Island of Icarus (9 page)

When I woke, Marcus was absent, and my first thought was,
Good lord, not again!

My muscles were stiff and sore from the night before. A splash of water from the basin cleared my head and my eyes. I tugged on my clothing and stumbled out into the clear, bright, still morning. Marcus was standing in the middle of the beach with his arms half-spread at his sides. The look on his face as he stared out at the ocean was one of immense satisfaction. Even the waves were calm. “It’s perfect,” he said.

I could not disagree, for it was. His arm and collarbone were also all but completely healed. So I said, “It is.”

“Let us hurry, before the conditions change,” he said. He jogged back to the workshop like a boy, and I followed. The wings sat partially unfurled on the ground, looking simultaneously dangerous and mundane. We each gripped one of the wing joints and carried the whole apparatus to the beach. Marcus wore boots and sturdy clothes. A pair of scuffed goggles dangled at his neck.

After all these weeks, the wings still seemed like a hopeless, tangled mess of cords, straps, and struts. I am not sure how Marcus made sense of it. “It looks trickier than it is,” he said, though I was doubtful. He knelt on the sand, spread the wings, and carefully arranged the cords that controlled them. Apparently satisfied, he donned the goggles and sat back into the harness. He threaded his arms through the leather straps. As he pulled the buckles tight, I said, “Do be careful. That arm is hardly healed.”

“Oh, I know,” he said, leaning forward to fasten the leg braces around his calves. He fit the leather gloves with the wing controls over his hands. “The harness distributes the weight over my entire body. There won’t be much strain on my shoulders themselves. And I have full range of motion in the arm now, so there will be no problem using the controls. The rest is in my legs.” He smiled and proffered a hand. “Hand up?” he asked. I took it and pulled. He hunched as he stood, wobbling under the unwieldy apparatus. Once standing, he unfolded to his full height and faced me, looking for all the world like some mechanical angel.

“
Please
be careful,” I repeated, an uncomfortable feeling gripping my gut.

“Come here,” he said, and kissed me when I did. Looking at me through the cloudy glass of the goggles, he assured me, “I will be fine. In fact, I will be even better if you stand back for your own safety.”

I was not sure if I expected him to simply leap into the air or to make a running jump. He did neither, but instead adjusted the weight on his back and began to walk in large, slow circles, his thumbs hooked into the harness. The braces that fit around his calves made him waddle. The whole process seemed painfully clumsy and awkward to me.

After several circles, he stopped and waved to me, the wing on that side flapping and wiggling with the movement. Then, he looked down, fingered a toggle, and lurched forward into a halting jog. I could just make out a fast blur of movement near the tail of the wings. He spread his arms and splayed his fingers. The pinions unfurled. They caught the light of the sun and glittered impressively.

For a long moment, it seemed like nothing would happen. The wings bounced comically, and the air resistance they caused seemed to hold him back. Yet, abruptly, only his toes were touching the ground as he jogged, and he was bent headlong as if he was ready to tumble head over heels. With a flex of the pinions, he swept into the air. Up he soared, as if pulled by some invisible force. He crowed wordlessly in exultation.

My heart lurched into my throat and my head spun. Up, he went almost straight up! Ten, twenty, thirty, forty feet, and spiraling now like a buzzard in the air—great big, lazy circles that brought him higher still. His shadow slid over me like some great bird’s, and then he leveled off at what must have been sixty feet above.

Silhouetted against the sky, the wings looked genuine. He had done an artful job with the overlapping lengths of thin steel, for they seemed like real feathers.

After the initial jolt of mouth-drying fear, it was rather surreal. I gawked upward at Marcus, terrified but also amazed—relieved, as well, that he had leveled off and did not seem to be climbing any higher. Though his movement on the ground had been clumsy, his flight was smooth and altogether graceful. The furcula we had carved must have done its job, for the wings stayed steadily open. My fear gave way to admiration and a rising envy, though the thought of taking off and up into that blue tropical sky made my heart race

Marcus turned broadly out of his circle and headed in the direction of the ocean. I jogged after him, apprehensive as he soared out over the water. Either he did not see my waving arms or he chose to ignore my warning gesture, for soon he was a distance away, his shadow skimming over the waves. I stopped at the surf to watch him. Oh, I did not fancy swimming to his rescue again.

He turned back before he had reached a distance I could not swim. Considerate of him, I thought wryly. He seemed like a boy to me at times, ready to test boundaries and push limits. Though I cursed his penchant for risks at times like these, I generally found it rather endearing. After all, it was he who had taken the risk to kiss me first. It had gotten him into the air. It had allowed him to survive on this island with nothing save his strong muscles and clever mind. He was a dreamer and a go-getter, my Marcus. And now he could fly.

He streaked right over me and executed a rather wobbly, sharp turn that threatened to send him into a spin. I ran after him, but the flight stabilized and he returned to his circling. However, something was different this time. The wings began to shake. I realized that he was waving one hand at me, frantically.

A thousand possibilities flashed through my mind: that he could not get down, or that something had broken, or that he had lost control, or that his collarbone had fractured again under the stress. He was shouting at me, but I could not make out his words, only the distant sound of his raised voice.

And then he was veering uncontrollably inland. It wasn’t a fall, exactly, but a sharply angled descent that carried him away from the water and straight for—

“The trees!”

It all happened very fast. Marcus’s descent took him right into the embrace of the treetops, which bowed severely under his weight and momentum. I half expected that the backlash would fling him back into the air, but there was only a crashing sound as the entire swathe of canopy sagged. I reached the trees moments later, and I could hear the sounds of brushing leaves and cracking branches.

“Marcus!” I cried, feeling a disconcerting wave of déjà vu. This time, there was no ocean of water. Instead, Marcus was lost in an ocean of trees above me. Perhaps the impact had badly damaged or killed him. I imagined half a dozen deaths for him—dashing his head, or strangling in the harness, or snapping his neck. I dodged through the trees, eyes trained upward, following the movement of the canopy.

It was not hard to find Marcus this time, not with him dangling from the treetops like a tangled marionette. He was suspended limply in the harness, head and limbs hanging lifelessly. I came to an abrupt stop and stood, frozen, staring at him as the blood drained from my face.

There was a crack of wood, and Marcus stirred. The squeezing pressure on my heart eased away, and I cried his name hoarsely. He looked at me with goggled eyes. When he tried to flex his arms, there was a movement to either side of him. The wings, which had broken his fall and now held him in the trees, shifted in response to the movement of his gloves.

“No! Stay still!” I yelled, bursting into a run. If the wings moved enough, they might slip right out of the trees, and he would fall twenty feet to the ground, surrounded by thirty or more pounds of metal and wood as it crumpled against the forest floor. I came to a stop below him and we stared at each other, my jaw slack and his body limp.

He would need to get out of that harness, but he could not unbuckle it himself unless he managed to first get out of the wing-control gloves. Even if he did, and even if he managed to unharness himself, he still had a long drop beneath him.

There was a branch near him, a thick sturdy one that seemed separate from those that held him up. If only I could climb out onto it, I might be able to help him out of the harness and break his fall. Climbing trees had been one of the few physical activities I had engaged in as a boy. I had raided more than one bird’s nest in my early days. “Hold on!”

Though the tree had few low-lying branches, its bark was thick and gnarled, full of good handholds. I climbed two feet onto a protrusion at the base of the tree, and from there I leaped onto the first branch above me. My hands caught and held, but feebly. Hanging by my fingertips, I swung my clockwork arm back and then hooked it over the limb. The branch had the girth of a child and easily supported my weight as I pulled myself onto it. I could see Marcus from where I squatted—closer, but not close enough.

The next branch was closer, easier to jump onto. Adrenaline charged my movements. This one gave under me just a little, but I braved its tapering, swaying length to reach Marcus. Reaching the end, I straddled the branch and hooked my legs underneath it. I could see the flash of the wings’ metal through the leaves.

“Steady.” I leaning forward, and my stomach clenched as the branch bent downward. I took a deep breath. Again, I murmured, “Steady.” I don’t know if it was for his sake or mine. Carefully, I reached out, my leg muscles trembling to keep me still. I took his hand and guided it slowly out of the glove. As his wrist bent to allow the release of his fingers, the right wing, which was lodged into the branches not far from me, tilted. However, it did not give.

Marcus flexed his free hand and relaxed into the harness. “Thank you,” he said, then freed his left hand. My mouth parched and every muscle was taut as I watched him. “There’s a ship. I think they saw me.”

His words struck me like a splash of cold water. A ship?

Marcus fumbled nervously at the straps of his harness. After unbuckling the first, he stopped and looked at me. “I don’t suppose we have a plan to get me down?”

His question jarred me back to the present. “You unbuckle, and I hold onto you,” I said. I placed my hard metal fingers around the meat of his upper arm, ready to grip hard.

“Oh.” He looked at the hand, and then began to work at the straps again. Once he had released the strap at his sternum, I could feel his body beginning to sag out of the harness. He glanced at me once, nervously. The strap at his abdomen seemed to prove more difficult, perhaps because of his weight straining against it. With only one strap left—this one at his pelvis—he looked downward and said, “My legs.”

His legs were still strapped into their own harness. “Hold onto the harness there.” There was one trick that I had not tried for a very long time, one that had allowed me to reach branches otherwise too flimsy to bear my weight. I flexed my legs briefly, and then hooked them underneath the branch again, this time with more strength. Gripping the branch in my hands, I fell over sideways in a slow, controlled topple until I was hanging upside-down. I swallowed hard. When I was confident that my legs would hold, I released my hands from the branch and hung there. If I reached forward just so, I could touch his right foot with my fingertips, and if I scrabbled for a moment for purchase, I could fit my fingers into the ankle strap. Marcus swung his leg out for me, which delivered his foot square into my two hands.

Quickly, I unbuckled the two leather bands that held his foot snug in the harness. My muscles were trembling by the time I was finished, and a cold sweat had beaded on my forehead. His other foot was just out of my reach, though if Marcus twisted it and I stretched to my limit, I could snag its harness with my fingertips. I grit my teeth as I sought for a grip, and was able to tease open the straps using little more than my nails. Only when his foot was free and I had eased back did I realize I had been holding my breath.

There was no moment to relax. Marcus was hanging by a single strap. I climbed back into an upright position and willed my muscles to stop shaking, then reached forward again to take him by the arm. He was completely motionless, tense with fear. “I’ve got you,” I said. “Let the last one go.”

He did. His body dropped, my grip tightened around his right upper arm, and the branch I straddled bowed under our combined weight. Above us, the trees quivered as his weight was suddenly released from them, and the wings shook and slid. I cried out as I dropped downward with the branch and instinctively tightened my hold on it with my other hand.

“Grab a hold!” I cried, swinging Marcus toward the sturdier branch beneath us. He missed on the first try, but caught hold on the second. At that moment there was a sharp crack, and then I was falling—truly falling—as the branch gave way. Marcus, still gripping my arm, yanked at me, and I slammed down beside him, knocking the air from my lungs.

As I struggled to catch my breath and catch a hold, the broken bough cracked and fell. It clattered against the trunk and its leaves whipped past us. We clung there in the aftermath, barely moving, just being, until Marcus chuckled nervously and said, “I didn’t know you could—”

A groan of metal and wood cut him off. The sound quickly crescendoed. The trees shuddered and the wings crashed to the ground. With a great swish and a whirlwind of leaves, the trees rushed upright again. Finally, truly, the forest stilled itself.

We looked at each other as my heart continued to pound under my tongue, and then we began to laugh. It was a nervous, exultant laughter. Weak and trembling, I lowered myself to the ground. My palms were raw and red from the rough tree bark, but I was well and in one piece. Marcus dropped down next to me and pushed his goggles up. He threw his arms around me and kissed my mouth with a smile on his lips.

“Marcus, your shoulder—” I gasped.

“It’s fine.” He grinned and kissed me again. “You are
marvelous!
” Then, his expression grew serious and he said, “The ship.” He looked off in the direction of the shore.

I reeled. “But the wings—” I began. There was his dream, crushed.

Marcus looked back at the pile of crumpled metal, wood, and leather that had been his wings, now bent beyond recognition. His lips flattened. He said, “Destroyed beyond repair, I’m sure. But they worked, and that is the important part. I have the plans still. And we are alive.” He hugged me again, cheek to cheek, then took my hand. “The ship!” he cried, and led me to the shore.

I staggered before falling into pace with him. “Are you sure you are all right?” I asked, breathlessly.

“Absolutely fine!”

Through the forest and out across the sand we ran. We halted, panting, at the shore. “There!” He pointed.

Sure enough, there was the white glint of a sail, and it appeared to be getting closer.