The mood at the breakfast table the next morning was somber. Everyone was quiet as they ate their gruel.
Brian’s wound was feeling more painful on the second day. Margaret put some more salve on it to try to stop it from getting infected, but it still hurt him to move. Margaret told him to stay in bed, and she brought his gruel over to him. The beds were against the wall of the cave, so Brian propped his back up against the cave wall while he reclined on the bed.
As for Margaret, she was trying to go on as normal, but everyone could see that she was not herself. When she moved, she dragged herself around the room. When she spoke, her voice was tinged with sadness.
Catherine tried to clear her thoughts and eat her gruel, but she was also haunted by her thoughts. She was still feeling upset about the strange energies that were flowing through her body, but now added to this original worry, she was trying to process the death of her father. It felt like it was all too much to bear, and all through breakfast, Catherine kept her head down and avoided making eye-contact with anyone.
But Carlyle had moved past despair, and was now beginning to feel increasingly angry. The previous night he had been in too much shock to feel much of anything. But now that the reality of his father’s death was settling in, he was starting to feel angry--angry at what they had taken from him, angry that his father’s killers still walked the mountain with impunity, angry that this father’s death had not been avenged.
“It’s not right,” Carlyle burst out suddenly.
“What’s not right?” asked Alfred.
“It’s not right that they can kill a man and then just go back to their caves. It’s not right that we sit here and do nothing.”
“What would you have us do?” called out Brian from where he was reclining on the bed.
“Something,” Carlyle said. “Go over and fight them. Stab them in the chest and see how they like it. And take back my father’s sword.”
There was an awkward silence after this, and then Margaret said, “You know how your father would have felt about this.”
“He wouldn’t have wanted me to take any risks,” said Carlyle. “That was how he lived his whole life. And look where that got him.”
Margaret looked at Carlyle sadly. “That was not how he lived his whole life,” she said. “If you only knew the risks that he took…”
“Then why don’t you tell us,” Catherine interrupted.
“You’ll understand someday,” said Margaret.
“I understand enough,” said Carlyle. “We sit in our house and cower and never fight back, and those robbers kill us whenever they like. What have we got to lose by fighting back?”
“Fighting back with what?” asked Brian. “They took your father’s sword. Do you think you can just go and fight them with your bare hands?”
“We have other weapons around,” said Carlyle. “We have the axes and the clubs, and the crossbow.”
“It’s no use arguing with him when he gets like this,” Margaret said to Brian. “He just needs to blow off some steam and use up that energy first. Then you can try to talk sense into him when he’s calmed down.”
She turned to Alfred and Carlyle next. “We’ll need more wood if we are going to trade with the forest people again,” she said. “Grab those axes you were just talking about, and go out and cut down some more trees.”
Carlyle and Alfred both stood up. Carlyle grabbed the two axes from the cave wall and then walked to the door. Alfred followed him. Carlyle undid the first bar holding the door shut, and then the second one. He opened the door, and saw five men standing at the doorway.
Carlyle tried to quickly shut the door again, but they pushed back against the door with such force that the door swung back and knocked Carlyle to the ground. Then, all five of them pushed their way into the house.
“Well, you kept us waiting a long time,” one of the five chuckled. “Mountain folk are supposed to wake up earlier than that. I hope you enjoyed that nice long breakfast.”
Carlyle scrambled back up to his feet. The men pointed their swords at him threateningly, and he backed himself up against the wall.
One of the other men pointed at Brian. “You were right Zed,” he said to the first one who had spoken. “That’s him alright.”
“I told you that it was the same cart outside,” said Zed. Zed looked over at Brian. “Well, well, we meet again,” he said. “You gave us quite a run yesterday.”
“What do you want,” Brian said. “You already got everything from our cart.”
“We don’t like to leave any loose ends,” Zed said, pointing his sword at Brian.
Catherine and Carlyle’s eyes immediately went to the sword. “That’s my father’s sword,” said Catherine.
“Ah, more loose ends, I see,” said Zed. “Don’t worry. We’ll take care of all of you.”
“Give us back my father’s sword,” said Carlyle.
The robbers just laughed. “You don’t seem to realize what’s going on here,” said Zed.
“Let’s get on with it, Zed,” said one of the robbers irritably. “What’s worth taking here?”
“Strip all the iron from the doors,” said Zed. “We can resell that. Take the axes, and any other weapons you can find. And take all the food. We’ll need it with winter coming.”
“And what about them?” the man asked.
“Start killing them now,” Zed said. He held out his sword towards Brian. “Starting with him.” Zed started walking towards Brian.
“Give me back my father’s sword,” said Carlyle, stepping toward Zed.
As soon as Carlyle stepped forward, Zed abruptly changed direction and turned back toward Carlyle. He swung his sword in Carlyle’s direction. It was a wild swing--Carlyle was still a few feet away from Zed, and he wasn’t close enough to be hit. But Carlyle instinctively jumped backwards nonetheless. The sword made a whooshing sound as it cut through the air.
While Zed was turned to face Carlyle, Catherine rushed forward and grabbed at the sword. Catherine grabbed at the wrist of Zed’s sword hand with her left hand, and with her right hand she tried to get ahold of the handle of the sword. Zed tried to hit her with his free hand, but then Alfred rushed over and grabbed Zed’s other arm. Zed struggled to free himself from the two teenagers, and when he couldn’t pull himself free, he kicked at them with his legs. Alfred and Catherine kicked back, and the three of them grappled and kicked and clawed as both Catherine and Alfred tried to pry the sword out of Jed’s hands.
“Catherine, no! Catherine, stop it!” Margaret screamed.
Two other robbers rushed forward to help Zed. Carlyle picked up one of the axes he had dropped on the floor, and started swinging it at the robbers. Even though they were armed with swords, Carlyle swung with such ferocity that he was able to keep these two robbers at bay. They retreated slightly, fending off Carlyle’s ax swings with their swords, and waiting for him to get tired.
While all this was going on, Brian managed to reach over from his bed and grab the crossbow and the sack of arrows from where they were hanging on the wall. He fumbled around with one of the arrows, and managed to fit it into the crossbow just in time. Just as one of the robbers was running at Brian with his sword raised, Brian was able to fire the arrow off. It lodged into the man’s breast, and the man immediately dropped to the floor. Brian then grabbed another arrow, and tried to get it fitted into the crossbow.
While this was happening, Catherine and Alfred were still grappling with Zed over the sword. Since Catherine wasn’t listening to Margaret’s pleas to stop, Margaret actually stepped forward and grabbed onto Zed with them. It looked strange to see Margaret’s wrinkled arms joining in the struggle, but Margaret was surprisingly tough for her age, just like Finn had been.
Margaret could see that there was no way Catherine could let go of Zed now. The moment she would loosen up her grip on Zed’s arms, Zed would slash at them with her sword. But Margaret pleaded, “Just keep calm, Catherine. Don’t lose control, Catherine. I’m here to help. Everything is going to be alright.”
Just as Margaret was saying this, however, another one of the robbers grabbed Margaret from behind and pulled off of Zed. In fact, he pulled Margaret off with such force that she was flung backwards into the kitchen shelf. Clay plates and cups clattered to the floor. The robber then drew his knife from his sheath, and ran at Margaret. Margaret grabbed his arm and held the knife at bay. She was tough for an old woman.
“Mother!” Catherine yelled out. Catherine wanted to help her mother, but she still couldn’t let go of Zed’s arms. “Leave my mother alone!” Catherine screamed.
It was at this point that Catherine felt the energy inside her suddenly begin to surge. The shock of seeing her mother attacked had caused Catherine to panic, and the panic had triggered the energy. It was becoming too big. It had to come out. Catherine didn’t think she could stop it now even if she wanted to. But she also didn’t want to. She wanted to release that terrible energy. She wanted to get it out of her body. She was also angry enough at the robbers that she didn’t care what happened to them.
The energy welled up in Catherine. She shut her eyes briefly as she contemplated what she was about to do. Then she opened her eyes, and turned her head abruptly to Alfred. “Let go,” Catherine said.
Alfred didn’t understand. Why would Catherine tell him to let go? They needed both of them to try to hold Zed back. But then Alfred felt Zed’s body suddenly become hot, and he quickly let go as he jumped backwards.
Zed screamed in pain. He dropped the sword. He jerked backwards, and tried to free himself from Catherine’s grip. But Catherine grabbed onto Jed with both hands, and tightened her grip.
Zed’s screaming was so loud it shocked everyone in the room. Everyone stopped what they were doing, and looked. The robber that was fighting Margaret stopped trying to attack her, and just looked with horror at what was happening to Zed. Margaret was also horrified. “Catherine, no!” she yelled.
Zed kept screaming. Catherine closed her eyes and let the energy flow through her. It felt surprisingly good. For the past few days she had been struggling to keep the energy contained when it didn’t want to be contained. It felt like an amazing relief to let it all out.
And then, Zed’s body burst into flames. He was still alive--he was still screaming and writhing, as Catherine gripped him tight, but flames were now shooting out from his skin. Catherine, however, did not seem to be bothered by the flames.
The fighting in the rest of the house had come to a complete stop. Everyone was now watching.
“Catherine, stop it!” Margaret yelled. She approached Catherine and tried to pull her off of Zed, but Margaret found the heat from the fire was too hot for her, and she had to step back.
Zed’s whole body was now in flames. His screaming was becoming more and more high pitched, and his voice was filled with pain. Everyone cringed at the sound of that pitiful voice. Everyone, that is, except Catherine.
The smell of burning flesh was filling the room. It was now obvious to everyone that it was too late to try to save Zed. The only humane thing to do was to put him out of his misery.
Brian had by this time managed to fit another arrow into the crossbow. He stood up, and walked over. He leveled the crossbow at Zed’s chest. Brian’s hand was shaking. He wasn’t a nervous man by nature, but the agonizing sounds of Zed’s screams had unnerved him. Brian gripped the crossbow with both hands, and tried to steady himself. He fired the arrow, and the arrow buried itself into Zed’s chest. Zed’s screaming stopped. and his head slumped down to his chest.
Catherine, seeming to come to her senses, released her hold on Zed’s arms. The burning body fell limply to the ground. Catherine looked down at the body, and began to wonder what had just happened.
The three remaining robbers looked at Catherine. At first their eyes were filled with fear, but quickly the look changed to hate.
“She killed Zed!” one of them yelled angrily. “That little witch killed Zed!”
“We’ll make her pay,” another one said.
“She can’t hurt us if she can’t touch us,” the third one said. “Slice her up with your swords, and don’t let her near enough to grab you.”
Catherine looked up from the burning body, and stared at the remaining robbers. There was no fear in her eyes. Balls of glowing yellow energy formed in the palms of her hands.
Meanwhile Brian frantically fiddled with the crossbow and tried to put another arrow in place while Carlyle darted down to pick up his father’s sword from the ground.
“I see you have your father’s sword again,” one of the robbers said mockingly. “Now let’s see if you can use it.”
The robbers rushed forward with their swords. Two of them rushed straight for Carlyle. He managed to parry both of their blades. Another robber pointed his sword at Catherine, and rushed at her. Alfred, who had picked up one of the axes now, rushed to Catherine’s defense and hacked at the robber with the ax. The robber turned his sword to parry Aflred’s blow, while the robber left his side unguarded and this allowed Catherine to dart forward and grab hold of his arm. Catherine felt the energy well up inside here again. She closed her eyes.
But before Catherine could release the energy, she felt herself being pulled backwards by her mother. “No Catherine,” Margaret said calmly, but firmly. “You don’t want to do that. Let the others handle the fighting.”
“They need me!” Catherine insisted.
“They can do it,” Margaret said.
Brian had by this time succeeded in getting another arrow fitted into the crossbow. He pointed and shot, killing the robber that Alfred was fighting.
That left the last two robbers, who Carlyle was still fighting against. It was two against one, but Carlyle was fighting like he was possessed. All of the anger about his father’s death was coming out now, and Carlyle was swinging his sword with all of his might. Instead of gaining ground against Carlyle, the two found themselves slowly backing away before the onslaught of his furious sword.
Then, Alfred joined in, hacking the ax at them.
Meanwhile, Brian was busy fumbling around with the crossbow, trying to load another arrow into it.
And it was at this point that the last two remaining robbers turned and ran out the doorway.
Carlyle was too exhausted to run after them. He had been swinging with his sword furiously during the whole fight, and he was completely out of breath. As soon as the robbers left, Carlyle collapsed on the floor and tried to catch his breath
All of them were too exhausted to pursue the robbers. Now that the danger was over, Brian’s legs began to buckle, and Margaret had to steady him and helped him to the bed
The flames on Zed’s dead body were slowly dying out now.
“What happened?” asked Brian. Brian initially directed his question at Catherine, but Catherine stayed silent and looked at the ground. So Brian turned to Margaret. “What happened?” he asked again.
“In all the confusion and excitement,” Margaret said slowly, “It’s hard to tell what exactly happened. There was some fighting. You were occupied defending yourself against one of the robbers. And while you were distracted, I think Zed might have accidentally gotten too near to the fireplace.”
“But the fire’s all the way over there,” said Brian.
“The door was wide open this whole time,” said Margaret. “Usually we keep it bolted shut, but when it’s wide open, it has a strange way of sucking the air out of the cave. I think some of the sparks from the fire must have gotten caught in the wind, and landed on Zed’s clothes. Then, once Zed caught fire, Catherine held his arms so that he couldn’t put himself out. The poor man couldn’t put himself out, and the fir enveloped him.”
Brian stared at Margaret. He was looking at her face carefully, as if he was seeing Margaret for the first time. Then he spoke slowly, “I’m not so sure that’s what happened.”
“I’m sure we all have different memories of things,” Margaret said. “It was a traumatic event, and things happened so fast, we’re bound to have slightly different interpretations of what we saw. Who can be sure about anything?”
Brian nodded, but his face looked skeptical.
Catherine kept silent.
“The important thing,” said Margaret, looking around the room and making eye contact with Alfred, Brian and Carlyle in turn, “is that we don’t want to spread rumors among the mountain folk if we aren’t sure of what happened. So we shouldn’t talk about it outside this room.”
Margaret waited for an acknowledgement, and after a moment’s pause, Alfred, Brian and Carlyle all nodded their heads.
“We’ve got bigger things to worry about anyway,” Brian mumbled. “Two of them got away. That means they’ll be back with more of their gang. And if they come back with 20 or 30 of them, we won’t be able to fight them off. We can’t stay here any longer. We’ll need to change houses. We can stay at my house. It’s not as sturdy as yours, but the robbers don’t yet know where I live.”
“What happens when they find your house?” asked Carlyle.
“Then we’ll move again,” said Brian. “Or they’ll kill us all. One or the other.”
“When do we start fighting back?” Carlyle asked. “We don’t have to just let ourselves be attacked. We can resist. You saw what happened just now when we fought back.”
“That was against 5 men,” said Brian. “There must be over 100 robbers on this mountain. You can’t fight them all.”
“Not by myself,” said Carlyle. “But if we get all the mountain folk together, we might have a chance. It’s better than just waiting for them to kill us.”
Brian snorted. “You think you can organize these mountain folk to do anything? Then you go ahead and be my guest!”
“The first thing we need to do,” said Margaret sharply, “is get rid of these dead bodies. I don’t want them sitting in this house a moment longer. And we don’t want to leave them just outside the door either. It’ll just be a signal to any robbers passing by.”
“We can throw them in among the trees,” Brian said. “The wolves will find the dead bodies soon enough.”
“Help the boys take them,” Margaret said. “Catherine and I will stay behind and try to clean up the house.”
Carlyle and Alfred took the three dead bodies outside, including the burned body, and loaded them onto the cart. Brian supervised them.
As soon as the boys had left the house, Margaret immediately felt Catherine’s eyes on her.
“Catherine, you have to trust me,” said Margaret. “When the time is right, I will tell you everything you know. But your time has not yet come. And for your own protection, there are certain things that I must keep from you until the time is right.”
Margaret stopped, and analyzed Catherine’s face to see how she was reacting to all this. But Catherine did not react. Her face was simply passive, as if she had resigned herself to this already. So Margaret continued. “There are also certain things that even I do not understand. So there will be some questions I will never be able to answer.”
“It felt good,” Catherine said quietly. “Letting that energy flow through me, letting it all come out, it felt…” Catherine paused and searched for the right word to describe the euphoric feeling that had flooded through her when she had released the magic. But being unable to think of a suitable word, she just finished, “it felt good.”
Margaret took a deep breath, and let the air out slowly. Catherine could hear a tremor in Margaret’s breath. “Catherine, it must be controlled. You cannot let it out like that. For one thing, if word of your abilities spreads, it will soon enough bring unwanted attention from those I have done my best to hide you from.” Catherine opened her mouth to ask a question, but Margaret anticipated it, and held up her hand to silence Catherine. “It’s not yet time for me to tell you everything. But secondly, listen to me Catherine, secondly you must not get into the habit of letting that energy out. It will start to control you.”
“The energy is inside me now,” Catherine said. “I didn’t want it, I didn’t summon it, but it’s there. And it wants to come out. And I don’t think I can control it even if I wanted to.”
“You remember the herb I gave you?” Margaret said.
“That herb makes me feel terrible,” Catherine said. “I don’t want to poison myself.”
“It’s important to keep the energy under control,” Margaret said. “Don’t let the energy control you. The herb will help you. I’m sorry, but I can give you no more guidance than this. I do not have the energy myself, and unfortunately I did not anticipate that you would inherit it. For now, just do everything you can to stop it, and maybe someday you’ll learn to control it.”
Catherine looked down at her hands. Now that the excitement was over, and her heart rate had calmed down, there was no yellow glow coming from her palms anymore. Catherine tried to will it back, but she found she could not.
Catherine looked back up at her mother. “Do you understand, Catherine?” Margaret asked.
“I don’t understand any of this,” Catherine said. And she turned around and walked away before Margaret could say anything more.
