The Army of Bones
Chapter 20
Through the gate, up the hill, running through Long Creek, over the steep mountain, down its rocky backside, across Weeper’s Run, along the shelf upon Dark Canyon, between Fool’s Pass, skipping on the downs, rounding Lake Pactolus, and cutting across her deep, rushing river.
They had left the house at once. The cougar figurine was the artifact! And with adrenaline coursing through their veins and a mild understanding of the path, the journey past twice as fast.
The sun cocked in the mid-afternoon sky, baking their backs, and yet not one of them grew tired or frustrated. The forest was a familiar home now; birds, trees, and scurrying animals were their distant cousins. Strange noises and creeping critters reminded them of happy times, climbing over mountains and pressing through thickets, clutching Balaam’s hide and following his direction.
They crossed the Pactolus eagerly, keeping an ever watchful eye out for the Rock Faeries, like Noya had shown them. On its far side, they laughed while recalling the joy they had of swimming and drinking from the cool, refreshing lake with Balaam. Water splashed against their bare feet while they stole up the shore in skips and fervent delight. On the upper coast, Marian handed out snacks she had stolen from the kitchen, and each of them refilled their water bottles, before heading inland across the Dead Valley. After a hot half-hour, they were at the felled sugar-berry. Aaron and Herbert stepped in first, holding branches down with their feet, and others up with their hands, until the girls past.
The group emerged on the far side, huffing and puffing in a thick, humid sweat. They brushed the leaves and debris from their faces and hair to see the peaceful Field of Atagahi; the deer dallied, the bears bumbled, and the rabbits rolled. Maushop was still leaning against the weeping willow, with his right hand dipped in the lake, as if he hadn’t moved a muscle since they had left him the day before; though his frown had turned shades gloomier.
“Good afternoon, Maushop,” Marian greeted him.
He looked a bit surprised to see them and smiled meekly. “Dolor children,” replied the giant. “You’re back sooner than I expected. What has changed?”
“We found out we had what we needed all along,” Esther replied. “Right, Herbert?”
Herbert reached into his pocket and pulled out a bundle of cloth. He unwrapped the elegant cougar figurine.
“The artifact,” Maushop’s voice rolled like a bowling ball down its alley.
Something in Herbert told him he was to go to the grave without his sisters and Aaron. He left them beside the sugar-berry and crossed the ryegrass field in silence. Noya flittered next to him as he approached the feeble pillar of stones on the far end, opposite the ever-watching giant.
He rolled the figurine in his hands, and held it out in front of the large, flat piece of stone. Staring at it, he realized how much the thing had scared him before. But he never simply stopped to examine and appreciate its beauty. Its soapy white marble patterns and gemstone eyes shimmered in the daylight. How could something that caused him so much regret and pain be so beautiful now? He didn’t know what to expect, or even what an Army of Bones amounted to, but the act of placing the figurine back left him with an unbearable feeling; it felt so sacred and surreal. It felt like fear, but not terrible fear; if there were a word for it, he did not know it yet. Before him, the headstone’s inscription stared at him: “Leave your regrets here to regain life there.” He closed his eyes and prayed.
The rest of the group stood still waiting and wondering if something was wrong. Marian took a step forward, ready to help, but just then Herbert opened his eyes and shoved the eight-point star into the hole.
A raspy, clicking motion came from inside the headstone, and Herbert realized the cairn was more intricate than he had first believed; it sounded hollow and full of machinery. Herbert stepped back, and the earth below his feet shook, reminding him of the forest gate opening. Then, suddenly, like lightning hit it, the headstone splintered at the ground and a crack ran up its center. The cougar figurine fell from the face, and Herbert picked it up, confused and a bit afraid. The deer, rabbits, groundhogs, skunks, and bears ran from the field, the birds became silent and disappeared.
Maushop stood to his feet. “Live again,” he whispered, and a tear ran down his cheek.
Next to Herbert, a skeleton arm burst through the earth. Millipedes and earthworms wiggled through the digits, dirt dripped off the forearm, and the arm wagged about before grabbing his sneaker. He fell to the ground and screamed. Another hand ripped up beside his head and clawed at the earth, trying to free itself from its earthly jailhouse.
“Herbert!” The others screamed and ran for him.
The skeleton hand let go of Herbert’s foot, desiring to dig itself free from the earth instead of hold on to Herbert’s shoe. At once, Aaron, Marian, and Esther were pummeling into Herbert and helping him up. All around them, dirt clods flew six feet into the air like little flak grenades, skeleton appendages burst from the ground, and a dull but ever-spreading moaning and groaning emitted beneath them like a zombie anthem. The children imagined hundreds, if not thousands, of skeletons were waiting to rip through the ground. They raced for the tree line, hammering through, with eyes shut and shoulders lowered, as rockets of dirt and grass hit the sky, and skeleton digits arched left and right in the air.
Enough of the dirt had hurled itself up now, and full skeletons were emerging from the soil and hobbling about the field. They stumbled through the grass, dug out their lost appendages, and helped others escape the soiled prison. Dirt, grass, and insects fell through their hollow insides as they staggered on their rickety legs.
Herbert sprinted past a skeleton struggling to attach its lower jaw to its face. Marian shrieked at one using a hand it found to brush a dead grasshopper off its teeth. Aaron tripped over a femur that was being used by a legless skeleton to drag to its other extremities. Esther ran into, and then whacked away, one holding its own skull in its hands like a basketball and shaking a colony of angry ants off of it; the skeleton bounced away clumsily and screwed its skull back to its spine. The field was alive with dead people.
The entire time they ran shrieking and tumbling through the field, Noya found it hilarious and spent her time laughing and twirling; but the children did not understand her pantomimic movements and assumed she was frightened into delirium. They made it to the sugar-berry and cowered behind one of its large felled branches.
Herbert closed his eyes. “I’ve done it again,” he whispered. “It’s all my fault.”
Noya tapped him on the shoulder, but he kept his eyes shut. She flew in front of his face and poked him in the eye.
“Ow!” He opened his eyes to see what she pointed feverishly toward.
Two-hundred skeletons, frail, pale and disjointed, had gathered in front of the cairn of rocks and stone. And then, something even more magical began happening. A soft purple and red coloration burst from the dry bones and Herbert thought for a moment they were exploding; but then he saw the skeletons were forming purple muscles, pink tendons, and yellow marrow around each joint. Veins and arteries rippled out like a sea anemone and snaked their way around the skeleton, wrapping the ribs, pelvis, kneecaps, feet and skull. A piece of red flesh pulsated at the center like a jellyfish, under the sternum. It burst open, and again he thought it was something horrific and vulgar; but realized then it was the heart pumping blood into the arteries and out all over the muscles and bones, dripping down the chest, waist and thighs. And just as he feared the blood would drain all over the grass, the skin formed and laced itself over the back, stomach, hips, and face.
The skeletons weren’t skeletons anymore. They were fully formed men and women, though not one of them was taller than Marian. An army of two hundred, bare, olive-skinned men and women standing in the field before the grave. They looked at one another in bouts of confusion and awe, speaking an incomprehensible language.
“My little people,” Maushop cried. The giant crossed the field in a single bound, dropped to his knees before the crowd, and wept. “I had lost you, my little people.” His face kissed the ground before them. “But now you are alive again.”
The crowd of newly formed people left the grave behind and ran to the giant man. They were laughing and giggling as many leapt onto his back and climbed his shoulders, while others hugged his feet and legs. He stood erect, towering in the sky, while the army clutched hold of his shoulders, waist and back; others ran and danced about him singing songs and whistling in delight.
“And now I can serve you again,” his voice boomed. “Let me find a home for us to belong.”
The giant turned in stride and in two powerful steps stood at the edge of the Lake. The four children dashed forward, bewildered. They watched the two hundred laugh, skip, dance and sing, following their hero into the Lake. A thick, heavenly mist rolled over the mountain and came onto the Lake in an instant, covering the party in its white, creamy shroud; like a blurry evaporation, they slowly left the children’s view. The company teemed with joy and excitement, jumping and cheering as they disappeared onto the far side of Atagahi.
Just before Maushop completely left her view, Marian caught a glimpse of a small woman resting on the giant’s shoulder. Her hand stroked his massive neck, and her head nestled in his ear-lobe. “Squannit is alive again,” she said, smiling.
“That hem wife?” Aaron asked.
“Yes,” she replied.
“I don’t know what we just did,” Herbert said. “But I’m glad we did it.”
Keith G. Alderman 