The Blurred Lands

by Ian W. Sainsbury

  He dropped his bags onto the least dirty patch of floor and ducked under the low archway that led into the galley kitchen. The oven looked new, the hob unmarked. A fridge freezer hummed in the corner.

  Back in the living room, he hung the big iron key on a nail that looked like it had been there since the cottage was built. He walked up the stairs. John had spent most of his time in Sally Cottage in the master bedroom. He'd rather get his first look at it while there was still daylight.

  The door was open. Enough sunlight made it through the tree canopy outside to illuminate the room, but the gentle waving of branches in the breeze filled the space with moving shadows. John flicked on the overhead light and they vanished.

  The bedroom was large, and it was dominated by the enormous bed in the middle. Space-wise, it would have made more sense to have pushed it into a corner, or against a wall. But the bed's position, like the bed itself, was a statement. It was a stage, waiting for the players.

  It was made of iron, heavy and intricately wrought. The headboard rose six feet from the mattress, and was fashioned in two pieces later welded together, giving it the appearance of a pair of gates. The design of the headboard took the form of branches growing from an unseen tree, the trunk of which—if the maker's vision were followed through—would be underneath the bedroom, its iron roots plunging into the foundations of the cottage.

  It was the same bed where John had lost his virginity in the summer of his final year of university. The same bed where he'd been introduced to many sexual acts he'd previously only imagined, and a few his imagination failed to predict.

  An old dresser stood by the window. There was no other furniture.

  It made perfect sense for the bed to still be here, John told himself. It probably weighed as much as a small car. Why would anyone move it? Even so, his pulse was racing.

  He supposed Helen would have advised him to sleep in that bed, but there was a limit to what John would do in the interest of cognitive behavioural therapy.

  He would sleep on the sofa.

  Thirteen

  Evie,

  And so we come to the rub. The reason I'm writing to you.

  Magic. It's a word that has gone in and out of fashion. The word itself became the common English term for those who practised the supernatural arts back in the fifteenth century. Delve further, and you'll find similar words in old French. Further still, via Latin, back to the ancient Greek - magikē. Witches, wizards, shamans, warlocks, mages, conjurors, sorcerers, enchanters, necromancers.

  A very long time ago, the Wardens and the Three decided it was easier to keep things simple, etymologically speaking. We practise the art of magic, so we are mages, or magicians. The greatest practitioners on Earth are known as Adepts. There are three Adepts on Earth as I write. When I die, there will be two. Until you are ready to step up, Evie, which I hope will be very soon after my death.

  No magic can prevent death. Humans are mortal. If we did not die, we would not be human, we would be something else.

  The curse that is killing me came from a god of the fourth realm. I know that means nothing to you now, but trust me, it's about as bad as it gets. Some curses can be deflected, weakened, or undone. Not this one. I've fought it for decades, but I am tired now.

  I do not know how long I have before I can no longer rely on my memory. Weeks, perhaps. It might be days. Just in case I have less time than I think, please don't forget the address at the top of my first letter. John, your grandfather, knows where it is.

  I wish I could be there with you to pass on this knowledge. I have already emphasised the importance of secrecy to the Three. I have never met another Adept from our own realm. This simple precaution means no enemy can ever discover the identity of the other Adepts if they should capture one of us. I only know that the other families live on different continents. We only communicate through our Wardens.

  Our realm, our universe, is the most fecund, when it comes to magic. It's the youngest realm, too. Some of the oldest realms are in decline. Mu has not been heard from for centuries. Shambhala fell silent after the gods' war. Over eons, realms are born, and realms die, just like everything else.

  Back to magic, then. Yes, magic. You've read those boy wizard books, I'm sure, seen some films. You probably say movies, I imagine. Tales about people with strange powers have been around ever since the first cave dwellers needed a story to go along with the pictures on the walls.

  The stories reflect the hidden reality. Magic was once a common part of what it meant to be human. Monsters roamed the earth, dragons circled the tops of unclimbable mountains. It's hard to separate myth from truth, although the older I get, the less convinced I am that there's any point in trying. Mother said little about our origins during our nightly walks to the woods. She knew I would understand when I became an Adept. You and I don't have that luxury.

  Here is the little I can tell you about our earliest history. You'll have to forgive the broad strokes.

  Once upon a time, there were seven realms in which all living beings existed, and everyone could move around them as easily as you or I might take a trip on a bus. In those days, humans could communicate with animals, trees, and plants; even talk to the wind and the rain.

  Of the other six realms, five are now unreachable from our own world to all but an Adept. But those who dwell there are not completely out of reach. They can still access the Blurred Lands, as can we, where our realities overlap. Two realms have chosen not to exercise their right to do so since the Accord. We don't know who, or what, lives there. Of the other four, only the closest realm, Da Luan, can be visited by humans. Any human can enter the Blurred Lands, but if they get through to Da Luan and spend a night there—or eat and drink anything—they cannot return. The other two realms whose inhabitants might occasionally be encountered in the Lands are Erebus and Tartarus. Erebus once gave us mythical creatures. Tartarus was the home of the beings who became our greatest threat.

  This is so difficult, Evie! Much of this will be incomprehensible until you take your place among the Three. But if, as I suspect, Astarte is planning to shatter the Accord, this realm will need you before you are ready, and every piece of knowledge I can impart may help. Please, child, bear with me.

  Right. Right. I am going to break a rule. My gut tells me you may need a clincher. Even after discovering that I planted a dream in your head.

  To avoid you dismissing me as your crazy great-grandmother, I will skip a month's worth of one-to-one lessons and give you a word of power. It doesn't matter a jot if you believe me or not. The word will work either way. I need you to do this so you know I'm telling you the truth, and that all of this is real.

  Make sure you're alone when you sing. Yes, sing. The word itself is an empty vessel. You must fill it with intent. Music is as old as magic, and as mysterious.

  Find a place with trees. Sing the word. Pick one note, and very, very gently, let it sound. Have you ever made a wine glass hum by running your finger along the rim? It's a little like that. Let it come through you rather than from you.

  When you have sung, wait. An animal or bird will come to you if you have spoken well. If you touch a tree, it will speak to you, but that is a conversation I would advise leaving until you are good and ready. Their wisdom can overwhelm the unprepared.

  Every animal and every plant, every living being, when summoned by a word of power speaks with the voice of their duen, the spirit of a species. What I mean is, if you talk to a mouse, she will not tell you about her quest to feed her family, or her keenness to avoid predators. When she speaks, you will know what it is to be her. This may change your perspective and your opinions. There's a good reason I'm a vegetarian.

  My first conversation was with a dunnock, or hedge sparrow, and I still feel a great affinity with that bird. Remember your dream? The bird who said your name was a dunnock. I hope your own experience is as gentle and as life-changing.

  I will end here, for now. Come back to this letter when you h
ave sung your word. Remember, make sure you're alone. Night time is best.

  Go, sing your word. Read more when you have tested your mad great-grandmother's claims.

  The word is orvaelae.

  Fourteen

  John finished his quick tour of the cottage and went downstairs. He was back where he'd had his first love affair. Back in the place where he'd nearly lost his mind. He found a broom in the cupboard under the stairs and spent an hour with a tea towel over his mouth and nose brushing clouds of dust towards the open door.

  After a simple supper of French bread, cheese, salad and a mug of wine, he lay down on the sofa, staring at the flaking paint on the ceiling as the last of the light leached away.

  It was 8:30. Too early to sleep, but he abandoned his attempt at reading the magic magazines he'd brought after realising he was taking nothing in. He had stopped at one glass of wine, but even that made him thick-headed and weary. His thoughts kept returning to those seven nights with Ash, thirty-two years ago. They had undoubtedly been intense, but he was a different person now. It was more than half his life ago, and he had spent twenty-five of those intervening years with Sarah, being as inexorably changed by her, as she had been by him. He looked back on the boy of his university years and hardly recognised him.

  The shutters were wide open, and the red warmth of the sinking sun filtered through the green penumbra of the trees outside, giving the patterns on the ceiling a strange, blood-purple hue. Minute by minute, the shadows gathered, and John's eyes closed.

  The first sign that he was dreaming was the sensation of floating. His surroundings were neither light nor dark. He saw colours that can only be seen in dreams, colours with no names, shifting like petrol in a rain-filled gutter.

  There was no sense of time passing. John's thoughts lost coherence and dissolved into nothing.

  He was standing outside his mother's room in Fir Trees, a care home that specialised in the treatment of dementia. The walls were an inoffensive pale yellow. Little effort had been made to soften the institutional atmosphere.

  John had often stood outside the door of room thirty-eight, wishing he had made more of the conversations with his mother before her illness took hold. In Fir Trees, she rarely spoke.

  Now, in his dream, he waited in the corridor outside her room, breathing in disinfectant and tea. There was the same stomach ache, the usual rising of bile in his throat, as he prepared himself to get through an hour with the frail, confused shred of a woman who had once been his mother.

  "Come in, John. I had the kitchen bring me a pot of Earl Grey, and they've even rustled up some fruitcake."

  Part of John knew he was dreaming, but nothing could prevent the swell of hope and love that lurched within him at her strong, happy voice. He took a step forward.

  Immediately, he was lying on the bed, propped up against three thick pillows. His mother was standing with her back to him in front of the window, looking out across the lawn to the line of trees that gave the care home its name.

  "I'm sorry this is happening, John," she said without turning. Rather than her usual shapeless nightgown, she wore a navy suit and a white blouse. "Thousands of years of balance, and now this. John, if we'd known, if we had suspected she would try to come for you again, I would have trained you to face it, even though there's so little a man can do. But she doesn't hold every card."

  Mae Aviemore turned from the window and looked at her son. While her face had been averted, John had been convinced she was young again. Her voice had the rich, warm, tone he remembered from when he was a child. But when she looked at him, he saw the face of an eighty-one-year-old woman, the skin lined and sun-damaged, her hair wispy and dry.

  John tried to speak, but his lips barely moved.

  "You can hear me, can't you, John? Nod if you can."

  With an effort, he dipped his head forwards.

  "Good. I wasn't sure this would work. It gives me some hope. Oh, my son, I would do anything, I would trade places with you if I could. No one ever thought she would risk the balance like this. She's insane. She would tear a hole in the universe for a whiff of power. Gods."

  On that disconcerting note, she stopped talking and smoothed down her dress, a gesture John remembered well. It was usually followed by a telling off. But her tone was very different in this dream. This was the mother John had always wanted, the mother who loved him, not the mother he had known, always careful to keep her distance, fearful of something she never revealed.

  She sat on the end of the bed. How many times had he done the same, talking to her but getting no response? Had it been like this for her - hearing him but unable to respond?

  "John, time works differently here. Reality is malleable and unreliable. I hoped the responsibility I carry would never touch you.That changed when she took you."

  He stared at her, trying to drink in the only complete sentences she had spoken in years while ignoring the fact that none of them made sense.

  "I would fight for you if I could, John, but I am lost. Lost to you, lost to myself. This fragment is all I have, and it will not survive long."

  His mother squeezed his hand. John lacked the energy to respond.

  "First, the little I can tell you about her. She wishes you harm. You must not forget that. When she first caught you, she wanted to dominate you. Ultimately, if she could not break your will completely, she planned to control you. If she had succeeded, the damage she would have caused might have... well. No one knows for sure, but it is obvious her confinement has not led to rehabilitation. Your strength, which must have surprised her, was enough to push her away. She thought you would crumble. You did not. You hurt her, John, and she lashed out. She underestimated you. She won't do that again."

  He sat up and looked around. He was tired, but some of his strength had returned. The bed was gone, and he was lying on a cart pulled by a placid chestnut horse. They were following a track through the trees. The dappled sunlight struggled to reach them through the dense branches above. John thought of the cottage ceiling.

  A movement near his elbow startled him, and he flinched. Looking down, he saw a field mouse staring back at him with caviar-black eyes. It spoke with his mother's voice.

  "She knows I'm here. Dammit!"

  Something jumped onto the back of the cart and streaked towards John's face. He held up his arm. A brown and white shape landed on his chest, then raced away. The mouse dropped from the cart and ran towards the trees. A brown and white cat was gaining on it. As the mouse reached the undergrowth and vanished, the cat pulled up short, its tail flicking from side to side.

  John sat back against the straw. A hedge sparrow was perched there. This time, he wasn't surprised to hear his mother's voice.

  "My time is short. You are in the Blurred Lands, John. You're protected to some extent, and you may even have a little power. But you can never access that power if you deny its existence. Let go of your certainties. There is no solid ground. Once you can embrace that, this world will reveal its secrets to you. I—"

  Her words were cut off as a sparrowhawk plummeted out of the green sky, snapped open her wings at the last moment and snatched the smaller bird. John followed her flight as she circled then dived again. Landing at the back of the cart, the sparrowhawk looked directly at him, her sharp curved beak closed, her fierce yellow eyes wild and arrogant, one powerful talon pinning her prey to the wooden planks. She didn't speak. The tiny bird was still moving, its beak opening and closing, its head straining to turn towards John.

  "Mother?"

  At that, the sparrowhawk lowered its head and, with three brisk stabs, pierced the breast of its prey and crushed its heart. When she looked at John again, the beak was smeared with blood.

  He woke up.

  Fifteen

  For half a minute, John was disorientated.

  He lay in the dark, eyes open, thinking about his mother. He pushed himself up on his elbows, reconstructing his surroundings as he reached out for the glass of water he
'd left by his side. It wasn't there. John patted the floorboards then waved his hand a few inches to each side. Still nothing. He waited for his eyes to adjust to the darkness.

  The night-filled room refused to resolve itself into recognisable shapes. He had left the torch near the sofa. Reaching out for it, his fingertips brushed the floorboards, but the torch had gone.

  Upstairs, almost directly above his head, he heard a sound as if someone had turned over in their sleep.

  Fully awake and alert now, John held his breath and listened. Nothing.

  Just when he'd convinced himself that he'd imagined it, and was on the point of going back to sleep, he heard it again. The creak of bedsprings.

  He sat up. Feeling his way along the sofa, John realised why he hadn't been able to locate his glass of water or the torch. During the night, he must have shifted position, moving closer to the kitchen. Shuffling back up to the other end of the sofa, he found the torch, and the glass of water beside it.

  He let out the breath he was holding, annoyed by how spooked he was. He drank some water and turned on the torch. The light emerged slowly, the beam pushing into the darkness as if it were encountering resistance.

  He swept the light around the cottage living room. His phone was on the floor. He thumbed on the power. 03:46am. Battery at eighteen percent. He'd have to charge it soon.

  At the bottom of the stairs, he flicked the switch for the landing light. It didn't surprise him when nothing happened.

  John whistled a jaunty tune as he ascended. He was going to check out the mysterious sound. At quarter to four in the morning. With a torch that was behaving like a prop from a horror film, leaving monochrome shadows where he needed harsh, all-revealing light.

  On the landing he went straight ahead, stood in the doorway of the bathroom and pulled the light cord. Nothing.