Red Leaves and the Living Token (34 page)

Handers hit the edge of the darkness coming from their weapons and passed through it without trouble.

"Go help you son!" Lord Valance yelled at him as he passed. "We'll defend you."

His son was laying still at the edge of the shallow pool circling the small hill. Handers dropped to the ground next to him and lifted him up, cradling him in his arms.

“Emret? Emret!” He pulled him close listening for a heart beat, for breathing. Nothing.

Blood poured out from the wounds of the arrow. It looked as though it might have pierced his heart. He shook him again. “Emret? Don't do this!”

He stood up with his son in his arms. Rage began to swell up inside him. He closed his eyes and saw the arrow that had fallen through the air towards his son. He saw the Botann soldiers standing on top of the barrier. Why? Why would they shoot a helpless boy? What threat could he possibly have been? The Rage boiled over.

He put his son's lifeless body down on the soft grass and turned to the Botann army.

His arm began to swell like liquid boiling up under the skin, pushing, stretching out. He stomped forward. “You killed him!” He screamed. “You killed him!” All he could see was revenge, blood.

“Wait, Handers, stop!” a voice yelled from behind a nearby tree. Handers looked back to see Bedic running towards him.

“If you attack you’ll bring the storm! You can’t do that. You can’t bring the storm here! It’ll destroy the RED!” Bedic yelled.

Handers blew past him, not listening, not caring.

“What about your son? Are you just going to leave him there, lying in the mud?” Bedic argued.

Handers stopped. Bedic was right. His son’s body. But what could he do in the middle of a battle? He'd go back, he thought, as soon as they were all dead. Every last green body.

“Look!” Bedic yelled, pointing up into the sky. Fingers of the black storm stretch out from the mountain top in the west and were angling across the sky towards them.

“Your son still has a chance if he finishes the journey that he started.” Bedic yelled as he chased after him. “Look at him, he’s only ten feet away! But he won’t be going any further on his own. He needs help. He needs his father!”

Handers slowed down.

“What was it that your son wanted more than anything else in this world? What did he come half way across the world to do?” Bedic asked, catching up to him.

Handers stopped and turned to the old man. “What does it matter,” he asked. “He's dead.”

Bedic responded quickly. “The boy came here to be healed of death didn’t he? Death was coming to him. If the boy was going to be healed of death before, why couldn’t he still be healed of it now?”

Handers strained against the pull of the old mans words. He tried to ignore him, to push his thought back to the army in front of him. He wanted to punish them. He wanted to feel them hurting under the  crushing pressure of his clenching fingers.

“Finish it.” The old man continued. “Finish what you came to do. What you came to help him do. You are the only one who can grant him his last wish. Take him to the Red.”

Handers resisted. “These men, they murdered my son.” He wanted to make them feel more pain than he felt. He wanted them to know the full reality of what they did. He wanted them to see the brutality of their actions on a helpless child.

“Even if you don’t believe that your son would be healed, your son believed it. Grant him that last wish. If you attack them, I promise you will not have the opportunity.”

He looked back at his son’s lifeless body. So close to end of his difficult journey. So close to finding what Handers had refused to help him find. Perhaps he could make things right in that way. He could give his son the help he'd asked for.

Arrows slipped through the air and landed in the grass a short distance away.

But these soldiers, he thought, they were unrelenting. His fingers clenched. He wanted to feel their skin ripping under his fingers.

“There is no time! In a moment your chance will be gone!” Bedic yelled.

Handers closed his eyes and remembered the voice of his son pleading with him for help. To be taken here to this place to be healed. Then he heard his own voice in response, telling him no, telling him he couldn't. He wouldn't.

He shook his head, trying to shake away the mistake. The shame of his choice.

This time he would not refuse his son. He would fight for what Emret wanted rather than what he wanted.

He turned back towards the lifeless body of his boy laying a just beyond his reach. "I'm sorry I didn't help you, Emret." He whispered.

He ran to his son and picked up the limp body. As soon as he was on his feet he heard the low blare of a war horn.

Behind him a sea of Botann soldiers swarmed down towards the center of the garden. A row of archers raised their bows into the air and released another volley of arrows that came slicing down through the air around him, cutting into the grass with a violent cacophony of noise.

He spun around to face his attackers. Again the anger surfaced. They would all die before the end of this, he swore.

He noticed that Valance was watching him, his weapon still held in the air to form the protective shield with the others. “Listen to this man, you fool! Go take your son!” He yelled.

Several new fingers of darkness shot across the sky from the storm hovering over the peaks of a mountain in the distance.

Bedic yelled again. “The storm. It’s still coming.” You must control your anger. You can’t bring it here. It’ll destroy the Red! That’s what it wants. That’s what it’s been looking for since you let it out!”

“I’m trying,” Handers yelled back. He turned again to the glowing hill just beyond the shallow pond. He splashed through the water carrying his son quickly towards the thicket at the top.

Bedic turned to look up at the sky as he followed behind Handers. The thin fingers were now a swollen mass of dark that was swirling directly over them. Lighting flashed casting a blinding pulse of light across the valley.

Bedic stopped as two black funnels dropped down out of the cloud. "Hurry Handers!

Handers turned and looked up at the sky in time to see the two black funnels slam into the ground by the outer barrier of the garden. Botann soldiers scattered. Others were sucked into the cloud.

Handers smiled.

“RUN!” Bedic yelled.

Handers glanced back at Bedic. He didn't understand the urgency, the panic in Bedic's voice. He'd been with the storm before. He wasn't the one in danger, they were.

But there was something different this time. More of the storm had come with the funnels. The sky was quickly filling with a strange, moving blackness. Hundreds of tiny arms stretched out of the sky, clawing toward the ground, towards the middle of the garden, towards the red glow.

“Handers. GO now!” Bedic yelled.

Despite the storm, the Botann soldiers still charge forward towards Handers. Determined despite the threat.

The Petra soldiers too had decided to attack, flooding into the garden behind the Bota.

Handers ran towards the hill, now so close he could almost touch it. He felt his feet push against the ground with the rhythm of his heart beat, sending his body, his son closer with each step. He focused on the movement, allowing it to drown out his desire to turn back, to make sure the storm did what he had hoped it would. It took all his concentration not to stop, turn around and watch it destroy them.

Another volley of arrows landed in front and to the side of him. They were still attacking! They were still trying to stop him!

Impossible! The storm, it should’ve taken care of them, it should’ve wiped them out. He couldn’t help it, he turned to see what was going on.

Valance’s protective shield was gone. He and his men were dodging out of the way of a massive black funnel spiraling towards them.

Some of the Botan soldier had gotten close. One of them was aiming a bow at him.

Then a sharp but quick pain pierced his chest followed by an unimaginable burn. He panicked, turned, and tried to run. But the ground, instead of passing under his feet, rushed up towards his face, striking him as it hit.

He fingers searched across his chest for the pain and found the tip of an arrow protruding from his skin. There was pain; there was immobility in his shoulder. But still he could move his arm. His legs? He got to his knees. Then to his feet. It hurt, but he could still move. He could still carry his son.

The thicket was in front of him, within his grasp. He took a step forward. He was too close to be stopped now!

Another stabbing pain shot through his back. Then another. He lost his balance and fell to his knees. Two more metal tips protruded from his chest.

The ground below his feet wobbled. Still, he willed himself forward far enough to grab the thin trunks at the edge of the thicket. He pulled himself close then pushed his son through the knotted branches. Fortunately, it wasn’t as tightly spaced as the barrier. He found another opening a little wider than the first and twisted himself through. A few feet in, the ground was smooth and free of the outer vines. He set his son down under the hot red glow and collapsed onto his side.

There beyond his son was a tiny red plant in the very center the thicket. Dwarfed by the size of the vines protecting it, it looked like it couldn't have been more than a few days old. It was so small, so fragile.

This is what they came to find? This seedling? He thought.

And yet the red glow bathing them, the warmth that he felt, it was clearly coming from this tiny thing, and it was anything but small.

With his last reserve of strength, he pulled his son’s lifeless body next to the seedling and lifted Emret’s limp hand up to touch one of the red leaves.

“I’m sorry.” Handers said, holding his blackened arm, still bubbling and churning, towards the young red seedling. “Please forgive me. Please…” He looked down at his lifeless son. “…heal him.”

The moment of silence was interrupted with a horrible crack. His son's body moved. The arrow in Emret’s chest broke and fell to the ground.

Emret sat up wearily. “Dad?”

Raj watched his son and smiled. “Emret!” He turned back to the seedling. “Thank you.” Then collapsed to the ground.

-

Bedic scrambled out of the way of a black tendril that shot down out of the sky. It was more than a whirling funnel of air. It had form.

Up in the sky above him, he saw the exact thing he feared. An ominous black face pushed out of the clouds, twisting and gnashing its teeth.

Valance and his men had regained their footing enough to put their dark shroud back above them. Swarms of Petra and Botan soldiers had advanced into the center of the garden and were pushing up against the shroud.

The three struggled to hold them back. The numbers gathering around them were growing quickly. There were already to many for them to control. In a moment they’d be unable to defend themselves.

“Put on the Crown, Valance!” Barnus yelled.

“No!” Valance screamed back. “If he sees it, he’ll hunt us!”

“What choice do we have! If we stay here, he’ll kill us just as well.” Barnus yelled.

Valance turned to Bedic. “Were is he? Where’s Handers?”

“We can’t wait any longer,” Barnus yelled. “We must go in and get it ourselves.”

“We can’t! The boy and his father are the only way in. Wait for them to bring it out to us!” Valance yelled.

Barnus dropped his sword out of the air, removing it’s energy from the protective shroud. He turned without a moment’s hesitation and plunged his blade deep into Valance’s side. “You coward!” He screamed. “You’ll kill us!”

Valance dropped to his knees, his silent mouth stretched with pain.

Barnus stooped down and yanked the velvet sack attached to Valance’s waist, opened it and pulled out the dark glowing Crown.

“I will not die here waiting for you or that boy’s father!” Barnus shouted.

“No Barnus, he’ll kill you. He’ll kill all of us.” Valance whimpered.

“You have to fight for what you want, Valance! What happened to you?” Barnus kicked him over then turned to Whiting. “Lets go!” He turned towards the glowing thicket in the center of the garden and sprinted.

Whiting held back with Valance for a moment. “I’m sorry,” he said, then jogged after Barnus.

The two arrived quickly in front of the small tangle of trees and vines protecting the small Red plant. Barnus turned to face his adversaries, the armies advancing on him and the storm gathering strength above.

He held the glowing purple crown out in front of him, took a deep breath, then dropped it down over his head.

An immediate surge of energy exploded out of the crown. Barnus’s body convulsed wildly, as though he was being exposed to an electric shock. His body bulged; his leather armor split. When the shaking ended, Barnus doubled over in a fetal position.

The giant black face in the sky went wild, twisting and pulling. Its features stretched and strained in a silent expression of its fury. Then, without warning, it shot down towards Barnus like the head of a snake. But half way between the sky and the ground it caught and snapped back up into the sky. Apparently not yet able to reach. The dark purple storm was still split between the mountain in the distance and the sky over the garden.

After a moment Barnus regained his strength and stood up. He was noticeably taller. His body was swollen, showing thick defined muscles. His skin had turn black and had lost its fur. His entire body looked like Hander’s arm.

Without another moment lost, he stretched out a hand towards the on coming mix of Petra and Botan soldiers. A stream of dark purple siphoned off the storm above and channeled towards him. It collected into a thick swirling cloud around his body..

The creature in the sky reeled backwards in pain as though a part of him had been stripped away.

Barnus extended his hand again and the cloud that had swirled around him shot forward toward the on coming soldiers. It caught them on contact and swept them back in a swirling torrent. Barnus smiled. Then stretched his hand up above his head. Two massive surges of storm pulled away. Lighting flashed, thunder roared. The face in the storm screamed in agony.