Freida stood up, too, a smile on her face. She put a hand on Maria’s shoulder. Her palm blazed with heat. “No, neither of you are. We can do this. We can save that town, and we can get whatever it is you need to know.”
Maria had never felt such love and support, not when the stakes were this high. She nodded.
“Let’s go. I’ll carry you, if I have to.”
“It won’t come down to that, Maria,” Gramps answered. “I can already feel my strength coming back.”
Maria sensed that wasn’t exactly the whole truth, but she didn’t say so.
Sherlock came back as they breasted the rising landscape. Dead trees stared down at them, their branches as jagged as wicked lightning bolts. From those trees hung odd birds with large yellow eyes, watching the wanderers’ every move. Each time Maria looked up at them, noting their scaly skin and sparse feathers, she expected them to look away, but they never did. They seemed to stare into her very soul.
“Too bad you don’t have wings,” Maria said to Sherlock as they passed one hanging upside down from a white tree branch like a bat. “Otherwise you could chase them off.”
Oh, you don’t think I’m young and spry enough to jump up there and scare them? Sherlock retorted.
“Not what I said, but no. No, I don’t.”
We’ll see about that.
Sherlock took off toward the towering white tree. He jumped and clawed up the trunk, tearing away strips of bark with his claws, but ultimately only got about half a foot off the ground. The bird-creature remained on its branch, watching Sherlock with curiosity.
Ow, Sherlock said after he’d given up and waddled back toward Maria. You’re right; I’m too old for that. Chasing birds up trees is a puppy’s game. He stretched, putting his front paws out, dipping, and sticking his tail end up in the air. Think they have doggy chiropractors here? I don’t think they do on Earth.
“Could always go to the V-E-T,” Maria said.
How dare you spell that word in my presence, Maria?
“Sorry.”
This little exchange raised a chuckle out of Gramps, who was only a few feet ahead of them, steadied by Freida. That was a good sign, Maria presumed. If he was laughing, he might be getting better. She knew she would need him for the rest of the journey, but that was nothing compared to the grand scheme of things—she would need her grandfather for the rest of her life, or at least as long as he walked the worlds. The thought of losing him… well, she couldn’t fathom that.
They reached the mouth of the cave no more than an hour later, though Maria thought it felt longer than that. Time had a funny way of moving on different planets, with different revolutions around their sun, and, in Oriceran’s case, their two moons.
“That’s not creepy at all.” Maria was observing the cave’s opening, which was completely devoid of light. It was so black inside the air seemed to shimmer.
“The Cave of Delusion,” Gramps said.
“Is that what they call it? Sounds like something out of The Princess Bride. You know, like the Dread Pirate Roberts or the Cliffs of Insanity?”
Gramps put his hands up as if to say I’m innocent. “Don’t look at me. I didn’t name such a thing. And whoever would name it that is obviously delusional.”
“Well, why do they call it that anyway?”
“Because you sometimes see things in all the blackness,” Freida answered. “But you mustn’t worry.” She snapped her fingers and a spark of flame shot out from her palm, hovering there, not burning her flesh. “We have light to guide us.”
Maria suddenly wished her magic was as easy as snapping her fingers. All in due time, my dear, her grandpa’s voice said in her mind.
Maria didn’t see anything inside of the Cave of Delusion, but she heard something.
They all did.
It was high laughter, like that of a person suffering from insanity.
Maria looked at her grandfather. Judging by the way his mouth turned into a thin line, she’d known for a fact he heard it.
“Ignore it. Keep moving on,” he said softly.
But it was hard. The laughter was as piercing as a blade to the eardrum. At one point, Frieda’s flame went out because she had to cup her palms to the sides of her head as she murmured, “I can’t take it! Make it stop! Make it stop!”
Maria had drawn her sword.
Sherlock whimpered and whined.
The whole time this went on, Gramps never wavered. He held his head high and stood as straight as his broken body would let him. To Maria, there was nothing more admirable about someone than their ability to go on in the face of the unknown. Her respect for him grew, as if it could grow any more.
Not long after, though it had felt like an eternity, they literally saw light at the end of the tunnel. Just a pinprick of white in the darkness.
Sherlock bolted toward the opening.
“No, Sherlock! Wait!”
Too late.
He escaped the light that was radiating from Frieda’s palm again, and plunged into the blackness. Maria couldn’t see so much as a hint of his tail or his floppy ears. She thought about chasing after him, but a quick glance at Gramps, who looked even more exhausted from the shadows dancing on his face, told her not to go.
“We will catch up to him, no worries,” Freida assured her. She closed her eyes and hummed, drawing on the power emanating from Oriceran’s core. The flame grew brighter, eating away the dark, but Sherlock was still nowhere to be seen. Stalactites hung above and around them, like blades hovering, ready to fall.
“I don’t see him,” Maria said, her voice shaky. She was getting worried. Now was the time for a last-ditch effort, the last resort. She opened her satchel, the music box gleaming in the firelight, and she pulled out the last few Milkbones she had stashed away on top of the refrigerator. She figured she would need them, and
