The Unwanted Winter - Volume One of the Saga of the Twelves (54 page)

He began to move, as
silent as he could, about the shoulder of the hill, not sure
exactly what he was looking for. He smiled begrudgingly at the
thought of his friend. Andrew was a dork, true, but Anthony was
very glad he was here with them, at this time, in this awful place.
At least, he could count on him to help keep his sisters
safe.

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

Arrow

Day One, Thursday, 7:03
am…

Andrew led the girls about
30 feet off the trail. He found a small hollow at the foot of a
good-sized eucalyptus tree. He motioned for them to place
themselves in between the roots and boulders, so their presence was
concealed against unwanted eyes. Since the tree was set in the
ground at a point higher than where they stood, it offered
excellent cover from above. Its’ massive trunk hid them from view
above, while its’ many roots and the various boulders and rocks
that grew around it, provided decent concealment from
below.

Meanwhile, Andrew crept
forward a few paces, slinking his way behind a large, snow-laden
fern. From there, he could see what the others were doing. The
elevated position gave him a good view. He could see Kenai had
begun to trace the ground much farther than before, attempting to
get the scent of the other kids she’d seen earlier.

Kodiak stayed in rooted in
place. She periodically closed her eyes and arched her great head
skyward testing the air for any clue.

So far, neither of the
bear-dogs seemed to have made any progress, but they kept at it
nonetheless. Catching the correct scent was more often than not a
game of percentages. One had to keep trying in order to be
successful. Most things didn’t come easy.

The wind gusted for the
first time since he’d been outdoors, making the falling, flaky
precipitation dance around him, partially obscuring his eyesight.
He waited and shivered in its grip until it subsided. The animal
skin he wore worked, for the most part, to keep him warm, but it
didn’t fit well. When the wind blew, the cold air would find a way
in the under his layers of clothing and set his teeth on edge
within seconds. The fact that it smelled like socks rank with
mildew didn’t help either, but it was better than nothing at
all.

He saw Anthony, searching
the ground a bit away from the others, on the same side of the
trail Andrew and the girls had chosen to hide. Only, he was at a
higher elevation than they were.

“
Anything yet, Drew?”
asked Elena from behind. Her tiny voice barely carried over the
wind. She was tucked back within the roots of the towering
eucalyptus, partially out of sight. He surmised her vision was
obscured to some degree.

He looked back in her
direction, shaking his head in the negative, bringing his index
finger to his lips, indicating she should stay quiet. She nodded in
affirmation, while Andrew resumed his watch over the
others.

Anthony had moved farther
away, off Andrew’s right hand side, about fifty feet.

Kenai continued to search
the area immediately opposite from where he crouched. Only she was
moving away. Each of her sweeping arches took her further out from
them.

He watched the bear-dog
for a few more seconds and then, out of the corner of his eye, he
saw Anthony stiffen, surprised, shocked. Andrew’s attention
immediately swung back toward his friend.

Anthony, half-crouched,
moved a few branches of the fern before him to one side. It was
larger than the one Andrew was hiding behind, so it would’ve
blocked more of his view. Once he’d moved the leafy fronds aside,
Andrew could tell the other’s view, further up the incline, had
opened before him. It was there his expression had changed, made
his body go rigid.

Andrew stood slowly to get
a better view, continuing to watch his friend, wondering what he’d
found.

Anthony stood straighter,
moving another frond, then another.

Andrew saw it, traversing
almost directly behind and above their hiding place. It was on a
small pathway beginning at the larger La Loma trail and doubling
backed around them about thirty feet higher up the hill. It was a
much narrower track, overgrown and made nearly invisible by the
foliage growing alongside it, but his friends’ attention was
elsewhere.

Anthony remained frozen
solid. His gaze was riveted to something in front and slightly
above him.

Andrew’s face rippled with
concern as he followed his friends gaze, taking a few unbidden
steps. He emerged, partially from his concealment, as his eyes
following the pathway all the way to the point where it mounted the
ridge of hill itself and fell out of sight. Almost sixty feet away
from where Anthony stood, he saw what his long-time friend was
staring at. It was so startling that he too stood, as immobile and
dumbstruck as Anthony.

Standing there a pace or
two from the top of the pathway was a Swüreg soldier, dressed in
full battle regalia, facing his friend. Clasped in its’ hands was a
black, vile-looking re-curved bow, notched - arrow aimed directly
at Anthony’s chest.

Andrew was only able to
yell, “NO!”

The warrior loosed his
arrow.

He knew in his heart, his
friend would die that day, right before his very eyes.

~~~~~~~~<<<<<<{ ☼
}>>>>>>~~~~~~~~

Blur

Day One, Thursday, About
Half a Minute Before…

Mikalah was watching
Andrew with such unrelenting scrutiny when his head popped up all
of sudden, she knew at once he seen something significant. Though
she’d been told to stay put - she didn’t. She stole from her place
of concealment amongst the large rocks of the hillside and the
roots of the eucalyptus towered above her and her sister. As quiet
as she could, she slinked through the crusty snow. She tip-toed the
entire way, until she was a foot behind Andrew, slightly to his
left, glancing up at him.

For no reason she could
discern, he’d stood up and took a half step from behind the fern,
his face hidden from hers as she approached.

She scuttled forward a bit
more to catch a glimpse of what he was looking at and saw her
brother take a few steps on what looked like another trail. Only
this one was much smaller than the one they had walked upon a few
minutes earlier. It was nearly invisible.

She saw him stop so
quickly, it made her eyebrows rise unwittingly. She’d seen her
brother react in this manner countless times, and every time, it
had been when he was stunned – utterly and completely stunned. She
felt Andrew move. She followed. She craned her neck as far as she
could in order to see as much as possible, exposing herself even
more.

The boy beside her went
rigid.

She looked up at him
again, seeing the concern on his face melt into horror.

In one fluid turn of her
head, she traced Andrew’s stare at its’ terminus… just in time so
see a Swüreg soldier release his hold on the string of his bow. The
cloth-yard shaft, wickedly black and barbed, shot from the bow like
lightning through the sky, straight for her brother’s
chest.

To Mikalah, the world
seemed to turn yellow with heat and fear, fire and a deep
smoldering vat of anguish exploding from her heart. She heard
Andrew’s screeching
Noooo!
as her mind flooded with a thousand, thousand
memories. A dam of images, notions, nuances, inklings had burst
within her. They filled her to the brim in less than a
second.

She remembered she had
once run from Anthony when they were having the only snowball fight
they had ever had as a family. He had thrown a snowball at her. It
had hit her in the back, right between the shoulders blades. She
had fallen to the ground little shocked. Yet, before she could
actually react, he’d picked her up entirely off her feet and
planted upright, giving her a quick kiss on the cheek and ruffled
her hair. The next moment, he’d run off, laughing, making her
follow suit.

She saw him again, all
arms and legs, trying so hard to learn how to swim when his was
fourteen, finally tired of being afraid of water. He’d been
frustrated and a little angry, because he couldn’t make his body
move the way it should’ve underwater. He’d been scowling, until she
yelled out over the den of splashing water, she believed in him. He
had turned to look at her shaking his head, trying to ward off his
embarrassment. When he met her eyes for a second time, she stuck
her tongue out at him. He had laughed.

Two weeks later, he was
swimming like a fish.

She could see Anthony - a
much younger Anthony - sitting cross-legged before her, showing her
how to connect her Duplex building blocks, while her tiny, clumsy
hands tried to duplicate his movements, to no avail.

She saw her brother, as
she lay on her side in the sand, come storming into the playground
at the park, yelling at the little bully who had knocked her off
the merry-go-round and had made her cry.

She saw him make a joke at
her expense and go off, down the hallway of their house, laughing
so hard he was almost doubling over. Right when she was about to
hate him, he’d looked back with a twinkle in his eye, making her
stop and smile back.

She had sat next to him on
a matching office chair, watching the screen of his laptop as he
played Lineage II, explaining all the history and detail that comes
with long experience of playing a game of that sort.

She watched the TV,
sitting beside him as he played Call of Duty.

She saw him trying to
trick her into something she didn’t believe.

She saw him put sour crème
on just about everything he ate.

She saw him riding his
skateboard and fall off, scuffing his arm.

She saw him making
fart-noises with one of his armpits.

She saw him cracking his
toes.

She saw him
cry.

She saw him
dance.

She saw him crow like a
rooster.

She saw him kiss a
girl.

She saw him make scrambled
eggs.

She saw him
mad.

She saw him
excited.

She saw him
smile.

She felt his
love.

Her entire life, she had
felt his love. He might not have expressed it day in and day
out.

No, he had conveyed it to
her, silently, but steadily over the years until it had become so
steadfast and sure, she had come to trust it would always be
there.

He had loved her since the
day she was born.

She had always known
it!

Now, she was going to
watch him die.

It felt like something
popped inside her head. The yellowish world turned slightly red,
pink at the sides, but fiercely so. As the three-foot arrow left
the ebon shaft of the Swüreg’s bow, Mikalah could see the it begin
the dual oscillation a missile of its’ kind would employ during
flight. She stared at it, seeing the three, glued feathers at its
end, keeping in it on course. She saw the steel arrowhead,
sharpened. It appeared to cut through the air itself. Her eyes made
out the type of the wood - it was made of yew or, quite possibly,
some other super-hard sort. Next, she could see the grain. Then the
miniscule grooves left behind by sanding during its manufacture.
She could see everything about it in such detail. It was like
watching it under a microscope.