Broken Dragon (The Chronicles of Mara Lantern, Book 3) (5 page)

“Daddy, can we go for our walk now?” Hannah asked. “It’s almost dark, and nobody will see my costume.”

“When will your aunt Mara stop writing and start acting normal?” he asked.

“In an hour.”

“She told you how long it would take her to write in the book?”

Hannah nodded. “She said,
not to worry
.”

“She knew I would be worried?”

Hannah nodded and walked to the front door.

* * *

Mara fell through a dark tunnel. She could hear Sam and Hannah talking somewhere ahead, muffled and barely discernible, coming from the pin of light through which she had plunged. It must be miles away now, but it had stopped receding into the darkness.

From behind her came another voice. It said, “Write.” And Mara felt compelled to write. Looking down, she could see the leather book in her hands, though there was no light. She opened it, and a pen appeared in her hands.

“Write,” the voice said again.

She recognized the voice. It was hers. She wondered how that could be for a moment, but a sudden urgency shoved aside that thought. Words and phrases flooded her head and poured out of the pen. She scribbled and flipped, scribbled and flipped, documenting the notions that came to her mind. All in her own voice.

* * *

Still not fully recovered from the ordeal with the darkling wraith two nights before, Ping continued to sense the anxiety of the dragon’s consciousness, which in turn caused Ping considerable trepidation about going to Thanksgiving dinner with the Lanterns. Just as he was about to call Diana and cancel, she called him and asked him to hurry down to Oregon City. Something was going on with Mara.

Twenty minutes later, he stood on the front porch holding two cake boxes, waiting for someone to answer the doorbell. He had heard a faint “I’m coming” from Diana in the kitchen, so he just rocked on his heels and looked at the deepening twilight. A child’s giggle down the street caught his attention, and he turned. Sam and Hannah walked along the road. She was carrying a plastic jack-o’-lantern with one hand and digging into the top of it with another. When Sam pointed toward Ping, who stood next to the porch light. Hannah waved and handed off the pumpkin. Flapping her arms, she jogged and hopped, until she got into the front yard.

“Look! I’m a dragon, just like you!” she said.

“And a pretty one at that,” Ping said.

“Nuh-uh, not pretty.
Fierce
some.”

“Indeed.” Ping nodded.

Sam caught up and said, “We just finished trick-or-treating.”

Ping looked skeptical. “I see.” Behind him, the door opened.

Diana stood in the doorway, wiping her brow with a towel. “Sorry about that. I was just getting out the turkey, and Mara wouldn’t or couldn’t come to the door. Anyway everyone else is out trick-or-treating.” Her eyes looked over Ping’s shoulder to her son. “Oh, you guys are back. Perfect timing. Everyone come in and get ready to eat.”

She took the cake boxes from Ping and waved him inside. As he approached the rear of the couch, Ping could see the back of Mara’s head. She sat on one end, looking down.

“Hello, Mara. How are you?” Ping asked.

Diana walked across the room on her way back to the kitchen. Over her shoulder she said, “I doubt she’ll talk to you. She hasn’t said a word since Hannah prompted her.” Nodding toward the telephone on the small stand next to the entryway, Diana added, “A few minutes ago, she just sat there and let the phone ring without answering it.”

Ping walked around the end of the couch and faced Mara. She was hunched over, writing, flipping a page, writing some more and flipping another page. During the second flip of a page, Ping caught sight of the book. She was definitely writing in the Chronicle of Continuity.

“Mara?” Ping looked from her across the room to Sam, an expression of concern on his face.

Sam walked behind the couch and looked over his sister’s shoulder. “It looks like she’s almost to the end of the book. Just a few more pages to go.”

“But she’s just writing a few words on each page and then flipping to the next one,” Ping said. “I wonder what she’s writing? Did you try asking her?”

Sam shook his head. “She’s ignoring everyone. It’s like she’s in a trance or something. I asked Hannah about it, and she says Mara will be fine, once she’s done writing in the book.”

Ping looked down at the little girl, standing next to Sam. “Do you know what Mara’s writing in the book?” he asked.

“It’s s’posed to help her,” Hannah said.

“Help her with what?” Sam asked.

“All the bad stuff that is coming.”

A distinct slapping sound made them all turn to Mara. The back cover of the book was closed. She looked at them with a confused expression and said, “What are all of you looking at?”

Ping sat down on the couch next to her. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m fine. Again, why are all of you looking at me, like a bunch of goofs?”

“Do you remember anything?”

“About what?”

“Writing in the book.” He dipped his head toward it, and Mara’s gaze followed his.

“I what?” She looked down to her lap at the back of the book. She picked it up and fumbled around with it, turning it over in her hands. Opening the cover, she read aloud the title,
Chronicle of Continuity
. She pressed a finger against the page and flipped it. The left page, the back of the title page was blank, but the right page had three lines of script, in Mara’s handwriting:

Herein find the clues,

To guide, without disrupting

Continuity.

She read the passage and looked to Ping. He pressed his lips together and shrugged. Mara flipped the page. On the next page, she found:

Seek out passengers,

Ignore a dragon’s folly.

Find the trail of mist.

Again she read it aloud. The following page, the one across from it, was blank. Mara flipped it, and the following pages were blank as well. She fanned the rest of the pages in the book and found no more writing.

“That looks like all she wrote—or all I wrote—since it looks like my handwriting,” Mara said.

Sam pointed at the book. “But you were writing for more than an hour, and you were scrawling and flipping through many more than two pages. I’m pretty sure you wrote something on every page. Don’t you remember it?”

“The last thing I remember is Hannah touching my face and feeling like I fell down a deep well or something. Then all these strange words and phrases kept coming into my head. I might have written some of it down.” She shook her head. “I’m just not sure.”

She turned back to the first page and held the book out to Ping. “What do you make of it?”

He took the book and reread the first passage. “This appears to be some kind of thesis statement for the book. That would be my guess. From the first time I heard it, I thought the use of the word ‘Continuity’ was an interesting one. The title wasn’t the Chronicle of Time or History, but Continuity. That implies not just time, but a specific configuration of time, a particular timeline. Now this verse speaks of providing clues without disrupting Continuity, so preserving this timeline must be a goal of the information provided in the book and, presumably, a desirable outcome.”

Diana called from the kitchen, “Is Mara out of her trance yet? Could one of you kids come give me a hand?”

Sam stood and said, “I’ll go.” Hannah followed him into the kitchen.

Mara watched them leave and turned back to Ping. “What kind of clues do you think it’s talking about?”

“Who knows? Hints from your future self to help guide you? It is your handwriting.” He flipped the page to look at the second passage.

“When I was in that tunnel, the thoughts that came to me were mine. It was like they were in my voice, coming from my mind, but they were being shoved at me somehow.”

Ping tapped the page. “Have you ever been interested in writing haiku?”

“What?”

“Japanese verse, typically, but not always, broken into three lines, with the first and last line comprised of five syllables and the middle one having seven. Five, seven, then five again. There are variants in the construction, but that is the most common form. Usually haiku will have a stark contrast or comparison in them—many reference nature, but not always.”

“I’ve heard of them, I guess, but I’ve not ever written one.”

“These appear to be structured as haikus,” he said, holding the book open to her, running his finger across the page. “Count the syllables. See? Five, seven, five.” He flipped back a page. “Even the thesis page is constructed as a haiku.”

“Maybe that’s just a coincidence.”

“Unlikely. You can even find contrasting concepts in each. In the first passage, you have ‘disrupting’ and ‘Continuity,’ and in the second, it talks of ‘seeking’ in the first line and ‘finding’ in the last. They don’t evoke the type of imagery you’d typically see in well-crafted haiku, but, nonetheless, they are there.”

“Great. I not only become a bad auntie who sends a five-year-old back in time to save my butt, but I become a bad poet as well. What does all this mean?”

“I’m not sure I’m the one you should be asking,” Ping said.

“Why not?”

He pointed to the book. “It says, ‘Ignore a dragon’s folly.’”

On the kitchen counter, a half-skeletonized turkey with carved meat piled high on a serving platter, sat next to bowls of mashed potatoes, yams, green beans and cornbread stuffing. Because of the limited space on the dinette table, Diana announced that dinner would be buffet style, and instructed everyone to grab a plate and load up before taking a seat. She started the process by fixing a small plate for Hannah. Sam followed, with Mara and Ping forming a line behind him.

Mara turned to Ping, as they waited their turn. “If I am so concerned with maintaining Continuity, why would I send Hannah back in time?”

“Perhaps, from your perspective in the future, Hannah’s arrival at this time is something that has already occurred. Therefore, it is something that you needed to make happen to maintain Continuity,” Ping said.

“That’s insane. I sent her back because I remember her arrival?”

“Presumably you sent her back because it produced a desirable outcome. Otherwise, you would have tried to prevent it.”

“What if I tried to prevent it and failed?”

“Unlikely. Hannah seems to be under the impression that you intentionally sent her here with certain tasks to accomplish, including bringing the Chronicle of Continuity.”

Sam stepped away from the counter and took a seat at the table next to his mother. Hannah sat on a booster chair between them. Mara handed a plate to Ping and took one for herself. She forked a slab of white meat and then spooned potatoes onto her plate.

“And saving my butt the other night and prompting me to write in the book. Seems unreasonable to think such a little girl will get everything right. Why not send an adult?”

Sam turned around and interjected, “Hannah said she prompted you to write, because you said the magic clue. It was a game you taught her in the future.”

Ping nodded. “Seems like you put some thought into preparing her to do what needed to be done. Of course you had, or will have, the benefit of hindsight.”

They took their seats at the table.

As they got settled, Diana passed them a basket of rolls and placed the butter in front of them. “You two might get more out of this experience if you spend less time analyzing how and why these things happened, and more time on what they are trying to tell you.”

“What do you mean, Mom?” Mara asked.

“For example, when I meditate, I don’t spend all my time figuring out how it makes me feel more centered. I simply accept that it does.”

“Okay. What’s your point?”

“Stop trying to figure out how and why your future self is communicating with you. Just accept that she is.”

“All right, I accept that my future self is communicating with me. Now what?”

Diana smiled. “Now listen to what’s she’s saying or, in this case, writing. Don’t worry about how or why. After all, she is you, doing what you would do, if you had her perspective.”

Ping nodded. “Your mother is correct. The best course of action is to follow the advice as best you can from the book. How and why we are getting this information are largely beyond our abilities to ascertain at this point.”

Mara shrugged. “Well, the first passage says—”

Diana pointed a fork at Mara’s and Ping’s plates. “I didn’t mean now. You two need to eat more and talk less.”

“They do talk an awful lot, Nana,” Hannah said, scooping mashed potatoes from her plate.

“I know. It’s hard to get a word in edgewise around here sometimes, isn’t it? What do you want to talk about?” Diana asked.

“I’m going to have a baby brother soon,” she said.

Sam choked on his stuffing, spraying crumbs across the table.

* * *

Mara figured her mother needed a break and that Sam probably needed his mother’s support in the living room with Hannah, so Mara volunteered to clean up after dinner, even before Diana suggested it. Ping said he would pitch in. After putting away the leftovers and stacking the dirty dishes on the counter next to the sink, Mara washed, while Ping stood next to her, rinsing and drying.

She gave him a sidelong glance, while she scrubbed. “Are you sure you don’t want to just have a seat? I can get this on my own. You look a little pale and tired to me.”

He shook his head. “I’ll be fine. I’m still getting over the other night. I guess I’m not bouncing back as fast as I used to when I was younger.”

“The dragon still tossing and turning?”

Nodding, he said, “It is still sensing danger, and I think the anxiety level is growing.”

“Is there any way for you to figure out what this danger is?”

“I’m assuming it’s related to the events on the roof over the shop. That’s when it peaked, and it doesn’t appear to be abating,” he said.

“So do you get the feeling that this Aphotis is still a threat? That it’s coming back? Is that why the dragon is so worked up?”