By Gregg Glory [Gregg G. Brown]
Chapter Six "Fight at the Mickleswift"
Sarah followed the Mickleswift as fast as her feet would carry her. She blazed down the pathway beside the river, drawing an odd comfort from the strength of the stream to just keep running on and on. I'll be like that stream, Sarah thought. Who needs cousins and bumblers? I know the way I must go.
Sarah marched away from the tearful Abbey without even looking back. Serves her right! Sarah thought spitefully. And I thought we could be friends after all. Why, Abbey and her boring brother were an absolute desecration of the Gilman chapel! Sarah was so busy thinking up punishments and prosecutions for the pair of interlopers, that she didn't even notice when a second pair of footsteps began crunching through the leaves behind her.
"Sarah Tone." The creepy voice brought Sarah to a halt. She spun around.
There was Bart Hecatomb, his hands on his hips, looking as if he owned the world.
"What do you want, Bart?"
Bart surveyed her evenly. He didn't look at all worried. What kind of trick did he have up his sleeve?
"I don't have time to stare you down again." Sarah thought she might be borrowing trouble, but somehow she just didn't care.
A look of irritation passed across Bart's face. That had gotten to him. But still, he didn't say anything. Bart's wide face and closed mouth remained in a contemptuous curl. He tapped his foot contentedly, as if he had all the time in the world. Sarah was tempted to just turn around and keep going, but Bart would just start following behind her again. Besides, she didn't think it was a good idea to turn her back on him. In one swift movement, Bart stooped and picked up a big stick that had been lying under some leaves near his foot. This he began to swing in front of himself like a scythe. Back and forth, back and forth, as evenly as a pendulum. It was threatening, but Bart didn't advance.
He was staring intently, his eyes manic and other-worldly, almost glowing. It was as if he couldn't quite make her out, as if there was a pane of fog between himself and her. And yet, the sun was as sharp as a dart.
Sarah plucked up her nerve. "Don't you know its not polite to stare?" Bart blinked, either he was rousing from some stupor, or he was able to see her more clearly again, for his eyes narrowed on her face.
"You're going to get flunked out of the choir. I heard my Dad talking to some other teachers, and they're going to have you dismissed from the choir because your grades suck."
This was unexpected. Choir was the one redeeming thing about school. They could keep the rest of it--the rigidity, the dumb unfunness of things. Things like having to do work with your classmates as lab partners, or doing whatever some finicky teacher arbitrarily demanded. When else would she need to recite the chief exports of the Ukraine in her life? Bart would have been hard-pressed to bring Sarah more alarming news. Still, she persevered.
"That's a lie, Bart Hecatomb. And when your father hears the tales you've been telling out of school, you'll be properly tanned for it, I'd reckon."
Bart was unfazed. The stick swung left to right.
"You think you're my Daddy's favorite because of that squeaky high voice of yours. Well, you're not that great. My Dad says its because your Father runs the Political Committee, and they pick the teachers that get tenure. My Dad hates your Dad, and he hates you too and your sissy soprano."
These words turned Sarah's world on its head. If Mr. Hecatomb was against her.... If she really didn't have such a special voice as she'd always thought.... Bart's grin spread to the other side of his face. He was actually enjoying this. This wasn't like his usual dirty tricks--this was more forceful--and more clever. These words were like acid eating into Sarah's self-respect. She could feel tears starting to form at the corners of her eyes. But she'd be damned if she'd let Bart see a single one fall.
"Well, if that's true, then my Father will get your Dad fired if he tries anything."
At this, Bart's grin, if anything, got even wider. It seemed as though his face would split from vicious merriment. A cruel light danced in his eyes. Did Bart want his Father to get fired? The stick he held continued to swish back and forth with the regularity of a metronome, as if guided by other hands.
"Your Father's to be replaced on the Political Committee. It happened last night during the secret ballot, as a matter of fact."
Sarah stooped with a blinding suddenness, picked up a large, water-smoothed stone that was laying in an eroded turn of the Mickleswift by her foot, and beaned Bart right in the eye. He let out a howl like a kicked cat.
Sarah almost rushed over to help Bart then. She had gone too far. But as she took a step closer to him, Bart let out a low laugh under his whimpering. It was one of the most confusing things Sarah had ever heard.
"Just like a girl," Bart said, down on one knee in pain. He had dropped the stick and was paying no attention to where Sarah was. Sarah fought an impulse to take the stick and brain him right on the spot. Or rather, didn't fight it as much as she scared herself with the vehemence of the feeling, and turned on her heel and stalked off in silence along the gabbling Mickleswift.
The sun shifted easily through the hazel branches, and then a stand of oak, and finally a grove of lovely ash trees, all turning festive with autumn as Sarah stalked onward through the wood.
Now Sarah was even more wound up than before. Blast that Bart! Why had she let him get to her? Had she forgotten all of her Granny Pansy's advice? It was as though something inside her was egging her on to lose control, to express a ferocious side of her personality that Sarah was sure their choirmaster Mr. Hecatomb would be astonished to find out even existed.
Sarah was virtually running through the woods now. The day was still as beautiful as it had been at breakfast, but it didn't matter. The sunlight, the leaves, the energy of autumn seemed to mock Sarah and her heartache. She wished it was night so that she could hide her face. She would run away where no one would ever find her! That would show them--if they would even bother to notice. Bart would probably sing and dance. And Abbey would probably move into her room. Just the idea of that happening was almost worse than her and her snotty little brother's desecration of Gilman's room. His sanctuary, as Sarah had begun to think of it. Sarah wished she'd never had breakfast with those people; that she'd never taught Abbey the secret of her paper boats. If she was back at the pond now, she'd tear them all to wet sheds--every one of them! Soggy homework would litter the woods, would fill it up like a gigantic snowstorm. There'd be destruction and wildness in every corner of Traeshurstaene.
Suddenly, Sarah had come to the clearing by the well. She paused here, not really sure why. She still felt an overwhelming need to express the rage inside her, but simply plowing through the woods at a hectic pace wouldn't do it. She felt suddenly and totally exhausted, defeated. Sarah plunked down as if the air had been taken out of her. She had never felt so tired, she thought. It was as if she were a puppet and the puppeteer had gotten tired of her silly antics, her ridiculous gestures of defiance and fraughtfulness, and had simply cut her strings. She leaned her back against the well, unable to move an inch.
Sarah closed her eyes and clasped her fingers around the pendant that had been in Gilman's breast pocket. It must have flown out of her blouse during her fight with Abbey, and when she ran away afterward. If she hadn't pricked her finger on Gilamn's medal of valor, she never would have discovered what had become of it. It was a misshapen silver pendant with some old runes carved into it. It was shiny with the passing of many fingers around it. It had been one of Gilman's most beloved objects, and Sarah had sort of assumed it had been interred with him. Gilman had always let her play with it, and it had never ceased to calm and fascinate her. She ran her thumb over the runic letters.
Her mother would never have allowed Sarah to have the necklace, so Sarah had placed it carefully under blouse that morning. Mrs. Tone didn't even like the fact that Gilman had owned it. But it was given to him by Granny Pansy, and there was precious little chance that Mrs. Tone would ever be able to over-rule Granny. It wasn't long after Granny had given Gilman the runic charm that Gilman had enlisted. At the time he claimed, rather cryptically, that he might might as well join up since he was, as he said, a "warrior anyway"--whatever he might have meant by that.
Sarah began a little wordless tune in her head, a comforting nothing as she let the struggles of the morning drain out of her. Her head was still as full of anger as an ant's nest, thoughts colliding with thoughts in such confusion until she couldn't make out which thoughts, if any, were genuinely her own. Gradually, with the light switching back and forth among the leaves of the ash trees, Sarah felt as though she were drifting off to sleep. Her arms were tired from punching and throwing rocks, and felt as heavy as seaweed pulled from the ocean. Her legs were useless from running the length of the Mickleswift. Her eyes were becoming more and more weighted, and a darkness began to creep into the world, a portion of oblivion. The last thing she remembered doing was tucking Gilman's rune stone back under her blouse and leaning her head against the side of the well.
END OF CHAPTER SIX