Chapter 22-1

Chapter 22-1

 

They sat outside a couple more minutes longer until Mrs. Tremens walks out of the house. “Well boys, don’t just sit there come in where we all can see you.” Derrick and Bowden laugh as they walk through the gate, Jeff paused watching them. Then walks thru feeling a surge of energy going through him, feeling warm and welcoming yet somehow changed.

His body was still different yet the same as he walks to the door of the house. Seeing EJ sitting on the couch. EJ, for some reason, was able to pick things up as if he was solid as Jeff watches him walk around the room... Some of the things lit up the boy’s face that Jeff remembers of EJ’s past. It was all here somehow.

Little carvings of a scrapbook of a little boy’s life that surrounds him all in one house and Jeff for a brief time was a part of it. It was good to see him happy as Jeff puts his arms around him as they sit on the couch by the fireplace and talk about anything they like not caring who’s listening because this is his house and the master of the mask were no illusion or hidden lies are told for everything is seen for what it is.

EJ smiles as he looks at Mr. Tremens and his wife watching them smile back at him as they each give him a nod. For EJ was bright for his age had to be because there are times you did not have the luxury of just being a kid, Sometimes you had to think things through like he did as he looks around the room of the house and back at the Tremens telling him they are caretakers of my farm.

He didn’t even know he owned farm then it hit him as they nodded back to him and smiled, they could see he had the answer… They are in the master’s house beyond the gate on this farm. EJ knew without a doubt he was safe here for he has met the master himself as he sits by the fire with him and his friends that they would be there to protect him on his Journey until the end.

It was a hard thing to say goodbye, but even harder watching. EJ watching his pony in the field wanting to ride him, wondering where he is if not dead or the roosters as EJ gazed about the farm one last time. Knowing he’ll be back often when he can as he watched Jaydan as he tries to instruct him to concentrate. “Focus on the camp and where you are at and repeat these words “tumanver slaka breim.”

Nothing was working or happening as EJ watched Jaydan return without him. Mr. Tremens slowly walks over to EJ as he sits on the porch with the boy waiting for Jaydan to return. “Sometimes you just got have a little faith in something’s, even things that you thought where impossible. Like this place,” as Glen points his finger out towards the fields.

EJ drew figures in the dirt. “Its just I feel so helpless every time we go back, I can’t do anything there. But when I’m here or somewhere else I feel free, as if the world not on my shoulders anymore. Nobody trying to kill me or take what I really want away. Here I don’t have to make a choice except one.”

“Which is?” Glen asks.

“Who I want to be with rest of my life, the problem is their down there and I am up here.”

Glen nods knowing EJ’s problem sitting down drawing with him. “What would you say if I told you that there may be a way to have both?” As he watched Jaydan come back into the gate seeing EJ sitting on the porch.

EJ glanced over at Glen. “How? I thought this was just for me and Jeff?”

Jaydan sits on the other side of EJ as Glen tells EJ that this farm was built for him. It is up to him who he choose to let through the gate, providing their hearts are pure. If not they can’t come in and will be sent elsewhere to dwell. For all mask and lies or seen for what they are before they enter.

“If the heart is to black they shall perish in the light for the light and shadows are one. You can not have too much of the other to be affected in some way. For if you have too much light you have never experienced life not knowing darkness. If you have too much Darkness you have no light to guide you out of the madness. To experience both in equal parts you are gambler waiting too tip the scales to either side.”

Glen stands up. “EJ, see that pile of rocks over there by the tree, I want you to pick as many small rocks you can, one for each person you want with you including yourself, then line them up here on the porch.”

EJ running over by the tree where there are lots of small little rocks. Counting each person in his family including Grandma and Richard and his Aunts and all his friends he ever knew. His hands where full then lines them up, Glen and Jaydan laugh seeing the boys pile of rocks as he lays them out.

“Now then take the rock of each person you would like to see the most up here and can talk about anything and all your secrets without fear.” Jaydan can see the rocks line getting shorter as he counts in his head.

“All right now then, if you were to stay here. Who would you miss the most?” The rock list got smaller. “Then ask this question. Would I die for this person so he or she may live if given the choice? Think hard EJ.” EJ slowly moves each rock over on the line as he looks at Jaydan then back at Glen.

EJ had made this choice long ago as he recounts it in his mind, then again once more in Morgan’s Dungeon, but this time it seems more real as he looks at Glen and Jaydan beside him. For in his mind he had chosen the Downing Family and his brother Danny and Grandma and Richard every single time. Glen slowly picks up the small rocks in his hands then placed them in EJ hand closing it tight.

EJ could feel a warm sensation and energy going through him and his hands for when he opened his hands they were not rocks anymore, but small heart shape disk of stone made of white glass. They sparkled in the sunlight as EJ looked at them in his hand. The master had made it possible for him and his family to be with him here on his farm. Now he was ready to go back as he puts them in a small marble bag, closed it tight in his hand holding Jaydan with the other as they return.

EJ opens his eyes feeling very tired as his Ma worried about him because he been asleep too long looking at Jaydan by his bedside with the ward around him. EJ smiles looking into Ma's face. “Ma do know how much I love you and Pa?” As the tears ran down his little wood elf face clutching a small bag. EJ tries to sit up, but is really too weak, but Jaydan helps him open the bag, lifting him up so he can sit up as he pulls out a small glass heart for her placing it in her hands and one for Pa as he tells them all about his little farm that they all get to see with him.

Jaydan nods bring in the rest of the family inside the tent sealing it off so they could all have some time together as a family.  EJ hands each one a heart in return he gets more as he gets kisses and hugs from his sisters extra one from Ma and his brothers which were not afraid to wear it as they find some strong cord for them, and placed it around their necks. To them, it was more than just a token of love for them it meant a whole lot more as they look at their brother. For them, it meant they would always be together with him forever.

EJ wanted to take them all there that night if he could, but no matter how hard he tried or they tried it would not work. Jaydan stopped by after super as promised with more books from the library and things that they needed to practice. Jaydan could sense something was wrong as he looked at them in tent placing ward round them and brier as well something new known as a protective spell that bites back if some is caught listening and it muffles the sound into gibberish.

“All right,” stepping in the middle of the tent, “we need to set a few things straight. First of all,” Jaydan said as he turned to EJ. “I have postponed our little outing as a family and made it impossible for you to even try going by yourselves until you are able... for two reasons. EJ needs to get stronger because it takes too much out him every time he goes.

"Second; you are not ready yet none of you are. The danger is real, right now we are sitting ducks and need to get moving, but I can’t do that unless things change here.  I have decided to divide the company into three groups to elevate some of the stress on all of us. Your leaving in the last group with me adding the Whitmore’s to finish whatever they can do help New Downing before we depart.”

“Now that’s settled” Jaydan continues, “Robert I want you and Will to think of a way how we can hide your brother once we get going because he is too weak to walk and to old ride with the rest of the children,  yet too young to ride a horse with the menfolk.”

Robert looked at wagon thinking of the time they had to hide to get back to the house from putting on Mr. Scarecrow clothes, thinking for just a moment. “Pa how many wagons do still need to build?” He asked.

“3 Why?”

“Well, I think I have an idea.” Robert taking peace of charcoal on a flat rock surface Robert draws a small wagon with a box under the seat. Pa could see where he was going looking at EJ then draws another wagon a little bit wider so he wouldn’t feel so cramped for his legs. With a deeper overhang seat to make it look like part of the wagon moving the wheels a little. 

Jaydan sat about watching three people making plans Will adding this and Robert adds that, Pa adding this adjustment to their design. Jaydan laughed with them all and a small boy and their mother watching. Martha just smiled as she strokes EJ hair as he sits lays against her comfortably.

It didn’t matter where he was as long he was with her as she kisses his cheek. She also knew Jaydan was right as she held her son; he can’t take the traveling without or with his current body. His spirit may be strong and willing, but physically it draining him more and more. He needed to rest or he will die. “No” she whispers to him “EJ you must listen when I say don’t be in such a hurry son for I love you too much to lose you,” as she kisses his head.

Grandma was still touched as she held the little glass heart around her neck looked at her grandson. For he has only chosen a select few as she walked back with Jaydan that night back to his tent. He recounts to her what took place on his farm regarding the little heart around her neck. How he started with a lot of pebbles then they lessened by each question.

In her mind she could see the people EJ knows as they slowly slipped off the ladder, counting then questioning. “Was his real mother among the counted?” Grandma looked back at the Downing tent then back towards New Downing where she at not knowing her son is here with them and Danny just a few miles away.

It was a hard choice even for her to make as Grandma slipped through guards that night while everyone was asleep. It bothered her like it was eating at her, knowing that Linda was so close to being with both her sons before they depart for parts of the unknown.

Grandma was not an idiot as she carefully walked a horse down a dirt road at least a mile. Then slipping on her cloak; makes a mad dash with the horse towards New Downing. She figured she had to least give it a try, as she galloped in back of Nathaniel house.