Disclaimer: Not mine, not making any money. I'm just playing.
Shadow Puppets
Chapter 22
The team watched the house from across the lake, sharing the three sets of field glasses between them. It nestled in the cradle of a smooth platform that rose up from the ground and opened like a lotus flower to cup the paler green, rounded structure atop it. The door and window were unmistakable. Whatever else it was, it was definitely a house.
"Does that thing remind anybody of the tower?" Lester asked. Tank and Morelli both nodded.
"I think that maybe we've found what we're looking for," Tank murmured without taking his eyes off the house. "I guess your woman was right, Santos. Follow the trail of frightened villages north."
Lester raised his eyebrows. "My woman?"
"You know who I mean. Back in the first village."
"Yeah, I know who you mean, just where the hell did all the 'your woman' crap come from?"
"Jesus, Santos, oversensitive much?"
"Just give me a break, okay?"
"Fine. The redhead you fu–" Tank flicked a glance at Lula and Edna, "approached for information in the first village."
"Screw you, Tank." Lester got up and stalked away.
Lula cast a speaking glance at Tank and got up to follow him.
She found him laying flat on the bank watching the house from a spot further around the lake. She sat down beside him and looked out across the lake as well.
"You okay?"
He didn't turn, watching the house instead. "Fine."
"You can stop, you know."
"I don't know what you mean."
"Don't you? You think you're the only one with pride? Maybe you think the rest of us had sellin' ourselves in our five year plan."
"Lula, I'm not a whore."
"Course you ain't. You just use your… talents to get you what you need. So did I honey, but I don't no more. You don't have to neither."
"Thanks, but you're talking to the wrong person."
"Okay, you the boss. Just remember it's your choice. They can't make you do it." She got up and started walking, calling over her shoulder, "And maybe if this one felt different you ought to face up to it."
Lester came back ten minutes later.
"You ready to go?" Tank asked.
He nodded.
Tank stood and checked his gun. "Then we're set. Let's go see if this bitch is in her treehouse today."
* * *
They made their way around the lake in silence and slunk to the bottom of the house and its giant cradle. The base was similar to the tower that had defeated them a week ago. Ridged and uneven, pale in color. Not like anything they had ever seen built.
"I could climb it," whispered Lester as he circled it, "but that overhang's a problem. If we use anything sharp it might shake like the tower did and give us away."
Tank stared at the platform for a couple of minutes before making a decision. "We withdraw. Let's watch it for a day and see if anything changes."
They re-traced their steps to their observation point on the other side of the lake and settled in to wait.
* * *
Morelli had the dusk watch. He sat motionless by the bank as the evening darkened and tiny bats skittered overhead catching insects.
When the light was almost gone he hissed for them to come over. They watched together in silence as the platform closed slowly around the house like a flower, leaving it utterly sealed from the outside world.
"God-damned motherfucking son of a bitch," Tank said as they looked on. "I don't fucking believe it. The whole thing is a giant goddamn plant."
Lester shrugged his shoulders. "I guess that rules out a night attack then."
"Ya think?" Morelli muttered.
They watched in silence for another minute. Nothing changed on the other side of the water.
"Maintain the watch," Tank decided. "We'll see if it opens again at dawn."
* * *
Lula opened her eyes knowing that something had changed. She shivered as the pre-dawn chill found its way into her nest of blankets, cold without Tank there to warm them with her, and lay in the dark listening.
She could hear movement outside, the occasional rustle. No voices. She reached out for her gun where it was tucked underneath her blankets and crawled to the entrance of the tent.
She relaxed when she looked outside the tent. Tank, Lester and Morelli were moving around purposefully, not saying anything. Tank looked up and saw her, and put a finger to his lips before pointing to the lake.
Lula wondered what the deal with the quiet was. It was obvious what he wanted, but it looked like the explanation would have to wait. She nodded and kept quiet.
A loud splash on the far side of the lake explained it neatly for her when she looked for the source and saw nothing. Sound carried over the water. In the pre-dawn stillness, any sound at all would be heard far away.
They crouched down and watched the structure as dawn broke over the water. The slate grey of the sky slowly lightened and became suffused with pink. Hidden birds found their voices and caroled their greetings to each other.
Lula met Tank's eyes and smiled. She was actually starting to get used to them. Maybe she'd let them live. For now anyway.
The other tent opened and Edna's head appeared in a straggle of gray curls. Lula caught her eye and put her finger to her lips, just as Tank had done.
Edna nodded and crawled out of the tent to join her. They turned to join the men watching the closed flower hiding the house on the other side of the water.
As the weak sun washed over the tightly furled green case it gradually opened, as if to accept the rays. A soft rustling sound crossed the water as a rounded roof appeared at the top, followed by a window and a doorway, until once again a little domed house sat on a green platform by the water.
"Looks like that's that," Morelli whispered.
Tank nodded without taking his eyes off it as he chewed his lower lip. His rock-like façade was fading day by day. Although calmer than most of the men Lula had known in her life, by Tank standards he was edgy, positively nervous. She had a feeling that the pressure of command was starting to tell on him. He needed to go home. She fought the urge to walk over and pull him into a hug, crush him against her breasts for comfort. He wouldn't appreciate it, not in front of the others.
"Let's go see if this bitch is in her treehouse," he said finally.
Once again they made their way around the side of the lake, clothes soaking as they brushed past bushes laden with dew that sparkled in the morning sun. A handful of ducks on the lake stopped grubbing under the water and bobbed on the surface to watch them as they went past.
When they arrived at the platform it was still open, the little house on top sitting in the center like the middle of a flower.
They prowled underneath it looking again for a way to get up unnoticed. It was exactly the same as the day before. The stem rose up in the air for around twenty feet before opening; well out of reach.
Suddenly the plant shivered and moved. They retreated, guns in hand, and watched as the platform dipped gracefully down towards the ground, keeping the house on the top level.
Tank waved Morelli back to guard the rear and signaled Lester forward to follow him. As soon as the platform was low enough he leapt onto it and raced into the house, Lester hard on his heels.
Lula turned to look at Edna, shrugged and followed them.
They found Tank inside the one-roomed dwelling with a hand around the neck of a tall, steel-haired woman in a long gray dress, pressing her against the wall. His other hand held the barrel of his gun up underneath her chin.
The woman glared at him with chilly blue eyes. "Do you dare?"
"Don't tempt me," he growled. "We have business to discuss."
"And you thought that the only way to do that was to attack me and bring another witch onto my territory?"
"You Ash?"
"I am."
"Then damn straight it was."
She wasn't cowed. "How sure you are, Mister Giant. Have we even met?"
"Oh I been waiting to meet you." Tank's voice was low and laden with menace. "I seen what you done to people. The kid locked up in a tower for kicks? Well I got news for you. You're gonna fix it all, starting right now with my friends that you turned into puppets."
She smiled, ignoring the steel pressed up under her chin. "So you're here about them? Aren't they wonderful? A departure from my usual style, but so interesting."
She looked around and caught sight of Edna standing behind Lester. Her smile disappeared suddenly, and she could have been made of bone, pale and hard, threatening. "Put your toy away, giant. You and your pet witch don't frighten me. You're in my territory."
The light changed as she spoke, darkening, becoming green in color, and thick and heavy, as if the room were suddenly under the sea. Morelli's voice shouted something from outside but the words were muffled, indistinct. Lula looked away from Ash to see what was going on and found Lester and Edna doing the same. Tank just ignored it and held on tightly to Ash.
The doorway and windows that had been open to the morning sun a few moments ago were darkened as something closed around them, the patches of sunlight growing smaller and smaller until they disappeared. The doorway and windows were still there but covered from the outside with something thick and translucent that turned the incoming light a deep, pulsing emerald traced with veins of shadow.
Tank pushed the muzzle of his gun up hard against Ash's chin. "Open it," he snarled. "Now."
Ash just smiled at him, a baring of teeth that didn't reach her eyes. "Why? I don't need to."
She stepped back through a wall that was suddenly warm-toffee soft, flowing through it and disappearing to leave just a crease in the wall behind her. It gradually filled in and smoothed out, leaving Tank with his hand on just a bare wall.
"What the hell?" Tank stared at the wall, perplexed.
"Oh my God." Lula looked around the sealed room. "How do we get out?"
* * *
Morelli had his back pressed to the house guarding the doorway when he heard a rustle somewhere near. He lifted his gun slightly and cautiously scanned the lakeside. A heron stood motionless in the reeds at the water's edge. The ducks were grubbing under the water again. There was nothing unusual that he could see. He lowered the gun.
A sudden shift under his feet threw him to his knees. He lost his grip on the gun and watched in horror as it fell to the floor and slid away from him through the open doorway. The whole platform began to tilt and curl up at the edges, threatening to crush him against the side of the house.
"Guys!" he shouted. "Get out of there, now!" He made a desperate scramble for the edge of the platform as it rose around him and caught hold of it. He dangled precariously there for a moment hoping that the others would make it out and join him.
When no-one came out of the darkened doorway he cursed and pulled himself up and out before the approaching platform pinned him against the house.
He slid down the curved outside of the platform that now resembled a tulip, crashing in a heap at the bottom, where he watched despairingly as it closed the rest of the way to leave the house sealed inside.
"Oh my God." He pushed himself up and staggered to the stem, hammering his fist against it. "Guys? Can you hear me?"
There was no answer from above him, just agonizng silence broken occasionally by a quack and a splash from the direction of the lake.
"Oh Jesus," he muttered. "Now what?"
* * *
A quarter of an hour later nothing had changed, and his desperate shouts had done nothing but make his throat hoarse and painful. He'd gone over their situation a dozen times in his mind, and he couldn't think of anything to get them out. He didn't even know if they could breathe in there.
"Knock it off," he said to himself out loud as he tried to keep his breathing steady and not give in to panic. "The kid in the tower could breathe. They're alive in there. They have to be alive. I just need to get help. There has to be someone that can help."
Something nudged at his back, and his stomach lurched as fresh adrenaline spiked through his system.
He spun around to come face to face with the horse, a white mountain looking at him placidly with dark brown eyes. A broken line told him how she had got there.
"Let me guess, you heard the shouting?"
She just looked at him.
"Well sweetheart, it looks like you're all the help I've got. What do you think we should do?"
She turned away from him and tore up a mouthful of grass.
He snorted to himself. He couldn't believe that he was talking to a horse half-hoping that it might have something to say back. He'd been in this crazy place too long. They all had.
She was saddled though, and the packs were hooked on there. They'd packed up just in case they had to move in a hurry. The oilcloth bundle that Garrick had given them was strapped securely to the back of the saddle.
He unstrapped it and pulled out one of the blades. It glittered with menace in the bright sunshine. "Do you think we could find him if we tried? He said Fellbridge. I don't know where that is."
She whickered and walked over to a large tree trunk that lay along the ground near the water's edge. He could probably climb up from there. If he knew the first thing about riding a horse, that was.
"Oh man," he muttered. "I'm so going to regret this."
He joined her at the tree trunk and unstrapped the packs from her saddle, hanging them from the branch of a convenient tree so that animals wouldn't get to the food and the others could find them if they got out without him. He kept his water bottle, some of the provisions and one of the swords.
With a silent prayer he looked up at the saddle. It was a long way up. If he fell off, it was going to feel even longer coming down. He was going to do it anyway.
He took a deep breath and climbed up onto the log.
"Okay, this is it. I'm in your hands. Don't drop me, will you sweetheart?"
She squealed as if mildly offended and stamped a foot, but she kept her body as still as the log she was standing next to.
"Yeah, you're right. No excuses. We're going to do this. I'm going to get on, and you're not going to tip me off and trample me. Do we have a deal?"
The horse shook her shaggy neck and continued to stand by the log.
He took a big handful of her mane and braced himself.
"Ready. One, two, three, go."
On go he launched himself up and forward, but he didn't get enough height; his chest hit the saddle hard, knocking the wind out of him with an ooff. He slid back down to stand panting on the log.
"Damn. Okay, higher next time."
He spotted the stirrup dangling in front of him.
"Ah. I guess I needed that, right?"
He stepped forward again and grabbed another handful of hair. This time he hopped around until he could fit his foot into the stirrup and used it to propel himself up. He landed belly down on the saddle looking at the ground the other side.
"Boy," he muttered, "Is it just me or is the air thinner up here?"
With an undignified scramble he dragged a leg over the back of the saddle and sat up.
The world looked different. His head was level with the branches of the trees and the ground was a long way down. Way too far down.
At the end of her long neck, the horse's long ears pricked up in front of him like a guide to where he needed to go.
"Okay. So far so good."
One ear flicked and she started to walk.
"Argh!" He grabbed a double fistful of mane and held on tight as he tried to get used to the motion. It was like nothing he'd ever experienced before. Instead of the back and forth motion that he'd expected, her whole body shifted and tilted from side to side too.
It got easier, though, as he listened to the steady thud of hooves on the ground. She had a gentle rhythm; he just needed to move with her. He forced himself to relax and go with her. Finally he started to feel comfortable, if a little stretched across her broad back.
"Okay sweetheart, I'm as ready as I'll ever be. Let's go find Garrick."
He regretted it instantly as she broke into a rolling canter that threw him forward across her neck. He wrapped his arms around it, held on and prayed as he watched the ground racing past underneath the huge hooves that could crush his skull if he slipped.
Fortunately she didn't seem to want that to happen, though, and shifted underneath him occasionally to stop him falling. As long as he didn't lose his grip, all he had to do was worry about whether the numbness in his groin meant that he was never having children.
He was dimly aware of one, two villages passing by as he clung to her back, enveloped by the smell of sweat and hot horse. Her neck and shoulders were covered in flecks of foam and her breathing was labored as they cantered on. His own fingers were numb where they were twisted in the coarse hairs of her mane so hard that the flesh had turned white. The muscles in his legs and back were screaming with pain.
"Stop," he croaked. "Slow down."
She did, slowing to a walk and letting her head hang low.
Morelli gingerly pushed himself up and untangled his fingers from her mane. "We both need a rest. Just… I don't think I could get back on again, so we'll just rest together, okay."
She flicked an ear at him and plodded on, nose almost brushing the ground.
When they reached a shallow stream she stopped and drank for what felt like forever. He looked longingly at the water rippling over the stones but opted to drink the water from his bottle instead. He grimaced at the brackish taste then chided himself; at least he had a drink. He needed to get help to the others before they started dying of thirst in their prison.
She turned away from the water and started tearing up grass ravenously. He perched precariously on her back and gripped the front of the saddle, wishing that she would bring her head up again but knowing that she had to eat. No point in riding for Garrick if his horse collapsed under him, particularly since she was the one choosing the directions. He had no idea where he was after the first ten miles.
Finally she lifted her head and started walking again. The sweat was drying her coat into hard ripples and she stumbled occasionally but at least she wasn't outright blowing any more.
After five minutes she broke into a trot that threatened to shake his teeth out of his head as he bounced around uncomfortably. The pains in his ass reached a whole new level and he wondered why anyone would want to do this for fun. He gritted his teeth and hung on.
Another few minutes and the canter that he had dreaded arrived. Once more he was hanging around her neck and hoping for the best. He lost track of time as they rode on and on, crossing wide grasslands that whispered around her legs, splashing across rivers that soaked them both to the skin.
Just as dusk was falling they arrived at a small settlement on the grasslands surrounded by a tall wooden palisade. The gates were open and the horse stumbled through the gates at an unsteady trot to stop in the yard.
Exhaustion finally claimed Morelli and he slid helplessly down over her shoulder to lay flat on the ground looking up at the sky. The horse just stood next to him with her head drooping to the ground. He heard men talking around him but couldn't make out the words as he lay there in a dull haze of pain and weariness.
A face appeared in the sky above him surrounded by a thick fall of blonde hair and he wanted to cry with relief as Belle gave him a dazzling smile and said, "Joe! You came after us."
"Hello Belle," he said dazedly. "Well what do you know, we found you. Can you help me up? I don't think my legs are working."
He closed his eyes and yelled with pain as an agonizing pain twisted through his left thigh.
Belle's face disappeared but he heard her voice as she shouted, "Garrick!"