by Sophia Sharp
“Do not try to lie to me either, Laura. I will know if you are truthful or not.”
“How can I trust you?” Laura asked finally. She had to buy herself more time to think. She was also becoming more aware of the wound she had taken in the human world. A dull pain had started to resonate in her heel. Wait – that was it. If the elder knew her memories, he knew of the wound. And he knew that without the proper attention, she would die. He was planning on using her to destroy his competition, and then let her rot away while he inherited all the power of the elder council! That was the only explanation for his offer.
“I can see the scheming in your eyes,” he said as he turned to her. “You think you can use me to kill the others, and then kill me when my back is turned. And you think we are the corrupt ones? Look at yourself in the mirror, Laura! Are you truly so pure as you claim to be? Your whole quest is precipitated on the idea that the elders do ill to the Vassiz. You are a fool! We keep order to the species so that we may continue to survive in a world not suited for us. And you wish to uproot that, simply because you heard of some prophecy? You trust too much, and think too little!”
“You lie!” Laura hissed. “I will never help you!”
The elder looked at her and smiled sadly. “So that is your choice, then? You will not aid me?” He shook his head regretfully. “Then your fate is sealed.”
A sudden blast from the fireplace shook the whole cabin. And the next thing Laura knew, the entire cabin was engulfed in flames. Laughter filled her head, laughter from the man before her. He stood there, his head thrown back in a hideous laugh, as the fire raged toward her. Laura felt no heat, but knew instinctively the flame was dangerous. It would still burn if it touched her.
She started to run to the door, but her feet would not move. The elder had her bound again! The flames from the fire pressed toward her. Laura needed to get free. She drew on the torrial, willing the flames to go away… and nothing happened. She tried again, to the same result. Why could she not control what was happening here? The fire circled around her, burning the walls and the floor. She could no longer see the elder through the flames. It would only take a few more seconds for her to be engulfed in it, and…
Another crash sounded, and a draft of air beat down the flames. Laura looked to her side, and saw the door had smashed open. A familiar figure stood there, outlined only by the light of the fire. Gray! How did he get here? That didn’t matter now. He was here for her.
Gray roared, and the sound reverberated through the cabin. The flames licked the edges of the doorway, but Gray didn’t seem to notice. His eyes locked on the elder, and he charged him.
The elder seemed just as surprised as Laura to see the bear there, but masked that quickly as he ducked out of the way. Gray’s vicious swipe just missed the elder’s side. Gray let out another roar, and quickly turned back, throwing himself at the man again. But the elder was not concerned with fighting back. Instead, he bolted out the cabin.
As soon as he was gone, the bonds holding Laura disappeared. And the flames died back. Laura ran to Gray and embraced him with all her strength. Twice now, he had saved her life.
On contact, the connection between them formed instantly. It wasn’t as strong as she remembered, but it was there. Through it, Laura sent her deepest appreciation to Gray. Instead of her looking out for him, as she had thought would be the case when she picked him up as a cub, he was the one looking after her.
Laura turned to the open door. The elder was nowhere to be seen. But Laura could have pointed to him with her eyes closed. Something he had done, in that moment he ravaged through her mind, had linked him to her. And her to him.
Laura stepped out from the cabin. It was time to repay the elder for all he had done. She went after him.
Chapter Fourteen
~The Black Forest~
Laura could feel the elder running just on the edge of her mind. He had gone far in such a short time, but no matter where he went she could find him. He had reached the bottom of the mountain already, and was moving rapidly away. Why? Why did he run? She didn’t know. But she had to go after him.
She was conscious of Gray beside her. Even if she could tell where to go through the thick fog, he could not. He had to be able to see. Laura reached through her figurine torrial and willed the cloud to go away, knowing it was pointless but wanting to try, like she had many times before. To her surprise, the mist lifted. And the entire top of the mountain was revealed.
She blinked in amazement. Why was she able to do it now but not before? The only difference was that the elder was gone. Was he holding it in place earlier, like he had held Laura’s bonds? It seemed plausible.
She scanned the earth before her. The ground was dry and cracked, fissured in places, but otherwise completely flat. She saw the four statues circling the cabin, each looking directly at it. She had a feeling they had something to do with the strength the elder exhibited over her. Maybe outside their band, she would be able to control the dream realm like she was used to. Like she was supposed to, with the figurine torrial. She hoped that was the case, because if the elder could manhandle her again like he had in the cabin, she would have no chance, Gray or not.
It was time to find out. The elder was moving fast, but toward what, Laura could not say. She ran to the brink of the mountaintop and looked out. Far in the distance, moving on the ground with immense speed, was a tiny black dot. The elder. She looked farther, and found a change in landscape in front of him. Thick trees created a solidified edge there, and continued on as far as Laura could see. A forest, but unlike any Laura had ever seen. That she could make out each individual tree from this distance told her just how enormous they really were. The trunks would have stood wide as city blocks, and the tops higher than the world’s tallest skyscrapers. That forest was where the elder was going. She had to follow.
Gray came beside her. He was also looking out, in the same direction she was. She knew his eyesight was not as good as hers, but the bond that existed between them could overcome that. Laura reached out and placed a hand on his back, and the wavering connection between them hefted into place. It was not very strong, not here in the dream realm, but just enough to allow Laura to transfer to Gray what she saw. She felt affirmation shoot back to her, and knew that Gray understood where to go. The trouble was that he could not move as fast as her, and she needed to follow the elder immediately. But as long as Gray understood the direction he could follow her.
“I’ll see you soon,” Laura whispered, and started down the mountain much the same way as she had come up. She jumped, and pulled through the torrial to shift the ground up toward her. The movement of the earth would not affect Gray or the elder, not the way she did it. It was only from her perspective that the ground moved up to meet her – anybody watching would only see her flying down through the air with enormous speed.
Laura reached the bottom of the mountain in less than a minute. She looked out toward the elder. She could not see him now, not when she was on the same level as him, but could have pointed in his direction like a compass pointing north. Taking one look back at the mountain, and imagining Gray making his way down somewhere near the top, Laura sped in the elder’s direction.
The ground was barren and dry, which gave her perfect traction for the run. Soon, she was moving so fast that her side vision streaked, blurring the land and rocks into indistinguishable shapes and shadows. The sun had not yet returned from its concealment, but that did not affect Laura’s speed. She could see just as well in the dark as in light, especially when she wasn’t stymied by an unnatural fog.
One thing she could not see straight away, however, was the forest where the elder was headed. It was so far ahead that the curve of the earth blocked it from her line of sight. Had she not seen it form the top of the mountain, she would have never guessed it to be there.
She ran over the flat land, sometimes swerving left or right to avoid an unexpected boulder in her way. She could feel the elder in her mi
nd. He was running with the same speed she was. She ground her teeth in frustration. At this rate, she would not be able to catch up.
Then, abruptly, the elder stopped. Laura felt him turn and look back, right at her. And then he vanished.
Laura missed a step and went flying to the ground. She caught herself just before making contact, ducking her shoulder to roll deftly over it.
Panic gripped her when she stood. The elder must have known about the connection, and somehow he had shielded himself from her. Did that go both ways? If she could not feel him, did that mean he could not feel her? Because otherwise, if only he was hidden from her, and she remained visible to him… well, it meant that going forward would be as good as walking into a lion’s den blindfolded.
Yet there was something about that turn back, that motion the elder made… It felt as if he were saying, come and get me.
Laura fixed the spot where he disappeared in her mind. And she started for it.
Not long after, the first line of trees appeared over the horizon. They were even bigger that Laura expected. Their trunks were not as wide as a city block, but rather the size of three or four blocks combined. Enormous, bushy branches extended down from the top, and the smallest leaf was the size of a family minivan. These trees were definitely not a natural formation – they were only something possible only in dream.
Laura ran toward them. The dark seemed to magnify itself beyond the first row of trees, becoming thicker and even more menacing. And based on the spot the elder disappeared in her mind, Laura still had quite a way to go.
She slowed as she came before the forest. The dark trees loomed high over her, their thick branches and leaves creating a canopy above that no light could penetrate. She heard no sound, which made it all the more uncanny. There was always sound around living things like trees, either of the wind rustling through the branches, or small animals running to and fro. But here, there was nothing.
Laura went to the first row of trees cautiously. The space between each trunk was massive, of course, but when Laura looked deeper into the woods she saw how shrouded everything really was. Not a single stream of light penetrated the thick barrier. She felt tiny, like an ant, lost in something much bigger than herself.
Yet the elder was somewhere in there. Why had he chosen this precise location to go to? Laura was sure there was something less than pleasant waiting for her within. But she had no choice except to go forward. Taking a deep breath, she stepped into the forest.
The air around her shimmered momentarily and then broke with a loud pop. And instantly, the entire illusion of the trees was gone. What stood in their place were strange, twisted rocks that curved in unnatural formations. They were tall, yes, but no more so than a two- or three-story house. They were definitely not the same height as the trees.
Laura stopped and looked around. So the trees were nothing more than some trick created by the elder to confuse her. But, why? And what was the significance of the rocks that now stood in their place?
The rocks did match the landscape a lot more than the trees had before. And there were many of them, extending as far forward as Laura could see. She had never seen a formation like this before.
But she didn’t have time to gape over things like that. The elder was still inside, somewhere in front of her. She focused on the spot he had disappeared in her mind, and started toward it. There was still a long way to go.
She didn’t take even ten steps forward before an uncanny rumbling shook the ground. Dust and sand from the rocks around her rained down. A low, menacing groan sounded together with the rumbling. Then both noises cut off at the same time.
Laura froze and looked around. What was that? The way the rocks were spaced, less densely than the trees had been earlier, meant that she could see pretty well in any direction. She scanned the area around her for a threat. She saw nothing except the strange, twisting rocks.
But she couldn’t simply ignore that noise. Something had caused it. She knew she had to be careful going in.
She started forward again, in the direction of the elder. Or rather, where the elder had last been. She did not run anymore, though. There was no point rushing headfirst into danger. She knew it would find her eventually.
She walked on slowly, and kept her eyes open for anything unusual around her. She had the gifts of the Vassiz, including her augmented senses, and was keen on not letting them go to waste. She strained her ears for the barest hint of noise, but found nothing. Her eyes pierced the darkness ahead, and to the sides, but saw nothing. Even her sense of smell found nothing in the dry air.
She went ahead carefully. Every step she took could be a step into some unexpected danger. She wondered what all these rocks really were. And how they had formed. The trees she saw before were an illusion, and as such could only have existed here, but everything else had some basis on reality. These rocks were only here because they were a reflection of something similar in the human world.
She was about halfway to the spot where the elder disappeared when that rumbling came again. It was stronger this time, though, and accompanied by an overwhelmingly loud groaning that echoed from all around her. The ground shook beneath her feet. Laura whipped her head from side to side, trying to find the source. She could not. The noise came from everywhere at once, surrounding her and distorting her senses. It was so loud, and so low, like a mega subwoofer. She did not know whether it was the sound that caused the rumbling, or the rumbling that caused the sound. But she knew it was something dangerous.
The rumbling grew stronger, until the entire earth shook with the tremors. Laura had to fight to stay on her feet. Small fragments of stone rained down all around her, breaking free from the unstable rocks. Cracks started to run across the ground, small at first, but they quickly grew to fissures as large as her wrist. For the briefest flash of a moment, she felt the elder again. There.
Her eyes darted in his direction. He had moved, had come closer to her, and circled around to a new spot. Did he become visible to her so he could sense where she was? That was the only explanation for the momentary lapse. The shielding, however he did it, must work both ways. And he was making sure she followed.
An especially strong tremor caught her feet and she could no longer keep her balance. She fell to the side, catching herself on one of those rocks. Her eyes, however, did not leave direction the elder was.
As abruptly as it started, the rumbling stopped. The low noise cut off, and everything was still. Laura looked around with wide eyes. In the aftermath of that, her beating heart seemed to drum so loud that anybody in a ten-mile radius would hear. The small rocks and dust that had been upended in the shaking slowly settled to the ground. Everything was quiet.
Laura pushed herself off the rock suspiciously. Something was going on. Somethi—
Her thoughts were cut off as the ground a hundred feet away erupted in a massive shower of rock and earth. For a second, Laura thought a bomb had gone off. But then she saw what really caused it.
Bursting out of the ground was a snake of unbelievable proportions. Its head could have easily have been the size of a small house. Large, dark eyes were framed by scaly skin, creating the appearance of eyebrows where there were none. A tongue slithered in and out of its enormous mouth. The rest of its body – at least, however much of it was above ground – was colored in vicious slashes of red and yellow. Laura had never seen such a beast before.
Time seemed to slow for Laura as the snake looked around, searching the ground. Then its eyes found her, and it whipped forward.
Laura barely had enough time to think before she found herself running for her life. Thank god she could move quickly. The snake came right after her, barreling over the ground and through the rocks as if they weren’t even there. Every single one of the odd-shaped boulders was smashed to bits, leaving only mayhem and devastation in their wake. Laura ran hard, not daring to glance back more than every few seconds. The snake was right on her, and each time she looked, seemed t
o be getting closer. The ground shook with the immense weight of the beast, and the air was filled with sounds of destruction. Nothing stood in the way of the snake’s enormous body.
Laura knew even she could not fight off something like that. The snake was a monster. She tried the torrial, willing the snake to disappear, to dissipate, to light on fire, to shrivel up and die, but none of those things worked. She could feel the strain of the dream realm as it accommodated the nightmarish creature. She knew, because the torrial was not working, that the elder was control the snake. Much as he was in control when he held her in his cabin with those invisible bonds. The torrial did not seem to give her control over things that somebody else had created in this world.
The snake chased after her, and Laura ran for her life. She did not want to think what would happen if the snake managed to catch up to her.
She was fast, yes, but the snake was even faster. It was a monstrosity, and Laura was sure it was only moving forward at a leisurely pace. She was its prey, and the beast was enjoying the hunt. Whenever it so choose, it would increase its speed and catch her easily.
Laura glanced back again. Right when she did, the snake whipped its tongue out and flogged it side to side. The tongue darted toward her, going for her foot. Laura jumped up at the last possible moment, and the snake missed. She had an unpleasant flashback to fighting the daemon, to the way it used its own tongue to catch her. Laura landed and sped forward, with as much speed as she could muster, fleeing for dear life.
Chapter Fifteen
~A Shining Cord~
