The Dark Lord's Demise (8 page)

Lisa agreed. "I'll bet these bees, or whatever they are, were an
attack from Lord Lunacy!"

"I know one thing," Wes said. "It wasn't me, and it wasn't even
the sword that destroyed those things. Gaal (lid it-"

Betty interrupted him with a screech. She hopped up and down,
and her eyes shone. "I did it! It worked! It worked!" she said over
and over. She almost sang the words. "I did it! It worked! "The Friesens were about to ask "What worked?" when a deep voice called
from the direction of the lake.

Some distance out from shore, a wooden raft bobbed on the
bright water. Two paddlers either sat or knelt on it. The deep voice
called again, but the raft was too far away for the children to
understand the words. The two figures on board were strong paddlers. Their raft made good time toward the shore. When it was
close enough for the paddlers to be clearly seen, Betty shrieked,
"What are they? They look horrible! Are they human or what?"

"They're Matmon," Lisa explained. "Haven't you ever seen Matmon before? Oh, that's right, how could you? Sorry."

The two Matmon, who had appeared to sit or kneel on the raft,
were actually standing. They looked like misshapen men, but not
in any cartoonish or comical sense. Both were adults about as tall
as Kurt. They had large, deep chests, big bellies (though you
wouldn't call them fat) and short arms and legs. Both had long
white beards. Their clothing was obviously homemade: simple garments of dark wool and leather, including tall boots with tops that
flopped over. At their feet were two leather bags like primitive
backpacks. The raft itself was constructed of logs with the bark still
on, lashed together with ropes. Though both logs and ropes
looked coarse, the raft itself was tight and skillfully made.

Kurt got excited. "We haven't seen Matmon since ... since ... I
don't think we've seen them since the day of the wedding!" Wes
and Lisa frowned. They thought Kurt meant the wedding of Uncle
John and Aunt Eleanor, which brought up all the painful tensions
since then. Kurt hurried to explain, "I mean the big party for the
wedding of King Kardia and Queen Suneidesis, over there in the city of Nephesh. Do you suppose ... oh, gosh, I hope it's Gunruth
and Inkleth!"

Lisa asked, "Would they still be alive? Of course, Matmon live
three or four hundred years. But that depends on when we're
here."

Wes squinted. "I don't think it's them. We need to be careful.
Remember what Uncle John told us about some of the first Matmon he ever met. They ambushed him and tied him tip in a cave
on the orders of Lord Lunacy."

Betty almost screamed. "They did what? Let's get out of here!
Now!"

"Don't worry. That was a long time ago," Kurt assured her. "The
Matmon are followers of Gaal now." Then he remembered the
sticky problem with time.

The raft was close enough for the children to make out the
words of one of the paddlers. He pointed at the treetops and called
out, "Which way?" His companion turned to him and said something inaudible, something that appeared to startle the first Matmon.

The raft floated into shallow water. Both Matmon used their
paddles to pole. With a couple of strong pushes they ran their craft
aground. Its free end continued to bob on the waves while they
steadied it with their paddles.

"Young strangers, is it?" said one of the Matmon to the other.
"From where do you suppose they come?" His voice was rough. His
beard, though mostly white, was streaked with reddish brown. Suspicious eyes looked out from beneath a thatch of hair, which was
also a mix of white and reddish brown.

The other Matmon looked older because his beard and hair
were silvery white. He answered in an equally rough voice, "Why
not ask them, Ildreth? No doubt they can speak for themselves. Are
they not Regenskind?"

The three Friesens felt a stab of joy at the word Regenskind. The
very term gave them pride. They stood up straighter. "We are
indeed Regenskind," stated Wesley. Regenskind were what the
people of Anthropos called human beings. They were descended
from the Regents, whom the Changer had sent to rule Anthropos.

"From where do you come?" inquired the older Matmon. "From
Glason? From Playsion?"

They hesitated. They knew of Glason and Playsion, but they
could claim to be from neither. Finally Kurt said, "We're from
someplace else you may have heard about. A lot farther away than
either of those places." Wes wanted to tell his brother to keep quiet.
He would stay on his guard until he had reason to trust these Matmon.

Ildreth, the younger of the two, did not believe Kurt. He pointed
out, "You have not the weary and unwashed look of those who
have been on a long journey." His words surprised Lisa. She
thought they must all look terrible after the insect attack. Then she
remembered that they didn't have any sting marks, and again she
wondered why.

Kurt was annoyed that Ildreth didn't believe him. He blurted
out, "We're from a far-off world called Canada!"

Ildreth roared with laughter. "Canada! What place of makebelieve is that? Do you hear the boy's wild imaginings, Shamith?"
He turned to the older Matmon, who did not laugh. "I have heard
of such a place," Shamith said simply. Ildreth shut down his laughter.

Shamith looked directly at Lisa. "What say you, young lady?
Does your friend here speak the truth? Do you come from this faroff world of which he speaks?"

"He's not my friend; he's my brother," Lisa answered. She
thought she could at least avoid the question for a minute. While
she tried to think of what to say next, she saw both Matmon's crinkled eyes grow large and round. They stared past the children at
the heap of dead giant insects.

"How came it that they are all dead?" Ildreth demanded.

"Wes here killed them," explained Kurt. He wanted his brother
to get the credit. He hoped Ildreth and Shamith would be
impressed.

Shamith asked quickly, "And none escaped?"

"Yeah, a few. They went that-a-way," Lisa answered. She pointed
into the woods and giggled. It sounded like something out of a
corny Western movie.

The faces of Shamith and Ildreth went blank, at least as blank as
the weather-worn and leathery face of a Matmon could. They
glanced at each other. Ildreth's voice was tight as he said, "You
have slain thousands of royal weaver bees! King Tiqvah is in need
of them! How shall he obtain silk for thread and rope? How is he
to have honey to soothe-" Ildreth stopped himself as though he
had said too much. Anyway, the Friesens had quit listening at the
words King Tiqvah.

"You mean Kardia and Suneidesis's son?" Lisa asked. "He's the
king now?" They had known Tiqvah on a previous visit to Anthropos. He was about Wes's age. Gaal sent the Friesens on a mission to
rescue Tiqvah and Suneidesis when a witch imprisoned them in a
cave beneath the sea. Later Tiqvah's father, King Kardia, died after
the battle with the dragon at the royal lodge on Lake Nachash.
When the Friesens left Anthropos, Tiqvah was about to begin his
rule under the wise guidance of his mother. The Friesens couldn't
wait to see him again-a boy-king who was also their good friend!

Shamith did not hide his scorn at Lisa's question. "Indeed we
speak of King Tiqvah. How could anyone not know of him? For
close to three decades he has reigned over Anthropos-since long
before any of you were born."

Close to three decades! The children were stunned into silence.
They tried to sort out the passage of time. In Canadian time it had
been only a little over a year since they last saw Tiqvah.

Ildreth's eyes narrowed. "I see this news displeases you. Had
you hoped to find some other reigning in his stead?"

Betty had been totally lost through this conversation. Now she
blurted out, "I didn't expect to find anybody reigning in anybody's
stead!"

What happened next might have been a scene from that corny
Western movie Lisa thought of, except it was all too real. Both Matmon stepped quickly from raft to shore. Ildreth grabbed Wes and
Lisa and held one of them tightly in each arm as in a clamp.
Shamith grabbed Betty and Kurt in the same way. They pulled the
children onto the raft. They were calm, efficient and impossible to
resist no matter how much the children struggled and dragged
their feet.

The Matmon muttered words like "Traitors!" "Anarchists!"
"Rebels!" as they pinned the children face down on the splintery
logs. Somehow they managed to open their leather packs and
extract some cord, with which they bound the children. They
stepped away, picked up their paddles and pushed off. The raft,
with six aboard now, started back across the lake for the far shore
and the capital city of Nephesh.

Lisa gasped, "Where are you taking us?" She hoped the Matmon
would take them to King Tiqvah. He would recognize them and
release them instantly.

`.. There is only one place fit for enemies of the king!" Ildreth
growled. "Where else would we take you?"

"King Tiqvah knows us," Kurt insisted. "He'll explain everything."

Both Mattison snickered. Shamith said, "Tiqvah knows you not.
Thirty years I have served him. I can swear you have never been in
his royal presence."

"It was way back a long time ago! When he was a kid himself!"
Lisa protested.

Ildreth lifted his paddle from the water and stared at Lisa. "The
king-a young goat? What madness is this?"

"Goat? No, no, by `kid' I mean we knew him as a boy-about the
age of Wesley here."

She knew how absurd it sounded. The children hadn't even
been born when Tigvah began to reign, not if you counted
Anthropos time.

Wesley managed to raise his head and shoulders and twist
around to look back at the shore they had left. If only he hadn't put
the Sword of Geburah back in its scabbard and leaned it against a
tree. He was sure the Matmon hadn't noticed it. They were too
intent on the bodies of the insects-weaver bees, they called them.
Wes's neck and shoulders ached. He would have to turn and lie
prone again.

Just before he turned away, he caught sight of motion on the
shore. Along the water's edge fluttered something like a piece of
white paper blown by the wind. It behaved oddly for something
windblown, for it bounded along the shore in one direction and then suddenly reversed and went the opposite direction. Now and
then it rose a foot or so from the ground, fluttered in a tight circle
and dropped again. It didn't look like a piece of paper. It looked
like ...

Wesley's heart leaped. It was a bird, a white pigeon! On other
visits to Anthropos the children had been guided and helped by a
white pigeon. Was this the same one? Why didn't it fly out to join
them on the raft?

The pigeon landed on the shore and looked out across the
water. Wes could not be sure, but he thought the bird cocked its
head to one side as though it studied the situation. He did not see it
fly again. As the expanse of water widened between shore and raft,
the pigeon faded to an insignificant white speck and disappeared.

Wesley groaned. Why hadn't the pigeon flown out to help them?
Maybe it wasn't the same pigeon that had helped them before.
Maybe it was only an ordinary bird. Even as he groaned, a warmth
came into his body, a warmth that was deeper than sunshine. He
put his forehead on the log raft, closed his eyes and waited.

Ildreth and Shamith paddled with power and skill. The raft
surged forward with each joint paddle stroke and rocked gently as
it lost momentum before the next stroke. The four prisoners stayed
quiet, occupied with their own thoughts.

Kurt wanted to sit up and face forward. He wondered if one of
the Matmon would smack him with a paddle if he tried. Slowly he
scooted around and eased himself upright. To his relief Shamith
and Ildreth paid no attention. Kurt studied the shiny pale cord that
bound his wrists. It was little more than string! He could easily
break it! The Marmon were intent on their paddling. Kurt tried to
pull his hands apart-though what he would do even if he got his
hands free, he didn't know. The thin cord held fast. Kurt tugged with short pulls. He strained with longer pulls. His wrists showed
painful red lines and began to swell. The cord did not break.