SPARX Incarnation: Mark of the Green Dragon (SPARX Series I Book 1) (3 page)

When the two Stouts were busiest, I stole away to peek at my find, and every so often I put my hand in my pocket to check that the stone was still there.

After much searching, nothing grand turned up. Near the end of our stay though, Kabor did happen to stumble on a slim, orange post in the ground. An orange ribbon with writing on it was nailed to the top. He took his spectacles out of his pocket and put them on. Kabor’s eyes suddenly looked three times bigger.

“HME-226,” he read aloud.

Over the years, more and more of the posts seemed to be popping up throughout the Mire and surrounding territories. It meant that the location had been claimed already, probably for mineral rights. Kabor pulled the stake out of the ground.

“Stop,” I said, flushed with anger. He had no idea the administrative processes people had to go through just to stake a claim, plus all the careful mapping and measurements required. The sharpness in my voice drew Gariff’s attention.

“We could all get in trouble for what you just did,” I went on.

“Oh ya?” said Kabor. His eyes narrowed. “Watch this.”

Without hesitation, he tossed the wooden post high up into the air, towards the creek.

I closed my eyes in an attempt to contain my irritation. It was all I could take. A distorted buzzing sensation welled up in the back of my mind, like nothing I had ever experienced before. It spread, growing to an all-consuming volume. It pushed at my skull from the inside. Then suddenly, the pressure inside released. I heard a snap.

I opened my eyes just in time to see the stake whiz past Kabor’s head and whack the bushes right behind him.

“What the heck?” I said.

“That was weird,” said Gariff.

“Huh?” said Kabor, oblivious. He shot me a sideways glance as he squirreled his glasses away. Gariff spoke up.

“The stake went into some branches overhanging the water there,” he said, looking to Kabor, “and then she flung right back at you… What are the odds?”

Kabor looked behind him, picked up the stake, and shrugged. “What are the odds of it happening twice?” he said. He then whipped it back in a low arc. This time, it landed with a splash and was whisked away by the current.

“How does that even happen?” I said, looking to Gariff.

The burly Stout shifted his weight back and forth with unease in his stance, eyes scanning the treetops. He had no explanation to offer. His cousin broke the silence.

“It’s a bit gusty up there, that’s all,” said Kabor. “The wind bowed a branch and it snapped back to hit the stake just right.”

“It didn’t look that way to me… but what else could it be?” said Gariff, scratching his head, eyes still searching. “I can’t think of any other way.”

I peered into the suspect branches overhanging the creek. The entire incident felt a little unnatural, amplified by the simple fact that bog bodies were nearby. The uneasy feeling was not easy to shake.

“Time to go,” I said at last, “or we’ll be crossing the mire in the dark.”

Kabor completely dismissed me and made his way to the next pond.

*

Gariff’s annoying cousin had left the two of us standing beside the hole where the post used to be. Like me, Gariff was all for a quick departure, but for different reasons. He had grumbled on and off that, with all the time wasted, we could have made it to the Akedan ruins and back for some “real” treasure hunting. He made one final pitch for it.

“We can still get there,” he said. “Kabor says there’s secret stairs in d’em ruins somewhere, with a heavy stone door at the bottom openin’ to an arm’ry. The finest blades ever ‘smithed came out of Fortune Bay, they say.” Gariff puffed out his chest. “Some day, they’ll say the same about d’Hills.”

I rolled my eyes.

“What are we going to do with a bunch of rusty old blades?” I said.

He shrugged in a way to suggest he was about to name a long list of fantastic things, and then he listed a bunch of boring things. Besides, trouble followed Kabor like his very own shadow, causing me to wonder what was in store for us if we actually did find those stairs. It suffices to say I wanted no part of his schemes.

“There’s got to be something good there,” Gariff went on. “Cuz seen it on a really old map, Nud.”

“He can’t see his hand in front of his face,” I retorted.

“Well… ya… but he can sort’a see his hand
beside
his face.”

I had to give to him that much. His cousin could read, after all.

“That map was in a box of notes n’letters n’such,” he continued. “Property of the oldest, grizzliest Hill Stout you ever saw. The ole man was ready to pass on and he gave it up for nothing but three dirty jokes. And they had to be good ones.”

If he had asked for clean jokes, Kabor would have been in trouble.

No doubt, the old Stout was dead by the time we heard the story, making it impossible to confirm or deny.

“Well, where’s the map? Cough it up, let’s take a look.” I said.

I had seen a good many maps and drawings of what Akeda used to look like. There were even maps portraying the old Abindohn settlement that preceded it. Akeda was once a first-rate staging ground for the defense of the bay, settled by Men on the north shore. The Men who had once lived there abandoned it long before my time – Paplov’s too – and moved further north along Dim River to establish Harrow on the shores of Dim Lake. According to legend, they destroyed their own city before leaving it behind and gave up seafaring altogether, although I have also heard that they continue to build magnificent watercrafts that grace the lake they now call home. As far as I could tell, no one really knew why they abandoned their city so readily and without a fight. Gariff did not have the map.

“Haven’t actually… uh… seen’er yet Nud,” he said. “I was sorta hope’n Kabor’d bring it along.”

I just shook my head… typical Gariff.

Kabor returned, appearing out of nowhere.

“I thought you took off,” I said.

“Changed my mind,” said Kabor.

Gariff looked to his cousin, expectation in his eyes. “Do ya have the map, Cuz?”

Kabor shook his head. “Nope,” he said. “I keep it hidden back at the Flipside.”

That sealed the decision to head for home. I didn’t tell Kabor about the flickering stone that day, and by the time he found out, it didn’t really matter much. I was right about one thing though. He would want it for himself.

Chapter IV

The Mire Trail

A
fter my fourth “crossing” of the day, the three of us clambered up the creek slope and met the Mire Trail, heading home. Until mere weeks ago, light watercraft and mucky portages were the only way in or out of town. We had no worries though.

Two tall and full weeping willows marked the entrance to the trail. Their serpentine roots spread along the ground and curled in and out of the watery mud. The smell of algae and wood rot saturated the air.

The woods all but disappeared beyond the trailhead and into the bog. Poplar edging gave way to heavy border stones that had been set to define and contain the neck of the trail. That marked the beginnings of a section of corduroy road. Here and there along the water’s edge, densely packed alders grew in clusters together with other mixed species of small trees and shrubs. The alders’ slender and silvery trunks twisted up and around like corkscrews, as though avoiding unseen obstacles suspended in mid-air. Dainty triplets of thin yellow catkins dangled from the tips of lithe branches.

We plodded on, trudging past a lonely brotherhood of dull and rolling hillocks into a view plane that opened up to the outer reaches of the surrounding expanse. It was the largest single section of actual bog in the so-called “bog lands” – the unofficial but common name for the network of bogs, ponds, and all manner of wetlands encompassing Webfoot.

The terrain unfolded and flattened into a shallow waterscape, spotted with grassy tufts and old standing deadwood that crackled and knocked whenever the wind blew. Pools of still water mirrored the evening sunlight, splotching with orange a never-ending blanket of pale green moss that stretched out from the trailside to the horizon. Soon, a half-submerged sun would set the blanket ablaze with orange fire in the west.

“It’s awfully late fer startin’ the bog-pass, isn’t it?” asked Gariff.

His voice wavered ever so slightly, betraying a hint of concern, and the words he chose were just another way of complaining that we had spent too long rummaging around the sinkhole. The Stout was far from the cradle of his beloved Bearded Hills and uncomfortably close to the fireside ghost stories of his youth. And although the bog was safe, as far as any of us knew, it just wasn’t smart to be out and away from town late at night. Paplov would have never allowed it, had he known.

“We’ll have daylight to spare on the other side,” I replied, “unless you care to break for a swim?”

Gariff shook his head. “I don’t think so,” he said, “I don’t have yer webbing, or love of leeches on my arse.”

“No, you certainly don’t have webbing,” I said, stalling for time while spinning a respectable retort, “and as for the leeches… I’ll have to take your word for it.” I turned to size him up, probing for a sporting target to seize upon. Only one thing came to mind, and it fit his compacted expression so perfectly he could have worn it for a mask. After squatting in the bushes off the creek for the better part of half an hour, he had returned with only a grunt and a sour expression to show for his efforts.

“You’re too backed up to stay afloat anyway – you’d sink right to the bottom. You need to let some loose,” I said.

Kabor took one look at Gariff and broke out laughing. The sturdy Stout’s scrunched face made the accusation hard to deny.

While Kabor chuckled on, I whirled around Gariff gracefully, leading a phantom partner by hand and waist: “Care to dance at the bottom of the bog… with the
Bog Queens
?”

“There’s no such thing as bog queens,” said Gariff. He turned to his cousin: “Right?”

Bog queens really were not something to joke about. I would have stopped there, we all should have stopped there, but Kabor picked up where I left off. His knack for digging up little bits of information and putting them together came in handy from time to time, and it just so happened that he knew the rest of the legend – even better than I did. What better time to enlighten his cousin than in the wake of a bog body discovery?

“Actually,” Kabor began, in the voice of a noted poet, “on this very road and on an evening just like this, the Men of Fortune Bay and their families fled their homeland, on a heading north, to Dim Lake. A brutal Jhinyari warlord pursued them fiercely, and his minions even managed to cut off their retreat on the other side of the bog. The Men and their families were trapped. With their silvery blades, the Jhinyari slew Men where they stood defending their families. They cast the women into the bog and conspired to steal the children for slaves.”

Kabor made sideways glances to his left and right as we strode, and then behind, as if to make sure no one else was within earshot. He cleared his throat and continued, in a whispered tone.

“Once the mothers understood what was happening, and saw that their plight was hopeless, each leapt into the bog willingly with their children in their arms, and swam under the moss to a watery death. They believed it an act of kindness.”

“Is that true?” asked Gariff. He looked to me for confirmation. I shrugged.

“Oh, it’s true all right,” responded Kabor, “if
The Diviner
says so, then it’s true. And he said so.”

“So then what?”

“Well… then a great
Leviathan
was raised from the bog,” Kabor spread his arms in a wide circular motion to emphasize the sheer size of the beast. “It appeared as a giant white whale. And the thing spoke to the last Men standing, weaving words of great knowledge and unsurpassed wisdom…”

The promise of the great beast’s epic words hung in the air, but Kabor held his tongue. He glanced over to Gariff and took a deep breath. We plodded on, listening intently to nothing but our soft footsteps and the evening twitter of birdsong among the grasses. The storyteller’s lips remained silent.

Gariff’s brotherly impatience with his cousin erupted. He swung his arms to his side vehemently. “Well, what did it say?” he said, as riled up as ever I’ve seen him, “W-H-A-T did the white whale tell them?”

In stride, Kabor shook one finger at Gariff. “Now the Men swore an oath never to repeat the words spoken by the Leviathan that day. But I can tell you this much…”

Kabor halted sharply, dramatically, and with a strong grip took Gariff by the shoulder.

“As the Men fought on in desperation, the Leviathan made a deal with them, a deal that no one will speak of, even today, a deal that only desperate men would ever make. The beast, now satisfied, returned to the murky depths under the mosses. For a moment, the fighting stopped and there was nothing but an eerie silence, broken only by giant bubbles that rose to the water’s surface and burst into the air.”

Kabor added a pinch of rasp to his voice and raised his arms high over his head as he spoke the next words.

“Then, as the orange sun dipped below a luminous green horizon, out of the bog arose the dead mothers, in vengeful fury, and many other dead things dredged up from the bottom of the bog along with them. Together they entangled the Jhinyari, each with a grip like wet swamp grass, and dragged them down, one by one into the murky depths, until those few that remained finally fled in terror.”

Kabor paused for effect before continuing with the tag line. He must have known that he had Gariff right where he wanted him, for he relished in the moment. Gariff said nothing as he glanced at the water-soaked mosses and tall tufts of grass that lined the trail, and then down to the muddy ground at his feet, kicking away small bits of dried mud with oversized boots.

The ending that Kabor devised had a dreadful spin to it. “It is said that the undying mothers still haunt these wetlands, and if they happen to discover children not in the company of adults on the Mire Trail at night, they grab them and pull them down under the moss for mercy’s sake, lest the Jhinyari get hold of them.”

As if on queue, a few fair-sized bubbles broke the surface of the bog waters right in front of us. Although commonplace to those accustomed to the bog, the unnatural timing of the event sent Gariff marching ahead at a quickened pace.

Kabor and I exchanged a few animated glances and smirks. We got him good… we got him good.

*

Well past supper we were still hiking. My legs were spent and I thought they might collapse under the weight of me if I had to walk much farther. When my stomach growled, it sounded like the noise came from a deep chasm. Gariff, encumbered by all our gear for the failed trip to the ruins, dragged his heals as much or more than I did. He just grunted whenever Kabor tried to make small talk.

The Bearded Hill’s most notorious delinquent was getting bored with us, so he reverted to a time-honored tactic that was more fun for him – unadulterated mockery. Gariff and I were too tired to counter.

Kabor made fun of our clothes, our hair, the way we walked and the way we talked. He told us exactly why we didn’t have girlfriends, in less than kind words, and wondered openly why we smelled so bad.

For once though, his distinct blend of humor – that being pure, unconstrained ridicule – was not totally unwelcomed. Kabor’s insults actually made us laugh as he shifted focus from one to the other, sometimes even killing two birds with one stone, so to speak, with a double slam.

Gariff seemed especially happy to be distracted from the “Mothers of the Bog” story, although I daresay he was hardest hit by the flurry of insults. In the end, Kabor lifted our spirits over the last leg of the journey just enough to bring us into town with a chuckle.

I was the first to spot the long wall that palisaded Webfoot. A passing memory brought me back to words that Paplov said so many times before, pointing with his walking stick and drawing my attention away from eyeballing the trailside for frogs and turtles, or interesting bugs. I repeated those words, in his voice.

“Behold the great wonder of the Mire,” I exclaimed, “the Wet Wall of Webfoot.”

“A great wonder it’s still standing,” retorted Gariff, “You Pips should’ve used stone to build your wall.”

“Oh I don’t know Gariff,” Kabor grinned, “there’s something charming about a twig fortress.”

“Those
posts
are solid,” I contested.

“What are they made of?” said Gariff.

“Oak,” I replied.

“I think they’re cedar,” said Kabor.

“Whatever,” I said. “Probably the sturdiest you’ll ever see… in a place like this.”

Gariff scoffed. “Parts of it are nearly leaning into the water,” he countered.

The posts were, for the most part, set vertically and bound together with rope made from a common swamp grass, but spaced so as to keep the larger, dangerous sorts of wildlife out while allowing small fish and game to pass freely. As a further deterrent to anyone or anything that might try to climb over, a dense array of thin, sharp spikes jutted out at its base. One slip while attempting to scale its slime-covered surface could mean instant impalement and death. Gariff was right though. Some sections had seen better days. I decided to keep quiet about that comment.

As we passed under the arched gateway into town, Gariff’s eyes scanned every post from bottom to top and followed every beam overhead. Every contact received a scrutinizing look.

“I don’t care what you say, Nud,” he remarked. “The whole thing is crude, makeshift and easily undone. Why even put effort into such a…
temporary
structure? Fire would undo her in the blink of an eye. It’s easy to see that wind and the slow heave of winter ground have already taken their toll. You can’t depend on a damn thing to stay still around here.”

And then he summed it all up with an uncalled for comment. “Who even wants to be in a bog to begin with?”

Contrary to what outsiders might say, bog lands are not dull and dreary places. They are full of life, color and variety. It’s all about the delicate balance in the bog, not stability and strength like life on a rock. I said the only thing I could think of.

“You Stouts can’t use wood to build because there are no trees left in the Bearded Hills. You ripped them all out of the earth until you hit bare rock, and now you’re ripping out the rock.”

Kabor chuckled at that, despite himself.

“Your bricks and carved rocks would just sink to the bottom of the bog and decorate the halls of the bog queens,” I continued.

Kabor liked that even more. He knew it would put his cousin on edge.

Gariff, however, dismissed my comments as unworthy of serious consideration. He stubbornly held his ground and stuck to his point. As we continued into town, he found more and more ways to criticize Pip architecture and construction than I ever could have imagined. Everywhere he looked, something laughable or on the verge of collapse was just waiting for him to point out. His eye for structural detail was like no other – a product of his bloodline, no doubt. For centuries, his kin proudly carved caverns out of rocky hills and built towns out of heavy, squared-off stone blocks. Hill Stouts were not to be argued with when it came to structures that would stand the test of time.

“You’re totally inflexible,” was all I could say in the end. “You’re just not cut out for bog life. What would it take to change your mind or make you see past your own nose?”

“Some common sense, for starters,” he said. Gariff’s tone indicated that the conversation was over. Exhausted, I decided to just let it go.

Once in town we decided to sneak a few bites at the Flipside before calling it a day. We couldn’t pay for the food, of course, but our little round friend, Bobbin Numbit, was sure to slip us something delectable.