The Realm of the Drells

by Kenneth Zeigler

  Consuela did not work well during the day, despite the severe beatings she received. There was an anger in her, a rage that she was barely able to contain. One afternoon, five days after her arrival, she simply freaked out. She turned on Lemnock scratching and biting even as he whipped her again and again. Blood flew all over the place and she still fought on. Then she lit into him like a wild animal. In fact, I’m not so sure that she didn’t take a piece or two out of him in the process. It took four wulvers to take her down. They beat her unmercifully and when they dragged her away I wasn’t sure if she was alive or dead. That was the last time I saw her. I pray that she died quickly.

  Still time passed. It was nearly time for our midday rations, and, as always we were carving new chambers out of the rock, when I realized that it was Christmas day. I looked toward Gwen as she shoveled up rocks and dropped them into the hopper. She looked so pitiful. God, what had she ever done to deserve Christmas in a place like this? She had often spoken of her home and family back in New Hampshire. This was her first Christmas away from them. It was during our all too brief rest period that David and I walked over to where the poor child sat.

  “Gwen, do you know what day this is?” I asked, trying to be as cheerful as I could.

  “No,” she said softly, hardly looking up from the gray floor.

  “It’s Christmas day,” I replied, kneeling besides her, looking into her eyes. “I wish that there was some kind of present that I could give you, but the only thing I can give you is my love, and to tell you that Jesus loves you too.” I planted a kiss on her dirty forehead and hugged her warmly.

  A tear came to her eye as she returned my embrace. “Thank you Debbie,” she replied softly, “I love you too.”

  David followed my lead, kissing the little child on the forehead, as did the young Scotsman, Camron. It seemed so inadequate.

  Marci placed her hand on my shoulder as we prepared to return to work. There was such warmth in her eyes. I think there was even the trace of a tear to be found there. “Thank you Debbie, I know it meant a lot to her. I’m not so much into this religion thing you’re into but I do appreciate the sentiment.”

  “The only gift we can offer each other here is our love,” noted David. “It might be the only thing that keeps us alive.”

  In the weeks that followed, it was the love of David that allowed me to go on. I cherished the few precious moments of the day that we could sit side by side, holding hands. Yet when the day was over we were locked away, apart from each other once more. God, I wish they’d allow us to spend just one night together. It wasn’t a sexual thing, understand. I just wanted to spend some time with him, just the two of us. Just feeling his reassuring arm around me as I faded off to sleep, to know I wasn’t alone, would make my life more bearable. It is strange how we miss the simple things when they are gone.

  It was mid-January, when something incredible happened. It had been an unusually difficult day of work in the tunnels and I’d fallen asleep in my cell almost immediately. I hadn’t even finished my meager supper. Now understand, I didn’t dream very much in this realm of the drells; other than on the day of my leaching. But this night was different and so was the dream. The dream that night was so vivid, so clear, that it was more real than reality itself.

  I found myself back on Earth, sitting in the middle of a field of white flowers. Oh, it was so beautiful and the flowers smelled so nice. I was free of my chains, wearing a long white dress. It was so wonderful to be wearing nice clean clothes again. Somehow I knew it was a dream right from the start but I didn’t care I prayed that I would never wake up again. I rose to my feet to see a man sitting on a rounded boulder in the shade of a great oak tree not far away. He waved to me, motioned for me to come to him and I did. I had no fear of him. I knew that he wouldn’t hurt me.

  As I drew ever closer I could see him more clearly. Like me he was dressed in white from head to toe. He appeared to be in his mid-thirties and had brown hair and a well-trimmed beard. His blue eyes were kind and deep like none that I had ever seen before. If love were a physical thing, he glowed with it. Now I knew who he was. Tears of joy came to my eyes as I quickened my pace. He stretched open his arms and a few seconds later I fell into them crying for joy.

  “It’s you!” I exclaimed. “It’s really you.”

  “Of course it’s me, Debbie,” He said in a soothing voice. “I’m here now. It’s going to be alright, I promise.”

  “You heard me,” I cried. “You really heard me.”

  “Yes I did, every night,” he confirmed. “I’ve been listening to you all along. So has my Father. I’m so very proud of you, child. When things looked the darkest you looked to me and your eyes have never left me. You have shared my love with the others too. You have acknowledged me before others and I in turn have acknowledge you before my Father in Heaven. I’m here to tell you that the Father has not abandoned you, far from it.”

  Jesus stepped back for a moment and looked into my eyes. I found such peace in his presence.

  “Please, sit with me for a time,” He said, motioning to the boulder. “I’m sure there is room for two.”

  I sat with Him. I just couldn’t take my eyes from Him. “Oh Jesus, please take me from this awful place I’ve been condemned to. Oh please help me.”

  The Lord placed His arm around me. “Debbie, I will help you, I promise. But let me ask you a question. Do you remember who Moses was?”

  “Yes,” I replied, “he delivered the children of Israel from bondage in Egypt. He led them out into the wilderness and then into the Promised Land.” Debbie hesitated. “But he didn’t actually make it into the Promised Land. He saw it but he never reached it.”

  Jesus smiled broadly. “You see; you actually do remember some of what you learned in Sunday school.”

  I chuckled slightly. “Yes, I guess I do. But what does that have to do with me?”

  “Everything,” assured Jesus. “Do you think that the Father appears to men in the clouds and commands them to do this thing or that? No, the Father works through men and women who are willing to trust Him completely, He always has. People like Moses, Joshua, Ruth, Gideon, and Esther were instruments of His will. He spoke to them, showed them the way, then they led the people. Trust me when I tell you that this is the better way to lead the people.” He paused. “Are you prepared to take your place among them?”

  I wasn’t expecting that question. “Me? But I’m just a slave in this place, not some sort of princess or prophet. I don’t know what to do. I’m not even sure what all of those people you just mentioned did.”

  Jesus smiled. “You will. I will see to that. All I need right now is your faith and your willingness. Are you ready, Debbie?”

  I managed a smile. “I’m ready. When do we begin?”

  “We begin now,” confirmed Jesus.

  The world around me faded into darkness and I slipped into a dreamless perfect sleep. I had a new peace within me. Come the morning I remembered all that Jesus had told me. That in itself was unusual. I rarely remembered my dreams with such clarity. Somehow I knew it was more than just a dream. I was ready to do whatever had to be done.

  It was two days later and we were working in the same part of the cavern we’d been working in for months. The heavy black bars of about twenty of the cells we had cut from the rock were already in place. David and about half a dozen other slaves were raising a black metal pole into place with a pulley, to support a huge gate that would guard the entrance to the new cell block. Lukor had come to observe our progress and supervise the work. He had turned to speak to one of the task wulvers when the rope supporting the leaning beam snapped, bringing the huge pole crashing toward the cavern floor, straight toward Lukor.

  What happened next was instinctive, it must have been. I didn’t have time to think, I just did it.

  “Lukor, look out!” I cried in a whispery scream. In desperation I lunged toward him. My ankle shackles tripped me, as I slammed into Lukor, shoving him out of
the way. The beam crashed down only inches behind my feet.

  Lukor turned to see the huge girder that had fallen but a couple feet behind him, then he glanced at me with a puzzled expression on his face. He looked away and rose to his feet. “Let’s get that beam raised back into place,” he said. “Time is a wasting.”

  When he had left, both David and Marci approached me. “Lukor would have been crushed if you’d just stayed where you were,” scolded Marci. “You could have been killed trying to save him!”

  “Why?” was all that David could say.

  “I don’t know,” I admitted. “I guess it was just sort of automatic. I knew that I had to do it. I couldn’t let him die if I could prevent it. God didn’t want him to die.”

  “God didn’t?” asked David, surprise in his voice.

  “Yes, that’s right,” I replied.

  “I assure you, Lukor wouldn’t have done the same thing for you,” replied Marci. “If you had been injured, rendered unable to work, he would have sent you off to the drells without a second thought.”

  “But I’m not Lukor,” I murmured. I didn’t look either one of them in the eyes. Maybe I’d begun to consider the foolishness of my hasty act. What could such an act of kindness ever accomplish here?

  Marci and David walked away. As I worked on, I continued to wonder if I might have made a mistake after all. No, it wasn’t wrong. I felt a warmth deep inside.

  It was well after supper, and the others were sound asleep, when Lukor appeared outside of my cell. I laid upon my rock bed, trying not to return his gaze. He stood there in the middle of the corridor watching me for a long time before he spoke. “Why’d ya do it?” he asked.

  “Pardon?” I replied, rising to my feet and walking up to the bars.

  Lukor walked to the bars of my cell, his eyes full of intensity. “You know what I’m talking about. That beam would surely have fallen on me, killed me. Why’d ya push me out of da way? Ya could have been killed.”

  “I couldn’t let you be killed,” I said. “Jesus within me wouldn’t allow it to happen.”

  Lukor’s expression turned to one of puzzlement. “What? Who is within you?”

  “Jesus,” repeated Debbie. “He died for my sins and I will live to do His will.”

  “Oh, I see,” said Lukor. “I have heard of this Jesus, though not for a long time. He is quite a legend among your people; a fable.”

  “Not a legend or a fable,” replied Debbie. “It is my faith in Him that makes it possible for me to go on. I live on because He lives in me. He wouldn’t have allowed you to die when He could have prevented it and He could prevent it. He used me to do it. I know He has a plan for you. You will do great things. You must survive to do it.”

  I wanted to tell Lukor about the dream I had, but I didn’t. I knew it was neither the time nor the place, not yet.

  “You still feel that way after all this time?”

  “Of course I do,” I said.

  “Many of your fellows do not,” continued Lukor, “or have you not noticed?”

  “I’ve noticed,” I replied.

  “Of course you have,” said Lukor. “You speak to them of it nearly every day. Think not that I haven’t noticed. You care for them. Even such a place as this hasn’t driven the humanity from ya, or shall I say drive Jesus from you.”

  “No,” I replied, “in fact I found Him here.”

  “Have you indeed,” pondered Lukor. “Well, I will not debate matters of faith with you this evening. Faith in something bigger than ourselves, it is a personal matter. Da drells insist on being our gods. They will leave room for none other, it is forbidden for us to worship any other god. I make no such demands upon you and your people. You need not worship them as we do. You serve them with your life’s blood and in the end with your very flesh. I do not think you owe them anything more than that, so I do not ask for it. When it comes to gods you may believe as you wish.”

  Lukor reached through the bars and gently touched the back of my hand. I didn’t pull away. I think it surprised him. “I’m sorry that this has happened ta ya,” he said softly. “I know that doesn’t mean very much, but its da truth.”

  I placed my other hand on top of his, gently stroking his coarse fur. I looked into his deep brown eyes. There was human compassion there. I’d never dreamt that I would see it in the eyes of a wulver. “It means a lot to me Lukor,” I whispered. “It means a lot to have a friend, especially here.” For an instant I thought that I could see the trace of a tear in his eye, but he pulled back, quickly turned away.

  “By the code of Torin, I hate the drells,” he said, almost under his breath. “It gives me no pleasure to do what I do here. For years I’ve tried ta tell myself that your kind aren’t like us. You’re just animals of a sort, I say, that what we do ta ya doesn’t matter, but it ain’t true. We’re not so different, your people and mine, and once, long ago, the difference was even less.”

  I drew closer to the bars. “Where are your people from, Lukor? I’d really like to know.”

  “From a land of legend,” he said. “A place called Scotland. Have ya never wondered why we speak yer language?”

  I had wondered, many times. But I figured that they had learned our language over the years, through dealing with us. I mean, I overheard them speak French to some of us too. “But how did you get here?”

  “In the same way you were brought here,” he replied, still facing away from me. “Twas a witch who sentenced the people of the shire to this realm, Victoria Barda of the Sisterhood of Twilight. Legend says that she was cast out of the shire for her evil deeds, for practicing the old religion. But she vowed to take vengeance upon us. Her vengeance was more terrible than any of my ancestors could possibly have imagined.”

  “Your ancestors were human?”

  “Of course they were. Twas the drells who did this thing to us, made us the things that we are. They changed us into beasts of legend, wulvers. The drells commanded that we consider ourselves as such so we do. We’re not human anymore.” Lukor looked down at his furry hands. “Kadra and I can’t have any young of our own, ya know. When the drells did this thing to our ancestors they created a bunch of freaks. Even when our kind do have children, they’re often horribly deformed. Perhaps tis just as well that Kadra is barren.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said, reaching through the bars to touch his powerful arm. There wasn’t any fear in my heart for the great beast, not anymore. He looked back at me again, there were tears in his eyes. His lips trembled.

  “Sleep well Debbie,” he said as he pulled away and made his way down the corridor. He moved quickly so that other humans who might still be awake would not see a wulver cry.

  When I rested upon the hard stone bed that night, I did so with just the flicker of hope in my soul. There was still tenderness in the wulver heart. The drells hadn’t driven their humanity completely from them, not yet. I had to convince Lukor to help me, help all of us escape from this nightmare. A divine thing had been set into motion and I would do all in my power to make it come to pass.

  The very next evening after all were asleep, Lukor visited me again. He handed me the coarse writing paper and the strange black metal pen with which I keep my journal. But he gave me something else, something far more precious. It is my most precious possession. He handed me a book hidden in a small pouch, a very old book.

  “Ya must be very careful about this book,” he cautioned. “It is a forbidden book. If the drells knew that Kadra and I had it, we would most surely be executed.”

  I carefully removed the brown leather bound book from the pouch. As I looked at the cover tears came to my eyes. There in gold letters were the words Holy Bible; King James Version. I carefully opened the cover to see the print date of 1672 and the inscription to Laura.

  “I am very sure that this is the only one of its kind in the realm,” continued Lukor. “You spoke of Jesus. I believe this book is about Jesus. I thought you should have it. Tis the least I can do. You saved my
life.”

  “I’ll treasure it always,” I replied.

  Then Lukor handed me a small glowing crystal. “If you’re going to read that book you might need this. Tis a bit dark in your cell. I wouldn’t want you to ruin your eyes.”

  I nodded, even as Lukor quickly departed. It was unheard of for a wulver to give a human slave such a thing. He had taken a horrible risk in doing this. Had Lukor really changed? I wasn’t sure. I wanted to believe he had.

  I opened the Bible and started reading in the Book of Matthew. I immediately realized that there would be challenges. English of the seventeenth century was quite different from that of the twentieth. It was more than just the thee and thou, there were several unfamiliar letters in the alphabet. Others took on an unusual shape. However, after about half an hour I figured it out and things began to flow for me.

  It must have been very late when I returned the book to its pouch. I hid it behind my rock pillow where no one else might easily see it. For now, I would keep its existence a secret both for my sake and Lukor’s.

  Chapter 4

  Seventy-one-year-old Dr. John Wilson adjusted the position of his wire rimmed glasses as he gazed through the control room window into the laboratory where his life’s work, the partially assembled focused electronic neural stimulator, FENS device, awaited its super cooled electromagnet assembly. Right now it was a mass of loose wires and open access ports, a skeleton awaiting flesh, awaiting life.

  The thin doctor was the classic picture of a scientist with his long gray hair and white goatee. He had aggressively pursued the development of this marvel of science for so many years. Yet now he looked tired, far from the picture of health.

  After more delays than he cared to count, the electromagnet was at last scheduled to be delivered. Just three more weeks and that most important component would be here. His longtime partner Karl Lund and his engineering assistant Connie Cox would be able to install this one of a kind component in about two weeks barring unforeseen complications. Then there would come the testing and calibration. That could easily take several months. After all, they were venturing into unknown territory here. No one had ever successfully established a stable electromagnetic field of this strength before, no less shaped it into so intricate a form. And this wasn’t some experiment into magnetic levitation or nuclear engineering. No, this was a groundbreaking medical instrument designed to stimulate damaged synapses within the brain, reroute higher brain functions around damaged areas, and restore comatose patients back to the land of the living. That was the dream anyway.