The Hundred: Fall of the Wents Read Free Page A

mite—getting shooed away by Hindrance. Fangor was constantly tagging after Tully and his friends, piping away in an irritating squeak and leaping onto unwilling shoulders.
    “They left presents, too,” said Hindrance. The three other Wents who shared the home with them—Kellen, Bly, and Sarami—came bustling over and crowded around for an impromptu party. They leaned over Tully, swaying in that gentle way of theirs that suggested they were still planted in the earth, as their ancestors had been so many years ago. They each presented small gifts, wrapped in coarse brown paper.
    “Open mine first,” said Bly. She bent down and thrust her package into Tully’s hands.
    “Happy dream day,” said Sarami. “Belated, of course.”
    Kellen, characteristically, said nothing at all, but stared at Tully in a searching manner. Her small black eyes darted over his body, assessing and cataloging, bright in her white, moon-shaped face. She did not smile or show him any kindness, though. Tully wished for the hundredth time that it were Hindrance, and not Kellen, who was his true blood relation. He had very little in common with the thin, morose Went who was had brought him into being. He did not have a sweet name for her. She was Kellen and that was all.
    Tully opened each gift, trying to reclaim some of the excitement that usually belonged to a dream day party. But, without his close friends there, it did not feel like anything special. And the gifts were rather poor. Copernicus had given him a small length of string. Aarvord had left a shiny rock. Fangor had left nothing but a grain of sand—all that he could carry, no doubt. And each of the Wents had baked various delicacies in the shape of a Nimbus Swan, a Grout, a Roach, and an Ugwallop. He was sure they would taste good, but who wanted to eat something shaped like an Ugwallop? Other than Hindrance’s mysterious little box, the gifts were dreadfully dull. Tully sighed and leaned back upon his pillow. This was his twelfth dream day, and it should have been his best of all.
    When he woke hours later the room was silent. Normally, all the Wents would have rushed to see that he was fine—something which occasionally irritated him but which was as reliable as the sunrise. No one came.
    Tully pulled himself out of his bed and his body dripped water over the stones. His arms and legs felt odd and unfamiliar. He made his way to the large wooden table and sat down, cradling the puzzle box in his hands. His body felt weak, but his head was clear. He longed to get out and see the sun again.
    Tully heard a small sound, like paper slipping over stone, and he turned to see the snake Copernicus Holland slip through a crevice in the rock wall. Copernicus whippled over the stones to Tully and shot up his leg in one swift movement.
    “Coper!” said Tully. “I’ve been very ill. Sick with the fever.”
    “I was watching you, from time to time,” said Copernicus. “But you were in a bad state. You couldn’t see me at all. You thought I was your old Grand-Ell Bepsiba.”
    “I didn’t!” protested Tully. “You look nothing like Grand-Ell. She was always nice and fat, tiny as she was. She had wings, too, and you don’t. And you’re so skinny.”
    “I came for your dream day. Did you get my gift?”
    “Yes, thanks,” said Tully. “It was a decent piece of string. Maybe I’ll use it to tie a gift for you, one day.”
    “I found it,” said Copernicus. “It was down in the Underbelly. A treasure!”
    “Special,” said Tully. “What luck.”
    There was a silence.
    “I’m sorry about that. The thing I said,” said Tully. “I wasn’t feeling well.”
    “Don’t mention it. It’s forgotten,” said Copernicus.
    “I don’t think Dualings are savages.”
    “No more than I think the Trilings are the greatest miracle ever produced by the richness of our planet,” said the snake.
    Tully pursed his lips.
    “What did you have, then?” asked the snake. “The sloping