The kids, laying on the floor of their cabin, stayed up whispering late into the night.
“What were you guys doing?” Solveis asked Girselle and En.
“Well, we were stuck on the boat for a while. They wouldn’t let us follow you off,” En answered. He didn’t mention that only he, and not his sister, had wanted to follow them to the enemy’s vessel. He asked the other two siblings (Livia was not a big part of the conversation because she kept falling asleep and waking back up), “What did you do? Did they really let you help? How come they didn’t just send you back?”
Still whispering, Arlendr answered forcefully, “Send me back! They couldn’t send me back. One of them grabbed me, but I cut his hand.” He had actually cut the hand of one of the bad guys, not someone who was trying to send him back.
They heard stirring in the other room, and all took a moment of silence.
Then, Solveis filled in her brother’s story, “They couldn’t send us back, I think. There were people with weapons fighting up top. So they tried to push us into a room that was already cleared out.” Then she explained how she had opened cages and chests. Then, being curious about Arlendr’s part of the story, she asked him, “What did you do when you ran out?”
“They saw my bow, so they put me with the archers. I shot at the guys tied up on the ground, but only when they tried to get up,” he answered proudly.
“So what then?” En asked. “You just stayed in the chest room and with the archers until getting off board?”
“Mostly, yeah,” Solveis answered. Then she added, “There was a whole fight thing with the frople kid,” she told them her adventure of helping him get to safety.
Girselle hadn’t spoken yet. Finally, she asked, “So that’s what that kid was doing there? I wonder where they got him from.”
“I wonder what they wanted him for,” Solveis added.
“That’s obvious,” Girselle answered. “For a convert. There aren’t many like him around here. He’d be good to take on, and he’s young enough to convert in time.”
This seemed true enough, but it was weird to hear from Girselle. Solveis then considered and asked, “But, under what pretext could they take him. Isn’t their whole thing about reclaiming the rightful treasures of their people? Like, restoring balance. How could you spin taking a foreign boy as restoring balance?”
“It’d be best if no one ever found out about him. Not until he’s on their side. Then he could spin his own story. – If he was seen too early though, it could always be story about rescuing him from abuse, or brainwashing, or something,” Girselle went on with her analysis.
This too was believable. Who knew really though?
En realized that only Solveis had explained what she had been doing. He repeated his previous question to Arlendr, “But... Arlendr, did you just stay up with the archers the whole time?”
“Just?” Arlendr questioned his friend. “Yes. I just did that mostly, except for when I stabbed the guy in the hand. Oh! And when I tried to shoot at the fire lady, but the other one pulled me down. That’s how I got stabbed.” Arlendr pointed to the bandage on his arm.
“Fire lady?” En questioned.
Girselle added what knowledge she had, “Some lady threatened the whole ship with explosives, right?”
“Yeah. Exactly!” Solveis whispered excitedly. “And, Arlendr tried to shoot her, or something… I don’t know exactly.”
Arlendr explained himself, as if it had been totally obvious, “If I could shoot it out of her hand, then she could be tied up too. Then we could get the whole ship. But, they stopped me… And, we left a bunch of stuff behind. And it’ll never get back home now… See.”
“But, Arlendr,” Solveis started speaking seriously, though quietly, “She would have killed you. She aimed to kill you.”
Arlendr looked reflective and spoke in an uncharacteristically meaningful voice. “Yes. She could have killed me. – Look she got my arm real good. It’s deep too you know.” The experience had been a significant one for him. He enjoyed adventures, especially dangerous ones, but his life have never actually been threatened in that way before. His life hadn’t exactly flashed before his eyes, but he could see that his death had flashed before the lady’s eyes. He felt differently about combat now, but he was still figuring out what exactly he thought about it all.
Arlendr asked the aepsis siblings what they had been doing, “What about you? I didn’t see you two fighting on our boat?”
En looked a little wounded. He explained himself, “They kept us back on the yacht. We kept the yacht floating close by, and then we helped people back up when you all jumped off the pirate ship.”
“Oh. I didn’t see you,” Solveis said.
“I saw you. You gave someone a little lizard thing. Lou collected it when we got back to land,” Girselle responded.
“That was you?” Solveis asked in a whisper that was a little too loud. They all had to be silent for another moment afterward.
“No! I said, you gave someone it,” Girselle said.
“Did you see what happened to Brutoin’s ship? They got away I guess…” Solveis asked Girselle and En.
“Yeah. A few of Lou’s people stayed onboard until everyone on our side was evacuated. They the last few jumped off. The fire lady harassed them the whole time. She freed Brutoin as soon as our people were gone. They sped away right away,” En explained what he had seen.
“How did they mange to get any of the stolen stuff back then?” Solveis wondered.
“Whatever people could hold in their hands,” Girselle answered.
Solveis shrugged in acceptance. Then, remembering her brother’s injury, she asked Arlendr, “You arm did get fixed then? I saw them standing all around you.”
“Oh yes. It will have a fine scar.” He presented the bandage to his friends.
Girselle spoke up again. “So, why were you even driving the yacht in the first place. Like… Where’d you get it from? Who’s is it? I haven’t seen it before? Did you really have permission?”
Arlendr glowed. He had wanted someone to ask him about that. Sir. Lou had given him secret instructions about retrieving that boat. It had been hidden at the base of the western cliffs of Molil. Arlendr had been let into the plans about how they might have to use the yacht a while ago. Today though… Today, he’d finally gotten to carry those plans out. Though he was excited to tell this story, he didn’t tell it entirely clearly. He started by taunting, “Permission. Permission. Permission. They told me where it the boat was way long ago. And, since I’m such a good kayak-er, and I’m so tiny and sneaky, they told me I could help get that boat. I did kayak, and I brought it over. I was the first one on there!”
He was questioned by the three awake friends, in hushed tones, until they mostly understood his story.
Solveis understood it to be that the fort people had thought this abduction might happen. They’d planned for it. Part of the plan had been to have a quick vessel hidden among the water at the tall western cliffs. At a particular signal, someone would be sent to get the vessel, the yacht, and bring it to the beach, where it could be boarded and go in chase after Brutoin and his ship. Arlendr was one of the people entrusted with the task of bring the yacht around, and he ended up being the quickest to the mark.
Even after Arlendr had told his valiant story and had been questioned until it made more sense, En was still a little confused. “Wait… They really asked you to drive the yacht? I thought the whole point of them being here was to make it safer here. They let you just go out there?”
Solveis saw this as strange too. She explained it as best she could. “They probably only meant him to get the yacht, not to go over, and not for me to follow him.”
“Hey!” Arlendr said just a little too loudly. They had to be quiet for a little. Then Arlendr continued, “I did it all good. I helped. It was a battle of Molil and I was there to defend my mountain. They were right to get my help.”
“Well. It’s all caused a lot of excitement,” Girselle put in with finality. “Everyone is scared. Your parents will be upset when they realize how involved you were, when they see that cut up close. – Our parents might be scared away from this place.” Girselle paused, pleased that she had the full attention of her peers, “People have been talking about Brutoin and his lot, you know. It’s even been in the news and stuff, but this will make it all more real. My dad says he’s a homeless fool, but now he really won’t like him.”
Solveis hadn’t thought of this. Apparently the others hadn’t either.
Arlendr spoke, “I won’t be scared away from my mountain.”
“We’ll see…” Girselle taunted them very quietly.
Conversation came to and end after this. They all really were very tired, and sleep came easily, even on the floor.
The next morning, everyone who could leave the island, did leave, including Girselle, En, and Livia. They seemed to want to be away from the unsettled feeling and the bad memories of the previous night. The Eigeroy family stayed, because it was their island, and also because they didn’t want to abandon any of these people for whom they felt partly responsible. Solveis wasn’t sorry to be left mostly alone. It had been a weird night. She would like to talk with the fort people and understand everything better, but that could wait. She really just wanted to think things over, and to look over every inch of her mountain, to check that it was all still there.
After breakfast with the parents, she went out to see Sir. Lou gardening out front. He hadn’t been doing this so much lately. She had mostly taken over, and he had been either away or busy with the fort people. Although she had been looking forward to being alone, he was someone that she would still like to talk to for a little bit. One could feel pleasantly alone while in the company of Sir. Lou.
“Good morning Sir.,” Solveis greeted him. She knelt by the garden and started helping him.
“Morning. I thought I’d been neglecting this little plot for too long. I came back to find it thriving under a different direction than my own. You’ve done a very good job. And, I’m not sorry to see you this morning too,” Lou said all this with a grandfatherly smile.
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Solveis almost thought that his comments had a second meaning behind the surface one, but she could never tell if she was understanding him correctly. Whatever the case, she might as well have conversation, “Thanks! It’s been fun. Actually, I really like weeding the best. It’s the best way to clear my mind.”
“That’s sort of beautiful,” Lou told her. He guided the conversation in another direction. “Are you all doing ok? It was an eventful day.”
“I think so. Everyone left this morning. It’s quiet now.”
“You didn’t go home.”
Solveis didn’t understand at first, then understanding, she replied, “Oh. This is home for me. I don’t know about the parents, but I feel more at home here then on the mainland.”
“It would be understandable if you were intimidated or scared to be here now.”
Again, she was confused. Then she understood, because the danger of Brutoin and his men. “It hadn’t occurred to me to be scared of them, except maybe when Arlendr stood up against that lady. I guess I should be more scared of them? I hope the parents don’t stop us coming here any more though.” Then, looking at Lou in earnest, she pleaded, “The fort people aren’t going away are they?”
“Oh no!” he answered happily. “Some will go home, but others will replace them. We’ll likely keep a rotation of people here for a while, if your family doesn’t mind.”
“That’s the only way the parents would let us keep coming, probably,” Solveis confided. She wanted to ask him about Brutoin and what had happened. She gathered her courage and asked, “What does he want? Why did he take all those people and things?”
“Well…” Sir. Lou began to answer, thinking. “People are complicated. You know he has a following. And he has a misguided sense of balance. He got some traction with people who believed in his mission, so he is perusing it further.”
“But he had that little man and the boy. They weren’t followers, and they weren’t creatures, and they weren’t treasure.”
“Well framed,” he complimented Solveis. “They are probably a little of each. He hopes they will be followers in time. They aren’t like him, so he might see them as creatures to a degree, or at least deserving of less freedom of choice than himself. And, they are quite valuable, being so unique. He probably saw them as assets, to make his movement stronger.”
“But that doesn’t make sense. It doesn’t match his goals. It’s a philosophy, right? To restore balance by making sure that the artifacts and cultures of the downtrodden get restored to them, so they can thrive as they were meant to.”
“Yes, but people’s intentions, as they express them, are not always the same as their true intention, deep inside. Even for you, I’m sure you have a code you live by. And, I’m sure you break it sometimes, probably because something besides that code has ruled you. – Also, we tell ourselves and other people a more palatable truth than the actual truth. Ethics and motivations are complicated. We can’t express ours in one hundred percent accuracy, but we can polish them up and tell the nicer version.”
“In that case, what does he really want?”
“Probably he wants what he says, but also other things. He wants equality. He wants people like him, the downtrodden, to have better lives. But, he also wants to be a great leader, to be important. He wants to make those who he doesn’t approve of suffer – not just to be limited to only what they deserve – but for them to suffer like him.”
“Isn’t that an old idea? Steal from the rich and give to the poor?”
“All ideas are old ideas. There is nothing new under the sun. He feels it strongly though, so he is fighting for it in his way now.”
“I never thought his ideas quite made sense, but I really don’t like these new more complicated ones.”
“Would anyone in your situation think that stealing from the rich was a nice thing?”
Solveis was a little insulted by this. She wasn’t thinking of preserving her own wealth at all. She did treasure this island, her mountain, dearly though. Of course she knew that it cost money to keep it. She hadn’t been complaining about rich people having their money taken though. It was the injustice that had bothered her. “I didn’t mean that! If I couldn’t have a nice house and things anymore, I think I could deal with it. I don’t mean that bad things should never happen to rich people. I just meant that it doesn’t make sense to fix thing by hurting people on purpose. Besides, who’s he to tell who should lose things and who should get them?”
“Who should have that right then?” Sir. Tin challenged her.
“I don’t know. I’d let you. But really, I don’t know. I’d say no one, but then it just stays all the same. And I know there are rich people who hurt people with the stuff they have, so that’s not good. What’s the right answer?”
“I don’t know. I’m glad it’s not me. In my experience, those who seek such positions are rarely the right kind of person to do them well. If anyone can, it is someone who was trusted and chosen by others. Or maybe, no one should do so, and everyone should focus on being the best person they can be, and living to a higher standard, in their own lives. That would, in time, promote fair treatment of all people.”
“You can’t make people do that though, can you? I mean, Brutoin is trying to make people do that. But he’s hurting people too.” This was all beginning to give her a headache. “I think I’m too young to figure this out,” she told Sir. Lou honestly.
“That’s true. Don’t worry about it too much yet. There will come a time when it is on your shoulders, but not yet.”
They both went quiet and worked in the ground.
Finally, her thoughts about Brutoin and his followers made her contemplate the fort people. What made them a cohesive group? How had the group formed? What did they have in common? What was their belief? She asked, “What do the fort people have for a common belief? How come they all work together? And for us and our bird? What do they care about that?”
“That’s a good question,” Lou replied. “What do you think?”
“They’re nice….” Then she immediately wish she hadn’t said it. Nice was such a meaningless word. It was what people said when they had nothing to say about a person. She tried to go on more clearly, “I mean, they’re kind. They respect everyone. They listen.” Then she thought of Patra and some of those with more challenging personalities. What brought them here? “They treat everyone else like what they want is important too. Or… it’s how they treat other people. Like no one wants to hurt or shut down anyone else. Even if they think the others are wrong.”
Lou let her ramble, until she was done thinking out loud. “Yes. I think you see it. I, and many of my friends, believe in an ancient rule: Everyone has a living spirit and is infinitely valuable. This means that no one of us has more innate value than any other.”
“That’s beautiful. It feels really true.” She thought it felt more true than Brutoin’s beliefs, even though there was a kind of truth in them too.
“Many people feel this truth. That is how all these people came to be at the fort, to help protect Margar.”
“That makes sense. I never really thought about why they came. I just figured you asked them to. I’d do something like that if you ask me to. Anyone would.”
“You may be called to do so, when you are older. Would you really like to be one of the people I ask?”
“Yes! How do you know who to ask?”
“Well, I ask people who I trust. All the others – with whom we share a great trust – we all have a sign, a signal. If anyone shows this sign, we trust them – within limits – and we rely on each other. Since this trust is hugely powerful and easy to take advantage of, we don’t tell other people about it. Does that make sense?”
“Yes. I won’t tell people you all have a sign.” She meant it. She had learned young that people had the right to their secrets, for the most part, and that it was best not to ask too much about them. “It’s nice to know that the fort people are all really trustworthy. I basically trusted them anyway, because you did. Maybe that was stupid of me.”
“You could be more cautions, but in this case your instincts were right. Personally, I try to start off with openness and trust, but also to keep my eyes open. And, I prefer never to tell other peoples’ secrets.”
“Yeah. That makes sense. I’m glad they are people you trust. – When I am older, could I be someone you trust? No matter where I will be when I grow up, I’ll still believe that people should treat each other well, and that I’ll try to be a trustworthy person.”
“I trust you now. I can give you the sign, if you promise to respect it. – You are a child, but even children can understand things. You just have to promise to treat all people as if they are filled with a living spirit, which is infinitely valuable, like your own. Also, not to endanger others who have the sign.”
“Of course!” Solveis exclaimed mildly. Then, thinking that it was a weak promise, she said, “I see that all people have value, as much as me, and I won’t go showing off the sign. I won’t tell anyone who doesn’t know already.”
“Very well. Here is my sign.” He took a wallet out of his back pocket and pulled a small carved pendant out of it. It was rather thin, and a little shorter than his finger. It was carved in the shape of a leaf. One side of the leaf had the usual almost shaped curve. On the other side, it curved more like the shape of the letter ‘s’. The tip of the leaf was sharp and pointing to the right, in his palm. “And there is a way to see if someone else is one of our number. If someone suspect you are one of us, or hopes that you are because they need help, then they’ll let you get a glimpse of their leaf. If you do notice it, then you should find a way to mention that you’d love to help a friend. They should find a way to say that they too love to help a friend, and then you show your leaf.”
“Wow,” Solveis said, impressed. “Does it need to be so secret?”
“Usually, no. But we have been around for a while. It has only been possible to remain through darker and more oppressive times by not being out in public. You should always be able to do the right things out in public, and to accept whatever consequences come. But the relationships you have can be injured from being publicly known, at least that’s what we have experienced. We make no secret of our individual choices, only of our connections to each other.”
“Wow. You’re still so careful, even though it must be long time since you needed to keep it a secret? It’s amazing that you have been able to.”
“It’s not an impressive group that people brag about, it’s just something that we believe in.”
“That’s true,” Solveis agreed. She liked the idea of all these people knowing about this, but not having to blab about it. She just realized, was he going to give her a sign? “Am I going to get a sign? Are you going to wait until I’m older?”
“You may have it now… or soon. It must be made by an existing member and given. I will make it and give it to you when it’s done.”
“Thank you,” she told him sincerely. Then, thinking that she may have sounded very babyish, she wanted to make him understand that she understood how serious this was, and that she was taking it seriously. “Thank you for letting me in. I really am taking it seriously. I was just asking questions because I was curious. I’m not-not taking it seriously. Really.”
“I know,” he told her with a smile. “Well we’ve done some good work here.”
She looked down at the garden which was quite tidied up.
They went their separate ways. She now had quite enough to think about for the rest of the day. She had a nice long day in the cave thinking about Brutoin and his beliefs, and his people, and what he’d do next, and if he’d threaten them again. She also pondered the idea that so many people had such a strong belief in the value of other people that they had a special group for it, and they gave up their normal lives, and lived here instead, and protected Margar. Arlendr joined her in the cave eventually, and they seriously discussed plans for next time the mountain was attacked. Arlendr had taken his injury seriously. It seemed to occur to him that battles were not so much an idea, as a reality, where people actually got hurt and died, even himself. He was going to make the parents live here full time from now on, and protect the place. Solveis didn’t think the parents would go for this, but it was nice to talk about.
When the Eigeroy family made it back to the mainland, Solveis became quite sick, and Arlendr was a little sick himself. Solveis slept for days and ate very little. She even missed a day of school. It didn’t last forever though, and it definitely wasn’t the worst she ever felt. This made her parents even more hesitant to leave their cozy mainland home. They acted like they were never going to return to the island. After much pleading from the children though, and assurances that the fort people would be there, the parents relented. The first weekend they were back, Solveis found Sir. Lou. She was growing quite excited at owning a sign of friendship. She had been imagining different ways to conceal it on her person.
She found Old Man Tin under his favorite tree working on something small in his hands. He held it out for her to see. “Hello!” he greeted her. “I’ve had it ready for a little, but I’ve just been adding more detail.”
She sat across from him, full of eagerness.
He tipped the small token into her hands. It was much smaller than his, but the shape, ‘c’ shaped on one side and ‘s’ shaped on the other, was identical. It had a lot of hand carved detail, and seemed to be sealed with some shiny substance. It had a little hole in the base of the leaf. “Put it somewhere safe, not super visible, and if you can keep it on your person, that’d be good.”
“I’ve been thinking of that. Since it’s small, do you think I could put it in a hair tie, the cloth ones? I wear those all the time.” She had been thinking of it. She’d had multiple ideas about how to wear it already, different ideas depending on the size Lou made it.
“That seems like a good idea,” he encouraged her.
That very day, she constructed such a fabric hair tie out of scrap fabric. She tied the leaf pendant to elastic, which she looped inside the scrunchy fabric. She made sure to leave a few openings in the seams of the hair tie so that the pendant could be pull out from its folds. It became a little fidgeting habit of hers to practice pushing the pendant out of and back into these little slits.
Having the little token in her hands was soothing. The movements she made with it in her fingers helped her to think. The solid, realness of it helped her to feel somewhat resolved about all the hubbub that had taken over her life recently, about the new reality of the dangerous of Brutoin. Even so, she knew that this was just a temporary period of peace and that Margar, and consequently the island of Molil, would still be on the radar of dangerous people.