie smiled. Dad was protective when it came to his
little girl. He would’ve been dressed in his mossy-oak camo, staking out Brant’s
place.

“So …
Arturo took his place, and Brant came back to the mansion distraught. He didn’t
eat or sleep for week. Poor chico
.
” María´s
knitting needles flew. ”For weeks, we didn’t hear anything, so he sent Arturo
to check on you. Arturo found you in a state he couldn’t ignore. As soon as Arturo
called, Brant jumped into action, making the necessary arrangements to bring
you back and save you.” María’s eyes darted up to Chrissie’s. “And don’t think
you’re off the hook for almost ending your life,” she scolded.

“Arturo
told you.” Chrissie looked down at her wrinkling fingers cupped under the
water; such a difference between the pills and the water. Pills had horrible
side effects and only did so much for short amounts of time, but the water made
her feel almost new without the heavy price of side effects. “Sorry,” she
whispered. “I was desperate to stop the suffering.”

“We
would’ve lost you forever. Then we would all be suffering.” María returned to
her knitting.

“Why
didn’t he just bring me back from the hotel and give me a dunk in the pool?”
Chrissie floated in the water, enjoying the release of tension.

“Our
village is an hour and a half from Caracas. He didn’t think you would live
through the trip, and once you were in the hospital, he wouldn’t have been able
to get you out. Whatever happened to you affected your whole body.” María
looked up from the soft blanket she was knitting. María liked to knit blankets.
When one was finished, she would start another. How many had she made in her
two-hundred-plus years? “Arturo and I made the decision a while back to taper
down our water intake and age slowly. We take an occasional dip in the pool to
save our body from the effects of arthritis and disease. It is good to have the
water for first aid purposes.” The click of the knitting needles was still rapid.

“Why
haven’t I gotten better? One moment, I think I’m completely healed, and another
moment, I think I haven’t made any progress at all.” Chrissie scrubbed the
bottoms of her feet with the soapy loofa, then her back, which felt so good it
gave her goose bumps along her arms.

“You
are a puzzle to all of us.” María put down her knitting. “Now, let’s let the
subject rest for a bit, yes? Rinse the soap from your hair and we’ll call it a
night.”

Chrissie
dipped her head back in the water, and a memory came to her. It was of dancing
to the song
Adorro
at a carnival in
the streets with Brant before she got sick. “María! I remember Brant!” It
wasn’t a dream, she realized. It was a full-fledged memory. The familiarity of it
comforted her.

“Good.
Let’s go tell him.” María offered Chrissie a white fluffy robe at the water’s
edge.

When Chrissie
headed out the door from the bath and into the hall, she saw Brant looking up
at her from the plaza. She waved with a bright, cheery smile. “I remember
Adorro
at the carnival.”

Brant
smiled. “Yes!” He fist-pumped the air.

She
walked into her room and closed the door behind her.

* * *

Chrissie
went to bed early that night. The day had been emotionally and physically
draining. María had sent Chrissie’s dinner up to her room, and she only managed
to eat half of it before almost nodding off into her plate.

      
The mansion
lay dark and quiet in the late night hours. Chrissie rolled over in a
half-awake, half-asleep state to see a man in her doorway. He wore a dark suit,
and his hair was slicked back. He charged over to the bed with a mean sneer on
his face, made even more wicked by the nasty scar that ran over the corner of
his bottom lip. His black leather gloved hand reached toward her as she held up
her hands to block his advance. She had to keep her glass rose safe.

      
She began
screaming while she tried clawing at his face. Her fingernails couldn’t rip his
skin. His mustache twitched as he tried to hold back his smile. She screamed
until her lungs burned.

* * *

Brant
heard Chrissie’s screaming. It jolted him awake. He didn’t bother to pull
clothes over his boxers. He didn’t have time. He ran from his room at the
opposite end of the house and threw the door open to see Chrissie thrashing on
her bed in a fit. He ran to her side and pulled her to him. Sweat matted her
hair down to her face. She shook from the nightmare. Her chest heaved up and
down in panicked breaths. He worried that the stress of the nightmare would make
her sick.

      
“Chrissie,
shush. It’s okay. No one’s hurting you. It’s me, Brant. I’ve got you.” Brant
cleared the damp hair from her face. He hated the fear in her bleary eyes.

      
“It was him.
He came for the glass rose. I wouldn’t let him have it,” Chrissie blurted out.

      
“You did well.
Who was it?” Brant spoke calmly. He
had
to be the composed one.

      
“I don’t
know. He was wearing a suit, and he had a thick black mustache. He had a scar
on his bottom lip.” Chrissie’s heart rate was at a hummingbird’s pace.

      
“You just
described Franco Santiago, the leader of the largest drug cartel in the area, sweetheart.”
He held her close into him in an effort to relax her. Trying to remain coolheaded
as he thought of Franco in that hotel room, was difficult. He wanted to kill Franco.

“Thank
you,” she mumbled into his chest.

      
“Anytime,
Chrysanthemum Love Stevens.” Brant pondered what she had described to him as
she calmed down. “I think the glass rose symbolizes the water, and you were
trying keep the secret safe from Franco.”

      
“You think
so?” Chrissie’s eyes looked tiredly into his face.

      
“Well, if
you think about it, the rose and water go hand in hand everywhere together. It
symbolizes the eternal bloom.” Brant scooted farther onto the bed, trying to
get more comfortable.