The Boy with the Hidden Name (24 page)

weed- choked pond in a forest, and nobody else is anywhere

in sight.

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O h!” exclaims a voice, and I jump a mile, because I

could have just sworn that I was all alone. “Oh! Oh!

Oh! A
visitor
! Oh, a
friend
! A
soul
!
Mate
!”

I try to locate the voice, peering through the undergrowth,

and then the owner of it bounds into view. He is a skinny, old,

bald man, with a long face and a long nose. He has a straggly half goatee that seems to be the only hair on his body, and he is filthy, dressed in rags, apparently from living by this pool of water.

He is an ugly little creature, and he looks utterly
delighted
to see me.

“Hello, hello, hello!” he enthuses and bounces up to me.

“Welcome, welcome, welcome! Are you thirsty? Would

you like some food? Please stay and have some food! Please

stay
forever
!”

“Uh,” I say very intelligently. “I have to get back…” Even

though I have no idea how I even got
here
in the first place.

I look down into the pool of water and try to determine if I

should swim down to the bottom. Would I emerge out of the

marble floor? I can’t see the bottom of the pond at all— the

water is filthy— but it’s the only idea I have.

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Skylar DorSet

I hold my breath and dive down toward the bottom. It’s

deeper than I estimate, and I don’t even find it the first time

I try. I do find it the second time I try, but it seems to be

nothing but mud and…other things I decide not to think

too hard about. I dive down again and again and again, but

I always just end up surfacing in the forest, with the skinny,

old, bald man watching me with interest.

Finally, I give up. However I get back to where I was, it’s

not through this pond. I’m hoping that the rest are looking

for me by now.

“Are you going to stay?” the man asks me eagerly as I strag-

gle my way out of the pond. “Please stay at least for a meal!

It is so
lonely
here.
Please
stay!”

“I was just in Iceland,” I tell him. He just looks at me

politely. “With…” Damn it, what was the name they’d said.

“Arnarson?” I guess, hoping it’s right.

The little man just says, “
Please
stay here for a meal.”

He is so insistent. Maybe he’s trying to tell me something.

“Okay,” I decide slowly. “I’ll stay just to have something to

eat. Then I have to be on my way.”

The creature screeches with delight and goes gambol-

ing away from me. “A guest, a guest, a
guest
!” he chants.

“This way, guest! It’s this way!” He gestures to me, into

the undergrowth.

I hesitate then decide I might as well follow him. He
seems

harmless, and I don’t know what else to do. I don’t have time

for any of this, but I have no clue how to fix it.

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The Boy wiTh The hidden name

The undergrowth gives way to a cozy clearing, in the center

of which there is a fire over which a rabbit is roasting.

“Look!” exclaims the creature. “I caught a rabbit! We can

share it!”

“Excellent,” I manage. I’ve never had rabbit to eat before,

and I’m not sure I want to start now.

“Sit down, sit down!” He practically shoves me down onto

a patch of moss and thrusts a dirty glass of water at me.

I take it. “Where’d you get the glass?” I ask. It is a stupid

question, but it is literally the first thing that occurs to me.

The creature laughs with delight. “It was a gift! Another

visitor left it for me!”

“Do you get a lot of visitors?” I ask and take a tentative sip

of the water. It seems to be drinkable.

The creature’s face falls. He sits on the moss opposite me

and looks like the saddest thing in existence. My heart aches

for him.

“Hardly any,” he says wistfully, looking out into the dis-

tance. “Hardly any.”

“I’m sorry,” I tell him sincerely. “It must be lonely.”

“So lonely,” he says. “I am the loneliest thing in the
world
.”

“I’m sorry,” I say again. He looks
so
miserable. I almost feel bad asking my next question. “Where are we?”

“This is the Urisk’s clearing.
I
am Urisk,” he adds after a second, as if afraid I won’t understand that. “I am the only

Urisk that there is!”

“Yes, but what’s this forest?”

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Skylar DorSet

The Urisk looks at me quizzically, as if he doesn’t under-

stand the question. Then he flops melodramatically onto the

moss. “You’re going to leave, aren’t you?” he wails. “Everyone

always
leaves
.”

“I need to get back,” I try to comfort him. I almost want

to tell him to come with me, I feel so terrible for the poor

little thing.

The Urisk sits up, sniffling, and pokes at the roasting rabbit.

“It’s okay. Don’t trouble yourself. I will be fine. Lonely, but

fine. Just oh so lonely. Have some rabbit.” He tears some off

for me unceremoniously and drops it in my lap. “
So
lonely,”

he mutters and munches at his rabbit.

There is a scrap of cloth on the ground, faded red in color,

long and thin, ripped from something. I pick it up absently

and tuck it into my pocket.

“I have to get going,” I tell him. “I’m sorry, but I have to

try to figure out where I am. Are there any towns near here?

Any people?”

“No,” declares the Urisk mournfully. “There is no one

around here. There is only me. Only me. And it is so very,

very
lonely.”

“I’m sorry,” I venture again uncertainly. “You could come

with me, I suppose?”

The Urisk shakes his head. “I will stay here. Alone. It is

my destiny. Alone, alone, alone. Always alone. No one ever

stays.” He stares at the moss as his slender fingers pick at it, apparently taking no notice of me.

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I stand up, wondering what to do. “Well,” I tell him.

“Thank you for the food and the water.” I receive no response.

“Good- bye.”

“Good- bye, good- bye,” says the Urisk without looking at

me. “Good- bye.”

I push out of the clearing and take a moment by the pond

to collect myself. What a strange, sad little creature. I feel terrible for him, melancholy weighing me down.

I dive into the pond once more, just to make sure, but its

bottom stays stubbornly mud. I give up and get out and start

walking, not knowing what else to do.

I walk for not very long, maybe half an hour, before reach-

ing another pond. For a second, I stare down at it, wondering

if I’ve walked in a circle.

Then a voice I recognize cries, “Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! A
visitor
!

Oh, a
friend
! A
soul
!
Mate
!”

The Urisk comes rushing into view, eager to greet me again,

bounding up to me.

“A
visitor
!” he exclaims. “A
guest
! How lucky to have you!

How fortunate! Won’t you stay for some food?”

I look at him quizzically. “But…we just ate.”

He laughs as if I am delightful and hilarious.

I continue to stare at him. “You ate the rabbit, remember?”

“Do you catch rabbits? How very useful!”

“No,
you
caught the rabbit,” I remind him.

“
I
caught the rabbit?” This gives him pause. “But I haven’t caught a rabbit in
forever
.”

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Skylar DorSet

“But you did, you just did, we just— ” I cut myself off, real-

izing something. This little creature is dressed in blue rags.

The Urisk’s had definitely been red. It’s the color of the scrap of fabric I took with me. So unless the Urisk had changed his

ragged clothing…which I suppose is a possibility…“Wasn’t

that you, Urisk?”

“I am Urisk, but we have not eaten together.”

“But we must have. You said there’s no one anywhere

around here, that you’re all alone and lonely. You said you’re

the only Urisk in existence.”

“Well,” he says. “That’s true. I am. And there
is
no one anywhere around here. I am all alone and lonely. Won’t you

stay
forever
?”

I continue to stare at him. “So we didn’t just eat together?”

He looks offended now. “I would remember. I never get

visitors. I would remember a visitor in my clearing.”

“But…then that means there’s two of you.”

“What?”

“There are two Urisks. There’s another Urisk just through

the trees, not a long walk at all. I just ate with him.”

The Urisk gapes at me for a moment. And then he bursts

into loud, shuddering sobs, burying his face in his hands as

he cries messily.

I don’t know what to do. “But this is good news,” I point

out, bewildered. “The two of you can be friends. You don’t

need to be alone anymore.”

“Oh, you are
cruel
,” sobs the Urisk. “You are
cruel
, you are 212

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The Boy wiTh The hidden name

cruel
, you are
mean
! Telling me that there are other Urisks in the forest, when I know I am all alone, all alone, all alone.”

“But you’re not— ” I start to protest.

“Leave!” he shrieks at me, lifting his tear- splotched face

from his hands. “Leave! Haven’t you done enough?
Leave!
”

“I…” I stammer.

He rushes at me as if to attack me, and I stumble away

from him, not really scared but extremely confused. Then he

collapses to the ground in a heap and cries as if his heart is

breaking. I stand and stare at him, unsure what to do.

“He’s not far away,” I venture quietly. “Only about half

an hour— ”

“
Leave
!” shouts the Urisk and throws something at me

in anger.

I dodge it, but when I look at what it was, I realize it’s a

key. An old- fashioned scrolled skeleton key. The Urisk is still sobbing behind me.

“Do you need this— ” I start to ask him.

“Why don’t you
go
?” he shrieks at me violently.

I decided that maybe I am making things worse. I tuck

the key into my pocket and follow it with a long, thin scrap

of fabric I find on the ground. Blue this time. And I con-

tinue walking.

“Oh! Oh! Oh! Oh! A
visitor
! Oh, a
friend
! A
soul
!
Mate
!”

Another Urisk bounds out of the woods by the new pond

I’ve reached, identical to the other Urisks, only this time

dressed in yellow rags.

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Skylar DorSet

I sigh, resigned. “I don’t suppose you would believe me if I

told you there were two other Urisks living not far from here?”

His face scrunches in confusion. “But
I
am the only Urisk!

I am all alone in this enormous forest! It is the loneliest life in existence!”

I sigh and decide it’s not even worth the effort. I walk

past him.

“Won’t you stay?” he calls after me. “I almost never

get guests.”

“Two other Urisks,” I call over my shoulder to him. “Not

far from here. I swear.”

“You
lie
!” he accuses furiously. “Why would you tell such a terrible
lie
?”

The sound of his sobs carries over the air to me, and I pick

up the yellow scrap of fabric, and then I stop and look at the

pond I’m standing next to.
Maybe
I
should
be
checking
every
pond
, I think.
Maybe
one
of
them
will
get
me
out
of
here.

I walk over to the pond, the Urisk still sobbing, and I look

into it.

And there’s me, looking back from the palace, the chande-

lier beyond my head.

I lean closer. And tip.

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i sit up with a gasp. And there I am, back in the large room

with Kelsey and Merrow and Trow and Ben and Safford

and Will and the Erlking. I am perfectly dry, as if I hadn’t just spent a little while thrashing around filthy ponds. And everyone gives me a look, as if I’m being dramatic for no reason,

as if they didn’t even notice that I had gone anywhere at all.

Maybe I hadn’t.

But there is a key in my pocket and three scraps of fabric

when I check.

Kelsey hisses at me, “Are you okay?”

I nod dazedly, because it’s too much to explain right now.

I put my hands down on either side of me, bracing against

a sensation of falling, even though I am perfectly still. Our

guide has disappeared, but instead there is another man

blinking down at us, accompanied by a woman. They have