Zahrah the Windseeker

  "For you, Dari," I kept whispering to myself. "For you."

  I scratched at a mosquito bite on my arm and looked at my dirty clothes. The cuffs of Dari's pants were caked with the soil, and they smelled strongly of dirty sweat. I reached into my satchel and brought out a small mirror. Small leaves and flower petals were stuck in my hair, and my face was greasy with sweat.

  "Ugh, I'm repulsive," I said, quickly putting my mirror away.

  Like any other northerner, I felt it was disgusting to wear dirty clothes and look so messy. But I had no choice. Itchy, dirty, and smelling of sweat and the outdoors, I needed to get over something more ingrained in my mind than my fear of heights.

  "Where am I going to wash?" I whispered. "How am I going to wash?"

  I hadn't thought of that when I left. But I knew the answer, and it made me shiver. I wasn't going to get to wash that night. I looked up at the patch of evening sky between the trees. I couldn't even wear perfume. Not that I'd brought any. Even I knew that wearing perfume attracted more mosquitoes. At least there's no one here to see me looking like this, I thought.

  I stopped in front of a tall tree and then glanced around. I was alone. At least as alone as I could be in the jungle. I wiped a little sweat from my brow as I wondered what to do. I must already be farther than anyone has been in years, I thought.

  Feeling very lonely, I sighed, set my bundle down, and stretched my back. I leaned against the tree and took out the digi-book. I pressed the "on" button and clicked to the table of contents. I clicked on the chapter called "The Fringes."

  The Fringes of the Greeny Jungle are tine least dangerous. Rarely do you get any of the really good stuff there. If you've heard grumbling and shifting leaves, most likely you're being tracked by whistling bush cows, close relatives of the southern capybara.

  Then the digi-book went into a long entry about these small but crafty furry mammals that liked to steal food from one's pack while one slept. They whistled when alarmed.

  Make sure you've zipped your bags securely when you go to sleep. And when we say securely we mean securely. Zip it up, tie a rope around it, lock it if you can. Bush cows have been known to pick locks and even use sharp stones to cut through material if they smell something they particularly like.

  I relaxed a bit. Bush cows may be thieves, but at least they don't want to make a meal of me, I thought. I skipped to the part of the chapter that talked about setting up camp. It was dark and I needed to find a place to sleep soon.

  The Forbidden Greeny Jungle is full of wonderful and often frightening beasts, as we all know. Once you enter the jungle, be ready to not see open land for a while. Most of us traveled alone or in groups of two. But all of us did the same thing: We learned to climb trees. Most of us started doing this weeks after we ventured into the jungle, but our advice to you: Learn to climb and sleep in trees now.

  There was more, but I was impatient. The fear was starting to set in again. I'd never spent a night really alone in all of my thirteen years. Someone had always been home.

  I frowned as I felt the tears well up in my eyes. I can't turn back now, I thought. It's night and I wouldn't make it out. I frowned. It was time to stop crying. I looked around. I'd paused at a tall tree with plenty of space around it. I turned and looked up at it. A baobab tree, not unlike the one Dari and I liked to study in at home. At least something was familiar. I placed the digi-book back in my satchel and touched the tree's trunk.

  Baobab trees had low branches, so I didn't have to climb too high. These fat trees with gnarled branches also tended to kill every plant around them so that they could spread themselves out. This one had the usual thick trunk, about as wide as a car. It reached high up, its many thick branches fanning out all around it. If I wanted to be safe, I had to go higher than the first branch.

  I took a deep breath and whispered, "I have to do this," just as I had to learn how to be dirty. But instead I just stood there, my legs refusing to move. "I can't go up there," I said. I cried some more and sweat dripped from my forehead. "I can't go up there."

  I was tired and something screeched close by. Then I thought of Dari lying motionless in his hospital bed. Forever. Never cracking his easy smile or laughing his loud laughs or voicing his philosophical thoughts again. If I didn't sleep and garner energy or if something attacked me because I was sleeping too close to the ground, how would I be able to save him? That was enough to get me moving.

  At first I squinted my eyes so I couldn't see too much. Then I climbed without looking down.

  "You're a big girl," I said as I ascended. My mother used to always say this when I complained about doing things I didn't like to do, like washing the dishes or cleaning my room. "And big girls are brave enough to do things they're afraid to do when they have to."

  I let my mind focus on climbing, grasping the tree's branches and trunk, watching for strange insects and spiders and keeping my balance. This worked. Before I knew it, I had climbed as far as I could climb, which was just above the jungle's ceiling.

  When I looked over all the trees, I gasped. I was very pleased, though my hands still shook. I looked over the treetops. It was a clear night and I could easily see the Ooni Palace lit up in the distance. I could even see my town at the edge of the jungle. But it looked very far away. How far have I come? I wondered. I could check my compass, but I didn't really want to know. It was better to look forward than backward.

  When I accidentally looked down, I almost fell out of the tree. I was farther up than I imagined, and the sight made me dizzy. I could see the ground through a crisscross of leaves and rough branches. I slowly sat down on the wide branch and closed my eyes until the dizziness went away. I inhaled deeply and opened my eyes.

  "OK," I said, taking another deep breath. "It's not s-s-so bad."

  It was bad but I was still alive and OK.

  I'd always been a heavy sleeper, rarely changing positions when I slept. Sometimes I woke up in the exact same position I'd fallen asleep in, except for recently, when I awoke hovering above my bed. It would come in handy that night. But I needed more security. Vines were hanging from the tree's branches, and I pulled at one. It gave for a few feet, but then no matter how hard I pulled, no more would come. I yanked as hard as I could, and still the vine held. It was strong. Good.

  I wrapped the feet of vine around my waist twice and tied it to itself. If I rolled off the branch, the vine would catch me. There was still a little give to it where I could move around.

  "OK." I breathed. "This is good."

  I nestled my things on the branch next to me, holding up my glow lily.

  "Oh my!" I said as the light fell on a small flock of brown birds with short beaks. Sparrows. Most of them were hunkered down, their eyes closed. A few of them opened one yellow eye to see where the light was coming from.

  "Sorry," I whispered, quickly wrapping a cloth around my glow lily. I didn't want to disturb them. The glowing-air flower would go out by the middle of the night, regenerating its light by the end of the next day.

  For a while, I just sat there, listening to all the sounds around me, thinking about the fact that this was the longest I'd ever gone without a bath. I scratched at my skin and looked at the dirt that had gathered under my nails. I started getting scared. When I finally slept, due to mental and physical fatigue, it was hours later. I'd imagined over a hundred dreadful things that could happen to me up in the tree, all stemming from the many stories I'd heard over the years about the Forbidden Greeny Jungle.

  A giant bird could come and carry me away in its gigantic beak. A swarm of invisible deadly mosquitoes could bite me as I slept until I had no blood left. The very tree I slept in could come to life and throw me from its branches. And many other things. In the end, my brain just got tired and I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  Chapter 14

  Good Instincts

  There was probably activity below as I slept.

  I knew that bush cows had been following me for about an hou
r before I climbed into the tree. They were attracted to the food I carried. Nevertheless, as I snored away, there was nothing the dog-size creatures could do.

  The field guide said that they had flat wide feet made for moving swiftly along the jungle's floor. They weren't made for climbing trees. I was fortunate, for I had no lock or rope to secure my satchel. If I'd slept on the ground, I'd have started my second day in the Greeny Jungle with nothing to eat. But there were stranger things than bush cows skulking about. Luckily, I didn't realize exactly what until the morning.

  I woke with a start. I was lying on my back, and the first thing I saw were trees, green leaves, and moss-covered branches. Then I heard the movement of something large below; it growled low and guttural. Instinctively, I didn't make a sound.

  I quickly let my mind get ahold of where I was and why I was there. I'm in the Forbidden Greeny Jungle, I quickly thought. I'm going north, in search of the most ferocious beast of all time: the elgort. I'm far from home. I walked many miles yesterday, and my muscles ache from all the walking. But still, I didn't move. Instead I held on to the vine around my waist and listened, closing my eyes so that I could create a picture in my head of what was below by using the sound of its movement.

  Mixed with my imagination, the sounds told me that whatever it was was big and had a large head and many big teeth. It wasn't an elgort. I wasn't far enough yet, and an elgort would move faster. I opened my eyes and slowly turned my head to the side. I didn't dare breathe.

  It was directly below me, and it was hideous to my eyes: a giant lizard, about the length of a car. It didn't have the dry scaly skin of the lizards I had seen back home. This one had soft skin like a human being, except it was pale and pink like the inside of an unripe okonwe fruit. Its eyes glowed yellow, and its large mouth was filled with sharp, jagged teeth. The tip of its snout ended in what looked like the head of a shovel. It was using its strange snout to dig around the trunk of the tree.

  I watched as it stopped and suddenly started digging with its claws. Then it leaned forward and bit into the dirt, pulling something out. The beast chewed on whatever it was and snarled with what I thought sounded like satisfaction. The sound made me feel less afraid. That such a frightening-looking beast could feel pleasure at eating something tasty made it seem less scary, made it seem normal. It walked into the bushes and went along its way. I sighed with relief and sat up. I stretched and waited a few minutes to make sure the giant lizard was gone. Then I untied the vine, gathered my things. The climb-down was nowhere near as scary as the climb up.

  I stood before the tree feeling oddly good. I'd learned something that I didn't know before. Actually I'd learned four new things. The first was that I could spend the night in the Forbidden Greeny Jungle all by myself and live. The second was that I could be quiet in the face of danger. The third was that I wouldn't die or get sick if I slept with grimy skin and in dirty clothes. And last, I could trust my instincts. I'd awakened, and my instincts had immediately told me to be quiet and not move. I'd done this without my usual many minutes of pondering. Who knows what that strange lizard beast would have done to me if I'd screamed or gasped.

  I smiled for the first time since Dari was bitten, embraced my newfound knowledge, and began walking, weaving my way around the trees, plants, and bushes. I walked for five hours before I decided to take a break. I brushed my foot in front of a tree to clear the leaves and mulch, laid my small blanket down, and sat on it. I ate a flour cake and brought out one of the five mangoes I'd picked from a wild mango tree along the way the day before. It was a small, strange-looking green one with blue splotches on the skin, but I figured a mango was a mango. I dug my nail into it and pulled the skin off. The flesh was a dull orange as opposed to the bright orange I was used to. Maybe it was a little overripe. I shrugged and took a bite.

  "Ugh!" I exclaimed dropping it, wiping frantically at my mouth, and spitting out what I'd bitten. "Blah! Blah! Disgusting!"

  The mango was horribly bitter. And the juice made my mouth cool, as if I'd eaten a very strong mint leaf.

  "My mouth!" I exclaimed. "Numb! Numb! Ptooey!"

  My tongue was going numb, and the roof of my mouth felt tingly. But I just sat there because something started happening to my perception of the things around me. Gradually everything grew odd. It was as if someone in my head were playing with my mental settings for color. The green leaves turned gold, and the brown tree bark looked purple. A grasshopper that hopped on my lap was every color of the rainbow. And a large squirrel in a nearby tree looked as if it were made of water!

  "Oooh," I moaned, rubbing my temples. I smacked my lips and chewed on my tongue. I tried spitting the bitter taste from my mouth some more. It helped a little. Aside from my mouth and my perception, I felt OK.

  "OK, Zahrah," I said out loud. "Stay calm. You know what this is, and it's only temporary."

  At least I hoped it was. When I was six, I'd experienced something similar to this. I'd accidentally eaten a chocolate-covered dimension cherry. My father's boss had given them to him as a New Yam Day gift. Dimension cherries were in season only once every seven years, and they're a delicacy among adults; these were potent ones. I thought the cherry was just a normal chocolate. I'd spent the rest of the day in my mother's arms as she told me over and over again that the house was not full of fuzzy green caterpillars and my skin was not blue.

  So I knew a little about what was happening to me, that what I was seeing wasn't real and the effect would eventually wear off. Still, I was glad I'd taken only one bite of that strange mystic mango!

  The mango's effect took about fifteen minutes to wear off. In that time, everything around me shrank to appear as if it could fit in my hands and then blew up to its normal size again; my legs grew long and lean, as if they were those of a woman, then they shrank back to normal; and I could have sworn I saw a large pink frog with gold speckles hop to my feet, humph arrogantly, and then hop away. I would never eat a mango with blue splotches on it ever again!

  When I was sure that I was OK, I stood up.

  "Ridiculous," I grumbled, picking up my things. I opened my satchel and dumped out the rest of the mangoes. I took a moment to kick each one of them as far as I could.

  Two hours later, I came across another mango tree. Almost all of the branches of this tree hung with plump red mangoes. Normal mangoes; mangoes that I was familiar with. I picked and sliced one open, and the flesh was bright orange. I sniffed it, poked it with my finger, and tentatively tasted it. Then I grinned with relief and took a big bite. It was the most delicious mango I'd ever had. I savored every bite and sucked the seed dry. I put my things down, sat in front of a tree, and ate two more. I put another four in my satchel.

  I patted my belly and brought out my digi-book. I clicked to the book's encyclopedia and looked up "elgort." I quickly glanced around to make sure nothing was preparing to attack me, then I began to read.

  "The elgort is a nasty, stupidly irrational beast. Mad as the Mad Hatter of the mythical Alice in Wonderearth tales. You don't want to follow one into any rabbit hole, trust us. Twenty-one of us explorers have been eaten by... Source Page Error."

  "Oh no!" I hissed, smacking the book on the side. "Not for this entry."

  I turned it off and turned it on again with no problem, but when I went to the elgort entry, it said "Source Page Error" again. I tried one more time, but this time the digi-book wouldn't even turn on. I sat thinking for a few minutes and then shook my head.

  "Doesn't matter," I said.

  I still had to get the egg. Dari deserves a strong friend, I thought. "Strong," I said. I nodded and then stood, packing up my blanket. "Strong," I said again. I was shaky but I was standing. Information or no information, I would move on. If the elgort is not very smart, then I have an advantage over it, I thought. I was dada, a person destined to be wise.

  "And I'm a Windseeker," I said. Whatever that meant.

  I kept hearing Dan's voice as I walked. "You should be flying," the voice
told me. "It'll get you there faster and you'll be high above any elgorts if you see them. " It was exactly what Dari would have said if he had been with me. I knew the imaginary voice was correct, but I was too afraid to try. I'm a coward, I thought. I bit my lip. An elgort will have a field day with someone as scared as me.

  My mouth felt gummy. I hoped to come across a pond soon, though I wasn't sure if I would have the courage to wash in it. Who knew what kinds of things would be floating or swimming around in it. I'll cross that bridge when I get to it, I thought, not for the first or last time. I reached into my bundle, brought out my first bottle of water, and took a sip. I sloshed it around my mouth and then swallowed. Then I brushed my teeth.

  The air was warm and humid but not too unbearable. Dari's pants and caftan felt comforting, though they were a little stiff from the dirt and didn't smell very good. I splashed some water on my face and reached into my bundle for another flour cake.

  For the first time I thought of my parents. I had no idea just how bad things were back home in Kirki, but I could make some good guesses. Many miles south, my mother was probably sitting at the kitchen table wailing as my father paced the kitchen. I couldn't imagine either of them getting any sleep. Instead, the letter I had written would be on the kitchen table, a constant reminder of their only child's certain death.

  This was what I wrote:

  Dear Mama and Papa,

  I've gone into the jungle. It's my fault that Dari ***u in a coma and it'd up to me to make him better. I'll be back ad doon cu I get the elgort egg. I believe it will cure him. I'm sorry for leaving without your permission, but I know you wouldn't have let me go if I asked. And I must go. I love you and please tell Dari that I love him too.