What manner of legends might darkness conceal?
Darkness, no fourteen-year-old should fear. Or so Bastian believes until he discovers that, in the dark, hides a terror known only to old English legendsâa terror thatâs stalked him since the day he was born.
Englandâs Sylphic Kingdom, peopled with its Forest Children and Faeries, its Oakmen and Sunwalkers and Sprites, awaits the coming-of-age of its heroâthe Sun Child. For at the hand of a Wight Witch, risen to great power, the Sylphic Kingdom stands on the brink of destruction. And with its fall, so too will perish the natural world.
To discover what hunts him, to understand why, Bastian must realize that some legends, holding both wonders and terrors, are real. And to protect his family, Bastianâa boy who fears the dark, who fears the fightâmust face dire challenges and win Sylphic allies. And he must wake his courage. For to unlock the secret to the Wight Witch's defeat, he must embrace who he was born to be, even at the cost of his life.
What manner of legends might darkness conceal?
Darkness, no fourteen-year-old should fear. Or so Bastian believes until he discovers that, in the dark, hides a terror known only to old English legendsâa terror thatâs stalked him since the day he was born.
Englandâs Sylphic Kingdom, peopled with its Forest Children and Faeries, its Oakmen and Sunwalkers and Sprites, awaits the coming-of-age of its heroâthe Sun Child. For at the hand of a Wight Witch, risen to great power, the Sylphic Kingdom stands on the brink of destruction. And with its fall, so too will perish the natural world.
To discover what hunts him, to understand why, Bastian must realize that some legends, holding both wonders and terrors, are real. And to protect his family, Bastianâa boy who fears the dark, who fears the fightâmust face dire challenges and win Sylphic allies. And he must wake his courage. For to unlock the secret to the Wight Witch's defeat, he must embrace who he was born to be, even at the cost of his life.
Bastian stared at the dark wall alongside his closet, where the shape of a goblin loomed.
His earliest memories, from just beyond babyhood, were of struggling to lie still in nightâs dark, aching for sleep to take hold and dampen his fright.Â
But now, at almost thirteenâBastian was far too old to fear the dark.
Unless there was a legitimate reason. Unless, in the dark, something really was waiting.
It had to be a plain shadow, just there. A shadow cast by the moving boxes, stacked nearly to the ceiling. Because goblins donât lurk beside closets.Â
Of course they donât. Goblins arenât real.
And yetâthere stood a dark something, more solid than shadow. A dark something breathing, it seemed.
Lucas, Bastianâs closest older brother, lay across the room, fast asleep. Lucas, born deaf, rarely woke to Bastianâs disturbances. He said the shapes Bastian saw in the darkness either were eerie moon shadows cast through the windowâsome illusionâŚÂ
âŚor they were signs of Bastianâs descent into madness.
Well, Bastian wasnât going mad. Of course not.Â
But it really seemed something monstrous was standing right there.Â
The somethingâthick-looking and massiveâbore two defined shoulders. The shape was darker than the deepest night, like a black hole devouring starlight. A suffocating void. A fanged blankness. A something claw-fingered, it seemed. Something biding its time until came the moment to strike.Â
Bastian had to do something.Â
He could wake Lucas. Should he?
Bastian slipped out of bed.Â
Watching the thing, he edged closer to Lucasâ bed.
In the middle of the room, though, he stopped.Â
He shouldnât wake Lucas. When Lucas, together with their oldest brother, Rhys, caught Bastian seeing or hearing odd things, they tore into him. It was all in good fun, but inside the jabs lay the not-too-subtle message that it was time for their youngest brother to let go of his imaginative games.Â
Bastian watched the dark wall.
A shadow arm separated from the rest of the form and unsheathed a jagged, obsidian blade.
Bastian rushed to Lucas. Shook him.
Lucas turned over.
Bastian pointed at the goblin standing alongside the closet, its blade glinting darkly in the sheen of the full, gentle moon.Â
Lucas looked where Bastian was pointing, then signed, âThereâs nothing. Go back to bed.â
Bastian could hardly breathe as the creature came away from the wall; as it moved into a blue shaft of moonlight.Â
It was a goblin, unmistakably. Its tusked face was greasy and rippled in terrible folds. A thick ring pierced its nose. Of all the shadow shapes Bastian had glimpsed, nothing ever had seemed this threatening, or this real.Â
It opened its eyes, showing irises flickering like fireplace embers.
âIâm not kidding,â signed Bastian. âItâs standing right there.â
Lucas sat up some and squinted where Bastian was looking.
The goblin lifted its blade and stepped toward them.
âItâs coming.â Bastian backed away, signing, âRun.â
Lucas turned on a lamp.
The goblinâs shadowy form, its black blade, its fiery eyesâthey all vanished.
Bastian sank into a crouch.
Lucas tapped him on the shoulder. âAre you even awake?â he signed.
Bastian looked at the emptiness where a goblin had undoubtably stood, only seconds ago.
âSee, thereâs nothing,â signed Lucas.
And there was nothing. There was a legitimate, undeniable nothing.
That mortifying nothingness seemed suddenly worse than a goblin.
Lucas smirked. âIf you want to be sure, I can wake Rhys to come check.â
Rhys had lost patience with Bastianâs ânight terrorsâ years ago, when Bastian would wake up in the middle of shouting and running, usually into Rhysâ room.Â
But these visions werenât night terrors. They were Sylphic.
When Bastian was small and had last lived in England, heâd many times heard the legends of the Sylphic Kingdomâtales of its brave Moor Folk and wicked goblins, its shining faeries, its dragons. Heâd heard the stories so often, so vividly, they seemed as real as his toys, as concrete as his brothers.Â
Even after Bastian and his family had moved away from England and to San Franciscoâwhere few seemed to know the Sylphic legends, he still ran across them. It felt as though Sylphic myths were a part of him; that heâd carried them to San Francisco like luggage. Or maybe theyâd followed him there.Â
Now that Daâs professorship had moved them to England once again, Sylphic legends were all Bastian could think about. The legends still refused to leave him, it seemed, because the chalet he and his family were soon to move into, nestled inside the forests of Dartmoor, was last owned by Malachi Daoine Kingfisherâthe storyteller whoâd first recorded the legends of the Sylphic Kingdom.
Bastian stood, steadying himself on the bookcase separating Lucasâ bed from his own. âDonât tell Rhys,â he signed. âOkay?â
âItâs fineâI wonât,â Lucas signed, wrapping himself in his covers. âJust try and go to sleep.â
Bastian moved to his bed and sat on its edge. âI promise you,â he signed, âIâm not crazy.â
âI didnât say you were,â Lucas signed back. âIâm not surprised, actually, that youâre having night terrors. This is a weird flat in a creepy borough. And you trained with Master Sayre today. Iâm betting he went on and on about the legends.â
Master Sayre, Bastianâs new Ryudo martial arts teacher, did speak of Sylphic legends often. The way he talked of them, so seriouslyâit did make them seem all the more believable. But he certainly didnât mean any harm.Â
âIt seems a bit cruel,â signed Lucas, âthe way Master Sayre insists on speaking to you about Sylphic frights, given your wild imagination.âÂ
âNothing about Master Sayre could ever be cruel,â signed Bastian.
Master Sayre was a rare and true friend. In San Francisco, Bastian had enjoyed hanging around with the kids on his baseball team, and at school. And of course heâd had Rhys and Lucas. But his friendship with Master Sayre felt different. Though heâd only known his new Master for a few meager weeks, their connection felt somehow deeper.Â
With Master Sayre beside him, Bastian felt stronger. Older. More himself.Â
Lucas signed, âStill, you should tell him to give the Sylphic legends a rest.â
Bastian glanced at the wall by the closetâempty, but heavy with the memory of that tusked, goblin face. âI donât think the problem is Master Sayreâs storytelling.â
Though older than Da, Master Sayre seemed like a young manâbut for a white padlock of a short beard standing starkly against his suntanned skin. His dark eyes seemed to see to the soul, and he spoke to Bastian as though he were an equalânot just some new kid he had to train.Â
It wasnât that they were never cross with each other. Everyone gets cross from time to time. And on the Ryudo pitch, Master Sayre was a merciless coach. But in his steady way, he seemed to care for Bastian the way Granddadda had. He said he perceived greatness in Bastian and was determined to see him reach his potential. It seemed Master Sayre held a readiness to do anything for Bastian. To spend every spare minute training with him. To live or to die for him. And the feeling was mutual.
âWhen weâre finally settled in our middle-of-nowhere chalet,â signed Lucas, âwhere nothing interesting or important could possibly happen, my guess is your nightmares will stop.â
The charmed chalet awaiting them indeed stood in the middle of nowhere. The Dartmoor forests surrounding it were incredible, with their great stretches of moors and wide, starry skies; their ancient knots of woods and spacious vales. But for all their beauty, compared to the scene in San Francisco, thereâd be next to nothing to do.
Bastian lay back and signed, âDo you really think it will be that badâliving in Dartmoor?â
âWeâll likely be bored to tears,â signed Lucas. âAlthough, I do have some good memories of England. Moving back here feels more like returning to a home than leaving one.â
Mum and Da swore to their three boys that theyâd love living so close to natureâthat unmatched fun awaited in the chance to ramble over Devon like banshees, building forts inside thickets, stalking frogs, sailing rafts of bark and reeds along the winding Windrush.
When Mum and Da talked like that, though, it seemed they hadnât noticed that Bastian and Lucas were both in secondary school nowâand that Rhys had just graduated.Â
Bastian and his brothers had been truly sorry to leave San Franciscoâalthough tedium wasnât Bastianâs primary concern. Dartmoorâs forests were so thick with shadows, and its wilds were so dark at nightâeven spangled with stars as they were.
 âIâll miss San Francisco,â signed Bastian. âMy baseball team. Our friends. The city lights.â
âMum says Kingfisher Chalet is the home she and Da will grow old in,â signed Lucas. âSo I guess weâd better get used to it.â
Bastianâs family would never have discovered Kingfisher Chalet, a lofty stone mansion tucked deeply inside Dartmoorâs Wystan Woods, except that some obscure realtor firm had sent a packageârumpled and spilling open, stuffed with pictures of the place.Â
Mum and Da were so taken by the chaletâs beauty and quaintness that they looked into it immediately. Theyâd all been thrilled to discover that it was being sold at a deep discount for having suffered some wear, the owner having abandoned it. And not only thatâit was well within driving distance of Daâs new job.
When they toured it, theyâd found the chalet sound and very charmingâjust in need of a little care. Its grounds, though, had truly gone badly untended and were swamped with weeds.Â
Mum and Da, stricken by both love and pity, had made an offer the very same day they visited.Â
The Dartmoor locals had spoken sadly of Malachi Daoine Kingfisherâs strange disappearance, more than a decade ago. Itâd seemed a general relief to the village to see that a structure so important to English lore would be cared for once again.Â
Bastian glanced at the closet, at the heaps of packing boxes around it. âSettling down anyplace will be better than always worrying about whether weâll move again,â he signed. âAnd Kingfisher Chalet will be a thousand times better than this flat.â
Their Exeter flat, cramped with its piles of clothes and towers of boxes, was tiny and stunk of rotten water. Daâs new university had offered it as free temporary housing, so Bastianâs parents hadnât shopped around.Â
They should have. Closing on Kingfisher Chalet had taken longer than theyâd planned, and this neighborhood was scary. This was the same borough theyâd lived in right after Bastian was born, but it was nothing like anyone in his family remembered.Â
Most of the businesses nearby had shut down, making the streets feel abandoned. And all the other houses on the block stood vacant.
Except one.Â
Down the street, there lived a boy who harassed them daily, shouting at Bastian, âHey Bastard,â making raunchy signs at Lucas, and casting threats and stupid insults. Bastian saw red when the boy got after Lucas like that, but he never managed to muster enough nerve to stand up to the boy. Bastian would just sort of freeze where he stood, unable to say or do anything.
Lucas caught Bastianâs attention and signed, âWhat did your night terror look like this time?â
âIt was a Sylphic goblin,â signed Bastian.Â
Just picturing the creatureâs face quickened his heart.Â
âWas the goblin bucktoothed?â Lucas bit his lip and crossed his eyes.Â
Bastian smirked.
âDid it have ugly stubble,â Lucas signed, âlike what Rhys wonât shave off and swears is a beard?â
Bastian laughed out loud.
Lucasâgrinningâsigned, âSweet dreams.â He flashed his brows, then clicked off the lamp.
Bastian, smiling, closed his eyes. Lucas always knew how to lighten things. He always knew exactly what to say to help Bastian ease away from his fears. And he understood what not to say. He knew how to keep a brotherâs humiliating secret.
By smiling in the darkness, Bastian felt he was smoothing off its edges, like maybe it wasnât so threatening. He breathed deeply and grew warm, his muscles finally relaxing.
A growl pierced the stillness.
Bastian sucked a hard breath that he couldnât let out.Â
For there, straight above him, gripping a jagged black blade, stood a swear-to-god goblin.
Bastian tried to cry out, but his voice hitched. He tried to move, but his body felt stony. Staring at the thingâs fiery eyes jolted him to try to jump up and runâbut he only managed to kick his covers into a knot.
âLucas,â he signed to the darkness.
The goblin lifted its blade.
Bastian grasped the bookshelf and tried to bring it down on the goblin, but it wouldnât budge.
The goblin let a blood-chilling roar, then plunged the blade straight into Bastianâs chest.
Bastian twisted beneath the agony of a sharp coldness rushing into him; an electric, icy current flooding his body.
A flash brightened the window, shattering it. A sound like dissonant chimes blared.Â
In through the busted window, a streak of fire streamed.Â
Flames shrouded the goblin. Even the blade ignited, shards of fire twisting down its sheath and metal, smoldering across Bastianâs chest.
Bastian shrieked. Thrashed. Down came the bookshelf. It struck the goblinâs shoulder but slid right off and crashed to the floor.
The goblin, its skin smoking, pulled out the knife.Â
The lamp snapped on, and suddenly Lucas was standing over Bastian.
Bastian couldnât draw breath. An aching cold was searing his heart, like a metallic pool of poison was spreading.Â
Lucas signed, âHold tight,â then raced off.
Seconds later, Mum and Da were by Bastian, sitting him up, rubbing his chest, his back, coaching him to take slow breaths.
A thick mist, cold and fresh like what follows a spring rain, seeped in through the broken window.Â
As it bathed his face, Bastian found he could draw air, though scantly. Looking down, he discovered his skin unburned, his chest uncut.
Rhys hurried in, carrying an asthma inhaler.Â
Lucas, standing alongside, was holding Mumâs phone. He was signing to his telephone interpreter, âCall an ambulance.â
2
Bastian jogged across a Ryudo field deep in the woods behind his familyâs chalet in Dartmoor, his eye on a bundle of aspen trunks bound by a rope that Master Sayre was hacking at with his axe.Â
The field was littered with racquetballsâRyudo mortars that Bastian had cast at targets or dodged, painted electric orange for easier retrieval in the woods.
Master Sayre was standing high on a rise, his gaze fixed on Bastian. He was holding back the last axe strike, waiting for the optimal moment to release the trunks, setting them to tear down the rise toward Bastian in an accelerating rush.Â
Anytime Bastian asked Master Sayre how he managed to set the logs spinning so fastâfaster than seemed natural, and aimed perfectly at him, heâd just reply that some things canât be explained through pedantic processes; that, at times, we must accept what verges on the non-natural.
The rushing aspens were among the last obstacles Bastian would have to deal with in trying to close in on his Ryudo targetâthe broad trunk of an old English oak standing recessed in the woodland at the top of the rise.Â
He tightened his grip on his racquetball.
Master Sayreâs final axe blow to the rope set the logs loose.Â
Bastian leapt into a sprint, racing right at them. A head-on confrontation, heâd learned, was the sole way to deal with them. Turning aside or stopping would end in a pulverizing.Â
Bastian tripped over the first few, then managed to leap among the spaces between them until he finally broke past. He sprinted, straining to reach within striking distance of the oak but had to cut back as something like tree rootsâmaybe actual tree rootsâlifted out of the hillside.
Though most of the obstacles on Master Sayreâs course were rigged in ways Bastian could figure out, this one stymied him. Something more than ropes and mechanics had to be at playâsomething ânon-natural.â Though, Bastian couldnât imagine what that might possibly be.Â
He raced among the roots, barely avoiding tripping. Upon reaching their far side, he angled off, running until he had a clear sightline to the oakâs thick trunk, standing among a tangling of branches.Â
The instant he found his shot, he pitched his mortar.
The mortar sailed over the top of the rise and struck the oak square, hard enough to leave an imprint of orange.Â
Master Sayre, from the hilltop hollered and punched the air. He jogged down to Bastian.
When Bastian first had entered into training with Master Sayre, the idea of casting the Ryudo mortars the great distances, of keying in on targets that were impossibly small, or far, or mired with obstacles, seemed beyond his reach. Heâd pitched in baseball leagues all his life, and heâd made a good start with Ryudo in San Francisco. But Master Sayre was renowned, internationally, for his teaching, and Ryudo with him demanded every bit of Bastianâs skillâand then some.
Bastian, staring at the glorious streak of orange marring the distant tree, dropped to kneeling. He gripped his chest, quelling a sharp ache.Â
This painâburning, even stabbing at timesâhad eased since the dreadful night, a year ago, when heâd suffered the night terror of the goblin. But at times like this, after running a challenging Ryudo course, or after any excitement, really, it still ached terribly.
Master Sayre tried to help him sit straight.
Bastian, cradling his chest, pushed Master Sayre away. âI can deal.âÂ
It was mortifying, the way Master Sayre was watching him, obviously knowing that Bastian couldnât deal.
âThis asthma isnât your fault,â said Master Sayre. âYou can let go of that shame.â
This ache, termed âasthmaâ by his doctor, loomed as a constant, sometimes dangerous, threat. It seemed tied to all darknessâa portent of something deadly approaching; something seething in shadows. Something Bastian couldnât see, much less deal with.
âItâs no wonder youâre struggling,â said Master Sayre, steadying him. âThe weeds are coming up quite early. Itâs no surprise that working so hard might induce a reaction. But chin up. Pain, often, is a pathway to healing. Iâm watching you grow more skilled by the day.â
This pain seemed far more complex than any asthmatic reaction, than any trouble with nightmares or weeds. Though, he himself had to admit that heâd advanced significantly in Ryudo, despite the pain. And the night terrors had markedly lightened over the last year.
By no means, though, were they gone. Bastian could assuredly say heâd never again seen anything like that goblin in Exeter, but he had sensed other odd things.Â
Heâd seen trees sparkling in the forest, even when no sunlight could reach them. Heâd heard the woodlands faintly peal with strange musicâsomething like pipes and flutes and drums, sometimes windchimes. From almost anyplace, he could catch the sound of distant ocean waves crashing. And wherever he went, the smell of rain and freshly cut grass seemed to hang as a heady mist, even on clear sunny days. When he concentrated closely on the sensations, he felt he was sensing the bustle of a country far off.
And, though very rare, when his imagination was particularly active, heâd sometimes sight a shadow at the edge of the forest shaped like a goblin. Or he might thinkâfor a secondâon a walk in the darker tracks of Dartmoorâs woods, that he mightâve glimpsed a pair of fiery eyes.
Master Sayre knelt before him. âTry to steady your breathing.â
âItâs justâwhat I sawâor thought I sawâlast year.â Bastian cradled his chest. âWhen this pain strikes, the memory of itâeverything comes rushing back.â
Master Sayre settled his hand on Bastianâs shoulder. âThrough reliving our fears, may we overcome them.â
âWhat happened to me, thoughâit wasnât just fear.â Bastian pushed to kneeling, mirroring Master Sayre. âIt was more like a hallucination. Why couldnât I just wake up?â
âFreezing in confrontation happens to even the bravest of us,â said Master Sayre. âAnd Ryudoâthe Way of the Dragonâhas markedly strengthened your nerve.â
Bastian studied Master Sayre. âYou just said, âconfrontation.ââ
Whenever the nightmare came up, Master Sayre typically digressed into folklore. But at rare times, like this, it seemed he was on the brink of acknowledging that he thought something more sinister than asthma and night terrors, more threatening than a bullyâs rock cast through a window, had befallen Bastian that horrific night.
âWhat I meant to say,â said Master Sayre, adjusting his legs beneath him, âis that we, all of us, might lose our daring when fear strikes.â
Bastian didnât remove his gaze from Master Sayreâs. âBut you saidââconfrontation.ââ
Master Sayre seemed to be watching Bastian carefully, as though wisely selecting his words. As though guarding something. âOur fears may surprise us with what forms they take. Standing bravely in the face of anything that might present itselfâthis is key.âÂ
And this was the whole point of Ryudo. To learn to stand oneâs ground despite oppositionâpresenting in many forms. It was a challenging athletic art form to say the least, geared to help an athlete develop strength and agility and aim. But it also helped one build tolerance for fear and find the determination to carry out an objective, despite overwhelming odds.Â
Bastian tightened his hand against his chest at the ache sharpening.Â
Master Sayre eased Bastianâs hand down and pressed his own palm against Bastianâs chest.
Beneath the strong pressure, the ache eased. It seemed to Bastian, even, that his lungs opened a touch, delivering him an almost-full breath.
âSee now,â said Master Sayre. âAs terribly as that pain troubles you, you are healing.â
Bastian stared into the forest, along a track dark and thick enough that its shadows seemed primed to shift goblin-esque.
âPart of me wishes that goblins truly were real,â said Bastian.Â
At this point, after learning Master Sayreâs geometric aiming methods; his techniques for accessing power and strength and control from within his own musculature and frame; for studying and using the wind, the humidity, the light, even, to drive home his mortarâhe hardly ever missed a target.
âIf I saw a goblin now,â said Bastian, âafter training for a whole year with youâI know I wouldnât freeze.â
âWhile I appreciate your confidence,â said Master Sayre, âand though I certainly am watching you attain near-champion level, I must caution youâdonât go looking for trouble.â
Bastian eyed him. âWhat kind of trouble could I look for?âÂ
âNothing in particular.â Master Sayre sat back some. âBut no matter what strength you may have, I assure youâyouâd rather that goblins werenât real.â
âGoblins might not be real,â said Bastian, âbut plenty of dreadful things are.â He found his gaze drawn to the old oak with its splash of orange, darkening beneath mounding clouds. âThat night, when I facedâwhatever that was, I was less afraid for myself than I was at the thought of something bad happening to Lucas. That rock that flew through the windowâit landed an inch from his head. I was terrified that something more, something worse, might be coming..âÂ
Master Sayre, listening closely, settled back to sitting on his heels.
âI never again want to feel so helpless.â Bastian sent Master Sayre a prompting look. âAnd I want to understand everything about what happened that night.âÂ
âWhen challenges rise, do you not think that I, too, want you ready to meet them?â
At face value, that sounded supportive. But Master Sayre was hedging. It was obvious he was keeping something back.
For years, thirteen-year-old Bastian has been intrigued by Sylphic legends and folkloreâbut it is not until his family moves to the mysterious Kingfisher Chalet in England that Bastianâs studies truly begin to blossom. Under the tutelage of Master Sayre, Bastian improves his skills in Ryudo martial arts, and he comes into the possession of an ancient text that expands upon his Sylphic knowledge. When Bastianâs baby brother comes into the world under dire circumstances, Bastian believes he is the Sun Child prophesied in his treasured texts. But the truth is even more spectacular than Bastian realizes, and he must summon all the strength he has in order to protect those he loves from terrible danger.
This beautifully poetic tale is filled with magic realism, expertly blending the line between fantasy and reality in a compelling and believable manner. Careful world building creates an immersive experience for readers, especially as Bastianâs observations become increasingly more troublesome. Bastian is the central character in this novel, and though he is the only person in his family to truly believe in Sylphic lore, his family recognizes his atypical beliefs and helps guide Bastian to others who share them. Though Sylphic teachings are unique to this book, they hold the power of believeability thanks to Wagnerâs masterful writing.
Filled with satisfying detail and descriptions, the pacing of this book is well done overall, engaging readers through both the slower-simmering dramatic moments and the action-centered emphatic ones. Readers familiar with Wagnerâs other works will recognize her iconic writing style in this one, and they will easily connect with Bastian and his journey of self discovery within the context of the fantastic. Familial love is a focal point of the novel, as well, especially as each character comes with a unique personality and circumstances. Their interactions with one another are reminiscent of A Wrinkle in Time, and they will appeal to readers who enjoy stories that embrace positive familial connection. This is a delightfully immersive tale of love and personal growth that is well suited to young adult and older readers who enjoy exploring the worldâs unlimited possibilities through a magical lens.