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                               Sangrelysia

                          by Vivian Darkbloom

The Forest of Silence

   Raindrops frozen in midair burst against my face as I hastily
   stride down the forest path.

   "Look!" says Sylvia, pointing.

   A butterfly on the wing, gracefully still, wings spread.

   "Why are we going this way?" asked Sylvia. "What about the
   others?"

   Her question inflamed my rage at being unable to save the Queen
   and King. I ceased walking for precious moments, to work it
   through once more, why running away wasn't simply cowardly.

   "You're the one they're after, nobody else," I said. "I would
   have to put you at risk in order to go back and try to help."

   "But can't you do something? My girls. . ." She was in tears
   again.

   "Believe me, I feel the same way. But anything I do, Elwrong
   would counteract, most likely making things worse than if I do
   nothing. It's their game here. There's no way we can possibly
   win." The fever from the poison surged, causing me to sway
   slightly. I could feel the prick of pain in my calf, and the
   magic fighting back.

   "But. . . but. . . will they all get killed?"

   I studied her carefully, perched on my back. "That wouldn't make
   sense. Why the masks? The marauders don't want to be recognized,
   probably because they're from King George's army. Now that I know
   Elwrong's behind it, I'm almost sure of that. They're expecting
   someone to talk about them.

   "Why the flags? Because they want the entourage to return to the
   castle saying that the Valeplysians captured the princess. That
   would give the King the excuse he needs to start the war he
   craves. As soon as they discover you're gone, they'll most likely
   fall back, and let the group escape.

   "'K."

   It wasn't OK, really. I clenched my jaw. "Sylvia, I promise that
   someday, I'll find a way to save us all from this madness. Just,
   today isn't that day."

   "'K"

   "Now let's see if we can get you to a safe place."

   Reaching out to the summit of the trail we were on, I folded the
   space in between, and stepped across the dizzying abyss of
   compressed meta-substance, and we were standing the top of the
   cliff, level with the top of the waterfall.

   She blinked.

   "That should save some walking," I explained.

   Sylvia pointed again. Looking across the way, through the
   cascading droplets, I could see vaguely through the shifting
   light what looked like a playground, on which stood a man and a
   girl, staring across back at us and pointing. It seemed as if
   they were from another world, a different story.

   "Sometimes," I said, "When time is standing still like this, in
   between the moments, one can glimpse gateways into other
   dimensions."

   I shifted her weight on my back, to make sure I had a good grip.
   "Hold on," I warned.

   Looking across to one of the distant hilltops, I folded the
   interval between, once again leaping across the absence within
   the pleated interval between points in space, and we stood once
   more on a strange hilltop, looking back at where we had come
   from.

   The entourage were like distant bugs in the clearing below us. I
   was reassured to note that the invaders were about the same
   number as Roderick's troops. It was difficult, but I refrained
   from helping out. Roderick was the best there was. I had no doubt
   he would prevail.

   "Won't Elwrong be able to go back in time and find us?" asked
   Sylvia.

   I mused. "I'm certain she'll follow us, but she can't go too far
   back, or she would be taking a huge risk. The occlusion spell
   that she herself cast will give her trouble, and she would chance
   slipping into a temporal undertow. She'll be able to trace the
   folds I'm making in space, but she won't be able to see or
   manoeuvre at all. Of course, I could help out. . ."

   I took out a vial from one of the many pockets of my coat, and
   sprinkled a pinch of yellowish powder into the air. It hung like
   a veil, glittering and winking with mischievously sinister
   delight.

   "What is it?" asked Sylvia.

   "Pollen," I replied, chuckling. "A violent fit of sneezing for
   anyone who walks through it. Hold on!" I sighted on another
   hilltop several kilometres away, and we left the miasma behind as
   I once more gathered the intervening spacetime fabric into a hop
   and a jump. Now the hilltop we had come from was distant speck.
   The clearing and the entourage were no longer visible.

   We leapt across to another distant mountaintop, then another,
   then another. The clouds overhanging the forest retreated, and
   the sun broke through as we got up into the mountains.

   I paused to scan the landscape back in the direction we had come
   from. All was stillness, all was silence. Then, almost
   imperceptibly, I saw a distortion like tiny puff in the distance.
   Already, we were being followed. Damn, she was better than I
   thought. The poison fever surged once more, weakening my grip
   slightly. I braced myself, then sighted the hilltop I was looking
   for. We were almost there.

   Once more I folded the space between and leapt, then the weakness
   brought on by a surge of infirmity forced me to set the Princess
   down.

   "Are you all right?" She asked.

   "I'll be fine," I said. "Here, hold my hand. Do you think you can
   do it?"

   She nodded. "I can try."

   "Here we go. . ." I gathered the fabric of spacetime once again
   for the final leap. Together we jumped, she not quite as far, and
   her foot slipped back into the abyss. Not good. With all my
   strength, I gripped her hand and hauled her onto solid ground,
   and lifted her tumbling into my arms, feeling her precious
   softness and warmth against me once more.

   Her expression was confused.

   I embraced her lovingly and laughed, setting her down once more.
   "A bit scary, but not bad for the first time. Now hurry! Follow
   me!"

   The final trail we needed to complete on foot, and I was hoping I
   would remember how to find the path I was looking for, even
   though it had been years and everything looked different on
   account of how the trees and underbrush had grown. Holding hands,
   we ran along the hillside, as I searched the contour for familiar
   details. There! A hedge had grown up thick in front of it, but
   the old ivy-covered archway in an ancient stone wall stood
   exactly as I had remembered it.

   We dashed up the hillside, under the archway. I wished I hadn't
   left my staff back in the carriage, but it would be alright. I
   would just have to execute the invocation by hand. Bracing myself
   once more, against the fever, I frantically searched the
   flagstones below us for the grid. There it was! In the middle of
   one of the stones by the wall, a five-by-five matrix of
   finger-sized circular holes, weathered and worn, but intact. I
   grabbed a handful of the incongruously smooth round pebbles that
   lay nearby, setting five of them in the secret pattern as Sylvia
   stood watching.

   "Remember this pattern," I said, once they were in place.

   "Right," she said.

   "Don't worry, I'll draw it out for you again sometime. Now stand
   close! Put your hand on my shoulder." She did. Closing my eyes, I
   held my hands over the square and conjured up the memory of the
   first Wizard. After a half a minute or so, I opened one eye.
   Oops, one of the pebbles needed to go one peg to the right. I
   fixed it. "Erase the other pattern, remember that one," I said.

   "Right."

   Once more closing my eyes, I lifted my concentration to the
   infinite omnipresence of universal order, the all-pervading soul
   of divine wisdom. The hush of silence shifted as the barrier
   arose, surrounding us. The forcefield rose up on three sides,
   with the stone wall being the fourth. I could hear a faint hum as
   the magical energy activated.

   One of the bricks in the wall opened from the top edge like a
   trapdoor, folding over into a shelf with an antiquated control
   console in the middle. The pebbles from the pattern jumped back
   over into the pile they had been on before.

   Through the archway, we could see a white form making its way up
   the hillside. Two figures -- it looked like Elwrong had brought
   someone with her.

   Sylvia gasped.

   "She can't see us," I said. Nonetheless, we both held perfectly
   still, barely breathing.

   The two, Elwrong in her white cape and some lackey, stopped in
   the middle of the hillside and looked all around for a minute.
   They did not look happy.

   "She's either extremely talented, or dumb and lucky," I commented
   in a whisper.

   Sylvia looked up at me. "Why do dumb people get all the luck?"

   I returned her gaze. "Like King George."

   She nodded.

   "Luck runs out," I observed.

   She made a noise of disgust. "Let's hope so!"

   The sight of Elwrong's cold, unseeing glare eerily directed
   toward us made me shudder. Finally, they wandered off out of
   sight.

   "She can't see the archway. To her it's a solid wall," I said.
   "Only those initiated by the lineage of the first Wizard of
   Sangrelysia, the wise and Ancient Mother, can pass through the
   archway.

   "Then why could I. . ." she asked.

   "I initiated you into the ways of magic," I said.
   "Congratulations. You're one of the club."

   I turned to the verdigris-encrusted control console. In its
   middle was a circular dial, divided like a pie into five slices.
   In the center was a large round button, of a faded crimson color.
   On each slice was written a word or two in an ancient
   Sangrelysian script.

   There was a brass selector that framed one of the slices, the one
   on the left. It pivoted from the center like the hand of a clock.
   Grabbing the little wooden knob on the outer edge of the
   selector, I turned it to the next position. It slid smoothly,
   like a well-oiled lever sliding over velvet, and settled in with
   a delicious `click.'

   Around us, through the force-field that enclosed us, we could see
   the landscape shift, transforming into a cobblestone city street
   in a cozy little village -- with the same archway, but a
   different wall. Nobody was in sight.

   I turned the selector to the next position. Now we were on an
   oceanside cliff in bright sunlight. Again, the same archway, and
   a similar wall. I heard waves crashing, and caught a faint whiff
   of the sea breeze.

   Once more I turned the selector, and we were under a grey sky on
   a stark, steep deserted mountainside, harsh, rocky and forlorn,
   bereft of trees.

   "Here," I said.

   "Couldn't we go to the beach instead?" Sylvia asked.

   "Some other time," I replied. I pushed the big red disk in the
   center of the dial, and after a short pause, the control console
   folded itself up into the wall, and the edges of the forcefield
   descended around us, and the humming faded into silence.

   We wrapped our garments around us against the sharp chill of the
   mountain breeze. I heard the wind whistling and singing in the
   nearby crags.

   "So, you thought riding a horse was fun?" I asked.

   "Yes," she replied hesitantly.

   "Well. Just you wait!"

                                                          Chapter 13

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