by Morgan Rice
“Thank you,” Kyra said. “And sorry. I had no idea I had fallen asleep in them.”
Dierdre pulled the furs tight, clearly pleased to have them back. She smiled.
“You needed them more than I did.”
Kyra stood and marveled at how quickly they moved, how much ground they were covering, and how easily.
“Much smoother than traveling by land,” she observed, studying the passing landscape. They had covered so much distance, had crossed so much of Escalon, and had done so without the danger of savage creatures or humans. She stroked Leo’s head and turned and looked at Dierdre.
“Were you sleeping all this time, too?” Kyra asked.
Dierdre shook her head, studying the waters.
“Thinking,” she replied.
“Of what?” Kyra asked, curious. Yet she realized, the moment she asked it, that perhaps she shouldn’t have inquired, given what Dierdre had just been through. She could only imagine what dark thoughts were haunting her friend.
Dierdre paused, staring out at the horizon, her eyes bloodshot, from exhaustion or crying, Kyra could not tell. Kyra could see the lingering pain and sadness in her eyes, could see she was trapped in memory.
“Of going home,” Dierdre finally replied.
Kyra wondered. She did not want to pry, but she couldn’t help herself.
“Do you have anyone awaiting you there?”
Dierdre sighed.
“My father,” she replied. “The man who gave me away.”
Kyra felt a pit in her stomach, understanding how Dierdre felt.
“He did not fight for me,” Dierdre continued. “None of them did. All of those brave warriors, who put so much stock into chivalry, did nothing when one of their own was taken away, right out from under them. Why? Because I was a woman. As if that gave them the right not to care. Because they were following a law written by men. If I was a boy, they would have fought to the death before I was taken away. But because I was a girl, somehow it didn’t matter. It was men whom I lost all respect for on that day—my father most of all. I trusted him.”
Kyra remained silent, understanding all too well her feeling of betrayal.
“And yet you are returning to them,” Kyra noted, confused.
Dierdre teared up. She fell silent for a long time.
Finally, she wiped away a tear and spoke with difficulty.
“He is still my father,” she finally said. “I don’t know where else to go.” She took a deep breath. “Besides, I want him to know. I want them all to know what they did. I want them all to be ashamed. I want them to understand that the value of a girl is as great as that of a boy. I want them to understand that their actions—their lack of caring—had consequences. I don’t want to give them all the chance to avoid me, to be able to forget what they did or what happened to me. I want to be there, in their presence, a thorn in their side that they cannot avoid—and be a living testament to their shame.”
Kyra felt a deep sorrow as she pondered how her friend felt.
“And then?” Kyra asked. “When you’re done shaming them?”
Dierdre slowly shook her head, tears in her eyes.
“I don’t know what is left for me,” she replied. “I feel washed up. As if my childhood was taken from me. I used to dream of being taken away by a prince—yet I feel that no one would want me now.”
Dierdre began to cry, and Kyra leaned over and draped an arm around her shoulder, trying to calm her, while Leo came over and laid his head in her lap.
“Don’t think that way,” Kyra said. “Sometimes, life can be filled with horrible things. But life goes on. It must go on. And sometimes, even years later, it can also be filled with amazing things. You just need to hang in there, to give it time, to give life a chance to be born again. If you can hang in there long enough, life will give you a fresh slate. It will become brand new. The horrors of your past will disappear, as if they never happened. Old memories will fade so much that one day you won’t even be able to remember what it was that troubled you.”
Dierdre studied the river, listening quietly.
“You are not your past,” Kyra continued. “You are your future. Horrible things happen to us not to trap us in the past, but to help us decide on our future. They make us stronger. They teach us we have more power than we knew. They show us how strong we are. The question is: what will you choose to do with that strength?”
Kyra saw her friend pondering her words, and she fell silent, allowing her her space. Speaking of past struggles, she could not help but think of her own pain and suffering, and she realized she was speaking as much to herself as she was to her friend. It seemed everyone she knew, now that she thought about it, young and old, was suffering in some way, was haunted by some memory. Was that the way of life? She wondered.
Kyra watched the river pass by and the sky grow darker, changing color again and again. She did not know how much time passed when she was snapped out of her reverie by the sound of a splashing and a snapping noise. She examined the waters and saw small, yellow, fluorescent creatures floating on the surface, like jellyfish, their tiny teeth snapping at the air. They all floated toward the river bank, and she looked over and watched the exotic creatures lodge themselves in the mud, swarming with them, making the muddy banks glow yellow. It made Kyra not want to leave her raft.
They turned a bend in the river and a new noise filled the air, setting Kyra on edge. It sounded like rapids—yet she was confused as she looked out and saw none. Dierdre turned, too, standing, hands on her hips, studying the horizon with a face filled with concern.
Suddenly, her face fell.
“We must turn back!” she cried out, panicked.
“What is it?” Kyra asked, alarmed, jumping to her feet.
“The Great Falls!” Dierdre cried out. “I did not think they existed!”
Dierdre grabbed an oar and rowed backwards frantically, trying to slow their descent. Their raft slowed, but not enough. The noise grew louder, and Kyra could begin to feel the spray, the clouds of mist even from here.
“Help me!” Dierdre cried.
Kyra jumped into action, grabbed the other oar, and began rowing. But the currents grew stronger and, try as she did, she was unable to reverse course.
“We can’t fight it!” Kyra yelled out, shouting to be heard over the noise of the falls.
“Row sideways!” Dierdre yelled back. “For the river bank!”
Kyra followed Dierdre’s lead, and they rowed sideways with all they had; soon, to her relief, the raft began to change course, drifting sideways for the muddy banks. The falls were growing louder, too—now hardly twenty yards away—a great white spray rising into the sky, and Kyra knew they had little time.
They were closing in on the river bank, about to make it to safety, when suddenly, their raft rocked violently. Kyra looked down, confused, not comprehending what had happened—there were no boulders she could see below.
It happened again, and this time Kyra stumbled and fell down to the raft as it rocked from side to side. She knelt there and looked down at the waters, wondering—when her heart plummeted to see a yellow tentacle rise up out of the waters and latch onto the raft. There emerged another tentacle—then another—and Kyra watched with horror as an enormous squid-like creature emerged, its tentacles reaching out and spreading across their boat. Bright yellow, luminescent, it opened its jaws right for her.
Kyra and Dierdre rowed frantically, trying to get away, but the creature was too strong, pulling them right toward it. Kyra realized they would never make it to shore, even though it was only feet away. They would die at the hands of this beast.
Worse, they were now back in the current, drifting closer to the falls, hardly ten yards away.
Desperate, Kyra reached back, grabbed her staff, released it into two parts, and raised it high. She brought down its sharp blades on the creature’s tentacles as hard as she could.
The creature screeched, an awful noise, as green pus emerg
ed from it. Yet still, it did not release their boat. It raised its jaws higher, and Kyra knew that in moments it would swallow them whole.
Kyra knew they had no choice—and she had to make a quick decision.
“Drop the oars!” she cried to Dierdre, who was still frantically try to row away. “We have to jump!”
“Jump!?” Dierdre called back, frantic, her voice barely audible over the deafening roar of the falls.
“Now!” Kyra shrieked, as the beast’s jaws were but feet away and closing in.
Kyra grabbed Leo and grabbed Dierdre’s hand, and she turned and jumped, pulling them both overboard and into the rapids.
A moment later they were all submerged in the icy waters of the Tanis, the currents pulling them for the falls. Kyra saw the squid, glowing beneath the water, too and turned and saw the falls but feet away. The fall might kill them—but that creature certainly would.
Water gushing, Kyra felt herself propelled downriver and she braced herself as she began to go over the falls. Beside her, she saw Leo and then Dierdre go over, airborne, shrieking—when suddenly something wrapped around her leg, keeping her back. She looked upriver to see a glowing tentacle wrapped around her leg, pulling her back.
Kyra was horrified to realize she was stuck on the precipice, and to see the creature’s jaws closing in on her as it pulled her close, using its magnificent strength to keep her from going over. She looked back and saw the falls behind her and ironically she wished for nothing more than to go over.
About to be eaten, desperate, Kyra thought quickly. She raised the two halves of her staff, still in her hand, and with one last desperate effort, she threw them at the beast. She watched them sail through the air, and she prayed her aim was true.
There came an awful shriek, and she watched with satisfaction as the short spears landed in the squid’s eyes.
The creature released its grip on her foot—and a moment later, Kyra felt herself gushing downriver, over the falls, plummeting through the air and mist and spray, and hurtling down to the rocks a hundred feet below.
CHAPTER TWENTY TWO
Merk jabbed his staff into the moist forest floor, poking leaves beneath his feet, hiking as he had been for days back through Whitewood, and determined to stop at nothing this time until he reached the Tower of Ur. As he walked, he closed his eyes and, try as he did, he could not stop seeing that scene of grief flashing through his mind, the girl, her family, her weeping…. Her final words still rang in his ears. He hated himself for returning for her—and he hated himself for leaving.
Merk did not understand what was happening to him; all his life he had been unsusceptible to guilt, to rebuke, to anyone else’s problems. He had always been his own man, on his own island, his own mission. He had always made it a point to keep himself at arm’s length from the world, not to involve himself in anyone else’s troubles—unless they needed his special skills and there was hefty payment involved.
But now, for some reason, Merk could not stop thinking of this girl he barely knew, of her rebuke of his character, even though he had done the right thing. He didn’t know why it bothered him, but it did.
He, of course, could not return for her again. She had her chance. What bothered him was why he had turned back at all. He longer knew what was right: to live a life for himself, or to live a life of others? Had his encounter with her been a lesson? If so, what was the lesson learned?
What was wrong, Merk wondered, with just living a life for yourself? For your own selfish needs? For your own survival? Why did people have to get entangled in other people’s lives? Why should they care? Why couldn’t other people count on themselves for survival? And if they could not, then why should they have a right to survive?
Something was poking at his consciousness, an awareness, perhaps, that there was a greater world out there, a realization that his having only looked out for himself his entire life had lead him to a deep loneliness. It was a realization that helping other people might be the best way to help himself, too. He realized it gave him some feeling of connection to the greater world without which he felt he would eventually shrivel up and die.
It was a purpose. That was it. Merk craved purpose the way a starving man craves food. Not the purpose of some other man who was hiring him, but a purpose of his own. It wasn’t a job he needed—it was meaning. What was meaning? He wondered. It was elusive, felt always just out of reach. And he hated things he could not easily put his finger on.
Merk looked up as he hiked through Whitewood, its stark white leaves shimmering in the late afternoon sun, the golden rays of an early sunset cutting through them and casting them in a beautiful light. This place was magical. A warm breeze blew, the weather finally turning, the rustling sound filling his ears, and as leaves fell from trees they showered down all around him. Merk forced himself to turn his thoughts back to his hike, his destination. The Tower of Ur.
Merk already saw himself as a Watcher, entering the sacred order, protecting the kingdom from trolls and anyone else who dared tried to steal the Sword of Fire. He knew it was a sacred duty, knew the fate of Escalon depended upon it, and he wanted nothing more than that sense of duty. He could not wait for his talents to be put to use for a good cause, not a selfish one. It was the highest order he could imagine.
Yet Merk was struck with sudden worry as a terrible thought crossed his mind like a shadow: what if they turned him away? He had heard the Watchers were a diverse group, made up of human warriors, like he, but also of another race, an ancient race, part human and part something else—famed for turning people away. He had no idea how they would react to his presence. What would they be like? he wondered. Would they accept him? And what if they did not?
Merk crested a hill and as he did, a valley spread out beneath him and in the far distance, a great peninsula reached out into the Sea of Sorrow, water sparkling all around it. He gasped. At its windswept end, there it sat: the Tower of Ur. Merk’s heart beat faster at the sight. Surrounded by ocean on three sides, huge waves crashing into the rocks and sending up sprays of mist, sparkling in the sunlight, the tower was set in the most haunting, beautiful landscape he had ever seen. A hundred feet high, fifty feet wide, shaped in a perfect circle, its stone was ancient, a shade of white he had never seen before, looking as if it had stood for centuries. It was capped by a smooth, round golden dome, reflecting the sun, and its entrance was marked by soaring doors, thirty feet high, arched, they, too, made of shining gold.
It was the sort of place Merk expected to see in a dream. It was a place he’d always wondered about, and a place he could hardly fathom was real. Seeing it now, in person, took his breath away. He did not believe in energy, yet still, he could not deny that there was some sort of special energy radiating off the place.
Merk set off downhill with a new bounce to his step, elated to be on the final leg of his journey. The forest opened up and he found himself a smooth, green countryside, the entrance to the peninsula, warmer here than the rest of Escalon. He felt the sun shining down on his face, heard the crashing of the waves, and saw the open sky before him, and he felt a deep peace. He felt, finally, he had arrived.
Merk hiked, the tower looming in the distance, and he was baffled to see no one standing guard around it. He had expected to find a small army guarding it on all sides, protecting the most precious relics of Escalon, and he was perplexed. It was as if it were abandoned.
Merk couldn’t understand. How could a place be so well-guarded, and yet have no one standing outside? He sensed this place was unlike any other he had been, that he would learn things here about the art of combat that he would never learn elsewhere.
Merk continued hiking and reached a broad plateau of grass before the tower. Before him sat a curious sculpture: a stone staircase, circular, rising perhaps twenty feet high, its steps intricately carved in ivory. The steps turned and twisted and led, oddly, to nothing but air. It was a freestanding spiral staircase, and Merk could not understand its meaning or symbol
ism—or why it was placed here in the midst of this grass field. He wondered what other surprises lay ahead.
Merk continued on and as he approached the tall, golden doors to the tower, hardly twenty yards away, his heart pounded in anticipation. He felt dwarfed by this place, in awe of it. He walked reverentially up to the doors, stopping before them, and slowly reached up his palms and laid them on the gold. The metal was cold and curiously dry, despite the ocean breezes; he could feel the contours of the intricately carved symbols, smooth in his palm. He craned back his neck and looked straight up at the tower, and admired its height, its immaculate design. Rarely in his life had he felt in the presence of something greater than himself—architecturally, physically, and spiritually—yet now, for the first time, he did.
Merk studied the ancient golden doors, like a portal to another world, guarding, he knew, the greatest treasure in Escalon. They gleamed in the sun, and Merk was taken not only by their power, but also their beauty. This tower doubled as a fortress and as a work of art.
He saw an ancient script etched into the gold, and wished desperately that he could understand the meaning. He felt a deep regret that he could not read or write, felt ashamed as he tried. Those who lived inside would know more than he ever could. He was not of the noble class, and while never before had he wished that he was, on this day, he did.
Merk searched the doors for a knob, a knocker, some point of entry—and he was surprised to find none. This place seemed to be perfectly sealed.
He stood there, wondering. This place was a deepening mystery. There came no noise, no activity inside or out, there were no Watchers, no humans—nothing but silence. He was baffled. There came only the sound of the wind, a gale whistling through, rippling off the ocean, blowing so hard it nearly knocked him off balance before it disappeared just as quickly. It felt as if this place had been abandoned.
