Changing the Prophecy Chapter 20

 

Chapter 20 Vinegar, Flan, and Reinforcements

“I’m going back out there,” Denzel declared, as he picked up his diving suit, which lay in a heap on the floor.

“You will do no such thing!” Reggie snapped authoritatively.

“Daddy’s right,” Maia agreed. “What if that squid comes back? Besides, we don’t know about the squid ink. It could eat through the diving suit.”

“Hold up!” Denzel shouted. “Wait, wait, wait! I know what to do. Maia, where did you put that window cleaner?”

Maia went to the supply cupboard and pulled out the bottle of window cleaner.

“Is that it? Is there any more in there?” Denzel asked. His amulet had begun glowing with red light.

“Woo-hoo,” Sonjay rejoiced as he pointed to his brother’s amulet. “Cool idea incoming.”

Mole held his hand up to Denzel for a high five, which Denzel gave him. “Vinegar,” Mole announced with a bob of his head that set his dreadlocks bouncing. “You’re brilliant, mon.”

“Vinegar,” Denzel repeated. “The window cleaner has vinegar in it and it should clear the squid ink out of those thrusters.”

After a thorough search of the supply cabinet, Maia produced three bottles of window cleaner, which Mole and Denzel proceeded to pour into the chambers of the flushing mechanism for the thrusters. Mole pressed a button and the window cleaner burst through the thrusters as the sub shot forward and emerged well clear of the billow of squid ink left in its wake. With renewed speed, the sub lurched up toward the surface while the expedition team cheered their victory over squid ink.

As the clock in the sub ticked down to zero, the sub reached the surface of the water and slid alongside the dock. They just barely made it back in time.

When they emerged from the hatch, they found Cardamom, Iris, Elena, and Guhblorin waiting for them. Elena flung her arms around Maia and both girls laughed and cried at once. “Guhblorin was timing you,” Elena informed her friend, “and we didn’t think you would make it back before you ran out of power.”

“We almost didn’t,” Maia admitted. “We were saved by window cleaner.”

“Good one,” Guhblorin said with a suppressed giggle.

“Seriously,” Maia told him.

“No lie,” Jasper backed her up. “Denzel put window cleaner into the flushing mechanism to clear the thrusters of squid ink because it had vinegar in it.”

“Squid ink? I didn’t know squid knew how to write,” Guhblorin replied. Elena attempted to cast a stern look in his direction, but her smile gave away her amusement.

Sonjay pointed to the beach next to the dock and asked, “What’s going on over there? Why is everyone on the beach?” People had indeed crowded onto the beach. They stood or sat on the sand and gazed out over the water. From where they stood on the dock, the Four and their companions could hear the murmuring voices of those on the beach punctuated by the sound of weeping. The people hugged and comforted one another, while many of them stood unmoving at the water’s edge, some with their arms wrapped around each other.

“News of the oil spill at the North Coast has reached Whale Island. We have had messengers. The spill moves slowly but steadily in our direction across the water. The whales fled even before it happened. And the algae is disappearing, which we can tell because of the dull, gray color of the water,” Cardamom informed them.

“Island People have lived for thousands of years as neighbors to the ocean and now this spill will kill it and all that inhabit it and therefore us as well,” Iris said despondently. “My people have come to say farewell to our dear friend, this beautiful beach, this beautiful water, which will die when that oil washes in,” Iris explained. “I have said nothing to my people about the Emerald Crystal because I didn’t know if you would find it and I still don’t know if it will avert this disaster. Did you retrieve it from the Coral Caves?”

By way of response, Doshmisi held the Emerald Crystal up to the light so Iris could see it. An admiring sigh escaped Iris’s lips as she gazed at the beautiful jewel. Having emerged from the depths of the ocean, the Emerald Crystal glinted in the sunlight with such intense green that it hurt their eyes to behold it. Doshmisi wrapped it in a swatch of cloth and stored it in her pocket.

“We need to get to the North Coast quickly to stop that oil spill,” Sonjay reminded them, as his eyes swept across the beach and took in the people mourning the approaching devastation the oil would bring to their home.

“What about Clover’s memorial?” Reggie asked. “Shouldn’t we stay here for that?”

“We can’t waste that precious time,” Doshmisi reminded her father.

“She would certainly prefer that you go,” Iris reassured them. “She has plenty of people here who love her and who will attend her homegoing.”

“We can’t go until we eat dinner, though. Guhblorin and I cooked,” Elena reported.

“No doubt you did,” Denzel said with a pleased smile. “And flan?”

“Absolutemente. There’s a chocolate flan with whipped cream and it has your name written all over it,” Elena told Denzel, as she folded her arms across her chest and tossed her blue-black hair in the sunlight.

At that moment Mole, who had remained behind in the sub to power it down and secure it, emerged from the hatch. He took one look at Iris and tripped over the edge of the dock. An assortment of equipment that he held in his arms went flying in all directions. A flare gun bounced on the dock and emitted a bright fluorescent-pink flare. The flare shot arced into the sky and burst like fireworks. A small package burst open and instantly inflated itself into a raft that knocked Guhblorin over the side of the dock and into the water where he spluttered and flailed while Mole stammered an apology.

Iris told Elena softly, “I’ll go home and set the table before I inspire him to do any further damage. I’ll see you at Clover’s shortly.”

Reggie reached out a hand and helped Guhblorin out of the water while the others gathered up Mole’s belongings and stuffed them into a large canvas sack that Denzel produced.

“I be hopeless,” Mole whined with self-pity. “I can’t even look at her without falling apart. She must think me the most ridiculous mon ever.”

“Don’t get so wound up about it. You need to relax,” Reggie advised.

“As if,” Mole responded dejectedly as the group began to walk toward Clover’s house and the library. “I better just go to my room. Bring me a plate of food, please? And some of that chocolate flan.”

“I think I have a sardine in my underpants,” Guhblorin announced with a giggle.

“We’ll get on the road as soon as we finish eating dinner,” Denzel announced.

“I disagree,” Reggie contradicted his son. “We need rest. None of us will function well if we’re tired.”

“Daddy, we can’t take the night off. We have to get moving,” Sonjay said firmly.

“I know that. I’m not suggesting we sleep through the night. But we need a few hours. A power nap. We can have Iris wake us at midnight. Would you agree to that?”

“That oil will continue moving while we sleep,” Doshmisi reminded.

“Maybe so, but I agree with Reggie. Food and sleep will make us more alert to handle whatever lies ahead,” Cardamom added. So they agreed to get some sleep after dinner and to start out at midnight.

Elena’s dinner did not disappoint. She and Guhblorin had prepared a totally scrumptious meal. While they ate, they filled Cardamom, Elena, and Guhblorin in on the events that had taken place under the ocean. When they finished relating their tale, Cardamom turned to Reggie and inquired, “I have a question I have wanted to ask you. How did you get back to Faracadar on your own? Without Debbie. I know you came once with Debbie, but, how did you find your way back without her?”

Reggie finished chewing a mouthful of chili rellenos and swallowed. “Do you not fear that if revealed this information could be misused?”

“I feel confident that no one at this table will misuse it or share it with another who might do so,” Cardamom replied without hesitation.

Reggie put his fork down carefully on his plate and paused. He glanced at the others seated around the table. “When Debbie and I returned from our visit on the one occasion that she brought me here, I tore a large sliver from the wood at Angel’s Gate as we passed through and I took it with me, hidden in my clothes. I didn’t know whether or not it could take me back to Faracadar until I tried to use it. When I found out what my wife had done, how she had promised years off her life to prevent Sissrath from using the Staff of Shakabaz in matters of life and death, I resolved to find a way to use that sliver of wood to return and attempt to reverse the deep enchantment that bound her. I took it to the cabin in the woods at Manzanita Ranch and I begged, with all my might, and all the love I have in me for my wife, to return here. Often wishing comes to nothing. But sometimes wishes become real. My wishes, and that shard of wood, brought me back. Unfortunately, once here, I proved no match for Sissrath.”

“It surprises me that you could travel by that method,” Cardamom said.

“I have learned a great deal while studying the Book of the Khoum and spending many solitary hours meditating and contemplating the nature of things,” Reggie told the enchanter, as his children listened attentively. “I have learned that love often opens doors that would otherwise have remained closed. I have come to believe that I managed to return because of the love I feel for my wife. I wish that my love could have carried me back to her while she lived. At least it brought my children back to me.”

“That it did,” Cardamom replied.

Just then, Guhblorin appeared in the doorway to the kitchen with a rolling cart that contained an enormous chocolate flan and a bowl overflowing with frothy whipped cream. “Dessert is served!” Guhblorin announced gleefully. After they devoured the spectacular flan, the weary travelers dispersed to their beds for a few hours of sleep before starting out for the North Coast. It would take them an entire night to travel to the Passage Circle. A ferry captain had agreed to make a special ferry run to Dolphin Island for them shortly after midnight.

At midnight, Iris went from room to room and woke each of them. When she woke Mole, he took one look at Iris’s face in the dim light of the glow-lamp and promptly fell out of bed. He sprawled on the floor at Iris’s feet and blinked up at her helplessly.

Iris sat on the floor next to Mole. “Don’t move,” she ordered Mole. “Just stay exactly where you are and don’t move a finger. Listen,” she continued, “I like you, but it’s entirely impossible for me to get to know you if you continue to self-destruct every time you catch sight of me. Understand?”

Mole nodded his head silently in the affirmative. His dreadlocks bobbed up and down.

“If we’re going to travel together then this goofiness has to stop,” Iris said firmly.

“Travel together?” Mole asked.

“I’m going with you and the others to the North Coast. If the land is in peril and fighting for its life, I refuse to remain behind. I’ll go with you to see if I can help. And if the end comes, then I would just as soon meet it in the presence of Clover’s grandchildren. She would understand and not want me to stay behind for her memorial under the circumstances. So you see, you have to get a grip, Mole. You can’t keep acting the fool whenever I appear.”

“I know,” Mole agreed, with a dejected sigh. “I’ll try harder.”

“That’s probably the problem,” Iris pointed out. She placed a gentle hand on his arm. “You’re trying too hard. Stop trying. Just let things be what they are. Now do you think you can stand up and get yourself ready to go without destroying any of my furniture?”

“I’ll try,” Mole said and then quickly revised that. “I mean I won’t try. I mean I’ll try not to try.”

As Iris rose from the floor she told him, “Don’t think about it too hard, you’ll hurt yourself. Just take it slow.” She walked to the door and turned in the doorway. “I’ll see you in the courtyard in a few minutes.”

The Four, Jasper, Elena, Guhblorin, Reggie, Cardamom, Mole, and Iris assembled in the courtyard under the burst of colorful stars that lit the night sky. They spoke in subdued voices as they prepared for the journey ahead.

Cardamom drew Reggie aside and asked him quietly, “Have you noticed the air?”

“The air?” Reggie repeated, as he raised his eyebrows questioningly.

“Don’t say anything to the others. Not yet. I’ve noticed the air is thicker, making it a little harder to breathe. The blue-green algae that cleans our air lives in the ocean, and the Corportons have poisoned the ocean with the oil spill,” Cardamom explained with a worried expression. “You know what I mean.”

Reggie nodded. “I have a feeling my children have noticed it, but let’s not go there yet. We might have some luck repairing the situation before we get into serious trouble.”

Elena handed out sack lunches to everyone as they mounted their tigers. Doshmisi sat astride Dagobaz. Despite the late hour, many residents of Whale Island lined the streets to see them off as they rode to the harbor to take the ferry on the first leg of their journey. “May the work of the Four continue,” people called out.

They traveled through the night both by ferry and hard riding across the ocean bridges that connected the islands to one another and to the mainland. The sun had stood in the sky for a couple of hours by the time they arrived on the beach at the Passage Circle. As they neared the beach, riding along the ocean bridge, they saw a throng of people waiting for them. Word of their mission and their journey must have preceded them. At the front of the gathered people stood Governor Jay, flanked by the royal family on one side and Crumpet and Buttercup on the other. Jack, the intuit, drifted slightly above the sand with a few of his intuit buddies. The intuits had skateboards tucked under their arms. Sonjay smiled when he saw the skateboards. It seemed like forever since he had spent a carefree afternoon skating.

As the travelers came within earshot of the people from the Passage Circle, Sonjay called out to them, “What’s up? What’re you guys doing here?”

“We came to greet you and bring you provisions,” Governor Jay replied.

“And some of us will go with you,” Princess Honeydew informed them resolutely.

Denzel’s eyes glittered with excitement. “Like an army?” he asked.

“Do you want an army?” Governor Jay offered.

“An army is not a bad idea,” Reggie said thoughtfully.

“Yes, it is a bad idea,” Doshmisi contradicted her father. “If I learned one thing from those indecipherable whales last year, I learned that warring armies solve nothing.”

“What she said,” Sonjay backed up his sister.

Denzel shrugged and said, “whatever.”

“So who’s coming with us?” Maia asked curiously.

Crumpet, Buttercup, Honeydew, Saffron, and Hyacinth stepped forward. Jack and his intuit friends floated up to join them.

“Why am I not surprised?” Sonjay commented.

“We figure you must be headed to the North Coast to stop the oil spill,” Crumpet told them. “We want to know the plan.”

“You can uniform us on the way,” Hyacinth said as he mounted a tiger.

“Inform,” Princess Honeydew translated her father’s mangled communication. “You can inform us on the way.” She and the others mounted their tigers as well.

“I guess you won’t be staying for breakfast,” Governor Jay observed sorrowfully.

“No time,” Cardamom said.

“The oil spill won’t stop for breakfast,” Sonjay reminded the governor.

Governor Jay held his hand up in front of him, palm facing outward. “May the work of the Four continue,” he called to the departing travelers. Those who remained by his side on the beach repeated his gesture and his words as the travelers sped away in a flurry of sand.

Changing the Prophecy Chapter 19

 

Chapter 19 The Coral Caves

“What did Clover say?” Jasper asked.

“She told us how to stop the oil spill from destroying Faracadar,” Denzel answered.

“She said we have to get the Emerald Crystal,” Maia told him.

“Then I have to put the Emerald Crystal into the herbal and put the herbal in the ocean at the North Coast where the oil well exploded,” Doshmisi explained.

“So far, so good,” Jasper said. “Do we know where to find the Emerald Crystal?”

“About that,” Sonjay said. “According to the Prophet of the Khoum, my dad, the Emerald Crystal is in the Coral Caves at the bottom of the ocean under Whale Island.”

“How did the Emerald Crystal wind up under Whale Island?” Jasper asked in exasperation. He didn’t expect to receive an answer, but Cardamom gave him one.

“Because,” Cardamom replied, “the whales placed the Emerald Crystal in the Coral Caves over a hundred years ago for safekeeping. It has such powerful energy that they feared what could happen if it fell into the wrong hands. No one knows if it’s still down there.”

“We be needin’ an underwater motorized vehicle,” Mole said. He had showered and changed into clean clothes and he looked no worse for having made a long and dusty journey that had culminated in his sitting in a platter of potato salad.      

“You mean a submarine? Do they have those here?” Elena asked incredulously.

“A submarine?” Mole repeated, bewildered.

“A vehicle that can go underwater with people in it,” Denzel explained. “We call them submarines.”

“Well, yes,” Mole replied, “we be havin’ somethin’ like that. I’ll talk to the battery makers to find out what they be keepin’ in the battery barn on Whale Island.”    

“I’ll go with you,” Denzel offered.

“Now?” Mole asked.

“No time to waste. Let’s go find the battery makers and see if they have something we can use. While we stand here talking, the oil spill continues to spread.”

“Yah, mon,” Mole replied.

“Later,” Denzel called over his shoulder as he and Mole headed for the door.

“I’ll go too,” Sonjay said quickly as he caught up with them and matched his stride to theirs.

“Do you know where I can find a map of the ocean floor?” Jasper asked Cardamom.

“Probably in the library,” Cardamom answered. “Come with me and we’ll have a look.”

“Do you mind if I tag along?” Reggie asked.

“Not at all,” Cardamom said.

“I have a book that outlines specifically how to get to the site where the whales purportedly stored the Emerald Crystal. Hold on and I’ll get it.” Reggie went to his bag and pulled out a worn, little book, which he passed to Jasper as they went out the door in the direction of the library.

“Come with me,” Elena ordered Guhblorin, and the two of them headed to the kitchen, where they proceeded to clean up the dinner dishes for Iris, who had remained by Clover’s side in the bedroom.

“Can I see what it does?” Maia asked her sister.

“What it does?” Doshmisi echoed.

“Can I see what the herbal does when you try to use it?”

Doshmisi unsnapped the herbal from the carry case and the two girls sat next to each other on Clover’s sea-green couch. “I’m not even sure it will open,” Doshmisi warned. But it did open and Doshmisi laid the book gently across her legs so that Maia could see it too.

The page read:  “Oil accumulated deep within, millions of years ago, as the remains of a previous species that once walked. An endless supply does not exist. just as the previous species was finite, so too the oil that remains behind. And one day it will also disappear. Only those species with transformative ability will remain. Ingenuity. Imagination. Wind and water. Sunshine.”

“When it first started acting strange, it scared me and I didn’t understand,” Doshmisi told Maia. “But now, after all that has happened, it sort of makes sense in a weird way. The Corportons came here looking for oil, which seems as scarce in their world as it is becoming in the world we left behind when we came to Faracadar. I think the herbal is trying to say something about how the Corportons didn’t adapt to the changing resources in their world.”

Maia chewed her lip. Then she speculated, “What if the Corportons came from our world somehow? From the Farland?”

“Creepy,” Doshmisi answered. “How could they get here?”

The girls’ conversation ended abruptly when Iris emerged from Clover’s bedroom. Tears coursed down her cheeks. “She’s gone,” Iris said in a quavering voice. “She slipped away peacefully a moment ago.”

Doshmisi and Maia returned to the bedroom with Iris and they sat on either side of their grandmomma and held her hands. Clover wore a delicate smile on her face.

“When she said she loved us all,” Iris said, between sobs, “those were her last words.”

News of Clover’s passing spread swiftly through the household and the surrounding community. The family gathered by Cover’s bed and each in turn had a chance to place a kiss on Clover’s still-warm cheek before the body was taken away. They stayed up late into the night, remembering together the many things they loved about Clover and sharing stories. Reggie had a wealth of stories from when Clover had lived a different life as a much younger woman. Iris hung on his every word, comforted to learn more about the life her friend had lived long before settling in Faracadar.

Before she finally went to bed, Doshmisi checked on Dagobaz. She buried her face in his neck and wept while he nuzzled her cheek.

In the morning, Clover’s library compound buzzed with activity. Elena and Guhblorin made Spanish omelets, home fries, and banana muffins for breakfast, taking over the cooking so that Iris could devote her full attention to making the arrangements for Clover’s memorial service. The family and their traveling companions assembled at the long table in the courtyard to eat.

Wearing a little white apron with a ruffle around the edge, Guhblorin zoomed around the table offering to pour either fresh-squeezed orange juice or apple cider into each person’s glass.

“I’ll have the orange juice,” Cardamom told Guhblorin. And then, “You’re taking this cooking business seriously, geebaching.”

Guhblorin flapped his ears and grinned broadly. “Elena says I show promise.”

“Cardamom and I found a map of the ocean floor in the library,” Jasper informed the others between mouthfuls of muffin. “But we’ll need some light to see when we get that far down in the ocean.”

“We’ve got a sub,” Denzel informed, as he stuffed a forkful of potatoes into his mouth.

“But there be some restrictions,” Mole warned.

“Like what?” Doshmisi asked, raising an eyebrow.

“It runs on a battery and the battery can only hold a charge for five hours,” Denzel told them. “So we have to get down there and back before we lose the charge.”

“The sub has no light on it yet, but Denzel and I will figure something out for that, no problem,” Mole promised.

“Yeah, don’t worry about the light,” Denzel said between bites. “We have bigger things to worry us. They have only one sub in the Island Settlement. Mole has one at the Passage Circle, but it would take a couple of days to go there to get it and we can’t squander that much time. We need to do this today.”

“Why do we need two subs?” Maia asked.

“In case something happens and we get stranded down there. As it stands, if that happens, we won’t have any help. No one can come down after us. And we have to get down and back in five hours,” Denzel explained. Then he called to Elena, “Hey, Elena, these are the best fries ever.”

“I washed the potatoes for her,” Guhblorin informed Denzel with pride. “And I cut up the onions.”

“Gracias,” Elena thanked Denzel. The others added their compliments to his and she modestly accepted the praise.

Iris entered the courtyard wearing a flowing green tunic over beige pants and a round green woven hat (just like the one Doshmisi always wore) on her close-cropped hair. Grief cast an added beauty to her expressive, brown eyes. The instant she appeared, Mole jumped up and stretched out his hand toward her, managing, in the process, to topple his glass of juice so that it spilled on the table. While he mopped up the juice with his napkin, he asked Iris, “Are you wantin’ to sit down? Would you like my chair? Can I fix you a plate?”

“No thanks,” Iris replied. “I already ate.”

Mole attempted to right his chair and seat himself; but he missed the chair by a good six inches when he tried to sit down and he landed with a thud on the ground.

Iris peered over the edge of the table at him anxiously. “Are you OK?” she asked.

“I’m good. I’m going to just sit here for a minute,” Mole’s voice rose from the ground where he sat halfway under the table.

Maia and Elena exchanged an amused, knowing glance. They had shared their thoughts about Mole the night before and they agreed that he had a crazy-bad crush on Iris.

“I came to tell you that we’ll hold the memorial tomorrow morning,” Iris said. “That way you can go for the Emerald Crystal today and then leave tomorrow for the North Coast right after the memorial.”

“That makes sense,” Reggie approved.

“So who will go to the Coral Caves in the sub?” Denzel asked.

“You’ve finally found somewhere to go where I won’t follow you,” Elena announced. “You couldn’t pay me to step foot in that submarine. Claustrophobia. Plus, I can’t swim, so no way I’m going under the ocean.”

Relief washed over Denzel when Elena said she didn’t want to go; however, to his surprise, he realized it was not because he wanted to be rid of her but rather because she would be safer if left behind. In the privacy of his own thoughts, he admitted that he had grown fond of Elena.

“I’m all in,” Doshmisi said.

“Bring it on,” Sonjay said.

“Me too, of course,” Maia said. “It will probably take all four of us to do this.”

“If Mole ever gets up from under the table, he will certainly go,” Denzel noted, as he lifted the tablecloth and peeked at Mole, who still sat miserably on the cobblestones under the table. “She left,” Denzel told Mole. “You can come out now.”

“Me too,” Jasper chimed in. “I have to go. You need a guide.”

“Looks like we’re getting the band back together,” Sonjay joked.

Reggie cleared his throat before speaking. “Except that this time you’ve got your old man with you. I will not let you go by yourselves. We’re family and that’s how we roll.”

“I think I should stay up here with the Staff of Shakabaz,” Cardamom suggested. “If something goes wrong, perhaps I can rescue you with the Staff from the shore. I’d like to have that option.”

“Nothing will go wrong,” Denzel insisted with determination.

“Just the same, I’ll leave the herbal with you, Cardamom. Maybe you’ll find a way to use it even without me or the Emerald Crystal if the need arises.” Doshmisi unstrapped the herbal from her waist and passed it to Cardamom.

“I’ll take good care of it,” Cardamom promised.

“I know you will.”

“So it’s settled,” Denzel said. “Let’s help Elena and Guhblorin clean up the breakfast dishes and then Mole and I will rig a light for the sub. After that we’re outta here.”

Denzel stood up and reached for a couple of empty plates, but before he could pick them up, Elena unexpectedly flung her arms around his waist and gave him a hug.

“What’s up with that?” Denzel mumbled self-consciously. He quietly explained, “You cooked, we should help clean up.”

“Nada,” Elena responded as she flashed him a smile. “De nada.”

“If we’re getting the band back together, then I need my sax,” Maia said, giggling. “I’ll meet you guys down at the dock. I have to go see a ferry man about a horn. You never know when you might run into an ill-tempered sea serpent.”

“Good idea.” Sonjay nodded approvingly.

“Horn?” Mole asked. “What’s up with that?”

Denzel explained that the previous year Maia defeated a nasty sea serpent by playing a horn kept on the ferries to drive them away. He concluded by telling Mole, “So we need to set up a microphone and amplifier that will project from a speaker on the outside of the sub, just in case we run into any sea serpents.”

“I’m on the job, mon,” Mole assured Denzel, as he emerged from under the table and hurried off.

Soon after, when they reassembled at the dock in the harbor, the underwater expedition team could see no more of the sub than the topmost part and the open gray metal hatch through which they would soon climb inside. They stared at that hatch as the reality of the voyage that lay before them sunk in.

Maia embraced Elena in farewell. She turned to Guhblorin and instructed him, “Look after her. She’s my best friend.” Guhblorin nodded solemnly, appearing more serious than Maia had ever seen him appear, as he replied, “Mine too.” Elena squeezed Guhblorin’s arm in appreciation.

Mole stepped forward and descended down the ladder into the depths of the sub. Reggie went next. Then Jasper. Elena stepped up and gave Denzel a kiss on the cheek. “When you find yourself under thousands of tons of water, remember that I’m up here cooking dinner and I expect you to return safe and sound to eat it,” Elena told him. “I plan to make chocolate flan especially for you. I’ll get angry if you don’t show up. You don’t want to see a Latina girl angry, trust me.”

“Got it,” Denzel replied; and he saluted Elena. “Chocolate flan. Tonight.” Then he and the others followed Jasper into the sub.

Inside, the sub seemed larger than they had expected. Denzel had rigged a bright light they could shine through the large viewing window and into the water so that when they descended to the pitch darkness of the ocean floor, the light would enable them to see. Mole had rigged a microphone and amplifier inside with a speaker on the outside so that after the sub disappeared under the water, Denzel’s amplified voice emerged in final farewell to those who stood at the dock. “Chocolate flan,” the voice said from under the water. “And whipped cream. Lots of whipped cream, please.”

“Chocolate,” Bayard said in his best imitation of Denzel’s voice. He perched on Elena’s shoulder as Guhblorin flapped his enormous ears beside them.

The instant that Denzel closed the hatch on the sub and secured the seal, Mole pressed a button on a clock that began to tick off the time, counting down from five hours. The voyagers clustered around the viewing window as the sub angled downward and cut through the water.

“Mole, do you have any window cleaner?” Maia asked as she shook her head in disgust. “This window is filthy. We can’t see anything.”

Mole pointed to a cupboard and replied, sheepishly, “You’ll find cleaning supplies in there. Sorry. I didn’t have time to tidy up.”

Maia retrieved a spray bottle of window cleaner and a rag. She pulled a chair over to the window and methodically cleaned the glass from top to bottom. Denzel and Sonjay complained about the vinegary smell of the window cleaner, but they quickly changed their tune when they enjoyed the view through the clear window after Maia finished. They could see out as if nothing stood between them and the ocean.

At first they didn’t turn on the bright light, since the sun penetrated the water. They passed brilliant tropical fish of all shapes and sizes, some of them glowing iridescent. They saw round, flat, yellow-and-black striped fish shaped like hearts; tiny, long, thin, glowing electric-blue fish with red-tipped tails; seahorses in all different sizes, some as tiny as a toothpick and others as large as a crocodile; square stingrays; parachute-like jellyfish; large fish; small fish; fish in every imaginable color; fish with big floppy fins; fish with tiny fins. All manner of sea plants also passed in front of the window; algae and seaweeds of golden-yellow, chalk-green, deep-maroon, amber, forest-green, and other colors. They saw velvety sea plants, shiny ones, and others as delicate as lace.

“Some of the sea plants look so fragile,” Maia commented. “Imagine what a coating of oil would do to them.”

“That coating of oil is on its way,” Doshmisi responded grimly. “We can’t fail.”

As they continued to descend, the clock continued to tick away their precious minutes. Everyone on the expedition team found it impossible not to watch it while they each calculated in their head how long it was taking them to reach the ocean floor. Jasper spread the map that he and Cardamom had borrowed from the library out on a table in the middle of the cabin and he, Denzel, and Reggie remained glued to it throughout the descent. Reggie kept flipping back and forth between several pages in a little book, frequently calling out directions to Mole, who steered the sub.

Doshmisi, Maia, and Sonjay watched the sea creatures drift past the window in the glow of the sub’s bright light, glancing anxiously at the clock now and then.

After they had traveled for more than an hour, they reached the ocean floor and Reggie directed Mole to the entrance to the Coral Caves, which looked like the enormous yawning-open mouth of a whale. It was as gray as the ocean floor around the edges, but inside the caves the colors went to pale-pink, chalk-green, beige, and the faint-blue of early morning light. Protruding pointed stalagmites and jagged stalactites resembling teeth covered the top and bottom of the caves. Entering seemed like sailing into the throat of a huge beast. The sub fit through the entrance easily. Reggie calculated the opening to be at least eighty feet across.

Jasper switched over to a map of the inside of the Coral Caves, which he and Reggie followed closely, guiding the sub through the subterranean tunnels. Meanwhile, the others gazed in awe at the dazzlingly colorful coral formations inside the caves. The vivid coral took the shape of poetic abstract forms. Curvaceous coral resembled bones while other coral tapered out into feathery wisps. Maia imagined that a sculptor had thoughtfully and precisely carved the coral in the caves over thousands of years. She and Doshmisi forgot to watch the clock, awestruck by the beauty revealed in the bright light emanating from the sub.

“I wonder if anyone has ever seen this place,” Maia marveled.

“Well, they must have,” Sonjay speculated, “because someone put the Emerald Crystal down here.”

“No they didn’t,” Maia corrected him. “The whales put it down here.”

“Oh yeah,” Sonjay conceded. “Right.”

“There, up ahead,” Reggie pointed out the window. Everyone peered into the distance as a small structure that turned out to be a pedestal came into view. It looked like a stone birdbath, standing about five feet tall with a basin on top. Fragile strands of seaweed entwined around it and drifted in the water above the outside rim of the basin. In the center of the basin a crystalline stone, about an inch across in size, glowed green.

“It looks like the crystal that hangs in my window at Manzanita Ranch,” Doshmisi noted. “Only green.”

“It seems lit from inside,” Maia observed.

Mole slowly and carefully maneuvered the sub as close as he could without disturbing the pedestal on which the Emerald Crystal rested.

Jasper glanced at the clock. “Two hours and seven minutes,” he said.

“We have plenty of time,” Denzel reassured him.

“This seems too easy,” Sonjay warned. The words had barely dropped from his lips when a large yellow-green eye appeared in the viewing window and rolled around in a chartreuse eye socket. The sub bounced around like crazy and a set of white-green scales flashed across the viewing window.

“You had to open your mouth and jinx it,” Denzel accused his brother, although they both knew Sonjay’s words had not caused the arrival of the sea serpent.

“Just saying,” Sonjay replied.

“It’s my biggest fan,” Maia called out. “I had a feeling he’d show up so I brought his favorite:  the horn that repels sea serpents!” She opened a large horn case that she had stashed in a storage bin when they entered the sub and removed the horn she had retrieved from the ferry captain before embarking on the undersea expedition. Her amulet began to glow with a strong blue light. As she took the horn out of the case, and grabbed the sheet music that went with it, she told Denzel to turn on the sound system.

Maia had sent a sea serpent scurrying away from a ferry full of passengers the year before by playing a haunting tune on the special horn made to ward off sea serpents. Through the viewing window, the expedition team saw the sea serpent glide away from the sub, turn around, and prepare to head back for a strike. It emitted a disgusting stream of slime from its mouth, shook its head, roared, displayed its rotten teeth, and then launched forward. Meanwhile, Doshmisi held up the sheet music for Maia, Denzel positioned a microphone at the mouth of the horn, and Maia blew for all she was worth, causing a haunting note to emerge from the instrument and echo into the outside cavern.

The sea serpent howled loudly and they could hear its cry inside the sub. It shook its monstrous head and squirmed in agony. The beast’s tail whipped around and smacked the pedestal. The basin on the top of the pedestal snapped off and turned upside down, dropping to the ocean floor with a dull thud. The crystal disappeared in a swirl of silt thrown up from the bottom of the cave. The sea serpent fled as Maia continued to play the haunting tune on the horn. It left in its wake a murky wash of mud, silt, rocks, and shells flung up from the thrash of its tail.

As he studied the scene outside the viewing window, Reggie commented in frustration, “Nothing is easy, is it?”

“Like I was saying,” Sonjay agreed.

The sea serpent had turned tail and run away. The last note from the horn faded. The expedition team assembled silently at the viewing window and surveyed the damage. The sub had a robotic claw that they had planned to use to collect the Emerald Crystal. It didn’t seem likely that the claw would work in their present situation, with the Emerald Crystal under a basin or buried in silt. “Someone has to go out there,” Sonjay said grimly. “Is that possible?”

“Yeah, mon,” Mole replied. “It be possible. There be two diving suits on board and the sub has a decompression chamber for exit and entry underwater.”

Sonjay turned from the window and instructed, “Then suit me up.”

“Sorry, Sonjay, it can’t be you,” Mole told him.

“What do you mean?” Sonjay demanded.

“You’re too small. The suits be adult size. A bad fit. You wouldn’t be able to move in it or use the breathing tube,” Mole informed him.

“That’s OK,” Reggie said immediately. “I’ll go.”

“You can’t go, Daddy,” Doshmisi said firmly. “You’re the only one who understands the information in that book about how to navigate out of here and get back up to the surface.”

“Maia has to stay to play the horn if the sea serpent comes back, and we need Mole to operate the sub,” Sonjay added.

“That leaves me, Jasper, and Denzel,” Doshmisi pointed out, even though they had all realized it already.

Jasper turned to Denzel and said, “Looks like it’s you and me.”

“Excuse me?” Doshmisi said as she rolled her neck. “How do you figure that?”

Jasper blushed, but persisted. “You should stay inside where it’s safe.”

“And when have I ever done the safe thing when it was necessary to take a risk? Are you calling me a coward?” Doshmisi demanded.

“No, no, that’s not it at all.” Jasper looked to the others for backup but no one was willing to cross Doshmisi, who clearly believed that she had just as much duty and right to go after the Emerald Crystal as either of the boys.

Maia closed her fist around the ends of three of her long braids and held her fist out to Jasper, Denzel, and Doshmisi. “Pick a braid,” she instructed. “The two who pick the longest braids get to go and whoever picks the shortest one stays behind.” The three each selected a braid and Maia opened her fist. The candidates moved their fingers down to the end of the braid they had chosen. Jasper’s braid was more than an inch shorter than the other two. He stared at it in disbelief.   

“Dosh, please let me go. It’s not right for you to go. What if something happens to you?” Jasper pleaded.

“What if it does?” Doshmisi fired back, exasperated. “Something could happen to you too. You’re no safer out there than I am. Unless you think that because you’re a boy you can defend yourself better.”

“N-no,” Jasper stammered. “It’s not because I’m a boy and you’re a girl. It’s because I couldn’t live with myself if something happened to you.”

“Then it is exactly because you are a boy and I’m a girl. You think it’s your duty to protect and defend me. Well I’m perfectly capable of doing that for myself. And if my choice gets me killed, well then it was my choice, not yours.” Doshmisi’s anger bubbled over and she couldn’t contain it; she waved a hand in the direction of her father. “Look at what happened to Daddy, trying to protect our mother! Did he save her life? No. Instead he wound up locked in a dungeon and he missed the last few years our family could have had together.”

Reggie immediately defended himself. “That’s not fair, Dosh. I tried to do more than just save your mother. I thought I could change the deep enchantment somehow, change the fate that she had chosen for herself and retrieve the Staff of Shakabaz from Sissrath. And I failed. During those years that I spent locked in that dungeon, I lost hope. But I’ve found hope again now that my children have returned to me; and I’m throwing my weight behind Sonjay, trying once again to change a prophecy, hoping that’s possible, because what else can we do? Just sit around and watch the end of Faracadar? We have to try, to put up a struggle against the unfolding events, against the deep enchantment and the prophecy. Perhaps the end really is fated and we can do nothing to prevent that outcome. But we can’t know for sure if something we do will tip the scales one way or another.” Reggie put a hand on Jasper’s shoulder and spoke to him. “I know that your heart will break if something happens to Dosh out there, something you think you could have prevented. I know because mine broke when I lost my wife. But nothing will ever change her decision to go. You have to accept that. I could not accept Debbie’s decision, and Dosh is right, my failure robbed me of the last years I could have had with Debbie.”

“I’m sorry, Daddy,” Doshmisi apologized, as she put her hand on her father’s arm. “I didn’t mean to criticize you. You did what you had to do.”

Tears ran down Maia’s cheeks and Denzel rubbed her back in a comforting way.

Sonjay’s voice trembled as he said, “Just because you failed to change the prophecy for Momma doesn’t mean that it’s not possible. This is a different prophecy. A different time. And we have a lot of help we can rely on.”

“I know it, son,” Reggie replied. “Like I said, I’m hopeful.”

“We be wasting valuable minutes,” Mole interjected urgently. “Dosh and Denzel need to move out.”

Denzel picked up one of the diving suits and pulled it on over his long legs. Jasper reluctantly handed the other suit to Doshmisi. Her lips curved in a slight smile and she said, “You know you love it that I’m willing to walk into danger when necessary.”

“Not as much as you think I do,” Jasper said drily. “It has its down side.”

“You have fifteen minutes to find the Emerald Crystal and get back into the sub in order for us to make it up to the surface before the power pack on the sub runs out of energy,” Reggie told his son and daughter. “We’ll flash the light on the sub at two minutes before the time is up. You have to come back then. We can return tomorrow with the sub recharged if we need to. But you have to come back when we flash the light. Promise?” They both nodded in agreement.

After they suited up and Mole showed them how to breathe through the apparatus that connected to their oxygen tanks, Doshmisi and Denzel stepped into the decompression chamber. Denzel saluted the others as the door slid closed. Mole turned a large wheel to seal the door.

As the two stepped out onto the floor of the Coral Caves, Maia glanced back at the clock. Then she watched anxiously out the viewing window as Denzel and Doshmisi walked to the pedestal, dropped to their knees, lifted the basin, and began searching in the silt. Their movements kicked up debris from the floor of the cave, making the water murky. The bright light glinted off millions of floating particles so that those who had stayed inside the sub strained to see through a fog of drifting matter.

Outside in the caves, Doshmisi tried to disturb as little debris as possible as she felt around in the fluffy silt for the hard edges of the crystal. Her gloves were thick and difficult to maneuver. Denzel placed the basin back on the stand. He saw no crystal inside it. Doshmisi stood still for a long moment while she studied her surroundings. She remembered that the crystal had glowed with a greenish light similar to the light emitted by the herbal whenever she used it to heal someone. She strained to see a green glow anywhere on the ground around her, but she saw nothing. She wished that Denzel would quit moving around so much. He made more debris lift from beneath their feet with every step.

Doshmisi sat down carefully in the spot where the basin had landed and felt around her carefully in a circle. Then she had an idea. She had not seen any dolphins or whales in the ocean during her entire time in Faracadar this year. Perhaps that had something to do with the oil well. The previous year, the whales had told her what she needed to know to defeat Sissrath, even though it took her a long time to decipher the poetic message they delivered to her. She wondered if the whales would come to her aid now if she asked them for help. She closed her eyes and sent a mental message to the whales. “Send help,” she thought. “It’s your world as well as ours. We’re trying to save it for all of us. But we need the Emerald Crystal to do it.”

Denzel glanced at Doshmisi in annoyance. They had hardly any time to look and his sister had plunked herself down and stopped even trying. She had even closed her eyes and given up searching. Girls! He would never understand how a girl’s brain worked. He found himself wishing that Jasper had prevailed and managed to come with him instead of his sister.

As she sent her thoughts out to the whales, Doshmisi pictured them swimming gracefully in the ocean, despite their enormous size, lightweight in the water, their home. She emptied her mind of extraneous thoughts, meditated on sending love to the whales, and imagined herself as an empty bottle waiting for the whales to fill it. Slowly the empty bottle of her self began to fill with an indescribable warmth and power. In her mind she heard the sound of whale voices, which she had only heard once before in her life. A high-pitched singsong voice and a deep rumbling voice intertwined. At first she could not make out what the voices sang, and then she understood. They sang follow the silver.

Doshmisi felt pressure on her arm and opened her eyes to find Denzel urgently attempting to rouse her from her meditation. The Amulet of the Trees, which she wore around her neck, glowed so brightly green that the light burst from the waterproof zipper on the front of her diving suit and from around the seam at the neck. The instant that happened, Denzel stepped back. He knew that if her amulet glowed then she had figured something out. Suddenly hundreds of tiny silver fish emerged out of nowhere and swarmed in the light from Doshmisi’s glowing amulet. She could still hear the whale voices in her head singing follow the silver and she knew exactly what they meant.

The little silver fish converged on a spot not far from where Doshmisi sat and circled above it as if caught whirlpooling in a miniature tornado. At the bottom tip of the tornado-whirlpool, something glowed green under the debris and silt. She pointed to it and Denzel walked to the spot, plunged his hand down beneath the circling fish, and triumphantly raised the Emerald Crystal above his head.

The bright light on the sub began to flash the two-minute warning. Denzel carefully handed the Emerald Crystal to Doshmisi, who clutched it to her chest, as they quickly returned to the hatch and entered the decompression chamber. In a few short moments, they reentered the sub. As they emerged from the decompression chamber the others cheered. When she removed her diving suit, Doshmisi’s amulet glowed brilliantly before fading swiftly to dark.

“Put the pedal to the metal,” Denzel called to Mole, who cast him a puzzled glance.

“He means to put the sub in high gear,” Reggie explained.

“Already done, mon,” Mole replied, as he turned the sub around to head for the surface.

“How did you call those fish?” Maia asked her sister, for she felt sure that the fish had come at her sister’s bidding.

“I sent a message to the whales,” Doshmisi replied. “They must have sent the little silver fish because they told me to follow the silver.”

“Well-played,” Maia complimented her sister.

Jasper felt so relieved to have Doshmisi safely back inside the sub that he hugged her to him, not caring who saw him do it. “I’m sorry I tried to hold you back,” Jasper apologized.

“And I’m sorry I lost my temper,” Doshmisi replied. She then opened her hand to reveal the Emerald Crystal, the most purely beautiful stone any of them had ever seen.

Reggie broke the spell cast by the beauty of the Emerald Crystal when he turned his eyes anxiously to the clock. Denzel alerted them that the return would take them longer than the descent, because the sub had to fight against gravity and the pressure of the water. They had just barely enough charge left in the power pack to return to the surface. Reggie broke a sweat as he directed Mole out of the Coral Caves and up through the levels of ocean toward the surface.

 “Twenty-two left,” Jasper counted, unnecessarily, since all eyes remained glued to the clock. They had not expected to cut it this close. Sonjay felt a small measure of comfort in the knowledge that Cardamom had remained behind on the dock with the Staff of Shakabaz, prepared to attempt enchantment to assist if needed.

Maia pointed to the viewing window. “Um, what’s that stuff?” she asked. “I don’t remember seeing that on the way down.” Reggie and Mole continued to concentrate on steering the sub back to the dock at Whale Island, but the rest of the expedition team followed Maia’s gaze out the viewing window where a large tentacle swished in the water.

“Squid,” Jasper said in horror. “It looks like a giant squid.” More tentacles appeared and then a squid eye slid past the window, watching the voyagers as if studying a cluster of odd sea creatures in an aquarium. All of a sudden the sub jolted and jerked wildly, throwing them every which way against the viewing window and the floor. Mole clung to the controls and struggled to remain upright.

“We must seem like a toy to that thing,” Doshmisi speculated.

“Or a dinner,” Sonjay suggested.

“Sonjay!” Maia exclaimed in alarm.

“Just saying,” Sonjay answered.

The sub stopped jerking around just as suddenly as it had started.

“Maybe we be in luck,” Mole said hopefully. “It maybe went away.”

“Perhaps we weren’t as exciting as all that to a squid,” Doshmisi said with relief. They stood at the viewing window and searched the water for any sign of the giant squid.

“Wait, look there.” Maia pointed, and in the bright light from the sub, they could see dark black puffs billowing around them. “I think that’s squid ink.”

“That can’t be good,” Jasper commented.

“Yah mon,” Mole agreed. “Not good. It’s clogging the thrusters.” A deep grinding noise rose from underneath the sub and it began to sink downward. The water had just begun to show signs of sunlight penetrating, but that disappeared quickly as the sub dropped toward the ocean floor.

“We be needin’ to clear that ink out of the thrusters,” Mole said urgently.

“How?” Doshmisi asked.

“I don’t know,” Mole replied with a helpless expression.

“We’re running out of time,” Jasper spoke aloud the words that were in everyone’s mind.

“We’re sinking,” Reggie stated the obvious. “Don’t panic. Think.”

Changing the Prophecy Chapter 18

 

Chapter 18 The Emerald Crystal

After a few minutes, when Doshmisi could finally let go of her father, and after she had stopped crying, she greeted her brothers and sister. She gave Cardamom a warm hug. “Wow, Elena,” she said to Maia’s friend, “you must have had the surprise of your life when you popped through after the passage.”

“Surprise is an understatement,” Elena replied.

“Did you guys bring that thing with you?” Doshmisi asked, as she nodded her head uncertainly in the direction of Guhblorin.

“I can hear you,” Guhblorin said. “I’m standing right here. I’m not a thing.”

“You’re a geebaching,” Doshmisi said.

“I am?” Guhblorin asked, acting surprised. “Why didn’t someone tell me?” Elena pinched him and he hollered “Ouch!”

“I think I can guess where you landed after the passage,” Doshmisi said to Elena and her siblings.

“We didn’t land inside the Amber Mountains, if that’s what you think,” Denzel informed his sister. “We turned up outside of them. But we had to run inside immediately because we pretty much landed on a buzzing hive of Special Forces.”

“I received an interesting introduction to Faracadar,” Elena said.

“I’ll bet,” Jasper commented with a chuckle.

“We had to use one of the through-tunnels to get to the Wolf Circle,” Maia explained.

“And I followed the direction of the mold on the ceiling, just like you showed me last year,” Denzel told Jasper proudly. He had looked forward to relating this to his friend.

“Cool,” Jasper responded.

“The passage took me right to Debbie’s Circle, same field as last time, where Jasper was waiting. I don’t know why you fools couldn’t turn up in the right spot,” Doshmisi teased.

“Debbie’s Circle?” Reggie asked.

“They named it after Momma,” Maia told him.

 “Where did you wind up?” Doshmisi asked Sonjay.

“In the Final Fortress,” Sonjay replied with a quick laugh. “Just my luck. You land in a rosy field of flowers. Denzel and Maia turn up right by the Wolf Circle. And I land inside the dungeons.”

“You’re joking,” Jasper said, sympathetically.

“No lie,” Sonjay affirmed.

“How is Clover?” Cardamom asked.

“Not good,” Doshmisi replied, her expression growing serious at once.

“You tried using the herbal, of course, right?” Cardamom continued. Doshmisi didn’t reply right away because she didn’t know what to say. She hadn’t told anyone that the herbal had stopped acting normal. Fortunately, Iris entered the room at that moment and rescued her from answering the question.

“Excuse me for interrupting,” Iris said. “I have food prepared in the kitchen if you want to eat dinner. Clover is sleeping and the nurse will tend to her needs if she wakes. Please fill a plate and we can eat together outside in the courtyard at the long table.”

They helped Iris carry the food platters, plates, and utensils out to the courtyard and once everyone had settled at the wooden table, they took turns telling each other about everything that had happened to them since they had arrived in Faracadar. Sonjay and Reggie related their adventures with Crumpet and Buttercup and shared everything they had learned about the Corportons, including what Compost had said when they ate dinner with him at Big House City. Elena interrupted them to explain how they happened to sit down to dinner with Compost in the first place and all about Compost’s reformation. Denzel and Maia shared the story of the garbage labyrinth and their travels with Princess Honeydew and Biscuit. Elena insisted on describing how they met Guhblorin and his role in rescuing the others from the garbage labyrinth. They told about the siege and how Sonjay had talked Compost’s army into deserting so they could go home to eat buttered biscuits. Jasper and Doshmisi related everything they had learned from their trip to the North Coast. When they got to the part about Dagobaz, Doshmisi left the table to fetch the beautiful stallion and brought him into the courtyard for the others to admire.

“Is he an enchanted creature?” Cardamom asked, with a note of awe in his voice.

“No. He’s just a horse,” Doshmisi said. “Horses are commonplace in the Farland.”

“But what a magnificent horse!” Maia exclaimed.

“Yes,” Doshmisi agreed. “The most magnificent I have ever seen.”

“Commonplace or magnificent; we’re a moving target as long as we have that horse with us,” Jasper pointed out quietly. “He made quite a stir when we stepped off the ferry with him. People will spread the word about Dagobaz up and down the coast and throughout Big House City within a few days. I doubt the Corportons will say ‘oh well’ and let this valuable animal slip from their grasp. They’ll attempt to retrieve him.”

“They don’t deserve to have him,” Doshmisi insisted angrily.

“Of course they don’t,” Jasper agreed, “although I doubt they will see it that way. We can’t return him to them; but we need to accept the truth of it. He’ll lead them right to us, so we need to prepare ourselves.”

“Anyone who abuses an animal has no right to own an animal,” Doshmisi stated.

Sonjay looked around the table at the others. “So,” he said, “I want to say that we are all on the same page now, but I’m going to spell it out to make sure. Correct me if I get anything wrong. It looks like these Corportons came to Faracadar to drill for oil in the ocean at the North Coast. We don’t know where they came from. We don’t know what they’re capable of doing. They have guns and they will shoot to kill. The oil well that they drilled has exploded and is spilling oil into the ocean.”

“Meanwhile,” Denzel picked up where his brother had left off, “Daddy, who is a Prophet of the Khoum, has foretold the destruction of Faracadar to Sissrath who, believing this prophecy, has cut a deal with the Corportons to help them drill for oil if they take him with them when they leave.”

“We don’t know how much oil they expected to get or if they have however much they wanted,” Maia pointed out anxiously. “We don’t know when they plan to leave or how much oil they have already taken out of Faracadar.”

“There’s something else,” Doshmisi said hesitantly. “I didn’t want to cause alarm; but I have known for some time that something is wrong with the herbal. It doesn’t act right when I try to use it. It says strange things.”

“How do you mean?” Cardamom asked.

“I can’t use it to heal anymore,” Doshmisi said, her voice cracking as she spoke.

Jasper put a hand on Doshmisi’s arm reassuringly. “Whatever it’s doing is something that’s just happening and not your fault. You know that, right? What exactly does it do when you try to use it?”

“It doesn’t tell cures or medicinal recipes. It doesn’t open to words about how to heal a person. It opens to undecipherable stories about resilience and adaptability. It says cryptic things about developing resources. It acts almost as if it’s angry, as if it has given up on healing. When I placed it on Clover’s chest, it refused to open. The indentation in the top, where I usually put my amulet, became red hot and it repelled the amulet the way two polarized magnets repel each other. I couldn’t force the amulet into the indentation. The herbal resisted me.” Doshmisi’s eyes welled with tears and Jasper put his arm around her shoulders. Doshmisi continued in a quavering voice. “I think that Grandma Clover is dying and the herbal doesn’t wish to help me try to save her.”

“Your grandmother is a wise woman,” Cardamom said. “Do you think that she would not realize that she is dying if it’s her time?”

“No, no I don’t,” Doshmisi replied. “But we have not spoken of it.”

In the waning light, Iris lit one of the glow-lamps on the table and, as she leaned forward to light the other one, she said softly, “Clover has been ill for quite a while. I think she has been hanging on, waiting for all of you to arrive, because she wanted to see her grandchildren once again and after that she will feel ready to leave in peace. Not just because she loves you and has had so little opportunity to spend time with you, but also because she expects that you will protect and preserve the land, that once you have arrived here then you will keep Faracadar safe. She has waited for all of you to arrive so that she can tell you about the Emerald Crystal.”

“Emerald Crystal?” Elena repeated reverently, because it sounded like a tremendously magical thing.

Suddenly, a flurry of activity in the entranceway to the courtyard drew their attention. It was Mole! After he stumbled over a loose cobblestone and sprawled on the ground, he bounced right back up, his dreadlocks flopping gaily around his head. A half a dozen other battery makers accompanied him. They appeared grimy and travel-worn, with smudges of oil on their clothing.

Mole smiled broadly. “We found you,” he announced merrily. Jasper and Denzel leapt from the table and hurried to greet Mole. Denzel had become good friends with Mole the previous year when they invented and built things together in the battery barn at the Passage Circle.

“That you did,” Jasper said. Denzel thumped Mole on the back happily.

“You said Whale Island and here we be,” Mole told Jasper.

“We worried about you after that explosion in the compound,” Doshmisi said.

“I’m good. I brought my friends with me too,” Mole responded, as he waved his arm to encompass those who had traveled with him. “We blew up the workshop at the compound. We created that explosion to make a lot of smoke so more people could escape.”

“It sure helped us escape,” Doshmisi confirmed.

“I’m glad for that,” Mole said with satisfaction. He turned to his fellow battery makers and introduced each of them by name. Then Denzel introduced all of those who sat around the table.

After Denzel introduced her, Iris rose from her seat and came forward, took Mole’s big muscular hand in her slender one, and shook it gently. “Welcome to my home,” she greeted him.

Mole was one of the Coast People so he normally had a blue glow to his rich brown skin. But when Iris took his hand he flushed an interesting plum-colored shade of reddish-purple. After shaking her hand, he stepped backward, right into a metal bucket of rainwater. His foot stuck in the bucket and the water sloshed up onto his leg.

“Aiyeee,” he exclaimed as he leaned on the table so he could pick up his foot and remove the bucket. When he pulled the bucket off, he fell backward and sat down abruptly in a platter of potato salad.

“Oh dear,” Iris said sympathetically, as she attempted to scrape potato salad off the seat of Mole’s pants with a butter knife.

“Not a problem,” Mole said. “It’ll wash off.” The others observed in fascination as Mole swung his arm open to emphasize his point and managed to sweep a metal bowl filled with sliced mangoes and papayas off the table and onto Iris’s dress, which became instantly soaked with fruit juice. Mole then picked up a cloth napkin from the table and attempted to mop up the juice on Iris’s dress, but the napkin had mustard on it and so he made the mess worse.

Iris stepped away from Mole as she said, “Stop, stop. I’ll take care of it. Just stop.” Mole hung his head dejectedly.

“I was about to clear away the food, but do you and your friends want something to eat?” Iris asked Mole.

“No thanks, we ate on the ferry,” he mumbled as he stared at his feet.

Iris turned away from Mole and picked up an empty food platter. She began to stack dinner plates on the platter as she remarked to Doshmisi, “You should go see your grandmomma. She hasn’t much time left and she has much on her mind that she wishes to share with you now that the four of you have come. Poke your head in her room and see if she’s awake.”

Doshmisi turned quickly to go check on Clover. Maia took her hand and went with her.

“I’ll go too,” Reggie announced as he accompanied his daughters out of the courtyard and into Clover’s house. Iris trailed close behind them with the tray of empty plates. The others in the courtyard began to help Iris clear the table, carrying things inside to the kitchen.

“Let me know right away if she’s awake,” Sonjay called after his sisters.

“Me too,” Denzel added.

Doshmisi, Maia, and Reggie opened the door to Clover’s bedroom quietly and slipped inside. A glow-lamp on the nightstand cast a soft amber light across the room and a nurse sat in an overstuffed chair by the window, reading a book. Clover’s eyes fluttered open when she heard the door close behind her visitors.

“Are you awake Grandmomma?” Maia asked.

Clover smiled faintly. “Maia. How wonderful. Come here and take my hand, child.”

“Denzel and Sonjay have arrived also. We ate dinner while you slept,” Doshmisi explained. “Do you feel up to a visit from us?”

As Maia took her grandmother’s frail hand in her own, Clover looked over Maia’s shoulder at Reggie and her eyes grew wide. “Is that? Oh my. Is that you, Reggie?”

“Yes, it’s me, Rosemary,” Reggie approached the bed and, as Maia stepped back, he took both of Clover’s hands in his. He had called her by her given name, Rosemary, from her former life in the Farland. She had left that name behind many years before when she bound her fate irrevocably to maintaining the library in Faracadar.

“Where have you been?” Clover asked her son-in-law.

“Short version or long version?” Reggie asked.

“I’m afraid I may not have time for the long version,” she replied wistfully. “As you can see, my health has failed.”

“Sissrath held me as his prisoner in the Final Fortress these many years until Sonjay rescued me,” Reggie said. “While imprisoned, I became a Prophet of the Khoum.

“Remarkable. If only I had suspected that you were there, I would have sent someone to look for you,” Clover responded, as tears stood in her eyes. “Very good. Good that you are of the Khoum and good that you have returned to the children. They must complete a difficult task and it will perhaps be easier with their father here to help them. Bring the others to me. I must speak to all of you together.”

Reggie went to fetch Sonjay and Denzel. While they waited for their brothers, Maia and Doshmisi helped Clover sit up in her bed. She leaned back against an avalanche of pillows. She was gray and thin and her hair had become brittle, her skin papery. She looked so different from the vibrant and spry old lady who had met them at the dock when they arrived on Whale Island the year before.

With her eyes closed, Clover told Doshmisi quietly, “It doesn’t work anymore, does it?”

“What?” Doshmisi asked, but she knew.

“The herbal, it won’t give you healing recipes or instructions, will it?”

“No,” Doshmisi confirmed reluctantly.

“It prepares itself for a greater healing and, after that, it will leave, just like me,” Clover said. Doshmisi’s eyes filled with tears.

At that moment, Reggie returned with Denzel and Sonjay, who went directly to embrace their grandmother. Clover could barely muster the strength to lift her arms to offer them each a feeble hug.

“Oh Grandmomma Clover,” Doshmisi burst out, “is there anything I can do to heal you? The herbal won’t help. Do you know of anything? Just tell me and I’ll do it.”

“Even if the herbal worked the way it used to, it would not have any healing words for me. I have grown old and my time to leave approaches.” Maia leaned over and rested her head on Clover’s shoulder. Maia and Doshmisi cried softly, but Clover told them, “Don’t cry for me. I had a splendid, long life filled with friends and music, laughter and delicious food, surrounded by the books that I adore. I have loved and I have danced and I have watched the stars at night.”

“They’re not crying for you, Rosemary,” Reggie said gently. “They’re crying for themselves. They barely had any time with you.”

“One day, in the future, in a time of peace, come back to the library, my children, and Iris will guide you through my writings and my drawings and you will have a lot more of me than you can imagine. For now, time is short and you have much work to do if you hope to save this library and this land.”

“What kind of work?” Sonjay asked.

“The herbal,” Clover said. Then she ceased talking and rested briefly with her eyes closed. No one spoke. Maia and Doshmisi wiped their eyes and waited for their grandmother’s instructions. Iris slipped into the room and stood near the door.

“The herbal,” Clover continued with great effort, as she opened her eyes again, “will not heal people anymore. It must heal the land. A poison has spilled into the ocean and it will spread if you do not stop it. The poison has started to kill the green algae and when all the green algae dies, our air will become unfit to breathe. Heal the ocean with the herbal, Doshmisi.” Clover paused as she struggled to continue speaking. Iris sat on the edge of the bed next to Clover and took her thin wrist in her hand.

“Please explain it to us,” Doshmisi begged. “Don’t go yet.”

“I’m still here,” Clover said, although her voice sounded distant and faint. “Put the herbal in the ocean at the North Coast. Where the poison started. Near the wound in the ocean floor.”

“We can do that,” Sonjay said.

“But it needs the Emerald Crystal to work,” Clover said softly as she closed her eyes again.

“Where can we find the Emerald Crystal?” Denzel asked, urgently.

“The whales hid it in the Coral Caves for safekeeping,” Clover answered.

“The Coral Caves,” Sonjay repeated.

“Doshmisi must put the Emerald Crystal into the indentation in the cover of the herbal,” Clover instructed. She gasped for breath.

“Like I did with my amulet?” Doshmisi asked.

“Like that,” Clover whispered with great effort. “Emerald Crystal in indentation in herbal. Herbal in ocean at North Coast. Under the water. Heal the ocean. Algae. Whales…” Clover’s voice trailed off.

“This is too much for her,” Iris said anxiously. “Too much.”

Clover nodded gently and opened her eyes. “Too much is fine,” she said so faintly that they could barely hear her. She looked around at her grandchildren and Reggie. She smiled with deep satisfaction. Then she looked into Iris’s eyes and whispered, “I love you. I love you all.” Her eyes closed again but the smile did not leave her lips. She said nothing more. Iris sat quietly and held her hand.

Maia leaned over and kissed her grandmother’s forehead. Doshmisi, Denzel, and Sonjay each did the same in turn. Then they filed solemnly out of the room. Reggie followed them and closed Clover’s door behind them.

“Well, we know what we need to do,” Denzel said with resolve. “We need to go to the Coral Caves and retrieve the Emerald Crystal.”

“We have to move quickly because that oil spill is spreading,” Doshmisi reminded the others. “We need to get the Emerald Crystal as soon as possible.”

“We can leave first thing in the morning,” Sonjay announced, ready for action.

“I wonder where the Coral Caves are,” Maia said.

Reggie cleared his throat before informing them, “I happen to know exactly where they are.”

“Cool. Then you can show us how to get there,” Sonjay replied.

Reggie continued, “I know where they are, but I have no idea how to get there. They’re underneath Whale Island, at the bottom of the ocean.”

Changing the Prophecy Chapter 17

 

Chapter 17 Reunion

In her ignorance of the history of Faracadar, Elena was the only person in all of Big House City to believe that Compost had genuinely decided to become a reformed individual. Everyone else perceived him as a dangerous enemy and he had certainly earned that reputation. Hadn’t he just laid siege to Big House City for many weeks at Sissrath’s command, threatening the lives of the royal family? Everyone but Elena had no doubt that he belonged in prison. They did, however, allow him to take a bath, and afterward Elena cut his hair close to his head. She provided him with a clean set of clothing, helped him trim his nails, and convinced him to rub cocoa butter moisturizer on his ashy skin. After his makeover, his own mother would not have recognized him. His captors feared him less than they would have if he had the ability to use enchantment. Only some of the Mountain People could use enchantment and Compost was not a person with this ability.

Once she had helped Compost improve his appearance and personal grooming, Elena introduced herself to the royal cooks and kitchen staff and arranged to use the kitchen to prepare a traditional Mexican meal as best as she could with the ingredients that she could find at hand. She enlisted Guhblorin as her kitchen assistant and didn’t complain when he taste-tested the ingredients (especially the chocolate).

While Elena kept busy transforming Compost’s hygiene habits and establishing a makeshift taqueria in the royal kitchen, Denzel, Maia, and Honeydew met with the great enchanter Cardamom and Honeydew’s parents to sort through the information they had and to chart a course of action. They wondered why Doshmisi had instructed them not to go to the North Coast, but instead to meet her on Whale Island, when obviously something serious was happening at the North Coast. The news that Sonjay had joined forces with a Prophet of the Khoum caused much excitement among those with an understanding of what that meant. But where had Sonjay locomotaported from? Everyone was worried about Sissrath’s activities and whereabouts because they knew how much damage he could do. After much discussion, Denzel concluded, “We need more information, especially about Sissrath.”

“Only one person here in Big House City has more information about Sissrath,” Maia said.

“We have to question him,” Honeydew agreed.

“Your friend Elena should do it,” High Chieftess Saffron suggested. “She has a rapport with him. I think he would speak to her about Sissrath to prove to her that he seriously wishes to change, whether he actually does or not, which, of course, is questionable.”

“She’s too busy cooking dinner for him to interrogate him,” Denzel reminded them, unable to keep the irritation out of his voice.

“She’s cooking dinner for all of us,” Maia reminded him.

“I’ll go to the kitchen and invite her to join our conversation,” Saffron offered.

Saffron proceeded down the back stairs to the kitchen where she found Elena with her thick hair pulled back in a ponytail and her hands covered in cornmeal. Guhblorin mashed avocados in a large bowl while nibbling on a hot chili pepper, which had turned his ears bright red. “Ay Caramba!” he exclaimed after each nibble of spicy chili pepper.

“It smells delicious in here,” Saffron greeted Elena.

“I’m just getting started,” Elena responded cheerfully, clearly in her element in the kitchen. “I love this.” Her eyes glowed brightly.

“I’ve come to request that you join us for a few minutes to discuss a delicate matter,” Saffron informed her.

Elena frowned as she brushed a stray hair back from her forehead with the back of her hand and left a smudge of cornmeal on her face. “Now?”

Saffron picked up a towel and wiped the cornmeal smudge off Elena’s face. “Wash your hands and please come with me. This won’t take long.”

Elena washed up, removed her apron, and warned Guhblorin not to eat too many chilies, before following Saffron up the stairs into the council chamber.

“What’s up?” she asked as she approached the others gathered around the council table.

“Would you please help us?” Cardamom asked.

“Me?” Elena replied as her eyes grew wide. She wondered what they imagined she could do.

“Let me break it down for you,” Cardamom continued. “We need to figure out what Sissrath is doing and why. He’s extremely dangerous, extremely powerful, extremely clever, and perfectly capable of destroying the whole land. As one of Sissrath’s most high-level commanders, Compost has valuable knowledge about Sissrath’s activities. We need him to share that knowledge with us.”

“He was one of Sissrath’s commanders,” Elena corrected firmly. “Was. He gave all that up. He doesn’t work for Sissrath anymore.”

“So he says,” Honeydew responded skeptically.

“And so he means,” Elena insisted stubbornly. “I believe that people can change. He’s trying to become a different person, a better person.”

“You haven’t gone through everything with him that we’ve gone through,” Maia explained.

“Last year he tried to kill us,” Denzel said. “He commanded the Special Forces when they burned the Passage Circle to the ground. You didn’t see what the Passage Circle looked like after that attack, or what it looked like before they destroyed it. Compost put us in the garbage labyrinth, remember? And he tried to starve this entire city to death. Tell me one thing he has done to make me believe that he has changed.”

Elena gazed around the room at the expectant faces of those gathered there. “Because I am new here, I don’t have any preconceived notions about people in this place, no stereotypic perceptions of what Mountain People are like or not like, or what geebachings are like or not like. So I just see Guhblorin as he is, as he’s trying to be. Same with Compost. I don’t know about Compost’s past, I see him for who he is now, who he’s trying to be now. As an observer, it appears to me that Compost’s people from the High Mountains have been mistreated and disrespected. Perhaps if he and his people were treated better then he would have behaved differently.”

“It takes time to build trust,” Saffron said. “And we don’t have the luxury of time for that in this moment. We need information about Sissrath’s activities now. Please help us convince Compost to tell us what he knows about Sissrath.”

Elena studied the others as she considered Saffron’s request. “I would be willing to ask him politely for information if you would be willing to invite him to sit down to dinner with us tonight in the dining hall.”

“Invite him to dinner?! But he’s my swollen enemy because of the crimes he has comittated,” Hyacinth pronounced sternly.

“Qué?” Elena asked.

“Daddy means that he can’t forgive Compost that easily for the horrible things he has done, such as trying to kill him,” Honeydew explained.

Elena crossed her arms. “Well, everybody has a choice. We can either keep doing things the same way and keep seeing things the same way, or we can open our minds to new possibilities. If you keep doing things the same way then you’ll probably spend the rest of your lives fighting. Mountain People. Big House City people. Fight, fight, fight. Battles. Sieges. Burning down circles. What if you could agree to a compromise and the Mountain People could agree to a compromise and you could make a peaceful place for your children? Everyone will have to give up things they don’t want to give up. That’s how compromise works.” Elena shrugged. “That’s my opinion. It’s your land. Do what you want. But I think forgiveness will serve you better than revenge and holding grudges. If you want me, you’ll find me in the kitchen.”

As Maia watched Elena leave the council chamber, she felt a rush of affection for her friend. At the same time, she knew that Elena had simplified things in her mind because she didn’t know the history of Faracadar and she had never seen Sissrath, the leader of the so-called dissatisfied people of the Mountain Downs, commander of the Special Forces, Compost’s boss, and the most malevolent individual she had ever encountered. She wanted to defend Elena’s position, but she could not believe that Compost had transformed himself into a harmless player in the unfolding events. She knew what he was capable of.

“Theoretically, she’s right, you know,” Saffron said, with a sigh.

“Theoretically,” Hyacinth echoed.

“But not realistically. She has this fantasy that we can make a truce with Sissrath, and we know he’s just not a truce-making sort of guy,” Denzel reminded them. The previous year, Sissrath had shot Denzel, his siblings, and all of their closest friends with poison darts and they would have died if not for Sonjay calling the Staff of Shakabaz to him and using it to save their lives just in the nick of time. After that, Sissrath ran away. Denzel did not look forward to another encounter with the powerful enchanter, who appeared devoid of any human attachments or affections.

“To get what we want, I think we need to honor Elena’s request,” Saffron said.

“Guess who’s coming to dinner,” Maia said to Denzel. It was a joke. Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? was the title of an old Sidney Poitier, Katherine Hepburn, and Spencer Tracey movie about a white woman who fell in love with a black man and brought him home to meet her parents. Denzel shook his head and smiled weakly.

“I’ll send a message to Compost that his presence is desired at dinner,” Cardamom said. The council meeting dissolved and Saffron headed for the kitchen to inform Elena of their decision.

They reassembled at a long wooden table in the dining room that evening. Hyacinth and Saffron dressed up for the occasion and they appeared spectacularly royal in deep-purple velvet robes trimmed with silver braid.

Eight ferocious-looking guards escorted Compost from his cell to the royal dining room. He appeared in a mustard-yellow suit with a black shirt; and the dramatic change in his appearance shocked the others. His feet remained shackled, forcing him to shuffle to the table. After Compost sat, a guard chained his left wrist to his chair, forged from heavy metal, unlike the other dining room chairs, constructed from artfully carved wood. When Elena emerged from the kitchen with Guhblorin to join the others, she took one look at Compost, and glared sternly at everyone else seated around the table. Guhblorin flapped his ears uncomfortably and hid behind Elena.

“What?” Denzel demanded. “What do you have a problem with now?”

“You must treat a dinner guest with respect. You don’t chain a dinner guest to his chair. I will not bring a single tortilla out here until you release him,” Elena announced.

“Release him?” Hyacinth asked incredulously.

“Release him?” Honeydew and Denzel echoed.

“Unchain him,” Elena demanded.

Everyone looked around at everyone else uncertainly before Saffron instructed the guards to release Compost from his chains. The guards stepped forward and unlocked the chain at his wrist and removed the manacles from his feet.

“And bring him a comfy chair like ours,” Elena ordered. Honeydew reluctantly rose and fetched a carved wooden chair with a cushioned seat from against the wall and brought it over to Compost.

Compost thanked her politely.

Elena seated herself between Compost and Guhblorin. “Tell them,” Elena said to Compost. “Before we eat, tell them what they don’t read in the history books. Tell them what you told me.”

Compost replied, “I think they know Elena. They just don’t want to know.”

“Don’t assume. Tell it,” Elena demanded. “Explain why your people feel slighted and mistreated. Tell about the long-ago time.”

“Yes, tell me about that,” Denzel interjected. “I would like to hear about that.” He couldn’t imagine what type of explanation Compost might have given to Elena, what stories he had fabricated about the past.

“At one time,” Compost commenced as he looked down self-consciously, “the Mountain People did not live in one place. We wandered with the seasons and set up camp in small groups throughout the land.” He glanced around at the others. “We didn’t believe that land belonged to particular people. It belonged to all of us and we had enough of it to share. But the other people saw things differently and didn’t like our groups when we arrived for our seasonal encampments in their settlements. They forced us into the mountains and contained us on barren land where we had difficulty finding or producing food. Before that time, we had eaten no meat, but soon our circumstances forced us to eat meat to survive. At least we retained control of our own community in the mountains, even if we had been banished from the rest of the land and ostracized. Since that time, my people have continued to feel disenfranchised and discriminated against.”

“That’s a peculiar way to describe the relocation,” Cardamom commented.

“Peculiar to you but that’s how my people see it,” Compost snapped.

“Obviously there is more to say on this subject, but let’s eat before everything gets cold,” Elena said, as she gave a sign to the kitchen staff, who then brought in trays of food that smelled delicious. Elena had cooked goose-chicken enchiladas with mole sauce as well as bean-and-cheese enchiladas with a vegetarian mole sauce. She had made chili relleno casserole, guacamole, shredded lettuce with tomatoes and cilantro, Spanish rice, and three kinds of salsa. She had prepared pitchers of sweet horchata (rice water) as well as strawberry juice. The conversation disintegrated into yummy sounds and compliments to the chef.

When Hyacinth finally stopped eating long enough to speak, and opened his mouth to say something, he did not have a chance to utter a single mangled word because the doors to the dining hall burst open and in strolled Sonjay with the others who had escaped the Final Fortress, accompanied by an escort of more than a dozen hoverboarding intuits and the colorful flash of Bayard Rustin’s feathers.

Everyone stared in amazement.

“Just in time for dinner, as usual,” Maia declared. Then her gaze fell on the strange man with the dreadlocks who had arrived with Sonjay. He looked sort of familiar to her, but she couldn’t place where she might have seen him before. Bayard flew to her and perched on her shoulder as he eyed the dinner table, searching for berries.

“Good thing we made so much food,” Elena commented to Guhblorin quietly.

“Enough for everyone,” Guhblorin answered.

“You’ve been upstaged,” Compost said to Elena. “Frankly, that one gets on my nerves.”

“Be good,” Elena warned him.

The intuits stepped down from their hoverboards and dropped to the floor in exhaustion. The guards surrounded Compost to ensure that he didn’t try to escape in the midst of the excitement, but he didn’t seem inclined to go anywhere. He continued to shovel large forkfuls of Elena’s goose-chicken in mole sauce into his mouth as he pointedly ignored the new arrivals.

“Is that?” Denzel managed to whisper, before he choked up, unable to go on. Denzel’s chest felt tight and he feared saying another word because he thought he would start crying in front of everyone.

“Our father,” Sonjay confirmed. “I found him. Sissrath imprisoned him in the Final Fortress. I turned up at the Final Fortress after the passage. I always knew our father was there.”

At the sight of Denzel and Maia, Reggie’s face collapsed with emotion and his shoulders heaved. Large tears rolled down his cheeks. Denzel raced over to Reggie, who, sobbing, seized him in an enormous bear hug. Bayard leapt off her shoulder as Maia also ran to her father, who embraced her as well. Maia burst into tears and Denzel, struggling not to cry, clung to Reggie.

Compost continued to focus on his dinner plate as he leaned close to Elena and said, “This is all very touching, but what’s for dessert?”

Elena glared at him. “Listen,” she said, “I have stuck my neck out for you to give you a chance to clean up your act. Behave or I’ll have them chain your feet together again and laugh at you when you fall on your face trying to walk.”

“OK, OK,” Compost said, attempting to appease her. “I’m trying.”

“Try harder,” Elena told him. “The suit looks good but the suit does not make the man.”

A great deal of hugging and laughter ensued and then Denzel and Hyacinth began pulling chairs to the table for the weary travelers. Crumpet smacked his younger brother Cardamom on the back while Saffron greeted Buttercup. Reggie remained locked in a tearful embrace with Maia. Sonjay asked Hyacinth if he would have some of his house staff tend to the exhausted intuits, who had used every ounce of their strength to fly Sonjay, Crumpet, Buttercup, and Reggie to Big House City. Amid the bustle and laughter and excitement, no one had yet noticed Elena’s dinner companion until Sonjay spoke up.

“Do I know you?” Sonjay remarked to Compost. “You look familiar.”

“Compost,” Denzel replied. “He’s friends with Elena now.”

“You’re joking!” Sonjay exclaimed.

“It’s a long story,” his brother said.

“Is that a geebaching?” Crumpet asked, pointing at Guhblorin.

“That’s a long story too,” Denzel informed Crumpet. “He’s also friends with Elena.”

“Is she collecting dangerous creatures?” Sonjay asked.

“Don’t be rude,” Elena admonished.

“We all have a lot of explaining to do,” Cardamom noted. “We can do so while we continue with this tasty dinner that Elena cooked for us.”

“I don’t suppose you cooked any meat,” Crumpet speculated mournfully.

“As a matter of fact,” Elena informed him with a grin, “you’ll find plenty of fat pieces of goose-chicken in this tray of enchiladas con mole.”

“Woo-hoo!” Crumpet rejoiced.

“Now you’re talking, girlfriend,” Buttercup added happily as she plopped her ample bottom into a chair and pulled close to the table.

Interrupting one another and speaking animatedly between mouthfuls, Sonjay and Crumpet shared what they knew about the Corportons at the Final Fortress, Elena introduced the reformed Compost (with a stern glance in his direction to remind him to behave) and explained why a geebaching sat at her right hand, Honeydew and Denzel repeated the information provided in Elena’s phone call with Doshmisi, and Hyacinth (in his strange way of speaking and with help from his wife and daughter) described the siege.

Cardamom showed Sonjay the enchanted box he had made as a receptacle for the Staff of Shakabaz. After Sonjay had reclaimed the Staff from Sissrath the previous year, he had left it with Cardamom for safekeeping. The box, artfully decorated with seashells, measured about the size of a loaf of bread. Cardamom demonstrated how he could open the lid and lift the Staff out until it stood at its full height and weight, and then how he could collapse the Staff back into the box.

Elena, who had never seen the splendid Staff before, could not tear her eyes from it when Cardamom revealed it. The polished, shiny, carved wooden branch bulged at the top, as thick around as the upper arm of a muscular man, and it tapered down to a thickness of no more than the wrist of a young girl at the bottom. Bristling red, yellow, blue, and green feathers graced the top of the Staff, where wooden struts held them in place within a weave of jute. Below the feathers, strings of small shells hung in a cascade. The many faces of people and animals carved into the wood of the Staff peeked out from wooden strands that entwined around the main branch like vines or smaller branches. When removed from the enchanted box, the Staff stood more than nine feet in height. “Muy bonita,” Elena said softly, “beautiful.”

“And extremely powerful,” Compost informed her.

As Cardamom returned the Staff to its enchanted box, the others around the table fell silent. Into that silence, Buttercup announced, “Reggie is a Prophet of the Khoum.”

“For real?” Honeydew asked, her eyes growing wide with astonishment.

“How?” Cardamom demanded.

“As in the High Shaman of the Khoum? With the Mystical Book?” Saffron asked.

“How totally fondue!” Hyacinth exclaimed. The others promptly ignored him because fondue was a melted cheese appetizer and no one had any idea what he really meant to say. Compost muttered to Elena, “And this man is our high chief. It makes me want to holler.”

Reggie explained how he came by the book and learned how to use it, Honeydew explained what the Prophet of the Khoum was all about for those who didn’t know and, finally, Sonjay shared with the others the prophecy about the destruction of Faracadar and the deal that Sissrath had apparently made with the Corportons whereby they agreed to take him out of Faracadar with them when they left.

“Does anyone know why the Corportons came to Faracadar in the first place?” Sonjay asked. The question hung in the air, begging a response. But none arrived.

Slowly, all eyes turned toward Compost, who patted his belly contentedly between noisy sips of horchata. The center of attention, Compost asked, “Could anyone else go for an espresso right about now?” Elena kicked him under the table. He winced and shot her a reproachful look.

Cardamom addressed Compost. “Your new friend Elena believes that you have made a serious commitment to changing your life. Perhaps you could demonstrate just how serious by sharing with us any useful information you have about Sissrath’s intentions and the purpose of the Corportons.”

Compost cast his gaze over the others at the table.

“Now would be a good time to share that information,” Sonjay said.

Compost turned to Elena and asked, bitterly, “Do you hear that tone?”

“I hear it,” she replied. “But you can’t tell me that you don’t deserve it after the nasty things you’ve done. Be gracious. If you know something that would help us defeat this Sissrath character, then please tell us,” Elena requested politely.

“I happen to be extremely intelligent,” Compost said, raising his voice to make sure everyone heard him. “And I find it insulting when people talk down to me as if I’m stupid.”

“A lot depends on how you use your intelligence,” Guhblorin piped up. “I happen to be an extremely funny geebaching, but if I use laughter to kill people, what good is my talent to me or to anyone else? How do you use your intelligence?”

Compost studied Guhblorin in surprise. Everyone else held their tongue. Compost leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “You’ve already figured out most of what I know. The Prophet of the Khoum has prophesied the destruction of Faracadar. When the Corportons appeared at the Final Fortress, Sissrath negotiated an agreement with them. He will help them on their mission here in Faracadar and in return they will take him with them when they leave. Sissrath bound the agreement with deep enchantment. We all know the strength of his diabolical skill at that.” Compost’s voice dripped with irony.

Those gathered at the table had never heard Compost speak about Sissrath with such dislike before. It shocked them.

“What about you?” Sonjay asked. “Did Sissrath plan to leave you behind in this supposedly dying land?”

“No,” Compost answered, “he did not. Or so he told me. He negotiated for me to leave with him. But honestly, I never planned to go.”

“Why not?” Elena asked in surprise. “I mean, if you believe the prophecy about the destruction.”

“I do believe it,” Compost said, with uncharacteristic sadness. “But why would I want to go anywhere else? Would you do it? I have a family and friends whom I left behind in the Mountain Downs. If the land dies, I don’t wish to survive everyone and everything in my community. I would just as soon perish with all the rest, here at home. I didn’t share these thoughts with Sissrath. He doesn’t know that I did not plan to leave with him when the time came. What joy would I have in a life so far from my home?”

The others contemplated Compost’s words in silence until Saffron stated, softly, “I always thought you were Sissrath’s man to the core.”

“You thought wrong,” Compost informed her matter-of-factly. Then he sighed and put his fork down on his plate. “Have you ever considered how things look from my point of view? What good am I? I can’t throw enchantments. So I have to work for someone who can. Admit it:  You would never trust me because I come from the Mountain Downs. I have had only one path open to me to gain power. Only one way for me to help my people have a say in the significant decisions of the land. Those of us from the Mountain Downs do tire of being demonized by you. You could give it a rest, you know.” Saffron and Hyacinth furrowed their brows in thought and Maia wondered if they were reconsidering their treatment of the Mountain People who lived in the Downs.

Compost continued, “I wonder if Sissrath will live to regret leaving Faracadar. The Corportons come from a land fighting for its survival. They need this stuff that they came here to take. I don’t know what they call the stuff; but they need it desperately to save their own land and they somehow figured out that we have it so they came to Faracadar to get it. Sissrath has helped them to mine this substance at the North Coast. When they have enough of it then they’ll go home and they’ll take Sissrath with them. You and I and everyone else will remain behind to live out the prophecy, which, as Reggie will tell you, foretells the destruction of the land but not exactly how that will occur.”

“He has that right,” Reggie added. “I can see the destruction but can’t see exactly how it will come about. I know for sure, however, that a prophecy through the way of the Mystical Book never lies, it always comes to pass.”

“Why did Sissrath order the siege of Big House City?” Cardamom asked.

“It meant nothing,” Compost replied. “Absolutely nothing. Sissrath wanted to distract you, the royals, and everyone else in order to keep you out from under foot so that he could help the Corportons at the North Coast without interference. But then the Four turned up and started turning over rocks and asking questions.”

“So now what do we do?” Reggie posed the question on everyone’s mind.

“We have to meet Dosh and Jasper on Whale Island. They’ve been to the North Coast and they know more about all this than any of us,” Sonjay replied immediately.

“We got separated during the passage into the land,” Denzel told his father.

“I gathered as much from Sonjay,” Reggie answered.

“But we need to get back together,” Maia said. “Who will go to Whale Island?”

“I’ve come with you this far and I refuse to leave you now,” Elena insisted firmly.

“What she said,” Guhblorin agreed.

“I have to see my daughter,” Reggie said simply. “So I’m in.”

Sonjay placed his hand on the box that contained the Staff of Shakabaz. “We could sure use you with us, Cardamom.”

Cardamom nodded in Sonjay’s direction and they understood from the nod that he had just agreed to go with them. Then Cardamom said, “The high chief and chieftess should remain safely within the walls of Big House City; at least until we have more information about the situation.”

“Count me in,” Honeydew said. “I’ll go.”

“Princess, I think the people need you safely at home with your parents right now,” Cardamom told her gently. Honeydew stamped her foot stubbornly. “No, no, no,” she complained in frustration. Bisc stood and licked her hand comfortingly.

Buttercup spoke up. “How about this? Crumpet and I will remain here at Big House City with the royals.” She patted Honeydew’s arm sympathetically. “But when you’re ready to head for the North Coast, send us a messenger and Crumpet and I will join you at the Passage Circle to travel with you. At such time, the princess will accompany us.”

“I advise against that,” Cardamom noted.

“Saffron?” Hyacinth deferred to his wife.

“We will all join you at the Passage Circle,” Saffron said decidedly. “If the land is in such grave danger then we have no reason to hide in the Big House.” Honeydew was not happy to be left behind, but she agreed to that plan.

Elena rose from her seat abruptly and went into the kitchen to fetch dessert, which was chocolate raspberry flan and sweet pumpkin empanadas.

Between luscious mouthfuls, Sonjay complimented Elena, “Girl, you seriously know how to throw down.”

“Absolutely,” Reggie agreed. “You put your foot in it.”

“What does that mean?” Elena asked Reggie.

Reggie laughed as he explained, “They use that expression back home where I come from. It means that you cooked an exceptional meal.”

 “Bueno. Gracias,” Elena said with a modest smile.

Hyacinth beckoned to the guards, who came forward and surrounded Compost. “Time to return the prisoner to his cell,” Hyacinth commanded.

“Wait,” Compost said as he held up a hand to stay the guards. “I have one other thing to share with you. It may help you against Sissrath.” Denzel’s eyebrows shot up in surprise and he thought maybe Compost really had started to change.

“Speak,” Cardamom encouraged Compost.

“Sissrath has a phobia about cockroaches,” Compost announced.

“How can that help us?” Sonjay asked impatiently.

“Hear him out,” Elena cautioned.

“You have no idea,” Compost continued speaking, with a raspy chuckle. “He has tried to conquer this phobia unsuccessfully. He has brought healers and enchanters to him and ordered them to remove this fear from him. None could do it and he put them all to death one by one because he thought to keep his weakness a secret. He doesn’t know that I know about it. I am probably the only person alive who knows. When he sees a cockroach, he chokes. He has trouble throwing an enchantment in the presence of a cockroach. He can barely breathe. If you put a cockroach in his path then you will have a chance of overpowering him.”

“Brilliant,” Crumpet declared. He stretched out his arm, said an enchantment, and an army of cockroaches began to drop from his sleeve and march across the floor.

“Ewww!” Elena exclaimed in disgust. Many of the others swiftly echoed with “ewwws” of their own.

“Put those away,” Saffron demanded. “I run a clean Big House here.”

“As you wish,” Crumpet said. He made three large circles in the air with his left hand and stretched his fingers out toward the cockroaches he had unleashed. They disappeared in a puff of orange-brown smoke.

“That trick will come in quite handy,” Compost told Crumpet. “Trust me on that.”

“We do trust you,” Elena replied. “Don’t we?” she asked the others, who muttered and sidestepped the question.

 “We must remember our manners, people,” Elena asserted. “Gracias for the good information, Compost. I will leave in the morning, but I hope to return to see you again, mí amigo.” She hugged Compost, who patted her on the head affectionately.

“What’s up with them?” Sonjay asked Denzel, as the guards led Compost away to lock him up.

“She likes him,” Denzel replied with a shrug. “She talked him into taking a bath. Go figure.”

“So, is she your girlfriend yet?” Sonjay teased.

“Shut up,” Denzel replied, while secretly he admitted to himself that he had grown fond of Elena. She had more substance to her than he had previously realized.

With the meal over, everyone prepared to retire to their rooms. Reggie hugged each of his children in turn and then burst into tears again. “I have imagined myself kissing you goodnight so often. I have longed for the privilege of doing so. This simple thing. To do it now feels like a miracle.”

Both residents and guests at the Big House slept well in their comfortable beds that night. They dreamt of chocolate flan and woke up refreshed and ready for whatever challenges they would need to face in the coming days.

Sonjay, Maia, Denzel, Elena, Guhblorin, Cardamom, and Reggie rode out on their tigers right after breakfast, and made the Passage Circle by nightfall. After a joyful reunion with her drummer friends, Maia stayed up half the night drumming on the beach. Early the next morning the travelers rode over the first ocean bridge and onto the first of the islands. Maia shared a tiger with Reggie, who held her and kept her from falling off while she leaned back into her father’s arms with a contented smile on her face as she caught up on the sleep she had lost the night before while drumming. The travelers arrived by ferry at the dock on Whale Island in the late afternoon, well before sunset, and Cardamom led the way to Clover’s house at the library. The Goodacres’ grandmother (the mother of Alice, Martin, Bobby, and Debbie), Clover the Griot, had served as keeper of the history and manager of the library for many years.

The library compound consisted of a central courtyard surrounded by cottages. The cottages housed the books and other library holdings. Clover lived in one of the cottages, which she shared with her assistant, Iris. Her grandchildren had visited her at her cottage the year before. In the courtyard, the travelers dismounted from their tigers and hurried to her door. They knocked and then entered, comfortable doing so in their grandmother’s house.

When the travelers appeared in the cottage, Jasper jumped up from where he sat on the couch studying maps and ran to greet them. He grabbed Denzel first in an enthusiastic hug and thumped him on the back. “Where did you land after the passage?” he asked.

“Long story,” Denzel replied. “I missed you, man. I have so much to tell you.”

Jasper released Denzel and flung his arms around Maia, then Sonjay, in turn. “I have a lot to tell you too,” Jasper said. “Say, who are these guys? Whoa, is that a geebaching?”

“Why does everyone make such a big deal about the geebaching?” Elena exploded. “Duh. Sí. Yes. He’s a geebaching. His name is Guhblorin. Don’t judge.”

Unfamiliar with Elena’s straightforward style, Jasper threw a look of hurt and puzzlement in her direction. He put his hands up, palms outward, in a gesture of defense while Bayard squawked, “Latina firecracker, Latina firecracker.”

“Elena, chill,” Denzel said. “It’s surprising and worrisome for people in Faracadar to see a geebaching. Aight? Geebachings have a bad rep. Get over it.”

Elena scowled as she informed Jasper, “He’s a reformed geebaching. He doesn’t make people laugh to death.”

“No, these days I just make them laugh until they wet their pants,” Guhblorin interjected.

Elena whirled around and yanked hard on his ear, “Enough out of you. Don’t make matters worse. And that wasn’t even funny.”

Guhblorin yelped. “I must be losing my touch,” he said contritely.

“Let me introduce you to our dad, Reggie,” Sonjay said to Jasper. Then he turned to Reggie and explained, “Jasper went everywhere with us last year as our guide.”

“You found your dad!” Jasper exclaimed. “Fantastic.”

“Is my daughter here?” Reggie asked anxiously.

“Your daughter,” Jasper echoed. “Wait right here.” Jasper turned abruptly and hurried down the hallway to Clover’s bedroom, calling as he went, “Dosh! Dosh! Come out here. You won’t believe this.”

Doshmisi emerged from the room with a startled expression. Jasper took her hand and led her to where the others waited. Of the four Goodacre children, she alone remembered her father well enough from before he had disappeared to recognize him instantly when she saw him again. They blinked at each other in astonishment in Clover’s bright living room and then Doshmisi ran to Reggie and collapsed into his arms, crying and laughing both at the same time. “Daddy. It’s really you. Oh Daddy.”

“I thought I would never see you again, baby girl,” Reggie said. He looked over Doshmisi’s shoulder and his gaze fell on each of his children, one at a time. “I thought I would never see any of you again. I thought it impossible.”

“Yes, well, we changed all that, didn’t we?” Sonjay stated with satisfaction. “Impossible happens.”