In his mind he took her hand and felt a subtle twisting of reality. He blinked. A lush green meadow spread in front of him, dotted with tall maple and oak trees. Junipers, heavy with rich purple berries filled the warm soft air with a clean, resinous scent, and flowers bloomed in random clumps, sweetening the heavens with the perfume of roses and lilies and flowers Jorse couldn’t begin to imagine. Anya led the way to a circle of fat overstuffed armchairs, all covered with soft velour of varying floral prints. On the low circular table set within the circle of chairs rested several hardcover books, and a pot of tea, with two cups.
“Tea?” Anya asked aloud, smiling at Jorse’s stunned expression.
“Uhh.” He replied intelligently, as he sat. “Sure.” He picked up the nearest book. It was Kahlil Gibran’s The Prophet, and he raised an eyebrow.
“I find it relaxing after a long day in the saddle.”
“Ummm...” Jorse said, taking a sip of his tea. “SADDLE!!” He was on his feet. “Then who the hell is steering the damn horse if I’m here chatting with you and drinking tea?”
Anya took another sip of tea, and set the cup down. “You are, of course; the part of you that doesn’t have to think—only drive and follow the other horses.”
Jorse sat back down, feeling foolish. “Did Selene show you how to create this... place?” He asked, just to change the subject.
“No.” Anya smiled. “The K’Dreex developed this capability long ago. They call it a pocket universe. That is a better name than calling it a shared hallucination, isn’t it?”
“Fitting name.” Jorse agreed, looking around. “I don’t suppose that I would be able to create a pocket universe of my own, would I?”
Anya looked at the ground and blushed lightly. “I was kind of hoping that both of us could use this one. It’s quite nice, really.”
Jorse opened his mouth, and then closed it without saying a word, as he took in Anya’s look. “I would love to use your pocket universe, if you would let me.” He replied seriously.
The young woman’s face lit up, and her smile was at least a million volts. “Let me show you around, then. You’ll love the gardens and trees and the river...”
“River?” Jorse interrupted. “You have a river here?”
“Oh, yes. After a long day I often go down and soak my feet in the water.”
Jorse was on his feet now. “Would there happen to be a place big enough for us to go swimming?”
Anya smiled. “Yes, I believe there is, or there will be by the time we get there.”
His eye sparkled with mischief. “So.... we might go skinny dipping?”
“Jorse!” Anya’s face turned red and then she turned and ran. Over her shoulder she shouted, “Last one to take all their clothes off has to make dinner!”
Jorse ran... He also made dinner before they finally returned to the slowly plodding horses. No one had even noticed that they were gone.
The horses wound up the narrow twisting trails until, sometime in the middle of the chill afternoon, the exhausted travelers finally reached the top. Under a pale and sickly sun Jorse looked in some disbelief at the top of the first, and lowest, escarpment. Towering mountains rose and rose in front of him, until they disappeared into the hazy distance. The biting wind sliced through the peaks and crags with a low keening wail and he shuddered, despite the warm coat he had taken from the bandit camp. The bitterly cold air felt dry, and bore the crisp scent of cedars.
“It must be nice up here—during the summer, that is.” He said to Gorku’s retreating back.
“Summer this is. Winter—uncomfortable. Snow...” He made a gesture two feet over the horse’s head.”
“Oh.” Jorse replied in a small voice. He was beginning to wonder why he had ever left Boktor. He could have just rescued Dala and stayed there with her. And what? A cynical part of his mind asked. Live a life of petty crime until they catch you and kill you - again? Or maybe kill Dala? Jorse glared at an inoffensive sparrow that had perched on a nearby cedar branch, and was eying him warily.
“Make good camp there.” Gorku pointed to a tightly packed circle of mountain cedars a quarter mile away, set at the very base of the towering crags. “Sundown wind stop. We be plenty warm then.” He leered at Dala. “No freeze leetle girl, ha!” He began to laugh as he urged his shaggy horse into a grudging trot.
There was an abundance of wood for a fire, and for the first time that day Jorse really felt warm. Dala sat next to him, silent and shivering, despite the extra blanket he had draped across her shoulders.
“The thing that burns me the most,” she said quietly to him, as they relaxed after dinner. “is that Gorku was right. This weather chills me to the bone.”
“It freezes us all, Dala,” he whispered back.
“Gorku, Darko and Uncle Mirek don’t appear to feel it at all—and you...” She gave Jorse a level look. “You...”
“Just soldier on, despite everything that gets thrown in my path. I know.” Jorse stared into the fire. That was it. Selene knew that he would soldier on. He might get hurt, he might want to quit, but he would soldier on. He was going exactly where Selene wanted him to go—doing exactly what she wanted him to do. The good little soldier. Well, he wouldn’t quit, but by the hells he was going to tell her what he thought. He stood up and brushed dinner’s crumbs from his pants. “I need to take a walk, for a while.” He turned toward the trees, and Dala rose to follow.
“Where are you going?” Her voice was curious, concerned.
They were standing just outside the ring of firelight and Jorse looked up. Standing like a pencil was a sheer, flat topped spire at least three hundred feet tall, the top etched in the night against the shining blue moon Elysium, full in the black sky. The silver rings of Thalasium seemed to shimmer, casting strange haunting shadows across the mountains. He pointed to the spire.
“I’ll be up there.”
Dala blinked, smiled and then shook her head. “It’s going to be a long climb, especially on a cold night like this.”
Without responding, Jorse walked away from camp, and kept walking until he came to a precipice that fell off into the valleys between the vast ranges. A thousand feet below, the cold rocks were shrouded in darkness. He looked at Dala and smiled. “Why, my dear, I’m not going to climb.” He stepped off the edge, and heard Dala gasp in fright. “I’m going to fly!” Jorse took three steps on thin air before he turned to look at Dala. He gave her a slow wink, and then rose into the night sky and disappeared. Far below him he heard a curse.
It was intensely cold, but low scrub junipers broke most of the wind up on the spire top.
There was a slight shimmer in the air and Selene stood before them - in a flowered swimsuit. “Yeow!” The Goddess almost shrieked as she waved an arm. The three stood on a sun drenched white beach, with crystal waves from a vibrant teal colored sea lapping at their feet. The temperature, after the cold rock spire, was sweltering. Selene let out a breath and rubbed her arms. “Feel free to take off whatever clothes you think necessary. There is no one else around.”
Jorse stripped to his smallclothes and Anya, after disappearing for a moment, returned in a modest blue swimsuit.
Jorse stood, all his attention riveted on Anya. “Well, now...” His voice trailed off.
“Do you like it?” Anya’s voice was almost girlish, as she did a slow pirouette for him.
“That outfit reveals more than it conceals, and it hints at everything else.” He replied, trying to catch his breath. “It even shows the dimples on your ...” Jorse blushed deeply as he remembered that they weren’t alone. Anya’s laugh was like silver bells.
“All right, children.” Selene said, smiling affectionately. “Was there something you wanted to talk about, or was this purely a social call? So few people call on me to just say hello; it’s always Selene give me this or grant me that.”
“I know what you’re up to, Selene.” Jorse said, sitting down on the beach. “Everything we’ve gone through has been part of your plan, hasn’t it?”
“Well,” the Goddess sat, sipping a fruity drink topped with a small red paper umbrella. “The sword in the back was unexpected. The fool bandit was supposed to hit your arm, and then Anya, Dala and Tessa would have healed it. The next day you would have left for the bandit camp, to find the Queen still there. Now we have to do things the hard way.” Her look was serious. “I don’t want you to die, Jorse. You are too valuable to me.”
“Then I’m just a tool, a valuable tool, but still just a tool.” There was anger in his voice.
“Yes, Jorse, just a tool—as all the rest of my children are tools, as my brothers and sisters are my tools, and as I myself am a tool. I will do whatever it takes to save this world, and the people on it. Rhiannon, my Sister, felt the same way and it may have cost her, her very life. Medin is her moon, by the way, and her followers all wore white. My own Priestesses wear white to honor her.
“Do... you really consider us your children?” Jorse asked and paused.
“Oh, Jorse, of course I do.” She laughed, and it held a sad note. “Few there are who I invite to serve with me into eternity. If you had died of that sword wound, I would have drawn you and Anya to me, and we would have moved on to find someone else to do our bidding.”
Jorse felt ashamed of himself for bothering her. “I’m sorry, Selene. I didn’t know.”
Selene looked up and Jorse was shocked to see tears in her eyes. She set her drink down, took two steps forward and swept Jorse and Anya into her arms in a tight embrace. “I don’t say this often, children, for I have no one left to say it to. I love you. I love you both and my blessing is upon you.”
The benediction was strangely formal, and afterward Jorse felt different, aware perhaps of the being who called herself Selene, and her vast loneliness. He was aware, too, of his own place, as small as it was, in her heart.
It was a long cold walk back to the campsite, but Jorse and Anya didn’t feel the biting, cutting wind. There was too much to think about, and their feelings were too open and exposed. She held his hand the whole way, her shadowy fingers touching his, gently, lightly, even as he crawled into his blankets—and for a long time he held her as she cried for the lonely Goddess.
The day’s ride to and up the second escarpment was almost the duplicate of the first, however, it was colder, much colder. The four riders were muffled and wrapped as best they could, but still they shook in the embrace of the cutting wind. Dala was miserable, and her temper became shorter, it was already short thanks to the flying incident the night before, and waspish. Finally Jorse gave up on having a civil talk with her, and rode at the rear of the small line of horses.
Darko halted the group for the night, when he stumbled on a small icy stream flowing out of a cave in a cliff wall. The cave was nothing more than a few slabs of granite that had sheared off the cliff face to form a small, thirty or forty foot, box-like shelter, through which a small, icy stream flowed out of the rocks. The cave was dry though, and the thick walls cut the wind.
Dinner was beans with bacon and a few small, withered carrots for flavor. The wine they had taken from the bandit camp had long since run out, so the five sipped strong black tea after their meager dinner.
“Let’s go for a walk.” Jorse whispered to Dala, after they had finished packing the supper dishes. He wasn’t sure how she did it, but Dala always seemed to smell of lilacs, and it made his heart beat faster.
“Are you crazy? It’s freezing out there!” Dala hissed back.
He lowered his voice further. “I’ll teach you to fly, if you like.”
Dala froze, and then slowly turned to stare at the young man. “You’re kidding.” She stared at him with agate eyes. “You’re not kidding.” She concluded suddenly. “Let’s go.”
The night was calm, but frigid when they emerged from the cave, and Jorse’s breath puffed out huge clouds of steamy vapor. Dala followed his lead into the woods, and toward the edge of the escarpment.
He took her hand in his. “We’ll do this together the first time. Feel what I am doing, more than looking. Both you and Tessa will have to work at it.” Jorse stepped off the edge, and then he took another step. Dala held her breath, swallowed hard and followed. He could feel her hands shake.
“I can feel something under my feet.” Dala said in amazement. “It’s like the air has turned to stone.” She took another step to come up beside Jorse. “Now what?”
“Well, I kind of push the ground away from me.” Jorse concentrated and they rose several feet. “When I want to go in one direction I push in the other. After a while you just think ‘I want to go there’ and you push in the right direction, automatically.” Jorse pointed to the top of the next escarpment, and they rose rapidly, the wind whistling in their ears.
“This is amazing,” Dala whispered, “can I try?” They hovered a few feet above the next escarpment, and Dala gingerly released Jorse’s hand. She stood suspended, and a huge smile creased her face. “Look at me, Jorse, I’m flying!”
“That you are, Dala. Now try going up.” She rose. “Go that rock over there.” He pointed and she went, zipping just a few feet above the ground. “Now, head out over the edge, and I will follow you. Try doing a figure eight in front of the moon, if you like. I’ll be right behind you, so don’t be afraid.” They flew...
Sometime later, with red noses and cheeks from the cold, they landed back at the escarpment from which they had started. They were both laughing, with the stars in their eyes, and didn’t notice the silent dark form until it was on them. Darko’s arm was wrapped around Dala, a thin sharp knife pressed against her throat.
“I see you, witchy boy. I see you and leetle girl fly. I see you teach. You teach me too, witchy boy, or I keel leetle girl.” The guide growled, pressing Dala’s throat with his knife.
“All right, I’ll teach you to fly.” Jorse’s voice was level and calm. Inside he shook.
“Promise! Promise, witchy boy.” A drop of blood ran down Dala’s white neck.
“Oh, I promise, Darko. I promise.”
“Good.” The voice was final. “How I fly?”
“Well, you have to step over here to the edge. You saw me teach the girl that, didn’t you?”
“I see.” Darko came near to the edge of the escarpment and looked over, fearfully. Fifteen hundred feet was a long way to fall. “Now what?”
“You take my hand and I teach you how to stand on air. You saw me teach that, too.”
“Yah.” Darko stepped hesitantly to the edge and took Jorse’s extended hand. The two men slowly lifted from the ground and drifted unhurriedly over the edge of the precipice. Darko’s face was the color of chalk. Twenty feet from the edge they stopped and turned back toward Dala. Gorku and Mirek had shown up in the meantime, and stood several yards from Dala, watching the two men hover in air. Gorku’s face showed amazement. Mirek’s was thoughtful.
“Ho, Brother!” Darko shouted triumphantly. “Look, I fly! I better brother now, ha!”
“Brother?” Jorse said with some disbelief. Gorku grimaced and nodded. Jorse turned to the man suspended in the air beside him. “Goodbye Darko.” He pulled his hand away, and Darko fell like a rock. “Ummm, Selene, If it wouldn’t be too much trouble, could you please catch that idiot before he crushes a few innocent pine trees?” The wailing scream was fading now.
“I would be more than happy to do that, My Dear.” A voice said from the air.
Jorse look over at Gorku, who looked stunned. “I said I would teach him to fly, which I did. I never told him that I would teach him how to land.”
“Ho!” Gurku slapped his thigh
and began to laugh. “Mama think this good joke. Papa kill Darko. Him not much brother. Him asshole.”
Jorse could see Dala bent over in laughter, and somewhere inside him Anya was doing the same. Blue light drifted up the face of the escarpment, and in a moment a radiant Selene floated up, clad in long white robes, followed a second later by a raving Darko, suspended by one foot. As the Goddess guided the man over the escarpment, Jorse motioned to Dala to join him in the open air. She was shaking almost uncontrollably as she took his hand. Selene deposited Darko safely on the ground and drifted over to float next to Jorse and Dala.
“Nice night for flying.” She commented.
Darko stood up, shaking off his brother’s assistance, and drew his knife. “You lie witchy boy. I keel now.” Frothing at the mouth, Darko ran off the edge of the cliff in his haste to attack Jorse. He shrieked for a long time before he hit the ground.
“Thank you for your assistance, Goddess.” Jorse said formally, bowing at the waist.
“Family never needs to say thank you, Jorse.” She said softly, and then she kissed him on the cheek. As in the benediction, it left him feeling subtly changed.
“Thank you, Selene.” She smiled, once, and was gone.
Jorse glanced down the cliff, toward the dark forest below, and back at Gorku as he drifted toward the escarpment. “That won’t make problems between us, will it? He was your brother after all.”
“Not much brother. Stupid. He touched by Goddess. He famous, but no... he stupid.”
Gorku looked at Jorse with something like wonder. “You family to Goddess?”
“Uhhh,” Jorse hesitated. “It’s complicated.”
“Answer yes. Good enough for me. Me be famous now.”
The Corsairs of Aethalia: A Thalassia novel Page 23
