[October Sky] Part VI

Earlier Parts: ONE | TWO | THREE | FOUR | FIVE By the time they reached the front door of Maman’s house, Emma was shivering so hard she shook. Her entire body was overcome by it. However, she never lost her grip on the card or the flowers. Having taken most of the way at a dead run, her lungs burned. Cedric had to catch her when she stumbled up on the stairs. Panting, she closed her eyes.

“Are you alright?” he asked.

“No, I hurt.” Her shoulder snapped at her where she had been cut. Her lungs burned. Her legs were like lead. “But maybe we have enough.”

Maman’s door wasn’t locked and Emma let them both in. The bustle coming from the kitchen told her exactly where her grandmother was. Emma moved into the kitchen, put the card and flowers down, and hugged her grandmother who still had not realized she was there.

“Emmaline?” she said. “Oh heaven. Thank god. You’re home. Where have you been? Mr. Amon has been by looking for you. And I hadn’t any idea.”

Maman turned and embraced Emma fully. She kissed Emma’s forehead and hugged her again. “Oh god.”

“Maman, this is Cedric.”

“He comes a bit strangely dressed, and so are you. What’s happening?”

“It’s a long story and I promise I will tell you, but I need to put on some warmer clothes and finish figuring out what this card says and hopefully get us all back to where we’re supposed to be without too much trouble.” Emma’s lack of explanation got an unhappy look from her grandmother, but the woman didn’t argue. Instead, she turned back to the stove and picked up a pot.

“There’s hot chocolate, I was just making some. You two can have it.”

“Thank you.”

Cedric looked into the pot with confusion.

“Hot chocolate.”

“Just drink it, you’ll like it,” Emma said. Then she went up the stairs to her bedroom to change clothes.

When she came back down, Cedric sat at the kitchen table with a steaming mug in front of him. He lazily flipped one of the flowers through his fingers.

“You were right, it is quite good.”

“See, I told you.” Emma sat down at the table across from him and looked pointedly at the card. A few more secrets. The symbols were all there. She just had to decipher them so that she could make it.

“How goes it?” Cedric asked.

“I don’t know. One of these is Charmot. The other is Lamia’s hair. But there are two more that I can’t figure out just yet.”

“Don’t you have your old textbook up the stairs?” Maman asked. “Wouldn’t it have the right symbols?”

“Some of them yes, but this recipe is from Mr. Amon’s private collection. His symbology is different.” Taking her mug of cocoa from Maman, she put the card down again. After a bit of a blistering sip, she coughed.

“There has to be something else I can do,” Emma said.

“You are doing a great deal, Emmaline.” Cedric assured her. Then he reached out to pat her hands. “You can figure this out.”

“I know I can, but I need to do this faster. That way we can finish what you need to do.”

“The King awaits. This I know. But we cannot force you to finish something. Only time will give us the answers we seek.”

“What’s all this about?” Maman asked.

“Cedric’s from a kingdom where the king controls the well of souls. It’s the same well we see in the sky at night during the fall and winter. From this side, if the well isn’t open, then people don’t die correctly.” Emma’s explanation left her Maman looking at her with wide eyes, but Emma didn’t attempt to explain further. Instead, she went back to staring at the card looking for some kind of answer to what those other two ingredients were.

Absently, she listened as Maman moved around the kitchen, an understated hum on her lips. For the moment, she might as well have forgotten about the stranger in their midst. Fine with Emma. Let Maman handle things however she saw fit. Emma would continue with her own problems.

Dinner appeared on the table a few hours later while Emma still studied and wondered and guessed. A green bean casserole with chicken that steamed and smelled wonderful. Cedric didn’t have to be told what it was, he tucked in as if someone had been making this for him all his life. Maman sat with her own plate relatively untouched. She pushed one bean from one end of the plate to another. Emma shoveled food in her mouth without seeing it.

A knock on the door interrupted their domestic scene. Maman wiped her hands on a towel and went to get it. Cedric followed her with his eyes until she left the kitchen. He jumped to his feet when he heard Maman shout. The mystery man hustled Maman back into the kitchen with one twisted arm. Then he thrust her away as if she were repugnant to him. He turned his gun on Emma and Cedric.

“Found you,” he said.

No one answered. Emma moved to slid the card off the table, but he made a tisking noise.

“Leave it there. You get up and join the old lady.”

With the table between him and Cedric, he jerked the gun at the two women.

“Stay over there.” He reached for the card.

Cedric snatched it off the table. The man brought his gun around as if to shoot the younger man. “Give it to me.”

Emma’s hand sought her grandmother’s which trembled. Standing there together, they watched the standoff between Cedric and their assailant. In those moments, Emma had a chance to really look at him. He appeared to be lightly striped. Maybe as an effect of the powder she threw at him. The stripes reminded her of a tiger and when he bared his fangs, she was almost certain he had been hit with a transformative of some sort. Odd. Her hand hadn’t gone striped. Maybe it was a reaction to the addition of the liquid they had thrown at him as well. Either way, he resembled a tiger and attempted to take away something which was hers.

Cedric refused to give up the card without saying a word.

Disrupted, the man shot a hole in the wall above Cedric’s shoulder. Maman made a break for it toward the backyard door. Seeing her move, the man swung around and shot Maman. Emma, caught by the suddenness of everything, stood dumb for a long moment before throwing herself in the direction of her grandmother.

“MAMAN!”

The old woman lay on the floor, face down but struggling to get up. Emma knelt beside her.

“Oh god, Maman.” Blood already began to pool underneath her. “Please be alright.”

With a groan, Maman flipped over and put her hands to her abdomen. Red stained her skin.

The man pressed the gun to Emma’s head.

“Stand up.”

He turned both of them toward Cedric.

“If you don’t want to see her brains all over the walls, give me the card, right now.”

Cedric slid the card onto the table, but not close enough for the man to reach it.

At Emma’s feet, Maman bled out. Her groaning became fainter and fainter. Emma searched for some sign she would be fine but all she could see was blood. Then Maman closed her eyes. A tear fell from Emma’s eye and she clenched her fists. A moment later, she turned on the man with those fists beating at him with all her might. He tried to shield himself from her blows, but couldn’t keep the gun trained on her while he did so. She had almost beaten him back when a hand gripped her ankle. Her eyes dropped to find Maman holding her. The old woman’s face had gone slack and ashen. Emma’s heart thundered. She snatched herself out of Maman’s grip and hopped back to the kitchen table. The man took a shot at her as Maman’s other hand wrapped around his ankle with a vise grip. The shot missed by inches. Then he turned the gun on the creature grabbing him, unloading it three times. When that did not effect his escape, he beat at the woman with the butt of the gun trying to get free. She grabbed his arm while he beat at her and dragged their faces so close they could kiss. He screamed.

Cedric came across the kitchen table and snatched Emma’s arm. The scene transfixed her.

“Come on,” he said.

Grabbing the card, she headed for the stairs, eyes full of unshed tears. Stumbling, she made it to her room and Cedric shut the door. “We have to leave,” he said. Emma shook her head. Pressing his hand against the mirror, he chanted. The words sounded familiar though Emma couldn’t place them. Then the mirror lit with an inner fire.

The bedroom door jumped then creaked in protest. The second hit thudded louder than the first. Cedric looked at the door and then at Emma. He unlooped the medallion from around his neck. “If we go, I fear he may follow. I’ll stop him here.”

“What?”

“Go now. Cure the king.” He thrust her toward the mirror and stepped away. “Go.”

Emma went.


The mirror returned her to a room she had seen once before. Night had fallen. The light thrown by the mirror faded and left her in dimness. She put her hand against the glass and slid to the floor, tears thick and heavy in her eyes. The medallion bored a hole in her palm. Looking up, she hoped to see some sign of Cedric following her. Nothing came. Emma sobbed. The card slipped to the floor by her knees.

“Maman,” she said with a sniffle. Her final view of her grandmother as an ashen faced soulless taunted her. It capered in circles in her mind, revealing her weakness. How could she have let that happen? Her fists gathered at the edges of her shirt and she almost ripped the hem. There in the gloom, alone and cold, she cried. Without Cedric, she knew nothing of where she was. Without Maman…without Maman, she wasn’t even sure who she was. Hiccuping sobs threatened to cut off her breath. Emma wrapped her arms around herself and shuddered.

Alone.

She would have to go on alone.

The thought terrified her. Yet she wiped away her tears and took several cleansing breathes. She was alone. A circumstance immutable. However, she didn’t have to cry and be afraid. Those were things she could change. The words of her master intruded on her low thoughts. Center yourself and you can see the universe. Putting her hands on the floor, she touched the card. It slid away from her fingers. Emma picked it up and put it before her eyes.

Four ingredients. Two deciphered. Two to go. The puzzle awaited her. On the floor, she drew the symbols for the two unknowns.

Someone walked by the door to the room and she stopped waiting for them to come in and find her. No one came. With a sniffle, she went back to writing. The symbols curled beneath her fingers, perched waiting for her to understand.

“It’s a tincture,” she said. “There has to be a liquid.” The whorls of the symbol floated under her eyes. Then it came to her. “Blusaga. Of course.” One more.

The light grew dimmer as she worked. Beyond the door, a torch was lit and then whomever lit it walked on. Every time someone neared, she held her breath. Yet no one entered to see about the mirror room. So she continued in quiet secret. One of the symbols she was certain meant flower, but there were dozens of possible flowers. What in concert with Lamia’s hair, Charmot, and Blusaga would give her a deep purple liquid capable of curing what ails? One came to mind and her heart sank.

“Royal rose.”

Royal rose, the finickiest flower she knew of. It required cultivation, so unless somewhere in the castle grew it, she would never find it. Despair crawled out of its cage and tears fell again. “Why did it have to be that? Why couldn’t it be a weed like Lamia’s hair?” she lamented. The idea of trying to find it seemed impossible.

The more she looked at the card, the more she knew it meant royal rose. Without a doubt, the hardest flower to find. If she had known that before, she could have raided Mr. Amon’s small stash. However, she had no recourse. If she wanted to make the potion, she would have to find it. Determination poked its way out from under the despair and forced her to wipe her eyes. Where was one most likely to find a cultivated flower? In a garden. Maybe the castle had one. Better to try than not.

Instead of trying to find her way in the dark, she curled up as tight as she could in the corner and tried not to think of the things waiting for her in sleep. Maman’s face floated before her vision for some time before the oblivion of sleep finally took her and wisked her off to the possibilities of morning.