Eliot Strange and the Prince of the Resistance

18) My Mom the Spy

Without his shoes, Jack Taylor walks as soundlessly as a cat in the forest, and I would bet that he was trained to do that. I can't forget that, according to Steven and the little that Torin has told me about him, Jack can be dangerous. Or at least "a good man in a fight, someone you want on your side" per Torin or "a man who could kill you six ways with his pinkie finger" according to the legends Steven has read. No matter, I have to trust him, my heart says trust him because Jack Taylor says my mother is on the good guy side.

"Your mother is a hero," says Jack Taylor. "We did meet her at the state dinner, but I knew of her long before that."

"How?" asks Steven who is again the anchor on the six o'clock news.

"Intelligence. We knew about the threat to Prince Torin. We have known about it for a long time. We took precautions, but we clearly underestimated the One and his nation of fanatics."

"So, do you think our government knew about him too?" asks Steven.

"Yes, they provided some of the information we knew, but they made an even bigger mistake than us about Professor Nation and his followers." I notice that Carli takes Jack's hand and starts to swing it in step to our pace. "Because there are so many threats from fanatics outside a country, domestic threats seem trivial in comparison. And, threats from within a country are far more dangerous, people forget that sometimes."

"But what about my mom?" I ask. "You said she was a spy? But you meant a good spy, right? Not a bad spy? A spy for our side? Our country?"

"Well historically, a spy is deemed either good or bad, depending on perspective, but your mother is a good spy. She sent word, before we actually met her at the state dinner, that raised an alarm. She did not know the specific details, but she suspected there was danger for Torin."

"And how did she know that?" I ask dreading his answer.

"Embedded, she was embedded for years."

"Embedded?" says Carli who is as surprised as I was when I found my mom's secret hiding place of maps and facts on the wall.

"Embedded?" asks Steven. "How embedded, how long? How did she do that?"

"I don't know," says Jack. "A long time."

"But how?" I want to know. I want to understand.

Carli wants to understand too because she stops swinging Jack's hand and turns to face him. She looks up at Jack with those big eyes. "Tell us more and what do you mean, embedded?"

"They become part of it, part of what is going on, part of the deceit, part of the plan. So involved that sometimes, lines get blurred."

"Blurred lines?" I repeat. "Like maybe not warning the rest of the world, including your daughter, that the world ends tomorrow."

"Maybe, she didn't know," says Steven hopefully, and then as if to reassure me and himself, "She's a good mom, Elie. The best mom."

Jack tries to defend my mom too. "Maybe, there was no time to spread the word when she did find out. Or maybe, they were suspicious about her and did not tell her the specific plan. She did warn us, though. It had to be her. A woman called. Right before they busted through the hotel doors to kidnap Torin. It was the only reason we were both able to escape. I had that split second to prepare, to tell Torin to go."

"Maybe, it wasn't her," I say though I don't want to admit it. I want to believe my mom is a good guy.

"It was her," says Jack Taylor, and I can tell from his assuring tone that he believes it. "Your mother is a hero."

"Well, where is she now?" I ask. "Why hasn't she left One Nation and that damn professor and come home? Come back to me?"

"She can't," says Carli. "That's what I have to tell you. Your mom is in danger. She is a captive. I saw her with.." She hesitates here like the memory is too hard to look at. "I saw her with them, with the One Nation Army, right after the battle."

Ok, now I am mad. "When were you planning on telling me that?" Carli always did love to keep a secret and then spring it on me. I remembered when I thought blue eye shadow was the height of fashion until she told me it was not, after she let me wear it to a middle school dance. "How do you know she was captive and not one of the leaders?"

"Your dad told me."

"My dad is in hiding in the mountains. How did you talk to him? And why did you just now tell me about seeing my mom? And talking to my dad. I have to go, where is she? Where is he?"

"That is why I didn't tell you right away, Elie. You are too impulsive. You can't run off with no plan into the middle of that monster army of baby killers. You'll get yourself killed or worse. Your dad said to tell you that he has things under control. He has a plan. He's got them pinned down now."

Ok, we heard that news. Someone had the army pinned down, but weren't they blown to oblivion by mortar fire?

Carli's voice has raised to the point that she sounds a bit hysterical, and I must sound ready to explode too because Steven asks in a let's-all-calm-down-voice, "Where are they, Carli? Where are Eliot's mom and dad?"

Carli looks at me like she doesn't want to say, like she was sworn to secrecy. She points in the direction she came from, towards the northeast of where we are now in Dobson. She points to a plume of smoke.

The plume of smoke that can only be my hometown burning to the ground.