One Way Out

There weren't always dragons in the Valley. Its soils were once fertile. Its streams gave fish to our people. Its grasses fed our herds. Trees reached into its clouded skies like red giants and foraged rains to meet our thirst. This land to us gave everything as if it was made by everything for us. That was then, before the ills and fire, but now—

"Hey, look at me, Baker! Look at me!"

Henry was balancing a long, white stick on his chin—or trying to, anyway. He looked like a drunk ballerina, Baker thought, as he frantically shimmied back and forth on his tiptoes. Before she could let out a disapproving sigh (one she'd spent years perfecting, with a pinch of exhaustion and a dash of disappointment), a thump rang out, followed by a sharp inhale.

"OUCH! Stupid, stupid thing. Idiot thing."

"You know Mom doesn't like you saying bad words, idiot."

Baker smirked and looked down at the limp paper she'd pulled from the dirt. She turned it over gently. It looked, felt, and even smelled ancient, like dusty, old books and manure. In a way she couldn't put her finger on, it seemed familiar. Perhaps it was a page from one of those You-Shall-Not-Pass! kids' notebooks. You know, the ones who huddle by the dumpsters at lunch and speak a notch above the decibel threshold of the human ear. But why would some kid leave their How to Train Your Dragon fanfiction way out in the Valley, half-buried in a muddy ditch, miles from the closest town?

2.4 miles exactly, Baker thought. Last year, when she only babysat Henry on Tuesdays and Thursdays, she'd walk to the Valley alone, count her steps, and do the math. That was before her mind was solely populated by "Hey, Baker! Look, Baker! What's that, Baker? What's wrong, Baker?" Speak of the devil, you'd be hard-pressed to find another kid Henry's age who'd willingly enter, let alone hang out in, the Valley: the cornerstone of every campfire story from Sante Fe to Cheyenne. If it wasn't aliens, cannibals, or skinwalkers, it was vampires, evil wizards, trolls—you name it. Everyone knew someone who had a story. For a 10-year-old, Henry had a unique tolerance for the harrowing, potentially cursed valleys of the world. For this, Baker took all the credit.

"Who ya' calling idiot, idiot!"

THUNK.

The stick cracked down squarely on Baker's head, and she let out a wimpy cry. While scrambling to evade a secondary attack, attentive only to the high-pitched ringing in her ears, she heard a sharp tear. She looked down at her hands. Her mysterious relic had torn exactly in two.

"Oh, now you've really got it coming."

Henry squealed. Baker lunged for his hair and caught a perfect yanking strand. As she thrust her fist upward, he swung his foot out, hard, and they toppled to the ground. From then it was a blender of punches and smacks, with faces smushed in dirt piles, shirt collars turned nooses, and elbows bent 180 degrees in wrong directions. In the scuffle, Baker's hand knocked against the stick. What an opportunity, she thought. A dastardly grin spread across her face.

Baker raised the stick above her head with one intention: bonk the living daylights out of Henry. It was only fair. The bonk would serve as restitution in full for all the ways he'd ruined her life since he was born: For the hours she'd spent scrubbing his dishes and vacuuming his crumbs so Mom wouldn't yell when she got home. For the nights he ceaselessly cried, even after she'd read The Very Hungry Caterpillar cover to cover twice. For the many, many months she'd been his personal keeper, dragging him along to her secret places, her havens from the world.

Oh, yeah—and for the fat, stinging lump forming on her scalp.

Henry looked up from the ground in abject terror, a gob of mud stuck to his temple. As Baker tightened her grip to deliver the most effective thwomp, she noticed something peculiar. The stick was quite heavy, oddly dense. Her throbbing head attested. She lowered it to her eye line, and Henry flinched, expecting the worst.

It was a bone.

"I knew you weren't gonna do it. I just knew it. It's 'cause I already got hit by that thing, right? Right there on my big toe. Ew! Baker, look. It really hurts, actu—"

As Baker raised the bone again, desperate for one moment of silence—just one, for God's sake—a sharp crack sounded from the wood. Henry froze in place, holding his bruised toe an inch from his eye. Baker swung her head toward the treeline.

"Who's there?" She asked, voice low and steady.

Leaves rustled out of sight. Baker stepped in front of Henry and dug her heels into the dirt. She cocked the bone high over her shoulder. Henry or not, someone was about to get whacked.

"Show yourself!" she shouted.

A small, gangly figure leaped into view from behind a bush.

"Don't hurt him, y— you wench!"

THUNK.

"Did you kill him?"

"No, of course not!"

"But he's not moving."

"I know. Shit."

"Bad word! Bad wo—"

"Henry, what if he's dead... like, for real?"

"You're gonna be in so much trouble."

"Wait, hold on. Are his eyes moving? HEY, WAKE UP! WAKE UP!"

When Minh came to, he was greeted by a massive headache and two hands slapping his face. To no surprise, the slapper was the very same wench who'd attacked him before, trying to finish the job before he could even stand. Her abiding wickedness was almost impressive. He'd come to expect that of wenches.

"You fight dirty, you— you criminal!" he shouted. "When I get up—"

"Thank God," Baker said. She flung her arms around Minh's neck, and he wriggled in her embrace like a bait worm. The more he flailed, the tighter she squeezed. Eventually, Minh exhausted himself. The wench was surprisingly strong, and worse yet, his trusted sword was lying just out of reach. (It was also made of foam, but that was aside from the point, he thought.)

It was time to face the facts. He had been bested. Months of grass-roots training, campaign after campaign of D&D, and two-and-a-half quarters of a kickass fantasy novel written and edited—all for naught, and at the hands of a girl no less. As he surrendered to his dire strait, he thought of a new moral for his novel: The worm is always destined for the hook. If only he could have lived to write it down. He rested his head against the grass and closed his eyes.

"Just smite me already," he said, blinking back a tear. "I accept my fate."

Baker sat up, and she and Henry shared a look. Henry snorted.

"I'm not going to smite you," Baker said. "I was trying to protect us from, like, a bear or something. What were you doing lurking around in the trees anyway?"

Minh raised his head and scoffed, triggering a hoarse, hacking cough. He spat a blade of grass out of his mouth.

"I should ask you the same thing. I come out here after last period sometimes to, uh, practice... sports. But I ran over 'cause I heard shouting, and then I saw you about to stab that guy."

"With a bone?"

"Well, clearly I didn't know it was a bone. But don't pretend it was innocent! I saw the look in your eyes."

"Clearly," Baker mocked. "For your information, creeper, that's my brother, and he started it."

Henry leaned in and blew raspberries in Baker's ear. She shoved his face away, and he tumbled back into the dirt with a giggle.

"So, you're not going to kill me?" Minh asked, still lying motionless so as not to provoke her.

"Obviously not."

"Oh, thank the heavens above. I am not ready to die," Minh said. He sat up, rubbed the top of his head, and winced. "I might die from a fractured skull, though."

"We have that in common," said Baker.

Baker got up and brushed the dirt from her jeans, while Minh, with his newfound freedom, scrambled away on hands and knees to seize his sword. Henry had moved on long ago. When Baker pushed him, he rolled into a large divet, in which he was laying on his stomach and overturning stones.

There it was: Minh's sword, of famed Medieval-Foam-Long-Cosplay-Sword-for-Halloween-Xmas-Gift title. The "blade" glistened dully under a sunbeam.

Last year for his birthday, Minh asked his Dad for a real training sword. His Dad weighed the honor of Best Dad in the World against Minh's forecasted urgent care expenses, and he ultimately decided to gift something more reasonable. Minh was rightfully upset. He could've handled the real thing. But after slaying his fair share of imagined wraiths and warlocks, alongside a few fire ants and wispy branches, he'd grown somewhat fond of his packing-peanut-ish weapon. He returned it to its sheath and opened his knapsack.

After rummaging for his ball-point quill (a gift his Dad had thrown in for brownie points), he flipped to a blank page and cracked the spine. Minh had identified a flaw in his moral. He scribbled down the revision: The worm, contrary to popular belief, is not always destined for the hook.

It still needed some work.

"I suppose this is yours then," said Baker, holding two halves of a brown, wet paper in front of Minh's nose. He recoiled.

"That literally smells like shit."

In the distance, Henry's voice resounded, "Bad word!"

Baker rolled her eyes.

"What is it?" asked Minh.

"It's a page from your notebook, isn't it? It's about dragons and trees and stuff. Looks like fanfiction to me."

Minh turned pink faster than he could snatch the pages from Baker's hand.

"First of all, I don't write fanfiction. I write stories. Grand tales of fantasy, danger, and sure, sometimes romance. It's art. Second, this definitely isn't mine. It's so... thick."

Minh wobbled the soggy papers like singing saws, squinting from the foul smell that began to waft toward him. He laid them side-by-side in the dirt for a closer, less smelly look. From as far away as possible, he began inspecting the details, brushing away clumps of mud and dirt with his sleeve. Almost immediately, he sat back on his ankles, visibly stumped.

"Either you got hit too hard on the head, or I did. This isn't English."

"Ha-ha, very funny. What is it, elvish? Wookie?"

"Not a joke," Minh replied. "And for your information, it's called Wookiespeak, and it isn't even a written language."

Baker thought that if she rolled her eyes one more time, they'd tire and fall out of their sockets.

Minh didn't know it, but he'd just confirmed one of Baker's growing fears: the Valley wasn't her safe haven anymore. It wasn't entirely his fault. In fact, it began with Henry. Baker hadn't been to the Valley alone since her Mom became Safeway's Assistant Manager. It was a great promotion, one that would really help the family finances, but it required overtime and late nights. In a snap, Baker became "Mom," and Henry just as quickly assumed the role of "leech on Baker's shin." Bringing Henry to the Valley was a nuisance, but it was tolerable. Running into kids from school in the Valley, she'd just decided, was absolutely unbearable.

Most sophomores, herself included, stopped believing that the Valley was cursed years ago. Maybe it was because, as with Bigfoot, no one could turn up solid evidence that the creeps and crawlies existed. More likely than that, it was because hormonal teenagers would rather risk death by Bigfoot mauling than be in the general proximity of their parents. Like Baker, they quickly identified the Valley as an adult-free, lawless paradise. Serpent's Rock became a popular make-out spot. All surrounding dirt roads became designated hotbox parking. Crushed Rolling Rock cans would soon outnumber bunnies and squirrels. To avoid unwanted run-ins, Baker and Henry had gone further into the Valley, past the well-known to the not-so-well-known-at-all. But apparently, the further in they went, the weirder the unwanted run-ins got. Her options had been reduced to kids groping each other or kids LARPing. Both turned her stomach. She had a sinking feeling that this would be her last day in the Valley for some time.

Baker turned to walk away.

"Wait up, wen— er, what's your name?"

Baker finally let out her disapproving sigh. She'd been holding it in so long that it presented as 90% exhausted, 10% disappointed. She'd have to work on that.

"Baker."

"Baker, please just look at this. It's insane."

Baker turned around and took a long, hard look at Minh. He was a full-fledged dork, no question about it: thin-rimmed glasses, braces, stark-white ankle socks. But his face was kind of cute (whatever), and his hair was nice. It curled right above his brows and puffed up on the sides. But he did call her wench, which, albeit creative, was rather sexist. But she had almost killed him.

Five more minutes couldn't hurt.

Baker settled in next to Minh, not at all bothered by the smell, and she prepared to start reading from where she left off. She blinked a few times, opened her eyes as wide as they could go, and then squinted. Her head cocked to the side.

It wasn't English. No ifs, ands, or buts about it. The characters were tall and thin, like Lincoln Logs. Boxy. They didn't connect or loop. There weren't dots over the i's, nor were there i's to dot. She couldn't make out a single letter, but as she skimmed, easing her focus, her brain started to make sense of the chaos in that mysterious way it sometimes does. Words began to pull together. Sentences formed. She started to read aloud.

That was then, before the ills and fire, but now dragons have laid waste to the Valley. To our people. Our elders our dead. Of our children, I dare not speak. Us few remaining camp in cold, dank caves. We light no fire, for fire is our enemy. We drink not rain but bloodied pools of mud. We eat not fish but the charred, rot meat of bodies burned.

"Uh, this bit is torn. Hang on," said Baker. She grabbed the next page, flipped it around, and read what she could.

—time, as many, we fell. We now fight only when we must, conjuring what little pow'r left we have. It is a pittance against them, like a fly to a bird's beak. Their magik is ancient, feirsomly built from the Earth-core flame. Ours is simple, strained, and tired from time.

Let this be the last testament of our people, for we will not again see an Earth cycle. May God be with us in the flames of Hell.

Minh, pale as a ghost, stared at Baker with his mouth wide open. Baker stared back, more convinced she'd gone mad than she'd read an ancient script from a soggy, torn piece of paper she'd nearly mistaken for trash. Her heart was beating so loud it echoed in her skull. The bone, which was leaning against a small rock to her side, emanated a sinister energy.

And then it was quiet for just one moment. Perhaps she'd manifested it. It was like all those times before when she walked aimlessly around the tall trees and through the wildflowers, chased fuzzy moths, and laid flat on her back in the hot sun. When she heard only crickets who'd gone to bed early and woodpecker drills. When the wind whispered softly as it played with her hair.

It was like all those times but different. Something was off. She had that feeling in her gut, the one she had when she left the straightener plugged in all day, or when she forgot to pack Henry's lunch only to remember halfway to school.

"There's no way in hell you just read that," Minh said.

"Bad word," muttered Baker under her breath. Goosebumps ran down her arms and legs.

"Where's Henry?" she said, standing up.

"Baker, we have bigger fish to fry. How did you read that? Was that a prank?"

"Bad word. Henry always says 'bad word' when someone cusses, but he didn't say it." Baker peered around a tree and rustled a bush.

"Okay, chill out. He rolled down that way I think," said Minh, pointing to a small downslope in the grass.

Baker shot him a nasty glare and rushed into the divet. She found nothing but upturned rocks and squirming earthworms, drying out.

"HENRY! CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

Minh came over the hill to help, pages gingerly folded in his knapsack and sword in hand, but Baker was long gone, sprinting toward the distant treeline. He checked his phone. It was an hour past dinnertime. Two missed calls. The damage was done. He'd be grounded. With nothing left to lose, he took off running in her direction.

Baker's scream ripped through the Valley like a wall of fire, and Minh watched crows erupt into the sky.

When he found her, she was clinging to a tree, white-knuckled, less than a foot away from a steep drop-off. Minh grabbed her arm. At the bottom of the hill, there were bones. Hundreds of them, maybe more. Too many to count. Human. They were black, brown, yellow, and broken. Weeds had grown through the ribcages and eyesockets, and trees had bent their trunks to swallow them up. Behind them was a small opening, almost too small to see. The mouth of a cave.

"HENRY!" Baker screamed, a crack in her voice. A crow cawed in response.

The only place to go was down.