Prince of Attania, 2

Attan went with Greg and his father in their beat-up pickup, and Ben’s group followed in the larger box truck up the narrow dirt road to the back of the mountain where the corn was stored.

“Are they really Sons of Men?” Greg’s father asked.

“Yeah.”

“And they’re with you. A Family Prince.” Greg’s disbelief showed in the flat tone of his voice.

“Yeah, they are.”

It became apparent why the Jadock’s were widening the road which led to their mountain storage cave. At least one large vehicle had passed through this way recently. Jagged tire tracks barely fit on the lower road and would not have been able to pass the upper road the way it had been before.

Tom? Attan wondered. That quickly? His question was answered as they pulled up in front of the large overhead door set into the side of the hill and Greg’s father hopped out to pull it open.

As the Sons of Men’s larger truck rumbled up, Renn reached inside and flipped on a switch, flooding the man-made cavern with artificial light. “See?” he said smugly. “What stolen corn?”

The shelter was empty.

Attan jumped down and rushed inside, creating his own light so he could see into the farthest corners. There was nothing left. “Why don’t you ask them what’s behind that door?” he asked, pointing to the hidden door which led to the inner cavern. With Attan’s harsh light, the outline of the door was plainly visible, although there was no lever or handle with which to open it.

“Open the door,” Ben said.

Renn Jadock threw up his hands in mock dismay. “I don’t have the key,” he replied, though there was no keyhole that Attan could see. There must be a hidden lever.

“Where is the lever?” Attan asked.

“What does it matter? There’s no corn in there,” Greg said, but his eyes darted to the left before he could stop himself.

Attan quickly turned incorporeal and went to investigate. Sure enough, on the wall behind an adjacent storage shelf, he found the hidden lever. Taking back his physical body, he pulled down on it. The inner door creaked upwards about half-way, then stopped. It was enough to show them what was in the room beyond the storage area.

Greg was right; there was no corn. However, on the long tables that crowded the front of the room before it was lost in shadows lay several guns in various stages of assembly as well as the communicator Attan and his father had discovered on their first investigation.

Ben pounced in it, sending two of his men to scoop up the gun parts while the other three trained hand-held lights on the far recesses of the cave. Attan helped them by lighting the entire floor. The man-made cave gradually gave way to a more natural cavern which got ever smaller the farther it went into the mountain.

Greg and his father stood frozen just outside the inner cave. “Now do you believe me?” Renn finally asked. “My Tom really does belong to the Sons of Men.”

Ben fiddled with the communicator. “Not one of our current models,” he said, mostly to himself. “But it could have come from one of the older groups, before—“ He looked up. “Is this how you communicate with your son?”

“Er—yes,” Renn said, squeezing through the half-opened doorway to take the communicator from Ben, who let him, watching as the older man expertly switched it on and then off again. It was one of the earliest models which could send and receive pre-set signals but was not capable of transmitting speech like the more modern ones were.

“You know it’s illegal for regular citizens to have one of these,” Ben continued, taking back the communicator.

“My son gave me permission,” Ren said.

“Your son is a thief and quite possibly a traitor.”

“He’s a patriot,” Renn insisted. “He may go about it wrong sometimes, but his heart is in the right place.” At Ben’s stony silence, he added plaintively, “He’s my son.”

Ben eyed him thoughtfully. “I should arrest you for crimes against Attania. But I won’t. I’ll be taking these.” He indicated the guns and the communicator. “I’m also leaving my man Briggs here, in case your son comes back. You can tell your wife he’s a new hire for the farm. Attan.” Ben beckoned Attan over. “When we’re out of here, I want you to destroy this inner room so it can’t be used again. Can you do that?”

Ben turned back to Jadock. “I’ll let you keep the outer room for storage. You have a farm to run after all. But no more storing anything for your son Tom. Understand? You’ll go back to being a simple farmer, and your younger son will go back to school and learn how to work with Family instead of against them. Got that?” He punctuated his question with several pokes of his finger, which also served to drive Renn Jadock back to the outer cavern. “Okay Attan, go ahead.”

Attan hoped he could shatter the rock walls in that one confined area without bringing down the entire mountain on their heads. He became a storm of contained fury, pulling down the rough-hewn ceiling and disintegrating the walls which had been painstakingly cut into the natural cave to widen it. Snaps and hisses accompanied by sparks of light tore the last of the man-made conveniences to shreds. Nothing but rubble remained of the area the humans had appropriated as their own secret hideout.

Before he finished, Attan merged through the remaining wall to find the hidden room on the other side of the mountain, the one which butted up against the cornfields and was completely lined in metal. He became fire and melted the metal walls to slag, then pulled stones and earth to fill in the hole. Tom would never realize his dream of trapping a Family Elemental there to do his bidding.

Attan materialized in the outer storeroom, a little relieved to see it more or less unharmed. Ben and the Sons of Men, and Greg and his father, waited for him outside. Greg watched with sullen eyes as Attan told Ben, “It’s done.”

“My Tom’s really not one of you?” Renn Jadock asked in a small voice, as Ben’s Sons of Men marched efficiently back to their vehicle, all except one. Briggs stood, hands clasped behind his back, next to Renn Jadock, awaiting further orders. His distinctive jacket was folded up in Ben’s hands, and he stood in just his coveralls and boots, looking surprisingly like he could really be a farmer.

Ben went down to have pie with Molly and the girls, smoothing over any anxiety they felt. Molly was shrewd enough to figure at least some of it out, and she was just glad her husband—and her farm—had come out intact. They’d heard the rumbling up on the hill.

Greg was very quiet, so quiet that Attan knew to stay out of his way. Attan was disappointed that Greg had known all about his brother’s plans. He really thought Greg had come to like him, or at least accept him. But it wasn’t like he needed Greg’s friendship. Attan had plenty of other friends.

Attan made his way through the crowd of Greg’s sisters—at least they had forgiven him—to Ben’s side. “I’m going home,” he said. “My mother--,”

“It’s all right,” Ben said. “I’ll contact you in the morning. Get a good night’s sleep. You did a good job today, Attan.”

Pleased at the praise, though not quite sure he should be, Attan left. He had upset the Jadocks, he had utterly destroyed almost an entire mountain, the corn was still missing and so was Tom. Still, Ben had told him he did a good job.

“Attan, wait.”

Greg followed him outside. He was his usual surly self, which did not bode well for Attan, but he stopped anyway. “What do you want?”

“Do you--?” Greg glanced around and lowered his voice. “Do you think I could join the Sons of Men? The real ones, I mean. Ben Reaves’ group. Could you ask him?”

That was the last thing Attan expected out of Greg’s mouth. “Uh—I’ll ask,” he said.

“Thanks.” Greg broke into a rare smile and turned to go back inside. “See you at school.”

Attan didn’t know what to make of Greg’s request. Was he serious? Was he just trying to get inside Ben’s good graces so he could betray him to his brother? Attan didn’t trust Greg.

He had a chance to talk to Ben the next day on their way to Midver. Now that the problem at the farm had been identified, Ben wanted to see the other part of the problem—Midver. He’d sent two of the other men back to Parrion, and set the remaining men, minus Briggs, to tracking the heavy vehicle which had left deep tire tracks around Jadock’s mountain. If it was Tom, he couldn’t have gone too far without being noticed. The Sons of Men would find him, eventually.

“Sure, he can join,” Ben said when Attan finally asked about Greg. “It’ll be a way for us to keep an eye on him, and he might learn a thing or two.” Ben grinned, glancing sidelong at Attan. “You can join too, if you want. Your Uncle Daniel is one of the Sons of Men.”

“He is? But he’s Family!”

“So? So’s your Dad. So are you. Don’t you all want what’s best for Attania?”

“Yeah . . . .” Attan drew out the word. He frowned. “Really? I can join?”

“I don’t see why not.” Ben laughed. “I’d rather have you join us than the Sons of the First. That’s what they’re calling themselves, right?”

Sons of the First were Family who dedicated themselves to taking back a purely elemental existence, as Aylard First had taught. “But wasn’t Aylard First the founder of the Sons of Men?” Attan asked, trying to puzzle it out.

“Exactly.” Ben laughed again, much more softly.

Oh. Aylard was Family yet he founded the Sons of Men. “Okay then, I’ll think about it,” Attan said.