They were multi-leveled, like low apartments, with balconies that jutted out from each floor. For dark stone structures, they looked reassuringly homey to the humans.
“All of the buildings that you can see,” Shandon told the group loudly as he spun in a slow circle, “are empty. They have been repaired and cleaned for you. Each one is furnished, but once you all claim the ones you want, my people will take requests for specific pieces of furniture. So off you go now and choose which ones you wish to call home.”
The group stayed huddled together for a few moments. People were clearly waiting for someone to make the first move. Finally, one of the women with a young child holding on to her skirt stepped away from the rest. She reached down and took her son's hand.
“Come along, Chris. Let's go and find our new home!”
The little boy looked up at her quizzically and then pointed toward the nearest building.
“There, Momma?” he asked brightly.
“Excellent choice. Lead the way, little man,” she told him with a proud smile.
The child hooted joyfully and took off across the square. His mother looked back at the group and two other women, one with a daughter about the same age as the boy, hurried to join her.
“We can't let you and Chris have all the fun, Julia,” one said with an eager grin. “Come on, let's go house hunting.”
As the trio hurried off after the little boy, the rest of the refugees from Nottinghill finally pushed aside their indecisiveness and spread out, trying to decide which building they'd like to explore.
“It's good to see them with some enthusiasm again,” Sebastian said as he watched his people. “Leaving yet another home was a hard blow for them.”
“It was a blow to all of us,” a deep voice rumbled from his left.
The mage turned and saw Malcolm and Aiden, the two warriors who had commanded the castle's guardsmen, walking toward him.
Tamara put her hands on her hips and looked up at the big man.
“I didn't think anything could bother you,” she teased.
Malcolm was the tallest man in the entire group and was heavily muscled. Aiden, his partner, was also big but not quite as heavy-set. Both men were good-natured and pleasant, which was fortunate because their Change had given them amazing skills in weaponry and warfare. They had been infected by a werewolf attack a few years earlier, which they controlled by wearing magical amulets. But the side-effect was that they healed very quickly and were immune to poison and disease.
Yes, Tamara thought as she watched the pair. Thank God they are so kind and even-tempered, for all our sakes.
“Losing our home bothers me, and him,” Malcolm growled as he poked a thumb at Aiden. “We were happy at Nottinghill Castle. Hell, we were happy in the old town of Nottinghill. What are we going to call this place? Nottinghill 3.0?”
She snorted but had to agree.
“I didn't live in either of the original towns,” she said as the two warriors stood close by and looked around at the brooding buildings. “But I'm sure that they were a little less...intimidating than this place.”
She lowered her voice so that the king wouldn't hear her and be insulted. Tamara was beyond grateful to the dwarves for their aid and had no wish to offend them.
Aiden seemed to pick up on her thought and glanced at Shandon, who was speaking with one of his guards, before answering.
“They were,” he said quietly. “But this is only a temporary situation. With any luck, we'll return to the castle one day soon and get back to our old lives.”
“Really? You actually believe that?” Tamara scoffed. “The world above is inundated with undead monsters and dragons. How the hell are a handful of us, even if our numbers reach five hundred, supposed to fight back against that?”
Sebastian's eyes widened and he nodded at something over his sister's shoulder. She turned quickly and saw that Shandon had approached quietly and was looking up at her with a defiant glint in his eyes.
“Because you are not alone, lady mage,” he said stoutly. “You have allies now. The dwarves may not dwell aboveground , but we will not hang back while that evil infestation goes unchecked. We will strike back at it whenever and wherever we can. And we hope that our human friends will join us in that effort.”
“We will,” Malcolm growled before Tamara could answer. “Just point us at a target and set us loose.”
The king looked way up until he locked eyes with the big man. He grinned broadly and then laughed out loud.
“Ah, my over-sized friend. Between the king of the dwarves and a man-mountain like yourself, the war is practically won already!”
The entire group, including Shandon's bodyguards, burst out laughing at his outrageous statement, and the underground rang with the merry sounds.
Maybe we do have some hope, Tamara said to herself. Even if it's only a sliver.
Chapter 2
“Don't forget to factor in the wind before you shoot.”
“Yeah, yeah, I know that,” Simon muttered, hoping that Ethmira didn't hear him.
He drew back on the bow, held the string tightly and waited for the breeze to blow across his body. The thin leather jacket that he wore allowed him to feel the wind quite well, considering that he was used to wearing a light robe.
He sighted along the arrow toward the target across the meadow, adjusted for the air flow and took a deep breath. He counted to three in his head and released the string.
The bow twanged and the missile shot across the open field and thudded into the target. It was a large white cloth tacked to a tall tree stump. In the center was a small red dot. The arrow had impacted an inch below the dot.
“Well, you are getting better. Slowly.”
Simon turned to look at the elven maiden, who was standing several yards behind him and to his right.
“You do realize that if the target was a person, he'd be dead if he was hit there, right?”
“Do you really think so?” she replied skeptically as he unstrung his bow. “A person struck by an arrow an inch below his heart will very often survive. And not just survive, but counterattack. If the target is a magic-user, the response could be a face full of fire.”
With a long sigh, Simon rolled up his bowstring and walked across the thick grass to join Ethmira. She saw his expression and smiled apologetically.
“Forgive me, my friend. I sometimes forget how much you miss your powers. But don't think of them as gone; think of them as sleeping, hibernating until the day that you return to your home world.”
He shrugged absently and dropped his bow and quiver of arrows.
“Back in a second,” he told her and headed across the meadow to retrieve his used arrows from the target.
The day was gorgeous and Simon took a moment as he walked to appreciate the beauty of the elven world. He knew he often took the place for granted and didn't give it the admiration that it deserved.
The entire planet was, as far as he knew, covered in a vast forest. There were mountains that climbed out of the trees here and there and he was told that several oceans were scattered around somewhere, but for the most part the world was shrouded with trees.
It was a remarkable thought and Simon wondered how such a place could develop. He wondered even more about where the elven home was. Was it even in his own universe? Or was it on another plane of existence or a different dimension. So many questions, so few answers.
All he did know was that it had offered him sanctuary from his enemies. And it had rendered him powerless.
Ethmira caught up to him as he was yanking the arrows out of the tree trunk. She offered him his quiver and he nodded gratefully as he slipped the bolts into it and tied it to his belt.
“I just don't understand why I can't use magic here,” Simon said for what seemed like the hundredth time. “I mean, the last time I was here, fighting the primal brown dragon, it worked just fine.”
The elven woman handed him his bow and then led the way into the for
est toward their encampment.
“Simon, I've explained it the best way that I can. Your last visit was brief and so you were not out of sync with Earth time for very long. But now you've been here for several months, our time. However, it has been a much longer absence back on your own world.”
He shivered at the thought. Time was slipping away and God only knew what was happening with his friends and the few other human survivors back on Earth.
“How much time has passed now?” he asked slowly, almost reluctant to know.
“Three years, more or less. But the time shift between our worlds in now increasing and soon the years will begin to slip by much more quickly. And if too many drift by, not even your slow aging process will allow you to survive the return to your home.”
He listened without comment to that grim prediction and remembered his friend, Daniel. He had waited too long in the elven lands and, when he'd returned to Earth, had aged decades in an instant. Simon knew that a wizard's metabolism was much slower than that of a regular human, but he also knew that he was far from immortal. Unlike the elves, time still marked him and he only had so much of it to spare.
“Then send me back.”
He glanced down at the leather clothing that he was wearing.
“I appreciate the effort you've made to teach me how to fight without magic, and I think that I'm a decent bowman now, but at my core I'm still a magic-user, Ethmira, and I always will be.”
The path that the elf was cutting through the thick forest dipped and weaved around the underbrush and his companion waited until they were walking along a reasonably open stretch to reply.
“I know that, my friend. But our world is as dangerous as yours is, in its own way, and I felt that it was only prudent to give you some way to defend yourself.”
She looked over her shoulder and gave him a quick smile.
“And you're quite good at archery, you know. I would call you a natural. Your hand and eye coordination is marvelous. Your gods must have fine-tuned your reflexes when they Changed you into a wizard.”
“Maybe,” Simon told her as he ducked under an overhanging branch that was thick with heavy moss. “But back in my old body, before the Change, I was quite dexterous for a big man. Perhaps becoming this skinny kid amped that up. But either way, thanks for the compliment.”
“It is the simple truth. Now, as far as getting you back home goes, I've had our sages working on a way to open a portal back to your world for a month now.”
They stepped out of the forest into a small open area where two single-man tents had been set up next to a fire pit. Their packs and camping gear were undisturbed and Simon felt relieved. The forest animals were often quite bold and could tear apart an unprotected camp very quickly.
He was especially irritated by, and also quite fond of, the amirax. The small primate looked like a monkey, but it was the size of a terrier, with gray fur and huge soulful eyes. It could slip into a camp, rummage through everything and slip out again without anyone even noticing, even the elves. And if the amirax was caught, it would look at you innocently with those big brown eyes as if to say 'What? What did I do?' The first time it had happened to Simon, he'd laughed so hard that he had fallen over. Naturally the creature had gotten away.
But he couldn't hear any of the haunting calls of the amirax and their things were intact, so that was one less worry.
A bigger concern, always, were the vicious reptiles that prowled the undergrowth and were a danger to anyone or anything that crossed their paths. Simon had personally seen one, the elves called them kravon, that was at least twenty feet long. Fortunately he'd been learning the most efficient technique of tree climbing at the time and had been high above the ground when Dellin, a scout who'd been training him, pointed the monster out.
It had been a nightmare combination of snake and lizard. Black scales and greenish, sickly-looking stripes blended it with the shadows so that it was almost invisible.
“My God, are there many that big?” Simon had asked in a hushed voice as he and the elf had watched the predator slither through the brush below.
“Most are bigger, my friend,” Dellin replied with obvious loathing, his voice barely audible. “I'd guess that it's a very young one. If you are caught by one of them on the ground, you are dead. It is as simple as that. I know that it looks slow and deliberate, but the kravon can move like lightning when they spot their prey. It is a blessing that they cannot climb trees.”
It was at that moment that Simon realized that the elven realm wasn't the idyllic place he had imagined it to be, but a real, tangible world with its own secrets and dangers. It had been a sobering experience.
And now here he was, learning to survive as an elf but constantly pining for home. He felt ungrateful toward Ethmira and her people but he was so worried for humanity and each tick of the clock seemed to draw him further and further away from them. It made him increasingly anxious and moody.
“The problem is,” she continued, “the time stream must be aligned precisely between the two planes or the portal will not lock on and nothing will happen.”
She chuckled as she set her bow and quiver on the ground next to her tent.
“At least that is what the sages tell me. I know nothing of such things. But rest assured, Simon, that a portal will be opened soon. Just be prepared for what might await you on the other side.”
He scoured the campsite as they talked and gathered up an armful of dry sticks and a few small branches.
“Meaning what?”
He knelt down beside the fire pit and began breaking the sticks into proper lengths for the fire while Ethmira opened her pack and took out a small leather pouch. She pulled out several packages of dried beef and set them down next to the pit. Then she sat back on her heels and caught Simon's eye.
“Lacertus. Surely you haven't forgotten him, have you? You need to think of a way to either hide yourself from him or destroy him. And I doubt that even you could destroy a god, even a minor one like him. No offense.”
“None taken. I'm well aware of my own limitations. But I may not have to worry about hiding myself from him, if my reason for coming here in the first place is correct.”
The elf pulled took a flint and a small square piece of steel from her belt pouch and quickly started the fire. Both of them watched as the flames caught on the tinder and the larger sticks slowly began to burn.
“You mean your belief that the physical body is torn apart and rebuilt when it crosses over from your world to ours?” Ethmira asked as she sat down cross-legged near the fire. She rested her elbows on her knees and looked at Simon quizzically.
“That is not proven, you know.”
“I know that,” he replied as he sat down heavily on the thick grass.
Ethmira offered him a packet of dried meat and he accepted it gratefully.
“Thanks. But the theory is sound and frankly I can't think of any other way to thwart him.”
He tore off a chunk of beef with his teeth and started chewing thoughtfully.
“If he tracks me down when I return, then I will have to face him.” He smiled grimly. “And I'll probably die. Rather horribly, I'm sure. Lacertus was enraged when I escaped his clutches.”
“You are taking this rather lightly,” Ethmira told him as she delicately sliced off bite-sized pieces of beef with her hunting knife and ate them. “We are talking about your death here.”
Simon finished his meat, drank some water from a flask on his belt and lay back on his elbows.
“I know that. But looking at the dark side of things just isn't my way. You must know that by now. Besides, I've spoken with several of your sages and they agree with me. It's all theoretical, of course, as they've been quick to point out, but they say that matter cannot cross dimensions in its native state. It has to be converted into energy on one plane and then reassembled back into itself on the other. And that should scramble whatever part of my body or essence that Lacertus was tracking.”
/> “In theory,” Ethmira added with a reluctant grin.
“Exactly. So now I just have to wait until your people manage to sync a portal between the two worlds.”
Simon looked around at the trees that soared hundreds of feet above the small clearing, and sighed wistfully.
“I love this place, you know. And I'm grateful for your help with my weapon skills. But when the portal is ready to go, it won't last long and I need to be close to the sages when it is. If we stay here, I may not be able to return in time.”
The elven maiden nodded slowly.
“That's true. A shame, really. Your skills have improved quite a bit in a very short amount time. It is almost regrettable that you will probably never need them after you return home.”
Simon pushed himself to his feet, walked over to his tent and began to pull the tent pegs out of the ground.
“Oh, you never know. Magic isn't always the best solution to every problem. And if I can, I'll try to practice whenever I get a chance.”
Ethmira laughed lightly as she also began to tear down her tent.
“Somehow I doubt that you will find the time. Now, let's get you back to the Hall of Knowledge. Maybe they can give us at least a hint about when a portal will be available.”
The two of them emerged from the endless forest several hours later. Nothing had threatened them and they had run into several patrols as they approached the large settlement where the elven sages conducted their studies. The patrolling elves had assured them that no roaming monsters prowled nearby and Simon and Ethmira had hurried along the forest pathways without having to constantly scan for danger.
The wizard remembered with some amusement how idyllic he had assumed the elvish world was when he had first learned that his friend Daniel had been saved by the elves, back when the dragons had invaded the Earth.
My God, he thought as he followed Ethmira across the large field that led to the elvish settlement. That seems like a hundred years ago now. So much has changed since those amazing, innocent days. So many lives lost; so many friends gone forever.
The Dragons of Bone and Dust (Tales from the New Earth Book 7) Page 2
