Morgan, ignoring Ned’s shock, said, “You must have traveled from quite a distance if word of the Master never reached you.”
“Yes, I think I did,” Josephine answered. Morgan almost remarked on this strange reply but then chose not to. “Now, will you please answer my questions?”
“Have some tea,” Morgan said, handing her a cup. “Relax now, and I’ll tell you what I can.”
Josephine set the tea aside. Never again would she drink something offered to her by a stranger. Ned took his happily and began to gulp it down.
Morgan sat in a large rocking chair—obviously his favorite spot, since the cushion held a permanent mold of his backside—and reached into his vest pocket, pulling out a pouch of tobacco and some rolling papers. He began to roll a cigarette, methodical and precise, and Josephine watched as he made it tighter and tighter between his fingers. She felt she might burst if he didn’t start explaining soon. He licked the paper and secured it, forming a cigarette no fatter than a toothpick, then found matches in his vest and struck one upon his boot. As he lit the cigarette and unbuttoned his vest, he began to speak.
TWENTY-EIGHT
When I was boy, I thought this place was heaven. My family lived on a farm on the outskirts of Gulm. My father wasn’t one for education, so we didn’t get to school very often. Mostly, we helped work the farm. We milked the cows and gathered eggs. I would work in the fields during harvest time. My mother was afraid we’d grow up ignorant, so she started sneaking us books.”
“‘Us’?” Josephine inquired.
“Me and my sister, Lucy. She was eight years younger than I was, so in a lot of ways I raised her. Showed her the best swimming spots, taught her how to read. She didn’t like reading much. She just kept reading one book over and over again. It was called The Dancing Possum. Lucy thought the idea of a possum dancing was the funniest thing she’d ever heard. She made up a little dance, and every night after supper we would beg her to do ‘the dancing possum.’” He smiled, recalling that happy time long ago, but then his face grew dark.
“And then the war came. Gulm had the misfortune of being between two lands that hated each other, and our town seemed like the perfect stronghold for each one. We were a simple people with simple ideas, and few of us knew anything about war. We had no weapons to speak of, no strategies.
“I hid with my family in a cellar near our farm for more than a year while the two rival armies took turns storming Gulm. Cut off from trade with other towns and nearly out of food, my father and I would sneak out at night and hunt in the forest. One week the only thing we could find was a possum. I shot it through the heart with an arrow. I’ll never forget Lucy’s face when we brought it home. In one single moment, we’d taken away her childhood.”
For a moment Morgan fell silent, and Josephine watched as his cigarette became small enough to singe his fingers. He stubbed it out and continued, “One day we went outside, and to our amazement all the soldiers were gone. They’d left overnight, as suddenly as they’d arrived. At first we thought that divine fortune had smiled on us, and we celebrated. But the day the soldiers left was the beginning of a much darker time.
“A boy arrived. He walked to the center of the town square and announced that he was responsible for winning the war and that from that day forward we would be required to pay homage to him. At first we laughed, thought he was a fool, until he introduced us to the Brothers. The boy explained that the Brothers were under his command, and his command alone. He would instruct them to protect our city, if we obeyed him, but if we chose not to, he would order them to destroy us. Once we realized that he was serious, that he had us under his control, we had no choice. He began to demand tributes.”
“What kind of tributes? Money?”
“No. Giving him money would’ve left Gulm its soul. The boy took the thing he knew would bring us to our knees.”
Ned finished for him. “He took the children.”
Josephine felt a chill run up her spine. “All of them? Everybody?”
Morgan shook his head. “It was one from each family. And if anyone refused, the Master said he would send the Brothers to kill the remaining children. We had a week to comply.
“Gulm became as silent as the inside of a coffin. No one went outside. I don’t think anyone even ate. We were full of fear and anger and shame. I’d just turned eighteen, so I was immune. I’ve never hated a birthday more than that one. If I’d been younger, I could’ve gone in Lucy’s place.
“My family knew we would never sacrifice Lucy, so my father and I planned our escape—he collected food and I tried to make us warmer clothes—while my mother spoiled Lucy with all her favorite games and sweets. We knew other families would be trying to flee and that most of them would head east to the plains or south to the lakes. So we decided to head north, to the glaciers.
“On the third day we made our move. Under the cover of darkness we left behind the farm and headed into the forest, taking only what we could carry. We walked day and night, never stopping. We took turns carrying Lucy. We tried to lie to her, to tell her that all families dreamed of moving north and that we were leaving the farm behind of our own desire. But she knew. She was always sharp as a thorn. But she played along with us. And as we walked, we’d talk about the home we would build of ice, and the seals we would keep as pets. After the sixth day I began to believe it myself, and I even found myself smiling at the idea of my father ice fishing.
“My parents decided we needed to have a proper rest and a decent meal. So we stopped for a night. We found a concealed spot among the trees, and I hunted pheasants for dinner. Mother made a fire and we ate and listened to my father talk about his days as a ‘bear wrestler.’ My mother howled with laughter and told us the closest thing to a bear he’d ever wrestled was the rug in her mother’s house. Lucy laughed and laughed and my father pretended to be very angry with my mother. That night we fell asleep full of hope. But when we woke, Lucy was gone.
“At first I thought she’d wandered off, looking for water or something, anything. But I knew. I knew the Brothers had been there. I could smell them.”
Josephine felt tears running down her cheeks, wondering if Fargus and Ida were doomed to the same fate as Lucy. “And you never saw her again?”
“No. We hurried back to Gulm looking for her, but we were told that the Master had sold all the children into slavery, in order to pay for his army.”
“That savage!” Josephine blurted out.
“The townspeople were determined to find out where the children had been sent. The Master had taken over a large estate in the western district, and a group of us decided to storm his manor with the weapons we had: axes, shovels, and knives. At dawn, my father led me and the other men of Gulm up the hill and past the gates of the estate. But the Brothers were waiting. They attacked us at once, killing dozens of men in the blink of an eye—they were merciless and unrelenting. I was one of the lucky ones. They broke my leg and left me for dead. I crawled for two days to get back home. Most of the others, my father included, never returned.”
Josephine could almost taste the dark pain that now permeated the room. Morgan continued, “Since then, no one has had the nerve to confront the Master and he hasn’t set foot outside of his manor.”
There was a long silence. Josephine hesitated before asking, “What about Ned? Does the Master want him, too?”
“The Master demanded the children nearly twenty years ago and hasn’t asked for any since. But with the disappearance of Ida and Fargus . . . well, I don’t know what to think.”
“He’s been taking kids from the Institute all this time. Ida told me.”
Morgan was surprised at the news. He rubbed his chin. “Orphans? Hmm. That makes sense. He wouldn’t have to worry about vengeful parents, then, would he?”
“But the Institute is empty now. Ida and Fargus were the only ones left.”
Ned asked his father, “Does that mean the Master will want more kids from Gulm?” He was trying to put on a brave face, but his voice betrayed fear.
“Don’t you worry about it, Ned. I’ll never let him take you.”
“But what could we do if—”
“Enough!” Morgan thundered. “You must trust me, Ned. I will NEVER let him take you.”
Josephine wished someone felt that deeply about protecting her. “Morgan, what are the Brothers?”
“That’s a very good question. And it’s why I have all of these. . . .” He waved to his collection of books on biology and animal species. “But I have yet to read anything about them specifically. It’s as if they never existed until now. All I know is that they are seen only during the day, they have no mouths, and they smell like the dead. They are . . . a mystery.”
Josephine asked a question she wasn’t sure she wanted answered. “Why did the Jarvises give Ida and Fargus to the Master but not me?”
