Trinity's Book Page 9

  My pendant!

  My mother had told me the Ananya pendant would calculate conditions when I learned to fly, but she had also called it a compass. I pulled the round disk out from under my tunic.

  “What’s that?” Moa asked.

  “If we’re lucky, it’s a fairy baby GPS.” I opened the disk and asked, “Where will the new Willowood fairy queen be born?”

  The filaments glowed, the tiny mechanism whirred, and a map of the cloud domain appeared. Two red dots glowed on the border and a tiny golden speck pulsed in the middle.

  “I think that’s us.” I pointed to the red dots and then to the blinking speck. I assumed it would glow steadily like our red dots when the new queen arrived. “And that’s where the baby will be born.”

  “That’s Castle City,” Moa said softly.

  I shrugged. “I still have to go.”

  “I know.” Moa sighed. “Follow me.”

  The bird led me around the craters and paused by a curved path at the bottom of a steep hill. The path looked like a bobsled run.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “A spoonga made this trail,” Moa said. “They draw moisture up and absorb it as they move.”

  I scanned the trail ahead. There was no sign of a large slug creature. “We’ll have to be careful.”

  Moa moved away from the spoonga path and started up the hill. His talons gripped the spongy surface, but my shoes kept slipping. I removed them and discovered that my toes gripped almost as well as the bird’s feet. I put my shoes in my backpack.

  At the top of the ridge, we looked down another slope into a valley strewn with giant heads of cauliflower.

  “What are those?” I pointed.

  “Trees,” Moa said.

  “How far is Castle City?” I asked.

  “Two more hills and a rolling plain,” Moa said.

  “Will it take long to get there?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure. I apologize, Trinity. Mist people can alter form depending on the terrain,” Moa said. “Before King Shyne changed me, I could have spread myself thin and floated on the wind all the way. I’ve never traveled through the uplands as a solid.”

  “Well, then we’ll just have to figure it out as we go.” I had an idea. Taking the sling out of my pack, I smiled reassuringly at Moa. I laid the sling on the ground. I sat on the forward half and patted the material behind me. “Have a seat and get ready for the ride of your life.”

  Moa squatted behind me and gripped my harness straps with his beak.

  I pulled the sling up like the rolled front of a toboggan and pushed with my free hand. The silky bark slid forward so fast Moa almost fell off.

  “Yee-haw!” I yelled as we picked up speed.

  Moa made choked gurgling noises in his throat as we careened down the slope. He couldn’t let go of the straps to scream. When we reached the bottom, the sled carried us on across the valley floor.

  “Lean left!” I shouted, and we leaned when we sped toward the first cauliflower mound.

  We zipped past the tree without hitting it.

  “Right!” I yelled.

  Moa leaned and we missed the next mound. We zigzagged through the cauliflower forest, slowly losing speed until we stopped at the base of the next slope.

  Moa immediately rolled off.

  “Are you okay?” I asked.

  “That was great!” he said. “Let’s hurry up the next hill so we can do it again.”

  “I second that,” I said, grinning.

  Once again, I let Moa lead. He knew the area and his experience was proving invaluable.

  Moa looked back. “Don’t step in the little holes.” He lowered his head to show me a three-inch opening.

  “What’s inside them?” I asked.

  “Tube flowers,” he said. “They open, swallow whatever steps in them, and seal closed.”

  I studied the ground closely before every step. Being eaten by the cloud version of a Venus flytrap was the worst fate I could imagine. The flowers might take forever to digest their meals.

  The ground was riddled with the flower holes, but they weren’t the only danger. Two-thirds of the way up, the slope curled over like a huge Hawaiian wave.

  “Can we go around?” I asked, even though the curled crest stretched as far as I could see in both directions.

  “It’ll be shorter if we go through,” the bird said.

  “Will the cloud let us do that?” I asked. “I mean, cloudy stuff hardens when it feels weight.”

  Moa made the laughing sound in his throat again.

  I hated being laughed at.

  “I’d rather use the tunnel,” Moa said.

  My cheeks burned red, but Moa didn’t seem to notice my embarrassment. He stopped by a two-foot-wide slit at the base of the curl and kept talking.

  “Tunnels are stable once the ice lattice forms,” the bird explained. “But we have to run through it.”

  “What’s in there?” I hadn’t expected the terrain and creatures of the Cantigo Uplands to be just as hostile as the cloud people. From the ground, clouds looked so beautiful and harmless.

  “The worms in the lattice are blind but very sensitive to motion,” Moa said. “When something moves, they shoot icicle darts. The faster we go, the less likely we’ll be hit.”

  I peered into the tunnel. The other end was a mere pinpoint of light in the darkness. I put my shoes back on just in case there were worms in the ground.

  “The darts go right through a mist person,” Moa continued, “but I think they would stick a solid.”

  I could deal with a little pain, but I did not want to be shot in the head. I pulled the silky sling out of my pack and tied it around Moa’s head and neck like a scarf.

  “The silky bark is tough,” I explained. “It might at least slow them down.” I untied my kite and held it over my head like an umbrella. “Ready?”

  “Yes, but you go first,” the bird said. “Your legs are longer and faster. If I went first, I would slow you down.”

  I started to argue but changed my mind. Moa was trying to protect me, and his logic was sound. More darts would hit me if I ran behind the slower bird.

  Taking a deep breath, I entered the tunnel and ran as fast as I could for the opening ahead. Hundreds of darts whizzed through the air around me, buzzing like a swarm of angry bees. They bounced off my kite with the pitter-patter rhythm of a heavy rain. I winced and yelped when a few hit my arms and legs. They stung.

  Behind me, Moa squealed a lot more often. I owed him for being willing to take the brunt of the attack.

  My lungs were bursting when I stumbled through the tunnel exit. I stooped over to catch my breath, but I resisted the urge to collapse on the ground. Darts were stuck all over me, and I didn’t want to accidentally push them in any deeper. I pulled a dart out of my leg. The small wound felt like it was on fire, but I didn’t flinch. When Moa ran out, I forced him to stay on his feet, too. His thick feathers had protected his body from the spines, but he had so many darts embedded in his legs that he looked like a cactus.

  “I have to take the darts out before you lie down,” I said.

  “Good idea. Thank you, Trinity,” he said, panting.

  Moa stood very still while I plucked the darts out of his legs. He didn’t whine or moan, but I could tell by his trembling that he could feel the fiery venom as well. When I finished, I praised him for his bravery and bit my lip as I pulled the rest of the darts out of my skin.

  “I don’t want to do that again,” Moa said with a backward glance at the tunnel.

  “But you want to slide again, right?” I fastened my kite to my harness and spread the silky sling on the ground again.

  Moa hopped on behind me. “Let’s go!”

  As soon as I felt his beak close around my harness straps, I pushed off down the hill.

  The second slope wasn’t as steep or as long as the first, and the valley floor had fewer cauliflower trees. The ride wasn’t quite as exciting until Moa started ya
nking on the harness straps. He wanted to tell me something, but he didn’t want to let go to talk. When I took a good look ahead, I understood why.

  We were speeding right for a huge, pulsing marshmallow.

  “Is that a spoonga?” I asked.

  Moa frantically tugged on my harness, and I took that as a yes.

  “Lean!” I screamed. The bird and I both leaned as far to the right as we could without falling off the sled.

  The spoonga couldn’t move fast enough to fully intercept us, but it was flattening so that it covered more ground. Odds were we wouldn’t be able to avoid clipping it.

  Moa was so scared I could feel him shaking, but he didn’t let go.

  “Pull your legs in and hang on tight!” Holding on to the toboggan roll with one hand, I reached for my kite with the other.

  I calculated our speed, the distance to impact, the angle of incline, and the spoonga’s slow reaction rate. When we made contact with the outer edge of the creature, it was shaped more like a melting scoop of ice cream. The silky bark protected us as it slid across the spoonga’s porous skin, and the spoonga started shifting to engulf us.

  As the sled’s momentum propelled us up the slope, I counted down. “Three, two, one—blast off!”

  I raised the kite, and we sailed into the air like a skier off a ski jump. The kite couldn’t keep us airborne, but it provided enough lift to clear the spoonga and land a safe distance away. The sled continued sliding to the base of the next hill.

  “Hah!” Moa jumped off the silky bark and strutted about with his feathers fluffed. “That was incredible!”

  “It was kind of cool.” I sounded casual, but I was just as exhilarated.

  We paused to calm our racing hearts and then tackled the last hill with a shared sense of accomplishment. No dangerous cloud plants or animals got in our way this time, and I felt energized when we walked through a tall notch in the third ridge.

  My euphoria evaporated as quickly as a mist in summer-morning sunlight.

  We stood on the edge of a butte, surrounded by spires of hard foam-rock and angular treelike formations that reminded me of modern art sculptures. A rolling plain of shifting rainbow colors separated us from the new queen’s birthplace in the city on the distant horizon.

  “It will take days to cross that,” I said.

  “And there’s no place for solids to hide,” Moa added.

  “I still have to go.” I checked the compass. The baby’s golden light was still blinking, but it was noticeably brighter. I was starting to worry we wouldn’t arrive in time if we traveled by foot.

  “I go where you go,” Moa said, “but first, let’s eat.” The bird dropped his head and pulled a bunch of pink grass with his beak. After he swallowed, he sampled some nearby berries. Then he made a clucking sound with his tongue. “Those are so good!”

  “You sound surprised.” I sipped water from my pod.

  “Mist people absorb liquids,” Moa said. “We don’t consume whole leaves and fruits—or drain animals like the spoongas. But these particular plants aren’t actually from the Cantigo Uplands.”

  “How did they get here?” I asked.

  “Seeds and spores drift in on the wind or drop from birds flying over,” Moa explained. “Anything that starts growing here thrives.” He took another mouthful.

  “Save some for us!” a familiar voice shouted.

  I looked up to see the red and black bird from Kasandria’s branch perched on a tree branch.

  “Hi!” I waved. “I’m so glad to see you!”

  “Not as glad as I am to see you!” the bird exclaimed.

  “Do you have a name?” I asked.

  “I was called Sunset long ago,” the bird said. “Before I left the jungle and was captured.”

  “That’s a good name,” I said.

  Sunset raised his hooked beak and whistled. A flock of birds flew off the tall foam-rock towers, circled, and landed. They were the birds I had freed from the evil fairy.

  “How many of Kasandria’s prisoners are here?” I asked.

  “Most of those who can fly,” Sunset said. “We stopped to eat and rest before we head home. Cloud people can’t catch birds.”

  “Unless they don’t have wings,” Moa said.

  “Yes, that is unfortunate for you.” Sunset nodded in sympathy, then turned back to me. “What are you doing here?”

  “I was sent by Queen Patchouli to rescue a fairy baby in Castle City,” I said.

  “But the cloud people hate outsiders,” Sunset squawked, “especially fairies.”

  “It’s something I have to do … for the good of all in Aventurine.”

  “If you get there in time,” Moa said.

  A hawk flew down from a higher branch and perched beside Sunset. “What’s the problem?”

  “Castle City is too far and crossing the plain is too dangerous,” Moa explained.

  “Freeing us from Kasandria was dangerous,” Sunset said.

  The other birds stopped pecking at pink grass and bubble berries to hoot, screech, and chirp in agreement.

  “It was the right thing to do,” I said.

  “And we owe you a great debt,” Sunset said. “Which we can only partially repay by flying you to Castle City.”

  “Are you sure? I don’t want to put you in more danger,” I said.

  “It is the least we can do,” said Sunset.

  The other birds fluffed feathers and flapped wings. They all wanted to help.

  “We appreciate the offer, but aren’t we too big to carry?” asked Moa.

  “It’ll work perfectly if I make harnesses that several birds can lift,” I said, pulling out the spool of string.

  “That thread doesn’t look strong enough!” Moa exclaimed. “I’m supposed to be protecting you, you know.”

  “I know, but trust me, Moa,” I said. “It’s strong enough.”

  The birds ate and napped while I knotted the string into seat slings. Sunset’s beak made excellent scissors, and I finished just before nightfall.

  “Flying in the dark will be much safer,” Sunset said as I stepped into my harness.

  Both harnesses looked like park baby swings with twenty ropes attached. When Sunset asked for volunteers, more than forty birds wanted to make the trip. The extras decided to fly with us in case one of the lifting birds needed to be relieved.

  Although I had complete faith in the string and the flock, I closed my eyes when I walked to the edge of the cliff.

  “Here we go!” Sunset called out.

  I opened my eyes just as Moa tucked his head into his feathers. Above me, twenty birds began flapping their wings. The strings drew taut as I was slowly lifted off the ground. My heart flip-flopped when the ridge fell away, but my spirits soared as we rose into the darkening sky.

  The extra birds flew alongside Moa and me, perhaps so we wouldn’t feel quite so alone. Unable to see the cloudscape below in the dark, I kept my gaze fastened on the faraway lights of Castle City.

  When Sunset whistled, a pigeon broke away from my side. The pigeon flew back a moment later and asked, “Where do you want to be dropped off?”

  “As far from the castle as possible,” Moa answered.

  I looked at my compass. As the miles slipped by, the image of the baby’s birthplace became larger. The blinking speck was located in a park area near the castle.

  “Name the baby’s location,” I said to it on a hunch.

  Words written in elegant script appeared over the park area: Morning Dew Garden.

  The pigeon relayed the message to Sunset.

  Moa gasped. “No! That garden is part of the castle grounds. King Shyne’s magic is very powerful, Trinity. I’m a mist person and look what he did to me! You’re allied with Queen Patchouli and the fairies. Whatever he does to you will be much, much worse.”

  “The future of Aventurine will be worse if I don’t bring the baby back to the Willowood,” I said. “Nothing else is more important, not even me.”

  “Y
ou’re more important to me!” Moa exclaimed.

  I smiled. “If something happens and I can’t complete the mission, promise you’ll take the baby back to the Willowood for me.”

  “I’m a bird who can’t fly,” Moa protested.

  “No, you’re a mist person who’s not a coward like the king,” I said.

  “King Shyne isn’t afraid of anything,” Moa insisted.

  “That’s not true,” I said. “He thinks cloud people are better than everyone else, and he won’t tolerate strangers or change because his arrogant beliefs might be proven wrong. In fact, they would be proven wrong.”

  “Really?” Moa asked.

  “You’re much stronger and more secure than other mist people, Moa—even as a bird who can’t fly! You’ve done some amazing things since we first met.”

  “I have, haven’t I?” Moa sounded pleased.

  “Absolutely,” I agreed. “So will you take the baby to Queen Patchouli if I can’t?”

  “Yes,” Moa said, straightening slightly. “On my honor.”

  Exhausted after a long, hard day, we both succumbed to the rocking motion of the harnesses and fell asleep. The larger birds had powerful wings and flew all night. The smaller ones hitched rides in Moa’s feathers and on my shoulders. Dawn was just starting to break when Sunset sent the pigeon to wake me. The little birds flew off and settled into escort formation beside us again.

  We were flying over the outlying residential and business districts of Castle City. In the gray light, I could see that the cloud people’s homes and shops were so varied and unique, no two looked alike. Some of them mimicked cauliflower mounds and ridge spires. Several were constructed of opaque and transparent bubbles connected by colorful rock-foam. My favorite had a small ice-crystal geyser on the roof. A few even looked like dart worm caves or misshapen spoongas, which made me think that at least some of the dreaded cloud people had a sense of humor—or maybe they just wanted to be left alone.

  Maybe most cloud people want privacy, I thought when I realized there were no roads. Walkways—if that’s what they were—meandered between some buildings. Most of those dead-ended. Many structures were built in clumps or packed tightly together in serpentine lines with no doors to the outside.