by M. Garnet
The sun on the black marble floor woke Margo up in a strange room. Her eyes were still swollen from the tears she had shed into the pillow through the night.
Last night, carrying her pitcher of water, she went to an open door around the balcony near the steps that went down. Before closing the door, she found the usual candleholder and matches just inside on a small table.
With a light, she closed the door and then looked around. There were no dust cloths on the furniture, and it looked like the room had been cleaned recently. Another question went through her head, who cleaned these rooms and why?
There was an extra-large bed, bigger than king size. Beside the door and the small table, was a large armoire and on another wall was a long cabinet with lots of drawers. The final wall, probably the outside wall was covered. It was one heavy drape from ceiling to floor and corner to corner, except the corner that held a funny shaped fireplace built into an angle.
So Master Coin didn't like to have sunshine coming into his rooms. Margo hunted through the drapes and finally found a window. She had no way to tie the drapes back, so she took off her jeans and looped the legs around one side to pull back one drape.
Working with the ponderous long drape, she did find one place the cleaning service missed, as dust kicked up around her. She needed a drink from her pitcher and to find a bathroom. She really hoped she didn't have to go outside to find a wooden chantey with a half-moon carved on the front.
She took her candle and went past the stairs and was in luck. It seemed the Master might live in a century old home, but he still likes modern bathrooms. This door led into a room that, although all in black marble, the black sink was up to date. The toilet, shower, and tub were right out of Bath and Beyond, except she had never seen it shown in black in their catalog. What was with this guy and no color?
Using the seat, she even found paper and surprise it was white. Opening a couple of flat drawers she found a bunch of toothbrushes still in their packages. She couldn't find any toothpaste, so she just scrubbed with cold water. There was no glass or cup. She made a mental note to steal one from the kitchen in the morning.
Returning to her chosen bedroom, Margo was unhappy to find she couldn't lock her door. She had already taken off her shoes and jeans, so she slipped off her bra in a female way, by keeping on the T-shirt and then crawled into bed.
Margo was sure she wouldn't sleep, but the sheets were clean, and the bed was soft.
The light on the black marble was a surprise. The marble was beautiful, black polished with gold strands running through it like thin threads. The gold reflected the sunlight.
If the asshole buried in his office just opened some windows, this dark house might not be so forbidding. She lay on her side looking at the gold threads and decided she needed some clothes.
Her jeans were now drape ties, and her shirt had been through a long afternoon at her home, then through a terrible rainstorm. Next, she had sweated up and down the mountain and finally slept in it. She was willing to try that fancy black shower before attempting to get out of this mountainous place, but she had to either wash her clothes or find new ones.
Her first effort was the armoire, and it did have clothes. It had beautiful, old, long, full dresses right out from Hamlet. The material was old enough that as she pushed them aside, she felt some of them tear, not in seams but the material itself. These dresses were old. What was going on in this house?
With a huff, she slammed the doors shut and leaned back on the armoire and looked over at the chest. Well, it wouldn't hurt to look while she was in this crazy house. The first drawer held socks all rolled into matching pairs. She pulled out a pair of black ones, of course.
Through the next few drawers, she was able to find a shirt to tie up at the waist and a pair of trousers that she thought might have been made for a boy. They had buttons at the bottom to make them tight, and she decided that they could blouse out at the knees. She chose to let them slip to her ankles over the long socks.
Her own boots fit over everything, and she was ready to go out and face the monster in his lair. Of course, nothing went as she planned in this horror-filled dream…if it was a dream.
His office doors were closed and locked, and no amount of yelling or pounding brought any response. Maybe it was just as well since right now she was hungry.
There was a new cook, a nice round lady with pink cheeks, flushed from the steam, as she stirred a pot on the big iron stove. She smiled as Margo entered.
"Good morning. I have fresh rolls over there and coffee with milk that Bogdan brought down from the cows on the mountain."
Finding a stool at the end of the work counter, Margo had to wonder what type of cow could climb this mountain. This woman had the same type of accent as the thin cook.
The coffee was strong, so Margo put in extra of the thick milk. The rolls were still warm and had fruit baked in them. Butter made it one of the nicest breakfasts she had eaten in a long time.
"I can make you eggs if you would like." The cook turned and put some big onions on the chopping board.
"No thanks, I would just like to eat another of these rolls. They are great. I wonder…where are you from?"
The woman smiled as she began to peel the onions. "I live down up with my family. We have a nice cabin."
"Yes, I understand. But I am American. Where were you from before you came to this area?" Margo took another bite of the second roll.
The cook smiled and nodded. "Yes, American England. Bretna told me. I am from here too."
Okay, if someone shows up wearing thick glasses and says his first name if Steven, I will look for a large dog named Cujo. I am in a serious loony bin.
"Thanks for the coffee and rolls. I will just take all of this back up to my room." Going out with the cup in hand, she stuffed the last of the roll in her mouth and went up to the bathroom to rinse out her much needed cup. Now if she could just find some toothpaste.
Wait, didn't her grandmother use baking soda? Maybe she should ask the cook later about toothpaste, and if it weren't available, she would get some baking soda. If it were good enough for Grams, it would be good enough for her. On second thought, she didn't intend to be around here that long.
Stopping at the top of the stairs and finding it was too dark but she was sure his doors were still closed. She went down and out the front door. Leaning against one of the big rocks that stuck out from the front of the building she studied the valley.
Without being able to see the difference in the buildings from this distance and through the trees, it looked peaceful and quaint. There was no break in the forest leading to the village that would show a wide road in the way she would expect for car and truck travel.
Having no idea about northern forests, since she spent most of her life in Florida with lots of big trees that were far apart and had all types of palms in between. In areas that were considered natural, the palms came in all sizes and filled in the low-lying areas with muck and water.
There had to be animals and streams and paths through the underbrush somewhere in that forest. Margo decided she would need some type of long knife to help cut through that forest if she was going to try in that direction. She was also going to need something to carry water in, and it couldn't be that little bucket that was still sitting beside the front door.
Chapter Six
The storm came from behind the mountain and the black rock house. It caught her by surprise as the valley and the gravel path were still in sunshine. There was suddenly a strong wind bending the tops of trees, but she was protected with the cliff at her back.
Margo decided to wait for the rain and then go in to hunt for something to carry water and to get her jacket. Unfortunately, she didn't even get off her perch when rain pelted down, soaking her and quickly sending rivulets down the gravel path.
Sliding off the rock, she turned to head toward the large doors when she was slammed with a face full of water from the heavens. The sky turned everything
dark, and thunder followed a streak of lightning that hit near the valley.
She felt his hard grasp around her wrist. "Where have you been?" His voice was harsh over the noise of the sudden storm.
She was about to yell back at him when her eyes got wide as she looked over his shoulder. The house and cliff were gone. He let go of her wrist, and she fell down on her knees still feeling the rain on her face.
Before and below them on a long grand sweep of land was a river overflowing its banks in a flood that was already moving up over the low country, pushing down giant trees ahead of its dirty cascade.
This amazing flood was already changing the landscape, and the river would never return to its original banks. Those banks were gone along with rocks and mud and its original river walls.
Suddenly, it was not the raging water below that drew her eyes but what was in the skies below the black thunderclouds. With the wind and rain, it was hard to see what was flying in the storm until she decided something large was able to fight the tempest.
Sitting in the rain on the wet hill she had read about such creatures and under normal conditions would never have believed that they were real, yet there was a dragon coming toward them. She could see this beast ignoring the storm as it banked and turned a large eye toward the man with his hands held high.
She wanted to scream, to run or to faint, but she stayed on her knees, feeling the moisture seep into her pants and watched the two individuals fight in this storm.
The man's hands seemed to make the roiling black clouds come lower and the lightning increased, making one crescendo after another as the thunder began to shake the ground.
She ducked her head to her folded knees as the monster swung around in a circle, but the man stayed upright. The man never moved, standing upright with his hands held up to the clouds that swirled above him.
The big wings took the thing away to allow it to gather speed and drop down again on their small hill. Margo looked down to see the flooding that was spreading out to cover all the land from their small hill to a distant landmass that was crumbling against the assault of the dark water.
As the fiend came around them again, the man did not turn or even look at the wide movements of those wings, he stood with legs apart and the wind whipping his coat and hair. His face was turned upward, and his arms never seemed to tire in his upward reach to the heavens.
Margo just wanted to be in any nightmare but this one, as she was sure the Leviathan was going to kill both of them. The lightning increased and she could see the outline of the man as if he were in a spotlight. Margo also thought she was feeling jolts in the ground as if she had stepped on a live wire. Was she going to die so far away from her warm Florida home with a make-believe dragon and a man calling down strikes of light?
The flying horror made one more sweep, and suddenly it lit up and was on fire as strike after strike of lightning touched its black hide and leather wings. It folded in on itself and, over the noise of the thunder, Margo heard its death cry as it rolled and tumbled to the ground far away.
Her nemesis slowly lowered his hands and fell to his knees as if he were exhausted. The lightning and thunder died away and the clouds began to drift high with the rain softening. Looking across the damaging floodwaters, she could barely see some figures moving. The distance was too great for details, but she could tell that they were upright and walked.
She got up to watch the far off figures move to examine the smoking beast. Had this strange man saved these people? Before she could turn to speak to him, he had her wrist, and they were outside the front door of the dark house on a cliff.
It was instantaneous, and he let go and was walking into the house when she thought to react. She stumbled and then bounded into the hallway to grab his coat.
"Wait, you owe me some answers if you are going to grab my wrist and yank me to fight some dragon."
He turned, looking down at her hand. "Let go."
"No, who are you and what is happening?"
He turned and took a step forward, and she let him drag her, but she didn't let go of the coat. He shrugged out of the coat and continued, but Margo was not falling for that trick. She let go of the material and reached for his jacket getting a strong grip.
She decided he would have to be naked before she would let go of him completely. But he got the message and stopped with a deep sigh.
"My name is Rahm Maaker. I know you are Margo Sanderson. Now I am exhausted, and if you don't want to have to carry me up these stairs, you should let go so I can get to my bedroom."
His voice was harsh and low but without any accent. Still, there was something different about how he spoke his words. She removed her hand and stood dripping, letting him move slowly up the steps.
Marge was left thinking about his eyes. There was still no white showing around pupils like most people; they were no longer the strange moving black. They seem to be a faded gray. Nodding her head, she decided whatever he was doing did take something out of him during the process.
Going through to the kitchen she found it empty with covered plates on the counter. Lifting different lids, she discovered clean cut veggies, meat sandwiches, and stuffed eggs. Looking around she found a pot of soup on the side of the stove, keeping it warm, but not bubbling from too much heat. There were several large soup cups on a shelf next to the stove.
She fixed the big tray with two kinds of soup, some sandwiches and two pitchers of water and carried it upstairs. At the top of the stairs Margo saw his office doors open, but one of the bedroom doors closed. She went to the closed door and sat the tray down. She grabbed a sandwich and a cup of soup and juggled a pitcher of water.
Putting her head next to the door she spoke loud. "Rahm, there is some food out here. I'll just leave it and go to my room."
She didn't hear anything, so she took her treasure to her room and closed the door. She sat everything on the floor and lit her candle then settled down for the night to think about what had happened when he grabbed her wrist.
Chapter Seven
After eating, Margo slipped down to take a short shower and was back in her room, carrying the sheltered candle with her as she pulled the table in front of the door. It wouldn't keep anyone out, but it would make a noise and give her some warning. She wasn't sure what she would do after that, but she would at least have some time to react.
Going to the makeshift tie back at the drapes, she hunted through her jeans and pulled out her cell phone and found her small pad that had the short pen clipped together. She also had twenty-seven dollars in still damp bills and fifty-seven cents in US coins. Just plain old money, yet it probably wouldn't spend anywhere here. Margo did have to wonder if it would work at that strange western bar in the village.
She was in a large shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a pair of man's undershorts—comfortable sleeping clothes. She moved the candle so that it threw some light in the right direction. She pulled the little pad out and turned several pages until she found some dry ones and tried the pen to see if it worked.
Now she began a list. First, she wrote his name. Rahm Maaker. It seemed foreign, but she had no idea what or where. Then she put numbers and where she had been with his hand on her wrist. #1 had been in Florida and #2 was here in his dark home. Then there was the odd storm outside the front door, and he had yelled at her as if he was frustrated, and #3 was somewhere that had a Dragon.
Writing down the Town called Better and Mountains called New Hope. She wasn't sure why she was putting this small information down of paper, but in this crazy world, she decided that she felt she needed to keep track of what she did know at this point. She just wanted to make sure she didn't get as crazy as everyone else here, and she wanted to see if the information changed.
Looking around for her cup to drink some water, it was missing. Whoever was paid by Master Coin to clean the rooms had taken her cup. She tilted the large pitcher, using both hands and gulped down letting the extra water drip down her chin.
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br /> She smiled as she wiped her chin on her arm. It seemed that she had been wet for the last couple of days and then she thought of the large wave and the loss of her home and her poor little dog. She really needed to talk to him, or better yet get him to talk to her.
Looking at her note page, she decided she was still sane and not dreaming. She believed she had not been doped up in any manner. As a modern intelligent woman, she was in a very strange situation and just needed to figure out what had happened.
All of this day, with her actions, had left her surprised that she was tired. She couldn't believe that she wanted to go to sleep without watching a movie on TV.
Again the sunlight on the black and gold marble woke her in the soft bed under the smooth sheets. This bed was better than the one she had picked out for herself in her Florida bedroom. She went directly to the long cabinet and remembered which drawers had the clothes that almost fit her body.
Putting on her boots and grabbing her jacket she was on a mission. She hid her notebook in the bottom of one of the drawers, went to the bathroom to take care of her needs and brushed her teeth with water.
Not trying to be quiet she did notice that his office was empty and the door to his bedroom was open. It would seem the Master was not home. Good, maybe it wouldn't rain here today.
Going through the dining room, she found the chubby cook working in the kitchen.
"Morning miss, can I fix you something special this mornin'?"
"Good morning. I could stand a cup of coffee. I was also wondering if you had any of those good rolls that were baked yesterday."
The cook nodded and pulled a cup out and filled it with the strong coffee. She pushed it across the counter, and as Margo sat down, the woman slid over some sugar and a large creamer.
The cook turned and returned with a pan of warm rolls with melting icing.
"These are a little different as I add pecans along with the fruit."
The pan was full of a pull-a-part group of glazed rolls with a full half pecan placed in the center of each plump bun. Margo reached in, worked one loose, and smelled the sweetness as she took a bite. Wow, these could really sell at the local bakeries in Florida.
