Show Me the Way to Go Home
Episode 3 of A Light in Her Violet Eyes
A Story of the Second Realm
By R.J. Davnall
Copyright 2013 R. J. Davnall
This ebook may be copied, distributed, reposted, reprinted and shared, provided it appears in its entirety without alteration, and the reader is not charged to access it.
The Second Realm
Season 1: The Second Gift
Season 2: Children of the Wild
The Rabbit Hole:
Episode 1: Through the Fire and Flames
Episode 2: The Sins of the Brother
Episode 3: Did You Never Dream of Flying?
Episode 4: Catch Me When I Fall
Episode 5: The Only Thing We Know is That We Know Nothing
Episode 6: We Have to Go Deeper
A Light in Her Violet Eyes:
Episode 1: Wolves at the Gate
Episode 2: Dragon Fly
https://itsthefuturestupid.blogspot.com/
Contents
Show Me the Way to Go Home
About the Author
A Light in Her Violet Eyes
3. Show Me the Way to Go Home
The oncoming horde of feral Wildren was a tidal wave cresting in Atla's mind. Drawback under it sucked his thoughts away toward the vortex where the Separatists' lair had been. Gritting his teeth, he clamped his hands to the sides of his head as if to hold his skull together. It certainly felt like he wasn't succeeding. He'd felt fatigue before, but nothing like the hot line of pain carving through from just inside his right eye to the centre of his brain.
He turned and broke into a run, downhill, past Rel, past the startled pair of Pevan and Chag, still half-holding each other. They'd picked an odd time to kick off their relationship, but Atla hadn't missed the look on Pevan's face when she'd realised their mad rescue attempt had succeeded. Chag had clearly finally earned the Gatemaker's trust.
Atla put it out of his burning mind, shouting for them to follow. There was no time to make a proper Route anywhere, they just needed to get away from the torrent of hunger and menace boiling out of the remains of the white cave. He'd have to navigate as they went, until they could catch a breather somewhere.
Disrupted, half-torn-apart by the overload and resulting collapse behind them, the local Realmspace didn't favour them. Down at the bottom of Atla's brain, where he kept his Gift, chaotic currents raced back and forth, scattering and reforming like shoals of fish. There were pockets of stability, trapped bubbles of air beneath a roiling, boiling ocean, but none of them were large enough to last very long if disturbed.
Further afield, things did start to stabilise a little, but it was as if there was a hidden reef to mark the boundary of the devastation. It would slow the pursuit down somewhat if they could get past it, but it would slow them down first, and they didn't have much of a lead to play with.
Beneath his feet, the green grass of the hillside gave way to what looked like a carpet of mushrooms. They wobbled under each step, threatening to turn his ankles or trip him, but he forced himself to concentrate on the way ahead. This wasn't the First Realm. Here, if he willed it hard enough, he could ignore what his logic told him physics ought to require.
"We need a Route!" Pevan's voice, harsh but as fierce as ever. She barely sounded out of breath. What did she expect him to do? The words struck past his ear, trailing fire that he had to flinch away from. "Rel, stop! We need to buy Atla some time!"
Atla almost stumbled. He couldn't find wind to shout back that there was nothing he could do.
Rel's reply was hoarse, "No time. He's too green!" In Atla's Gift, the Clearseer's judgement boiled almost as much as it stung in his chest.
"Only thing he's done wrong... so far," Pevan shouted back, finally showing some sign of human lung capacity, "is... helping you get your... self captured."
Atla's foot bounced off a particularly springy mushroom and he tumbled into a rolling, sprawling fall. Fragments of the surface rubbed off under his hands as he stretched out to try to keep himself upright. His flailing made no difference, and he got a face-full of whatever the stuff was. It didn't smell like a fungus, close up; it was too sour and inorganic, with hints of pitch and charcoal.
Somewhere behind him, another bitter gripe from Rel blew a gout of steam through Gift. Blood roaring in his ears stole the words, but he didn't need to hear them. He could feel his own fear writhing in the deeps of his Gift, a minnow trapped ahead of the onrushing bore of the Wildren. It was that sensation, second-hand and detached, rather than anything his body felt, that drove him back up onto his hands and knees, scrabbling forwards, already feeling the futility of it.
Hands seized his shirt, pulling it tight at his throat and launching him onwards, just enough to steady him and get him running, bent double. After a few paces, he managed to straighten up and look back in thanks. Pevan, her argument with her brother forgotten, waved a hand at him, pointing ahead.
The reef where the edge of the distortion met stabler Realmspace came into view. He could feel something of its wrenched structure, oddly similar to a Sherim, through his Gift, but visually it looked completely different. Instead of tightly-knotted currents flowing around a webwork of hidden corals, a curtain of thick brown hair fell across the world, waving back and forth as if in a heavy wind.
No, it wasn't hair, he realised. It had the gloss and shine of well-tended hair, but that was an illusion of distance. Squinting, still sprinting forwards, he made out tiny silver needles or thorns glistening as the vines of the curtain whipped through the air. Small wonder that none of the Wildren beyond had strayed close; they'd have been flayed to shreds.
He looked over his shoulder, caught Pevan's eye, tried to shake his head. His balance faltered, but he managed to stagger steady again. Pevan returned a hopeless shrug. She didn't say it, but he could almost feel her thinking it's all on you now. Behind her, Rel's face was tight with exertion and something that was probably anger.
Fighting for breath, Atla closed his eyes again and tried to judge what they could do. The wave of Wildren would be on them in under a minute. The reef ahead probably cut that even shorter. Realmspace seethed around them, threatening an explosive reaction at the slightest provocation. He could feel his Gift trembling.
Above them, the sky was mostly clear. Wings would shake local Realmspace, but it probably was the least of all available risks. Gritting his teeth, Atla pointed upward as vigorously as he could, almost wrenching his shoulder as he wavered to keep his balance. The ache told as he spread his arms and threw himself skywards.
Even with everything else, he couldn't help cringing at the burst of flame-coloured plumage where his wings took. Actual fire flaring up from the overloaded Realmspace didn't help. He had to look like a stupid show-off to the others as they fought their way into the air, though in the chaos, he couldn't get a clear read on their feelings.
Beating his wings felt like trying to hold back an oncoming avalanche. The ache in his shoulder spread across his back and up into his skull, but the sky yielded. The deadly, flickering tangle of the reef dropped away. Driven beyond consciousness by anger and pain, the pursuing Wildren didn't rise in pursuit. Below, Rel was well aloft, his mind held so tightly under control that his wings barely brushed sparks from the charged air.
For a moment, Chag seemed to be struggling, Pevan hanging low to help him. Then, somehow, he was up, a petrified smear in Atla's Gift, trailing jagged rifts in the roiling water. His movement stayed erratic as he and Pevan climbed into formation.
Only when Atla was able to push back his Gift and open his eyes did he see why; Chag hung in the air as an oversized fly, all grotesque eye-bulbs and many-jointed, hairy legs. The
blur of his wings left a shimmering trail behind him, slanted slightly as he edged closer to Pevan and she edged away.
Through the wind of their flight, Atla heard her say, "I wish you wouldn't use that form."
"It's... faster for me... than wings." At least Chag had the decency to sound tired. "You want me... alive... or not?"
"Isn't that the question?" Pevan's acerbic tone made the words dance and crackle as they speared away towards the reef, already far below. She looked up, then, and called, "Get us that Route, Atla!"
Easy for her to say. His head pounded as he sunk himself back into his Gift. It rose to meet him, eager to be away. Had he ever felt anything like that from it before? He shoved the thought away, and spread feelers of thought through his inner ocean.
Something was wrong at the Court. Now that they were clear of the reef, there was a pandemonium there that was impossible to ignore. Wildren - thousands upon thousands of them - piled against the black, immovable walls. Where normally the Gift-Givers' fortress felt like a mountain in his Gift, now it felt like a towering stormcloud. One of the spires had fallen and lay flat along the horizon, a dark knife slicing between land and sky.
He couldn't think about that now. The Sherim were the fence-posts at the very edges of the Realm, almost evenly-spaced along a shape that intuition told him was a circle, even if its actual dimensions eluded
Show Me the Way to Go Home Page 1
