I was tired, I couldn’t run any longer. Mallory suggested we go back to her house so we could rest. I silently agreed. We power walked with only dry twigs making any sound.

Suddenly it hit me. "We can’t go back to your house," I said to her without lifting my eyes from the ground.

I could feel her staring at me, "why not?"

My eyes stayed on the dirt path, "The Scarred Man. He could be there waiting for us."

I heard the muscles in her face form a scowl, "there’s no reason for him to be there."

I finally looked up at her, "He saw last night, As far as he knows, I live there, He could be waiting for me."

She put a finger up to forehead, "he took that book didn’t he?"

I thought for a moment, "yeah I think so."

"Exactly! Why would he bring a book with him when he comes to take you? What is he gonna do? Read you a bedtime story?"

My eyes returned to the dirt. Phillip had hopped ahead of us.

Mallory huffed, "if it’ll make you feel better we can go to your house. We can even check on your sister."

That’s right, I have a sister.

I nodded.

I heard Mallory clap. Her voice now came from ahead of me, "can we at least STOP by my house? There are a few things I need to get." She didn’t wait for my approval.

The front door to Mallory’s house was still unlocked. When we walked through the door I was half expecting The Scarred Man to be sitting on her couch waiting for us. I was relieved when not even a speck of dust was out of place.

At least no one’s been in here.

I sat on the couch, Phillip hopped onto my lap, and Mallory quickly jogged up the stairs, presumably heading to her room.

Wait, no one has been here,

When Mallory came back she had a medium sized duffle bag slung over her shoulder. She tossed the bag at my feet.

"Where are your parents?" I asked her.

"dunno" she said as she knelt next to the duffle bag. She took off her backpack and tossed it towards the bookshelf. It hit the bookshelf with a thud then a rattle of all the candy inside. She tossed some things around within the duffle bag, then she nodded. She went to the bookshelf.

"What are you doing?"

Using her finger to guide her eyes, Mallory scanned the rows of books, "I’m looking for a book."

Philip hopped off me letting me stand up. I walked to her and said, "maybe I can help?"

A breath of excitement left her lips. With her hand shaped like a claw, Mallory took a book by its spine. She flipped through the first few pages then handed me the open book.

"Here hold this." I took the book, but not before trying to read it. Mallory grabbed The Scarred Man’s notebook from the floored backpack. Her attention went from one paper back to the other. "Put that one in my backpack."

I did as I was told.

Mallory continued to pull books from the shelf and handed them to me. "This one too. And these ones can go into the duffle. And I think this one.." she stared at the open hardcover in her hands.

"Are you alright?" I grew slightly concerned.

"Uh... yeah, I just," she paused for a moment. "I just didn’t remember that we had this one." a moment of silence followed. She shook her head. Her smile returned shortly after. Mallory carefully placed the book into the backpack. Scanning the row it came from she found another book that caught her interest. She handed it to me and told me to put it into the duffle. Mallory zipped up the backpack and I zipped up the duffle.

With the duffle now slung over my shoulder I said, "before we go could Phillip and I get some water?"

Mallory nodded. She quickly walked into her kitchen. As soon as she walked through the arch a scream left her mouth.

My immediate thought was oh God, The Scarred Man!

I froze. Phillip however hopped into the kitchen with the bravery of someone a hundred times his size. I shakily walked to the kitchen archway. I must have been trembling more than a hairless cat during winter.

Mallory was kneeling next to a body. Tears were in her eyes when she swirled her head to look at me. Some of my shakiness subsided allowing me to continue through the kitchen. On the other side of the kitchen island was another body, bigger than the other one. They laid in a puddle of water and shattered glass was strewn around them.

"What happened to your parents?"

"I don’t know! Why are they knocked out too?" Mallory cried, "I thought Phillip could prevent this!"

I didn’t know what to say.

Mallory shook her mother, but she didn’t wake up. "Pour water on them, it might help!"

I stepped over her dad, filled up a glass at the sink, then kneeled next to her dad. I splashed the water onto his face. Nothing came from him.

"What are we going to do?"

"I don’t know, not yet at least. We can’t stay here."

Mallory nodded and wiped away her tears. She stared at her mother.

Phillip hopped onto Richard’s chest.

"Phillip get off of him!" I scolded him.

Phillip began to urinate on Richard’s chest. Some urine trickled down to his neck. Phillip hopped off him and soon after Richard growned.

Mallorys eyes widened, "pee on my mom now!"

Phillip did as he was told and soon Nicole groaned as well. They didn’t wake up immediately, or at all. From what I could gather they were in that phase of unconsciousness that you’re in right as you’re waking up, when the world seems like a dream and dreams seem coherent.

"Mallory, I’m sure they’ll wake up, especially with the help of Phillip’s urine, but we need to go."

She nodded in agreement and we left her house.

It was late afternoon by the time we got to my house. The front door was unlocked, not unusual for my house but it did mean my sister had not left at all. When we walked in my sister was on the couch staring up at the ceiling. She sat up when we walked in.

"No one was at school today," she said to me.

"Something is going on," I replied, not making a big deal of the fact that those were the first words I had heard come from her mouth in weeks.

My sister turned her head to Mallory and locked eyes with her. Mallory smiled her smile and stretched out her hand.

"I’m mallory! Nice to meet you!"

"You’re so pale," my sister said to her.

Mallory turned a shade of pink only she could but she remained steadfast, "what’s your name?"

My sister glanced at Mallory’s hand then looked back into her eyes. Reluctantly my sister took Mallory’s hand, "Melengell, you can call me Mel if you want." They shook hands for a moment then my sister pulled away. She returned to being on her back and stared at the ceiling again.

My sister was colder to Mallory than I was when I first met her and I could see it on Mallory’s face that she didn’t know how to respond to it. Mallory told me to dump the duffle bag onto the table at the foot of the couch. After I did so she took off the backpack and placed it near the duffle. I took off mine then headed for the kitchen. I made sandwiches for the three of us while Phillip ate a minor dragon fruit and a cactus pad. When we returned to the living room Mallory had her books around her. I handed the girls their plates before I sat down on the floor next to Mallory.

"What’s all this?" I said with half a mouthful of sandwich.

"Here take a look at this," she handed me the Scared Man’s notebook.

I flipped through it, noticing the first handful of pages were torn out. Surprisingly the notebook was written in neat handwriting. I began reading a line butsoon enough I reached a word written in a language that was unknown to me. I asked Mallory what this was.

"Well, I thought it was code at first," she handed me a book it read:

BEBO’S MOST COMMONLY KNOWN SECRET CODES

"But there’s not too much of a pattern," she continued. "So I though it could be an entire language! I kept looking through it and I felt like I’ve seen this language before, but I didn’t remember where. Until we went to my house and I found this," Mallory handed me a hardcover book. Its cover was silver and plain. On the front were those odd symbols, engraved into what I presumed to be a silver plated cover.

"This is?" I questioned.

"It’s a book of teachings." Her words were somber as she spoke, "teachings and rituals from the North. More specifcally, our relegion"

Melengell sat up.

Unsure as to why Mallory was upset, I asked her, "So why is it important?"

She took the book from me, "I-I can’t read it. At least not anymore, cause I kinda remember that I could. I do remember that some words have power," Mallory sighed. "If I can relearn how to read this then I can learn to perform rituals, spells, or even hexes."

"Makes sense to me," I responded

"If not then at the very least we can try to translate it, that’s why I brought all these," she motioned to the books. She rummaged around for a book,"this one specifically, I brought because, well take a look."

The title of the book read Bo and Burnt-Ham’s Whimsical and Educational Weaver’s Guide to Some of (but not all of) the Dangers of the South. The cover had an intricately painted flower on it. The stem of it was unraveling like a poorly made tapestry.

"A weavers field guide? What is a weaver in this context?" I asked.

"From what I remember, a weaver is what I can be once I study enough."

"That doesn’t explain what a weaver is," I scratched my head.

"Just read," she pushed.

I opened the book and read. The lettering was typed in an odd stylized font, as if the author tried their best to mimic handwriting. An intro on the first page thanks the reader for purchasing the book along with a minor humble brag about how well detailed each entry is. It went on to remind the reader that the book is not all inclusive, as it only includes some of the more interesting animals seen on the author’s travels. I turned the table of contents, it was organized by region. Underneath the region name were different subcategories; fuzziness, scaleyness, aquaticness, ariealness, demonic, and celestial. I turned to the page with the first entry. Bold letters atop the page read:

MUSCLE MONKEY

Fuzzy rating: -12

Beneath the title was a photograph of a vaguely ape-like animal in the midst of jumping at the photographer. The animal flashed its sharp wolf-like teeth and a thick hairless outstretched arm displayed four fingers with dark green nails. Upon closer inspection I could see the hairless ape had skin so taught the muscles underneath could easily be mistaken for some form of armor. Beneath the photo was a description of its Physical appearance. The subsequent pages had many, not all, of its other properties. One thing I wish it would have informed us about is the fact muscle monkeys are very blade resistant. Knowing that would have prevented a few scars later on.

I read its description and came to a realization, "why is it called a monkey if it has no tail?"

Mallory raised an eyebrow, "that’s your take away?" She took the book from my hands and held it open up to my face. Her pale finger pointed to a word in parentheses, "see? It says its name in our language! This book can help us translate!"

I took the book from her, "How well do you think you can translate with just a few words?" The second that sentence came out of my mouth, I landed on an entry that caught my attention immediately. Unlike the previous entries this one had no photograph, it had a detailed sketch of the animal. The sketch was of a rabbit with antlers. The title read:

HORNED HOPPER

Fuzzy rating: 7

"There’s an entry here about Phillip!" I turned the book to mallory.

Phillip hopped up to us in hopes of getting a better view.

Mallory snatched the book from my hands yet again. Her eyes shifted side to side as she skipped the physical description and read the other properties, "Horned hoppers are not elusive or rare, they are abundant and some could even consider them an intrusive species. They often find themselves in the company of Blacksmiths. As a result much of the information about horned hoppers is not publicly available, despite being so abundant. All is well however, as a friend to the Blacksmiths is most definitely an enemy to the Weavers."

"What’s a Blacksmith?" I asked. My eyes moved down to Phillip, who had not an idea.

Mallory shushed me and continued reading, "One thing that is often spoken of when referring to horned hoppers is a unique transmutation property. However this is most likely a rumor, and I refuse to spread misinformation. Although considering its spreading could only hinder Blacksmiths I will inform you, dear reader!’

I hadn’t noticed until then but Melengell had sat up and was paying close attention. I always knew she was fond of Phillip but never thought to the extent of curiosity about what he was.

"The author doesn’t seem to like Blacksmiths," I said.

Mallory silently nodded and continued reading, "It is rumored that horned hoppers have the unique skill to vastly change their physiology by simply eating other animals. Though it should be noted that only certain animals can cause such changes. Furthermore, eating certain fruits and plants, mainly those originating from the South causes a variety of passive effects, of which I have no examples."

We stayed silent for a moment.

I broke the silence, "is that it?"

"Yeah, that’s it," Mallory responded. She pursed her lips before picking up the Scarred Man’s notebook. After a moment of searching she found the page she was looking for. She flipped the notebook so I could read it. A finger pointed to a word in the notebook while on her other hand a finger pointed to the weaver language word for horned hopper.

"I don’t get it."

Mallory grunted in frustration, "read this," she emphasized the Weaver word, " as this," Mallory then pointed to HORNED HOPPER atop the page.

Doing what I was told I read the equation aloud, "Horned hopper plus fruits equals cleanse?" What followed that were what we assumed to be nonsense ramblings about ridding the forest of all horned hoppers. Mallory couldn’t properly translate yet, if at all, so most of this was guess work

Mallory smiled with a mixture of excitement and anticipation.

"Hold on, do you think that Phillip is the last horned hopper for miles?"

Melengell slammed her fist onto the couch creating a muffled thud. Mallory and I both glanced at her before we continued our conversation.

"No- well maybe. But not that though. I was thinking that horned hoppers could be the key to cleansing the town," she did air quotes when she said cleansing. "Why else would he want to rid the forests of them?

"Makes sense," I said as I stroked my nonexistent beard. "That would explain why his pee helped your nudge parents."

"Yes!" Mallory shouted. "We just need to find out where one of these words is placed!"

I scratched my head, "what do you mean?"

"From the looks of it," she opened up a different book, "they need to be carved into things to do stuff?" She showed me a photograph of a large stone prism with Weaver words carved into it.

I folded my arms, "if that’s the case then i doubt it would be in town. It would be so easy to just chip away at it."

Mallory nodded, "which is why it could be in the forest. And maybe horned hoppers can easily cleanse it, which is why he wanted to kill them all!’

"So we just need to find a word in the middle of the forest and either break whatever rock it’s carved into or have Phillip pee on it," Mallory said.

Before I could open my mouth Melengell opened hers, "I wanna help."

Phillip, Mallory, and I turned to her.

Once again, before I could open my mouth I was beaten to it as mallory opened hers, "If you think you can sure! The more of us go on this adventure, the better it’ll turn out!"

I ignored that Mallory referred to our genuine effort as an adventure and sighed. My arms still folded, I looked down at Phillip, "are you willing to do this? I mean it is your pee."

Phillip stood on his hind legs. His nose twitched ever so slightly and he looked up at our ceiling. Then he looked into my eyes with confidence welling up in his.

I shook my head, "alright then."

Mallory leaned in towards me, "what did he say?"

My sister, already knowing the answer, returned to being on her back.

"It’s getting dark. Tomorrow morning we’ll go on your adventure."

Mallory clapped her hands together multiple times as she squealed with glee, "this is gonna be great!" She quickly tapped my nose, "Trust me!"

A smile snuck its way onto my face.

Next Chapter: Was it Realy That Easy?