The Child Thief (17 page)

Nick saw another one duck away into the hollow of a log. It looked like a spider but was the size of a cat.
Geez
, Nick thought, and made a mental note to steer clear of any hollow logs or stumps.

They passed a clump of dead bushes, then rounded a bend, and a shallow valley opened below them where brown foliage sparsely littered the trees. As they trekked along the trail, the landscape gradually began to shift and the trees and bushes to fill in. But it wasn’t until after about an hour of hiking that Nick finally caught sight of any real greenery.

They forded a wide, lazy creek, crossed a field of tall brown grass dotted with a few wilted wildflowers, and shortly thereafter entered a forest of thick, sprawling trees.

“This is Myrkvior Forest,” Redbone said. “It’s the oldest woods on Avalon, the very heart of the island. Its magic is strong, but man, look at that.” Redbone pointed at the scraggly limbs and gray-and-brown leafage. “Man, even here the damn scourge is choking the life out of everything.”

Nick found no signs of magical creatures, and only heard the occasional lonely birdcall.

The troop halted while Sekeu and Abraham inspected a line of prickly bushes, poking and prodding among the brown leaves.

“Find anything?” Abraham asked.

Sekeu held out two shriveled berries.

“Now that be a pitiful sight,” Abraham said, shaking his head.

The group moved along, farther and farther into the tall trees, checking one cluster of bushes, then another, then another. A couple of hours later they halted beneath a grove of short trees. Redbone pulled a limb down for Sekeu to pluck a couple of berries. She dropped them into Abraham’s bucket.

Abraham looked into the bucket. “Well now we’re getting somewhere. Why that makes eight berries and about twenty acorns so far.”

“Enough for my breakfast,” Redbone said. “Don’t know what the rest of you jive turkeys are gonna do for grub.”

Abraham let out a long, defeated sigh. “Once you could’ve filled all our buckets up from just this one bush here. If this keeps up we’ll be eating thorns sure enough.”

“What the fuck?” Dirk said. “Last week there were plenty of berries here.”

“Shit,” Redbone said. “It’s like it’s going faster. Every time we have to search farther and farther into the forest. Man, what’re we gonna do when we run out of forest?”

“Enough talk,” Sekeu said sharply, her face tight. She walked quickly away, continuing down the trail.

The rest of the Devils exchanged somber looks and followed.

A SMALL DEER
broke cover. It was thin and mangy. It leaped across a wide, shallow creek, up a slope, and disappeared into the brambles.

Redbone snatched Danny’s spear away from him and started after the deer.

“
NO!
” Sekeu shouted.

Redbone ignored her.

“
THE LADY’S WOOD!
” she cried.

Redbone stopped. He looked up and down the creek, his face confused.

“Oh, good Lord,” Abraham said, his voice incredulous. “She’s right. That’s Cusith Creek. Why, I didn’t even recognize it. Not with all them leaves and flowers gone.”

“Impossible,” Dirk said. “The scourge in the Lady’s Wood?”

“If we don’t bring something back we’re gonna starve,” Redbone growled. “I say we go after it.”

“You go,” Abraham said. “I’m in no mind to throw my life away for a spot of venison.”

Redbone stared after the deer.

“The elves will kill you,” Sekeu stated with certainty. “The trees have eyes and ears.” She pointed to three bird-size faeries watching them from a high branch.

THEY FOLLOWED THE
dark creek downstream, stopping occasionally to examine the bushes along the banks. The sun never came out from behind the clouds, but the day had grown warm and humid.

“Hey,” Danny huffed, wiping the sweat from his brow. His face was bright red, his T-shirt soaked. “Any chance of a break?”

Sekeu kept plodding onward, her eyes relentlessly searching the bushes and underbrush.

“Y’know,” Abraham said, “break might not be such a bad idea. Be a mite awkward if we were to kill the New Blood on their first day out.”

Sekeu stopped, took a hard look at Danny, then scanned the surrounding tree line. “Rest here. I will go check oak grove. Dirk, come.”

Nick collapsed atop a large, flat stone next to the shallow creek and watched Sekeu and Dirk disappear into the woods. He let out a tired sigh and joined the rest of them in dousing his head and getting a long drink. The sweetness of the water still amazed him.

“Can’t believe the scourge has spread to the Lady’s Wood,” Redbone said. “Man, I would’ve never dreamed that possible.”

“Seems to me, it’s accelerating,” Abraham said. “I do wonder if Peter has any idea.”

“Y’know,” Dash said, “Peter should’ve been back by now.”

“Just hope he ain’t got himself in a spot he can’t get out of,” Abraham said.

“There’s no such thing as trouble that dude can’t get out of,” Redbone said.

“I just hope he brings some more Snickers,” Dash said.

“Man, there ain’t much I miss about the world,” Redbone said. “But I gotta say I sure miss the food. Remember that time Peter brought back six boxes of Ray’s pizza?”

“Do I ever,” Abraham said, and a big smile lit up his face. “Why I dream about that most every night.”

Danny’s eyes grew big. “Pizza! Wow, that’d make my decade.”

“Don’t tell me you’re getting tired of acorns and mushrooms already,” Redbone said, and nudged Danny. “Man, you gotta wait ’til you’ve been here as long as me before you start griping about the food.”

“So where
is
Peter?” Nick asked.

“Catching kids,” Redbone said with a laugh.

Nick couldn’t believe they were laughing. “That’s funny?”

Redbone’s smile faded.

“It’s not right,” Nick muttered, half-under his breath.

“What’s not right?”

Nick didn’t answer, he just shook his head.

“I said, what’s not right?”

“What do you think?” Nick said. “The bastard kidnapping kids. That’s what’s not right.”

Redbone struck Nick. He moved so quickly Nick didn’t even see it coming, hit him in the chest, knocking him into the creek.

Abraham was up and between them in a blink, holding Redbone back. “Whoa. Ease back now. Let it go. He’s New Blood, remember?”

Redbone glared at Nick then glanced around at the other New Blood. “Let’s get one thing straight. I don’t want to catch any of you badmouthing the
man
. That jive don’t fly with me.” He walked over to Nick, grabbed him by the collar, and pulled him up out of the creek. He propped Nick back up on the rock, then plopped down across from him, leaning forward and locking his crazy eyes on him.

“You need to understand a thing or two,” Redbone said. “So I’m gonna lay it on you. Back before I came here I lived upstate with my old man. Got tired of the sorry fuck beating the snot out of me every other day. So I upped and lit out for the big city. In less than a week, I was sleeping in a cardboard box, stealing, and turning tricks just to eat. You’ve any idea how bad that is? I had to do things I can’t even talk about still. I was thirteen.
Fucking thirteen!

“One night this pimp gets a hold of me. Bastard tells me if I wanna work
his
street, I gotta pay.
Pay?
With what? I didn’t have enough dough to buy food. How was I supposed to pay this hustler? So I don’t. Sure enough he catches up with me and beats the crap out of me. I mean really beats the crap out of me. Left me in a Dumpster, spitting up blood. Man, at that point I wanted to die.

“Week later I’m back at it, because that’s all I got, see. Only now, no one wants anything to do with me. Y’know why?” Redbone’s eyes bore into Nick. “Because I got this gnarly scab on my mouth and I was all scraped up from the beating. So I’m mostly stealing shit and eating out of garbage cans. He caught me on his turf again. I wasn’t getting any action. I was just there, y’know. Made no difference to this motherfucker. He drug me into an alley, stuffed garbage in my mouth so no one could hear me screaming, and pulled out his knife. Says he’s gonna fix me for good and gives me this.” Redbone traced the scar running down his face. “Would’ve killed me, but that’s when Peter showed up. Y’know, the guy you were just badmouthing? Before that asshole even knew what was happening Peter cut him
wide
open. Laid him out! That’s one son’bitch that’ll never hurt another kid,
ever
.

“Peter doctored me up the best he could and brought me back with him. So let me lay it on you straight. I love that pointy-eared dude. He did more than save my life. He gave me a life. Gave me a family. I know what I’m about, ’cause it’s all real simple here. We’re clan. We’re Devils and we look after one another.”

Abraham and Dash nodded along.

“And if you think my story’s bad,” Redbone continued, “man, you ain’t heard shit. Get Abraham to tell you what it was like to be a runaway slave sometime. Ask him about the life Peter
saved
him from. Hell, ask any of them kids back at the fort. Every one of them gots a hard-luck story that’d bring tears to your eyes. Plenty a lot worse than mine. And there’s not a single one of them that wants to go back. Because we’ve all had our share of dealing with fucked-up parents, stepparents, priests, cops, pimps, pushers, crackheads, all those fuckers out there. That world out there, I say they can keep it, man.

“Peter’s given us another chance. That cat has put his life on the line for me. For you and for every kid here, time and again. The sooner you get your mind right about that the better off you’ll be. Are we straight on that?”

No
, Nick thought.
We’re not
. But he nodded anyway.

“Good,” Redbone said. “Because I like you. And I’d hate to have to kill you.”

Nick wasn’t sure if Redbone was kidding, was pretty sure he wasn’t, pretty sure this kid
would
kill him if Peter asked him to, and judging from what he had seen back at the fort, probably any of them would. He glanced at Abraham, Dash, Leroy, even Cricket and Danny. He could see it in all their eyes. They were completely taken in by Peter’s ruse. It was as though Peter was some sort of messiah to them, come to take them to the promised land.

“This is a magical place,” Abraham said, addressing all the New Blood. “You wouldn’t know it. Not by the way things are now. But when I first come here these forests were lush, teeming with life. Every kind of fruits and nuts you could imagine. Why there were wild bananas hanging off the trees…a true paradise.”

“And it’ll be again,” Redbone stated with absolute conviction. “That’s where we come in. Where
you
come in. Together we’re gonna drive away the Flesh-eaters and then.” His eyes glimmered. “Then, we’ll be the Lords of Avalon.”

“Flesh-eaters?” Cricket asked.

Redbone hesitated, cut his eyes to Abraham.

“Tell us,” Cricket prodded.

“Yeah, well,” Redbone muttered. “Let’s just say they’re the ones causing all this trouble and leave it at that.”

“What are they?” Cricket persisted.

“Hush up, now,” Abraham said. “Here comes Sekeu. She’s in a foul enough mood already. She’ll scalp the lot of us if she hears us talking to New Blood about Flesh-eaters. Peter will tell you. Let you in on everything soon enough.”

Why can’t we talk about these Flesh-eaters?
Nick wondered.
What are they hiding?
Nick thought about asking Sekeu, then saw her face and decided now wasn’t the time.

Sekeu held out her hand: four gray acorns.

“That there’s from Oak Grove?” Abraham asked.

She nodded.

“What’re we gonna do?”

“I say we slip across the creek,” Redbone said. “Make a quick raid into the Lady’s Wood.”

Abraham looked at him as though he’d lost his mind. “You do have a death wish.”

“The elves are too vigilant,” Sekeu said.

“Well, that leaves the witch’s swamp,” Redbone said.

They all fell quiet.

“Well?” Abraham asked, looking at Sekeu.

Sekeu shook her head. “What other choice do we have?”

THEY FOLLOWED THE
creek downstream until the land began to level out. The water turned brown and led into a marsh of high, gray reeds. The reeds gave way to squat twisted trees with slick, black, oily bark, their branches dripping with thick moss. The path became soggy then muddy, grabbing at their feet. The trees pressed in around them as the path wove around weedy bogs and stagnant ponds.

Nick didn’t like it; other than an occasional bellow, the swamp was still and silent, the air musty and stifling. Even Redbone had fallen deathly quiet, all of them creeping along, weapons out, keeping a tight watch on the trees and murky pools. Nick felt as though he was in a sideshow spook house, knowing something would pop out at any second. He was worn out, his feet sore, and the dread was wearing on his nerves. He decided he’d had all the adventuring he needed for one day, and found himself actually longing to be back at the fort.

A cry came from behind and Nick spun about in time to see Danny sliding down a short embankment and into a pool of black, viscous mud.

“HELP!”
Danny cried as he clawed at the slippery bank. The mud bubbled up around him. It was up to his waist in no time and appeared to be pulling him down.

Redbone leaped over, grabbed a root in one hand, and snatched a hold of Danny’s wrist with the other. Dash and Dirk were there in a second and it took all three of them to finally pull Danny out.

“Hey Danny,” Redbone said. “Next time you decide to drown yourself, try not to make so much noise. Okay?”

Danny looked like he was about to cry. He’d lost both his boots and was covered from the neck down in stringy, oily mud. The mud gurgled loudly behind him and he scurried away from the bank.