“Speak to us of our foes, that we might know where to aid,” Rusty intoned, trying to give the line the gravitas that the Lion wanted. He had told Rusty on the walk back that Clerigg of Jahomalay was one of the wisest of the satyr leaders, and the most likely to notice something wrong if Rusty did a bad job of pretending to be letting the Lion speak.
Either Rusty did a good job or Clerigg was too busy and frantic to be paranoid, because the antler-horned satyr barely let him finish before launching into a frenzy of words and exaggerated, sweeping gestures, clawed hands waving in various directions and fingers twisting while he described just how thoroughly everyone was screwed.
“They harry us, Lion. We get no rest. The stormers have fallen back but the elves are here, and I know not how. This is nowhere near their greenroot. I know not how they are coming all the way out here, and we did not build our defenses against elves.”
Rusty nodded. The Lion started to explain, but he saw how Clerigg was looking at him, and knew he didn’t have time to wait for his friendly feline parasite to finish. “We have brought allies to help us, but they are unfamiliar with why many things are the way they are.” He said, pointing to Ken and Alice, who were peering through the curtain at the medical shack across the way, where Beth was getting worked on. “Do us the service of answering their questions, as I— as we think upon your words.”
The hardest part was getting the confidence right. The Lion was an elder being, something that had been around so long that it could easily speak with absolute certainty when it had that. Rusty wasn’t an elder anything, but he thought his performance went pretty well.
And thankfully, Ken didn’t disappoint. No sooner had the Satyr waved a hand in something that was probably an “okay, I’ll do that,” gesture, then Rusty’s best friend in this whole world spoke up. “Okay, so let’s ask something simple here, daddy-o. What’s a greenroot?”
Ken spoke pretty good satyr. They’d had a little time to practice on the boat. “Daddy-o,” clearly threw Clerigg for a loop, but he took it in stride and talked around it.
But Rusty went back to listening to the Lion’s explanation instead. His mental passenger had fewer grand gestures. He was a bit less distracting.
“The elves are not born, as your folk are,” the Lion said. “When an elf’s body ages or is reduced to uselessness by injury or disease, they return to the greenroot, and give themselves to it. They wither to a husk in its embrace, and new elves bud from the cocoon of refuse left behind. But the elven memories are kept in the greenroot, and those that the root deems worthy of passing on are given to the elves who fall from the vines when ripe. It is immortality of a sort. Much like my own.”
“So the elves are kind of like plant people?” Rusty asked.
“It would be more accurate to say they are fungus people, but yes, that explains them well enough. Now, the thing to know is that they bring the greenroot with them through spores that fall from their persons, but it is not enough to do so. It does not take root in the soil of other worlds without a lot of help and aid from the elves, and they must tend it in an unbroken path, and maintain it until the greenroot has been in place long enough to overwhelm the other plant life and spread on its own.”
“Oh, it’s like kudzu!” Alice said, as Clerigg got to roughly that point in his own explanation. “That’s bad.”
“It is also confusing,” the Lion said to Rusty. “For it is not enough that the elves are born from the root. They must return to it to rest, and regularly. It limits their use in the battles, as they lose energy and slow when they are too long from their root. And this is far, quite far from the world tree.”
“The one who shot Beth sure wasn’t slow,” Rusty murmured, then hastily rearranged his face into what he hoped was a neutral expression when Clerigg squinted over at him.
“Well done,” Rusty nodded at Clerigg. “We believe they understand. And you are certain there is no greenroot path here?”
“We know well the signs, Lion,” Clerigg said, spreading his hands. “There is none, at least within two days of us. At least, there was not the last time we could send scouting parties out. Now we are trapped here, while their stormer allies fortify and ready for the push that will break us.”
“We could do some assensing,” Alice offered. “Uh, the Lion could too, I guess. Y’all can’t do that, so maybe they left some magical clues around that we could find?”
“The problem is one of visibility,” Clerigg said. “We would need to get you to a higher vantage point, and that would risk revealing you to the elven snipers. It is a good idea, but it needs more than that. Lion, Ban Frakis has told me of your child who can hide. Is she here? She could perhaps do that safely.”
The Lion had already started speaking as Clerigg spoke, and Rusty shook his head, then drew his hand aside, palm down, in the traditional satyr gesture that translated into “I wish it was not so, but no,” as he answered. “She is not here. For now we cannot use her, she is doing something important elsewhere and we cannot call her back,” Rusty told him. “But we have another option before we try that one. Send out a band to collect the corpse of the elf we slew, and return him here. We shall see what his memories reveal.”
“How are we to do that?” Clerigg asked. “He is dead.”
“Through stolen magic, old friend,” Rusty said, repeating the Lion’s words and trying to offer the most sincere smile he could.
Perhaps it was enough. Perhaps it passed muster. Either way, Clerigg went off to see the matter done.
Rusty sighed, and rubbed his face. “I hope they bought that,” he whispered to his friends. “This is harder than it looks.”
Beth squinted at him. “How ARE we going to get the elf’s memories?”
“So I’ve read a dead kid’s mind before,” Rusty said, trying not to be hurt at the way her jaw dropped in disgust and surprise. “It’s… not good. When they die their brain, uh, rots. This one’s… fresh? Maybe the memories will be clearer. But we should be able to see something. I mean, I should. I’m not sure how to show you what I see unless I alter yours…”
“Clerigg was hesitant,” the Lion said. “I do not know if that is because your performance was insufficient, or he is unused to seeing me in a child’s skin. It would be better if you could show him the memories… though asking him to put aside his charms defending against that would not reduce his suspicion further. The satyrs do not trust magic of the mind. There is a very good reason for that, and it is why they are no longer allied with the elves.”
“Shoot.” Rusty whispered. When the other kids looked to him, he explained what the Lion had said.
“Oh, that’s easy,” Ken said. “We can set up a regular cinema show, here. All we have to do is combine our magic a little…”
*****
The elven corpse sat in the middle of the floor, and Beth finished the circle of ashes, putting the charred stick to one side. She took a deep breath, and looked down at the face of the thing that had almost killed her, stared at it for a long while.
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Rusty wondered what she was thinking. He knew she’d tell him if he asked, but he was afraid of what she’d tell him. And Clerigg and a few more satyrs and grach were just over THERE, and he wasn’t sure if they’d get more suspicious if he started crying.
Which he thought he might, if Beth blamed him. He thought he might, and he pushed his thoughts away from that before the tears could come.
But Beth stepped back.
Ken moved in next, stepping carefully over the circle. He knelt beside the corpse, put his hands on its head. “Undo any decay to this guy’s memories,” he whispered. Then he rose, stepped back. “Now, Beth.”
“Let this circle display the effects of any spells cast within it,” Beth said, her eyes shut. “Ohhh… hang on… there. There we go. That worked.”
It had almost a ritualized feel to it, the whole thing. So when Rusty rose, and all eyes followed him, he chose his words carefully. He didn’t NEED to say them, not after so much practice with his spellwork, but he did anyway.
“Show us this elf’s memories of returning to his last resting place,” Rusty said, and willed the spell into being.
Replay situational memories from elven corpse!
Committed Chakra: 38 of 202
Cost: 1
WARNING: Magical resistance! Cost to bypass: 15!
Bypass Y/N?
“Yes,” Rusty thought.
Resistance bypassed!
Remaining available Chakra: 177
A hazy mist fizzled into existence, filling the circle. It was a view of the jungle, passing by rapidly. At one point it paused, as a distant booming grunts filled the air, and the grach across the circle perked up. One started rumbling words, but the nearest satyr shushed them, eyes glued to the illusory memories.
The elf’s field of vision shifted left, and he caught a glimpse of another elf… this one was highlighted, shining golden in the light. Some sort of magical effect? Or was it how elves saw other elves? Rusty couldn’t say.
Then, after a pause, the viewpoint shifted back and Rusty saw them accelerate, the trees flashing by faster. At one point the elves crossed a river and one of the satyrs got excited. She started to say something, then stopped as Clerigg held up a two fingers with a thrusting motion.
Finally, the elves came to a clearing, moving around the roots of a tree the size of an office building. They came to a hollow, moved in…
…and the air shimmered, and was replaced with a familiar rainbow light.
“They have a portal,” Clerigg whispered, as the elf shut his eyes. “There ISN’T any Greenroot HERE. They are going to another world! But… how?”
“They should not have been able to breach, here! Not without one of the ancient ruins… unless…” the Lion mused, pacing around the chamber, visible only to Rusty’s eyes. “Unless they didn’t open it from HERE.”
“Shh!” Rusty thought at him, as the elf opened its eyes again.
“Oh!” Alice gasped, as the thing’s eyes adjusted to an entirely different sort of sunlight.
A familiar sort of sunlight, shining off of very familiar snow, drifting around very familiar trees.
“Those bastards are sneaking around in OUR world!” Ken gasped.
“But where?” Beth asked.
“Shhh!” Alice said. “Look for clues, sights and sounds!”
They watched, as the elf and his buddy moved through the trees. Watched as it paused at a snow-covered road, hid in the brush as a snowplow moved through.
Watched as they followed after the plow…
…and past a green sign.
“Crystal Falls! That says Crystal Falls!” Ken whooped.
“Shush!” The other kids said in unison.
The elves broke from the road, after about a dozen driveways or other turn-offs. It looked like they were pretty far out into the woods. They’d passed a dozen old fields, farmer’s fields that were fallow and empty. Rusty knew the sight well. The last few houses they’d passed hadn’t had Christmas lights, or lights at all, and the snow covered their windows like armor. Abandoned? Very likely.
He watched as the elves broke through the woods to a fancy looking cabin, with a deck over a lake. It was lit up even in the daytime, the electric lights casting reflections over the snow and frozen ice on the water below. The elves slipped around to the side, opened a door and walked in.
The first room looked normal. A small library, with stacks of books, and comfy looking chairs. A lit fireplace crackled with a wood-stoked fire. Nothing out of the ordinary. Nothing strange.
That changed the second the elves moved into the kitchen beyond, then walked downstairs.
Once, it had been a cellar.
Now it was like a greenhouse gone berserk.
Lichen covered the floor, layering it in thick tiles. Vines and flowers ran down the walls and across the ceiling, only a few patches of bare earthen walls remaining. And those patches had fleshy-looking white lumps growing out of them. They ranged from cherry-sized to fist sized, and they MOVED, waving thick, green hairs like caterpillars questing for food.
And most disturbingly of all, the vines circled and wrapped around people.
Elves. About half a dozen, hung from the walls in vine-wrapped cocoons.
No sooner had the onlookers seen this, than the memory ended, and the mist dissipated from the circle, leaving the elven corpse behind.
Immediately the grach across the way who had first hooted, spoke. “The call we made yesterday, we heard again today. This one was near the fight at the broken leaf crossing when they heard that.”
“And that was the creek to the northwest,” the satyr woman said. “I could find that crossing, I know it!”
“That was our world,” Alice said. “They have taken over a house in our world to hide in!”
“Time runs faster there,” Beth said. “They’re sleeping and recharging and coming back without much time lost HERE.”
“You know that great beast they feared?” Clerigg asked, with interest. “They hid from it. It is rare that elves hide from beasts, can we use that?”
“Beast?” Ken asked. “What beast?”
“The thing with the flashing eyes, and the great growling. It was hunting through the snow, searching for food. Or marking its territory, the snow was melting behind it.” Clerigg wrinkled his nose. “That must have been quite a lot of urine.”
“He’s talking about the snowplow,” Rusty spoke as he realized. “Uh, Clerigg, that was a… can you explain it please, Ken?”
“Gotcha, daddy-o,” Ken said, and took over trying to explain machinery, and public works, and other fun subjects.
“But where is Crystal Falls?” Beth asked. “Can you cast it again? We can look for clues, maybe. I wish the elf had looked at the snowplow’s license plates. They might have said.”
“They might have,” Rusty said slowly, closing his eyes. “But I’m more interested in the books on that library table. It was pretty well lit in there, and… Ha!” he said, as his magically-assisted perfect memory zeroed in on the side of a well-used phone book. “I have it!”
“...so that’s salt it’s dropping behind it, not pee,” Ken finished.
“You spend salt so freely?” Clerigg’s eyes were huge. “Truly, your world is blessed with it! It is usually quite rare, in the realms we walk.”
“Well it’s not rare in Michigan, at least,” Rusty grinned.”Iron County, Michigan, to be precise.”
The kids paused.
“I’ve never heard of it, I’m sorry,” Alice said.
“It must have been the wizards that made this portal,” Rusty said, speaking for the Lion. “They had already carved their way into your world. They found a place to anchor it for the elves, and carved the exit. We know not whence elven realm they are pulling reinforcements from, but they have set up a small greenroot there. This is…troublesome.”
“Not enough that we got wizards snatching kids, we got elves invading,” Ken muttered. “Oh, this is bad.”
“It IS bad,” Clerigg said. “If they can do this once, they can do it again! Our lines will become meaningless. We will be swarmed from all directions!”
“Not so, old friend,” Rusty spoke for the Lion. “If this were easy to do, they would have done it already. This is either a test, or something hinders them from invading in this manner. We need more information.”
Clerigg nodded. “I agree. But above that, we must shut it down, and fast. I see now, the Stormers are waiting for the elves to weaken us before they move in. if we close this worldgate off, then we can yet save this position.”
“We can,” Rusty said, realization burning in his mind, as he dared to speak for himself. “But we can do more than that.”
He looked at his sister. Watched her rubbing her leg, where a fresh scar traced across her chubby calf. Watched her look up at him, and remembered how she had looked on the deck, screaming.
And Rusty knew what he had to do. He forced his eyes away from Beth, and spoke.
“We can send someone back to get help!”
