Branded (Master of All Book 1)

by Simon Archer

  “Come on, Reg,” I said softly. “You need to get out of the storm.”

  “Wait a tick.” Sir Thorpe blinked as he looked over at me then back to the archway. “What about you, young William?”

  “Oh, I’m going inside too.” I grinned a bit as I felt my heart start to pound in my chest. Anticipation… excitement rushed up my spine and through my brain. “But then I’m going further.” I clapped him once solidly on the shoulder and stepped inside.

  Reggie was right on my heels as what I could only describe as the warmth of spring soothed away the numbing cold of the valley. “You do not seriously mean to simply… step into that?” he argued. “Certainly, I am not one to turn from adventure, but this is a monumental find. It must be studied, observed, intricately and scientifically examined before any human being steps through--”

  I cut him off by dropping my pack heavily on the smooth floor. Now that we were inside, it was clear that it wasn’t simply smooth natural stone. Someone had laid marble tile here, and some unseen force kept the elements from entering the open archway.

  “Reggie…” I turned towards my old friend. “There’s more to Dad’s story than just this discovery.” I gestured back to the scintillating light of the portal. “He didn’t just pass through it and then come back. There’s a lot more going on that… that he didn’t want me to tell you before now.”

  “A lot more going on than that?” Reggie literally sputtered for a few moments at the apparent insanity of that thought. “What more could be going on? And why didn’t Professor Tyler feel that I could be trusted with it?”

  I sighed at that as I began to pull off my parka, careful not to aggravate the stinging scratches in my arm. “Well, first, he didn’t think you’d believe him. He barely believed you’d accept the first part of it.”

  Sir Thorpe chewed on his mustache a moment but then sighed in defeat. “Well, he wasn’t entirely wrong, was he? I was questioning things but an hour ago.”

  “Yeah, but the second part is… well…” I looked at the portal, entranced by the dancing lights. They were calling to me, and my blood was buzzing in my veins at the pull of it. “This is a family matter, but more than that, what goes on in there could change not just our world, but their world too.” I let out a short sigh. “My world.”

  “You don’t…” Reggie’s voice trailed off as his keen mind deduced the meaning of my worlds. “You were born there, weren’t you? I never met your mother, your father always claimed that he met her during an expedition, and she died in childbirth… That was, indeed, some expedition.”

  But then he shook his head. “But what’s this about changing worlds and…?”

  “Come on, Reg,” I said as I took a triple check of my wounds. They really had been shallow, and they had already scabbed over. “Think about it. That isn’t a natural thing. That’s created. That’s magic, a force beyond understanding, and do you really think it’s a good idea to let the rest of the world know about it?”

  “Hold on now!” Sir Thorpe crossed his arms and arched an eyebrow sternly. “You don’t mean to ask me to hide all this from the rest of the world, do you? It’s an astonishing academic find! It will revolutionize how we look at both the ancient world and our cosmology. It…” He blinked slowly as I let him come to the natural conclusion on his own. “It will change the world… and who knows in what way?”

  “Exactly. Dad knew that. It’s why he kept this a secret as long as he did. Now, though, I’m old enough to finish what he started.”

  “What he started…?”

  I smiled a bit and clapped Reggie on the shoulders. “Family business, like I said. It’s the one thing I can’t share with you, so I’m asking you to trust me on this.”

  Sir Thorpe’s grey eyes met my hazel ones, and I smiled as he assessed me. After a long moment, he nodded slowly.

  “I am an old-fashioned man, William,” he admitted. “I believe in an older code of honor than most, and I can see that you speak and act with conviction on this matter. Family is the most important of things, and I shall not bar your way from this.” The old explorer snapped me a salute worthy of a general. “What do you need me to do then, Master Tyler?”

  I smiled at his show of support. Honestly, Sir Thorpe was the only family I had left after Dad’s death… and whatever I might find in the world beyond… so the fact he understood made this all the easier.

  “I need you to help me with Dad’s last wish.” I turned to kneel next to my bag and began to unpack it. “After I pass through to the other world, Reggie, and after you’re rested up and ready to hike back, I need you to collapse this cave.”

  Before he could even ask how, I got past the survival gear and supplies I had been carrying and unloaded the bundle of explosives I had been carrying with us this entire time. I couldn’t claim that I hadn’t been the one to figure out how to get that into Canada. Dad had been preparing for this day for years. Sir Thorpe let out a low whistle at that, then again when I pulled out the brand-new satellite phone I had purchased before we left civilization.

  “Set the place to blow, then call in for a rescue on the sat phone,” I explained. “The phone was my addition to the plan, I’m proud to say. He expected you were still spry enough to just hike out of here.”

  Reggie laughed at that, despite the bizarre situation we were in. “Who says I can’t? I may not be as young as I used to be--”

  I cut him off by thrusting the phone into his hands. “Just trust me and be safe, okay?”

  “But what of you?” he asked with real concern flashing in his eyes. “You are like a favorite nephew to me, William, and so… you really don’t plan on ever coming back?”

  I stood and turned to stare into the portal. “My destiny is through there, Reg.”

  There was a clatter, the distinct sound of the rugged plastic of the sat phone on the marble floor before Reggie slapped me on the back and let out a chuckle. “Then I certainly can’t let you go into that great unknown beyond alone, now can I? Your father’s wishes be damned this one time!”

  “But…” I stopped myself and glanced over my shoulder to see the old Brit smiling like a young man about to enter a new adventure. The hunger in his eyes was real, and then I realized the truth. There were no more great adventures for this explorer left on this world. Part of me still wanted to tell him no, that it was safer this way, but was that true? Dad might have had his own wishes, but Reggie had said it himself. He was family, and this was family business.

  “Okay, Reg,” I said with a smile of my own.

  “I’ll not take no for an answer, young man...” he began to protest, no doubt expecting me to stick to Dad’s demands, but Sir Thorpe’s voice trailed off into a sputter as his mind caught up to what his ears were telling him. “I, well, the deuce you say?” He smoothed out his grey whiskers. “Then what are we waiting for, lad? Let’s set up those explosives, put ‘em on a timer, and get cracking!”

  I thrust out a hand to him, one he happily took and shook, as if to seal our new agreement. “You got it, Reggie. Adventure awaits!”

  2

  Warm sunlight played across my face, and the cool, soft grass under me was awfully inviting. It was no wonder I had fallen asleep here… wherever here was.

  I felt like I had been through a ten-car pile-up on I-85 and lived through it, so the very idea of opening eyes wasn’t high on my priority list. Still, I had this nagging feeling that something important needed doing, that I needed to fight through the aches and pains and get my ass up.

  That’s when I heard Reggie let out a tired groan to the right of me, and with that sound, the last few days came rushing back into my head. The Canadian wilderness, the climb, the wolves, and most of all, the portal. Sir Thorpe and I had rigged the timer on the explosives, jumped through, and then…

  Everything was blank.

  I went from sleepy to fully awake as that realization hit, and my eyes snapped open. My idea was to sit up, spring into action, figure out what was going o
n… but what I saw made me pause. Not in fear, but in absolute wonder.

  Above me was a clear sky of soft purples and golds, like a perpetual sunrise moment even though I got a clear view of the sun. Well, suns, to be exact. Two of those celestial bodies dominated my view, one larger than the other. Occasionally, wispy clouds the color of cotton candy drifting across the dual suns, only amplifying the dazzling displays as the light filtered through them.

  Dad’s story and his letter had all been true. There really was a world beyond ours, and we were in it.

  At the corner of my vision, the canopy of a forest encroached on my view, and that helped me shake off the fantastical sight of the alien sky. A forest meant life, and life could mean danger. I had to get my shit together because the one thing Dad had impressed upon me was that this new world, the Land Below as he called it, wasn’t a safe one.

  I finally sat up and scanned my surroundings. As I expected, Reggie was stirring himself, and thankfully, the old man looked none the worse for wear despite his groans.

  Two other things immediately caught my eye though: His Webley was still safe in the holster strapped to his thigh, but his hiking pack was gone. It wasn’t torn off, there was simply no evidence it ever existed. I didn’t even bother touching my shoulder to check my own pack. The fact I had been lying flat on my back told me all I needed to. At least my knife was a comforting weight at my side.

  The clearing we were sprawled out in was ringed by a primeval forest that was both familiar and strange in one go. The trees were, well, obviously trees, bark, leaves, branches, and all that, but the shapes and colors ran a range that was, well, unearthly. Some familiar looking ones could have passed for oaks and maples, but there were also leaves that ran the colors of the rainbow and wood that shimmered like steel. One gnarled trunk straight ahead looked more as if it were cast from bronze instead of grown, with curled leaves that resembled arrowheads in shape and, judging by the gleam of their edges, perhaps function.

  But that wasn’t all. The grass beneath us sparkled as if each blade was a tiny jewel, a waving carpet of tiny emeralds, and as I rose and turned, I laid eyes on what had to have been the other end of the doorway to the Land Below. Or maybe I should say what was left of it. It was obvious that it had once been a standing archway in the same style as the one we had walked through to get here, but it was now a crumbling and broken pile of stone.

  As Reggie picked himself up, I walked carefully over to the pile of rubble and went down on one knee to examine it. My first thought was that the explosives we had set on Earth had blown through the portal as well as if it were a normal doorway, but after a moment’s investigation, I realized that this arch had collapsed from more natural means. The rocks were weatherworn and crumbling under my touch, and any trace of the obsidian top piece was gone entirely.

  I glanced back to Sir Thorpe to see him doing what I had done moments ago, staring in wonder at the purple sky and two suns. Despite our strange and potentially dangerous situation, I couldn’t help but smile at the spark I saw in his eyes. It was just like when he insisted on joining me, and it made the sixty-year-old explorer seem twenty years younger.

  “How are you feeling, Reg?” I asked as I stood and dusted my hands off. My own aches and pains were fading quickly. Maybe I had slept off the worst of it already.

  He started at the sound of my voice as he spun around, but when he saw me, Sir Thorpe’s eyes lit up again as he smiled. “Master William, I am… indescribably happy despite a few lingering aches.” Reggie crossed the clearing, grabbed my hands, and shook them. “And I am greatly in your debt for bringing me along. We’re here in a whole new world, and I have new vistas to explore!”

  I brought him in and gave him a quick hug. “I’m glad you’re here to see it too, Reggie,” I said as I pulled back, a big grin on my face. “Looks like Dad was finally wrong about something.”

  “Professor Tyler was a brilliant and noble friend,” Reggie said as he collected himself, “but no one is perfect.” He gave me one last manly clap on the shoulder then adjusted his belt. “So, now that we’re here… perhaps you can divulge to me the rest of what your father entrusted to you?”

  I nodded as I hooked my thumbs in my belt. “Sure thing, but let’s talk as we start to explore.” I tilted my chin towards Reg’s missing pack. “We’re about out of supplies thanks to, well, whatever took our packs. Guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Dad made some vague hints about how hard it was to take things with you to the Land Below.”

  “Of course, smart thinking, William.” Sir Thorpe took a moment to draw his revolver and break it open to inspect the cylinder. “Glad I reloaded after our little scuffle with those wolves. All seems in working order.” He then patted one of his pockets. “Ah, good. The loose ammunition I had pocketed is still there as well. Still, that only leaves us…” I could see him do the math in his head. “... sixteen bullets.”

  “No wonder Dad had me do all those survival courses.” I chuckled. “At least I’ve got my pocket survival kit. It’s not much, but it’ll give us a leg up on things.” As I talked, I began to walk a slow circuit of the clearing. It seemed as if no one had come this way in a long time, but that meant there had to be game trails or other sign of animal life that would have come in with the lack of hunting… assuming this world was anything like Earth, that was. “Check the other side, Reggie, see if you see any sign of anything. Food, water, and shelter are our top priorities.”

  “Naturally, my boy,” he replied, more chipper than I frankly had ever seen him. Old Reggie was in his element now, it seemed, and started his own search opposite of me.

  “Now, here’s the rub,” I began to explain as we searched. “Dad’s own information about everything beyond the gate was kind of sketchy. Maybe the better way to put it was that it sounded like he was recounting a dream. What I pieced together was that there is something like what we would call magic on Earth that really works here, and that Dad urged me to come here and find ‘Her,’ always capitalized in his letters.”

  “That is exceedingly vague.” Reggie stooped to get a closer look at something, then dismissed it as he stood again. “Perhaps passing through the portals induces some kind of trauma that could account for his vagueness though. The trip here impacted us both quite a bit, and it seems as if your father made more than a few trips back and forth over his life.”

  “That’s a sound theory,” I agreed as I came to a parting in the trees as if there was a natural trail. There were no tracks, not even a broken branch, and yet, I couldn’t help but notice how the trees grew. They all bent and swayed out of the way of the path, almost as if some unseen hand had urged the trees to grow clear from where someone would walk. “Huh, Reggie, come take a look at this.”

  Reggie dusted off his hands and joined me, making sure to give the crumbled archway a wide berth. I gestured to the oddly shaped trees, and he nodded sagely as he rubbed his whiskers.

  “It appears to be something similar to how plants will grow towards light and water, creating what we see as unnatural shapes,” he mused. “But there are no clear stimuli that I can tell.” He gestured to where some leaf-bearing branches swerved in opposite directions to best avoid the trail. “Very odd.”

  “Or very magical?” I said with a grin.

  “I suppose that must always be kept in the equation now, William,” the old Brit said with a faint cough. “Good to keep this old dog on his toes, eh?”

  “Yep, and if it is magic, that means this has got to go somewhere, right?” I pointed ahead, off into the faintly lit trail. The canopy wove tight together here, blocking much of the twin suns’ light.

  “Indeed, which means, as a natural course, that it is down this path that our journey truly begins.” Sir Thorpe smoothed out his khakis, adjusted his belt, then tried to tame his now-unruly mustache and beard. I was pretty sure he was actually trying to look his best for the natives. “Unless, of course, the professor passed on some more directions as to the location of this mys
terious ‘Her’ you have been quested to find?”

  I paused at that and let out a long breath. The whole mystery of ‘Her’ had been on my mind during this entire expedition, ever since Dad had laid this all down on me. He spoke of her like she was everything, the key to it all, whatever that all was, but more than that, he spoke of her as something akin to, well, a lover. Was this ‘Her’ my mother? Maybe, but at the same time, the few times Dad spoke about my mother was focused entirely on how she had been lost and how he never forgave himself for what happened to her.

  “William?” Reggie asked as he laid a comforting hand on my shoulder. “Is something amiss?”

  “Just… remembering Dad and what he said about ‘Her,’” I admitted as I collected myself. “Brought back his death a bit, you know?”

  “I do.” Reggie clapped me once more on the shoulder before pulling back. “Grief is something that lingers, my boy, but we shall persevere.”

  “Stiff upper lip, right?” I replied with a grin, to which Sir Thorpe stiffly nodded. “Anyway, the one concrete thing Dad wrote about Her location was that it was close to the entrance to the Land Below, in the Forest of Welcome, as he put it.” I shrugged. “So, we’re in a forest close to the archway...”

  Reggie pointed down the shaped trail. “And if this isn’t a welcome mat, I don’t know what is. Shall we?”

  I nodded. “Let’s go.”

  Though part of me wanted to draw my knife as I stepped forward, the sensible part of me decided that if we did run into some peaceful natives, a drawn weapon wouldn’t put forth the best first impression. Instead, I led the way open-handed, though I did keep the clasp open on the sheath. It didn’t hurt to be a little prepared, after all.

  Reggie stayed close, ranging just a little bit back so that we didn’t stumble over each other if things got hectic. Fortunately, the trail expanded a bit as we moved on, enough that we could walk side-by-side if we stuck tight together, with the canopy drooping a few feet past the top of my head, maybe eight or nine feet tall altogether. Though the sunlight only trickled through, there was still enough to see clearly enough to make out the continued multi-colored display of flora on all sides. Just when I thought I had seen the last of the variety of plant life, I caught sight of something new, be it crystalline ferns or glowing mushrooms that seemed to breathe with their own inner life.