Changing the Prophecy Chapter 24

 

Chapter 24 The Work of the Herbal

Doshmisi rode off toward the ocean through the open gate. Elena (with Guhblorin clinging to her) and Maia followed Doshmisi out the gate and toward the water, but Dagobaz swiftly left them trailing behind. By this time, the air had grown thick and oily. Doshmisi had never had asthma, so she didn’t know what an asthma attack actually felt like, but she imagined it felt like trying to breathe the thick, oily air that surrounded her. She had to force the oxygen into her lungs and it seemed as though the air left a sticky film inside her chest with each breath. Dagobaz wheezed and had to slow down. Doshmisi went over Clover’s instructions again in her mind. Clover had said to put the Emerald Crystal into the indentation in the cover of the herbal and then to place the herbal under the water at the edge of the ocean near the oil spill. She hoped that the others had managed to keep the Corportons imprisoned inside the compound and that Sissrath had not shaken free; but restraining Sissrath was someone else’s job. Doshmisi’s job was to get the Emerald Crystal into the herbal and into the ocean.

Dagobaz clambered up a low hill, crowned the top of it, and came to an abrupt halt. They had reached the shoreline and the sandy beach fell away from them toward the water. Dark green-black slime embedded with mounds of dead fish and birds coated the beach, emitting a stench that smelled like burning tires and rotten seaweed. Dagobaz whinnied and shied away from stepping onto the foul sand. The once-green ocean appeared even worse than the beach. A film of filth and oil floated atop the water. The bodies of dead dolphins, birds, and other marine life drifted in the water and dotted the shore. Dagobaz tossed his head and stepped back and forth at the edge of the sand, half-screaming his outrage and terror at what lay at his feet.

“It’s OK,” Doshmisi soothed the horse as she stroked his neck. “You don’t have to step onto the beach. Just let me off. I’ll go.” Dagobaz stood still and Doshmisi slipped off his back. He nudged her with his head. They both wheezed as they tried to breathe the awful air. The speed with which the air had deteriorated without the algae to clean it astonished Doshmisi. She cringed at the odor of rank oil, rotten seaweed, and death, as she stepped onto the greasy sand, immediately slipping and falling as she slid along in the disgusting filth so that it coated her backside and her hands. She gagged, which made it even more difficult to breathe. She tried to stand, but kept sliding. Meanwhile, Dagobaz paced back and forth like a caged panther at the edge of the sand, whinnying plaintively and bobbing his head up and down. Maia, Elena, and Guhblorin soon appeared beside him. Their tigers also balked at the edge of the tainted beach and refused to set foot on it.

Doshmisi crawled toward the ocean on her hands and knees. It was the only way she could move through the muck. She did her best to avoid the multitude of dead fish and oil-coated bird carcasses, but she could not help touching some of them as she made her way across the beach. It seemed like it took her an hour to reach the water. She felt as if she was running in slow motion in a dream.

From where they stood at the edge of the sand, Maia and Elena sang a song in Spanish. Doshmisi didn’t know what the words meant, but the song lifted her spirits. The singing voices harmonized beautifully. She imagined that they told her she could do this. The song strengthened her resolve and assisted her in the dreadful trek across the ruined beach. Her amulet glowed incandescent green, bursting forth from her shirt with rays of light.

At last she knelt at the edge of the soiled ocean. Her hands, coated in oil embedded with sand, shook uncontrollably. She fumbled with the clasp on the carrycase for the herbal and managed to open it. She wondered if she would ever in her life be completely clean again. She took the enchanted book from the carrycase. By this time it had become smudged with oil. It made her sad to see it so dirty. The oil on her hands left streaks of grease on the Emerald Crystal when she removed it from her pocket. She clung to it to prevent it from slipping from her grasp. Then she firmly placed it into the indentation in the front cover of the book in the place where she had often placed her amulet in the past to activate the herbal.

As it did whenever she put her amulet into the indentation, the herbal began to glow with green light, which comforted Doshmisi. It cheered her to see something so bright and clean. The herbal flew open and revealed to her the following instructions:  Sing the algae home. Sing along the coast on the beaches. The more singers, the stronger the song, the stronger the pull for the algae. Even those not at the water’s edge should sing. Anyone can add to the song, from anywhere. Call the algae home across the water. It will take many songs, many voices, for this healing. The energy embedded in these pages will always gravitate to your efforts and will continue to be one with the healer.

It seemed as if the herbal had become a living creature and she sensed that it had chosen to say farewell to her with these parting words. She tenderly placed the herbal, with the Emerald Crystal in the cover, under the water and pushed it out from the shoreline. The green glow from the Emerald Crystal grew and rose above the oil-black surface of the water. A bolt of green lightning crackled in the sky and shot down to meet the herbal. A hum began to sound across the water. It grew in intensity, a single tone, growing louder and vibrating with sound. As she heard it, Doshmisi flashed on the knowledge of what it would mean to sing home the algae. Everyone would have to sing one note like this vibrating sound, everyone together.

Slowly the sand beneath Doshmisi began to slide, as if the ground had become a blanket on which she sat and someone had begun to pull the blanket out from under her. The oil that coated the beach slipped like an enormous stretch of fabric, moving toward the herbal, picking up speed. Doshmisi struggled to scramble up the beach, away from the water. The oil slick continued to slide beneath her as the herbal sucked it in. At the same time, the herbal sucked in the oil that spread across the water. The oil rushed toward the Emerald Crystal and the herbal faster and faster. The green light emanating from the herbal grew into a large cloud that resembled smoke and it surrounded the area where the herbal lay submerged in the ocean. Lightning continued to crackle in the sky above and occasionally a lightning bolt shot down and zapped the herbal, which sparked with red, blue, and green light.

The oil, the carcasses of dead birds and fish, and everything in the whole abysmal mess gradually glided to the spot where the herbal rested under the water. Before long, pieces of metal from the oil rig began to appear sliding across the surface of the water, and the herbal sucked them into it also. The herbal had formed a vortex that became larger and larger as it drew all the nasty consequences of the oil spill to it, sucking them in like a magnet.

Then, to her fascination and horror, Doshmisi saw Corportons begin to appear on the rise at the edge of the beach. The Corportons rolled and tumbled uncontrollably across the sand. Dagobaz had walked further down the beach as it had cleared and the magnificent horse tossed his head and retreated from the stream of Corportons appearing over the rise.

As the vortex created by the herbal sucked the Corportons down the beach, they tried desperately to grab hold of anything in their path. They grasped for the scrubby bristles of oil-coated beach plants and tried to gain purchase on slick dolphin carcasses. But the things they tried to hold on to were being sucked down the beach along with them. Miraculously, the vortex did not pull Doshmisi into the herbal under the water. With an eerie feeling of safety amidst the chaos, she watched all the things around her as they flew to the ocean’s edge while she herself remained where she stood, impervious to the suction force of the herbal.

Then Sonjay appeared over the rise, mounted on a tiger. And immediately after she saw Sonjay, Doshmisi saw Jasper appear; and soon all the others astride their tigers, all except for the enchanters. At first she thought her friends and family were being sucked into the vortex, but then she saw that they remained free of the pull of the vortex just as she did. They stood on the rise from where they witnessed the scene unfolding below. She wondered why the enchanters had not appeared with everyone else.

The vortex from the herbal sucked the oil coating from Doshmisi’s hands and her clothing, leaving her clean and dry, as if not a speck of oil had ever touched her. Although the air remained thick, making it hard to pull it into her lungs, it did not seem to be getting any worse. She found it a little easier to breathe with the terrible stench from the rot on the beach dissipating.

The Corportons struggled comically yet frighteningly as the herbal sucked them down the beach and into the vortex it had created. They scrambled to save themselves to no avail. Doshmisi’s heart leapt into her throat as she saw Aldus Shrub himself appear over the hill. He had lost his helmet and his mask along the way so she could see his panicked face quite clearly. “Help me,” he squealed. “Help me, help me.” Over and over again he pleaded. Doshmisi stood too far away from him to reach him even if she had wanted to, which she didn’t. The ground beneath her moved rapidly and even though the vortex did not suck her in, she had to concentrate to keep standing amidst the motion beneath her feet. The Emerald Crystal and the herbal sucked Shrub down the beach along with the Corportons. Shrub grabbed a large piece of metal, a piece of the oil rig, embedded in the sand near the water’s edge. Doshmisi had one last glimpse of his face, twisted with terror and dread, before the vortex sucked the entire piece of metal out of the sand, with Shrub clinging to it, and the man and the metal disappeared under the ocean and into the vortex of the green-glowing herbal. A startlingly dramatic bolt of lightning flashed out of the sky and struck the herbal with a spray of red-orange sparks as the air hummed with an electric buzz.

Doshmisi wondered what had happened to Sissrath. If the enchanters still contained him back at the compound, then what would they do with him after the herbal cleaned up the oil spill and dispatched the Corportons? What Doshmisi did not know, could not know, and would not find out until afterward, was that the enchanters had contained Sissrath at the compound while the Corportons flew off one by one toward the ocean, sucked away. Finally, after the Corportons had all disappeared, Sissrath had been slowly sucked out of the compound as well. Crumpet, locked in the bubble of light that he had created to prevent Sissrath from performing enchantment, had been pulled along with him. “Let go,” Crumpet called to the other enchanters. “Let go of me!”

Princess Honeydew did as Crumpet commanded and removed her hand from Cardamom’s shoulder. But Cardamom said, through gritted teeth, “No, dear brother, I am with you.”

“Please. You must let go. You must release me while there is still time to save yourself,” Crumpet pleaded. “Think of Alice and release me for her sake, for all the years you have spent apart. She deserves a few years with you.” At those words, reluctantly, Cardamom dropped his hand from Crumpet’s shoulder and entreated his brother, “Crumpet, you too must let go, come what may!”

“I can’t,” Crumpet replied. “I’m bound by a power that will not release me.”

“You have proven yourself to be the mightiest enchanter of all time,” Cardamom shouted to his brother as Crumpet was dragged through the front gate of the compound. “Mothers and fathers will whisper your name to their children for generations to come.”

“Don’t say such things,” Crumpet called back to his brother.

“I wish for you to hear your praise from my own lips because I fear that we will never see each other again,” Cardamom replied as he ran to keep up with Crumpet, who continued to pick up speed, trapped in the bubble of light with Sissrath. Cardamom’s voice broke with emotion and tears coursed down the great enchanter’s cheeks.

“Who is to say?” Crumpet called out. His eyes locked with his brother’s for a brief moment. “Perhaps death is not as permanent as it seems. We may yet see each other again.” After those words, a force beyond his control pulled Crumpet, and Buttercup who still clung to him, away toward the beach.

Cardamom hopped onto a tiger so he could follow the others as they rode out of the compound after Crumpet and Buttercup, who fairly flew through the air, trapped in the enchanted bubble of light that controlled Sissrath. Buttercup clung fiercely to her husband’s arm, her long hair streaming behind her. Cardamom chased after them to the beach on a tiger’s back.

At the water’s edge, as Doshmisi was wondering what had become of Sissrath and the enchanters, they appeared at the top of the hill. She realized instantly that Sissrath did not have any control over his body. He moved like a marionette, like someone else pulled strings to move his arms and legs. The vortex sucked him in along with the Corportons. He might have resisted the pull of the herbal and the Emerald Crystal more effectively if he had not remained locked in that green bubble of flaming light created by Crumpet (supported by Buttercup). The green-bubble enchantment seemed to prevent him from using his powers.

Doshmisi heard Crumpet call to Buttercup as they slipped past her on the sand, “Buttercup, my dear wife, my love, please let go of me and save yourself. I will hold him on my own and you may die if you do not drop your hand from my shoulder.”

“I would never leave you, babycakes,” Buttercup replied. “We’re in this together as we always have been. You are my husband and there is no other. You are my brilliant enchanter, the greatest of them all. Love of my life. Where you go, I go.”

To Doshmisi, it seemed as though Sissrath, Crumpet, and Buttercup slid down the beach toward the herbal in slow motion as the deep enchantment of the Emerald Crystal and the herbal swept them along in its grip. She hoped with all her might that her friends would not share Sissrath’s fate, that they would not be sucked into the vortex with him, that the Emerald Crystal would understand that they were separate from Sissrath.

Sissrath tumbled head over heels toward the water, his faded yellowish robe flapping around him so that he resembled a giant bird. At the water’s edge he let out a final furious howl of rage that gave Doshmisi goosebumps. Then the glowing green vortex sucked Sissrath into itself with all the rest. To Doshmisi’s horror, and the horror of all those who witnessed, Crumpet and Buttercup, trapped in the bubble of light with Sissrath, were also sucked into the herbal and disappeared under the water.

Doshmisi expected the herbal to spit Crumpet and Buttercup out as soon as it realized its mistake. But it didn’t. As the seconds and then minutes ticked by and the herbal continued to clean up the ocean and the beach without releasing Crumpet and Buttercup from its enchantment, Doshmisi came to realize that they had sacrificed themselves and were gone as completely as the Corportons, Shrub, and Sissrath. To where? She would never know. She pounded her fists on the beach. “No, no,” she moaned. “Not them too. Don’t you understand?” If anyone could talk to the herbal, she could. If anyone could make it spit her friends back out she could. “You are an instrument of healing, not an instrument of grief!” Doshmisi screamed at the herbal. “You must understand. You must make it right!” Her words and wishes fell around her in tatters and changed nothing.

Almost no oil remained on the sand. The ocean water had cleared and turned a clean grayish-blue color. The oil rig had completely disappeared. The dead bodies of all the marine life had also vanished. While Doshmisi and the others watched, the green vortex sucked up the last remnants of the oil from the beach and then the vortex closed. The lightning died away. The sky cleared. The electrified hum faded out. Except for the fact that the air remained heavy, still making it difficult to breathe, everything had returned to normal, with no visible sign of the oil drilling operation or evidence of the spill.

Doshmisi waded into the water to the root of the vortex and touched the herbal, now entirely black, cold, and hard, like obsidian. The light in the Emerald Crystal had gone out and left it dull and gray. Much as she tried, Doshmisi could not lift the book, which had become so heavy it felt as if glued to the ground under the water. She sank to her knees and wept for the loss of Crumpet and Buttercup.

One drop of oil oozed up to the surface of the water just as the herbal disappeared completely under the ocean, under the sand, out of the world.