Tales from Dargo Island: The Complete Trilogy (20 page)

As soon as I
got home, I went to the closet and traveled to Dad’s realm. He wasn’t there,
but I didn’t think I needed him to do what I planned. I looked down to figure
out where I was. I knew it wasn’t Texas; too much snow on the ground. Even
though I’d never stepped foot in Dallas, I imagined myself there. My power did
the rest.

I was on a
single cloud in a relatively cloudless sky. I knew I was in the right place
since I’d seen it before. I created more clouds.

Then I brought
the rain.

It fell hard.
From what I was told, the plague was confined to Dallas. I used the rain as a
cloak and traveled to the ground, turning into an old woman the moment my feet
touched the ground. I walked into a bookstore and read a newspaper. No other
cities reported the disease, and hopefully soon, this city would speak of it no
more.

I went to the
nearest hospital and left the cure and a note, telling the doctors what it was,
and that they were free to test it. I wouldn’t be sure if my plan worked until
the next day, at least, so I returned to Dad’s realm and then teleported home
to the island.

“Where were
you?” Mom asked when I stepped out of the closet.

“Keep this to
yourself, but I cured Dallas of the plague.”

“How?”

I told her.

“How did you
get the cure?”

“I stole it
from Dargo’s palace.”

“Astrid!” Her
eyes were wide.

“How else did
you think I got it?” It was night and I was young again. I wasn’t usually so
smart-mouthed when I was an old lady. “He didn’t even know I was there, and hopefully
he never will. But we have another problem: He made another bird, and I’m
pretty sure it won’t be the last. We have to stop him and get rid of the bird.”

“Let’s get
Aneela and Victor over here,” Mom said. “Whatever we come up with, they should
be involved.”

They joined us,
though Victor still seemed depressed. I didn’t regret bringing him in on this
and figured he just needed something to do. Estevan joined us as well, and I
told them everything I’d done, including finding the skeleton in the wardrobe.

“Why would he
still have that?” Estevan asked.

“Sentimental
value?” Aneela guessed.

“I doubt it,”
he said. “It’s like he needs it, or something, but is trying not to draw
attention to it. Otherwise, he would have locked it in a safe or something.”

“Why does he
need sleep?” Victor asked. It was the first thing he’d said during the meeting,
though he’d asked in a distracted way. He was staring out the kitchen window
behind me.

“I guess he has
to respect his host’s limitations,” I said. “Though, when I saw him at the
bookstore, he was young. The curse doesn’t affect him. Otherwise, he probably
still needs to eat and use the bathroom.”

“Do you think
he would be susceptible to sleeping potions?” Aneela asked.

“Maybe. Why?”

“If we could
slip something into his food or drink, we could lock him up somewhere until we
figure out what to do with him.”

“That sounds
like a temporary solution,” Victor said, though he didn’t sound pleased.

“It’s better
than nothing,” Aneela countered. “It’s not like we can kill him without killing
Josh.”

“Josh sounds
like he’s prepared to die to save us.”

“No!” Estevan
yelled. “He’s my friend, and what’s happening to him isn’t his fault. We have
to help him.”

“He still has
the ability to leach off of someone’s life force,” Mom said, “though he chooses
not to use it. If Dargo’s in charge of that power now, killing him would be
difficult anyway.”

“Not if we lock
him in a room away from other people,” Victor said.

“Do you hate
Josh or something?” Estevan asked.

“I adore the
boy, but we can’t let Dargo continue on with his plan.” Victor was involved
with our discussion now, no longer looking lost in his thoughts. “Astrid may
have cured Dallas, but if he makes more birds, it’ll start all over again. At
the palace, Josh told us to kill him. Remember?”

Estevan didn’t
reply. Instead, he turned away from Victor, whom he sat next to on the couch.

“I don’t know
if separating him would work,” Mom said. “I don’t think proximity has much to
do with his power. The day he died in the tornado, I was probably the closest
to him, but he ended up leaching off a boy twenty feet away. Just some random
kid. Everyone would have to be
really
far away.”

“We could cut
off his head,” Victor suggested.

“Are you
freakin’ kidding me!” Estevan said, facing him again.

“That might
work, but, again, Josh was completely dead that day. His power still sought out
a life force, even when the body was shut down. Besides, could any of us really
bring ourselves to cut off Josh’s head?”

Victor shook
his head. “It was just a thought.”

“Something else
that bothers me,” I said, “is how Dargo talks. It seems so modern. If he really
was locked in that cylinder for a hundred years, why doesn’t he talk like
someone from that time period? And why keep his original skeleton?”

“And how did he
know the key was in his chamber?” Aneela added. “Andor said his
great-grandfather was the one who tried to release Dargo, but he got trapped in
the chamber.”

A thought came
to me. “What if Dargo did escape?”

“What do you
mean?” everyone asked at once.

“What if
Andor’s great-grandfather did release Dargo, and then got possessed? Then, say,
he returned to his chamber to get the birds. But then the rocks fell outside
the door.”

“Dargo is a
powerful wizard,” Mom said. “Why not just push the rocks away with his power?”

“Maybe he’s not
as powerful in someone else’s body,” Estevan guessed, and I thought it sounded
plausible. “The great-grandfather dude died in the chamber….”

“And Dargo
returned to his original body—the skeleton?” Aneela finished.

“That’s why he
keeps the skeleton in a place that’s not locked up. Maybe he automatically gets
drawn back to it, despite his wishes. Now that the skeleton is out of a prison
cell, he can just leave it again if he gets drawn back. Think of it as a
temporary headquarters.”

“What would
happen if that HQ was destroyed?” Aneela asked.

“Good
question,” Victor said, twirling his red beard.

“Wait a
minute,” Mom said. “Why did the second island appear when Josh took the crystal
from the chamber? I still don’t get that.”

“Well, Rockne
is the one who cloaked the island,” I said. “Maybe Dargo couldn’t banish that
spell, so he cast one on the key before his host died. So that when someone
found it, his spell could override Rockne’s.”

“This is so
convoluted,” Estevan said, rubbing his forehead.

“But it does
make a crazy kind of sense,” Aneela said.

“How do we know
if Dargo has figured out how to use Josh’s power?” he asked.

“We can kill
him and find out,” Victor suggested.

Estevan looked
at him. “Are you volunteering to sacrifice yourself?”

Victor laughed
for the first time in days. “Perhaps.”

“The first
thing we should do is destroy the skeleton,” Aneela said. “That would limit
Dargo’s options if anything happened to his host.”

“We also have
to destroy the bird,” I said. “And we should think of a way to get rid of Dargo
without killing Josh.”

“And if we
can’t?” Victor asked.

It took me a
moment to reply. Finally, I said, “Then we’ll have to kill Josh as well.”

“I know of
something we can use,” Victor said. “Something we can drug him with. It will
kill him slowly and in a way that may drive Dargo out of the body. But it’s in
a dangerous part of the island.”

I perked up,
surprisingly. “A quest?”

He smiled as
well. “Yes, my dear. A quest.”

Victor and I
set out on horses an hour later to the other side of the island, near where
Josh and I first saw the birds. Victor hadn’t told me much about what we were
going to do, but he’d brought an axe with him. All I had was a backpack. Once
we got closer to our destination, we slowed down to a walk.

“Now are you
going to tell me what we’re doing?” I asked, looking up at the rising moon.

“Be happy
you’re young again,” he replied. “What we’re doing is not for the geriatric.
We’re stealing venom from the hexl.”

“Hexl? I
thought that was just a myth.”

“I assure you,
it’s quite real. We Dargons have seen it many times without realizing it.”

“What does it
look like?”

“I suppose I
should spoil the surprise. It looks like a giant flower.”

I smirked. “I
think I would know if I saw a giant flower, Victor. Many people would.”

“Oh, you’d
think. The hexl is a master at hiding in plain sight, however.”

“How are we
supposed to find it at night, then?”

“I saw one,
once, decades ago. They sleep at night and are relatively harmless. Their venom
is potent.”

I looked around
to make sure no one was following us. “What will it do to Dargo?”

“If we manage
to slip it into his food or drink, it will slow his heart within minutes. We
can only hope he hasn’t mastered Josh’s leaching ability. Dargo will be forced
to flee the body.”

“But his go-to
location won’t be waiting for him,” I finished.

“Exactly. By
the fact he kept his skeleton rather than destroyed it, I’m hoping that means
if it is gone and he is forced to leave his host, he will simply perish.”

“So,” I said,
“we get the venom, destroy the skeleton, and then poison Josh.” I must’ve
sounded worried, because Victor looked at me in the darkness.

“We can save
Josh once Dargo is gone. Within the hexl also exists the antidote. I’ll gather
both secretions and be ready to administer aid. If everything goes to plan,
Josh should be just fine.”

“It’s been so
long since we last went on a quest,” I said, feeling a lot better.

“Indeed. What
did we do on the last one?”

He remembered,
but enjoyed making me tell him. “We chased floxin on the beach.”

“And?”

“And I fell
into a pile of bethel poop.”

“Bethels sure
do eat a lot, don’t they?” He chuckled.

If Josh were
here, he’d ask what all these animals were. I’d already mentioned them, when I
found the first red bird, but hadn’t told him what they were. Mom had taught me
about the animals on the mainland. I would’ve compared floxin to geese and
bethels to elephants. Victor and I had tried to catch one of the blue floxin
because their fur is said to re-grow hair on bald people. I still didn’t know
if that was true.

“We’re coming
up on hexl territory,” Victor said, stopping his horse and jumping off. I did
the same. He grabbed his axe from his back and crept up a small hill to our
right. When we got to the top, all I saw was a large, steep crater. It was
filled with a few trees and lots of dark grass.

“Is it in
here?” I asked quietly.

“I’m sure of
it.” He stepped into the crater carefully, holding on to a vine with his free
hand. I followed, worried that if things went wrong, whether we would have
enough time to climb out again.

We walked to
the center of the crater, toward a small pink-and-yellow flower petal poking
out of the ground.

“Is that the
hexl?” I asked sarcastically.

“Yes.” He was
not being sarcastic.

I gawked at the
flower. It stuck out at least four inches. Victor looked from side to side of
the flower, and then he knelt down and asked for the venom jar. I took one out
of the backpack and handed it to him. The jar was labeled “venom.” He squeezed
the flower’s stamen and some goo oozed out of it. The jar was filled a quarter
of the way before he put the lid back on and handed it to me.

He stood and
searched again for something, moving to the right of the flower. I followed him
and saw another flower, this one blue and black. “The other jar,” he said,
holding his hand out. I gave it to him. He repeated the process and sealed the
jar. “Now, let’s get out of here before—”

Of course, he
was interrupted. The ground shook and a large thing emerged between us. I was
separated from Victor, but I heard him scream at me. “Run!”

I was on the
side we had come from. I backed away from what looked like a giant root, and
headed toward the vines. I put the antidote jar in the backpack and ran. The
root turned toward me, and I saw its head.

The hexl had
the head of a giant flower petal, much like the ones we’d just milked. This
petal was orange and red and had been under the dirt, inside the left crater
wall.

The beast had
lifted up far enough for Victor to run under. He swiped at it with his axe,
getting its attention. “Here I am, you ugly monster!”

It lunged at
him, but he hid behind one of the few trees. I started to climb a vine, but it
broke and I fell back into the crater. When I got to my feet, the hexl shot
toward me. I barely had enough time to jump to the side as it plunged into the
wall. It was like a train-sized snake, and it kept driving into the dirt until
it disappeared entirely.

Victor and I
were alone in the crater.

“Don’t move,”
he said quietly from behind the tree.

He slowly walked
toward me. I wasn’t sure, but I thought I heard the hexl moving around in the
dirt, circling the crater. It sounded like a far-away airplane, of which I’d
heard plenty while training with Dad. My heart raced as I worried it would
shoot out from anywhere at any moment.

“Go, now!”
Victor lifted me up so I was able to reach the lip of the crater. I climbed out
and turned to pull him up, but the beast shot out from the far side and went
straight for him.

“Victor!” I
screamed as I covered my face from the dirt that shot up from the impact. After
a few seconds, the hexl was gone again, leaving an empty crater. Victor was no
longer there.

I stood there,
frozen. Not knowing what to do, I headed for the horses. Surprisingly, they
hadn’t scattered during the attack. I felt numb; I’d lost three of my friends.
Josh, Victor and Champagne—how could they be gone?

Before I got to
the horses, I felt a minor earthquake just before the hexl shot straight up. It
looked at me for a moment before vomiting something next to the horses. Then it
shot out of the ground, over my head, and back into the crater. I covered my
eyes from the dirt that rained down on me, and then looked at the vomit.

It was Victor,
and he was alive.

I helped him
up. “I can’t believe you’re not dead,” I said, nothing but pure joy in my
voice.

“I guess it
didn’t like the way I tasted. It ate my axe, though.”

With that, we
headed home.