The End of Time by P. W. Catanese, David Ho Read Free Book Online

cracked them. “But let’s put that aside for the moment. The answers we’ve been waiting for are right before us!” He reached into the chest and picked up a leather-bound notebook.
    “That looks like one of your notebooks,” Hap said.
    “Caspar used the same kind,” Umber said. His expression softened as he skimmed the first pages. “And that’s Caspar’s writing. Oh, this’ll be mighty helpful.” He noticed Hap leaning in, and turned the page so he could see. “In this notebook he’s summarized everything he’s learned from the documents.”
    Umber put the notebook on his lap and scooped a pile of old parchments out of the chest. “So here we have the source materials, and, in the notebook, Caspar’s conclusions. This is excellent! I’ll tell you what—you have a go at the old stuff, since you can understand all those languages, and I’ll peruse the notebook.”
    Hap was halfway through an old document in a forgotten language from a faraway land, which told of a seldom seen, mischievous green-eyed people, when Umber lowered the notebook from his face to reveal a solemn gaze. “Happenstance,” he said.
    Hap was always mildly alarmed when Umber used his entire name. “What is it?”
    “Do you want to know how Meddlers are made?”
    All the moisture left Hap’s mouth in an instant, and his pulse seemed to triple. “H-how?”
    “There is an essence—a liquid. It is poured into the eyes of someone who is recently . . . you know.” Umber took a deep breath. “Departed.”
    Hap’s limbs started to shake. This was hardly a shock; they were almost certain that Julian Penny, his former self, had drowned, and that the death had been connived by the Meddler they’d come to know as Willy Nilly. But still, the confirmation struck him like a spear in the belly.
    “An . . . essence made me?” Hap asked, touching the corners of his eyes.
    Umber nodded. “It gave you your abilities—your grasp of all languages, your nocturnal vision, your springy legs, and, of course, the power to see the filaments. It also wiped away your old memories.” He glanced at the notebook. “And there is only one source for the essence.”
    Hap waited.
    “You won’t like this,” Umber said. He closed the notebook, with his finger marking the page he’d been reading.
    Hap gulped. “I haven’t liked any of it, ever.”
    Umber’s bottom teeth sawed his upper lip. “The essence is taken from the eyes of another Meddler. That’s the only way to get it.”
    “So that means . . .” Hap’s mind swirled, desperately evading the obvious conclusion.
    “It means that another Meddler died so you could be made,” Umber said. “Or was blinded.”
    Hap pressed his palms over his eyes. He rocked back and forth and groaned. The list of horrors was still compiling. He thought about poor Julian Penny—the boy who was him and yet also a stranger. He thought about Julian’s parents, and the fateful chain of circumstances that had delivered them into the hands of a monster. And now someone else had lost his eyes and likely met his doom so that Hap might become a Meddler. “Do you think Willy Nilly did it? Killed another Meddler?”
    “It’s possible,” Umber said. He touched Hap’s shoulder. “Don’t blame yourself. You didn’t ask for any of this. It just happened to you. And you have to remember—you may have been born from tragedy, but you have to think of what’s ahead. We’re going to save a world, you and I. A billion lives, or more.”
    Hap nodded and smeared a tear across his cheek. “What else did Caspar know?”
    Umber opened the notebook again. “Do you want to hear it as I learn it, or all at once when I’m done?”
    “As you learn it.”
    Hap finished reading the parchment and turned to another. It listed all the names that had been used for Meddlers across the world: Hoppers, Tinkers, Fate Lords, Leapers, Interferi , Wanderers, Greeneyes . . .
    He looked up to see Umber staring blank-faced, holding the