Plain of the Fourteen Pillars - Book 1

by T K Foster

“Briar...!” is what Billy was surprised to hear himself call out in that split second before hurtling through the universe and landing with a hard thud on the thick green grass beneath them both.

  “What the heck...?” was the next thing he said.

  They were in a heap, with Briar sprawled across Billy’s lower half and pinning him down with the weight of a pig. A drizzle of rain about them had dampened the grass plenty enough to soak through to Billy’s back and cause him a chill. A shadow fell across them in the failing light from a roughly hewn stone pillar; it was leaning ever so slightly and was accompanied by several others, all drawing their own long shadows away from the diving sun.

  “What the....” Briar repeated with a toothy grin.

  Billy pushed him off onto the wet ground and they sat up near to each other and smiled.

  Then Billy grimaced, “No no no,” he chanted and shook his head, “You can’t be here. You can’t come home with me. You need to go back.”

  Briar screwed up his snout and stared down at the ground.

  “What happened to you Briar?” Billy said, “Why did you just take off like that?”

  Briar’s look was one of confusion, not that it was much different to any other look he may have given off, pig shaped faces didn’t lean toward differentiating between emotions too easily, and to Billy it simply appeared that Briar may not have heard the question.

  “And Brand said you’d just up and left early before the sun rose,” Billy continued.

  “I did not,” Briar snapped.

  “Well, you were gone. I was a little upset at that.”

  “So why didn’t you come looking for me?”

  “We went in the same direction that Brand told us you’d gone.”

  “You wanna know what happened to me?”

  “Yeah.”

  Briar rolled his eyes and coughed.

  “I fell asleep on the bed....” he began, “and I woke up a pig on a spit!”

  “Huh...?” was all Billy said.

  “Everybody was laughing at me Billy,” Briar continued, “I was tied up to a roasting pit in the town square.... upside down.... with a rapple in my mouth.”

  Billy looked on questioningly and stupidly asked, “How’d you get there?”

  “I don’t know,” Briar said gawping, “I’m thinking the tall Irish topey, but then, when you all took off on me I wondered whether you weren’t all in on it.”

  “Never,” Billy said positively, “Do you really think Barret would do that?”

  “Do you really think he would?” Briar echoed the question.

  Billy hummed and stuck his tongue out to taste the rain. It tasted British.

  “Maybe, come to think of it....” he began hesitantly.

  “Of course he did,” Briar huffed, “When I got out of the pit I found out which way you’d gone....”

  “I knew we were being followed,” Billy said, “Why didn’t you just catch up to us?”

  “Because I thought that none of you cared that I was gone.”

  “Oh Briar, we cared. Even Barret cared in his own special way.”

  “I doubt it. He never liked me,” Briar said dropping his lip.

  By now the rain was a little heavier, and the air a little cooler. Billy stood up and reached out his hand to help Briar do likewise.

  “They kept blaming me for leaving doors open,” Billy whined, “and it was you all along. Barret thought I was going stupid.”

  “Barret’s stupid,” Briar spat.

  “He’s ok,” Billy said.

  “No.”

  Billy flicked wet hair from his forehead and then asked, “How did you follow us through the plains?”

  “Is that what we did?” said Briar, “That was weird.”

  “So it was you that kept bumping into me,” Billy now realised, “How did you know when to jump in?”

  “I didn’t,” Briar said, “After hearing you tell your story and seeing you all huddled in the middle of those rocks I figured something must be going to happen, so I jumped in there.”

  “You retreated quickly.”

  “I know! How good am I?”

  “So you managed to stay hidden all that time?”

  “Did I say I was good?” Briar said proudly.

  Again in the fading light Billy took a survey of their surroundings. The stones encircling them were in disarray, they were all roughly cut, and a number of horizontal cap stones spanned above to create odd shaped arches. It all looked somewhat familiar.

  “Do you really want me to go back?” Briar asked.

  Billy thought for a moment, “I guess, if I had a choice,” he said, “you would have to go back.”

  Briar frowned and put his hand into his jacket pocket.

  “You don’t look right here, Briar,” Billy continued, “People don’t look anything like you here, and animals don’t talk. I don’t know how I’m going to hide you.”

  Briar ran his chubby fingers over the small metal box in his pocket and flinched when he accidentally pressed one of its buttons. Nothing happened, but he guessed he needed to be careful with it.

  “I don’t want to go back,” he said softly then, “No one cares about me there.”

  He managed to acquire the box from the old man’s workshop earlier. Briar had watched him through the window while he tinkered around with at least five of them. When he was done and gone from the room Briar climbed in the window and took one.... because.... well.... he’d seen the other two guys using the same thing and he figured it looked important. Turns out it was.

  “Well,” Billy said, “we don’t have much of a choice now do we? We’ll just have to figure something out.”

  When the sun finally vanished beyond the horizon and night relieved the day, Billy came to a sudden realisation as halogen lights flickered on all around him.

  “Oh, well.... will you look at that....” he said to Briar who’s vacant expression indicated that he wouldn’t have known at all what Billy was talking about.

  Billy glanced around at the derelict stone structure that surrounded them again and smiled.

  “Stonehenge,” he reported. “Who’d have ever guessed that Stonehenge was an Elevator?”