SPARX Incarnation: Mark of the Green Dragon (SPARX Series I Book 1) (15 page)

“What else?” he said.

She winced and felt at her side pouch. “I have a… I have a…” She searched and searched. “I have a brush, but I doubt they would use it.”

“The cloak,” said Bobbin.

“Don’t be a fool!” snapped Kabor. “A thief with a cloak like that would be unstoppable.” I cringed, fearing they heard every hushed word. Kabor didn’t stop. “Holly, just turn it insi—”

“Shush!” I said.

Holly nodded her head and then handed the brush over to Gariff. He fumbled and dropped it.

“Let’s put the loose stuff in your hat, Gariff,” Kabor offered, “since you’ll be handing it over anyway.”

“Huh?” Gariff seemed a little taken aback by the suggestion, and I am sure he debated the offer internally. But with the hags waiting and the midges swarming, there was no point delaying any longer.

“Come on Gariff, we don’t got much else,” urged Kabor. “They might like it.”

Gariff grit his teeth, took his hat by the rim and gave it one last farewell look before passing it around for the offerings. “I suppose… I guess you’re right,” he admitted.

Holly picked up her brush, wiped it on Bobbin’s shirt, and placed it in. Then she pulled a clip out of her hair and dropped that in as well. Kabor’s change jingled as he allowed each coin to slide out of his hand and into his cousin’s hat. He took off his glasses and dropped them in as well.

“No way!” said Gariff, a little on the loud side. “D’ya know what Pops paid fer those?”

Kabor squirreled them away. Gariff just shook his head.

Bobbin put in a crust of bread after all. He found it at the very bottom of his pack. The hat still looked more empty than full though.

“What about you Nud, don’t you have anything to offer?” asked Holly. “Stuff is practically spilling out of your pack.”

“I have some wood… but what value would that be to them?” I said.

No one even suggested that I include it. There was also the short bow strapped to my pack. In the dark and unstrung, it was likely to be overlooked. I did not offer the remaining deepwood arrows either, for fear it would tip them off.

Satisfied we had given our all, Gariff called out to the hags. “We have your present, a REALLY good present… yes, yes… really good indeed, but you can’t have it until you give us Jory… no, no.”

The two hags blocking the trail exchanged confused looks, and then faced back our way.

Finally, the hunched hag replied. Her statement was abrupt.

“Him’s gone,” was all she said. A sinister grin crept across her face.

Her companion jerked her head to a sideways tilt. “All gone,” she repeated, just as abruptly. She sounded the parrot and acted the bubbly clown.

The hunched hag shook her head slowly and spoke. Her face was disfigured as well. “Him’s not comin’ back… no, no. Not from where him is.”

“No, not comin’ back, him’s not,” the other repeated.

All three cackled hysterically at the notion.

Holly scanned the trailside nervously. “What do you mean he’s not coming back?”

“What did you do with him?” said Gariff.

“Us?” said the hunched hag.

“No. Not us,” her companion assured.

Holly called out: “J-O-R-Y!”

The hags found Holly’s antics amusing in the most sinister way, and a voluminous cackling echoed through the bog that evening. When the parrot hag finally regained her composure, she lifted a horn to her mouth and gave it a little toot, smiled, then tossed it aside. It was Jory’s. The two hags ahead of us looked to one another and cackled madly. The parrot hag became so excited she fell over and rolled on the ground in a bout of cruel laughter.

Gariff turned back to us. “Let’s just give them what we have and be done with it,” he said. “Maybe we can’t save Jory, but we can get out of this and send for help.”

“They’ll do the same to us,” pleaded Holly.

Despite fears for the worst, we put the last of our belongings into Gariff’s hat, but kept our pocketknives. Gariff snuck the rock pick out of his pack and stuffed it under his shirt. I kept the SPARX stone tucked away, the bow strapped to my pack, and Paplov’s deepwood.

With slow, cautious steps, Gariff made his way towards the two hags on the trail ahead. Holly, Bobbin and Kabor stayed put, and I hung back to keep an eye on the other hag amidst the grasses, quiet as she was.

With an outstretched arm, Gariff offered them the hat and its contents. The two hags did not budge, so he ended up resting the offering on the ground in front of them, along with his pack. They watched with eager eyes.

“Here you are,” said Gariff. “That’s all we got that’s worth anything… and you can keep the hat.” He backed away.

The hunched-in hag looked into the hat and kicked it aside. “More. Need more… ya, ya, you gots to give us more.” Then she spat in the hat.

“More, more” said the parrot hag, dead flower swaying with her stringy hair. She sucked back a huge glob of phlegm. She too spat in Gariff’s hat.

Gariff flushed. “But that’s all we got,” he said through his teeth.

“Them’s won’t do… no, no. Won’t do at all.” The hunched-in hag shook her head and crossed her arms until it looked like they were on backwards. She looked to her partner who began shaking her head in unison.

The hunched over hag pointed to the reeds. “The Shadow in the Water won’t let you pass… won’t let you pass, he won’t.”

“More, more,” said the parrot hag.

It was the hag in the grasses that spoke next. “The l’il girlsies,” she started, then waved her hand at Holly
and
Kabor. “We want the l’il girlsies – that’s all.”

Kabor leapt toward her and raised his right fist. “Girl! Who are you calling girl you demented… swamp thing!”

Under different circumstances, the look of disgust on Kabor’s face might have been humorous – a contorted blend of terror, disbelief and embarrassment, all rolled into one.

“I’ll take
HER
! Take
HER
!” said the hunched hag as she raised her hand to Holly.

“HER, HER,” mimicked the parrot.

“She pretty… she is, she is. Take her… ya, ya. Pretty for our garden beneath the moss.” The hag in the grasses agreed.

Gariff gasped, “That’s it! They are bog queens!”

“I’ll take the other girlsie,” the hag in the grasses continued, pointing to Kabor, “not so pretty though… a shame… ugly. Fix her up nice I will, ya ya, really nice. Take time, it will, she’ll look pretty like the rest. Pretty pretty.”

Kabor drew his knife. “I say we skin‘em all. We can do it – there’s five of us and only three of them.”

“Wait Kabor, STOP!” pleaded Holly.

Gariff drew his pick. “I’m with ya, Cuz!” he said.

“No Kabor,” pleaded Bobbin. “There
were
six of us, plus there’s something in the water, that makes at least
four
of them, maybe more.”

“Then stay out of the damn water,” said Gariff.

The hags had finally grown tired of their ruse. Perhaps it was not quite working out the way they had hoped it would. The time had come to collect. Morbid playfulness at an end, the trio succumbed to their primal urges. In the battle that ensued, we found out that there is definitely more to hags than their old crone guise might suggest.

The hag in the grasses commanded the others. “Take ‘em all… down, down. Save the li’l children… we will, we will.” She looked directly to me. Her voice wilted. “Let me save you,” she said. “Down, down deep to the safe cool waters. I must save you, my child, my promise.”

That was all I could endure. The five of us clustered, standing back to back. The Stouts held their weapons defiantly. Bobbin brandished a butter knife. Holly picked up a stick.

I made a sideways glance at the quivering ball of flesh at my side, then at his utensil.

“Seriously?”

Bobbin shrugged.

I considered assembling my bow, but it would take too long to unhook from my pack, string, and then gather the arrows together. And I did not draw my knife as the boys had. Instead, it was the words of Fyorn that played back in my mind about the light of the stone, about the Hurlorns, and about the wise Elderkin. And how the Hurlorns had chosen
me
above all others for reasons even he did not understand. Was this to be the end the woodsman spoke of, as foreseen by trees? In my mind’s eye, Fyorn’s voice rationalized everything.

The Mark does nothing for the path ahead, but at the end is another journey waiting.

Those trees must know something we don’t.

So, I let things happen the way I thought they must have been meant to happen. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the bog stone, the gift of the Hurlorns. I held it high, in full view of the crooked hag in the grasses. A spark of light flared bright for an instant, bright enough to be seen clearly by all. The light flashed and danced beneath the facets of the stone. I held the sparking stone in a manner so bold that anyone watching might have thought it to be a great weapon, and that it would flare up and strike the foul creature down. I truly believed it would do
something
. I believed in the mysterious power of a glowing hunk of ancient tree gum.

It flickered, as usual.

“Nud, what er ya doin’?” Gariff was baffled. “That won’t do anything.”

“Mine! All mine… MINE! I loses it!” cried the hag in the grasses as she dashed at me, reaching out for the stone. “My l’il one.”

Knives flashed and Gariff’s pick rose to halt her advance.

“I know what I’m doing,” I said.

“You’ve got to be kidding. Put that thing away and take out yer knife! Are you daft?” said Gariff.

“Throw it away!” said Holly.

The hag in the grasses erupted in a hoarse shriek: “Give it to me!” She shifted back and forth, her gaze ever on the crystal.

Then she looked me in the eye, her voice full of ridicule. “Listen, listen l’il pipses. Hear the children’s whispers, ya, ya.
All the saved children like to whisper
.”

I heard the whispers. My heart froze.

The parrot hag repeated the words stupidly: “All the children’s whispers.”

“What does she mean, Nud?” said Gariff.

“I don’t know,” I said. Really, I knew. We all knew, but we didn’t want to know.

The parrot hag and her hunched master crept closer, and once again the rushes betrayed the Shadow in the Water. My friends and I stood ready to fight in the middle of the trail. It was their move.

The hag in the grasses kept her distance at first, slithering to and fro and relaxing her stance. In a gentler tone, she began to speak. Her motherly tongue, forked as it might be, could have passed for reassuring. “Be a good l’il one… a good l’il one and give it to me… ya, ya. Save you I will. Save you from it. Your mother
wants
it. She asked me to tell you.”

I closed my eyes and concentrated on a wish.
Strike them down.
I felt something, a surging energy. But there were no lightning bolts or blasts of magic arcing out from the electric spark in my stone, no matter how hard I tried, or thought I tried. The wind picked up, and in blew a gust so strong and concentrated that it rolled Gariff’s hat over, emptying its contents, and then sent the monstrosity soaring over the bog waters.

The hag in the grasses watched curiously as the hat flew, tracking where it landed in the far off rushes. Then she turned her stare to me.

That’s it?
I wondered. My thoughts raced.
The stone is
powerless
.

“You can have the pretty stone when you give Jory back to us,” I told her flatly, “and if you don’t leave us alone I’ll smash it to pieces. SMASH IT!… I will, I will. Do you HEAR ME? I’ll smash your l’il one.” I posed as if to throw it against a half-buried stone.

In a dance full of anguish, the hunched-in hag squirmed and writhed. “Them’s lies to us… them’s liars! LIARS!” she said to the parrot hag.

“Bad l’il ones. Bad children! Bad! BAD!” added her mimicking companion.

“Give them’s one more chance,” commanded the hag in the grasses. “Look into the heart of it… Tell us l’il ones, tell us what you see? Heh?… speak up. SPEAK UP!” She choked on a glob of phlegm, then wretched it up and expelled it into the moss.

I held the stone at eye level and stared into it, just like she asked. I don’t know why I did it. The flashing was hypnotic, entrancing – just like that first day at the creek. Except this time, I remembered everything I saw. Tall grey towers rose against a grey cliff, and gargantuan trees grew beside them. Their topmost branches swayed in the breeze hundreds of feet above in a cool, starry sky. I drifted up into those branches. My ears filled with the familiar whisper of rustling leaves. The sound rose to a dull roar as the wind picked up, stronger and louder.

I don’t know exactly how much time went by, but when I finally came to, all was in chaos. I felt Kabor’s hand pushing at me. He had wedged himself between me and the hag in the grasses. The hag had me in her grips, but Kabor got between us, stabbing at her arms with his knife.

The rest had scattered by then. I lost track of their battles.

Kabor and I struggled against the hag in charge, with me in her clutches. The Stout whipped around and tried to pull me free. I became the rope in a deadly game of tug-of-war. A break finally came – as Kabor pulled I lurched forward and stumbled towards him, free at last.

I glanced up the trail in time to see a fallen hag push herself to her feet, then pull a long, pointed stick out of her belly. The disturbing sight caused me to miss a beat in my own battle. I just stood there and watched, half-dazed, as the two hags up ahead – including the wounded one – took chase after Gariff, Holly and Bobbin. They moved with sudden and unnatural bursts of speed, stopping momentarily between leaps to look at one another. The parrot hag sought constant approval from her master.

Our part of the skirmish was not going well. The hag in the grasses was quicker than she looked for one so old and decrepit, and she could lash out at a distance. She snagged me and Kabor with vine-like tendrils. I fell into her entangling arms. Her rancid breath smelled like the bottom of the bog.

“Down now children, down we go,” she whispered, “down to safety, down to rest.”