Lilu's Book Read online

  And she would always sing us this one song, while Mom and Aunt Mary played the djembes. Tan and I would sit on the floor, tapping our toes and weaving jewelry to the beat.

  The Weaver’s Song

  Everything is one

  Never come undone

  Take a bit of moonlight

  Weave it with the sun

  Steal the fire’s flame

  Tie the waves upon

  Spin it into cloth

  Wear it like a cloak

  Always be the water

  Always be the warmth

  Everything is one

  Never come undone

  Everything is one

  Never come undone

  Nan-Nan had a way of making everything sound so simple—black and white. Except sometimes things you thought were one do come undone.

  As I settled on my pillow and watched the ba-dum boat wind its way through the moonlight-tipped marsh, I wondered about the road we were traveling. Were we heading in the right direction? Would I know what to do when we got there?

  Speaking of heading in the right direction, I wondered how Hanna was steering this thing. That’s when it occurred to me to look back at Jo.

  Jo was meticulously tapping on the chimes at the stern of the boat. She had the same concentrated look on her face as the ringers in the handbell choir at my church—like she wouldn’t see me if I were in front of her; she would only see the music and the knowledge of when to ring her bell.

  Now that I was watching her, I could hear the light chiming underneath Hanna’s beat on the drums. I studied Jo’s movements and felt the effect of them on the boat.

  Jo was steering the boat with music!

  Whenever she tapped a higher note, the craft adjusted its route to the left, and whenever she struck a lower note, the craft veered to the right. So cool! I could understand now why she didn’t want me messing with the chimes earlier. It clearly took a lot of skill to strike the right note for the boat to swerve and avoid hitting clumps of reed grass and cattails as we zipped over the marsh.

  If Hanna was playing the heartbeat that fueled the boat’s motor, then Jo was playing the thoughts that directed the boat’s rudder.

  “This is the coolest boat ever,” I said to myself.

  Hanna heard me. “I’ve never been on any kind of boat except this. Dragonfly Fairies use these all the time when we’re covering long distances across the marsh,” she said.

  “Does flying tire your wings out?” I asked. I was curious about fairies in general. Queen Patchouli hadn’t been the type who I could ask a whole lot of personal questions, but Hanna seemed friendly and open.

  “In fairy form, we can’t go very far at all. The Kib and Willowood Fairies are way better fliers than us, and I’ve heard the Kalistonia Fairies are so good they can dance on the wind. But I’ve never been to the mountains, so I can’t say for sure if that’s exaggerated fairy lore or the truth.” Hanna tapped the smallest drum to the left and then stopped drumming completely.

  I thought we would screech to a halt, but the beat continued on without her needing to drum. “Is that like autopilot or something?” I said, pointing to the small djembe.

  “I don’t know what autopilot is,” said Hanna. “This just keeps the boat moving at the same speed without me having to wear out my hands beating on these drums the whole way.

  “Anyway, so in dragonfly form we can fly for miles and miles. It’s the best way to fly. But you can’t carry anything heavier than a dewdrop when you’re a dragonfly. You would be way too heavy. Even the egg we need to get would be too heavy. So the ba-dum boat is the next best way to travel. It’s pretty useful when you’re traveling with baggage.” She shot me an apologetic look. “Um, not that we think you’re baggage or anything. You’re a fairy-godmother-in-training, which is a pretty big deal around here. It’s, like, a huge honor to help you on this mission, and Jo and I aren’t going to screw it up.”

  “Thanks,” I said. “I wasn’t insulted, and you and Jo have been really good guides already.”

  “Really?” Hanna beamed at me. She turned around and shouted, “Hey, Jo, Lilu says we’re doing a good job! Nice, huh?”

  “Yeah, but we haven’t even done anything yet, Hanna. If you want her to keep thinking that way, maybe you should pay attention. The black swamp area is coming up. We should slow down.”

  What a wet blanket.

  Hanna tapped the djembe to the left and then steadily tapped out a slower rhythm. The ba-dum boat slowed to a crawl.

  I hate to admit it, but I hadn’t noticed the dark crop of trees ahead. It was probably good that Jo had pointed it out when she did. But would it have killed her to use a friendlier tone?

  We slid in amongst the cypresses and followed a slim trail of water that twisted and turned and wound its way deeper and deeper into the trees.

  “It’s getting too dark out here. We should stop for the night,” called Jo.

  I wasn’t scared of the dark like Tan, but something about this place gave me the chills. Our boat’s music reverberated off the trees and echoed around us. Any predator within a mile had to know we were here. Better to get back out into the open, right?

  “Let’s keep going till we’re out of the trees,” I said. “Hanna, can you go a little faster? Get us out of here?”

  I knew I was being irrational, but I couldn’t shake the feeling we were being watched.

  Hanna shrugged. “Sure, I’m always game for more speed,” she said. “You’re the boss.”

  “Lilu,” said Jo, “I don’t think this is smart. We can’t see well in here. Let’s wait till morning.…”

  Hanna picked up the tempo and drowned out Jo’s protests.

  The ba-dum boat gathered speed, and I could hear Jo frantically ringing the chimes—low, low, high, low, high—to keep us out of the trees. A branch on the left scraped along the side and she overcorrected, causing us to bump into a trunk on the right.

  It jarred me, and suddenly I was afraid of the speed. Afraid we were losing control. Things would be a whole lot worse if we hit something and damaged the boat. Then we would be stuck out here when the Tangerine Tide blew through, and that would mean big trouble. Nan-Nan almost lost her house the last time a hurricane hit Charleston. Plus, Zeus and Zandria were counting on me.

  “Gross, Lilu,” groaned Hanna. “We’re all scared, but that’s no reason to fart.”

  “What? I did not fart,” I said. “I don’t even smell anything.”

  The trees were thinning, and I could catch glimpses of the marshlands stretching out in the distance past the next clump of trees. We had almost broken free! Now was not the time to make fart jokes.

  “Ugh, what did you eat?” Hanna started gagging. “It’s not fair. I can’t plug my nose when I’m drumming!”

  “I told you, it’s not me. I don’t smell anything!” I said. I turned to look at Jo. “Jo, back me up—”

  Jo was lying on her side, completely knocked out!

  I raced over to her and started shaking her. “Jo! Jo! Wake up!”

  She didn’t move.

  I heard a thump, and the drumming stopped. Hanna was slumped over the drums. What was going on?

  I grabbed my crescent moon shell, but explaining everything to Tan would take time, and the boat was still careening forward. We were going to collide with the last outcrop of trees.

  I found the mallet for the chimes in Jo’s hand and took it from her stiff fingers. Desperately, I struck the highest note.

  The boat veered to the left, but not far enough. We were only a yard away now.

  I struck again—hard.

  The note hung in the air and the boat took a sharper turn, throwing all of us to the right.

  I waited for the impact. Expecting to hear crunching wood and to be tossed forward.

  Nothing.

  The ba-dum boat slid to a halt about ten feet from the last clump of trees.

  I let out a cheer. But it sounded hollow without Jo and Hanna joining in. Wha
t happened? Was there some kind of poison gas?

  I felt Jo’s neck and found the thrump of her heartbeat, but her breathing was shallow. I crawled up to Hanna and checked her. Same thing.

  If it was some kind of gas, how come I wasn’t affected, too? All I could smell was the pleasant scent of the water lilies behind my ear.

  The water lilies! Had they protected me from the gas?

  I took them from behind my ear and held them under Hanna’s nose.

  That’s when the stench hit me. Rotting garbage, raw sewage, vomit, and used baby diapers rolled up into a compost heap would smell like a fresh breeze in comparison. I bowled over and gasped, trying to cover my nose and keep from puking.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see that the flowers were working—Hanna’s eyes began to flutter open. “Mar-marsh frogs.” She coughed. “They’re coming.” She collapsed in a fit of coughing.

  I couldn’t understand what she meant. My mind was getting foggy. I could feel my arms getting heavy. Frogs? Why would Hanna sound so afraid of frogs? Frogs don’t smell. Do they?

  Didn’t matter; I needed to take a nap. If I was sleeping, I wouldn’t smell anymore.

  Suddenly the flowers were back behind my ear.

  In my delirious state, I turned to Hanna and thought I could see the lilies’ perfume trailing from her face to mine. I waved my hand at the purple streak in the air. It felt like ribbons of silk.

  I concentrated and grasped the ribbons. They felt solid now, but slippery. Slowly, carefully, I pulled and pulled on the ribbons in the air. I had an idea, but I would need longer ribbons of perfume for it to work.

  When I had a pile of ribbon on the deck, I heard something coming from the trees.

  Plop. Plop, plop.

  Marsh frogs? I almost turned to look, but the ribbons began to fade when my attention wandered.

  I shoved away my fear and calmed my shaking hands. Nothing had changed except that I needed to act faster now.

  I imagined the tight weave of surgical masks and began to work, quickly creating a mask big enough to cover Hanna’s nose and mouth. The fragrant ribbon fought me, trying to curl or drift out of my grasp, but I strengthened my will and my hold on the strands and wove them even tighter. Soon I bit off one complete scent mask and fit it over Hanna’s ears.

  The waters around the boat were beginning to ripple.

  The second mask was easier than the first, despite my tremors. Then I heard thumps on the bottom of the boat. Something—or some things—was jumping out of the water, trying to get into the boat, which was still hovering a foot or two above the water.

  I tied off the final knot on the second mask as Hanna began to sit up. I scrambled over to Jo and fit the mask over her nose and mouth. She had been out for so long. I was worried.

  The thumping sounded like hard rain pounding on the bottom of the boat. One reddish-brown frog cleared the side and landed by my leg.

  “Don’t let it touch you!” screamed Hanna.

  I grabbed the mallet again and swatted the frog off the boat.

  Hanna began pounding a rapid beat on the drums, and we blasted off.

  7

  A Face in the Trees

  I dragged Jo—still motionless—off to the right of the boat and took up position to steer. Luckily the path was wide. It was not hard to adjust our flight path as we escaped.

  The boat shot across moon-glossy patches of water, in and out of circles of shadows. Behind us, the trees faded into the distance. To my right, Jo stirred, and I heaved a sigh of relief.

  After we’d traveled for some time, Hanna slowed the boat to a gentle stop. She immediately rushed back to her twin. “Jo, Jo, how are you feeling?” she asked softly.

  “Mmm, better,” mumbled Jo. She was sitting up now, and her eyes were clearing. “What happened?”

  “Yeah, what happened?” I echoed.

  “Marsh frogs. They’re natural predators of Dragonfly Fairies. But they can kill humans, too. They release an awful smell to knock out their prey, and then they … well, their skin is poisonous. First they make it so you can’t move, and then the whole pack of them eats you,” Hanna said.

  “That’s awful,” I said.

  “Queen Patchouli must have foreseen us needing protection. She wisely gave you those lilies to combat the sleeping gas,” said Jo, the color returning to her face.

  “Smart move, weaving masks out of the perfume, Lilu,” said Hanna. “You saved us.”

  “Thank you, Lilu,” said Jo.

  She reached out a hand to me, and I pulled her onto her feet. I could tell she wanted to say more, but I cut her off. “You should thank Hanna. I was almost passed out when she pushed the flowers back behind my ear. She sacrificed herself,” I said.

  “Well, you’re the fairy-godmother-in-training. Queen Patchouli gave the flowers to you—not Jo or me—because you are the best suited to use them, what with your being from the Songa Lineage and all.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “Everyone knows the members of the Songa Lineage can weave anything they desire. I’ve never fully believed it, but I’d be a fool to doubt it now. I’m still wearing a mask you wove out of thin air,” marveled Hanna.

  She pulled off her mask and studied it. Jo did the same.

  “Solid weave,” said Jo.

  I felt a glow of pride warm my chest and melt the fear that had lodged there when I first saw Jo crumpled under the chimes. In the waking world, I never would have been able to weave a mask so tightly. I could barely weave a basket in the time it took Tandy to weave three.

  “It’s starting,” Hanna said.

  Her voice nudged me out of my thoughts. “What’s starting?”

  “The rain,” said Jo, pointing to the dots speckling the deck. “We’re going to need to find a place to stop for a while.”

  “Just until the rain passes. Don’t worry. It’s not the hurricane. Not yet,” said Hanna. “We only need to camp out for a little bit.”

  Oh, great. What other dangers lurked out here in the marsh? My fingers inched toward the necklace.

  Jo caught my hand. “You don’t need her,” she said.

  I reluctantly let my hand drop.

  “C’mon,” said Hanna. “Let’s get moving. We’re a bit off course now, but I think there’s an island not too far away. Jo, you know the one?”

  Jo nodded and took up her place at the chimes. I sat back down next to Hanna at the djembe drums. It was almost as if nothing had happened; except that a lot had happened, and now we were all knit together somehow. I could feel it. Saving each other’s lives had bound us together.

  Soft, steady beads of rain continued to fall, but we didn’t get any wetter. Thin reeds of saw grass emerged from the sides of the boat and wove shimmering silver threads to form a protective canopy over us.

  Jo quickly steered us to the island. When we arrived, Hanna tapped out a distinct rhythm that lowered the ba-dum boat back onto the water. Then she flew out with the lines and tied us to some mangrove trees.

  Jo took a box from the boat and flew out as well, but then turned to help me down.

  My feet were unsteady on the solid ground at first after being on the boat all night. But soon I was helping to set up camp. The boat was as well stocked as I had imagined, so we quickly started a fire and put our tents up and our bedding down.

  Orange and red sparks sputtered against pieces of bark. Funny. Before I went to bed last night, the idea of sitting around a campfire built by fairies might have seemed strange. Now I was wondering, Hey, why haven’t I done this sort of thing before?

  Hanna broke open a large pod that provided fresh water, which she poured into a pot. Jo, meanwhile, chopped up strange-looking plants that I assumed were similar to vegetables back home. They both flitted around the campfire, tasting dishes and adding ingredients here and there. They worked like one person split in two. It would have been eerie if I wasn’t a twin myself. I knew how well Tandy and I could work together.

&
nbsp; “Is there anything I can do to help?” I offered.

  “Yeah,” said Hanna, “you can weave up a bowl for me. It looks like we only have two sets of dishes here.”

  “That’s weird. Queen Patchouli must’ve only been expecting two of us to travel or something,” I said.

  Hanna and Jo shared a strange look.

  “Dinner’s almost ready, Lilu. Why don’t you get started on your bowl?” said Jo.

  I went over to the reeds and trimmed off a bunch of strong grasses. Hanna touched them briefly. “Now they’re clean,” she said.

  I sat by the fire and began to work, hopeful that my skill at weaving the perfumed masks would carry over. But, as usual, I was all thumbs. The grasses struggled against me, and focusing my attention on them didn’t help like it had with the ribbons of fragrance. It seemed that working with tangible materials was still too hard for me.

  Eventually, I had completed a lopsided bowl. Even in the dim firelight, I felt myself blush with embarrassment.

  Jo dished me out a portion of delicious-smelling vegetable stew.

  “I … I’m not that talented with making baskets and things. Not like my mom and sister, or any of my other female relatives. Sorry,” I said, and sighed. I hated not being good at something.

  “No need to apologize, Lilu,” said Jo. “You proved your weaving skills today when it really mattered.”

  Hanna nodded. “Yeah, don’t stress about it.”

  We began talking about the Songa Lineage. Jo said that their ancestry had a rich lineage of heroes, too. “When you grow up hearing the tales of your ancestors, it fills you with a sense of anticipation, you know?” she said. “How can you not wonder what lies ahead and where your life and adventures will lead?”

  I nodded. Then I told them about Nan-Nan. “She used to tell my sister and me these wild stories that had been passed down from generation to generation. Tandy loved acting out the stories, and Nan-Nan would act them out with her.…” I let my voice trail off and sat in silence, staring into the fire.