Ambush

  I tried to shift and beat pieces off me with the tray, but there were just too many. Some chunks were now trying to shove themselves into my mouth and eyes. I was in the mood to scream a little more, but I was afraid to open my lips for fear of cactus getting in.

  I kicked and flailed, but it was no use, I was being beat down. Everything was sticky and painful. A large piece pushed into my right eye, and the sting was so sharp I couldn’t stop myself from shrieking.

  The second my mouth opened, cactus flowed in. My throat burned, and I began to heave and cough, spewing pieces of the plant all over. I was seconds from consigning myself to death when lights flashed on and I could hear the hallway door opening up. Like the mushrooms I had tangled with earlier, every last bit of cactus froze and dropped to the ground.

  “Sweet Jane!” the skinny cop said, running up to my cell. His eyes were as wide as saucers, and he had his hand on his nightstick as if it might be needed. He looked into my cell and stared at me as I lay there covered in needles and cactus remains.

  I was so happy he had interrupted my death that I smiled.

  Unfortunately, he didn’t smile back. I was glad to be alive, but I knew beyond any doubt that somehow this cop was going to think this was my fault. The officer began to swear like it was part of the cop oath to do so. He opened up the cell door and yanked me up. He had more questions than I had answers.

  “What the . . . ? How is it possible . . . ? Why would you . . . ? Do you think this is acceptable?”

  “No,” was all I could say.

  The officer informed me that it was after one in the morning and that I was now in more trouble than I had ever been. He took me from my cell back to the front office of the police station. There was only one other officer in the building with us at the time. I got cleaned up, and I happily put on a needle-free, black-and-white striped jumpsuit. It’s funny how people’s taste in fashion changes with time and circumstances. They put me in one of the other cells, and the skinny officer put a chair right outside my door and took a seat.

  “I’m going to sit here until the sun rises,” he said angrily. “I’ll have my eyes on you, so no more funny business.”

  There was no way I wanted to be left alone, so I used a little strategy I had learned in dealing with the folks at the manor.

  “You don’t have to stay,” I said. “Go on.”

  I knew that adults sometimes needed to be prodded into sticking to their decisions. Going against a kid’s wishes was often the final encouragement they needed. The last thing I wanted was to be by myself again. I didn’t feel like I would ever be safe until every last plant was locked up.

  “Seriously,” I added. “I’ll be fine by myself.”

  “Nice try, kid,” the officer said. “I’m not letting you out of my sight. Understand?”

  “Yes,” I said, sounding sad but feeling thankful.

  “When Sheriff Pax gets here and sees the mess you made, you’ll have some real explaining to do.”

  I didn’t reply. Instead I lay down and partook of some real sleeping.

  Chapter 8

  Ask Me Why

  Only I could get attacked by a cactus and then get in trouble for it. The entire police station was mad at me for making such a mess.

  I was checked over by doctors, grilled by officers, and ignored by my family. I thought for sure that Thomas would come immediately after Sheriff Pax told him about the cactus attack, but no.

  Sheriff Pax and his officers were pretty baffled by what had happened. The afternoon after it took place, Sheriff Pax pulled me into his office, locked the door behind us, closed his blinds, and put his phone in his drawer so that it wouldn’t bother us.

  I didn’t think that preparation bode well for me.

  Sheriff Pax took a seat on the edge of his desk while I sat in a red leather chair directly in front of it. He sighed, rubbed his eyes, and then sighed again. If he was hoping to break me down with that, he was way off. I had had very few conversations with adults in my life that didn’t begin with them sighing and rubbing their furrowed brows.

  “Can we talk honestly, Beck?” he asked.

  “I’m a big fan of honesty,” I said, sitting up straight in my black-and-white striped jumpsuit. My arms and parts of my head were speckled with tiny red marks that the cactus quills had inflicted.

  “I’m baffled,” Sheriff Pax said.

  “I think it’s admirable that you would admit that.”

  Sheriff Pax shook his head. “Is everything a joke to you, Beck?”

  “Not everything,” I said nicely. “I don’t think Professor Squall’s funny.”

  “My point exactly,” Sheriff Pax grumbled. “I want to help you, Beck. I even think you know that, but some things about you are very difficult to explain.”

  “I’m not really that complicated,” I pointed out.

  “Really?” he questioned. “Do you know how many mushrooms they cleaned up over at the museum?”

  “Ten?”

  “Thousands,” he corrected. “They were all over the place and in all sizes. Some were growing out of the walls and some from the small traces of mold along the baseboards.”

  “They really should keep that place cleaner,” I commented. “Besides, I already told you that I didn’t bring in those mushrooms.”

  “Right,” the sheriff conceded. “Do you want to hear something else strange?”

  “Not if it’s about you personally,” I said.

  Sheriff Pax grumbled softly.

  “Sorry,” I apologized.

  “Listen, Beck,” he pushed on. “I’m not quite sure what happened here last night. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more gruesome scene.”

  “The death of a cactus is never an easy thing.”

  He ignored my remark and asked, “So you still have no idea what happened?”

  “I told you. I was sleeping, and when I woke up there were needles and pieces of cactus everywhere,” I lied. “I thought you and your men were just playing a joke on me. You know, like an initiation, or police brutality.”

  “Really?” the sheriff asked suspiciously. “So you’re sticking to your story?”

  I nodded.

  “You know, I’ve been doing some checking,” Sheriff Pax said, standing up. “When you first arrived here there were some reports from your school of oddities.”

  “That’s just Clark,” I said, waving. “His eyes are too big for his head and they kind of bulge out a bit.”

  “Beck,” Sheriff Pax said firmly.

  “Sorry.”

  “The oddities I’m speaking of have to do with plants,” he continued. “There was mention of plants coming in through the school windows and picking kids up.”

  “That is odd,” I replied.

  Sheriff Pax took out a small notebook and flipped it open. “There was some sort of dustup in the school cafeteria,” he read. “Salads were flying around.”

  “That was the heat ducts,” I explained, using the same lame excuse the teachers had used when it happened.

  “Stranger still is that over a year ago dragons attacked this town and people barely remember it.”

  “I haven’t forgotten,” I said, equally baffled by the short memories of those in Kingsplot.

  “Yes,” Sheriff Pax said slowly. “Here’s the thing, I have lived in Kingsplot my whole life. I didn’t even know there was anything out there beyond our valley until I was in high school.”

  “That might be the fault of your geography teacher. Was it old Professor Welsh?”

  The sheriff ignored my remarks yet again. “I have never traveled beyond the Hagen Valley and I have no desire to,” he continued. “Do you think that’s weird?”

  “Home is where the heart is,” I said remembering the saying from an embroidered pillow I once saw.

  “Beck, I think there’s something wrong with our town,” the sheriff confessed.

  The mood in the room suddenly grew heavy. I could feel the air thin out, and a thick oppressive an
xiety weighed down on both of us. It was as if, for the first time in his life, Sheriff Pax knew something was different with his town, and he had the presence of mind to recognize it.

  “What are you talking about?” I asked with a nervous laugh, hoping to lighten things up.

  “I think there might be something askew here, and I feel as if the only person who might truly understand what I’m talking about is you. I went back to the museum today because someone stole one of their cactuses—the biggest one—a saguaro that was shipped in from out West years ago. It had cost thousands of dollars, and it was the centerpiece of their cactus garden. You know the weird thing about that missing cactus?”

  I shook my head, feeling as if he were trying to trick me into admitting something I didn’t want to admit.

  “I’ll tell you the weird thing,” he continued. “It doesn’t look like anyone broke in and took that cactus. It looks like it just jumped out of the display where it was planted, dragged itself across the floor, and squeezed out through a small, high museum window.”

  “How can you tell that?” I asked nervously, while looking around for any other cactuses that might be thinking of bursting into the station and finishing me off.

  “I can tell because there’s a clear trail of dirt and needles and no sign of someone else,” he answered. “Then, outside of the museum, there’s a faint trail of needles and dirt leading across town and up to this station. I’m not the brightest bulb in the world, but I’m thinking that’s the same cactus you tore up in your cell.”

  “I told you I didn’t bring it in,” I argued.

  “Listen, Beck,” Sheriff Pax insisted. “I feel like for the first time I’m waking up, and I can see that something isn’t right here. Dragons aren’t real; cacti don’t walk across town. I’m an officer of the law, and those things don’t make sense.”

  “I agree with you totally,” I said supportively.

  “Beck,” Sheriff Pax snapped. “This is me being as honest with you as I can. What happened last night in your cell?”

  I looked at Sheriff Pax carefully. He was staring at me so intently that I started talking and couldn’t get my mouth to stop. I told him about the mushrooms and the cactus and how I was scared of every living thing at the moment.

  “So you can make things grow?” he asked incredulously.

  “Sort of,” I answered. “It’s something in the Pillage blood. I think that’s part of the reason my dad’s so sick. Sometimes plants just seem to have minds of their own and a desire to pick on me.”

  Sheriff Pax was silent for a moment. He walked around his desk, peeked out the blinds on his window, and sat down in his desk chair. He sighed in a way that must have released every bit of air his body contained, and then shut his eyes. When he finally opened them back up, he seemed relieved to see me.

  “There has to be some way for us to figure all of this out,” the sheriff said. “If I forget or my mind grows foggy like all the others here, you have to remind me.”

  “I’ll try,” I said honestly, liking the idea of having a confidant who was also the law.

  Sheriff Pax took me back to my cell without saying one more word to me.

  Chapter 9

  Chains

  Really early the next day, Thomas finally came to the station and picked me up. I was pretty happy to see him. Thomas was a tall man with thin shoulders and crooked legs. He had intensely dark eyes and a bulbous nose that looked as if it would work better on a Muppet.

  Thomas paid my small bail and then led me to the car without saying a word. Because my clothes had been torn up and ruined by the rogue cactus, I had to leave the police station wearing my black-and-white striped jumpsuit.

  The ride back to the manor was completely silent except for the occasional sound of Thomas clearing his throat and running his hands around the steering wheel with what I felt was an excessive amount of force.

  The old blue Mercedes climbed up the steep roads through the stone tunnels and into the high mountains. The air was wet, but strong beams of light broke through the clouds and put on a laser show as we ascended. At one point I reached to turn on the radio, but my actions were halted by a grunt from Thomas.

  When we reached the gate to the manor, Thomas said, “Home, sweet home,” as if he had read somewhere that saying that to a delinquent would help him out. The three gargoyles on top of the gatehouse stared down at us as we drove through.

  As we passed the statues and the tall trees lining the drive, it felt good to be home.

  We reached the stone fountain and courtyard. Thomas pulled the car up to the back door and shut off the engine. He turned to look at me, opened his mouth as if to speak, thought better of it, and then just shook his head.

  “Did you have something to say?” I asked.

  “Come,” Thomas replied sadly.

  I climbed out of the car and walked up to the large service door near the main kitchen. Thomas pushed the door open. Millie was in the kitchen beating the spunk out of a large wad of dough. She stopped harassing the dough the moment we walked in. She looked at me in my prison garb, and I could almost hear her heart break.

  “Why do you have red marks all over?” she asked. “Does the jail have bedbugs?”

  “They’re from a cactus,” I informed her.

  “Oh, right,” Millie said slowly. “Sheriff Pax told us about the incident.”

  “It was more than an incident,” I insisted.

  Millie sighed.

  Maybe it was just me, but she seemed to have aged since I had come to the Pillage manor—of course, that aging was most likely because of me. On a normal day she was one of the nicest people I knew. She cared for me like a mother and grandmother combined. She was short and plump and by far the best cook I had ever met. Her meals were the sort of creations Zeus probably ate when he was really celebrating.

  Millie had never told me her age, but if I had to guess, I’d say she was somewhere over fifty-five and below eighty. She walked with a slight limp and tilted just a tiny bit to the right nowadays. She also had a lazy right eye and was carrying around twenty pounds over the doctor-recommended weight for a person her height. I loved Millie. Usually I could talk her into anything by simply smiling correctly, but I could see that even my best smile wasn’t going to save me today. I tried anyway. Millie scowled in return.

  “Sit down, Beck,” she insisted, while dusting off her pale, white hands.

  I sat down on a wooden stool near one of the large ovens.

  “Are you hungry?” she asked.

  “Starving,” I answered, having had only prison food for the past two days. Of course, it was actually pretty good stuff. Sheriff Pax’s wife had made my meals. And even though it wasn’t Millie-good, it was still tasty. I wasn’t about to tell Millie that, however. Nothing made Millie happier than people enjoying her food. I figured I would have to eat my way out of this mess. “I’ve dreamed of your food for days.”

  Millie humffed and walked over to the far counter. She retrieved a round platter and placed it in front of me.

  The platter held nothing but a couple of hard rolls and three slices of warm spongy cheese. It was obvious Millie was mad. The kicker was when she went to the sink and drew me a glass of tap water. Thomas left the room, looking like someone who desperately wanted to get away from what was coming.

  I looked at Millie’s stern face and figured I’d better just jump right into it.

  “It was an accident,” I pleaded. “I told you that. I never meant for those buses to roll into the lake. I didn’t even want to go to the museum. If I had had my way we would have stayed at the school and watched a movie or played baseball.”

  “I’m sure if they had done that, you would have blown up the projector and given someone a concussion with a baseball,” Millie tsked.

  I was stunned into silence at Millie’s tone. It wasn’t like her to so blatantly point out my flaws.

  “You can’t blame what happened on the trip to the museum,” Millie said. br />
  “I can try,” I pointed out. “I didn’t ask those mushrooms to grow.”

  Millie reached out as if she were going to strike me. Instead, she stretched past me and pulled on one of the ropes on the wall. The tug caused bells to go off in other parts of the manor. Within thirty seconds, Thomas was back. Right behind him was Wane, and behind her was the groundskeeper Scott. All three of them looked like guests who had been invited to a fingernail-pulling party. They, along with Millie, grabbed stools and circled me. I spun around looking at all of them quickly. I felt like a spinning bottle and stopped with my eyes landing on Wane. It was my hope that maybe she would be a kind face to look at.