The War for the Waking World (13 page)

“Finally, the fleshling recovers!”

“We thought you might stay dead.”

“Now, hold still.”

Rigby went as rigid as the stone he clutched. The Scath were all around him, and there was something holding his arms in place.
The cobalt shackles
, he remembered with dread. He could feel the cold metal on his wrists. “What . . . are you doing?” he demanded of the Scath.

They replied with sniggering laughter. Rigby saw one of the larger Scath on the other side of the stone. This one held something that looked like some kind of axe or hammer. The Scath reared back as if readying to swing the weapon.

“No! Don't!” Rigby screamed, but the Scath paid no heed to the command. The creature swung the heavy weapon around and struck with such an earsplitting
ker-rack
that Rigby's headache began again with renewed strength.

But Rigby's arms dropped away from the stone. The Scath had not maimed him, after all. They had freed him from the cobalt shackles. Rigby felt his will coursing through him as he stood.

Beyond the ring of Scath in all directions was a crater-pocked wasteland. “I knew it,” he whispered. “I knew she couldn't pull off the Harlequin Veil.”

All of the sudden, the weight of all he observed hit home. Rigby swallowed back the hot bile surging up in the back of his throat.

Where he was exactly, he could not tell. Much like a desert or open sea, everything around him looked the same. Among the craters and scarred-gray terrain, blackened trees leaned, some still burning. Here and there, the thin, barely recognizable skeletons of structures stood. “And this,” Rigby muttered. “This is what's become of the world?”

“We've done as you asked,” the Scath hissed.

“You are free.”

“Now, you must free us!”

Rigby flexed the muscle in his neck and cracked the knuckles of both fists. “I will keep my promise,” he told the Scath. “Now return to your master—your temporary master—and I will come for you.”

“Will come?” the Scath chorused.

“We wants now!”

“Be patient,” Rigby commanded. “Kara is too well protected in that fortress of hers. I'm going to need help.”

“We cannot help.”

“Not anymore.”

“That's okay,” Rigby replied. “I am going to visit my uncle.”

The Scath departed, and Rigby rubbed his wrists. They were cold and tingly, but the cobalt shackles were gone. His will churned as if impatient to be put to use, and Rigby wasn't going to deny it much longer.

“So where am I exactly?” he muttered aloud. Instinctively, his hand flew to his jeans pocket, but, as he suspected, his personal cell phone was long gone. And that wasn't too much of an issue, not now that the cobalt shackles were gone. Rigby held out his hand, flexed his will, and called up a brand-new cell phone. As it powered up, Rigby wondered if the Rift had shorted out the more delicate electronics systems of the world. He thought it likely that most of the cell towers had probably been fried. But the moment his phone's operating system
booted up, Rigby saw it had a full five bars. It was, he thought, a little odd, especially being out in this desolate wasteland like he was, but he was grateful for the signal.

He called up his maps app and discovered quickly he was in Cunningham Falls State Park in Thurmont, Maryland. Quite a hike from Kara's Baltimore fortress, but not terribly far from home, he thought. Once again, the Scath had been thorough.

Rigby jogged down the rocky incline, slid, and almost fell, but, with a thought, he gave himself a pair of tough-terrain hiking boots and found surer footing. Then using his will to maneuver like a deer born to the forest, he raced through the trees and brambles. Leaping, dodging, ducking, and spinning, he darted through the pine trunks and boughs. A strange smell stopped him in mid-stride.

It was the scent of something burned . . . or perhaps, still burning. But it wasn't the rich outdoorsy smell from a fireplace or a wood stove. This smoke reeked of acrid chemicals and . . . something else, something pungent. It was altogether wrong, whatever it was. Rigby charged on, noting the darkening of the trees. Their needled foliage thinned until there was nothing but blackened branches and scorched trunks.

It was a chilling vista. Nearly a third of the forest had been razed. Rigby leaped over the still burning park gate and raced ahead, hoping for a change. The scenery only grew worse.

He found himself in a rural neighborhood. Or, at least, it had been once. Farms, homes, and buildings were shattered, and debris sat strewn about as if a massive tornado had plowed through the area. People wandered aimlessly about the wreckage. Some were out in the street, but most were wandering through the wreckage of their homes. There were even a few people sitting in the driver's seats of cars so damaged they would likely never run again.

As Rigby made his way through the wreckage, he called out to people he passed, “Sir, are you okay?”

No reply.

“Miss, you should get out of the car. It doesn't look safe.”

Not even so much as a glance in Rigby's direction.

People were moving about in the oddest way. They gestured frequently, and their mouths were moving, as if they were acting out some silent play.

A dull ringing echoed across the area. It grew in intensity and re-triggered the splitting headache Rigby had before. He fell to his knees and clutched his head. The oncoming flood of sensation was too much. He couldn't bear it. He shut his eyes and fell over on his side. It was tearing at his mind . . . impossible to endure much more—

Gone. It was all gone. Feeling a surge of well-being, Rigby opened his eyes. At first, he was surprised. He gasped as he clambered back to his feet. Blinking against the strong sunlight, Rigby wasn't sure why he felt so surprised. He was standing in the middle of a beautiful rural neighborhood. The sky was bright blue, and kids were out, running around or playing with pets.

Wait,
Rigby thought,
shouldn't I be getting home? I'm supposed to be home now. I'm supposed to be home with Uncle Scovy.

He started walking. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he knew it was the way home. In a few blocks, he'd come to a bus stop. He'd need to take the bus to get back to Gatlinburg. Didn't he have a load of homework to finish up before tomorrow? He was pretty sure he did. He picked up the pace a little, but paused as a woman backed her car out of a driveway to Rigby's left.

She smiled at him and waved politely. Rigby didn't wave back. He stared. An image of this woman and this car flickered in and out of Rigby's mind. He gasped. One second, the car had been a burned-out husk, and the woman had blood streaming down her forehead. The next, she was perfectly normal.

Rigby turned in a slow circle and watched with sickening fascination as the entire neighborhood flickered in and out of two different
realities. Suddenly, as if he'd been nearly unconscious only to walk through a refreshing mist of cool water, Rigby came to his senses.

“Well, what do you know?” Rigby whispered. “Kara actually did it. The 'arlequin Veil works.” He stared at the real-as-life beauty all around him and shook his head. He'd only been awake for a few hours, and yet already the Veil had taken hold. How had Kara gotten the Veil to be so widespread and so . . . immediate?

Rigby scanned the treetops and the sky and muttered, “It's not like she 'as a bunch of broadcast towers placed all over the world, right?”

He rolled his eyes at his own momentary stupidity. “Of course,” he muttered, sliding his cell phone out of his pocket and staring at it in his palm. “Very clever, Kara.”

NINETEEN

E
TERNAL
E
VIDENCE

H
IGH
C
HIEF
J
USTICE
M
ICHAEL THE
A
RCHELION LEANED
forward from his judge's bench and turned his eagle glare to Archer. “Dreamtreader Keaton,” he said, “do you wish to make an opening statement?”

“Go, Archer, go!” Razz whispered.

Archer hesitated in his seat for a few moments. He felt as if three hundred spotlights had just been turned on him. “Um, yes, your honor,” he said, while thinking,
Here goes nothing.

The judge nodded. “Proceed.”

Archer stood and wandered around the defense table to face the gallery on the left. He'd seen a few courtroom drama movies. He'd even visited a courtroom for a civics class field trip. He thought he knew what to say, but that had been a while ago.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,” he said, “esteemed high judge, my accuser has leveled charges against me . . . serious charges. I do not take these lightly, and to be honest, I have to admit the charges are . . .
mostly
true.”

The courtroom erupted in chatter. For about five whole seconds.

The judge raised his right arm, and a massive steel gavel appeared in his hand. When he slammed the hammer down to his desktop, there was a flash of dangerous light, followed a split-heartbeat later by the sound of thunder. Actual thunder. It was the kind off sudden thunderclap that rattles the windowpanes, causes the foundation of the house to shake, and generally scares the bejeebers out of anyone nearby.

It certainly scared Archer. Involuntarily, he jumped and ducked at the same time. Abruptly, the courtroom chatter ceased. Archer swallowed and glanced over to Bezeal, whose pinprick eyes had grown to the size of half-dollars.

“I will have order in this court,” the judge said quietly. And no one argued nor dared to speak. “You may continue, Dreamtreader Keaton.”

When Archer spoke, his words at first came out in some sort of half-strangled, gravelly chicken-squawk. “While the charges are—” He cleared his throat. “While the charges are somewhat true, the motives—suggested by my accuser—are absolutely false. I intend to prove that as a Dreamtreader in the midst of the most difficult circumstances imaginable, I did my job. In fact, I did my job the best way I could, and I intend to prove that each time something tragic happened, it was caused by an opponent seeking to cause the evil that occurred. When we look at the evidence, you will see I am not innocent. I made mistakes. But after you see my motives and my actions, my enemies in action, and the destruction they caused . . . I am content to accept whatever verdict seems right to you as well as whatever sentence seems fair.”

Archer took his seat. Silence reigned.

“Prosecution,” the judge said, “call your first witness.”

“Your honor,” Bezeal began. “My first witness comes from the past. She entered the courtroom moments ago so fast. She is—”

The thunder-gavel fell once more, and this time Bezeal jumped.

“I warned you about that singsong, rhyming nonsense,” the judge growled. “It gives me a headache. Bailiff, if the prosecution rhymes again—even one time—I want you to take him into custody for contempt of court. And then I'd like you to find the coldest, dankest cell and lock him away.”

The bailiff seemed extraordinarily happy with that command. “Yes, your honor,” he said, cracking his knuckles. “I will most certainly see to that.”

Bezeal's eyes shrank once more to a pair of pale dots, and he made an exaggerated bow. “With all due
respect
, your honor,” he said, putting a strange emphasis on the word. “I do my best thinking in rhyme. To take that from me is . . . well . . . a rather unfair handicap.”

The judge lifted his gavel. Archer winced, expecting a blast. But it didn't come. Instead, the judge stayed the hammer in his hand and said quite tersely, “That we have allowed you into this court at all, Bezeal, is a courtesy greater than any but you and I can know. Do not fool yourself into thinking you might gain additional courtesies. You will not find them here.”

At this point, Archer was feeling pretty good about the way things were going. Chief Justice Michael did not seem to be really on anyone's side, but he was definitely not extending Bezeal any favors.

“My first witness, then,” Bezeal said, “shall be Archer's Dream companion, Razz.”

“Objection!” Razz shouted.

Archer gave himself a face-palm.

“What now, Ms. Moonsonnet?” the judge asked.

“I object because I am co-counsel. How can I be expected to be a witness against my client?”

The judge's granite expression didn't soften in the least. “Ms. Moonsonnet, we have no exceptions for truth. If your testimony will shed light on your client's innocence or guilt, we will hear it. Now, take the stand.”

Razz frowned. She looked at Archer for guidance.

“Just tell the truth,” Archer said.

Razz nodded and whooshed to the stand. She hovered a moment over the seat, decided against it, and sat instead on the rail.

“Ms. Moonsonnet,” Bezeal said snidely. “Would you please tell the court what Archer whispered to you just now.”

“I'd rather not,” Razz mumbled. “It was private.”

“What was that?” Bezeal asked. “So you're saying you won't share with the court? Could it be that Archer was feeding you things to say?”

Muttering rippled around the court.

“Um, no,” Razz replied, “Archer just ordered me to tell the truth.”

Bezeal stopped in midstride. “Oh.”

The muttering turned to giggling.

“Very well,” Bezeal said. “Ms. Moonsonnet, I'd like you to recall a little trip you and Archer made to Archaia.”

This
, thought Archer,
isn't good
.

“Could you state for the court what you and Archer were doing in that part of the Dream Realm?”

“Stitching up breaches,” Razz replied. “The usual Dreamtreader stuff.”

“Just the usual,” Bezeal repeated. “But there was a point where Archer insisted on doing something else, wasn't there?”