He let go and fell to the ground as the troll’s roar turned to a shriek and it finally collapsed to the ground with a mighty crash.
Silence and darkness descended over them. The troll had stomped out their campfire, and all they had to see by now was starlight. Thaddeus got to his feet, swayed unsteadily a moment, then went to find Teofil.
“Are you hurt?” Teofil asked.
“No, are you?” Thaddeus replied, though his hand and leg were throbbing.
“No.” Teofil leaned in to kiss him quickly, then held his good hand as they walked around the fallen troll. Thaddeus refused to look at its flat, ugly face, instead keeping his gaze forward, looking for his father.
“Dad?” Thaddeus asked, and Teofil followed it with, “Mum?”
“Here,” Miriam called. “We’re here. Are you two hurt?”
“No,” Teofil assured her as they approached where she knelt on the ground. He stopped suddenly and said, “Oh.”
Thaddeus couldn’t quite put together what he was seeing. Then it became clear, and he dropped to his knees beside his father as tears flooded his eyes. “Dad? Dad!”
“He was struck by the troll’s club,” Miriam said. “And it appears he was grazed by a barb.”
“Oh my God. No, Dad!” Thaddeus shook his father’s shoulders as a sob burst from him. “Dad, no, not like this. You can’t leave me now. Stay with me.”
His father coughed and gasped, and the sound loosened the iron band that seemed to have tightened around Thaddeus’s torso. He took a shaky, relieved breath of his own, and put a hand on his father’s chest, feeling a weak and fast heartbeat. His father’s grip was strong, however, when he took Thaddeus’s hand.
“You hurt?” his father asked.
“No, I’m fine. Keep quiet. Save your strength.”
His father shifted position and grimaced, then flashed Thaddeus a weak smile. “I zigged when I should have zagged.”
Fresh tears swamped Thaddeus’s eyes, and he looked away to keep his father from seeing him cry.
“Where did the barb get you?” Miriam asked, kneeling beside Thaddeus. She looked over her shoulder and said, “Fetter, fetch my pack.”
“I’m fine, Miriam,” Nathan said, but there was a wheeze to his breathing that set a cold stone of fear in Thaddeus’s belly.
“Well, of course you are, you silly, stubborn man,” Miriam said, her tone light, but even in the dim starlight, Thaddeus could see creases of concern across her brow and at the corners of her eyes. “You just tell me where it hurts, and I’ll have a look, all right?”
“Felt a sting in my left leg, and it made me stumble,” his father said. “Then the club hit me from the side.”
Thaddeus sat opposite Miriam as she pulled a knife from her belt. “Keep quiet and hold still.” She cut the leg of his jeans and peeled back the material to expose a long scratch on the side of his calf. It looked dark in the dim, white light of the stars, and Thaddeus worried it might be more than blood.
“Astrid, Fetter, Teofil, get us a fire going somewhere upwind of the troll,” Miriam said without looking around. “And bring me my pack and a torch once it’s going.”
“There’s a flashlight in my pack,” Thaddeus’s father said, looking at him. “Grab it for her, will you, son?”
Thaddeus ran to find his father’s pack, keeping a good distance from the body of the troll. He heard his father and Miriam talking in quick whispers, and figured his father had sent him off on an errand in order for him to talk with Miriam more openly about the situation. It irked Thaddeus not to be included in their conversation, and he was so focused on what his father might be saying he overlooked the pack a couple of times. When he finally found it, he hurried back, the grass swishing around him as if with quiet whispers of its own. He sat down beside his father and dug through the pack until he found the flashlight and slid the switch. His father had put in fresh batteries before they’d left, and the light was bright when he directed it toward the injury.
His skin went cold, and a chill skated down his spine. The injury itself didn’t look like much; a simple scrape that could have been received from anything. But the skin around it was swollen and puffy, as if something had burrowed in beneath the skin, and thin black lines crept out from the wound toward his foot and higher up his leg.
“Oh my God,” Thaddeus whispered. He could tell how bad the pain was by the expression on his father’s face.
“What do you feel, Nathan?” Miriam asked.
“It’s cold,” he said through gritted teeth. “I can feel it spreading, like ice.”
“You can stop it, though, right?” Thaddeus said, fixing his gaze on Miriam. “You’ve got something in your pack that will help.”
“I’ll check what I’ve brought,” she said, but her face looked grim. “Those gnomes only listen half the time. I asked them to bring me my pack. You sit with him while I go find it and mix something up.”
In the distance, Fetter and Astrid bickered about how to properly arrange a campfire. He heard Miriam scold them for not bringing her pack, then low and frantic whispers as they asked about his father. Thaddeus moved up closer to his father’s shoulder, the grass tall enough to be over his head and making it seem as if they were the only ones around. He switched off the flashlight to save the batteries, and to keep from seeing the wound.
“Thaddeus,” his father said, voice weak. “You have to go on. You have to find your mother. Head to the mountains, to the tallest one. It’s called Wraith Mountain. That’s most likely where she flew.”
“I’m not leaving you,” Thaddeus replied, shaking his head as tears ran down his cheeks. “I won’t.”
“You have to.” His father turned his head away and coughed before continuing. “Our mission depends on you now.”
“Dad, I can’t leave you. Would you leave me if our roles were reversed?”
“That’s different. You have to continue the journey. She recognized you, we all saw it. Out of all of us, you have the best chance to get through to her. I’ll rest here and wait for you to return.”
“No.” Thaddeus shook his head. “No. And that’s final. Miriam is mixing up something to help, and we’ll get you comfortable after that so you can sleep.”
“You have to keep going,” his father said, but his voice was soft now, just above a whisper. “It’s important.”
“Dad?” Thaddeus watched his eyes flutter closed, and a jolt of fear went through him. He pressed his ear against his father’s chest, then let out a relieved breath at the sound of his heart. His father was still alive, for now.
The glow of the fire Teofil, Fetter, and Astrid had started provided better illumination, and Thaddeus was able to see father’s tightened expression, even as he slept. He felt so helpless. The pain had to be quite bad, not only from the poison working its way through him, but from the troll’s club as well. And Thaddeus could do nothing for him.
Miriam returned, cradling a large leaf in her hands. She knelt across from Thaddeus and looked at his father’s face a moment.
“He looks like he’s in pain,” Thaddeus said. “Is it that bad?”