Terraless

by Thorby Rudbek

  Eshezy realised what was the culmination of this tale: the young girl had successfully sneaked back to Neechaall, and brought this valuable update for the miners, and her. “I’ll have to talk to Jeraldanine and thank her.”

  “She’s somewhere with Tresnian, so happy to have a new friend.” Gefforen grinned again. “I think she would run twice as far, to get such a reward!”

  Eshezy looked at Travakane and Harthangan to gauge their reaction to this news. She could see they were impressed by the security that this Fortress that they had never seen was able to supply.

  “After Krilishmal, I want to see everyone still here in Neechaall. But only one comes in here at a time, and no one looks in through the window.” She stepped out through the doorway and leaned her bow against the outside wall, but left her quiver in its place on her shoulder. “Then, as soon as I’ve seen everyone, we must leave here and go to my Fortress.”

  Travakane and Harthangan exchanged curious glances, but went off to start the process. Gefforen was about to go too, when Eshezy gently grabbed her hand and took her inside.

  “I’ll start with you – they’ll be a while moving that badly injured one to here.”

  Gefforen looked scared, but submitted readily enough, as Eshezy had her lay on the bare bed space beneath the window, taking the opportunity to check outside. No one around. Good.

  She pulled the door into the frame. “Now, close your eyes and lay still.” Eshezy had considered using the word ‘relax’, but decided that it would be too much to ask of the perpetually frightened teenager. Once Gefforen was in position, Eshezy knelt by her and placed her left hand over her eyes. It would be so tempting to look, once my new companion reaches out…

  The fur draped around her neck seemed to come back to life, sliding silently to the dirt floor, its enormous eye suddenly visible again, its two comparatively huge feet being extended from obscurity in time to restore its mobility. The head rose up at the bedside and the small mouth and the even smaller nose above it scanned along the skinny body from foot to head, sniffing through the rough fabric of the primitive shirt and unpretentious skirt where these covered the girl. After this careful examination of Gefforen, the silent beast curled up under the raised surface where she now reluctantly resided, and Eshezy took her hand away.

  Gefforen looked up, curious, but no longer as nervous as she had been.

  “It’s alright – I just wanted to check that you were not injured in any way.” You are too important to me!

  Gefforen sat up, reassured by the care implicit in her mentor’s actions. “Do you want me to go now?”

  “No. I’d like you to stand outside the window, and make sure no one looks in.” Eshezy looked at her young disciple, gauging with great confidence that Gefforen would be able to resist the temptation to peep, and would stop anyone else from doing so.

  “She Who Cannot Be Named knows I will do whatever you ask.” Gefforen stated solemnly.

  “Great!” Eshezy watched as she opened the door and walked around the corner. She turned and walked back to the window, waiting a moment for her guard to take up position. The feel of fur against her calf made her look down. “Rauffaely, you really move now!” And I thought you were fast before… His self-satisfied expression confirmed to her that she still had some time.

  After the ‘stretchered’ Krilishmal, each injured man was either carried or limped slowly into the small ‘house’ and left afterward on his own two feet, all signs of injury erased. The process went quickly, with the least possible wasted time between each ‘patient’. Nevertheless, Eshezy became increasingly uneasy as time slipped by. Finally, Rauffaely made his characteristic meow at her from his position supervising the healings by the simple single sleep space and looked at her with his pale green eyes wide, the pupils super-dilated and his ears twisted clockwise so that the left one was forwards and the right one was to the rear. She stopped the sequence of healing acts by stepping to the door with the latest rejuvenated person as he left. She held out her hand in front of the next miner, one that had blood-stained cloth wrapped around his left hand.

  “You’ll be the last.” She looked at the four standing behind him – their injuries were mostly bruises and some minor cuts, though the coloration was livid in the extreme. “Sorry, gentlemen. We must go. Someone, bring me a burning log from the ovens.”

  The next nearest man nodded and turned away, quite resigned to having his battered face for the next few days. “I’ll get it.”

  “Ragastang?” Eshezy recognised this miner belatedly, recalling that he had escaped the soldiers’ attack unscathed. “What happened to you?”

  He turned back, his bruises now less obvious as his blush filled in the rest of his facial features. “It was the practice fighting.” His embarrassment was intensely amusing to her, though she tried hard not to show it.

  “It’s okay, there are many ways to learn.” Eshezy nodded, straight-faced, urging him to hurry. “And it is always better to learn with a friend, than an enemy.” She could see his head shaking slowly from side to side as he caught the crux of her humorous homily. She stepped back inside the little home as soon as Ragastang walked away. She guided the last fortunate one towards his ‘healing moment’ and shut the door. Following her now well-established routine, she got him to lie down on the basic bed, covered his eyes with one hand and watched her unique new friend lick his injuries into nothingness. As soon as the creature had moved back under the bed, she gently ushered this rejuvenated miner out, and, checking that the others had moved away, shut the door one last time.

  Walking over to the bed under the window, she found Rauffaely staring under the simple slab-like raised surface. She knelt down and looked into the comparative gloom there. The previously flat dirt floor was uneven, and a hole, partly collapsed, could be seen… The magical beast that had healed almost the entire town was already gone. And I did not get to express my gratitude…

  Sighing softly as she got up and kneeled on the bed, she leaned out and found Gefforen a couple of paces to the right, her back to the wall, staring out over the narrow streets. She leaned out a little further and coughed quietly.

  “Oh!” Gefforen turned abruptly, with her trademark nervousness and looked at her heroine with concern.

  “Gefforen, we will be leaving Neechaall soon; we may not come back and I’m sorry to say we will have to make sure the enemy does not find anything here – and I can only think of one way to do that.”

  “How?”

  “We must burn this building, and a few others, too.”

  Gefforen’s eyes widened, their deep blue hue compelling Eshezy’s attention beneath the eternal ‘sunshine’.

  “We must save whatever will be useful from each building we burn, like the blankets in here, for example – or at least as much as we can carry back to the Fortress.”

  Eshezy was impressed with Gefforen’s self-control – though she clearly speculated about the strange fur ‘wrap’ and what had happened to it, she merely walked away, stating she would find Travakane and bring him back. As soon as the girl was gone, Eshezy moved the basic bed frame away from the window and smoothed out the soil with her feet. Once she was satisfied that the dirt was flattened and the hole was concealed, buried, Eshezy replaced the bed, stepped back to the door and opened it.

  Walking towards her, came Ragastang, holding the ‘cold’ end of a glowing log, followed by Harthangan and Travakane. Gefforen ran past them and collected the blankets from her first home on Terraless, leaving the door open as she exited. Ragastang bent down in front of Eshezy to place the log on the ground, uncertain what to do with it. He knelt beside it and looked up at her with anticipation.

  “Why don’t we burn the whole place down?” Travakane asked grimly, with a certain sense of excitement, as soon as he was close enough to be heard without shouting. “Especially the temple!”

  “I think I can imagine how you feel! But though a part of me likes the idea, I think we’ll resist that impulse. The s
moke would be visible from far away – and I don’t want to make that big of an announcement that Seirchaal is being challenged; I think he will figure it out quick enough without such dramatics.” Eshezy could see that her point was well taken. She looked around, took her bow from its resting position and then smiled as Rauffaely used Ragastang’s knee as a launch point, settling himself on her shoulder with a small growl as the smell of burnt wood assailed his sensitive nostrils. She nodded at the still kneeling, battered man.

  Ragastang got up, touched the log to the humble structure and the flames started to spread across the dry wood walling and up into the roof. The fire grew rapidly and the roof was engulfed in moments, burning fiercely and with little smoke, for the materials were very dry. He looked at Eshezy, wondering which structure to torch next.

  “Do the one next door, and the one behind. I think the fire will spread to a couple more in that direction, as they are so close. That should be enough.”

  Eshezy turned to walk towards the river, then staggered and stopped.

  Gefforen, keeping close to her, saw the characteristic illumination briefly transform her heroine’s face. “What is it? Can you tell me?”

  Eshezy smiled. “Yes, I can this time. How brave are you feeling, my little disciple?” She studied the perennially scared girl’s face. “I am going to look inside the temple before we go. If you want to come – and we must be quick – come now! You will be safe with me, I promise.”

  Gefforen’s Adam’s apple bobbed, her forehead glistened, and her face flushed, but she nodded and managed a nervous grimace-like grin a moment later.

  “Get everyone down to the river.” Eshezy told Travakane, as his expression reflected his stupefaction at this development. “I’ll be with you before everyone is assembled there.” This last sentence was made to sound like a challenge and she allowed a smirk to show as she voiced it.

  “We’ll be ready!” Travakane turned, grinning as he spoke and walked rapidly away, shouting instructions to his men as he left.

  Eshezy took Gefforen by the hand and walked directly to the temple. Let’s see what this does… She let go of the hand, grabbed the carved handle and pulled firmly. The right-hand door swung out easily and the static effect disappeared as a spark jumped to her hand on contact. Stepping in, she saw the interior was big enough for all the soldiers to fit, though it might have been a little cramped. I suppose there were always some outside, watching the ‘citizens’… The walls were planked over with well-sanded boards, and some kind of finish had been applied to the wood, to produce a faint sheen. Eshezy was both glad and proud to detect that Gefforen had followed her inside and took her hand once again. “Look.” She said quietly. “They have tried to create some quality here.”

  “Your Fortress is much better.” Gefforen managed, almost mischievously. “Look at the floor.”

  Eshezy made a show of glancing down, but she had already noticed that the floor was only a dirt one. “Let’s see what is behind this door…” She led them forwards to the end of the room, where another set of double doors, hinged on the far side – for there was no mechanism visible here – hung in shabby grandeur. The doors did not move as she pushed the surface of each in turn, and the sudden application of her magnificent short sword, shoved hard into the surface – Gefforen jumped and then giggled at this – allowed her to attempt to pull the door outwards.

  “Hmm.” Eshezy wiggled the sword out, wondering if she had time to hack the door to pieces, but an alternative sprung into her mind as she looked at the inch-wide slot she had created and she slid the sword back into its scabbard instead.

  Gefforen gasped as her heroine reached out and gestured, as she had done so successfully back at the Fortress. The sound of metal bolts sliding through metal channels ceased after a few seconds and Eshezy smiled with anticipation as she pushed on the right-hand door and let it spring back out enough to get a grip on the edge. The door swung out and a bright interior was exposed. Yes, glass above! Looking up, several large clear panels let copious light in, but the bright interior beneath soon captured both interlopers’ attention.

  They saw: a panelled wooden floor, patterned with foot-square markings… on it, a cushioned rocking chair, an ornate desk with a padded pale green leather top, a metal and … Not sure what that is… Eshezy leaned her bow against the desk and picked up the part shiny, part dull contraption. The end facing her was blockish, with a rounded protrusion from which light reflected, highlighting a circular panel of convex glass, part purple sheened, part green. The part she had grasped was bobble-surfaced, in a dark grey, slightly squashy material that seemed hauntingly familiar. The back end was flat and seemed to be mostly comprised of another glass panel, this one flat, dark and blank. A small raised bump on the back surface next to the featureless glass seemed to invite her to touch it, and she did so without any sense of trepidation – but incredibly the blank glass blossomed into a brightly glowing picture.

  Eshezy looked at it closely, holding the device perfectly still, as the picture seemed to be moving so much that it could not be understood. “Ah!” She turned the other end towards Gefforen, and smiled at the perfect reproduction of her faithful follower now displayed. “Look!” she invited the girl, and turned the device around until the rounded glass surface was pointing at herself.

  Gefforen looked, and was transfixed by the seemingly living image of Eshezy and Rauffaely – still on her shoulder. “What strange power is this?”

  Eshezy grinned, swinging the very un-Terraless object around and pointing it at the rocking chair, so that they could both admire the image. “Now I understand! It is a device from the world I came from. Seirchaal is an interloper – like me!”

  “He is nothing like you.” Gefforen sounded almost offended by what she considered to be an outrageous comparison and was confused by the unfamiliar terminology Eshezy had used in her reference to the being she had once regarded as the God of Terraless. Leaving this disturbing idea, she concentrated on an easier question: “What is the purpose of this … thing?”

  “Do you remember when Jeraldanine first arrived, how much shorter she was than she is now?”

  “Not very well – just the idea, really – and she was here for about a year before I came, so I didn’t see her at the start.”

  “This thing could make an image, or a whole series of images, and keep it, so that you would be able to see what you can now barely remember, or an even earlier image, as if you were here back at the beginning.” She looked behind the desk and found a box of shiny metal, the top half separated from the bottom on one side by a shiny white surface. She bent down and lifted the top half, discovering it was hinged, and that the interior was padded with thousands of tiny bubbles, suspended in a surface of exceptional softness, and with a space in the centre which appeared to be the perfect size for the device. She put the image-recorder inside, placed the shiny white material on top of it and closed the top. A moment of examination helped her figure out how to engage the catches, and she was back upright, passing the strange container to her helper. “I’m going to ask you to take this with you. Now, we must hurry. And this temple – I’ve changed my mind – it needs to be burned, too!”

  Gefforen laughed quite joyously at this and ran out the door with the case. Eshezy walked around the room, checking to see if there were any other artefacts that she would want to keep. No… let’s just make a big mess here, so he can’t tell that I have discovered his secret.

  As she walked out the double doors into the dirt floor audience chamber, she could hear the sound of fast footfalls approaching. She pushed the door of the supposedly private chamber closed and gestured, listening with great satisfaction as the bolts slid back into place.

  “Here!” Gefforen gasped, holding a flaming fragment of planking in front of her and trying not to inhale the smoke.

  “Would you like to do the honours?” Eshezy pointed at the walls and the closed double doors in front of them.

  Startled, Gefforen tu
rned her deep blue eyes towards the source of the audacious proposal. Noting that the offer was serious, her smile widened until it seemed to change her whole appearance. “Would I?!”

  Gefforen and Eshezy stepped hastily from the temple as the walls blackened and burst into glorious flames, Rauffaely became agitated at the crackling and the heat and smoke, his normal quiet meow was replaced by a horrendous howl that impressed Eshezy and startled Gefforen. The blissful fire-starter bent down and picked up the case again from the ground outside the temple and the three hurried through the town to join the others, who were by this time down by the river. Most of the miners were looking back, seeing the tall columns of white-grey smoke rising higher in the fairly still air; each of them was holding something salvaged from the only home they had ever known and most of them had blankets or sacking draped over their shoulders. As Eshezy caught up with them, she concentrated on the far bank, conscious that her healing work had been cut short for a reason, and though that reason had not been revealed to her, she thought the most likely explanation was the return of the soldiers, and so she was keenly aware that there could be trouble on the way to her Fortress. She glanced at Rauffaely’s face, noting how he now seemed to be focused on the gentle swaying of the tall grasses, his composure restored. Nothing… at least not right now.

  “Come on!” She stepped into the water, holding her bow up high. “We must stay close together – we’ll use the big track, it will be quickest.” I know it is time for sleep, though of course the sun creature is still up there, where he always seems to be!

  She reached the far bank without incident and watched the tall grasses for tell-tale signs of sudden movement as the others waded through behind her. Rauffaely turned his head and touched his nose to Eshezy’s cheek, giving her a single, small lick. Then he made his characteristic ‘nuah’ and jumped down. Eshezy watched as he turned to the right of the path to Fortress and ran off into the tall grasses. Goodbye, my little friend; may your errand be successful! She knew that something important must have called him away from his comfortable spot on her shoulder.