I'm at the very climax of my story and normally I would just word vomit and polish it up later but I really don't know what to write. I'm going to copy and paste the chapter leading up to it and I just need someone to write a loose climax that I can tie up later.
Chapter Thirteen - Revenge for the Salami Sandwich
“It says what n-” Skylar begins, but is cut off by Daniel whirling around to stare at us intensely.
“Be quiet. All of you. Stand right where you are and don’t even think about moving. Can I see your horsies, sweet peas?” He asks, setting a bowl of the steaming, obsidian black liquid on the floor next to the cauldron. The mounts take one whiff and immediately kick us off.
“Ow!” Houston complains, and I clutch my side. Luckily, my bow and arrows were not harmed in the fall.
All except Spot. He’s straining towards the bowl with his head, but his own feet carry him farther away from it. Oz, mounted on him, looks surprised at first but then develops a proud smile, despite the circumstances.
“I told you he was a loyal guy deep inside,” Oz says proudly, looking right into Daniel’s eye.
“Oh, shut up. Kelpies are stupid things anyway. Demons are always-scratch that, I’m not stupid, am I?” Daniel lets out a hearty laugh.
Skylar purses her lips and raises both eyebrows intimidatingly - which is hard to do when you’re sprawled out on a stony, cave floor in front of your evil great-uncle.
“Fine. Have your Kelpie. If I’m being honest with you, though, I was expecting him to come to me - being a demon and all. But alright, that’s fine, it’s not like I need him anyway,” Daniel says, rambling now nonchalantly as he takes one of the Hungarian-labeled potions of the wall and splashes it on our feet.
“Hey! OW! IT STINGS!” Lizzie exclaims, jumping back. Newt and I try to scramble away, but the potion seems to know where we are, and scorches through my foot. I gasp, frozen in shock, then start trying to stamp whatever it is out.
Leaning against the cauldron, Daniel just snickers and shakes his head, thoroughly enjoying the little show.
We, on the other hand, were not. Definitely not.
I begin to notice small, sleek black brambles creeping up my ankle from the bottom of my shoe. Quickly realizing what they are, I try to rip them off, but the small spikes I didn’t see before tear at my skin, and I pull back, letting the brambles have their way, pinning me to the ground. There’s no point - they’re not going past my feet, and if I try to pry them off, they tear me.
“Basil! What are you doing?” Skylar asks, trying to kick off the branches.
“She’s being smart, that’s what,” Daniel answers for her, giving me a thin, wicked smile.
I don’t say anything else and cross my arms.
“They don’t grow past your feet unless you fight them. It’s Alish Moonfire. The more you struggle, the more it pulls at you.”
Newt nods. “They’re held in check by Unicorns, mostly, but if Unicons died then they’d be all over the country, unstoppable. They grow wild, but you can liquidize them so that when a solid surface touches them, they’ll turn back into brambles. In this case, the solid surface was our shoe soles,” Newt agrees, relaxing.
“Really?” Houston asks, in the middle of bending down to tear some of the plant off his ankles.
“Really,” I assure him, reaching back to finger my arrows. There’s some chance that I could shatter the cauldron with one, spilling everything...but then how’d we escape?
The glass.
The shard of glass that fell out of Newt’s coat pocket, the one he told me I could keep because to him, it was just trash. It’s very sharp.
I sit down, cross-legged, as if I’m totally giving in. Daniel raises his eyebrows at me and bites his lip, as if he wasn’t expecting it to be this easy.
“Well, how about you all sit down. Skylar, I suppose you expect me to explain why I’ve been killing everyone and terrorizing everyone lately.” He leans against the cauldron. Newt, Oz, and Lizzie sit on the balls of their feet, ready to leap up, but more relaxed. Skylar, however, stands up straight, with Houston following suit. Daniel laughs and waves to sit them down. They reluctantly sit, casting glances at those of us already seated. “It was that family reunion. Five years ago. Do you remember, Skylar?” Daniel asks. “You mean….the one at the Wilama National Park?” She remembers. “Yes. We were all served an great array of sandwiches. Most people chose salami sandwiches, right? Well, you were about to grab the last one, but I got it because I hadn’t eaten breakfast that morning and was really hungry for one single salami sandwich. I thought, you can just get another type. No, Skylar doesn’t need this salami sandwich. I do,” He explained slowly. I was getting very confused as to where this was doing. So was everyone else except Skylar, whose face turned white.
“I was just a few bites in, sitting on a bench outside the wigwam where everyone else was,” He continues, enveloped in his story.
Meanwhile, I’ve slowly unsheathed the glass from my pocket, running my finger along its edge. One noise too loud, one ray of light reflected onto the ceiling, and I’m busted. But if I can do this right, it might work.
Might.
I slowly bring the shard to the first bramble, running it along. To my relief, it doesn’t make any noise.
I dig the glass deep into the thick bramble. It snaps, barely audible. The rest of the brambles bounding my feet fall away, weakened by the first cut.
I’m free.
I could shatter the cauldron and run, or I could pass the glass along to the others, which has a higher risk of us getting caught. But I would never leave my friends with this monster, so I nudge Newt.
He looks over, eyes wide in surprise. I poke his hands with the glass softly. He looks down in amazement, then to my unbound feet. Daniel has his eyes fixed on Skylar, so I quickly raise a finger to my lips, then put the glass in his hands.
“I noticed you were flitting in and out, with no sandwich. I assumed you’d either already finished eating or wouldn’t settle for anything if not salami. I didn’t care about you, really - like I said, I hadn’t had breakfast that day and thought you could survive without a salami sandwich for lunch. Well, your nasty little brain didn’t agree, did it? Do you remember, Skylar?” Daniel sneers.
“I was so hungry - I didn’t know you hadn’t had breakfast - I was very young, I probably didn’t in all honesty mean to, you know, toddlers are very picky eaters, I wouldn’t take anything else-” Skylar vies. Newt shakily presses into his brambles with the glass.
“If you don’t come clean, I’ll have to kill you all before I even get what I want. Come on, now, Skylar, did you eat my salami sandwich or no?” Daniel’s voice becomes hard and stony, and Lizzie gives a small whimper, her peachy glow fading.
“I - I suppose I did. I give my sincerest apologies. I was a toddler then, a picky eater, manners still out of whack - I wouldn’t dream of doing it now,” The angry Skylar we knew has run away, replaced by a cowering, stuttering fool. But I need her to buy us time so that we could escape - if only Newt wasn’t so timid, and he could go a bit faster!
“Foolish girl, you may have been young, but you were still yourself. Many young people would still know better than to steal their great-uncle’s meal, or at least be kind enough to ask if they could have it. You were a shriveling, rude, ugly, evil, disgusting little girl. You stole cunningly from your elders. You cared only for yourself, and only ever will. I find satisfaction in seeing you tremble before me now. This is REVENGE FOR THE SALAMI SANDWICH!” He bellows, filling the cave with his thundering voice.
“Is that what you want, then? A confession from her? So now you can let us trot off?” Houston asks, malice in his cloudy gray eyes.
“Oh, shut up. That’s another offense for interrupting your elders. How did you know I was finished with what I was saying? I wasn’t. Let me speak,” Daniel retorts, and Houston's shoulders sag.
Newt’s brambles snap silently, falling to the floor around him. Daniel has his back turned, but his foot is pivoted in such a way that he will surely turn around and see our unbound feet and the freeing shard of glass.
In a second, I gather up the brambles and arrange them around my feet, angling them deftly so that they won’t slip off. Newt copies me, sloppily, just as Daniel swivels, dilated pupils looking at each of us in turn. He doesn’t notice our fake binds and again focuses his attention on Skylar. Newt passes the glass to Oz, indicating his unbound feet.
“I knew, right then, that whoever had raised you was a terrible person. So was the rest of the family, because when I went around telling people about how you stole my only sandwich, they laughed it off. All terrible people. So, I went about killing them. One. By. One. Having had two daughters myself, I was very firm about how the rest of my family was brought up. Looking around, though, I was extremely disappointed about the dissary of manners in the family, even in my children! I knew that I couldn’t have had this influence on them so I decided to kill my wife and children in punishment, as well as everyone else in the family.”
Oz had finished. He passes the glass to Lizzie, nearly cutting himself.
“You were the hardest to track down. Your parents were difficult, too, as for their size, but I tracked their magic. Your sister was in the arctic, but she was relatively easy, too. Now tell me, is there some sort of spell around the Hollow where you live?” Daniel asks, pivoting around with a whip.
I can feel everyone else glancing at me. They all know about my great - great - grandma’s sunset journey. But Daniel doesn’t, thank goodness.
“Never mind that. I was only able to get your fox address, so I sent you the letters that seemed like they were from your parents, as well as the ones telling you that I would come and get you. I hoped you’d come here on your own, because I didn’t actually know how to get you. And you did.” Houston has the glass now.
“You wrote those letters?” Skylar gasps.
“Yes. Have you ever seen their real handwriting? Disastrous,” Daniel replies nonchalantly. Houston is struggling, but finally the brambles snap. He hands it over to Skylar. She better go fast.
“Besides, I had already killed them, so there was really no other way to get the letters to you,” He explains, as if this logic - if you call it that - was simple and effective. His eyes are off Skylar, scanning the rest of us, but they’re about to rest on the Druid once again. In a flash, Skylar closes her fist around the glass. She hadn’t cut through yet, so Daniel doesn’t see anything amiss. He stars pacing in front of our helpless forms, and looks each of us in the eye as he speaks. Skylar gets back to word, and I notice her hand is bleeding from clenching the glass. “But then...why attack all those other people that weren’t in the family? They didn’t do anything wrong - at least not to you, did they?” Skylar digs.
“As I was searching for your house, I slept in many old barns and sheds - hardly a place for a genius like me, I think, but that’s besides the point. As I was hiding out in these places, I watched the people close to me - what else was there to watch? And I saw terrible things, Skylar. Terrible things. People were raising their children wrong all across the world. I saw my chances when they came, and I eradicated them, leaving only purity behind.”
“What did you do with all those children that you kidnapped?”
“I figured I couldn’t just kill everyone, so I decided to take fifty to sixty children that behaved the best - which is still not very good - and took them here, where I put them in a school of good manners. I’ll release them when they’re old enough to have children of their own.”
This argument goes back and forth until Lizzie finally finishes cutting herself loose. It’s amazing, really, how easy this seems. Now I have to hope my arrows are up to par.
As long as Skylar keeps him talking.
I lean over, as discreetly as possible, to whisper in Newt’s ear. He bristles in shock, then stiffens at the fact that my head is so close to his. I fight the urge to roll my eyes, and relay the message.
“Pass this along - Skylar must keep Daniel talking so I can shoot us out of here!” I urge, fingering an arrow.
He looks at my arrows in surprise, then chuckles softly, shaking his head.
“We’re lucky to have you with us. We’d have been dead by now if you hadn’t. Or, at least, I would have been,” He whispers back, then leans over to Oz, whispering to him.
“So, you still have them? Where are they?” Skylar demands, almost getting up but thinking the better of it.
“On the other planet. Earth,” He replies nonchalantly.
“I told you it was real!” Lizzie bursts out.
“They’re - but - how did you get them there?” Skylar asks. The message is on to Lizzie.
“Easy! All Jagars are descended from Earth’s inhabitants. Their planet is different, you see. Many people here on Htrae do not know how privileged we are. We live in perfect conditions, perfect circumstances, massive comfort on our part. On Earth, though? Nonsense. Their world is full of hardships and obstacles that I thought were impossible to overcome, so much so they’d move away. But of course, they didn’t know how. So they simply had to overcome, or else they’d all die. Jagars are a race that fights.”
“Why are you so interested in them? There are so many other fighting races on Htrae. They all try to climb to the top.” Houston points out.
“No. Jagars are different. They don’t fight each other. They fight for peace. No other species fights for peace. They struggle, and are rewarded. They go through hardships and learn what it is like to truly fight for something good. If there is an town that has been destroyed by earthquakes, then they simply build the city better. They cannot be stopped. And they are powered simply by their circumstances, by their own will. We could be like that, too, if we wanted. That’s why I raise my captives on Earth,” Daniel finishes.
I feel quite honestly a little bit flattered right then. I’m sure Newt is too.
“I can hear your thoughts: Yes, that’s why Jagars are the hunters. They know how to fight, how to survive, how to struggle and win, how to persevere. The rest of us?” Daniel scoffs. “We need the aid of magic. We are not strong. I am raising people to be strong.”
Lizzie leans over to whisper the final message to Skylar, shifting her weight so that her unbound feet are shown. She whispers a bit too loudly for my liking.
Quiet down, Lizzie! Get back in position! I plead in my head.
Daniel tilts his head as if he’s heard something. I get a rotten feeling in my stomach and unsheath an arrow, resting it on the crest of my bow.
“What are you talking about, darlings? Talking over your elders again? And - why are your feet unbound? All of you!” Instead of lunging at Lizzie or Skylar, he takes a deep breath and gives a charming smile. Lizzie cowers in fear. “Kids these days. Immature. Rude,” He begins. “We’re kids. We’re supposed to be immature!” Oz points out, and Daniel gives him a death glare. “Shut up, kid. You’re going to get yourself killed.” Oz gulps. Daniel heads over to the Revenge for the Salami Sandwich cauldron and takes out a pouch inside the folds of his cloak. He takes a pinch of sickly green powder out of it and drops it inside the cauldron. The liquid starts fizzing and jumping inside the cauldron. “It can’t wait for its treat!” Daniel exclaims happily, spooning some of the potion into six glasses. “When I say run, RUN. Run out of the cave, into the desert. Run as fast as your little legs can carry you, and hide. Somewhere. I don’t care.” I whisper to everyone as soon as Daniel has gone to another room. “wHaT - Basil - what is this? You won’t survive! Please…?” Newt looks up at me in surprise. “Do you want to survive?” I ask him. He sinks back onto the floor. “But what about the shimmer blockade?” Skylar asks. I hand her one of my arrows. “Throw this at it. Remember to retrieve it once the blockade collapses,” I instruct her, gently placing the magical object in her hands. “But - what -” “JUST DO IT!”
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