Happenstance Found (Books of Umber #1) (23 page)

For a while, all Hap heard was his own breathing. “Have you ever told anyone else about this?” he finally asked.

“Nobody. They’d think I was crazy, unless I also showed them this.” Umber put his hand on the computer. “And I don’t want a soul to be aware that this computer exists. If you haven’t guessed already, this is the source of all my innovations. But it’s better if everyone thinks they come out of my head, because this world isn’t ready for everything this computer could show. There is good progress and bad progress; I prefer the good.”

“But now you’ve told me.”

“I had to,” Umber said. “You had to know what happened to my world. Now that you do, I think you’ll understand why I hesitated to show you this note.”

Umber opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out two familiar sheets of parchment. “Are you sure you’re ready?”

For the first time since he had known the note existed, Hap wasn’t sure he wanted to see it. But he nodded, and Umber slid the parchment across the table. Hap wiped his palms on his pants to dry the perspiration. Then he turned the parchment around and lifted it carefully. His eyes raced over the words until he neared the part he hadn’t yet read.

By now you must be wondering: Why? Why do what this stranger asks? The reason is this: I know where you came from, Umber. I know too what happened to that world of yours. Quite a mess you folk made of that. I was there; I saw.

What if I told you there was a chance, even a small one, to undo the damage, to save those billion lives? But perhaps that thought has already crossed your mind. Surely it has. And surely you don’t think it a mere coincidence that you found your way here, where magic lives. You must have considered the possibility that you might somehow find the key to saving your world.

I tell you this: Such a thing is possible. But it all depends upon the boy. Without him, there is no hope for the world you left behind.

That is all I can tell you for now. You’ll know more in time. For now, follow your instincts. That is why I have chosen you.

—WN

Hap laid the parchment back on the table, feeling numb. He looked at Umber, who was watching him closely.

“Do you understand?” Umber said.

“I … I think so.”

“Please don’t run away. Or vanish on me.”

“I … why would I do that?”

“That note says you’re the key to saving a world. A billion lives. More, really. That’s why I didn’t want to show you the note right away. It seems like too much to ask. Too much to heap on such young shoulders.”

Hap covered his face with his hands. “But … how could I save a world? I don’t know how to do that.”

“Not yet, you don’t. We’ll figure this out as we go along, I suppose. It has something to do with those threads of light, that’s for sure. There’s no doubt now: You should do your best to not only see those filaments, but also understand their meaning. That will be your true power.

“Happenstance, the only thing that matters is this: Are you willing to try? As your skills arise, will you master them? Will you become everything you are meant to be? You can trust me to help you however I can—it will be you and me together. But
will you try
?”

Hap didn’t say anything for a long time. With his hands over his face, he thought about what Umber was asking him to do. It sounded like madness. And if he hadn’t just seen the astonishing machine, he wouldn’t have believed the existence of another world was even possible.

The question awed and frightened him. He wished the idea of it would simply go away. But he knew that ideas could never do such a thing. It was as Umber had said many days before:
Once an idea is out and about, it can’t be called back, silenced, or erased. You can’t contain it, any more than you could put the head of a dandelion back together after the wind has scattered its seeds.

Hap thought about his life. It may have been brief, but it was surely eventful. Balfour was right when he’d said that memory is like a book. Already, Hap’s existence bound many pages. Now those pages added up to something: an identity.
I was nobody when it started, but I’m somebody now,
Hap realized, and his heart swelled to think of it.

He flipped back to the first pages of his remembrance, when he became conscious in an underground city. Strangers found him. But they weren’t strangers anymore. They had helped one another, saved one another. There were words for such people, he knew, and words rich with meaning sprang into his mind:

Family. Friends.

He heard Umber take a breath, and remembered the question:
Will you try?
He slid his hands down to his chin, revealing his bright green eyes.

A billion lives. A world in jeopardy. It was a flawed and crazy world, a civilization with a capacity for astonishing achievements and cruel destruction. But it was a place that Lord Umber—his friend Umber—thought was worth saving.

Will you try?

What else could he say?