The Appleclock Saga

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

About a month after Peregrine’s escape…

---

Installment Eight: Adventure Awaits

I find myself staring out to the sea, at the boat that carried us here, shrinking into the distance. The last familiar thing I will ever see for a long time.

I pant like a fish out of water, and I feel my eyes watering from the wind and the emotion.

“Isn’t this exciting, Korey?” said Leina behind me, “Don’t you just want to explore the whole island?? Too bad we can’t travel the world more often!”

“Hmm,” is all I can say.

I wish I shared my sister’s love for adventure and excitement. It would certainly help for this test. I wouldn’t be surprised if I end up failing in the next few weeks in my utter fear and confusion. I’d have to send a letter to the Guardians, and they’d have to pick us up and sail us back to Efranya where we would be shamed by a crowd of a hundred disappointed and concerned citizens’ faces, where Leina and I would not become the promised, new Guardians, and where we would both have to face twelve more months of lecture and study.

All because of me.

I really don’t want to let my country down, be a burden, make the High Guardians change their plans, but I could see myself doing at least one of those items eventually.

I just want to go home. Where I’m loved and cared for, where I’m fed and taught, where the catwings and mulebirds would be there in the stables to comfort me.

I watch a falcon fly over out heads and think about Jan, my personal mulebird. Oh, how I miss feeding him carrots and walnuts every evening. How I miss running my fingers through his soft, fine and colorful feathers. How I miss—

“Korey!”

I blink and turn around to face my sister. “What?”

Leina sighs, rolls her eyes and asks, “I said shall we get started?”

“Oh! Oh, yeah, all right.” I hurriedly pick up a sack of supplies at my feet and follow Leina up the beach. I can feel my face turning red.

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

I adjust the pack on my shoulders as I start walking up the beach towards a small tunnel.

I have been looking forward to this test for two years, ever since Korey and I started training to be Guardians. At last, that day has arrived! To think that we are about to spend eight months in an exciting new place, meeting friends, exploring, camping out in a tent. It gives me shivers of excitement every time it crosses my mind.

And this place, Aethasia I believe it’s called, has some very promising sights from what I’d seen on the boat as we circled the island. Cities and towns abustling, mountains towering, hills and meadows, cliffsides, even snowy tundras; this place has it all!

Now if only my paranoid, little twin brother would keep up. “Korey! You back there?”

“Yeah, right behind you.”

“Good. Master Lans told us to set up camp at the Evergreen Meadows. Now where would that be…”

“I know he said that. I was there, too!”

“Juuuust reminding you,” I sigh, “Have the map?”

“I’m holding it right now,” Korey replies.

I stop and turn around to find Korey inspecting the map. I come up behind his shoulder and read it with him.

“So we’re here…” Korey lands his finger on a beach next to a sea labeled “Engine Bay,” “So we need to go up Bootleg Pass, skim the border of the town of No Man’s Landing…”

“…And turn south toward Evergreen Meadows!” I finish, grabbing the map from Korey’s hands and marching forward. Korey follows behind in silence.

I hope Korey gets accustomed to this place, I think to myself, He would find this much more enjoyable, and I would have more freedom to explore without making him mad.

[Peregrine_Appleclock]

Illustrations for The Appleclock Saga

Installment One. "My eyes drift eastward, and fall upon a shape barely visible in the dense fog. Another island: My second home."

Installment Five. "I look back down at her red cap, and then at the broken Pacifier at my feet... It’s the most satisfying thing I have seen all month."

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

Installment Nine: Back and Forth

As we walk past the sign reading “Welcome to NO MAN’S LANDING,” I brace myself for any and all people that may pester us. I wish Leina would slow her pace so I can catch my breath and process my feelings.

All too quickly the trees suddenly clear out, and we find ourselves standing in the middle of a street paved with dull, grey cobblestones. To our left are several docks harboring boats of all sizes. One boat is being loaded with hay barrels by two gruff men. As we walk, we are engulfed in a crowd of bustling townspeople, not dense enough that we’re shoulder to shoulder, but dense enough to suffocate young, lost folks like us.

Men are carrying bundles and boxes toward and away from the docks, women were cradling boxes of apples and crates of slashberry juice and the like. Everybody seems to know exactly where they were going. They turn every corner with set jaws and an empty yet determined look in their eyes.

They all look the same to me.

We finally manage to hack our way out of the worst of the crowd. We pause at the edge of the street and Leina pulls out the map. “We should be close to the passage way,” she shouted over the roar of the crowd.

I look to my right and see a path leading away from the docks. Nobody seems to be taking it. “That it?” I ask.

“No, that’s the Junkyard,” she answers with a hint of annoyance, “Oh great, I think we passed it. All right, let’s go back.

Personally, I’d rather not plunge back into the hot sea of jostling elbows and shoulders, but I take off anyway, keeping close to my headstrong sister. Because the only thing worse then plunging into that sea is plunging into that sea alone.

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

My throat rumbles in frustration that we had missed the path to the Evergreen Meadows, but at least we get to go back into the crowd. How exciting the crowd is! Look at all the different people. Look at what they carry, what they wear. What’s their story? Where do they come from? Do they have a family? What kind of jobs do they have? I shove past them with gusto and wonder.

Still, I’m relieved to escape the jostling crowd as my eyes fall on the passageway, canopied my tall trees with twisted limbs and pale green leaves. I start down the road with anticipation.

My brother’s trembling hand squeezes my shoulder. “Wait! Leina, wait! That’s not the way!”

I turn and wrinkle my nose at him. What does he think he’s talking about? “Of course it is! It’s on the map, see?” I poke the passageway on the map with my fingernail.

“But this road leads back to Bootleg Pass! We missed the right turn again!”

“We… We can’t have!”

“We did! See?” Korey points to the familiar “Welcome to NO MAN’S LANDING” sign that we had passed, and then at the docks, just adjacent to the path we are on.

He’s right, I realize with dread and frustration. My throat rumbles even harder. “Come on,” I mutter to my brother with clenched teeth and a cold glare, deliberately brushing his shoulder with mine.

Korey follows with a humble face, a face that agitates me. Why doesn’t he gloat and grin smugly like everybody else?

This time we keep as close to the south side of the road as possible, hoping to spot the passageway this time.

“HALT,” barks a muffled voice. Korey and I stop and turn around to behold a man… At least it looks like a man. Sort of. He’s covered in metal armor, and one of his eyes, glowering right at us, seems to be glowing green.

Korey tenses and clutches my arm, gazing at the man with wide, brown eyes. Don’t be such a baby… I command silently.

“Where is the heading of your travel?” drones the man. Although it doesn’t quite sound like a real man’s voice. It was metallic and practically monotone.

“Evergreen Meadows,” I answer calmly, brushing a ponytail off my shoulder, “Could you take us there?”

“Names?” commands the metal man instead.

“Leina Kil—” I recall reading a bit about Aethasia and laughing about the ridiculous last names of some of them. I decide to take advantage of my knowledge. “Leina… Ratchetfun” is the first name that formulates in my mind. “And this is Korey…” I look at my brother for a moment. “… Braziertoaster.”

In the corner of my eye I see Korey looking at me in confusion and disgust. I suppress a smirk.

“These names do not register in my citizen bank. Please stay where you are for interrogation.”

My heart jumps in fright and I tense. Now it’s my turn to cling to my brother. I grab his forearm and squeeze it in a death grip as the metal man marches closer.

A gunshot fires to our right and the metal man reels to one side. He steadies and turns toward the origin of the sound. A smoking hole can be seen in his chest.

“LEAVE ‘EM ALONE!” hollers a voice, and suddenly a young man breaks through the crowd, charging toward the metal man with a huge hammer in his hand. He swings the hammer with all his might and it hits home on the metal man’s neck. His head flies off the body and into the bushes, and the torso topples over.

The man with the hammer takes a deep breath, wipes a trickle of sweat from his forehead, then looks at us with a genial smile, “Hullo, guys! Sorry about the automaton. Got you out of nowhere, didn’t it?”

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

Installment Ten: The Hammer Man Shows the Way

Still squeezing Leina’s tense arm, I gawk at the young man who had just attacked and decapitated the strange armored man. He’s wearing an orange suit lined with fur, with a matching orange top hat. He stands up straight, swings the hammer onto his shoulder as if destroying armored men were but a routine, and flashes a smile at us. “Hullo, guys! Sorry about the automaton. Got you out of nowhere, didn’t it?”

“… Suppose it did,” replies Leina after a stunned moment or two.

I make the mistake of looking away from the man and at the crowd, and my stomach tightens. Eyes from all directions were trained on us. There’s nowhere to hide. This is exactly what I hoped would not happen. I inch closer to Leina like a toddler shying away behind his mother.

The man also seems to notice the attention. He takes a step toward us and lowers his voice. “You headed anywhere?”

“Evergreen Meadows,” replies Leina.

“I’ll escort you there. Follow me!” The man turns on his heel, shoves his hammer into a loop on his belt, and beckons for us to follow as he starts walking.

As it turns out, we kept missing the way to the Meadows because the bushes on either side of the path have been left untrimmed, obfuscating the path. The great crowds in No Man’s Landing didn’t help at all. I’m thankful we have help, and SO relieved to escape the many pairs of eyes making my arm hairs stand on end.

We walk down a dirt path in silence for a while. I sigh in relief as the sounds of the voices and footsteps of the townspeople peter and fade from my hearing.

“Anywhere in the Meadows in particular you’re looking for?” asks the hammer man.

“Nope, we were simply told to find and set up camp in the Meadows. Know of any good places to set up a tent? Maybe make a fire now and then?”

The hammer man pauses and put a hand on his chin. “Hmmm… How about on the banks of the river! You’d have to mind the insects, but the water is safe to drink, and it’s peaceful and quiet. A lot of wildlife hangs around there, too, so if you’re especially into nature, I know you’d like that!”

I beam at the mention of wildlife. Animals have always been my best friends. I love them with all my heart. It was clear when I was a child that my special Guardian ability would have something to do with animals. Abilities aren’t usually revealed or discovered until the Guardian trainee is in his teens, but my parents spotted it when I was just eight. I found the ability to communicate with animals of all kinds. I can’t really explain it, but I guess they just become more… “human” around me, allowing me to better understand them and vice versa. It’s really come in handy with the beastkeepers. The Guardians say that I should be wasting my time hanging around low-lives like beastkeepers, but not only do I love animals, but I love being helpful, too. Being wanted. Being useful.

“Here we are!” announces the hammer man. We had walked through rocky corridors, over steady hills, surrounded by plant-life of all shapes and sizes, and we are now on a more-or-less isolated piece of land. On one side is a giant wall of mossy rock, and on the other side is a slow-moving, placid river.

“Oh, this perfect,” exclaims Leina bouncing on her toes excitedly, “Thank you, mister!”

The man laughs. “Call me Christopher! Christopher Puddlevest. What are your names, by the way?”

“I’m Leina Kil— Ratchetfun, and this is Korey Braziertoaster.”

I glare at her again. ‘Braziertoaster.’ Why ‘Braziertoaster?’

“Pleased to meet you both! Are you new to Aethasia?”

“Yay*! We just arrived today. We were sent here by our Guardians. The goal is to practice survival skills and be resourceful. It’s required for the work we’re doing.”

“I see. Well, best wishes to both of you! And if you ever need any help, Buzz, Shep or Buck should be able to help you. They’re workers here in the Meadows. Hope to see you later!”

“Bye! Thank you!” Leina calls. I wave and smile, yearning to say something, but my sister keeps plucking then out of my mouth.

As Christopher disappears around the corner of the rocky cliff, Leina rocks on her feet and gives a wide smile, as she always does when she’s excited. “I’m glad this is off to a good start, aren’t you, Korey?”

“Yeah, I’m glad Christopher found us. He was great help,” I reply, relieved to hear my own voice for once.

“Yes, he was. Welp, let’s get the tent set up, shall we?”

“Yay.” I slip off my shoulder pack, and as it falls to the ground, I realize how heavy it had been. I flex and stretch my shoulders to loosen them, then begin pulling wooden poles from the pack.

---

*In Efranya, the country Korey and Leina are from, "yay" is a common equivalent of "yes."

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

OOC: ARGH! Wrong account! @Hanna_Brassheart Could you please delete the first one??

---

Installment Eleven: Hired

Needless to say, there is a notable difference between living in the Guardian house in Efranya, where one is well-fed and cared for by servants and well-educated by mentors, and camping in the wild in a tent with only a sibling and the nature for company. Leina and I are still getting used to the significant change in scenarios even a week after our encounter with Christopher and the metal man (called an “automaton,” as it turns out.

“Keep up, Korey! Can’t you go any faster??” calls Leina, several paces ahead of me.

“Yay, I’m coming,” I sigh. I stand up and, with one last gaze at the intriguing fern I had found on the side of the path, I proceed.

We can both agree with no question that nature walks are awesome, but it means something slightly different to her than it does to me. She doesn’t bother to take in details in little bits like I do.

“Why’re you walking so slowly?” she asks with her arms crossed.

“I’m looking at nature, of course.”

Leina rolls her eyes with a disgruntled sigh. “You know, I wish we weren’t opposites.”

“You go on ahead, Leina. Don’t let me slow you down.”

“Actually, I wanted to tell you something that I forgot to mention earlier.”

So much for a soothing, quiet stroll in the country. “Yes?’

“The three brothers who work here in the Meadows? They hired me!”

I stop walking and my eyes widen. This is new. “What for?”

“I’ll be delivering honey, wool and milk to the Business District, north of here. It’s a mile walk!”

“Huh…” I respond, trying to take in the news.

“They’re paying me, too. Five coppers a load. We’ll be able to afford supplies! Oh, and guess what, Shep and Bucky are talking about hiring you, too!”

My brain struggles to keep up with her rushed talking. When it gets to the part about hiring me, my eyes pop open. “What?? Me, deliver?”

“No not to deliver, to help tend the alpacas and cows! Bucky and Shep would like extra pair of hands, and I told them you were good with animals.”

I stare at her puzzledly, “All right, but… when would I start?”

---

“This ‘ere is Bessy and Clarabelle. They my cows, and I don’ want you treatin’ ‘em like mere beasts, hear?”

I nervously bite my tongue and nod at Bucky. I’m still struggling to process the situation. One moment, I’m walking with my sister down a placid trail, and the next moment I’m getting a job. Sometimes I wish Leina weren’t so impulsive… But at least I get to deal with animals.

“You’ve milked cows before right?” Bucky raises an eyebrow at me dubiously.

“Yes, I did it quite a bit at my homeland.”

“Good. Sensible kid. Now, Bessy is a fine cow. She shouldn’ give you much trouble. But Clarabelle here is a stubborn one. I’ve milked ‘er a good plenty times, and she still wallops me!” He grins and points to his temple, swollen and red. He’s obviously taken a recent beating. “Good luck, son!”

“Thanks,” I reply slowly, eying the cows suspiciously, “So, I’m starting now?”

“’Course you are, son! Grab a pail and get to it!” He leans on a fence post and watches me smugly, probably hoping he’ll get a show out of Clarabelle and me.

We’ll see about that, I think to myself as I grab a pail and approach Bessy. I’ve handled many creatures, great and small, ferocious and tame, and I’ve gotten through with the lot of them thanks to my powers. I hope the effect applies on Aethasia as well as Efranya.

I look into Bessy’s eyes and start whispering, “Hullo, Bessy. I’m Korey. You’re a beautiful one. Don’t worry, I’m a friend. Be calm, be calm…” I stroke her long, brown mane, never breaking the eye contact. I sigh with satisfaction as I feel the emotion in the cow. She’s wary, yet trusting and understanding. Just what I expect in a new animal acquaintance. She doesn’t flinch as I get down on my knees, crawl between her legs and begin to harvest her milk.

In no time at all, I fill one-and-a-half buckets. I inch back out from under her and stroke her neck. “Good lady,” I breathe with an affectionate smile.

I grab two more buckets and face Clarabelle, who is already eying me warily. She snorts and paws her hoof on the ground. Her horns are aimed right at my pounding heart. Ignoring Bucky’s giggling behind me, I approach the cow. I gaze straight into her eyes and early on began whispering, “Hullo, Clarabelle. I’ll be your milker today. Now don’t worry, I won’t hurt you, love.” I mean it with all my heart.

Clarabelle moos gruffly and prances in her spot. Her eyes are wild and protesting. I put down the buckets and extend my hand to her nose, a foot away. “You be a good lady, all right? Surely you can manage that.”

The cow hesitates long enough for me to rest my hand on her nose. I feel a wave of fright as soon as I make contact. She brushes my hand off and, to my surprise, bites my fingers.

I don’t pull back my hand, but I toss my head upwards and give a soundless cry of pain. Bucky’s giggles intensify. I rub my fingers and take a deep breath, ridding any frustration building in my heart. If there’s one thing that I have learned about dealing with animals, it’s to not let them see or feel strong emotion in their caretakers. Again, I extend my hand to her, but I don’t touch her. “Come on, lady. I know you’ve got it in you. It won’t take long. Just trust me. And trust Bucky.”

Little by little, the wildness disappears from her eyes. In a few moments, she is sniffing my hand curiously. Bucky’s giggling ceases.

It takes several minutes of stroking, whispering, and even some singing, but I somehow find myself under Clarabelle’s legs without a scratch on me, save for my bruised fingers. When I finish, I get up and pat Clarabelle gently. “Good lady. I knew you had a sense of trust in you. Now you be good for Bucky, all right?” She responds with a dip of the head and a hoarse moo.

I turn to Bucky and have to keep myself from bursting out laughing. He’s giving me the queerest look, one bushy eyebrow raised, his wide, amber eyes dancing with intrigue, his lips pursed.
“Well! You seem to know how t’ take care‘v yourself, son.”

I smile warmly. “Thank you. You have some fine cows, Mister Bucky.”

“Enough with the ‘Mister!’” he explodes with laughter, “Now, go take care of Shep’s llamas over there, will ya?”

“That’s alpacas!!" hollers Shep from behind a line of tree. Bucky laughs even harder.

---

The alpacas were even more touchy than the cows. When I approached the pen, Shep was chasing them all over the place with a large shearing tool in his fist. His face was red, his eyes bulged and he was hollering at the alpacas passionately. After a lot of whistling, gesturing, whispering and scratching, I manage to get them to settle down. Shep was impressed.

Now, cows milked, alpacas sheared, and five rusty coins in my pocket, the work for the day is done. I take a deep breath of the fresh air and smile. I could get used to this life.

The Sun has passed well under the tree line. It’s early evening, and time to prepare supper. Leina and I have been living off fish and sea flower stew from the river, berries and fruits from the foliage in the Meadows, milk from the cows and the occasional snack that Christopher brings when he comes to visit. Kind chap.

By the time Leina arrives after delivering her shipment, fish is cooking over the fire, and we sit by it, munching on berries and sharing our adventures and misadventures.

I could get used to this place. As long as nothing changes, of course.

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

Installment Twelve: The Urchins

~~ Twenty minutes before Korey begins his work~~

I jog toward the Meadows’ entrance like a little girl on her way to her favorite playground, skinpack bouncing against my back. For the hundredth time, I mentally scan the packing list. Did I forget anything? I’ve got water, snacks, small bandage, map, lantern, mask. . . Yep. Yay, I’ve got everything!

I turn the last corner and behold Buzz standing in the middle of the path, one hand in his pocket, the other stroking his beard, sticky with honey. Beside him is a wheeled, wooden cart about three feet tall, containing jugs, jars, sacks and small boxes.

I stop in front of him and pant, “Reporting for duty!”

“’Ey there, busy bee! You look just about ready.”

“Yup, I’m so ready!” I reply, rocking my feet back and forth.

“Right. You’re delivering everything in this wagon here. Jugs contain Buck’s milk, Sacks and boxes contain Shep’s wool, and most importantly, these glass jars hold my prized bees’ sweet honey! Be careful with these jars! Don’t jostle them too much or they might shatter. A drop of honey out of its jar and you’re done for. Got that?”

“Yes, sir!” I say with a grin.

“Good. Now, I’ve met someone who can help you find your way, and give you more instructions.”

A helper! A guide! They could show me Aethasia! They could help me experience its greatest beauties first-hand! My feet are now so restless that I start bouncing instead of rocking.

Shep beckons to someone behind him, and slowly, stiffly, a young woman approaches. She’s lanky and pale, and very tall, only half a foot shorter than Shep. Strands of jet-black hair obfuscate one of her dark brown eyes. Her lips are pale and look as though they’re glued together. Her dress is simple, yet fashionable, mostly black with velvet green highlights.

“This,” continues Shep, “Is Azeline Darkheap. She will show you around No Man’s Landing, specifically the Business District. Azeline, this is Leina.”

“Hello!” I wave at my new helper and smile as best as I can. Her cold nature dampens my excitement a little.

Azeline peers down at me with a cool, emotionless gaze and nods her head in greeting. “A pleasure,” she murmurs.

“Now,” says Shep, “I must go back to tend my bee farm. Good luck, Leina! All yours Azeline.” He brushes past me with long, quick strides and rounds the corner, out of my sight.

A sigh from Azeline brings my eyes back to her. “Right,” she says, “Let’s begin. Bring your cart.” She swiftly turns around and starts down the path to No Man’s Landing.

I find with relief that it doesn’t take too much energy to push the cart, and eventually I’m keeping up with Azeline’s brick pace.

Throughout the journey, my guide doesn’t say much, except to point out which path to take in a fork in the road, where automatons are usually stationed, and a couple reminders to not give urchins the produce, or let them steal it.

I spot several urchins on our trek, young and old, watching us wheel by, playing a crude version of football*, chasing each other, fighting over an uneaten morsel of food, and/or napping in a pile of rags. And all of them are dirty, with ragged clothing and greasy hair. I straighten my back so my skinpack doesn’t stick out as much, lest a snoopy pair of hands pull it open and take my dried fish bits. I bite my tongue and try not to feel sorry for these youngsters. Troubled questions leak into my mind.

*(Americans: “Soccer” football, not our football.)

“Keep up. Don’t stare,” comes Azeline’s voice.

I tear my eyes from the urchins and push my cart harder. I catch up with Azeline and ask, “Why are there so many of them??”

She never slows down, but answers with downcast eyes, “They took their parents.”

“Who did? The urchins?”

“Don’t you know? The Empire, of course. Turned them into automatons.”

My jaw goes limp as I recall the armored man that had approached Korey and me on our first day here. Christopher had called it an “automaton." That automaton. . . used to be a regular person. Used to be a father or mother. And this “Empire” took them. . . and left behind their children, helpless, hungry, poor. . .

My grip on the wagon slackens, and I slow down almost to a stop. What kind of “Empire” is this? Why did they have to ruin such a beautiful land with such immorality?

“Keep up! You’ve got work to do!” Azeline’s piercing voice once again jerks me out of my shock and I shove the wagon back into motion. “Sorry,” I mutter, trailing behind her.

“Now,” continues Azeline, “We should be leaving the poorest part of town now. Then begins the Business District. Take a right. . .”

I follow Azeline and her pointing fingers and directing voice carefully, taking note of every turn. It isn’t long before the the first shop looms into view. "THE HONEY TRAP.”

A man leans over the counter from inside and exclaims, “WELL, IT’S ABOUT TIME!”

“Delivery!” I respond with a cheerful voice, “I understand you take honey?”

“Only the finest! And my cousin-once-removed’s honey is no exception.”

“Buzz is your cousin?”

“My cousin-ONCE-REMOVED. You new to this job?”

“Yep!” I say as Azeline and I start loading honey jars onto the counter top, “I started working in the Meadows, delivering goods to the Business District.”

“Tough job, finding your way around this place.”

“Oh, I can manage!” I smile and slide the last jar to the shopkeeper.

“Thank ya very much for your kind delivery! What might your name be?”

“Leina Ratchetfun. Oh, and this is Azeli—”

“He knows me,” interrupts Azeline, “I used to deliver for him, too.”

“Yes,” adds the shopkeeper, “A few years ago, until she quit and j—”

“I was tired of going back and forth all the time. I’m. . . pleased for you, Mister Tony, that you have someone more. . . enthusiastic to help.” Never once does Azeline give a sign of emotion as she talks to the shopkeeper.

“Yes, I hope she serves well for a long time,” replies the shopkeeper with a nod. Then to me, “I’m Mister Tony, by the way! Thank you again for delivering the honey!”

“Of course!”

“Now run along and deliver the rest of your trinkets. Mister Remy and Mister Jake will be pleased to see you. Do be careful of Remy, though. . . He’s especially feisty.”

“’Kay, thanks!”

“See ya next time!” Mister Tony greets with a wave.

---

Feat. @Azeline_Darkheap

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

Installment Thirteen: Wolf

“The next closest shop is the wool shop, run by Jake,” states Azeline as they leave Tony’s honey shop.

After a left, a right and a smooth curve, we reach the wool shop. Jake is seated, his forearms resting on the counter top. He has a distant, lazy look on his face, and he seems to be casually chewing something. He looks toward us and raises his eyebrows.

“Hello!” I greet. “We have a delivery of wool for you.”

“Ehh? Ye?” his voice is gruff and unrefined.

“Yep! I’m new to the job.”

“Aye, I reckon so,” he remarks as he sits up and crosses his arms. He closes his mouth, twists his lips a little, then opens them and started blowing a bubble with the substance he’s chewing. Bubble gum!

He watches wordlessly as Azeline and I load the sacks and boxes of wool onto his counter. When we finish, I announce, “That’s all for now. I’ll be back with more later!”

“Aye, fine with me. Thanks.”

“My pleasure!” I start pushing the cart away from the counter. “See you later!”

“Aye.” He slowly stands up, hauls himself to his new delivery and starts peering inside one of the sacks.

“Right,” says Azeline with a nod, “Now onto the cheese shop, run by Remy.”

She walks down a different passageway, and I begin to follow, but I glance into the cart, and freeze in my tracks.

Azeline looks back and gives me a puzzled look. “What’s wrong?”

“We. . . missed a jar of honey!”

Oooohhhhh. . . Breathes Azeline, looking at the sky like she was asking it, “Why me??”

“How about. . . I take the honey and give it back to Tony, while you go on to Remy?”

“You’d get lost without me to guide you!”

“I’m good with directions! I’m sure I could find my way back!”

“There are automatons patrolling this place! If you get caught, you’re in a tough situation.”

“I’ll keep my eyes peeled. Trust me, Azeline! I think I can do it!”

Azeline squints at me with a cold stare and pursed lips for several moments. “. . . All right. You can try. But if you’re caught by an automaton, don’t blame me.”

“Got it! Thanks!” And with that, I grab the honey jar and take off in the direction we came.

“Meet back here!” Azeline calls behind me.

“Kayyy!” I respond.

I run down the path, analyzing my surroundings. We passed that large crate, that’s were I saw a squirrel, and there’s the green poster, and there’s the white poster, and—

CRASH! Scamper!

The sound came from behind me. I stop for a moment and look back to see what caused it, but everything seems untouched. I guess it happened around that corner. Probably someone running into something. Nothing important. I’m about to turn back around and continue on my way, when, around a corner, scurries a dog.

No, it’s more than a dog, it’s a wolf. And it’s running in my direction.

I cry out, drop the honey and sprint. I hear the wolf following me.

I almost trip on my skirt as I round another corner, hoping to lose the wolf. I take a brief look behind me to find that it’s still chasing me, piercing, green eyes trained on me.

Looking forward again, I realize I’m about to run smack into a wall, and I outstretch my arms and cushion the impact. My arms are probably bruised, but other than that, I’m unharmed.

For now.

I look back and scream. The wolf had stopped running, but it’s creeping towards me with raised hackles, and lips peeled back revealing a full head of sharp, white fangs. Actually, I’m not sure it’s a wolf anymore. I’m not sure what it is. It has the snout, ears, teeth and claws of a wolf, but the thrashing tail is too long. And it’s wearing clothing! Almost like urchin’s clothing, dirty and tattered. And long brown hair drapes over its neck.

It’s like this wolf was once human.

Suddenly, a loud BANG sounds from several feet away, and the wolf thing raises its head, gives a high-pitched howl, collapses and remains motionless. I spot Azeline with a pistol in her hand and sigh in relief. I jog to her and gasp, “Thank you!”

“It’s wounded, but not dead. I caught her shoulder. We must keep moving. I delivered the milk to Remy already. Let’s head back to the Meadows.”

In my shocked state, I could obey any command. I keep close behind Azeline as she pushes the empty cart down the path back toward Urchin’s Grotto.

“How did you find me?” I pant, struggling to keep up with her ever-brisk pace.

“I think it’s rather easy to pick out where someone is from her screaming and the growling of a wolf, don’t you think?”

“Hmm. . .” is all I can say.

“There are stories about that wolf,” Azeline continues as they rush through Urchin’s Grotto, “Mostly stories about it stealing food from markets and shops, or roosting in alleyways. As far as I know, there haven’t been any official reports of it killing people, but maybe. . .” She gives a small shrug.

---

By the time, we arrive at the Meadows, I’m feeling better, and I’m ready to share my adventures with Korey. I decide to not bring up the wolf, or the broken honey jar that I left in the District, to Shep, Buzz or Bucky, but I will tell Korey. Korey will be most interested about the wolf.

Azeline stops and says, “Well, here you are. I’ll leave you here for the boys to watch over you. I have other business to tend to.”

“Oh, okay, thanks for guiding me!”

Azeline nods stiffly, turns and speed-walks back towards No Man’s Landing. I wonder why she’s always in such a hurry. . .

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

Installment Fourteen: The Empty Grotto

“Brown fur, brown hair like a human girl, glowing green eyes, long tail like a cougar’s, and clothing. . .” I look away from my sister for a moment and narrow my eyes in thought. “. . . I’ve never heard of such a creature! Odd, it does sound half-human!”

“Doesn’t it??” exclaims Leina, “Anyway, so it cornered me in an alley with a dead end and started creeping up to me. I was fairly sure I was a goner, but Azeline found me and shot it in the shoulder! She saved me—”

“Shot it?!” My heart tightens and my mouth gapes at the scandal. “Shot it?! Why would she do that?!”

“It was going to kill me!”

“She could have saved you in a more harmless way!”

“Like how? She was like a hundred feet away from us!”

“How do you know the creature was going to kill you?”

“It was growling! It chased me and cornered me! It was looking right at me ferociously!”

“It could have wanted something else! I think if it were trying to kill you, it wouldn’t slow down when you found the dead end. It would take the opportunity, and pounce!”

“Why else would it chase me, then?”

I rub my eye and sigh, tired of the bickering. “Look, I don’t know, but my point is, Azeline shouldn’t have killed it.”

“She didn’t kill it! It was still alive when we left it. She hit it on the shoulder.”

I sigh again, this time with a taste of relief. “Ohhhh, no matter. What happened next?”

She continues her recap of her first workday, but I don’t listen. I’m too busy pondering the creature she described.

A wolf with glowing eyes, the hair and clothing of a human and the tail of a cougar. Fascinating. A shame it had to be wounded. I wonder if this is a common species in Aethasia. I want to see it.

---

~~ The next day. . . ~~

“This is where it cornered me.”

After a long time of zig-zagging through seemingly random paths, Leina points into an isolated alleyway. I peer inside to find that the creature is no longer in there. “Where was it when it was shot?” I ask.

Leina walks into the alley and stops partway in. “About here!”

I look at the ground around where she’s standing. No sign of blood or any other indication the creature was here. I nod to myself in satisfaction: No way to trace it. “Right. Okay, thank you. We can go back.” I start back out the alleyway.

“Don’t you want to find it?” asks Leina in a quiet (probably nervous) voice as she joins me out.

“Sure, but I have no way of knowing where it is.”

“I think it’s in Urchin’s Grotto. We passed through there to get here; maybe you could check!”

I pause and narrow my eyes warily. “Why do you say that?”

“You do want to see it, right?”

“No, I mean, how do you know it’s at Urchin’s Grotto?”

She furrows her brow and stares back at me. “IIIIIII dunno. A guess?”

“That’s an unusually specific guess.”

“I. . .” she averts her eyes and gazes at her feet with a troubled look on her face for a few moments, and then looks back at me with confusion and impatience. “Look, it’s just a guess, and it’s all I know. Shall we look, or not?”

“As long as it’s on our way, why not.” I answer with a shrug.

We head back towards the Grotto in silence. When we arrive, the place is oddly empty. When we had passed by it before, I had seen dirty kids running around, but now all is eerily quiet.

“This is the Grotto, right?” I inquire.

“I believe so,” breathes Leina.

We both stand still and look all around us, unsure of what to do or where to go.

“Oy, you two!” hisses a voice.

We follow the voice with our eyes to a boy, watching us from the shadows with a fearful look on his face. “You shouldn’t be out ‘ere!”

“Why not??” asked Leina skeptically.

“There’s this big dog prowlin’ about! Right big, it is! Looks ‘ungry.”

I look at Leina, she looks at me. I reckon we’re both thinking the same thing: Leina’s guess was right!

“Where is it? Where did you see it?” I ask the boy.

“Dunno, we’ve all been ‘iding back ‘ere in Wally’s shack! ‘ave’nt seen it! Georgia says she saw it down that alley, though.” He points a grimy hand behind them, down an unlit alley that slanted down the hill.

“Anyway,” he continues, “‘f you fear for your life, flee! Leave the Grotto or join us or somethin’, but don’t stan’ out in the open like that! It’ll see ya!”

“Leina,” I command, “keep going to the Meadows. I’ll catch up.”

“You mean you’re going on your own?!”

“I don’t want you hurt!”

“But what if it’s not in that alley? Maybe it moved, or the kid lied! And you could get lost! I’m good with direction; I should stay with you!” She looked at me with pleading eyes. Eyes of true concern that I don’t see often in my sister. With a sigh, I give in. “All right, but stay out of my way and keep your eyes peeled.”

“I will,” she promises with a bold, firm voice.

I give her a little smile and begin making my way towards the alley where the boy said the wolf was.

“You mad?!” shrieked the boy, “Get away from there!”

“He’ll be fine!” was Leina’s reply.

Will I be. . .?

I look down the slope, and my eyes adjust to find, at the end of the alley, two glowing, green eyes greeting me back.

[Peregrine_Appleclock]

Installment Fifteen: In the Sand, Half Sunk

~~ A month before Korey and Leina’s arrival, a day after Peregrine’s escape ~~
~~ From the perspective of Imperial Officer Larkcape; third person ~~

Ben emerges from the mines and stretches his arms. After an hour of directing automatons where to dig to find the Emperor and Zaul, he desperately needs a break.

So weird, he thinks to himself for the umpteenth time, The mines were built with expert care! It shouldn’t have caved in! And all those mine autos! What could have possibly caused such excessive damage??

Yesterday, Silverclaw had told him that a dog caused all this. “A DOG?!” he had exclaimed.

“Yes! A dog! It attacked Lucky and Zaul, caved in the walls and shredded the automatons!”

“A dog.”

“Yes! It was really big and powerful, with lots of teeth and razor-sharp claws. I know. . . I tried to catch it.” Then she had held up one hand to reveal a bandage wrapped around her arm, and with her other hand she had pointed to a set of fresh, jagged claw marks on her neck. “But it escaped. It swam to a departing taxi boat bound for the mainland and boarded it.”

Ben furrows his brow and starts walking about aimlessly as he recalls Silverclaw’s story. Surely not. Why would a DOG cause a room in a well-built mine to cave in, and then rip a dozen automatons to bits? And Silver has claws of her own! She probably just accidentally scratched herself—”

He pauses and his jaw drops. On the ground, in the sand, right in his path, are large paw prints. They were obviously formed by something large and something fast. Intrigued, he walks alongside them until the prints disappear into a disturbance in the sand. In the mayhem, he spots a claw mark in the ground, and two crude shoe-prints, besides quite a bit more sand that appears to be flung in every which way. He gawks and shakes his head, his mind spinning. Surely not! he repeats to himself.

The paw prints. continue at the end of the hypothetical fight scene, leading towards the dock, then disappear at the water’s edge.

He yanks his communicator out for his pocket and dials Silverclaw’s code. “Silver, you there?”

“Hey, Ben! What’s up?” responds her voice.

“A-Are you sure that dog story is real.”

“Positive! If you go the the beach, you should see paw prints.!”

“Yeah, um. . . I get it.”

“You looking at ‘em?”

“Well. . . as a matter of fact, yes.”

“You have to believe me now, right?”

Even if he can’t see her face, Ben knows she’s taunting him. He sighs and rolls his eyes. “Guess I have no choice.”

Silver chuckles.

Something catches Ben’s eye as he’s talking to Silver. Something shiny, peeking out of the spot where Silver had grappled with the dog. He approaches the object and brushes it off. It appears to be some kind of bangle. “Hey, Silver, did you happen to drop a bracelet on the beach?”

“You know I don’t like jewelry!” is Silverclaw’s reply.

“Well did you leave anything that looks like a giant, stainless steel ring? With tiny little switches on it?”

“Nnnnnnnnope! Why?”

“Use your sleuth skills.”

“. . . You found a giant stainless steel ring. With switches.”

“Brilliant, Holmes,” Ben jokes with a smirk.

“Elementary, dear Watson,” she jeers back, “Right. It’s my shift. Talk to ya later, Pig.”

“You know that’s not my nickname anymore!” Ben shouts with indignance.

“Over and ouuuut!” Silver sings out with a nasal voice before the communicator clicks off.

Ben groans and rolls his eyes, shoves the communicator back into his pocket, and starts back up the steps toward the mine entrance. As he walks, he turns over the giant ring thing in his hand. If it didn’t come from Silverclaw, maybe it came from the dog. He chuckles to himself at the possibility, then slips the ring into his other pocket.

Soon, he is back underground, commanding automatons, watching for signs of life and wondering what he will have for supper after the job is done.

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

Installment Sixteen: The Taming of the Wolf

Nothing could have prepared me for what cowers at the end of the alleyway. As soon as I see those round, bright green eyes I freeze, and my jaw goes limp. Even from several yards away, I can feel the creature’s emotion as if I were the creature myself. It. . . she. . . is terrified.

She has the face and claws of a wolf, the tail of a cougar and the body of a human. Her quivering pointed ears are trained on me. Her lips are peeled back in a raspy growl. She’s crouched on all fours, claws digging into the pavement. Her lengthy tail is swishing back and forth. I steadily creep closer and find that she indeed, just as Leina said, wears clothing. A no-sleeved, faded pink top with ripped, grey, knee-length pants. I spot a red, mangled spot on her shoulder – the bullet wound from Azeline.

She flattens her ears and growls with increasing volume as I creep ever closer. After I’m a few feet away, I stop and slowly kneel. Maintaining eye contact with the creature, I stretch a trembling arm towards her, take a large swallow and whisper, “Hullo, you. You’re a beauty. It’s all right, girl, calm down, calm down. I won’t hurt you! What are you? What kind of creature might you be? Are you a Frankenstein kind of being?”

The creature is breathing hard and rapidly. Her eyes manifest terror and wildness, and, with utter fascination I notice, a glint of human-like intelligence. I hack into her mind, trying to trace it, but I find nothing but frenzied insanity. I think Leina is right. This girl was once human. A sob escapes my chest as I gaze at her. She steadily gazes back, as if she understands what I understand about her, as if she’s waiting for me to unearth other things buried deep in her mind.

Her growling quiets, but she is still tense and threatening. I raise my lowered hand towards her again, and wait patiently. She cranes her neck towards my hand a little and sniffs, still grunting warily.

“It’s okay, love, I won’t hurt you. I wouldn’t hurt you, poor thing. Peace, peace. . . Good lady.” Now my hand is grazing her cheek. Her fur is rough and slightly matted.

After several minutes of inching closer, the creature has stopped growling, and now grunts every once in a while. She lets me stroke her head and ears, and often looks me in the eye, as if trying to tell me something. I wish with all my heart I could figure out what she wants to tell me.

As she nudges my hand, I know I can’t leave her alone to cower in the streets of the Grotto. I want to take her home, to the Meadows. I pull myself to my feet, motion for the creature to stay and walk back up the alley to meet Leina.

She and the young urchin boy who had cautioned us earlier have both been watching from the entrance. “Thought you might be able to tame it,” says Leina with a jocular smile as I near her.

“By golly, y’ must ‘ave a real way with big dogs, mister!” exclaims the urchin.

“Listen, do either of you happen to have any rope?”

“You mean you’re taking it with us?!”

“Yes, we’re taking her with us. We can’t just leave her to starve in the Grotto! And she’s filthy!”

“Right mad, you are!” said the urchin.

“Maybe I am, but so is she. She was once human! I saw it in her eyes! She needs help. She needs nourishment.”

“What if she hurts someone?” asks Leina.

“Then I take the blame. Now, where do I find a rope?”

“Wait a mo’, guv,” says the urchin, running across the street. He flings the lid off a rusty grabage can and begins to dig through it. After a few moments, he emerges with a dirty rope, about ten feet long.

I thank him with a smile, coil up the rope and walk back down the alley to the creature.

Getting the rope around her neck is one thing. Pulling her out of the alleyway is another thing all together. It takes half an hour of coaxing, whispering, tugging and guiding to bring her out of the shadows of the alleyway. I find that she moves faster when she’s near me, so I gather up most of the rope and coil it over my shoulder and around my waist so the rope is taut around her neck, enough to keep her close, but not enough to choke her. I walk slowly, with a hand resting on her head, with Leina silently trailing several feet behind us. The urchin (whose name is Petie) hovers around our little procession keeping urchins and other pedestrians away from her, as they might spook her. As we leave the Grotto, Petie falls back with a wave, leaving Leina to shoo away the spectators.

Thankfully, No Man’s Landing is relatively calm at this time of day. Residents are either at home or at work, and not many automatons prowl around due to low criminal activity. But the few who do cross our path, stare. I keep my eyes on the road ahead, trying not to notice the curious eyes of the spectators, or the sound of Leina herding them away saying, “Stay back, don’t come near. Nothing much to see here. Stay away. Run along. GET BACK HERE!”

I breathe a noisy sigh of relief when we finally reach the Meadows. The creature has been mostly silent throughout the trip, save for the heavy panting. Even when I’m not looking down at her, I can feel the tensity in her body. “Don’t worry, girl,” I breathe, “As soon as we reach our camp, you’ll be safe. We’re almost there. Almost there. . .”

Shep, Buzz and Buck don’t seem to be around; they’re probably on lunch break or something. In any case, I’m glad they aren’t around to see the creature. We make it the rest of the way to camp without incident. I lead the creature into our tent and feed her berries and scraps of fish.. She’s still very scared, but she’s warming up to Leina and me better than I expected. All we can do now is be patient with her.

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

Installment Seventeen: An Intellectual Jigsaw Puzzle

~~ Two days after Korey meets the creature ~~

“Come on, girl, hold still. . . Whoa! Easy. It’s all right. I just need to trim that mane of yours.”

Leaning against a fence post, I smirk in amusement as I watch Korey attempt to cut off the wolf’s thick head of hair. It’s proving to be one of the most difficult tasks he has faced with an animal. He is now on his knees, one arm wrapped gently around her neck, and the other hand hacking away the mane with a knife. The wolf is not happy in the least, thrashing her head and clawing at his arms and back. A laughing huff from Buzz next to me tells me he’s as entertained as I am by the strange sight.

“One last lock, dear girl! One. . . (GRUNT!). . .last. . . (OOMPH!) . . .lock!”

Buzz and I quietly applaud as the last strand of mane falls to the ground. The fur on the creature’s head is now more or less the same color and length as the rest of her, save for several spots that Korey missed.

Korey puts down the large knife and picks up a smaller one. “Right! Good lady! Now for the touch-up.” As the knife nears her head, the creature suddenly growls and snaps her jaws at Korey.

Korey releases her neck and exclaims, “Whooooaaa Nellie!”

That does it. I burst into uncontrollable laughter, and am soon joined by Buzz. I had never heard Korey use that phrase until now, and it’s the most hilarious moment of the day.

Korey, sweating, panting, rolls his eyes and humph’s at us good-naturedly, then begins to follow the creature with his knife in his pocket.

---

Later that day, as Korey and I are preparing supper, I turn to him and remark, “You know, I think you should name her ‘Nelly’!”

---

~~ Meanwhile. . . ~~
~~ From the perspective of Detective Applequill, third person ~~

“Come in!” A sing-song voice at the other side of the door responds to Nola’s knock. Nola opens the door to find her coworker and acquaintance Gloria Oldenpinner, lounging in her favorite chair. “Hiya, Nola!” greets Gloria with a wide grin.

“Hellooo,” replies Nola with a nod and a tight smile.

“Find anything out there?”

“Nope. All traces of the Phantom are gone!”

Gloria purses her lips and sighs from her nose. “How does he do that? He generally stays in No Man’s Landing, yet it’s impossible to track him!”

“I’d rather not think it impossible, Oldenpinner. Just very, very difficult.”

“Of course. I admire your optimism!”

Nola dips her head in return, then retreats to her own office.

Nola’s office isn’t as spacious as Gloria’s office, but Nola likes it because it houses a tall bookshelf of files. Files of nearly everyone in the Resistance as well as several Imperials, bounty hunters, criminals and rogues. Files of crimes and strange happenings, mostly in the No Man’s Landing area, with scattered cases from Evercity, the Isle, the Flying L or even the Snowmoors. When she isn’t busy, she will sometimes pull two or three random files off the shelf and, just for fun, try to connect them together in some way, brainstorm how they are relevant to each other. She loves that game.

Upon entering the cozy, white-washed room, Nola closes the door, throws her sun hat onto the hat stand and collapses into her desk chair with a groan. After hours of scavenging for clues of the mysterious “Phantom” that lurks around No Man’s Landing and finding nothing, she doesn’t really feel up to an intellectual jigsaw puzzle. Sprawled on her chair, her head resting on the back of it, her arm hanging limp over her tired eyes, she wonders, What should I do now? I’ve still got some time today to do something here, but what? What is there to do besides to think? And I’m tired of thinking. Is there anything, ANYTHING on this planet that doesn’t require thinking?

In the silence, she finds herself paying attention to her own heartbeat. Well, besides that. . .

She lets her arm slip from her eyes and she gazes around her office. She notes for the first time, from the piles of paper on her small crafting table, a couple wads of candy wrappers on the corner of her desk and a stack of unorganized files on the shelf, that her office has gradually grown a bit disorderly. She gives a faint smirk and gets up to tidy the mess. Finally, something that I and I alone can control: the tidiness of my office.

After tossing the candy wrappers into a trash can outside the door (and making a mental note to obtain a wastebasket of her own), she moves on to the papers on the crafting table: Uncategorized files, an article on fog levels, a recipe for strawberry cheesecake, an old to-do list, a letter from her brother and a few dozen more odds and ends. It’s tricky and tedious trying to find homes for these seemingly random articles in an office as small as hers, but somehow she manages it.

She slips one more paper into a drawer in the corner then turns back to the crafting table to check for more. No more papers, but there is something else on the table that she hadn’t noticed before: a large metal ring. She raises an eyebrow and cocks her head at it, trying to recall where it came from. She faintly remembers Gloria handing a paper bag to her some time last week, saying that inside it was an unknown metal device, but Nola was preoccupied with another case at the time, and she never had a close look at the object.

She moves the ring into the light a little so it will catch her eye more easily in the future, then diverts her attention to a stack of files still waiting to be sorted into the bookshelf. She grins and rubs her hands. She’s saved the best job for last.

One by one, files are taken off the pile and glanced through briefly but carefully. Little by little, they find their new homes in the shelf. It takes Nola five minutes tops to get to the last file. But when she opens it, she freezes. Her eyes widen in intrigue. The first thing she sees is a photograph of the ring. The same ring that’s on her desk. Clipped beside it is a photograph of a soot-covered young woman with frazzled blond hair and scratched glasses. She hasn’t read this file before! She sits down at her desk, her eyes never leaving the page.

NAME: APPLECLOCK, Peregrine
GENDER: F
BIRTH DATE: unknown
AGE: unknown
HEIGHT: 5’3”
HAIR: Blond
EYES: Blue
KNOWN RELATIVES: none
OCCUPATION: Assistant of Overseer Grimm; Miner; Specialized Auto-Commander
ASSOCIATIONS: Imperial Isle Operations; Zaul Grimm
Committed treason against authority, disrupted Imperial work zones and escaped from the Isle’s fog rock mines. Is reported to have shape-shifted into a large, wolf-like animal and caused the mine’s walls to cave in on the Emperor and the Overseer, then destroyed seventy percent of the mine’s automatons before escaping on a taxi to No Man’s Landing. Metal ring left behind in the animal’s tracks. Unapprehended. REWARD: 300 Sovereigns.

Intriguing! Nola silently remarks with a growing smirk on her face. There goes my thinking fatigue. I should have known. . . With me there’s no such thing, is there?

She shoots out of her chair and is upon the ring in seconds. Her hand is inches away from grabbing it to get a closer view, when she stops. Gloves. She needs gloves. A good detective does not leave her own fingerprints on a piece of evidence. After digging out some clean ones from a drawer and yanking them onto her hands, and grabbing a magnifying monocle on the way, she snatches up the ring and examines it closely.

It’s a very boring object, really. No carvings or paint, just a smooth, steel ring. On it are traces of sand and gravel. She turns it around a little and discovers a neat, rectangular, minuscule cavity, with what appears to be a switch on the inside. She gently pokes her finger into the hole and finds that it’s just large enough for the tip of her finger to access the switch.

Or the tip of a wolf’s claw, she notes.

Suddenly aware of how fast her mind is racing, she sets the ring back down, dives into her chair, grabs her notebook and the nearest writing utensil, and begins to jot down notes. She must not let a single detail, a single thought, pass her by without acknowledging it. She bites her lip and strains her eyes as her pencil flies, fighting the urge to read back on her thoughts or correct a spelling or grammar mistake in her writing.

Half an hour later, with the paper bag with the ring in her right hand, her notebook and Appleclock’s file in her left hand, a pencil tucked atop her left ear and her head spinning with ideas and possibilities, she opens Gloria’s office door and announces, “I have a new case.”

Gloria smirks. “I knew you wouldn’t stay fatigued for long. Do tell!”

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

QUICK RECAP (as it's been eight months since the last installment)
Young twin siblings Korey and Leina, foreigners to Aethasia, are on a mission of survival. They set up camp in the Evergreen Meadows where they will remain for some months. One day they meet a crazed wolf-like creature whom Korey calls "Nelly". Ever since they found her, they have been taking care of her and doing their best to protect her from others. . . and herself.

Installment Eighteen: A Homey Beacon

"I think we should have let her stay at the Meadows!"

"I wish we could, but she'll go wandering off! We have to take her with us."

"To the meeting??"

"Hopefully we'll find a suitable hiding place for her until it's all over," I say, furrowing my brow as we merge with the path to No Man's Landing.

It's almost a week after we discovered Nelly, the creature from the Urchin's Grotto, and Leina and I have a dilemma on our hands.

Christopher Puddlevest (the one who fought off the automaton with a hammer on our first day here those weeks ago) has been kind enough to invite us to a meeting with his friends, but we don't know what to do with Nelly. If we take her with us, she'll probably frighten everyone, and might even be taken away from us. On the other hand, if we leave her in the Evergreen Meadows, she will quite possibly wander off and get lost. We tried asking Buzz (who had inadvertently discovered Nelly not long after we found her) to look out for her, but he refused ("The bees would not be happy with her!").

"Why don't you ask Shep or Buck?" asks Leina, kicking a pebble sitting in her path.

I glance down at the creature, trotting by my feet on all fours. She looks back up at me with an oddly trusting look in her eyes. "Neither of them know about her, unless Buzz has broken his promise to not tell them. And the less people know about her, the safer I feel."

"So where will we hide her?"

"I don't know," I answer with a hint of annoyance showing in my voice, "We'll figure out something. Use your good sense of direction!"

"Like that's any help. I'm good at navigation, not finding things!"

"You didn't seem to have much trouble locating Nelly in the Grotto."

At this, Leina falls silent. Neither of us have quite figured out how she knew where Nelly was, the day she led me into Urchin’s Grotto and I found her cowering in a dead end.

As the buildings of the city loom into view, I realize that it’s going to be a lot harder than we think to hide Nelly. The streets are often teeming with people, which means she will always have a curious pair of eyes on her.

“Korey, look, it’s Petie!”

I’m so busy trying to shield Nelly from the prying eyes of the townspeople that I almost don’t hear Leina’s exclamation. I glance in the direction she’s waving and spot him against the wall eating an apple. When he sees us, he waves casually, pushes himself away from the wall and saunters toward us. “Need ‘n escort?” he asks.

“Desperately,” I groan, nodding my head.

“Where to?”

“Mmmm. . . somewhere quiet and not crowded?”

“Right, the Grotto shoul’ do jus’ fine.”

I walk, keeping Nelly as close and as calm as possible, while Leina and Petie orbit around us like bees, keeping townspeople back and directing us toward the Grotto.

Finally, after what seems like hours, the burning eyes have faded away. We are alone, save for Petie, and the occasional frightened urchin peering from inside his hut, or from behind a heap of junk.

I steer Leina, Nelly and Petie into a secluded alleyway, the same one -- I note with some amusement -- where I first met Nelly. Under the shadow of the cliffside and the abandoned, dirty buildings, I part my lips and loose a relieved exhale.

“Need anythin’ else?” Petie offers with a smirk and a twinkle in his hazel eyes. It’s clear that he’s enjoying all the excitement. And I don’t blame him. It’s certainly not everyday for an urchin who spends most of his life living in filth and poverty. My heart goes out to him.

I look him in the eyes and reply, “Yes. We need suggestions.”

~ ~ ~

“Honestly, Kor, I think there should have been another way,” says Leina, glancing back at the pathway to the Grotto.

“Possibly. But this was the most convenient option available. Besides, we can trust Petie, and I think we can trust the other kids, too. I have to hand it to the chap; he has been a wonderful help.”

“He has. I really appreciate it. I’m just worried how they’ll fare with Nelly. . . and without you.”

“I gave her a little talking-to. I think she’ll be fine -- at least for quite a while.” I hope.

Leina is not the only one with doubts nagging in her head. Nelly trusts me, but she’s still unstable. She’s still wild. The best I can do for her is assure her that I’ll be back, and that the kids can be trusted. But after I leave?

“This looks like it!” At Leina’s voice, my mind surfaces from under my own thoughts. We are standing in front of a building that looks like it used to be a house. In the sideyard, large pieces of machinery hiss and rattle. Hanging above the carved double-doors is a wooden sign with faded yellow lettering.

“THE BEACON”

We approach the door, and Leina tentatively lifts a fist to knock. I place a hand on her shoulder and say in a low voice, “I don’t think you need to do that. Christopher said it’s a printing shop.”

“Mm.” She lowers her hand and turns away, clearly annoyed. I flash a warm smile at her, close my hand around the knob and open one of the doors.

Inside, it’s awfully quiet. The atmosphere is a little stuffy, but not suffocating. It reminds me of the library where Leina and I spent much of our time studying, back in Enfranya. I hear music playing, but I can’t tell where it’s coming from. In the back of the room are a couple book shelves filled with colorful books and small gadgets of many shapes and sorts. By the left wall is a single towering machine. Possibly the printer, I wonder to myself. On the right is a desk with a phonograph on it; that explains the music.

I shut the door behind me as we take in our surroundings. “So. . . no meeting?” Leina whispered.

This is the right place, isn’t it? It has to be! Christopher made his directions crystal clear: Every weekend, at the only printing shop in No Man’s Landing, there was a meeting. So why was there nobody here?!

At least I assume there’s nobody here. . . that is, until, a nearby door slam makes us nearly jump out of our skins.

I hadn’t noticed the wardrobe in the corner just to the right of the door until now; let alone the figure who has just emerged from it. Its body is completely covered in metal except the head and neck, which is yet obscured by a blue mask and a strange-looking helmet. The figure notices us and pauses. We stare back, unsure of what to think or how to react. Leina squeezes my tense arm.

All is dead silent save the phonograph and the grandfather clock next to the wardrobe.

The figure cocks its head and breaks the silence. “What’s up?”

A female voice. At least she doesn’t sound like an automaton.

“Uh. . . hello!” Leina manages a wary smile.

“You two are pulling off a rather intense gawk,” she remarks with a hand on her hip. I pick up amusement in her voice, muffled by the mask.

“I’ve never seen that outfit before,” ventures Leina.

“Oh, this old thing?” She bows her next towards her outfit and, to our mild surprise, throws back her head in a pleasant laugh. “It’s one of my favorites! I made it myself. So don’t worry, I’m not as menacing as I look. Usually.”

Scanning the outfit, it’s hard to imagine that she put this together on her own. I can’t help but admire her handiwork.

The woman walks around the desk and approaches us with casualness in her step. “So, can I help you with something?”

“Actually yes,” Leina replies, “We were invited to a meeting and we’re told that it’s being held here in the Beacon.”

“A meeting, you say. Hmm. . .” The girl cranes her neck towards us slightly. She appears to be studying us intently, as if still trying to decide whether or not she can trust us. I guess I don’t blame her.

I add, “We were invited by a ‘Christopher Puddlevest.’”

She relaxes. “Ahhh, ol’ Cap! How good of him. Follow me! I’ll take you to the meeting. I’m Missy, by the way.”

The house is only so big, I think to myself, How does one stash a meeting in a compact place like this?

Missy comes up to one of the bookshelves and heaves it -- book, gadget and all -- away from the wall. It moves as if it were on a hinge, which -- in fact -- it is. Behind it was a flight of steep stairs leading down a dim hallway.

Well, that answers that question. . .

[Peregrine_Appleclock]

~~From the Documents of D.G.O. and Assistant Applequill~~

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

Installment Nineteen: A Resistance

As Korey and I follow Missy down the stairs, my mind churns with anticipation. Anything could be down there. Who knows what the meeting has in store for us. . .

. . . Assuming this is the right meeting. Missy’s strange attire had thrown me off a bit, and I’m still not totally sure I trust her. Then again, she seems to be familiar with Christopher. It shouldn’t be too bad.

After a few turns, the hallway opens up ahead of us. I hear voices. When Missy reaches the landing, I hear cries of “Hello!” and “Missy’s here!”

“Yo, everyone!” Missy responds as Korey and I take our first look at the meeting room.

It’s surprisingly spacious and homey. The walls are brick, and are lined with desks, machinery, posters, picture frames and a chalkboard. In the center of the room is a table and an odd assortment of chairs, stools and even beanbags, all of which are occupied.

I emerge from the stairway to find about a dozen pairs of curious eyes trained on Korey and me. One pair I’ve seen before.

“You came!!” Christopher practically leaps out of his chair and approaches us with a radiant grin on his face.

“Hi, Christopher! Thanks for inviting us!”

“Good to see you!” says Korey from behind me. I can imagine he’s probably relieved to find at least one familiar face in a sea of strange ones (or at least it may feel like a sea to him).

“You, too! I’m so glad you could make it! May I introduce you to my friends and fellow Resistors?”

Resistors? I wonder. I suppose it’s a club or something. We follow Christopher and Missy to the middle of the room, where the rest of the Resistors are seated. “Friends,” Christopher addresses them, “this is Korey and Leina. They recently moved to the Evergreen Meadows, and are kindly joining our meeting today.”

“Hello!” I greet. They wave, nod heads and tip hats in return.

Missy gestures to a tall man with wispy white hair and a mustache -- clearly the oldest in the room. “Korey and Leina, this is our founder and captain, Alexander. He started the Resistance, and makes sure everything runs smoothly. He has a wife; her name is Selina. She’s currently running errands elsewhere.”

“A pleasure to meet you both,” says Alexander with a nod and a warm smile.

I decide to ask later why they call their club “the Resistance”.

“This here is Jacoby Elderfun,” says Christopher, slapping his hand on a young man’s shoulder, “our captain in training.”

“Nice to meet you,” Jacoby says, tipping his hat.

“And that’s Aislinn Mollisong,” Missy points to a dark-haired woman, “automaton combat expert and aether specialist.”

“Oyaa!!” is Aislinn’s rather enthusiastic greeting, to which I giggle in response.

“There’s Hanna Brassheart.” (“H’llo!”)

“And that’s Ariella Newheart.” (“Care for a Pringle?”)

“That’s Ilayne Merespark and Scarlett Darkhall; they’re twin sisters.” Scarlett waves and Ilayne simply nods with a tight smile.

“And here’s Gloria Oldenpinner, our resident detective!”

“Charmed!” exclaims Gloria as she vigorously shakes our hands.

The more people Missy and Christopher introduce us to, the more I decide that I like them. I can tell Korey is enjoying himself, too, despite his quiet nature. After we learn the names of a few more “Resistors”, Christopher pulls out a couple extra chairs from a corner, adds them to the circle around the table and encourage us to have a seat.

I plop into a chair in between Korey and Ariella and my legs immediately begin to bounce in anticipation.

“So,” begins Alexander once everyone has found their seats, “I have a few questions for you both, but before we begin, I’d like to know how our Resistors have been doing over the past week. What they have accomplished, how they have fared, ways they have spread the impact of the Great Engineer. . .” (The Great WHAT? I ask silently.) “. . . Jacoby? Anything to report?”

“Nothing too spectacular,” Jacoby replies, inclining on his beanbag, “Fixed an urchin’s bloody nose with aether yesterday morning, took down a couple bombardiers on Tuesday, led several small missions throughout the week such as clearing out autos from No Man’s Landing, and -- as usual -- strategized on potential larger ones like delaying automaton shipments and raiding military bases.”

“Good, good. You’ve been doing very well, lad,” says Alexander patting Jacoby’s back firmly. Jacoby nods in thanks.

“Anyone else?”

“Emily and I took out some of the automatons in the mines on Wednesday afternoon,” says a woman named Iliara Mustardtop.

“Excellent!” exclaims Alexander with a nod of approval.

“Did you ever get to see that slave girl you told us about several weeks ago?” asks Scarlett.

“Nope. Haven’t seen her since the one time I met her. Hope she’s doing okay.”

“You know,” adds Gloria, leaning forward in her chair, “I think I recently found out the name of that girl. Did she have short blond hair and glasses?”

Iliara nodded with enthusiasm. “Mm-hm! So what’s her name?”

“Peregrine Appleclock.”

“Interesting name,” comments Hanna.

“She escaped the mines a month ago, which is probably why you haven’t seen her for a while, Iliara,” says Gloria.

“Oh!” Iliara raises her eyebrows. “I hope she’s doing okay out there then. I told her a bit about the Resistance, and even gave her my red cap.”

I glance at Korey, wondering if he’s as utterly clueless as I am. He returns my glance with a nervous smile and a shrug, confirming my thoughts. I squeeze his arm in understanding. Alexander will tell us what’s going on soon, I say silently, even though I know he can’t read my mind. At least I hope he can’t, I add with amusement.

“I guess she hasn’t found us yet, or else we would have noticed,” says Emily Purblebottle with a shrug, “Obviously.”

“The Engineer be with her,” breathes Iliara.

“And that’s not all,” continues Gloria, “Detective Applequill and I have hypothesized that she is somehow linked to the wolf rumors spreading around No Man’s Landing. In fact, according to our documents on her, she may have actually been able to shapeshift into a wolf and escape the Isle!”

Trying to hide my surprise and intrigue is a lot like trying to swallow a solid rock. I glance at Korey, and he glances back at me. His brow is furrowed; I can practically see the gears turning inside his head through his troubled eyes. So Nelly is human. . . or at least she has been before.

“Unreal,” says Ariella’s sister Arona Copperburst, her face spelling skepticism, “How would she be able to do that?”

“We haven’t figured that out yet,” says Gloria, “But we sure want to!”

After that, the conversation leaves Peregrine the “shapeshifting wolf”, and other Resistance members report on their weeks. Along with all the questions accumulating in my mind about Nelly, new questions arise the more I listen to the members. Why are they called the “Resistance”? What are they resisting? What’s aether? Who is the Great Engineer?

[Leina_Ratchetfun]

Installment Twenty: No Small Thing

“All right, thank you, everyone, for your reports!” says Alexander, “You are all doing well. Keep going in the name of the Engineer. Now, let’s get to know our guests a little bit!”

About time, I think to myself. I sit up straighter and grin. Korey takes a deep breath and gives a weak smile.

“A question for you two,” Alexander continues, “What do you know about the Great Engineer?”

“To be honest,” I reply, “absolutely nothing. I didn’t know there was such a thing until today.” Several people raise their eyebrows, but otherwise they don’t look offended or otherwise surprised. Good, at least I’m not making a total dumbo out of Korey and me.

“Ahhh. . . Well I think it’s about time you knew! The Great Engineer, lads, is our King. He is our Creator, Founder and Lord. Everything on this land belongs to Him and Him alone. He is our all-powerful ruler, worthy of Aethasia’s throne.”

“So. . . he’s the King of Aethasia?” Korey inquires.

Jacoby sighs before answering, “Yes. . . and no. He is the rightful King of Aethasia, but years ago, one of His subjects -- known as Lucky -- rebelled against Him. He took the Engineer’s throne, covered Aethasia with fog and declared himself the emperor of the country. We Resistors have nicknamed him “the Usurper” because of that. The Engineer hasn’t been seen ever since. Many believe He abandoned us, but we believe He’s still with us, still working in us, conducting our lives.”

Ariella chimes in, “But sometimes when someone is having trouble remembering or seeing the goodness of the Great Engineer, the Scarlet Man roams the country, reminding people that there is hope, encouraging them on their journeys, rescuing them from the Usurper’s fog. And He encourages us to do the same.”

“And that’s why we’re here,” Aislinn continues, “To fight against the clutches of the evil emperor Lucky, to overthrow the fog and fill Aethasia with aether -- our life blood, to spread the influence of the Great Engineer like a forest on fire. We are the Resistance!!”

Aislinn stands and throws her fist in the air like he has just earned a victory. The other Resistors cheer in response. I watch them with intrigue.

“So,” Ilayne smirks and crosses her arms, “Will you join us?”

My smile fades. I wasn’t prepared for a question like that. I look at Korey for help, but he looks as thrown off as I do. I wish I could think of a good answer. Finally Korey says, “We aren’t from Aethasia. We came here on a survival mission and we’ll be back at our home country in a few months, if all goes according to plan. Your Resistance interests me for sure, but I don’t know if it would apply to us as foreigners.”

I nod. Good point.

Hanna answers, “The Great Engineer’s influence applies to everyone, not just us Aethasians. You are one hundred percent welcome to join us. Besides, we’re small; we could use a couple extra pairs of hands.”

“Korey and I already have jobs working for farmers and beekeepers at Evergreen Meadows,” I say.

“Minister to the farmers!” says Christopher, “Do what they say with diligence, and may they see aether in your actions.”

“Speaking of aether,” Alexander beams and stands up, “I received a delivery from Lukas the other day. . . six new aethermeters! I don’t see why Korey and Leina can’t have a couple.”

Gasps and remarks of excitement tell me that an “aethermeter” is no small thing.

“Should we do it?” Korey breathes, “Should we join this Resistance?”

“It’s for a good cause. And I think we can work it into our schedules. I hope.”

Alexander hands each of us a heart-shaped locket-like object. He proceeds to explain to us how to open it and summon aether, and when to do so. I smile when I learn that I can collect aether by picking up trash. I had seen a lot of garbage dotting the cobblestone in town while I was delivering farming goods, especially at Urchin’s Grotto.

The Resistance members are kind enough to fill our aethermeters partway with aether from their own aethermeters. There are thirteen of us in all, so none of us are too worried about using it up. Hanna then urges us to try using a few drops of aether on ourselves.

I tentatively open my locket and let a glob or two of the purple misty substance pool onto my palm. I gaze at it with awe as it swirls around my hand like a lively yet gentle living creature. Korey has a small aether cloud of his own as well. His stare is fixated on the stuff as it orbits his fingers and wrist.

“Now, embrace it,” says Gloria, bringing her arm towards her chest and clenching her fists. All the Resistance members are watching us eagerly.

Even though I have never seen or touched aether before, somehow I know what to do. Like a net, my skin absorbs the magenta mist, and it disappears into my body. I wasn’t aware of how thirsty I was until the thirst suddenly disappears, nor did I notice the minor headache until my head is clear. I feel like I can concentrate better, notice and understand things that I otherwise couldn’t. I take a deep breath, and the air is refreshing.

Korey is gazing at the Resistors intently. I know that look; it’s the expression he makes when he’s studying. I’ve seen him make this face when he was reading a book, or laboring over a paper back in Enfranya. This time he’s studying something new and unusual. . . he’s studying the people, something his shy, introverted self never would have done if it weren’t for aether.

“This stuff. . . is incredible,” I whisper, as if afraid I’d exhale the aether too quickly if I spoke too loudly.

“And that’s why we have hope,” says Jacoby.

“Hope that the Engineer is all-powerful, and with the help of aether, we can spread that hope until it’s viral,” says Iliara, her voice teeming with emotion.

“I’m in, are you?” I look up at my brother, who hasn’t taken his eyes off his fellow Resistors.

“I’m in,” he replies with a solemn nod.

Suddenly a feeling of dread, like a rush of ice-cold water, rushes through my veins. Not about Korey, not about the Resistance. . . Nelly is flashing through my mind. But why? I trust Korey and his abilities, and I trust Petie and his friends who are taking care of her right now. Nevertheless, a question is resonating in my mind like the beat of a drum.

Where is Nelly??

Don’t be ridiculous, Leina, she’s at the Grotto under Petie’s care.

But where IS she?

I just told you!!

“Leina, are you all right?” I guess I must have been making funny faces or something or else Korey wouldn’t have noticed my concern.

“Do I look bad?”

“No. . . you feel bad.”

I narrow my eyes at my brother, struggling to understand.

“My powers allow me to understand animals like Nelly, but with the aether. . .” Korey looked away and furrowed his brow. “. . . I can understand people.”

I direct my gaze to the Resistors who are watching this unfold and have a terrible thought. An unthinkable thought. A thought that seemingly came out of nowhere. I think they might potentially be in danger.

I look back at Korey with a newfound urgency and murmur, “She’s coming.”

He narrows his eyes, trying to comprehend my strange words.

“She’s coming,” I repeat, a little louder.

“Who is?” asks Alexander, cocking his head.

How am I supposed to explain all this? The clothed wolf with a cat’s tail? The sixth sense I didn’t know I possessed? That’s when it hits me.

My power. It’s my power. I know where she is.

“She’s coming!” I say again, my voice cracking with emotion.

“Who is?!” Several Resistors repeat, the concern on their faces intensifying.

“Leina, you don’t mean. . .” Korey’s face is serious, but I know he’s nervous.

“I do,” I reply. I turn to the Resistors and swallow the accumulating emotion. I lock eyes with Gloria the detective.

“Peregrine.”

Like an answer to my statement, Nelly bursts into the room, her eyes wild, her teeth bared and snapping.

[Peregrine_Appleclock]

Installment Twenty-One: A Runaway Lead (Part 1)

~~ From the perspective of Detective Applequill; third person ~~

Urchin’s Grotto hasn’t changed much in all those years since Nola lived there. And yet she also feels like it’s changed a lot. A field has become a scrap pile, a crate of food supplies -- a toy-box, etcetera. The spot where she used to sleep as a child is now occupied by a small garden.

As she passes through the Grotto, both good and bad memories erupt in her mind like a once-dormant volcano. She fights a considerable battle trying to force the lump in her throat down to her stomach.

What is she doing there? Basically, she’s passing through to get to the Business District. Why there? She has no idea yet. She has come to a point where most of her cases require nothing short of just gathering information wherever she can. She hasn’t checked the Business District for a long time. Perhaps there are clues and leads waiting for her there.

She doesn’t realize how tense she is until she has left the Grotto. She exhales in relief and relaxes her shoulders as she gazes at the tall buildings in front of her. Her work begins here.

As a detective, Nola has learned that the key to looking for clues is to study and note everything in one’s surroundings. She has scarcely taken three more steps into the District and her hand is already scribbling notes in her trusty notepad. She has done this so many times now that she can take notes without looking at her paper; she only has to glance down every few seconds. And she can dodge and look out for patrolling automatons at the same time.

For the most part, this exercise ultimately doesn’t help her much with her cases, but she keeps the notes anyway. Perhaps in a hundred years when she and Gloria are gone, some historian will discover them and use them in a history textbook or something.

As Nola surveys her surroundings, she hears a voice that she hasn’t heard in a while:

“Honey for sale! Honey for sale! Get it while it’s fresh!”

The honey stall is open! That’s not everyday. Nola decides she may buy a bottle or two to put in honey muffins, one of Gloria’s favorite desserts.

“Hello, ma’am! Care for some fresh honey?” greets the vendor as she approaches the stall.

“How much is it?”

“Fifteen cogs per bottle!”

“Rather expensive, don’t you think?” remarks Nola, raising an eyebrow.

“Honey is awfully rare these days, ma’am! It’s just how it is.”

“Why is that?”

“I normally don’t get very many deliveries from the Evergreen Meadows. But now that I have a delivery-girl, I can set up shop again!”

“That’s good to hear. What’s the name of the delivery girl?”

“I believe her name is Leina. Kind lass!”

Nola thinks back on her files back at the office. The only “Leina” she can remember is an Imperial autofficer who died in battle five years ago. Oh well, it isn’t of much importance.

She purchases two bottles of honey and continues her analysis of the District. Finally after about forty-five minutes, and five-and-a-half pages of notes, she decides to take a break and head back to her office.

She is halfway through the Grotto when she hears screaming coming from around the corner. She freezes, fearing the worst. She had, after all, watched her friends being taken away by automatons back when she had lived here.

The screaming subsides into shouts, and Nola finally decides that it is simply a group of urchins playing a game.

. . . Until a large figure covered in fur bounds around the corner, urchins in hot pursuit.

She yells and jumps out of the way, tripping and falling onto her back.

One of the urchins -- Irving, Nola realizes -- stops running and approaches her. “Ho, ma’am! Are you a’right? Are you ‘urt?”

Nola shakes her head, unable to speak through the shock. She slowly gets to her feet and brushes the dirt off her crimson suit.

“Sorry ‘bout the scare! We’re takin’ care of this big dog, an’ she’s mighty big and wild.”

Nola’s eyes widen. The wolf! Appleclock! “Where did you find the dog?”

“She belongs to two o’ Pe’ie’s friends. Korey and Leina, I think are their names. We’re taking care o’ their dog ‘til they come back to fetch ‘er.”

Leina again! Nola’s notepad feels like a burning lump of coal in her pocket. She decides not to pull it out to take notes until later, to avoid Irving suspecting something. Instead she asks, “May I see her?”

Irving glances down the alleyway where the dog ran. “Maybe. I dunno if Pe’ie would be happy ‘bout that.”

“Irv, where are you?! Help us!! We have her pinned!” a voice calls out above the screaming and yelling.

“I’ll be right there!” Irving responds. He flashes an apologetic smile at Nola, and then takes off towards the sound of the yelling.

As soon as he’s out of sight, Nola whips out her notepad and pencil and jots down notes like her hands are on fire. She’s dimly aware that she might not be able to read her own handwriting when she reads this later, but she doesn’t care. She wants to see the wolf.

She finishes up, slips the notepad back into her pocket and makes for the alleyway through which Irving had gone. As she gets closer, she thinks she hears a growling sound.

She turns the corner, peers into the alleyway, and freezes. The first thing she sees in the shadows of the alleyway are a pair of glowing green eyes, belonging to what appears to be a wolf. Seven or eight urchins are on top of the snarling beast, pinning her limbs and neck down with their hands. A chill runs through Nola’s spine as those ghastly eyes meet hers.

“‘Ello again, ma’am,” grunts Irving as he struggles to hold down the creature’s right leg.

Nola finds herself maintaining her gaze, despite the shivers of fear passing through her body. She had never seen anything like this creature. It’s absolutely fascinating. The beast is still staring back at her with a look of. . . something on her face; Nola can’t work out what.

The beast suddenly shakes herself free with a roar, and bounds straight towards Nola with surprising speed. Nola doesn’t have time to get out of the way before she pushes her to the ground. She curls up and covers her face with her arms, awaiting her potential doom.

But nothing happens.

The sounds of shouting and footsteps going past her tells her that the creature had kept running without bothering to harm her. She leaps to her feet and follows the urchins, yearning for a better look at her.

By the time she and the urchins reach the edge of the Grotto, the creature is nowhere to be seen. They stop running and gasp for breath.

“Darnit, we’ve lost her!”

“She’s one wild dog, eh?”

“What’ll Korey and Leina say? They were countin’ on me!” wails a boy about Irving’s age. Nola speculates he might be the “Petie” Irving had mentioned.

“I’ll see if I can find her,” offers Nola, already speed-walking toward No Man’s Landing.

She spends a good half an hour scanning the city for signs of the runaway beast, but with no success. Finally, with a sigh of fatigue, she decides to retire to her office and log the event in detail. She has a lot to tell Gloria when she comes back from her Resistance meeting.

_{@Nola_Applequill1}

[Peregrine_Appleclock]

Installment Twenty-One: A Runaway Lead (Part 2)

~~ From the perspective of the wolf; first person ~~

Where am I? Who am I? Who are these strangers I’ve never seen before? They’re terrifying me; I’m suffocating. Everything is chaos. I can’t think, I can’t see, I can’t get out. I’m stuck. Someone help. I didn’t ask for this. What’s His name? En. . . Engee. . . The Great “something”? I want Him! Where is He? Please get me out of here.

Who is that? Can’t process. . . tall, red shirt, blue eyes. . . very blue. Will she save me? Will she break these chains? Will she soothe my chaos? Why is it chaos? Why?

The mines. . . the island. . . fog. . . fog everywhere. . . it won’t leave. . . it’s intoxicating. . . it’s fog. . . it’s my life. . . serving Zaul. . . serving Lucky. . . serving. . . But Zaul is invading the Kingdom. No! The King! Not my King! No. . . can’t. . . let him. . . get away. . . with this. . . ghastly evil. . . NO!

Get out! Get out NOW! Break free! Go! Save them! Save them!! Save the Kingdom! Run from the fog! No more fog! No more Lucky! Get me out of here! I’m trapped! Can’t breathe! My King! Great Eng-- Great. . . help me! Help me!

Let the chaos END.

[Korey_Braziertoaster]

~~Installment Twenty-Two~~ Her Name Is Dekreel

Some are immediately seeking a place to hide; others are pointing guns and knives at Nelly; everyone is either screaming or shouting commands or warnings.

“STOP!” I yell, shaking myself out of my shock. I run between Nelly and the Resistors who are brandishing weapons and hold out my arms. “QUIET! PLEASE DON’T HURT HER!” Behind me, Nelly is roaring. She’s scared.

“Korey, mind the wolf! It could pounce on you easily!” yells Jacoby, training his pistols past me.

“She’s mine!” I respond, my voice cracking with fear, “She’s my wolf, do you understand! Her name is Nelly! Please, don’t hurt her!! And stop screaming; you’re scaring her!”

“Listen to Korey!” says Leina in a sharp tone.

Jacoby and the other armed Resistors lower their weapons, but dubiousness is still written on their faces. When the yelling peters, a tense silence replaces it, broken only by Nelly’s nervous low growling.

Slowly, I turn my back on the Resistors and lock eyes with my creature. “Nelly girl, it’s me. It’s Korey. I’m here for you. Shhhhhhh, it’s all right. You’re safe. They won’t hurt you. . .” By now my hands are clamped around her shivering head. Her lips are still peeled back, and her eyes are dancing with terror. . . and something else. . . urgency.

“Wait, wait, that’s--”

“Shhh, let her calm down,” I hush Aislinn, who has hidden under a table.

“But--”

“Shhhhhhh. . .”

Aislinn furrows her brow and puffs a little, but obeys.

I turn to look at the Resistors who had drawn weapons. “Put those away please,” I say with a level voice, “She’s terrified and needs to calm down. The last thing she needs is a reason to be afraid of you.”

One by one the weapons are sheathed, Jacoby’s pistols being the last.

I continue to stroke and soothe Nelly until she’s no longer growling and her hackles are flat against her neck. I slowly stand back up to face the Resistors, a hand still on her furry head. “You see? She won’t hurt you if she isn’t scared. Just don’t get too close to her, and don’t make any loud noises or sudden movements.”

“Wow. . .” breathes Emily. She had drawn an icy-looking sword, but it is now back in her scabbard.

“Fascinating,” Gloria remarks as she emerges from behind a pillar, “That may be the very wolf creature from the rumors!”

“It seems we may have found your slave girl, Iliara,” says Hanna.

“That can’t be her,” answers Iliara quietly, never taking her eyes off Nelly, “She was totally different.”

“Yeah, I’d assume the slave girl wasn’t covered in fur,” remarks Missy with a nervous smirk.

Christopher -- who is obviously very intrigued -- asks, “What did you say her name was?”

“Nelly,” I reply with a smile, “She’s beautiful isn’t she?”

“That’s not her name!” Aislinn has emerged from the table, but her brow still signifies that she is troubled.

“What do you mean?”

“Nelly isn’t her name! I should know; I know her!”

I raise my eyebrows, conflicting emotions exploding in me. “Does she belong to you?”

“No.” It’s Iliara who answers this time.

Taking a step closer to us, Ariella chimes in, “She doesn’t belong to anyone. At least she didn’t. She used to be intelligent -- almost human. She could stand on two paws and talk just like any person could talk. She could draw and write too, and she had a full head of brown hair. She was very kind!”

I meet eyes with Leina. Her brow is furrowed with confusion.

Aislinn crosses her arms; a different look is on her face now. “What did you do to her?”

“I didn’t do anything! She was like this when I found her! Really!” Aislinn’s accusation, though false, feels like an arrow to my heart.

Nelly makes a sound I’ve never heard before: a strange high-pitched trilling sound. Her eyes are on the three girls who had spoken up against her name. When I dig into her mind, I find a feeling I didn’t expect to find: longing. Like how someone longs to go back home when they’re on a long trip, or to see an old friend they hadn’t seen in years.

She’s met the girls. . . and she remembers them.

Aislinn leans forward. “Dekreel, it’s me, Ace Mollisong! Remember me?”

“Dekreel. . .” I echo the foreign name, and Nelly’s ear closest to me swivels toward me. She doesn’t take her eyes off the girls. Her strange trilling is intensifying.

She’s found her friends; she’s found people she can trust more than me. My heart swells with happiness for her, but the joy is promptly muted by heartbreak. Could this possibly mean I’m about to lose my dear Nelly?

When I was eight, Estel, a catwing -- one of my dearest of animal friends back in Enfranya -- died of sickness. After a small burial service, I ran upstairs to Master Lans’ office and wept into the old mentor’s robe. It was the hardest I’ve ever cried as far as I remember. He placed me into his lap and comforted me until I finally stopped crying after an hour. When my well of tears had nearly dried up, he looked down at me with those soft green eyes and said, “She will always be in your heart, young Korey. Memories live on.”

My mind flashes back to those words now as I look at down at Nelly. . . Dekreel. She was once practically human. She wasn’t a wild animal. She was intelligent and had talents. And she had friends. Looking into her mind, I realize that the madness, the animal inside her, isn’t natural. Something has let the beast come in, and now we have to find a way to get it back out. It may mean losing the Nelly I once knew, but it also means that Ariella, Aislinn and Iliara could find the Dekreel they once knew.

I turn to the girls. “Is there a way to restore her intelligence?”

“I don’t know,” replies Iliara, “I’m not even sure how she lost her intelligence.”

“Could we try aether?” suggests Scarlett.

“That’s not a bad idea. . .” says Alexander, nodding.

“I don’t see why not!” Missy tosses me a few drops of aether, and it falls into my aethermeter. Other Resistors follow suit.

“Korey, you’re really doing this?” exclaims Leina.

“Yes, I am!” I answer.

“You do realize that once Nelly is intelligent, she won't be in your care anymore, right? She won't be your ‘dear Nelly’!”

“Yes, I know. But she isn't meant to be an animal. She isn’t how she’s supposed to be. Even her name is false. And because I love her, I’m helping her. Besides, memories live on.” I smile at my sister and hope she understands. She nods once and averts her gaze to the floor.

I look down at my aethermeter and grin to find that it’s full, the purple fluid swirling and sparkling. I lay a hand on the beast’s shoulder, and she looks at me. Her eyes are clearer and calmer than I’ve ever seen them before. “Dekreel, I need you to hold still. We’ll get you back to normal soon. If aether doesn’t work, we’ll find another way. I promise, dear girl.”

She seems to understand me. She doesn’t struggle or cringe away when I open the aethermeter and let the aether spill freely into my hand. “Good-bye, my Nelly,” I whisper. And I release the aether.

Dekreel absorbs the mist, and almost immediately, her eyes droop. She collapses onto one side and lies still.

“Nelly??” Leina cries and runs forward. I hold up a hand to stop my sister and inspect the motionless creature. After a moment, I exhale in relief. “She’s fine; she’s in a deep sleep. I don’t know when she’ll wake up, but I think she’ll be all right when she does.”

“Aether always helps and never hinders,” says Iliara, “Even if she doesn’t have her intelligence back, she will definitely have improved. Especially since you gave her a full meter.”

“Thank you.” I smile at Iliara, and then gaze at the rest of the Resistors. “Thank you all. Thank you so much for your help. Leina and I are so grateful, and I know Dekreel will be too when she wakes up.”

“Our pleasure, Korey,” Alexander says with a grin, “Would you two like to stay here to look after her? You may stay as long as you like!”

“Oh, Alexander, thank you! I would like to stay if you don’t mind.” I feel the stress that has built up over the days since I found Dekreel melt away like the spring thaw. Not having to worry about how to get her home without stirring her is a huge relief.

~~Six Hours Later~~
Leina left to deliver more goods to the Business District, but I have never left Dekreel’s side. The Resistors have been kind enough to bring me dinner and snacks, keep me company, etcetera. Now most of them have gone home to bed. I’m lying on a rug, reading a book of Aethasian history and munching on flavorful wedges of potato Ariella calls “Pringles”.

Dekreel is lying on a nearby couch, a blanket pulled up to her chin. She’s still sleeping peacefully. Every once in a while she will stir and move around -- probably dreaming. She’s looking more human by the hour. It’s hard not to miss her rough, restless “Nellyness”, everything from the challenge of taming her to the mystery of what is buried inside her mind. I feel like a father who has just succeeded in raising his daughter to a healthy, happy adult. Whether or not I’m actually finished taking care of her is still yet to be found, but even if I’m not finished, I have the feeling that it will be a bit more manageable than before. If the aether is as powerful and good as the Resistors say it is, then I have the Great Engineer to thank for everything he’s done for her, and for me and Leina.

~ ~ ~

“So you’re my caretaker, eh?”

I don’t realize I have fallen asleep until the unknown voice jolts me awake. I look around to see if anyone had entered the room. Nobody. I look over to Dekreel and I gasp a little to find her awake. She’s still lying on her back, but she’s propping herself up with her elbows. She’s looking right at me, smirking. Her eyes are now crystal clear and teeming with human-like intelligence.

I open my mouth, but no words come. My eyes cloud with tears. A sob escapes from my chest. My heart overflows with astonishment and joy.

Thank the Great Engineer; she’s back.