In the Grip of Time

by Adam Jacob Burgess

  She trailed off, feeling as though she wasn’t doing a very good job of articulating what she had wanted to say. Sawwse wanted to tell Ruby that it felt difficult to criticise a place where the majority of gnomes had seemed happy enough, but that things could have been improved further, had the community been prepared to break from their traditions. Her feelings were further confused by a rising sensation of homesickness. She’d have to scour the Gnomeopedia later for any mention of it.

  ‘What about you, Ruby? Are you far from home?’ Sawwse asked.

  ‘Y-yes,’ Ruby squeaked, seeming to shrink as she replied.

  ‘Have you travelled a lot?’ Sawwse asked.

  ‘This is the farthest I’ve travelled in a long, long time.’

  Ruby spoke quietly, thinking of the years she’d spent hermit-like, holed up in a cave. There was a pause, before Sawwse saw the outlines of Ruby’s cheeks raise into a smile.

  ‘I just thought of a joke. What do you call a travelling gnome?’

  The formalities of jokes outside of the Blue Forest were a little lost on Sawwse. The gnomes of the forest were far more likely to prank, than joke. She felt bad for not responding correctly, but she simply said, ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘A gnomad!’

  Ruby clapped her thigh and set about laughing loudly. She quickly translated for the horses who whinnied their approval noisily.

  Sawwse felt like laughing more at Ruby’s reaction to her own joke than at the joke itself. She was about to respond when the driver called out to them from the front, in a raised whisper.

  ‘I said keep it quiet back there. You should know better than to attract attention in this area.’

  Turning to see their nonplussed expressions, he quietly explained that they were in the hinterland between two realms. They were currently passing by the Slǣpan Wiga mountain range that acted as a natural border between Dorienne and its regional neighbour Pāx.

  ‘Though we’re much more likely to run into bandits than a sleeping knight.’

  ‘A sleeping night? That sounds... I didn’t realise the night-time was-’ Sawwse began, but the driver kept on speaking.

  ‘Anyway, we’ll be through shortly, and then we’ll move into safer territory. I’d advise you both to get some sleep. Our first rest won’t be for another while.’

  They decided to take the driver’s suggestion. Their diminutive stature meant that they had a lot of space to curl up in the back of the carriage. Ruby fell asleep immediately. It had been a longer day than she was used to. But the thought of bandits and sleeping nights - sleeping knights? - played on Sawwse’s mind. At first she stared out into the night sky, amazed by the myriad constellations decorating the sky. But before too long, she too had drifted into a misty dreamscape.

  --

  As Ruby entered the house, tension automatically entered her body. Her shoulders hunched and her arms tightened into her sides. Taking a deep breath, she walked into the main room of the house and sat opposite her father at the table. A bowl of dust coloured, too-thin soup was laid out in Ruby’s place. Her father did not look up from his bowl.

  ‘Where have you been?’

  ‘I was in school,’ Ruby replied meekly.

  He gestured slowly with his finger.

  ‘After.’

  Ruby’s tiny appetite diminished. She stared into the grey liquid in front of her and jumped as her father smacked his hand down hard on the table.

  ‘Tell your father where you were.’

  The austere figure of Ruby’s mother appeared. Although Ruby was scared of her father’s hands, she was terrified of her mother’s voice.

  ‘I was spending time with my friends after school.’

  ‘Speak up.’

  ‘I was with friends.’ Thankfully Ruby spotted the thick dark hair suddenly spurting from the back of her hand. She whipped it from the table and sat on it. Though she was in control of her powers for the most part, nerves made Ruby helpless to her body’s whims.

  ‘Friends,’ her father repeated the word as though it was distasteful.

  ‘Are these the same friends we’ve told you not to spend time with?’ Her mother’s tone was icy.

  Ruby bowed her head. The anxious thoughts whipped round her mind, spiralling down. She tried to focus on skin. Normal human skin. The shapes of her knuckles and the length of her nails. I am normal, I am normal, I am normal, she thought furiously.

  ‘Answer your mother.’

  Her father spoke slowly and deliberately, before he brought his palm down hard on the table again, spilling Ruby’s soup as the bowl skittered across the wooden surface.

  Ruby let out a yelp, instinctively bringing her hands to either side of her head to shield her ears. A scream issued from her mother.

  ‘What is that?’

  The child lowered her hands: a gorilla’s paw and a tentacle. Her ears burned. She felt like her father had grabbed a spoon and scooped out her insides, leaving a hollow vacuum to be filled with shame and loathing.

  ‘This again.’

  Ruby’s father stood, letting his chair hit the ground.

  ‘Human beings do not transform,’ her mother hissed, ‘it isn’t natural.’ She spoke as though she were delivering facts. ‘It really is detestable. Get to the cellar.’

  ‘Please don’t,’ Ruby pleaded.

  ‘Move it.’ Her father’s bulging nose pointed to the cellar door. Ruby flinched as he moved closer to her. Her eyes began to swell with warm tears as she left the table and walked down the steps.

  The cellar was cold and damp. There was a large desk with a few masonry tools scattered on it, but other than that the place was unused.

  Ruby took her usual seat facing the dank wall, and placed her transformed hands flat on the desk in front of her.

  ‘Good. You’ve remembered something,’ her father said, reaching for the long cane.

  ‘She learns the punishments, but not the reason why.’ Ruby’s mother stood in the doorway of the cellar looking down at them.

  Ruby turned her head to look at the woman who had brought her into this world, tears streaming down her cheeks.

  ‘You need to know that we’re doing this out of love.’ Her mother’s face seemed almost to soften for a moment. ‘We just want for you to be normal.’

  The little girl turned her face back towards the cold stone wall. Her father raised the cane above his head before smacking it across the young girl’s hands.

  A howl of pain burst from Ruby’s lips. Not the scream of a young child, but a cacophony of anguish. Her parents glanced at each other, before her father gave another crack of the cane.

  The same growl-screech-yell-roar. Ruby thought again, frantically repeating in her head: I am normal, I am normal, I am normal.

  This time the cane smacked against desk instead of flesh as Ruby removed her hands. She curled her injured fingers into her chest as she sobbed and pleaded with her parents, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please don’t do it again. I’m not sure I can-.’

  Her father’s rough calloused hands grabbed her arms and forced them onto the desk. ‘Stay,’ he bellowed, as though she were a dog. He raised the cane above his head once more and once more Ruby moved her hands out of the way. This time she shoved her father hard in the chest.

  ‘I said, please don’t!’

  Ruby’s parents didn’t have time to consider that she wasn’t speaking to them. Her body instantly tripled in size and elongated. The fur that coated her body was striped. Tooth and nail lengthened and sharpened. A flash-flurry of claws and it was over.

  --

  Gnomes tend to dream similarly to humans. Their unconscious catalogues and filters through the events of the previous day, week or month, and produces dreams that help them to make sense of the experiences they have had (albeit usually in a nonsensical way). Unlike humans, however, gnomes are generally also lucid dreamers. Sawwse was used to sharing anecdotes with the Duke of Münchfeld while overlooking i
ncredible gorges, prancing across rainbow-coloured rivers, or having a dance-off with light-footed bears. Tonight, she was involved in a feisty war of words about floor polish with a particularly sardonic seal when the carriage bumped her awake.

  Dawn had broken and Sawwse could now see the impressive mountains that they had passed during the night. In the distance the craggy shapes appeared to resemble a knight lying on its back, a sword held tightly to its chest.

  Turning to her side, she saw that her companion had transformed into a curled-up hedgehog, twitching and quivering in her sleep.

  The carriage slowed to a halt outside a shabby shack. Stepping out of the carriage, the driver looked into the back and spoke to Sawwse.

  ‘Time for some grub. Take the chance to stretch your legs.’

  He glared past Sawwse at the still-asleep hedgehog now occupying Ruby’s seat and walked off towards the cabin shaking his head, mumbling something about ‘bloody polymorphs’. It looked as though Ruby was having a bad dream, but Sawwse wasn’t sure whether to wake her. On reflection, she thought it best not to. The spikes on Ruby’s back looked sharp and she didn’t want to startle her.

  When Sawwse stepped down from the back of the carriage, she noticed three people passing the driver on his way into the shack. The two men leading the way were human and wore similar wide brimmed hats, bandanas, dusty boots and stirrups. The shorter of the two men was smoking a cigarette. The third figure was an old unkempt dwarf: a large, battleworn axe strapped to his back matched his weathered features. White scraggly hair covered his head and most of his face, underneath which were many scars. The trio appeared to be involved in some kind of argument. Sawwse looked on, intrigued.

  ‘You didn’t have a problem with it before,’ said one of the men in the hats.

  ‘This is different.’

  The dwarf spoke very quietly, almost under his breath.

  ‘Not sure it is,’ said the smoking man, blowing out a cloud of purple smoke into the air. ‘We’re jus’ after money, same as you. In’t that right Mauro?’

  ‘Exactly. And when something as big as Dorienne topples over, there’s bound to be money spilled, and I’d like to mop up some of it, thank you very much.’

  Mauro broke into a wide grin. The white-haired dwarf replied, but Sawwse couldn’t quite hear what he said from her position. Feeling curious, she strolled slowly towards the shack and tried not to draw attention to herself.

  A harsh, fake laugh fell out of the other man.

  ‘Thought you left your honour behind? This in’t the time for noble deeds. This is the era of gittin’ what you can git.’

  They walked around the side of the shack where their horses were hitched. Sawwse quickly crept up to the corner and continued to listen in on the conversation.

  ‘You’ve gone soft Osrik. Come with us and reap the rewards of collective anxiety.’

  Sawwse peered around the corner and saw the man called Mauro holding out his hand, gesturing to the dwarf.

  ‘Look, most people hate change. They want security, safety, and reliability. People like us embrace change. Relish it. Take advantage of it.’

  The smoking man blew out another vibrantly coloured cloud while untying one of the horses. Sawwse could smell the sickly sweet scent it produced. He spoke over his shoulder.

  ‘Things git shaken up ‘n’ our opportunities grow. Thought you needed the money?’

  ‘I’ll wait.’

  Osrik the dwarf spoke again, in the same quiet voice, inaudible to Sawwse.

  ‘He’ll not be joining us.’

  A woman’s voice sounded from somewhere above Sawwse. Looking up she saw a tall figure silhouetted against the sky.

  ‘I told you our time with this one would be short-lived.’

  The red cloak surrounding the figure billowed as she jumped off the roof and began floating down to the ground slowly. Her back was to the gnome.

  ‘Oh, and it might interest you to know that we have a nosy waif.’

  The three figures peered around the cloaked individual. Amused looks appeared on the faces of the two men, as they looked down at Sawwse. In response, she moved fully out of the corner and held her hands up.

  ‘I’ll be honest, that was rude of me. I should have introduced myself straight away. My name is Sawwse Bohge, and it’s a pleasure to meet you.’

  She bowed in her traditional manner.

  ‘Francesco,’ came the curt reply from the smoking man.

  The other figure, Mauro, took a step closer to Sawwse and brushed open his long jacket. An indigo scabbard was attached around his waist.

  ‘What’s caught your interest then, Sawwse Bohge?’ he asked.

  ‘Oh, nothing. I was just passing and I got drawn in.’

  Sawwse took a step back as she saw Mauro’s hand rest on the hilt of what she presumed to be a sword.

  ‘W-well, actually, I was just in the Dorienne Kingdom, the other day I believe, and everything seemed fine to me-’ she blurted out.

  ‘Ah, so you heard that part.’

  Francesco and Mauro shared a glance and began walking slowly towards Sawwse, hands ready to draw from scabbards.

  Sawwse’s focus was so drawn to the imminent danger that she failed to spot the dwarf’s approach. He placed the head of his axe in between the two hostile figures and the gnome. He slowly turned his gaze from the axe’s blade to the cloaked woman, immovable.

  ‘There’s no need for this, Alla’fyr,’ the dwarf said.

  ‘Leave insignificant matters to insignificant creatures,’ replied Alla’fyr, after a pause.

  The red cloak swung around and Sawwse found herself locking eyes with the woman underneath it. Her sunken cheeks and large, dark eyes gave the impression of a skull. Wavy auburn hair was hidden beneath the crimson fabric of her hood.

  ‘Subterfuge was never one of Osrik’s strong points,’ Alla’fyr added, with a mocking grin. ‘It’ll be easier without him.’

  She turned back to the horses.

  ‘Let’s go.’

  With a click of her fingers, the rope hitching the horses to the shack fell to the ground. She sprang onto a bright white horse and began riding away towards Doriana. Mauro and Francesco gave a last reproachful look at Osrik, before mounting their own horses and riding after the red-cloaked woman.

  The wispy-haired gnome and the scraggly-maned dwarf stood side-by-side, watching them leave.

  ‘Thank you for intervening.’

  Sawwse spoke low, unnerved by the skull-faced woman’s barbed comment about insignificant creatures. She made to bow, but Osrik held up a hand to stop her.

  ‘It’s no bother,’ a smile wrinkled his pale grey-blue eyes. ‘And there’s no need for any of that. A simple nod will suffice for me.’

  Sawwse followed his lead and dipped her head in a short nod. ‘He has kind eyes,’ she thought, ‘but he certainly keeps strange company.’

  As if following her train of thought Osrik said, ‘Sorry about that.’

  ‘Who were those people?’

  ‘Mercenaries. Swords for hire.’

  The smile faded from his eyes as he looked down at his feet.

  ‘And where are you headed?’ Sawwse asked, thinking it best to change the subject.

  ‘To find work,’ Osrik answered, rousing himself from his thoughts. He strapped his axe onto his back and nodded again to the gnome.

  Sawwse watched him walking towards a dusky grey horse. She called after him.

  ‘We’re travelling to Rhyddinas if you’re interested?’ she gestured to the carriage.

  Osrik mounted the horse and trotted towards Sawwse. He paused for a moment, narrowed his eyes, and moved his lips as though to reply, but with another nod he was off. He rode in the opposite direction to the mercenaries, along a long, dusty road.

  After this encounter, Sawwse made her way inside the shack. There were two small tables and a counter, behind which a young boy sat bored. Next to the counter, th
ere was a sign for ‘creamy mashed potatoes.’ Sawwse wasn’t sure what that was, but as it was the only thing on offer, she placed one of the gold coins from Mirrah’s sack on the counter and pointed to the sign. The boy greeted her with a quizzical look, but took out a bowl of mash and handed it to the gnome. Unsure of whether she had paid too much or too little, she smiled genially and walked over to where the driver was sitting, ploughing through his own bowl with more relish than finesse.

  ‘Now then,’ he said as Sawwse sat down. She gathered this was more a general greeting than anything specific as he said nothing else and did not turn from his vigorous attention to the potatoes.

  ‘How much longer will we travel to get to Rhyddinas?’ Sawwse asked, while slopping the watery potatoes with a spoon and thinking wistfully of Dannse Gan’s beautiful cooking.

  ‘The horses have done a grand job so far. If the next two are as good we should arrive before nightfall.’

  They finished their mash - Sawwse had as much as she could manage without gagging - and got ready to depart. Back at the carriage, the driver untied the reins from the two horses and took them to water round the back of the shack. He emerged moments later with two different horses, explaining reluctantly in response to Sawwse’s enthusiastic questions that this was a region-wide free-flowing economy of horses, where tired horses could be quickly exchanged for fresh ones without losing any time on the road.

  In the back, Ruby had shifted back into a humanoid form, although the sandy-haired man that now sat facing Sawwse had furry, hedgehog-like ears. Sawwse wondered whether it was rude to point out the change in Ruby’s ears, so she decided to smile politely and stay quiet instead. After his sleep, Ruby seemed more withdrawn. He barely spoke, and looked rather self-conscious, constantly touching the backs of her hands as if she was checking they were still there.

  Their journey onward was the driver’s favourite kind: uneventful. They stopped twice more for a feed, once beside a ruined mill that had been converted into a resting point for travellers, and again in a camp at the edge of a large lake. Other than a big friendly dog who came over to play with the pair, and whose gambolling did much to cheer Ruby up, nothing much happened.