He looked down the two staffs they were flashing back and forth and the air around them was deepening into something else like some kind of deep hole in time and space. More rifts were forming in the air everywhere. More evil looking creatures were entering. The guards were advancing on Brother Dog and Zhoulin.
But then the one creatures climbing out of the hole in space, took a swipe at one of the guards. All of a sudden it was mayhem below him. One guard was bitten in half by something that dragged him screaming back into the rift.
The staffs. Their glowing jewels were almost a foot apart, there was no way he could strike them at the same time. He reached for the sword as it continued its slow-motion arch. Willing it to come to him and it fell slowly into the hands of the Wolver king.
Power was building around Billy now. He could feel it like a tangible thing like water in a fountain. It was humming as it ran through his veins. It tickled him in a not totally unpleasant way, but there were flashes now from the apparatus. The small tears in the sky was rent larger, an army of things fighting and clawing their way into the world.
He heard a commotion from the stair, there was yelling and sounds of combat.
“Perhaps the only blood I need is yours.” the Wolver said. As He stepped toward Billy swinging the blade, which was glowing brighter and brighter in reaction to the magic.
The wolver lifted the blade up in both hands.
“I will end this now!”
Billy cringed as the blade flew toward him, end over end, there was nothing he could do. He couldn't even dodge he was still tied to the apparatus.
But the blade didn't strike. He opened his eyes to a giant black spider. Its’ long thin black leg had pierced the Wolver and it cried out in pain and anger. “Filthy creature!” the spider said, as it stabbed the Wolver again and again. And to his amazement, Marcy was there astride the strange looking creature, riding it like a horse. She reached up and deftly plucked the sword out of the air as her strange mount whirled into the battle.
A group of men burst onto the platform fighting the guards and monsters all at the same time. Cloth-yard arrows split heads of demons and men as well. "TO BILLY!" Longstrider yelled as Little John split a head open with a massive club. The men of Sherwood fought valiantly against a mob of soldiers and courtiers that pursued them. There was a scream as someone fell from the dangerous stairs. He could see Longstrider take out a cloth-yard arrow and aim it straight at him.
“What the hell are you doing?” Billy shouted.
“Don't move young William!” was the answer.
The arrow hurtled at him, he tried not to move. Again he was stuck in the embrace of the chains. He closed his eyes and clenched for the impact.
He opened one eye as the arrow struck true in the center of the lock that held together the whole apparatus that had held him. It all crashed to the ground and Billy fell from the chains, landing squarely on the shafts of the staffs sparking and flashing with magic power below.
He tottering there for a second the staffs bending under his weight. "The sword," he shouted, as Marcy skittered past on her strange mount swinging the now blazing sword wildly at the incoming monster hoard.
One last swing as a head rolled to the floor and she and her strange mount jumped through the air covering the distance between them. She tossed the weapon just as the Wolver King dived for it. They all crashed together. How the creature was not dead from the stabbings of the spider Billy did not know.
He reached out and caught the handle of the sword as it flew past him and a flash of memory. He and his brother Steve in the forest. As was their habit to always find ways to compete, standing on a small log ax in hand, chopping through the center till the piece was completely cut in two. Their father had cursed them for being fools. Saying “What possible use could there be for such a skill?”
Billy sword in mid-air, centered himself on the two staffs even as magic and light flashed around him. The staffs were bouncing terribly. As he raised the blade he saw a knife pierce Zhoulin's, heart. A spear had embedded itself in Longstrider’s head and Brother Dog was stumbling in a pool of his own blood.
Billy centered his eyes on the target not daring to see any more of the carnage, swung the now blazing sword down between his feet as his weight forced the staff heads to meet. There was a terrible surge of power as the sword struck true between them.
Of a sudden he was blown through the air. Like a rag doll, as the world exploded around him. Glimpses of his friends, dead on the grisly blood-soaked floor. He saw the worlds colliding the universe collapse.
He saw a flash of Zhoulin running through a meadow laughing. He saw Brother Dog sitting having a joke with Old Uncle. He was above them for the briefest of moments in the longest of times. Shards of the exploding jewels of power cut at him as the very universe disintegrated. Marcy on her strange steed seemed to ride toward him touching him and was gone.
24 Epilogue
B
illy awoke with a start. He was laying in his bed listening to the sound of his father reading a book. It was a western novel. Billy really didn't like westerns. He lay there listening. He couldn't really think, it was like his head was all jumbled weird images like out of a dream flashes of strange characters?
Why was dad reading to him? That was the weirdest. Dad never even talked to him unless he was mad about something; so what had happened that he was reading at Billy’s bedside? Did someone die? His father must have noticed his awakening as the reading stopped. Then.
"Shirl'! Hey, Shirley, I think he's awake."
Billy opened his eyes to his father’s face just inches away as he leaned over him... A rough hand moved his hair away from his eyes and felt his forehead. He could hear his mom coming up the stairs and then she came into the room breaking the awkward moment. His dads face looked different somehow softer.
“I am sorry son.” His dad said as his mom pushed him aside and gave Billy a big kiss and a hug.
“Oh we were so afraid.” she said “Doctor didn't know if you would ever come around. You were unconscious for a week. So we brought you home. Can you talk? Say something.” He rubbed his eyes and tried to sit up he was really groggy.
“Where’s Geezer?”
His mom was surprised, "What? What geezer?" She turned to Dad "Geezer? Why would he talk about an old man? Maybe something we don't know about?" His dad looked concerned "What geezer son?" he said, in a voice that Billy had never heard before, all soft and loving. It made him feel strange.
“Um. My pet Geezer he has to be here somewhere.” He said and tried to sit up but his mom pushed him back down.
“Now you just relax.” she said giving his Dad an odd look “You have been lost in the forest and hurt. I don't know about any pet. You just relax son and we will send for the doctor. We don’t want you to strain yourself after what you have been through. We will talk after the doctor gets here. OK? Just go back to sleep.”
He was relieved that when she got up to go phone the doctor dad went with her. All that tenderness was just well…weird is what it was! Especially coming from his dad who was such a very big gruff man. He could hear them talking as they went downstairs.
“Geezer? What a strange name. Maybe it was some kind of dream. God knows, he was missing long enough, anything could have happened the scar looks much better today. Hello Doctor?”
She must have been talking while she was dialing the phone Billy thought as he faded off to sleep. He didn't sleep that well there were images of people dying and magic and all kinds of weird things, and a Chinese face. Beautiful girl...He awoke to a strange voice in his room it was a small room and everyone who was trying to get in were making it very crowded.
Finally, the doctor and his mom sat by his bed and the doctor, of course, started probing and prodding. What a job that must be, Billy thought.
“How are you young man?” the doctor said Billy recognized him, he had been to Doctor Gillespie’s office many times over the years this was the first however that the doc ha
d come to his bedside.
“You certainly gave everyone a scare. Can you tell us where you have been? You were lucky old Mr. Brown found you by that hollow log. But by the look of you, you haven’t just been lying there. What do you remember?”
Billy lay there thinking. He wasn't sure, what he remembered really was a bit of a blank, like a dream that was fast fading. “I’m not sure.” He said hesitantly.
The doctor looked at his parents. “I just saw him just a couple weeks ago, didn't I?”
“Yes?” mom responded.
"But I seem to remember him being a new crew cut, haircut, but his hair is long. It would have taken six months to get hair that long. And then there's that scar on his side I'm damn sure that wasn't there on his last checkup it looks like it has been there for maybe a year. Look at his nails they are long and uncut? How is that possible? Even if he was stuck in the tree trunk for a week it is impossible for all that to have grown out. And those clothes where has he been? , of the bathrobe? This is all very strange, that there is pure silk you know. Worth a fortune if it was new."
“Really?” mom said looking at the red and gold material more closely. Billy looked down at his pajamas and they were certainly nothing like he had ever seen before. Golden dragons festooned the chest and arms.
“When did you find him? 2 days ago?” Doc said, “And he is only waking up now? I have to wonder about this Geezer he spoke of, an old man?”
“What do you think will be done Doc?” Mom said.
A long hesitation "The government wants nothing to do with this. They say it is some kind of hoax and they are sure, not interested in it becoming big news anywhere. Just some kid got lost in the woods is all they want to hear. Maybe the kid had a growth spurt or something. Best to keep it to yourselves," he muttered and he got up to leave. "I think he will be fine. Plenty of bed rest that sort of thing."
Over the next several days Billy began to recover but he couldn't shake the idea something strange and wonderful had happened. Mom and dad said it was just dreams from a fever. He had been lost for about a week and old Mr. Brown had come across him lying in a field. Apparently, old Duke Gary’s dog had led the farmer to him. Billy couldn't remember. Then they said oddly enough Duke had disappeared.
“All dreams?” he thought, as he wandered about the farm aimlessly. He felt a hint of loss for some reason.
Then one day his mom said “oh I almost forgot. Your father found this clutched in your fist when we tried to bath you.” she showed him a necklace with a long glass shard wrapped in some kind of gold wire.
"What is it?" he said. There was a flicker of some memory, and then it was gone.
"Well, your Dad found this gold in that little leather bag you had tied around your waist. He made it into a wire and don't ask me how, but he wrapped this up in the wire and made you a necklace out of it all. Your dad is a talented man. Don't know why he isn't rich. It's some kind of crystal. Do you remember where you got it?"
Billy shrugged, somehow he thought he should know but memory wouldn't come.
“Well it sure is pretty, sometimes it flashes in the sunlight. Sometimes there is a little green glow. I took it to Tom the jeweler he says its some kind of crystal not glass at all.” As she tied the necklace around his neck and had a look “Well it’s different anyway.”
Apparently, Steve had gone with his best friend on a camping trip, Marcy’s mom really wanted to talk to him, and Marcy, and Tommy and Gary, oddly enough were missing. But that could wait till he was well he thought, as he drifted off to sleep…after all Marcy didn’t like him anyway…
Not the end…….
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
William Smart was born in a city that he never lived in and spent most of his youth on a lonely farm in Northern Ontario Canada. The winters were harsh and cold. Summers were long and boring. He spent his time in his own imagination, until one day his mother gave him his first fantasy/sci-fi, written by Andria Norton After that he read every science fiction and fantasy he could get his hands on, till he had boxes of wonderful books. It was then he realized there were people just like himself, living in their imagination. He dreamed of being an author and at least writing one wonderful book.
The Jewel of Nirune (The Sword of Time Book 1) Page 32
