Gods of Green Mountain by V. C. Andrews

Turning away, he went stiffly to a chair and carefully lowered himself down to the seat. All is hopeless...we are all too far gone...even the suns can't save us, ran the flow of his thoughts that he would never speak aloud.
    He turned his head, once great and noble, and stared at his wife and what remained of his family, all sitting crouched on the floor, waiting for darkness, for the instant sleep that would take them into oblivion and out of the dreadful need for food in their rumbling stomachs.
    It was then a faint scratching was heard on the trapdoor that covered the tunnel to their underground lodgings. The trapdoor was raised a cautious few inches, and a boy's face showed. "Baka Valente," began the boy Sal-Lar tentatively, "I have come to bring you very grave news."
    "What other kind is there?" asked Baka sourly. "But come up and tell it, I have grown accustomed to somber news. Good news would shock me."
    "Sir," began Sal-Lar very respectfully as he glanced at Bret-Lee lying so still on her bed. Deeper anxiety shadowed the boy's purple eyes. He looked again at Baka. "I risk my life to come and tell you this, but they are whispering in the caves against you. They say everyone is suffering because the Gods are angry with you alone--for you have defied them by refusing to move underground like all of us. They say the Gods want the top of the earth, and the sunlight only for themselves."
    "They say? They say!" Baka snapped. "Who are they?"
    "Everybody," Sal-Lar replied meekly, "even my own grandfather--and all the elders. At this very moment they are in the council room, taking a ballot on whether or not to sacrifice you, and all your family."
    This so sombered Baka, he forgot his weakness, his stiffness, and he jumped to his feet, then howled with the pain of his too quick action. "Have I not suffered too?" he shouted out angrily. "Have I not lost four sons, plus others--and take a look at my daughter! I have not gone unscathed! My family shared our food--we are as hungry and as desperate as any others!"
    Sal-Lar hung his head and awkwardly shuffled his feet on the raw dirt floor. "They have many faults to find with you and yours. Not the least being your son Far-Awn, who ran off with the last puhlet flock alive--leaving us all to survive on tortar flesh--and you are responsible for Far-Awn's actions. They say Far-Awn should have been thrown into the abyss soon after birth. He is a freak who has brought the wrath of the Gods down on our heads, so that nothing will grow, can grow with the storms coming so often."
    "So," said Baka with his eyes hard and bitter, "the cowards below send a boy to tell of their grievances. Why don't they come here, and look me in the eye, and tell me themselves?"
    Lee-La and her sons sat silent, all with their eyes fixed on Baka. Outside the sky blazed with a riot of glorious colors as the first sun hid itself behind the Scarlet Mountains.
    "Baka Valente," Sal-Lar began in a voice he struggled to make manly. "As I said before, I am risking my life by coming to warn you. I want you to run away and take Bret-Lee--for they are going to put you all to death! They are voting, but already everyone knows the outcome, for they are constructing extra sacrificial altars."
    "Fools!" roared Baka with all his former vigor of vocal power. "They should be using that energy to plough and seed the soil!" Then his temper simmered down, and he looked with narrowed eyes at the boy standing before him, thin as a rail, and hollow-cheeked. "Why do you care, boy? Why do you risk your life to save us?"
    Sal-Lar walked to the bed where Bret-Lee lay without movement, her eyes staring blankly into space. Very lightly Sal-Lar stroked her cheek. "Bret-Lee and I have been secretly in love for years. I had intended to ask for her hand in marriage when I reached the age of fourteen..."
    "How old are you now?" asked Baka, without much interest. What meaning had love when death was around the corner?
    "Thirteen. Two months and I