The Soldiers of Halla (33 page)

“Nothing has changed,” Boon called out above the whine of the rotors.

It reminded me again of what Nevva said to Saint Dane. The valley was as spectacular as I remembered. Nevva expected it to stay that way. I wondered if it would.

We had gotten maybe halfway across when we were hit with sudden turbulence. The gig must have dropped several yards, then suddenly rocketed higher. I looked to Kasha, waiting for her assurance that we were okay.

She didn't give it.

“That was not normal,” she announced.

The craft was suddenly thrown again. It was like we where hit with something that knocked us sideways. Were we under attack? I couldn't tell. The gig wasn't damaged and we definitely didn't hear anything being fired from the ground.

“Are those updrafts?” I asked, hoping that she would give me a simple, “Yes.”

She didn't. Kasha looked worried. That was something I hadn't seen in her before.

“Whatever it is, it is not natural.”

We were hit again, and again. Each time, the little gig was buffeted. First one way, then the other.

“I cannot maintain control,” Kasha announced with a voice that was way too calm for the circumstances.

“Get us down!” I shouted. “Whatever it is, we're better off not flying in it.”

We were hit again. The gig began to spin.

“Kasha?” Boon called nervously.

I looked over the side to see that the ground was coming up fast.

“There's a clearing beyond the lake,” I announced.

“I'll try to keep us in the air long enough to reach it,” Kasha replied.

The gig was rocked again. We nearly went over sideways, but Kasha was able to right us. It was amazing that she was as skillful as she was, considering she hadn't flown in a long while.

“Brace yourselves,” she called out. “I don't know how hard we'll hit.”

She held on to the control stick with both paws, fighting
gravity and the rotors and whatever force was knocking us out of the sky.

“Thirty feet!” I called out as a warning. “Move forward!

We were still over the water. It wouldn't have been good to land on wet.

We were hit again; this time we were knocked forward, as if we had gotten a huge kick from behind.

“Whatever it is, it's coming at us from all angles!” I shouted.

“Losing control,” Kasha announced calmly, as if she were actually not losing control.

“Twenty feet. We're over land.”

“Put it down!” Boon called.

Kasha dropped the bottom out. We half fell, half descended under control. I grabbed on to anything I could find to brace for the impact. We were hit one last time. The force knocked the gig onto its side. We were so low, the overhead rotor hit the ground and tore apart.

“Cover up!” I shouted.

Boon and I huddled down into the cockpit, desperate to protect ourselves from flying shrapnel. Kasha didn't flinch. She maintained control until the end. The gig hit the ground with a violent thud that felt as if it shook my teeth loose. We were down. Dazed, but down. What followed was a jumble of hands and feet and paws and fur. The crystal engines whined louder for a few seconds more, then calmed down. We weren't moving anymore. I took mental and physical inventory. Was I alive? Yes. Was anything broken? I didn't think so. What about the others?

“Kasha? Boon?”

“I'm all right,” Kasha answered.

“I can't move my arms,” Boon announced, scared. “I'm trapped.”

The gig was on its side. The rotor was gone. The side rotors were winding down. The fuselage walls were crushed in around us. We were all still in our seats, held in by seat belts.

“We gotta get out of this,” I said.

No sooner did we start to pull ourselves out of the wreck, than the scene turned chaotic. The attack came from everywhere. We were descended upon by a group of gars that screamed and yelled to intimidate and confuse us. They didn't have to bother. I was plenty confused as it was. I have no idea how many there were. Ten? A hundred? They wore hoods, much like the gars I had first encountered on my original visit to Black Water.

“Friends! We're friends!” I shouted, but I didn't think they heard me. Or understood. Or cared. They were too caught up in their attack. They moved quickly, as if not wanting to let us get our wits back. As chaotic as it seemed, I got the feeling that it was being orchestrated. I guess you'd call it organized chaos.

They first went after Boon. They violently pulled out the chunk of fuselage that had pinned him inside and dragged him out of the gig. He didn't fight back.

“We're here to help you,” he called in desperation. “Listen to me!”

They didn't. Boon was a klee. Klees were bad. That's all they cared about. Kasha was yanked from her pilot seat and pulled away the same as Boon. She didn't try to speak. She knew it was futile. As the gars hauled her out, they cheered at having bagged another klee.

Finally they came for me. I felt hands reaching in to grab
at me, and I was rudely pulled from the wreck. They dragged me out and threw me on the ground next to the destroyed gig. I think it wasn't until then that somebody realized they weren't dealing just with klees. I heard somebody shout, “It's a gar!”

The chaotic screaming suddenly stopped. A confused rumble followed, as word spread that a gar had been pulled from the wreckage. Nobody made a move for me. Instead, they formed a protective circle, staring in at me like I was some kind of freak. My cheek was on the dirt, which meant a lot of dirt was in my eyes, which meant I couldn't see all that well. I made out the fact that all the gars wore brown cloaks with hoods that covered their faces. It was a frightening sight. I wasn't sure if they were going to welcome me as a friend…or tear me apart.

“Leave the klees alone,” I coughed. “They've come as friends.”

Someone pushed through the crowd. He was a tall guy with his head completely covered by the hood. He stood over me, looking down. It seemed like whoever it was, he was in charge, because nobody pulled him back. He stuck the tip of his boot under my chin and lifted it to get a better look.

I squinted up, but saw nothing more than a shadow, because the sunbelt was high in the sky behind his head.

I squinted and croaked out, “Sorry for dropping in like this, but you're all in danger.”

I sensed the guy stiffen, as if I had said something earth shattering. Or Eelong shattering. As it turned out, I had. But it wasn't what I expected. I had rocked him all right, but it wasn't because of what I said. It was because of who I was.

He knelt down by my head and said, “Tell me something I don't know.”

I knew that voice. It wasn't a he, either. It was a she. The hood came off and I was faced with a vision. It was a girl with long, brown hair and amazing gray eyes.

“Cutting it kind of close, aren't you, Bobby?”

Yeah. I found Courtney.

I
f I were a crying kind of guy, I would have cried.

Okay, maybe I did anyway. A little. But I'm not admitting to anything for certain. Courtney held out her hand and helped me to my feet. I wrapped my arms around her and held her so close I was afraid she might break. Oddly, I thought of a line from a Marx Brothers movie I had seen on First Earth. “If I held you any closer, I'd be in back of you.” If I could have squeezed her any tighter, I would have. Seeing her was not only a complete surprise, it triggered a feeling that I never would have expected.

It gave me hope. The last time I'd seen her, she and Mark were being herded into the flume on Second Earth. I feared they had both been killed. But Mark turned up alive. And now, so had Courtney. Knowing that my two oldest and best friends in Halla were okay re-energized me. After all I had learned about my true origins, holding Courtney reminded me that I had another life. A much more familiar, comfortable, and yes, understandable one. I was Bobby Pendragon from Stony Brook, Connecticut. As much as I believed all that I learned on Solara, I couldn't imagine turning my back on
the person I had always been. Being with Courtney centered me. It brought back my base. For those few seconds I didn't think about how impossible the battle was that we were about to face.

I thought about how I wanted to win it more than ever.

“I've been waiting for you,” she whispered.

“Sorry it took so long.”

“Doesn't matter. I always knew you would come,” she said, breathless.

“I was afraid you were killed.”

“I came close. A couple of times. I still don't know what happened to Mark.”

“He's okay. He's on Third Earth.”

I felt Courtney shudder. I wasn't sure if it was a laugh or the physical release of tension she'd been holding for a long time. She pulled away from me and looked me right in the eye. Like Mark, Courtney was older. By how much, I couldn't tell. A few years maybe. She had been through a lot. I could see that just by looking into her eyes. They were hard. They had seen things. Courtney had always been intense. When she played, she wanted to win. But the look she had in her eyes just then showed more than that. The stakes were higher in this particular game.

And she was more beautiful than ever.

“They're coming, aren't they?” she asked straight out. The joyous reunion was over.

I nodded and looked at the sky. “They won't reach the mountains before dark. I'm guessing the earliest they would attack is sunrise.”

“How many?”

I took a breath before answering. She wasn't going to like what I had to say.

“It's an army.”

She shrugged and sighed. “We've been expecting this. We're ready.”

“You are?” I asked, surprised. “How?”

“Come with me,” she said, and started to walk off.

I reached out and stopped her. “Wait. Are they here?”

“Who?”

“The rest of the people from Second Earth who were pulled into the flume. The exiles.”

She looked at me for a moment, as if trying to understand exactly what I had asked. I held my breath. Her answer was going to determine the future of all that ever was or would be. Whatever she had to say would be kind of important.

“I don't know what happened to the people who went in with Mark and me,” she finally said. “We somehow scattered. That's why I lost touch with Mark. I haven't seen him since that day.”

“But the others,” I asked, getting anxious. “From Yankee Stadium. There were thousands. Tens of thousands. Do you know what happened to them?”

Courtney looked me square in the eye and said, “You should see something.”

I wanted to scream out, “Just tell me!” But I was on Courtney's turf now. However she wanted to play this was fine by me. Sort of. She turned to look at the gars that surrounded us. I'd almost forgotten that we weren't alone. There were around a dozen of the little people. None of them were much taller than five feet, but that didn't mean they weren't dangerous. Boon and Kasha were being held tight by several of the small gars. After all the excitement, and the sudden appearance of klees from the sky, it probably didn't make sense to them that Courtney and I would have
hugged each other like that. You could see the confusion on their faces.

Courtney stood up tall and announced to them in a bold voice, “They are friends.”

The gars stared back at her, dumbfounded.

Courtney walked up to the gars who were holding Kasha and Boon.

“Let them go,” she ordered.

They didn't. Courtney added with more authority, “I said let them go; they are my friends.”

The gars finally followed orders and released the two klees, though reluctantly. It was strange. Courtney acted like she was in charge. She had always been bold and confident, but now it seemed she was the leader of this band of gars. The image was completed by the fact that she stood nearly a foot taller than most of them.

“Hello, Kasha,” Courtney said awkwardly. Unlike the confidence she had shown to the gars, with Kasha she seemed tentative. “I don't know what to say about what happened to the flume. I'm sorry.”

“Do not apologize. You could not have known. You came here to help us, to help Pendragon, that is all that matters.”

Courtney added, “It's a relief to see you. I thought you were, I mean, Bobby wrote that you had been, you know….”

“Killed?” Kasha asked. “I was.”

Courtney started at her blankly. “Uh…what?”

“My body died. My spirit didn't” was Kasha's answer.

Courtney shot me a questioning look, as if to ask, “What the hell is she talking about?”

I shrugged and said, “Long story.”

“Hi, Courtney,” Boon said.

“Hey, Boon. Sorry for shooting you all out of the sky. I thought you were klees. The bad kind, I mean.”

I jumped in and asked, “You shot us out of the sky? How?”

Courtney gave me a sly look and said, “I told you we were ready.”

My hopes were raised even higher. Was it possible? Could the gars have really found a way to defend themselves?

“Is anybody hurt?” Courtney asked. “Can you walk?”

A quick look around told her that we were all good to go.

“Then let's get to Black Water.”

We left the wreckage of the gig and began the long walk to the waterfall that shielded the tunnel through the mountains that led to Black Water. The home of the gars. And I hoped, the home of the exiles from Second Earth.

Courtney and I walked first, followed closely by Kasha and Boon. I noticed that the rest of the gars hovered closely around the klees. In spite of what Courtney had said, they weren't trusted.

The trip was a familiar one. We hiked through the dense forest and up to the series of majestic waterfalls. A short walk through shallow runoff led us to the waterfall that protected the entrance to the tunnel.

The whole way I filled Courtney in on what had happened since we had been with each other on the floating docks near her parents' sailboat on Second Earth. When I was with Mark, I held back explaining about the whole Solara-spirit thing. We had been on the run, and I was afraid that laying all of that on him would only confuse issues. But now, here, when we were so close to finding the exiles, I felt
as if Courtney should know. So I told her everything. I told her about Solara and finding my family. I explained how the flumes were destroyed, but that it didn't matter anymore. At least not to the Travelers. I laid out the most important aspect of all, which was how the spirit of mankind helps guide Halla and gives the Travelers their abilities. Courtney listened without saying a word. She kept her eyes on the ground, taking it all in. I had no way of knowing if she accepted and believed it all, or if she would turn to me with her typical sarcasm and say, “Okay, yeah, funny. Now what
really
happened?”

Kasha and Boon walked behind us. Of course, Kasha knew it all already, but Boon didn't. Every so often I heard him gasp. Boon was a trusting klee. I knew he believed. The question was, did Courtney?

We all rounded the waterfall and entered the dark cave tunnel through the mountain. I continued my story as we made our way along the rocky path that I hoped would bring us to the end of our journey, and the prize we had been seeking for so long. I didn't even want to think ahead to what we would do once we got there. I just wanted the truth. I wanted to see the exiles. By the time I saw the spec of light ahead that marked the end of the tunnel and the entrance to Black Water, I had told Courtney everything. Whether she accepted it or not was another matter. We had nearly reached the end when I stopped, and stopped Courtney.

“That's it,” I said. “I know it's incredible, but it's the truth. The exiles are now the last remaining source of positive spirit that is keeping Solara alive. At least, the Solara that has been guiding existence for so long. If anything happens to the exiles, the Travelers will be done, Solara will be done,
and the split that Saint Dane has created will be complete. The dark spirit of Solara will control Halla. So you can see why we're a little bit anxious about knowing whether or not the exiles are here.”

Courtney nodded thoughtfully and said, “You probably think I'm having trouble accepting all this.”

“Well, yeah. It's not exactly the kind of thing you hear about every day.”

She chuckled. “No, it isn't. But the thing is, I already knew. At least, I knew some of it.”

I glanced to Kasha. She looked just as stunned as I felt.

“Wh—how?” I asked.

Courtney smiled and motioned for us to follow her to the end of the tunnel.

Kasha whispered, “I wish she would just tell us what she knows and eliminate the dramatics.”

“Yeah, well, that's Courtney.”

We walked to the end of the tunnel and looked out onto the valley surrounded by mountains that was home to the gar colony of Black Water. Much of what I saw was the exact same. It was a pretty valley with a waterfall on the far end that fed a narrow river that wound its way through the farmland and eventually through the town itself. The buildings were wooden, like log cabins. They were built as concentric rings that grew larger as they moved away from the hub. I had seen all this before.

What I hadn't seen was that the village had grown much larger than when I had been there before. There were many more rings. If I were to guess, I'd say that the number of buildings had tripled. And grown in size. From the high perch we were on, I could see that the streets were full of people. More people than I remembered. Lots more.
Even from our faraway vantage point, I could tell many of them weren't gars. At least, they were much taller than the average gar.

My heart leaped.

Courtney could tell. “They're here, Bobby,” she said with a smile. “All of them. More than all, actually. It's been a couple of years, you know. Some babies were born.”

I grabbed Courtney and held her again. My relief was complete. I flashed back to that horrible moment when the giant flume was created in Yankee Stadium that sucked thousands of innocent, terrified people into the void. It was known as the Bronx Massacre, and at the time I had no reason to doubt that I was watching a mass execution. But that wasn't the case. They were here. Alive. Healthy. And safe. Sort of. For a fleeting moment I felt as if we had completed our mission. We had found the exiles. Truth was, our mission was only beginning. But at that very moment, all I felt was joy. They were here. They were alive. We were looking down on the people whose spirit was keeping Halla alive. It was a staggering thought. We were still here, Halla still had hope, because of them. Or more to the point, because of the powerful spirit they possessed. The spirit to survive and to thrive. These were the people who were keeping us in the battle to defeat Saint Dane. I didn't know a single one of them, but I loved them all.

I even thought I saw a tear in Kasha's eye, and that's saying something. “They do not know how precious they are,” she said, once again reading my mind.

“No, they don't,” Courtney agreed.

“So then, how do
you
know?” I asked. “I mean, about Solara and the spirit and all?”

Courtney shrugged. “I didn't believe it at first. I didn't understand. But everything you told me confirms it. So I guess it's true. Wow.”

She started walking down the slope toward the village.

“But how did you hear about it?” I called to her.

“From Nevva Winter,” she said, and continued walking.