World's End (11 page)

"What did Marcus Firment tell her?" asked Alfonso.

"That's the truly mysterious part," declared Nance. "No one knows except for the Grand Vizier and Hill, who was also there. But neither of them will breathe a word of what was said. You see what a killjoy I have for a husband!?"

"It's a sad business," said Hill quietly. "Soon after his arrival, Firment died from exposure."

Their conversation was interrupted by a loud snort from one of the anteaters. The gigantic animal was standing nearby and it was just barely possible to see its silhouette in the moonlight. Steam rose off its back. Everyone strained their eyes and peered into the darkness. Everyone except for Hill.

Instead, Hill glanced at Alfonso and gave silent thanks that his nephew was alive and well. Hill had been eagerly hoping that Alfonso would return to Somnos and he had been disappointed when his nephew failed to appear at the city's gates on the morning of Great Wandering Day. Later, when he rescued Alfonso from the downed airplane, Hill was overcome with a rare feeling: joy.

During the last three years in Somnos, Hill had achieved more than he ever dreamed possible when he had been a locksmith in Chicago. Hill had been made foreign minister of his homeland, married a famous singer, and lived in a beautiful mansion. He remained a national hero.

Still, something was amiss.

In recent months, Hill would sometimes wake in the middle of the night and find that he had sleepwalked all the way to the ancient cemetery in the Trunk District of Somnos, at the foot of the Founding Tree. He'd be standing at the moss-covered gravestones of his grandparents and parents. Next to them was also a gravestone for his younger brother, Leif, even though there was no body buried beneath the stone. Hill had insisted on this, as a way to honor the memory of his brother.

On other nights, Hill would wake and find himself in the Delirium Quarter of the city—a spooky and rat-infested area dominated by old warehouses. The Delirium Quarter was also home to Somnos's few pickpockets and criminals. On his excursions here, Hill typically awoke in front of a small, plain doorway. Engraved on the door was the curious symbol of a plant growing out of the spine of an open-faced book.

Once, Hill found that the door was open, and he climbed a narrow set of stairs leading to a warehouse filled with thousands of bronze canisters stacked in neat, orderly piles. The canisters looked like oversize tablets of aspirin. Two elderly men were picking up the canisters, inspecting them, and then restacking them one by one.

"What is this place?" asked Hill. The old men explained that this was the Arboreal Research Vault, a place containing rare tree and plant specimens. They came from all over the world, but especially from the Dormian cities and from Straszydlo Forest. The specimens, which were all stored in the bronze canisters, included strips of bark, sap, dried leaves, and seeds.

"Are you doing some kind of inventory?" asked Hill.

"Yes sir, Foreign Minister," replied one of the men. "You see, during the recent Battle of Somnos, it looks as if the Dragoonya raided the vault. Apparently some canisters are missing, but the records are bad and we're trying to figure out what or if anything was taken."

This made no sense. Why would the Dragoonya bother with this old warehouse? And why did Hill keep coming here in his sleep? There had to be a reason—there always was—but Hill couldn't decipher it.

In the last months, Hill felt as if his mind was becoming increasingly muddled. His attention span seemed to be diminishing. Even during his waking hours, Hill became restless and fidgety. He stopped eating properly and his moods became increasingly somber. He began muttering to himself and complained frequently of feeling overly drowsy. Nance had insisted that he visit the doctor, but the doctor declared that the foreign minister suffered from no diagnosable ailments. "Perhaps I am just getting old," Hill told his wife. "Old and a little crazy."

Lately, Hill's sleeping-self was becoming even more erratic. The Marcus Firment situation was weighing very heavily on Hill. And now came the news that Leif might still be alive. Hill felt sure that these were all pieces to the same puzzle. Perhaps Josephus could help decipher what all of this meant.

Hill rubbed his eyes tiredly. These were serious times in Somnos—most Dormians acknowledged that—but only Hill and Grand Vizier knew just how precarious the fate of Dormia truly was.

A
FTER FINISHING HIS TEA,
Alfonso made his way to the cozy little guest bedroom on the third floor of the mansion. Most of the bedrooms in Hill's mansion weren't actually bedrooms at all because they contained no beds. In fact, the Dormians called these rooms "waking chambers." Dormians, of course, almost never slept in beds. They spent their sleeping hours out of the house and busy at work, doing tasks that required high levels of concentration and precision. When they returned home and spent time in their waking chambers, Dormians tended to engage in quiet, contemplative behavior—like playing music, painting pictures, writing poetry, meditating, or simply reading a good book.

Perhaps because he was only half-Dormian, Alfonso enjoyed a good night's sleep. Alfonso was relieved to see that his guest bedroom was furnished with a bed. It also had a small desk and a balcony overlooking the river. Alfonso unpacked his backpack and carefully hid both his sphere and his rosewood box underneath the bed. He was just getting ready to get under the covers when he heard a faint noise at the window. It sounded like someone whispering.

Alfonso walked over to the window, opened it fully, and listened to the sounds of the night. At first, he heard nothing but the distant snorts of the anteaters, but then he heard the strange noise again. It sounded like a cross between whispering and the wind blowing in the trees. This time the words were quite audible:
Did you see it? Did you see it? Did you see it?

Alfonso wondered if his mind was playing tricks on him. "Did I see what?" he asked out loud.

The response was immediate:
The place where the Wanderers have gathered—the deep hole in the ground.

"Y-Yes," he stammered. "I saw it." A prickle of fear ran up Alfonso's neck.

It will happen again. You've come late, perhaps too late.

"Where are you?" demanded Alfonso. "Who are you?"

Do you not know me?

Alfonso stuck his head out the window to get a better look around. He saw no one, only the orchards and fields and then beyond this, the towering silhouette of the Founding Tree. He decided to go wake his uncle. Maybe he had been hearing the same noise.

Deep inside his head, he distinctly heard the response to his thoughts:
It will do no good. There is only one who can help you. And he is far away.

"Who?" asked Alfonso nervously. "Who are you talking about?"

There was no response.

Alfonso was overcome with a creepy feeling. A question bubbled up from his subconscious: had he just been conversing with the Founding Tree? His Founding Tree. It was an absurd thought, but then again, Alfonso's life was filled with many absurdities. Other questions soon flooded his mind as well. Was it the Founding Tree that had drawn him into the catacombs beneath Paris, to the place where strange holes burrowed down into the earth? And, if so, why?

Moments later, the door to his room resounded with a crisp knock. Alfonso opened the door and found Resuza.

"You look like you've just seen a ghost," said Resuza.

"Sorry," muttered Alfonso. "I'm a little tired."

"Can I come in?" asked Resuza.

"Yeah, of course," said Alfonso.

As she entered the room, Alfonso marveled at how much Resuza had changed over the last three years. She was now sixteen years old, and a far cry from the orphan who had helped them navigate the streets of Barsh-yin-Binder.

"I hope I didn't wake you," she said. "It's just that our house has this lovely pool..."

"You want to swim now?" asked Alfonso. "It's dark."

"You're not made of sugar—you won't melt in the water," teased Resuza. "Come on, we have a first-rate diving board." She held up two long towels and smiled. She looked beautiful in the murky candlelight of the bedroom. It would have been impossible for Alfonso to say no.

"Okay," he said with an awkward shrug of his shoulders.

They walked upstairs to the fifth floor of the mansion and out onto a deck that overlooked the property. The far end of the deck connected to a swinging bridge made of thick ropes and wood planks, which rose steeply up into the canopy of a nearby palm tree.

"Come on," said Resuza, as she swished her towel impatiently.

"Where are we going?" asked Alfonso.

"Don't worry, it'll be fun!" yelled Resuza. She began skipping across the swinging bridge.

"What about the ants?" asked Alfonso. Resuza was already out of earshot, however, and Alfonso hurried to catch up. He stepped across the wooden planks of the bridge. It was incredibly dark; the only lights came from the occasional flickering of fireflies. Alfonso inhaled deeply. The night air smelled like honey. The bridge continued to climb steeply, until it reached the trunk of a large tree, and it ended at a wooden platform that was built into the tree itself. From here, a second swinging bridge led the way over to another nearby tree. It appeared as if there was an entire network of walkways connecting dozens of treetops.

Suddenly, Resuza spun around and leapt into the darkness below. Several seconds later Alfonso heard a loud flapping noise and then, several seconds after that, he heard a splash. Alfonso peered down, straining his eyes as hard as he could, but it was impossible to see anything in the blackness of the night.

"Come on!" yelled Resuza from what sounded like far below. "The pool is big—you can't miss!"

Alfonso hesitated, but then took a deep breath and leapt into the darkness. He fell for several seconds and then—quite miraculously—he felt himself traveling back up. This was short-lived. He was soon heading back down and then,
splash,
he was immersed in warm water.

"How'd you like that?" asked Resuza.

"What happened?" sputtered Alfonso as he tread water and struggled to get his bearings.

"On the way down you hit a giant leaf—Hill and I put it there deliberately to break the fall—and it bounces you upward, like a springboard, and then you come back down into the water."

Alfonso looked behind him and, now that his eyes were adjusted to the darkness, saw a giant leaf suspended over a corner of the pool.

"Awesome," said Alfonso. "I could do that all day!"

"I have a secret for you," Resuza suddenly whispered.

"Okay," said Alfonso.

"Two days ago the Grand Vizier dropped by unannounced for dinner," Resuza continued. "Afterward, she asked to talk with Hill in private. They went up to his study on the fourth floor and I kind of tagged along, you know, eavesdropped. Well, I couldn't hear everything, just bits and pieces. Apparently Firment encountered a large army of Dragoonya during his travels. 'Enormous' was the word he used. He was convinced that they were searching for something they considered extremely valuable. 'A mad, frantic search' is how he described it," explained Resuza.

"What do you think is going on?" asked Alfonso.

"I'm not sure," replied Resuza. "We'll have to keep our eyes peeled and ears open. Meanwhile, I'm so happy you're here!" She splashed him playfully. "We've got to go on some adventures while you're here. I'm desperate for some excitement."

"Come on," said Alfonso. "It can't be that bad here. I mean, you live in a mansion!"

"That's what you'd think," said Resuza. She quickly explained that life in Somnos was comfortable, but frightfully boring. Occasionally, she managed to sneak out and go hunting with some of the old Dormian hill dwellers who roamed the jungle on their anteaters, looking for ant colonies. There was one hill dweller in particular, an old woman named Misty, whom she especially liked. Misty was her only real friend. Resuza didn't regret her decision to stay with Hill in Somnos, but she felt increasingly certain that at some point she would have to leave.

"I was going to sneak out on Great Wandering Day," said Resuza, "but I wanted to see if you showed up. So you really do owe me. Now promise that you'll come with me on some adventures." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "And then I'll tell you the strangest part of what I overheard."

"I promise," replied Alfonso. "Now what else did you hear?"

Resuza took a deep breath.

"Firment said the Dragoonya were being led by a young teenager," said Resuza. "He was a boy just about your age."

"A boy my age?" asked Alfonso.

"Yeah, weird, isn't it?"

***

Later that night, when he had returned to his bedroom, Alfonso found himself sitting on the edge of his bed, holding the rosewood box in his hands. He couldn't sleep and his thoughts returned to this curious box that he had found in Alexandria. Alfonso sensed that, somehow, this box was the key to finding his father.

Once again, he studied the thousands of indentations that were imprinted on the floor of the box. Before he even fully realized what he was doing, Alfonso felt himself slipping into hypnogogia, and soon all of his senses came fully alive. He concentrated on the box and trained his mind to focus only on the indentations that were nonagons, or nine-sided. Almost instantly, the image of a door came into focus and, moments later, the door swung open.

This time, instead of pulling out of hypnogogia, Alfonso urged his mind to move through the door. Ten or perhaps fifteen seconds passed until suddenly Alfonso found himself in a small, windowless room, with marble floors and wood-paneled walls. The room had several candelabras, which cast a soft yellowish light. The only piece of furniture in the room was a narrow, wooden desk. On top of this desk was a piece of parchment. Alfonso walked over to the desk and took a closer look at the parchment. It contained a note, which read:

 

My dear Alfonso,