The Maloneys' Magical Weatherbox (25 page)

“Dad?” I said, squatting down beside him and putting a hand on his shoulder.

“It's done. I'm no longer Weatherman.” He stopped, his voice choked, then he swallowed and went on, “Summer wanted to kill me. To boil me alive in the lake. The others decided I should live because of the long service of my family. But Neil, our family can no longer serve. I'm so sorry. They won't accept you. I don't think they ever will. It was all for nothing.”

He sat in the mud with his feet in the water and his head in his hands. His wet hair plastered to his head seemed thin and gray now, his body gaunt and weak. I knelt beside him, my hand still on his shoulder.

“It doesn't matter,” I said in a voice that didn't really seem to be mine at all. “As long as we're all OK. We're a tribe, Dad. We'll be together and we'll be OK.”

I looked up at Hazel, but her hair fell about her face, and she sat down and drew her knees up and put her arms around her legs. Weisz and the Shieldsmen had emerged from the trees to join us. They looked grim. Would they have to serve Mrs. Fitzgerald now?

“Then it's mine,” said Mrs. Fitzgerald, and she walked into the lake, where the four Seasons were waiting to make her their Weatherman.

 

CHAPTER 30

LIZ

Ed insisted on driving.

“It was only birdshot,” he said, leaning on Mum. “No, really, it is just a scratch.”

He wouldn't let anyone look at it or check it or put a bandage on it. I didn't argue because we didn't have time. Mum and I helped him, and we all hurried back through the bog to the road and pushed Ed up behind the wheel of the truck. Ash was very worried, but we couldn't listen to her because we could argue all night and then we wouldn't get to the lake or get Ed looked after either, so it seemed better just to hurry, whatever we did.

Owen stared into the woods after Neetch.

“I hope he'll be OK,” he said.

What can you say to that? He was a ten-foot-tall bog monster. If
he
wasn't going to be OK, nobody was.

“Can we please go to a hospital now?” wailed Tony Holland. We ignored him and left the AtmoLabbers to follow on foot, or not.

I was caked in mud and had a Baby Season on my back. I was also shaking so hard my brain was rattling in my head. Mum pushed me into the middle and Ed put the heater on full. It didn't help much because both doors had been ripped off. Ash squeezed in between me and Mum, and Owen sat on Mum's lap.

Ed leaned forward against the wheel, keeping his back away from the seat. He looked over at me, his face all drawn and shadowed and old under his beard, gave me a wink, and fired it up. The truck wobbled and roared and rolled, and the road ahead lit up under the beams of the headlights. Ed stamped down on the accelerator, and everything flew around us.

We went past the house and swerved around the broken Weatherbox without slowing, and if Ash and me hadn't grabbed them, Mum and Owen would have been flung out the door.

I sat forward, one hand on the dash, and told Ed to go faster. It was all taking too long, too long. It might be all over by now. What if they had chosen
her
? What if she was the Weatherman now? What could we do? Hand over the Baby Season to her like a present? Let it go? And if it escaped, what then? If the other Seasons discovered what had been done to their child by the new Weatherman they had chosen, what would they do? Would they bother to start all over and pick another? Or would they just … rage?

I looked out at the four upside-down mountain-clouds, all standing on their heads, and I thought,
What would happen if they got angry enough to give up on us, on the Weathermen, on the agreement, on the gateways? If they decided to just fall on us in all their rage, how long would we last? You wouldn't even be able to measure it in seconds, and after that there wouldn't be anyone left to measure anything at all. Then it really would be the end of the world
.

“Weathergirl,” whispered the girl hag, and the Baby Season moved on my back, hugging me tighter and closer. For the first time I noticed that there was a warmth coming from the Season, spreading through my wet clothes and into my back and all around me, and even though I was racked with the cold, I should have been a lot colder. I shouldn't even have been able to move. I moved my hand, putting it over the Season's hand and giving it a gentle squeeze.

Ed nearly drove us into a ditch taking the turn for the farm. The truck rocked and bounced on the rutted track, and the wild hawthorns and the birches and the brambles of the hedge slapped and scraped at the fender and the windows as we went along.

Suddenly, the cloud mountains vanished and the weird lights cut out, leaving a clear sky and a full moon that hung over the lake. I was pretty sure there wasn't supposed to be a full moon tonight.

Ed swung into the farmyard, the big headlights shining on the cracked concrete and the weeds and the broken barn.

“Best. Holiday. Ever!” he whispered.

I clambered over Ash and Mum and Owen, ducking low to make sure I didn't bash the Baby Season's head on the roof, jumped out of the truck and ran out of the farmyard and into the field and across to the lake, where the four big giant things were, and the moon. Dad and Neil were on the shore with the other girl hag and the Shieldsmen, looking as if they'd been in the wars. But, most awful and most important,
she
was wading into the middle of the lake.

Too late, too late.

I ran faster.

 

CHAPTER 31

NEIL

“The moon is for judgment,” said Hazel as we watched her sister wade into the lake. “The sun is big and bright and loud and happy and gives all life. The moon is silent and sneaky and subtle. It hides. It peeks. They adore the sun. They dislike the moon, but they respect it.”

Sometimes it was like the moon was far away, in the sky beyond the mountains, and sometimes it was like it was right there on top of the field, just over our heads. I was wondering if we should slink away to the woods and hide.

Something roared and clattered and clanked and there was a flare of headlights from the farmyard as Ed's truck came out of the darkness, like a dragon out of a cave, and shuddered to a stop with a grinding of gears. Liz dropped out through the passenger side and came running through the gate, waving her arms in the air and yelling something I couldn't make out. She lowered her head and dropped her arms and sprinted straight for the lake.

“She has the Season!” Hazel said, and with a start I realized that there was something thin and gray on Liz's back.

“Oh my God,” I said. “If she can…”

But Hugh saw it as well, and started to run to cut Liz off. Mrs. Fitzgerald was halfway out into the lake. Liz had to get the Baby Season out there, now.

“Stop him!” I howled, and leaped after Hugh, and Hazel and the Shieldsmen charged with me.

Liz didn't stop or slow or even swerve. Her eyes were fixed on Mrs. Fitzgerald and the lake. I'd no idea if she even saw Hugh coming right for her. She was small and fierce, but he was big and heavy, and if he caught hold of her that was it.

Hugh reached for Liz, one big hand grazing her shoulder. Hazel and I dived at the same second. She took him in the back of the legs and I wrapped my arms around his waist, and we all went down in a kicking, screaming heap—and then all the Shieldsmen piled on. Through a confusion of legs and arms and heads I saw Liz reach the shore of the lake, and then I thought I saw the Gray Thing on her back wave a long, thin hand, and she was running out onto the water, leaving impossible footprints on the surface that shook like jelly before slowly filling in.

I crawled out from under the struggling bodies and jogged down to the lake.

Liz caught up with Mrs. Fitzgerald just before she reached the middle of the lake. Mrs. Fitzgerald looked at her and let out an irritated noise, then held up her hands and made a shape with them and rose out of the water.

“Liz,” she said. “This will not work. Don't do this. They will destroy you.”

I put one foot into the water. I had to get out there, even if it meant splashing and spitting and swimming. I had to be there for what happened next.

“Do what?” Liz said. “They lost something, I found it. And now I'm giving it back. They'll be so cross with themselves when they realize they lost their baby, won't they? They'll be mortified. They won't know where to look.”

“They'll blame you,” Mrs. Fitzgerald said. “They don't care about things like fairness or justice, and they don't recognize good deeds or favors. They'll take it and they'll cast you high and let you fall.”

“Liar,” Liz said.

I had the right. I was son of the Weatherman. Liz had done her part and brought the Baby Season here, and now the Seasons would decide who would be Weatherman, and if it wasn't Mrs. Fitzgerald, it had to be me.

“What do you think will happen? Will you let Neil be Weatherman while you go back to being you? Without me you'll never know what it's like to have power. To never be scared and never be mocked and do whatever you please. No one else can teach you. No one else will.”

Liz looked at her, and then back at me, jerking her head, urging me to hurry on. My little sister. I stood at the edge of the water listening to Mrs. Fitzgerald mock her and taunt her and tell her she'd never be special and never have power and be always scared and small. And in that split second, with barely a thought, I made a choice. It was a choice I didn't even know I had—a choice to change things. There was a new Season now. There was a strange, uncertain future ahead. Maybe it was time for the Weatherman to change, too.

It would have been nice, wouldn't it? To go out there and claim my inheritance. To do magic and know secrets and be treated right by everyone. To be able to protect the people I love and be the living terror of people I hate. It's what I was born to do.

But I took my foot back out of the water and stepped back. Liz's eyes widened, and I made myself grin and wave her on.

That's my sister, you rotten, evil old hag,
I thought.
She'll make a better Weatherman than any of us.

Liz didn't grin back. She looked at me questioningly.
Was I sure?
I nodded. Of course I wasn't, but I could pretend to be. She blinked, then turned to look at Mrs. Fitzgerald.

“Yeah,” I heard her say. “Teach me to stir and sing to an old black pool till I go mad. No thanks.”

They stepped forward together and let the Seasons make their choice.

 

CHAPTER 32

LIZ

The Summer wanted to kill us all.

That's the first thing I felt, this terrible blast of hate and anger from the ball of light. The others were angry, too, and impatient, but even then they were only thinking about what was going on at the lake with a small part of themselves, while the rest was up in the sky, floating in the warm September night. Summer's fury was a thing the size of a planet, all squashed down into one little ball, and now the ball was looking at me. It knocked me back like a punch from a fist as big as an elephant.

While I reeled, Mrs. Fitzgerald spoke calmly, politely, and pleasantly, except it wasn't really speaking.

“Honored Seasons, I present myself as candidate for the role of Weatherman. As you can see, I am strong, powerful, resourceful, intelligent, and competent. I have a male heir who can ensure the perpetuation of the role down through succeeding generations. I have been observing the disgraced Weatherman you so rightfully rejected, and I strove, in your name, to curb his abuse of power and thwart his ruthless attempt to take the strength of the Seasons for his own. It is thanks to my efforts that he did not succeed. Here beside me is one of his female offspring. Observe how she has bound to herself your own offspring, the child Season that the ousted Weatherman kept imprisoned in this very lake. I have brought them here so you may punish the one and return the other to its rightful place. I do this with no expectation of reward, save the opportunity to devote my life, and the lives of my family, to the operation of the ancient Doorway in your service. I implore you to punish this human child for her grotesque crimes, and release the child Season from its bondage.”

As she spoke her poison, the Baby Season on my back squirmed and struggled as if trying to untie itself from a knot, and I realized to my horror that even though I had pulled it from the bog hole, I hadn't pulled her claws from its mind. She still controlled it. The Baby Season was supposed to save us by telling the others the truth about what had happened, but she wouldn't let it.

“Don't listen to her! She's lying! It was all her!” I cried.

“A hysterical creature, isn't she? Here, child Season, let me break your shackles and separate you from this imp.”

She lifted the Baby Season off my back with one hand, holding it by the scruff of its neck. It hung limp, twitching feebly.

“Such terrible suffering it has endured,” Mrs. Fitzgerald went on. “It will need long healing. I urge you to leave it in my care, where I will see that it receives the peace and quiet and affection it needs.”

The Seasons, even the Summer, were taken aback by this. How could a human care for a Season? A Season needed the sky to heal. A Season needed weather to grow. She was a fool to suggest that it was her place, even as Weatherman, to have charge of a Season—even a child!

Mrs. Fitzgerald sensed she'd gone too far. “Forgive my presumption,” she said quickly. “Of course, it must be free, and freedom will be its healing.”

“You don't like that, do you?” I told her, and turned to the Seasons. “Look at her. She's scared! She knows that once the Baby Season is free she won't be able to control it and it will tell you the truth of what really happened! Right now, she has it in her power! It can't talk or move unless she lets it! Please set it free before you decide. Please listen to what the Baby Season has to say.”