Fervor (19 page)

The rain was so heavy that Sam was practically blinded by it, and there was only the vaguest hint of moonlight that managed to trickle down through a small parting of the dark clouds. The only time he could really see anything was when the sky would light up with a flash of lightning. He struggled down to the shore, trying to follow his finding instincts despite being mostly blind and completely deaf, blown about by the harsh winds and soaked to the bone.

When his foot finally sank into the sand, Sam paused. Another brilliant flash exposed a figure prone on the beach before him, too large to be Sarah, Fiona or Francis. Was it Nathan? Sam was about to move forward when he noticed the taller silhouettes around him, barely visible in the dimness. It was the Controls – he was sure of it. His heart lurched and his pulsed quickened.

Before he could react, a hand grasped his arm and started shaking him. It had to be Royce. The lightning flared a third time, and the dark-haired boy loomed over him, but instead of his usual malicious smirk, his face was that of a gruesome monster.

Sam shrieked in terror, but he realized that he had heard his own screams outside as well as inside, and he knew that that just wasn’t right…not only that, but the hand that was holding him and shaking him was much smaller than Royce’s should be. His subconscious made him deny what he was experiencing, and moments later he woke up with Sarah at his side.

“
Wake up. Sam, please wake up,”
she begged
. “It’s Elliot. I felt him, only for a split second, but he’s here, on Fervor. I had him, and then he was gone.”

Sam sat up in bed, startled by what she had just told him. Part of his dream had been real. Even sleep was not enough to suppress his finding instincts.

“
I know where he is,”
Sam insisted
. “We have to go get him, but you and I won’t be able to do that alone, even with Fiona’s help. It looks like you are about to get your wish. We are going to have to let Francis in on this.”

Found

“
Tell Francis?”
Sarah exclaimed.
“What?”

Sam stumbled out of bed and hurried through the door.
“We have to go get Elliot and we may have to carry him back. You can’t come with me, you’ll just get in the way, and he looked bigger than Nathan even. Fiona and I won’t be able to fetch him on our own, and even with Francis, it will be a stretch. We really should have Nathan’s help, but I don’t see how we can make that work.”

As Sam threw his rain gear on, a bleary-eyed Fiona and a yawning Francis emerged from their rooms, responding to a summons by the Finder. The smaller boy reached out through the connection towards the general area where he expected Elliot would be. He found the vaguely familiar mind, but it was dim, dimmer than Sarah’s had been immediately after her encounter with the wall, and it was completely non-responsive to Sam’s gentle prodding.

“
We need to hurry,”
he suggested, pushing with some urgency at Sarah.
“I think something may have happened to him. I don’t even know if he’s conscious.”

“
What are you doing?”
Fiona demanded unhappily.
“It’s the middle of the night, Sam. There’s a terrible storm out there. You can’t go out there like this
.”

“
We have to go, Fiona. We have to go get Elliot, before it’s too late.”
Sam thought this openly to all three in the room, not making any attempt to block Francis out. The older girl’s eyes widened at the mention of the technician, but then she realized what Sam had just done. Her expression fell, horrified at the fact that Sam had just exposed them to the Teller.

“
Elliot? Who is Elliot?”
the blond boy asked, with the question as open as Sam’s statement had been.

“
Sam! How could you? I thought we had agreed...”
Fiona began, her thoughts a whirlwind of emotion.

“
So this is something that you are aware of, too,”
Francis interrupted
. “Well then, I want the most concise answer that I can get, and that is, after all, what Keepers are for. Tell me everything that you know about this Elliot, Fiona.”

Clearly disgusted with what she was being forced into, the older girl did just that. The words spilled out of her like Francis had just released the magical restraints holding back the waters in a reservoir. She spared no detail as she described from the first message that had come into Sam’s possession to the last one that the Little had found on the day that Royce had been exiled from the house. Francis had thrown up his walls the moment Fiona’s revelations had begun, allowing only her to see his reaction to her response in the face of his command. When she was done, she turned away from him trembling with anger, ashamed at what she had done and viewing the Teller as more despicable than ever.

At first, Sam watched all of this with curiosity, and Sarah stood behind him, wishing she had a better idea of what was going on. Then, wary of the delay, he hunted through the connection for Elliot again. When he did find him, he could see why Sarah had lost contact with him. His presence there was now so dim even Sam could barely sense him. Sam took the opportunity to redirect Sarah to Elliot, suggesting that she hold fast to him until he had been retrieved. A push from Fiona drew the Finder back to the house again.

“
Why, Sam? Why?”
Fiona murmured tearfully, her cheeks flushed from her shame.

“
I told you, Fiona. We have to go out there and get him. You and I can’t do that alone. We need Francis’s help. I’d rather we go through this here and now, than find ourselves arguing about this while standing out there in the storm. He was going to find out eventually, once we actually get to Elliot,”
he thought in his own defence.
“Now that that’s out of the way, we had better go, before it’s too late for him. His presence in the connection is very dim. I think that he is hurt worse than Sarah was when Royce attacked her.”

“
Close to what Sam was like when Nathan pulled him out of the water. Sam’s right,”
Sarah agreed.

“
But what about Nathan?”
Fiona disputed, with her thoughts poignant and shrill.
“Better Nathan than Francis!”

The Teller cocked an eyebrow at her with this comment. He dropped his walls again.

“
I would hazard to say that you are wrong there. It would be a bad idea to bring him along, unless you really want to get this Elliot of yours into trouble.”

“
See, I told you,”
Sam mumbled, the thought directed at the Keeper.
“He is their eyes.”

The smaller boy’s comment drew a startled reaction from Francis. Before he could say anything, however, Sarah began physically pushing the Teller in the direction of the door.

“
Enough talking and more doing,”
she insisted.
“He needs you. I can feel him fading. No more delays.”

Throwing on their own rain gear, Francis and Fiona followed Sam out into the storm. It was just like his dream. Once away from the house, the pathway was barely visible with the exception of when the lightning flashed overhead. The notion that Royce and the other Controls might be out there was enough to bring goose-bumps to the smaller boy’s sodden flesh, remembering the monstrous face that Royce had been wearing in his nightmare. Sam refocused his efforts on finding Elliot as a means of escaping these frightening ideas.

The beach proper was not as agreeable as it had been in Sam’s dream, however. The clouds did not part to allow any moonlight through, and the lightning flares were even more sporadic. Sam sloshed forward into the wet sand using the connection to search for Elliot more than anything that he was using in the physical world. Fiona and Francis followed closely behind him, and fortunately were using more caution than he was or they would have fallen with him when he actually tripped over Elliot’s prone body. Sam tumbled into the sand next to him and momentarily lost his bearings. When he sat up, the sky lit up briefly, and Sam, Francis, and Fiona all grabbed for Elliot’s sprawled form.

“
How are we going to manage this,”
Fiona moaned internally.
“We need Nathan for this.”

“
We’ll manage,”
Francis assured her calmly.
“Fiona, you take his feet and I’ll grab him at the shoulders. Sam can help bear some of his weight and brace him at the middle. Pay close attention. I’ll direct you both to the best of my ability.”

The girl obeyed, as she had to. They felt around in the dark in order to get into position, and following the Teller’s instruction, they all hoisted Elliot from the ground. Then they began the treacherous trek back to the house.

They had to stop to rest and restore a proper hold on their heavy burden three times before reaching the house. The third time, they were close enough to the house that the outside light that Fiona had illuminated on their way out gave them the chance to see Elliot properly for the very first time. He was dressed in a simple and strangely slick navy cover-all, looked like he was about a head taller than Nathan with a similar build, and had coarse, shoulder-length hair the same light brown colour as Sam’s. He also had facial hair, something that none of the children had ever remembered seeing. The other thing that Sam noticed was the patch of blood on the side of Elliot’s face.

“
I wonder what happened to him,”
Fiona thought, reaching over and touching his beard with some trepidation.

“
I wonder what happened to his hover,”
Francis added, trying to catch his breath as the rain ran in thick rivulets across his face.

He was not built for this kind of work the way that Nathan was. The blond boy was of average build and not particularly athletic. Despite this, he had been bearing the lion’s share of Elliot’s weight, but had not complained about it once, unlike Fiona.

“
Without it, he’ll be just as stuck on Fervor as the rest of us. He was crazy to think that he would make it here without getting caught. They had everything all calculated out before this all started. They didn’t want anyone interfering with their plans, especially not someone from the mainland. Things were supposed to go as scheduled. They won’t be pleased about this. The punishment will be harsh.”

Sam was surprised. This was more than they had gotten out of Francis in the last year. Perhaps Sarah had been right after all. Perhaps by showing their hand, he would be willing to show them more of his.

“
Is that what you are afraid of, Francis?”
the smaller boy asked.
“Are you afraid that if you don’t follow the Directives, that if you tell us too much, they’ll punish you, too?”

Before the Teller could answer, Fiona spoke up within the connection.

“
What is that, around his neck?”

The two boys looked to see what she was referring to. There was a black case suspended on a strap that rested on Elliot’s chest. The strap had been knotted so that the loop was too small to fit over the man’s head. It was something that he had secured purposefully so that he would not lose it.

“
The Languorite,”
Sam guessed.
“Maybe that’s the Languorite.”

Francis went to reach for the case, but then hesitated. After displaying an unexplained twitchiness, he withdrew his hand again.

“
No, it would be silly to look at it out here. Besides, it’s only short stretch more to the house, and Sarah is waiting for him. I think I’m rested enough to make it now,”
the Teller suggested.