The Whisper (7 page)

“I'll do whatever it takes to get you home.”

*   *   *

Over an hour later, Alistair was starting to find his rhythm—taking four steps, pausing for a breath, then four more steps, pausing, and so on. Two thin towropes that were once attached to the fronts of their sleds were now fashioned into a crude harness that Alistair wore around his chest. Charlie, cross-legged on the nesting sleds, held the other ends of the ropes like he was holding reins. Charlie was the driver, Alistair was the dog. Whenever the reins were less than taut, Charlie gave them a flick and cried, “Yah!
Vámonos!”

They had gone only a half mile—barely a quarter of the way back—and Alistair was already exhausted. The temperatures were in the teens, but the work was so hard that it was beckoning sweat. Alistair's coat was off, tied around his waist. Everything with a zipper was unzipped. The ventilation helped at first, but when the sweat finally arrived and began to chill the inside of Alistair's clothes, the choice was between freezing and dehydrating. For the moment, freezing seemed preferable, so he reached down, scooped up a handful of snow, and filled his mouth. It melted on contact, sending cold, earthy liquid down his sandy throat.

“Did you check to see if it was yellow?” Charlie laughed. Awfully chipper for a boy with a broken ankle.

“How about not talking for a bit?” Alistair asked.

“Jeez. I'm only trying to keep your spirits up.”

“My spirits are fine. Awesome. The greatest. It's freezing out and it's almost dark and I'm yanking your fat butt through the woods because you can't sled worth diarrhea.”

Charlie drove the heels of his mittens into the snow, putting on the brakes. “You knew I hated sledding. But you insisted.”

Alistair pulled harder. He wasn't going to be slowed down. Not now, not so late in the day. “I didn't insist,” he said.

Because snow was working its way up his coat sleeves, Charlie relented, lifted his mittens, and said, “Let's think about it. Who would you rather be at this moment? Me, defeated by a tree stump, soon to be a laughingstock, or you, playing sled dog for a few hours, but soon to be the hero?”

Alistair didn't have an answer.

“You're not wearing the shirt I gave you,” Charlie said. “That's a shame. Because I'm wearing the one you gave me.” Charlie was referring to a swap the two had made a few months before. A shirt for a shirt, a symbol of solidarity.

“No,” Alistair said softly. “Sorry.” He put his coat back on and forged ahead.

*   *   *

One more hour and still one more mile to go. The sun had set, but luckily there was a bit of moonlight sneaking through the pines. Alistair had about ten paces of visibility, so he kept to his four-pace cycle. It hadn't gotten any easier, but the rhythm of the slog was now pulsing through his body.

Step, step, step, step, stop. Step, step, step, step, stop.

The two weren't talking. Words only led to arguments, and arguments weren't getting them home. Charlie was humming, though, the only music he cared about, the sound tracks to video games. The boops and beeps might have been grating when played through television speakers, but when done a cappella, they were exponentially worse. Alistair's solution was to use snotty tissues from his pocket as earplugs and let the rhythm of his steps worm into his brain instead.

Step, step, step, step, stop. Step, step—

But he was losing the rhythm. Darker thoughts were more powerful and rushed in uninvited.

I could leave Charlie here. There's snow forecast for tonight. He would freeze. I would never have to deal with him again.

Alistair hated that his brain couldn't defend itself against such swill, but he also had to accept that it was honest swill. He didn't really like Charlie, not anymore. He was having trouble remembering the last time that he had.

*   *   *

Another hour, another half mile. Clouds smothered the moon and the darkness was pudding-thick. Alistair ached all over, except for his toes. His toes had been in pain—plenty of it—an hour earlier, but not anymore, and that wasn't a good sign. Frostbite comes after the numb, or so Alistair had heard, and while he was confident he would survive the trek, he wasn't sure all of his appendages would. He pictured himself sitting next to the fireplace in his living room, pulling off his boots and socks and watching blackened nubs of flesh and bone fall to the floor.

I could leave him here.

I could abandon him.

No more Charlie in my life.

No more Charlie.

Alistair stopped for a moment and looked back at Charlie's dark shape, bent like a chubby
Z
in the sled, his mittens balled up and clinging to the towropes like they were a beloved blanket. It was hard to tell if his eyes were open.

There was anger trying to claw from Alistair's chest, but it was buried in regret—for not wearing thicker socks, for all his decisions that day—mainly for not telling his parents where he was going. If Alistair had told them, they surely would have dispatched a search party. As it was, the wind had blown snow over the boys' original tracks, and there were too many trails to go down, too many houses in the neighborhood to call and ask
Have you seen the guys?

No one would find them anytime soon. So Alistair turned back and faced the darkness.

Step. Stop. Step. Stop. Step … I could leave him here.

*   *   *

They reached the tiny parking lot at the trailhead about an hour later. Temperatures had dropped close to zero. Breaths not only condensed, they crystallized in the air. The sweating had ceased, and Alistair's underclothes were crusty with ice. He still couldn't feel his toes, but that was no longer a concern. After two miles in four hours, pulling more than a hundred pounds over drifts of snow, he had almost made it home. All he cared about now was a hot drink and a warm bed.

The lot was haphazardly plowed, and even though there were patches of snow and ice, there were also bare stretches of pavement, and Alistair wasn't sure he could pull the sled over them. It didn't matter really. Once they hit the road, pulling the sled would be too difficult, and there was only a few hundred yards to go along the road.

“I might have to leave you here for a few minutes,” Alistair said. “I can run back to your house and have your mom drive over to get you. Probably the fastest way.”

Charlie opened his eyes and sat up. He yawned as he considered the plan, then he swung his legs over the edge of the sled and planted his heels on the ground. “Why don't I just walk?” he asked.

Alistair peeled the harness off and dropped it in the snow. Thin bruises and chafing on his shoulders roared to life, and he massaged them as he pointed out the obvious. “Um … what about your ankle?”

Charlie shrugged. “My ankle? Well, about that. Honestly, back there, I was pretty sure it was broken. But I wasn't
totally
sure. Now I'm pretty sure it's okay.”

That's when Charlie pushed himself up and stood. Just like that, no problem at all. There wasn't a lean or a wobble—nothing to indicate an injury—and Alistair, still wallowing in guilty thoughts, tried to put together a sentence. “But—”

“But,” Charlie said, “it's a good thing you're such a great friend. My ankle would have been pretty sore if I had walked that entire way.” Charlie patted Alistair on the back and smiled, but it wasn't a malicious smile. It was grateful.

“You're … okay?” Alistair was too shocked and too tired to deploy the fire building up in his lungs.

Charlie winked. “I think we'll both be feeling it tomorrow. But you should come over in the morning. We'll play Nintendo, and my mom will make wings and milk shakes for lunch. Beats being stuck out in the cold.”

The closest house to the lot had a bay window, and Alistair could see some kids clearing dessert plates from the dining room table. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked and two other dogs barked their replies, and the sound ricocheted off the gusts of cold, cold air. Chimneys coughed smoke.

“I hate you,” Alistair said.

This coaxed a smile too, and before he turned to walk home on his own two legs supported by his own two sturdy ankles, Charlie said, “No you don't. If you hated me, you would have left me back there. You're a great friend. The best. I'll never forget what you did for me.”

 

CHAPTER 5

It was true. There was no forgetting what Alistair had done for Charlie. The memory was still too fresh, too real, and shame, an all-too-frequent visitor, sat on the pedestal next to Alistair, reminding him of Charlie's betrayal and mocking him about Polly's betrayal. Why, after so long and so much, hadn't Alistair smartened up? Why did he keep letting people trick him?

Hadrian swooped up and down, clearly relishing his perch, and he said, “There are three things you must know about the Mandrake. First, he is a liar. He will try to deceive you by making you think he is weak. He is not weak. He is a most vicious creature, almost as vicious as his master.”

Alistair didn't have to ask, but he asked anyway. “Who's his master? Is it the Riverman?”

“Ah, the Riverman,” Hadrian said. “Been ages since I've heard that name used. We've grown more accustomed to calling him the Whisper. But yes, you are correct. He is master of the Mandrake. This was a peaceable kingdom once, but the Whisper loathes harmony. So he gave us the Mandrake, and therefore we have been forced to take shelter beneath the ground.”

Behind the crowd there was a pair of wooden doors. Did those doors lead to an entire underground city? Did all of these people live beneath that sea of blood?

“The second thing you must know about the Mandrake is this,” Hadrian went on. “He does not always look like a monster. Sometimes he takes on different forms. Small ones. Deceptively innocuous ones. But there is always one way to recognize him. There is a blue mark, in the shape of a horseshoe, hidden behind his left ear. If you see that blue mark, then you kill. You do not hesitate. You do not doubt. You kill.”

“How do you…?” Alistair couldn't bring himself to say
kill
. Aquavania may not have been like home, but it wasn't like a video game either. These figments appeared to have flesh. There was something unmistakably alive behind their eyes.

“Fair question,” Hadrian said. “For that brings us to the third thing. We do not know how to kill the Mandrake. All we know is that the sea of blood protects us from him. He will not enter it. Beyond that, we do not know what the Mandrake's weaknesses are.”

“And I'm supposed to know what his weaknesses are?” Alistair asked. “I've been here for barely a day, and you're expecting me to—”

“You are a swimmer!” Hadrian barked. “And being a swimmer comes with responsibilities!”

“Aren't you a swimmer?” Alistair asked. It was a guess, but an educated one. Figments seemed to look up to swimmers, or at least treat them differently. With a crowd of figments at his bidding, Hadrian certainly fit that bill. Fiona had told Alistair stories about how the kids who traveled from the Solid World to Aquavania never aged, at least not physically. Hadrian might have looked like a six-year-old, but that obviously wasn't the age of his heart and his mind.

“Once upon a time, you could have called me a swimmer,” Hadrian said. “But now I am simply Lord Hadrian, protector of these beautiful people. We count on swimmers like you to help us.”

“And what do I get if I help you?”

“Honor. Esteem. And your choice of tubes.”

Before that tube had jolted down from the ceiling and snatched Polly away, Hadrian had mentioned a place called the Ambit of Ciphers. The name meant nothing to Alistair. “Would one of the tubes take me home?” he asked.

“Unlikely,” Hadrian said. “But there are many ways from this world to other worlds. I'd venture to guess that Polly brought you here through a passage to Mahaloo. Many of the tubes can bring you to worlds like Mahaloo. But they won't bring you home. That's simply nonsensical.”

“Is there a tube that will bring me to Fiona Loomis?”

“I don't know who that is.”

“What about the Riv … the Whisper? Does one lead to him?”

The crowd laughed. Either the answer to Alistair's question was obvious or it was ridiculous. Probably a bit of both.

“You don't seem nearly up to that task,” Hadrian chuckled. “But that's neither here nor there. You have to deal with his Mandrake first.”

“And what if I refuse?” Alistair asked as he climbed to his feet.

Hadrian smiled and dragged his heels on the ground to slow himself down. When the swing was almost at a standstill, Hadrian reached up and stroked the loop of one of the hanging ropes. This loop was red, and when Hadrian pulled it, exerting only a small bit of pressure, one of the tubes from the ceiling descended a few feet. There was a whirring sound, and inside the tube there were spinning teeth shaped like the blades of a blender.

“Like all the others who have refused, you will become one with the sea,” Hadrian said.

All at once, fists shot up and the crowd belted out their favorite chant.

“New blood! New blood! New blood!”

*   *   *

Hadrian showed no interest in questions or objections. He simply tossed him the sword with the ruby-encrusted handle, which Alistair didn't attempt to catch. When Alistair bent over and picked the sword up from the net, Hadrian yanked at a yellow rope, and a tube shot down from the ceiling and vacuumed Alistair away. Liquid rushed all around him as he snaked through the darkness, up and down, twisting and looping as if riding a waterslide. It might have even been fun, had it not carried the paralyzing prospect of certain death.

Eventually the tube spat Alistair out and he landed butt-first on a dirt road. Before he had a chance to even knock the dust from his clothes, the tube retracted into the sky and disappeared. No maps, no further instructions, no idea where he was. Only a mission to find and kill the Mandrake.