by Sanders, Dan
It was worse than she first thought; the spectacle she caused when she fell over had stopped every ear and nose from twitching in the cave. Thousands of eyes reflected the cave light, staring up at her, giving the cave an eerie feel.
“Show’s over folks, go back to your business,” Bently shouted, his orange ears waving wildly.
“Are you well?” A smaller, pale blue rabbit with a squeaky voice looked up at her.
“Holy mother of Eostra, she’s a giant,” a portly, ivory coloured rabbit said.
“Stop talking about me as if I’m not here,” Emily said as she rolled over onto her paws again. “Oh no, I’m still a rabbit.”
“You are a snow rabbit, and my name is Kobi,” said the ivory rabbit, crunching on a ferrum stick.
“I must be dreaming,” Emily said. “I’ve never had a rabbit dream before or any other animal if you must know.”
Emily scratched her whiskers with her front paws. Her big feet slapped the ground as she walked about in circles pondering her dilemma.
“By the way,” Emily continued indignantly, “I am not huge and I am definitely not a ‘snow rabbit’. For your information I’m a bird, and when I wake from this dream, I’ll be back to my old self.”
Kobi looked at the rock platform and said, “Alecia, do you think she could have hurt her head when she fell off this rock?”
“What are you babbling about now?” Alecia said.
“She must have hit her head if she thinks she is a bird.”
Alecia hopped closer to Emily, and said, “I’m glad your brains are bigger than your body K, but just focus on the problem at hand.”
“What are you doing?” Emily asked.
“You’re not from around here, that’s for certain. Your ears are much too big and you are four times the size of the largest Adros Rabbit. Even the giant rabbits of the western Ranges are only half your size.”
“I’m a bird! I’m only two tree knots high, average for my kind. When I’m awake, I have soft brown belly feathers, a red under-beak, dark brown eye feathers, and bright red wings, like my father.”
“There she goes again with the bird thing,” Kobi said, exasperated.
“Come to think of it, you are all rather small,” Emily said. “It must be the dream thing. Things are always a bit strange when you dream.”
“I think she’s beautiful.” A small blue rabbit joined the chattering.
“Ah Rupurt, don’t embarrass her,” Alecia said as she sifted through Emily’s hind quarter fur.
“Leave him alone; he’s always in his own world,” Bently said, his orange ears flicking excitedly.
“Hey, can everybody focus,” Emily said. “How do I wake up from this? I want to find my family.”
“Well, as I recall,” Kobi offered, looking at the claws on his front paws, “the best thing to do is to wait until you finish your sleep cycle and wake up naturally. Unless of course something bad jars you awake.”
Emily pondered this advice. And as these rabbits were a figment of her dream, it must really be her advice, so she decided it must be sound.
“I think you’re right. After the lady in the strange dream last night, today isn’t so bad. At least my wing isn’t broken anymore and I’m not freezing to death.”
Bently and Kobi had joined a game of leap-rabbit in the grass; a competition on who could jump over the tallest mountain of rabbits piled on top of one another.
“Will you two knock it off,” Alecia said.
Emily watched with fascination at her dream having so much fun.
“You are such a kill-joy Alecia,” Bently puffed as he bounded over a pile of thirteen rabbits. He sprawled head over paws, nearly landing on Alecia.
“Get out,” Alecia said, pretending not to smile.
Rupurt was still sitting on his light-blue haunches, transfixed by Emily’s majestic presence.
Alecia padded to the other side of Emily, continuing her close inspection of this anomaly in their midst. She noticed something strange. “Hey guys, come and look at this.”
Her three companions stopped fooling around and padded over to find Alecia holding up Emily’s left arm, just below her paw.
“Is that what I think it is?” Kobi said, himself running his paw in some detail over Emily’s foreleg.
“It looks like Eostra’s Mark,” Bently said, his orange-brown nose twitching excitedly.
“I think it absolutely is,” Alecia said. “See how the crescent moon tightly hugs the spiral of space.”
“I’m still here you know,” said Emily.
Alecia’s small lime paw rubbed the red mark. “How did you get this?”
Emily looked at the spot of fascination under her paw to see the red mark, like a scar, imprinted through her fluffy white fur and onto the white skin underneath.
“I don’t know,” she mused. “Just part of the dream I guess. It’s sweet though.”
“We need to ask Harli about this. He’ll know what to do,” Kobi said.
“This is clearly Eostra’s Mark,” Alecia continued, deep in thought. “Question is, how did she get it and what does it mean for her?”
“Wait a minute,” Emily interrupted. “You forgot I have a say in this. After all it is my dream.”
“I hate to break it to you, my rabbit friend, but we are real, which means this is not a dream,” Kobi said.
Emily laughed so much at her dream’s continued assertion that it was real; she created quite a grass storm as she padded her large feet on the grassy ground.
“That woman last night, and now you lot today. What next?”
“Tell us about your dream,” Alecia said, suddenly curious. “You mentioned a woman. What was her name?”
Emily was about to recount her unimaginable time in the snow when the chatter stopped. A large group of rabbits separated to make a path for an old rabbit padding his way to Emily and her new friends. This must be Harli she thought. It struck her how much older he was than the others. His white fur hung off his body, while weary grey whiskers drooped around his little mouth. He wore a small silver amulet around his neck. It was in the shape of a rabbit, with a small egg-shaped crystal set in the stomach area, near the hind leg.
He approached her silently, and padded around her, pulling his hind legs under the front balancing paws. He took particular care stroking the red mark on Emily’s left forearm, the one everybody seemed interested in.
“Please continue,” he said in an older voice, unlike the bell voices of the others.
“Well, yes,” Emily said nervously. Then she remembered her popere always reminded her that beings are all the same, even those in particularly important stations in life.
She sat on her haunches, getting used to the feeling of padding beneath her. They were right, she was much bigger.
“It all happened so fast, but I remember her name. In fact, she said she had a few names she was called by. She called herself Eostra.”
Emily heard a collective breath of the entire brood, as though the very cave was astonished by the implication of her dream. Harli clasped his amulet, closed his eyes and mouthed a few words. Emily thought the egg in the amulet glowed briefly.
Emily thought something peculiar was going on. Saying that name made her feel strange. Was it possible it was real? She shook her head, twitching her whiskers. It felt real, but no doubt she would snap out of it when she needed her next nap.
Alecia broke the silence. “Do you think it was her?”
Harli stretched out his paw to his companions. “Let me introduce myself. My name is Harli. And in case you haven’t been properly introduced, this orange rabbit from the western Ranges is Bently. And this quiet fellow is Rupurt. Our hungry friend here is Kobi, and this is Alecia.”
Harli tilted his ears to the light green leader of the group.
“And you are…?” Harli quizzed Emily.
“My name is Emily. I’m a bird.”
“We are the Adros Rabbits,” Rupurt finished.
Emily
decided to humour her dream a little longer. Harli did seem wise and might help her work out why she was having such vivid dreams. Always in the back of her mind, she was anxious about waking up, getting back in the air and navigating back to her family.
Harli dismissed the crowded cave. The rabbits scuttled into the many round doors that surrounded the public area, doors of every colour that led into the vast underground warrens that were home to the Adros Rabbits.
Harli led them to his private chambers. The walls were rounded to a domed ceiling, and lit by the same sparkling minerals as the main cave. Ornaments lined the walls; paintings of regal looking rabbits; a suit of crystal armour; a black crossbow; and crystal balls floated gently along the walls.
Harli climbed onto a large green padded cushion that faced two large chairs and three other padded cushions, all arranged in a circle.
Noticing Emily’s puzzled looks Harli offered an explanation. “The room needs to be this large and furnished this way, as I often have house guests and dignitaries from other species here. I see you admire some of the gifts I have received over the years.”
They all hopped into a seat. The warm yellow light from the walls relaxed her. Sitting on a plush brown cushion, she was reminded of her family nest and her home.
Emily worried she might not be in a dream, as she couldn’t quite reconcile that she had never seen anything like the sights she was experiencing now. If she had not encountered such varied beauty, how could her mind concoct such an elaborate, horrifying and intriguing theatre?
Rupurt took a seat next to Emily, never speaking, just watching and smiling whenever she looked his way.
Harli eventually spoke. “Perhaps you could tell us where you come from and what brought you here.”
With her paws folded, Emily spoke quietly. “I’m from the Five-Ring Brood, near the sea.” Emily saw their blank looks and tried to explain. “Our brood is well known among the bird nations, for it sits in a ring of five of the largest oak trees in the region. I am from the house of Malmour and my father’s name is Bijou.”
Emily felt reassured at mentioning her popere’s name. “Anyway, the food is scarce and water is drying up and… our brood is slowly dying.”
Rupurt covered his mouth with his paw. “I’m sorry for you and your brood, Emily. But why?”
“The Elders don’t know for sure. We all know it has something to do with the season of strangeness we’ve been having.”
Emily didn’t tell them of watching her friend being buried or how she had persuaded Noogie to spy on the Elders’ meeting to find out what they were planning.
Harli scratched his grey whiskers as he spoke. “Seasons of strangeness?”
Emily didn’t want to tell them about her feelings but saw no other way. “I can feel things in the land. I can’t explain it. It’s as though the land is in pain. I can feel it in the rocks and the plants and the water.”
Emily expected them to laugh at her the same way many in her brood laughed at her. Instead they all nodded knowingly.
“My friend Noogie and I were out with the scout group looking for answers when we got lost in the human settlement. We saw the boy being hurt by the gang of other boys. And then we fell through a wall in the cave where we were hiding, and here I am.”
Her new friends sat entranced with her story, as though they were also in a dream, soon to wake up and find it all a figment of their imagination.
Harli wrung his paws and twitched his whiskers. “If we assume we are real, and that you also are real to us, that means you have survived the travel in time and space into our world, which we call Annwyn.”
Emily stared at the room full of strangers. She looked at her paws and her footpads. She pulled on her ears and her whiskers. She shook her head and clicked her teeth.
“How do I get back to my home? I want to go now.”
Harli and the other rabbits looked blankly at each other.
“That I do not know,” Harli said. “But it is as the scholars say; the Twin Worlds are connected.” He looked deeply at Emily. “Emily, you are from Earth, Annwyn’s twin world. Our world is also in peril. Although many still pretend nothing takes place beyond their walls; nonetheless, the Dissonant One spreads his darkness across our lands. If we do not stop it, your world will also die.”
Emily said, “How is it you know of my world and its name? What did you call it, Earth?” Emily had never heard this name before and wanted to understand a world closing in on her, raising more questions than it answered.
“Earthlings have come to Annwyn for nearly two thousand years now. At first there were not many but now they have sizeable settlements.”
Harli hopped down and poured Emily a bowl of yellow liquid. She looked quizzically into the strange liquid and pushed her snout into the bowl to drink. Unfamilar with drinking from a rabbit nose, Emily spurted the liquid over her fur and knocked the bowl onto the floor. She stamped her footpad in frustration.
“Don’t concern yourself, Emily,” Harli said. “It will take time.”
Emily tried to hop back onto the cushion but tripped again. Her face accidentially fell into Rupurt’s lap. They both blushed.
“How do the other Earthlings come to Annwyn?” she asked.
“Like you, the other Earthlings come through one of the AGates,” Kobi chimed in. “I can’t explain the Lore of it, but it happens. Only trouble is, these Gates are only one way. I would love to see your world…”
Emily didn’t hear the last part of Kobi’s wish to visit Earth as the room started to spin. The lights flashed, and concerned voices became a dreamlike blur. This couldn’t be happening! Her family would be lost to her forever. Bile and tears rose in her belly as she fainted, landing squarely on her new friend Rupurt again.
When Emily came to, the room was a little dusky, as though the speckled lights had dimmed. There was a pan of water on a low table in front of her. Rupurt fussed over her, nudging the pan, encouraging her to drink.
“You are all still here,” Emily said.
Harli’s deeper rabbit voice said soothingly, “Emily, this will be difficult for you to hear but you coming here is a great honour for our world. These things are outside my experience and life calling.” Harli pointed to a crystal ball floating on his desk. “I have sought the advice of the most powerful Melder, Magas Whiteoak, Lord of the realm of Eostra.”
“Can he send me home?”
“If anybody can, it is he. But I will warn you. These are dangerous times for our land.
“Melder Whiteoak wouldn’t say too much but he said you are very special, and must be protected.”
Emily scanned the room for danger. She sniffed. Nothing.
Raising her paw she said, “I almost forgot. Eostra said I must find the Earth boy. Something about him being important.”
Harli said, “I know nothing of the boy. For now you are safe here. Melder Whiteoak has instructed that before you are taken to him, you are to be taught the ways of the rabbit.”
“The ways of the rabbit?” Emily yelled and flapped her paws. “I want to go home and be a bird. Can’t anybody understand that?”
She looked at Rupurt with a tear of frustration forming in her eye. “I am a bird.”
Rupurt patted her paw and said, “If you are to be a rabbit in our world, why not learn our ways?”
Emily thought for a while, tapping her rabbit footpad. Eventually she sighed and said, “I will learn your ways and go with you to this Magas man.” She nodded. “But just until I find a way to get out of this dream, and can be home with my family and my kind.”
Chapter 8
Xavier’s Visitor
CASTLE OF OVERLORD DARIUS MORGENSTERN
JALPARI,
ANNWYN
Xavier broke the silence with his father and said, “Thank you for my gifts.”
The red sun glinted off Overlord Darius’ ruby ponytail. He looked down at Xavier. “It’s your birthright. You come of age today.”
“All the same,
” Xavier said, “I wanted to thank you.”
Four guards escorted the two royals through the city. They wore plain red robes pulled tightly over their heads. They reached the edge of the city and paused at the Jalpari precipice. Steam spat and hissed from the Jalpari Volcano and its hulking form cast a shadow over them. The Overlord patted sweat from his cheeks. Xavier held his nose from the smell of sulphur. His arm brushed against his father’s robe. Absently, he spun a small tuft of flames on his two top fingers.
His father looked down at him and said, “Don’t you think it is time you tied your hair back?”
Xavier pulled at the bulging ruby hair under his hood and said, “I like it this way.”
His father said, “Just remember, growing up brings responsibility. Sometimes it’s uncomfortable, but you must bear it with dignity. You will be leader someday.”
“I wish Mother were here,” Xavier said.
“Wishful thinking is not helpful.”
Xavier pursed his lips at his moment of weakness. They continued along the edge of the precipice that wrapped around the volcano. Only occasional Jalpari subjects were seen this far from the town centre. They stopped at the only building in sight. The free-standing hut made of grey stone was the only connection between the Fire-Lore nation and the volcano. Suddenly Xavier heard a screeching above. He looked up and saw Sirakon riding Lin, his giant dragonfly. They hovered near Xavier. Sirakon waved. In a blink Sirakon buzzed to the far side of the volcano, then shot to the top of the volcano, and paused before buzzing back to Xavier again. The delicate Esa hovered just above him. Wondering why dragonflies never stay long in one place, he looked around, hoping Bardolf was with them.
Xavier was about to call out when his father raised his hand. “Quiet; what have I said about raising attention?”
Xavier pulled back his hand and shoved it under his robes. He sneaked a smile at Sirakon, and sighed. Sirakon flicked him a final wave before the Esa disappeared into the clouds.
The Overlord strode into the flat roofed hut, and Xavier scampered after him. The Overlord spoke to six wooden rods that poked out from the grey wall. The wooden brands flickered into soft wood-light, burning without being consumed.
