Terry Brooks - Armageddon’s Children

But he kept his feelings to himself, focusing on what he was here to do, a small excitement beginning to build at the prospect of completing his journey.

He did not allow himself to think beyond the possibility that Hawk was the gypsy morph. He would not worry yet about what he would need to do if he was. The nature of this undertaking, grave and dangerous, required that he not think past the moment. This was difficult for him to do. He had learned to stay alive by thinking ahead. But thinking too far ahead here might result in a mistake that would reveal his intentions to Cole and the others who warded this compound.

They must not be given any reason to look on him as a threat.

They were deep inside the compound when Cole halted before a steel door, one of several that lined the corridor in which they stood. He signaled to the guard on duty, and the man produced a key that unlocked the door. The door swung open, the guard stepped back, and Cole gestured for Logan to go inside. Logan almost hesitated.

"I'll need a light," he said. "So I can see after you've closed the door."

Cole handed him a battery–powered torch. "Make it quick. Just call out when you're done. Someone will be right outside."

Logan took the torch wordlessly, switched it on, and walked past him into the cell. The door closed behind him with a soft thud, and he could hear footsteps receding into the distance.

Hawk stood directly in front of him, not six feet away, squinting against the brightness of the light. He was slender and not very tall with a shock of ragged black hair and eyes so deep–set they seemed black until the light revealed a hint of green. He wasn't imposing in any way, didn't appear at all impressive, and gave no indication that he might be anything other than what he seemed to be. Logan directed the torch beam toward the floor, letting the boy's eyes adjust.

"My name is Logan Tom," he said. He turned the beam on himself to let the boy have a good look, keeping it in place as he talked. "I'm a Knight of the Word. Do you know anything of our order?"

The boy shook his head, said nothing.

"Your friends told me where to find you," Logan continued. "Owl said you had come here to meet Tessa. I guess that meeting didn't work out."

The boy made no response, watching Logan closely.

"Your name is Hawk?"

The boy nodded.

"I'm looking for someone. I think you might be him." He waited, and then gestured at the floor. "Sit down with me. I'll show you something interesting."

He sat cross–legged on the floor, and after a moment or two, the boy joined him. Logan placed the light to one side, its beam directed across the floor in front of them so that the pale wash illuminated them both. Then he lay down the black staff, reached into his pocket, and extracted the black cloth and finger bones of Nest Freemark. He spread the cloth on the floor carefully, smoothed out the wrinkles, and looked at the boy.

"This is how I found you," he said.

He tossed the finger bones onto the cloth, and they scattered like bleached sticks. For a moment, they lay where they had fallen. Then they began to move, forming up into fingers and a thumb, taking shape as Nest Freemark's right hand. Logan saw the boy start in shock, then settle back to watch, wonder mirrored on his lean face.

The bones came together, a slow connecting of joints, a fitting together of pieces until the entire hand was in place.

The index finger extended, pointing at the boy.

Logan took a deep breath and held it, waited a moment to be sure, then moved the cloth so that the finger was pointing away. As soon as he did so, the bones shuddered and began to move again, readjusting so that they were pointing at the boy once more.

Logan exhaled softly. "There you are," he whispered.

Hawk looked at him, uncomprehending. Leaving the bones where they were, Logan leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees.

"Let me tell you a story, Hawk," he said.

IN THE HALLWAY outside, the guard stationed on watch was pressed against the door, his ear at the crack between door and jam, listening. Ethan Cole had told him to do so, to try to learn what this man wanted with the street boy.

Ethan didn't trust him, even though he had agreed to let him come inside the compound. Ethan didn't trust any outsiders, which was probably what had helped keep the residents of the compound safe. Best not to trust anyone you didn't know; the guard knew that much about the world. When it came to outsiders, you could never be sure.

He listened hard in the near silence, but all he could hear was the sound of his own breathing. The steel door was too thick; it muffled all sound from within. It would have been better if they had left it open a crack. Then he might have been able to hear something. But Ethan would never agree to take a chance like that. The door had been opened to let the man in and it would be opened to let him out again, and those were the only times it would be opened until sunset.

The guard shivered as he thought about what would happen to the boy and the girl when the sun dropped. He thought about how they would be taken to the highest walls of the compound and pushed off into the fading light. He thought about how they would scream helplessly as they fell. He thought about the sounds they would make when they struck the concrete at the base of the walls. He had seen and heard it all before, and he had hoped not to have to do so again.

He waited a moment longer, and then stepped back impatiently. Trying to listen was a waste of time. He walked a few yards down the corridor to where his folding chair waited and sat down.

WHEN LOGAN HAD finished his story, the boy said, "Are you telling me I'm not human?"

Logan hesitated. "I really don't know what you are. You were born to a woman, so I guess that makes you human. But you were something else first, a creature of magic, and she was always gifted with magic of the same sort." He shrugged. "What difference does it make? What matters is what you're supposed to be now."

The boy looked at him a moment, and then shook his head. "I don't believe any of this. I guess you do or you wouldn't have come this far. But those bones could be telling me anything."

Logan nodded. "Maybe, but I don't think so."

Hawk was silent a moment. "Didn't you say I was supposed to know what to do after the bones found me? If I'm this … whatever it is."

"Gypsy morph."

"Gypsy morph. But I don't know anything more now than I did before. I don't have any idea at all what it is I'm supposed to do. Or what everyone thinks I'm supposed to do."

"You have visions. Candle said so. You have dreams about the boy and his children. Maybe that's some of it."

Hawk sat motionless, staring off into space, his thoughts unspoken. He was working it through, trying it on for size, but not finding anything that fit.

Logan could see it in his face, in the shifting of his eyes. He was a boy sitting in a cell waiting to die, and this latest madness was too much for him.

Why he didn't seem to know who he was or what he was supposed to do surprised Logan. He thought it would all be made clear once he found the morph. Logan wondered suddenly if there was something he had forgotten.

Then, abruptly, he remembered. He gathered up the bones and held them out.

"Take these. If you are the morph, they belong to you. They are your mother's bones. They might help you remember."

Hawk looked at the bones, then at him, and shook his head. "I don't want any part of them. I just want you to take them away."

"If I do that, what will happen to you then? They're going to kill you."

Logan kept his hand outstretched. "And Tessa. What about her?"