by T J Trapp
“I need to make us a transporter ring. That will be the focal point for the hole between universes. I will use it to transfer us between universes. Once I have the ring, I need to create a hole between a low- and high- dark energy universe. That energy flow will increase the amount of dark energy that the concentrator can access. We will have to hope it is enough to transport us. Then I have to link the crystal to the energy flow. Once I have done that, I should be able to feed enough energy into the ring to transport us.”
Erin stared at him with tired eyes.
“The first step is to build the ring.” Alec went to work and started focusing. Piece by piece he focused and constructed metal pieces for a ring, then linked the pieces together. He focused and let dark energy bond the individual pieces into one solid ring. Twice he went back and adjusted the segments. Finally, he smiled at Erin. “This is the best I am gong to be able to do. I think it would work much better if I made it out of a rare earth material infused with tricrystals, except I don’t have an understanding of the chemistry of the rare earths, so I can’t make it out of them. Instead, I made it out of copper infused with tricrystals. That won’t be nearly as good because it will require much more energy to use, but I hope it will last for our trip.”
“When all you have going into a battle is hope, it rarely turns out well,” replied Erin darkly. “But I must trust my Great Wizard. I must believe that since you have gotten us this far, you will get us the rest of the way.”
Alec grimaced at the comment. “Now for the easy part. We need to restart the concentrator and set up a stable pattern as we did before.”
Alec approached the sphere and put his hands on it. The surface of the sphere had a cold feeling to it. He focused and pushed dark energy into the sphere. It came to life, and the cold surface was replaced with a warm glow. Millions of patterns flowed into the sphere. I have to find the right pattern in all of the choices.
“Help me,” he said to Erin.
Erin put her hand on his and helped him sense. She let him feel the patterns and Alec could feel the wrongness of most of the patterns. Finally, only a handful of patterns remained and he started merging them into an organic whole. Erin helped him feel the rightness of the flow until he was satisfied.
Alec released the dark energy and stepped back from the sphere. The ever-changing pattern of glowing lights in the sphere had resumed.
“We did it! We restarted the sphere with a much better pattern than before. Now I need to complete the second part: the linking of the dark energy fields between Nevia and Earth. It is the most difficult part of what we have to do.”
“It is very late. The five moons will soon be out. Is this the best time?”
Alec nodded. “It is time to do it.”
Alec put his hands on the sphere and let the sphere pulse. He felt the energy pull of the concentrator. Then he felt the link that was the zero-point – an area of weakness in the dark energy field – and he probed the weakness. “Now is where you can help,” he said to Erin. She rejoined him and put her hands on his. Together they used the concentrator to probe the dark energy field around the zero-point.
“That’s not right,” Erin said softly, shaking her head. “I can feel that it’s not right.”
“How about this?” Alec continued to work, probing the field again and again until Erin felt the rightness.
“There.”
“Go time. This will work, or it will fail,” Alec said. “And if it fails, we will never know.”
Alec let the energy in the concentrator sphere increase until he felt a rupture in the field at the zero-point. Then he let Erin help him feel the rightness until he had linked the rupture with a second rupture in the dark energy background.
Alec relaxed and felt the flow of dark energy. Then he turned to Erin and smiled. “We did it. We did what Alder wanted to do. It took the elf technology as well as your sensing abilities and my calculations to succeed, but we did it.”
“We have built the link to your world, without creating the ‘bad hole?’”
“No black hole, and a good link to my world.”
“Can we leave now? I am ready to get out of the elf lands. I have too many good elf memories stored in my rod to hate the elves anymore, but I hate what they did to my people, and to me. I am ready to go home.”
“Then we will do it now,” Alec stated. Erin nodded in agreement.
Alec let the concentrator draw dark energy from the background. Then he let the concentrator pull dark energy from the energy flowing through the zero-point from one universe to the other. He felt the link between the two universes and started to let the energy flow into the ring. A blue patch appeared in the transporter. That is the other side of the transport. Alec let the energy oscillate slightly, and the blue patch wavered. The transport seemed to be pulled towards a location. He let the transporter align itself with the location. Now the blue patch was replaced by a dimly lit area. Much better – we now have the transit point close to an area that is not high in the air.
Alec increased the flow of dark energy in the crystal. The area became brighter and the little points of light buzzed with increased intensity. The sphere heated up until it was almost too hot for him to touch. “Time to test the ring.”
“We do not get in?” asked Erin.
“First I am going to send something else and then bring it back. If it goes and returns in one piece, I will have some confidence that we can go.” He looked around and found a small stone block on the floor; he carefully placed it in the center of the ring.
The light flashed in a multicolored display and a boom shook the building. The block was gone. The ring looked scarred and in a couple of spots molten copper puddled along the edge. Alec waited for the copper to cool and then put his hands on the crystal again. The light flashed in another multicolored display and a second boom shook the building. The block sat in the middle of the ring, where he had initially placed it.
“It seems to have worked – now it’s time for us to send ourselves. Watch out for the molten copper.”
Alec put his hands on the crystal and increased the flow of dark energy. The crystal became brighter and the little points of light buzzed in a frenzy of energy. The two of them stepped into the ring. The copper on the edge of the ring started to froth as it melted. He thought to Erin, It’s not working! The ring can’t do us both together! It will barely transmit enough energy to send us one at a time. He grimaced with the effort. You are going first. You will arrive before me. The only thing you have to do is get out of the arrival area so I don’t bring you back when I come. Wait close by for me to arrive.
Alec stepped out of the ring.
The swirling started, and it became more intense. Erin felt the world start to go black. Suddenly she heard – or felt – a voice crying out: Mamma! Mamma! Don’t go away! Come home!
Then the only thing she could sense was Alec, and she could tell that he was concerned. Consort –
She heard his voice cry out. Then he was no longer in her senses.
Erin’s world continued to spin, but now there was light.
✽✽✽
Alec watched Erin vanish and the lights flash in a violent multicolored display. The building shook so hard that little pieces of the ceiling fell around him. The copper in the ring frothed and bubbled; little molten spots appeared, and copper flowed in little rivulets to the center of the ring.
Got to fix that or it won’t be strong enough to transport me. Alec surveyed the ring. He focused and tried to push dark energy into the ring. The breaks in the ring flashed and gnarled. Got to repair the breaks before I can send myself. Gotta be quick. I can’t delay all that long, or with the time differential I won’t be able to find Erin.
Alec started to work his way around the ring, repairing it, one rupture at a time. But then a loud banging interrupted him. He looked at the heavy door to the chamber.
As he watched, the door moved, and then shattered as the end of a sledgehammer broke thro
ugh. Through the jagged hole he could see drones beating as hard as they could against the heavy wood, and armed clutchmen standing just behind them, goading them on. Why now? he thought in despair.
Part Two
23 – Pursuit
Colin had left the Queen’s Residence full of fervor and hope, intending to rescue his sister and her consort, and the captured riders, but the long trip back to the edge of the Elf Mountains had taken its toll on his mood. The journey had been long, cold, and uneventful. Colin found the narrow gulch where Erin and her band had been ambushed only a few weeks ago, and his riders skillfully retraced the path that the cull had taken, skirting Gott and trekking into the Elf Lands. They found nothing unusual along the way; the few corpses they passed had been picked over by scavengers to the point of being unrecognizable. The several abandoned campsites yielded little if any new information; no one remained behind: not elves, not villagers, not captives. They found one hungry little drunglet that seemed to have wandered off, and the occasional pile of trash, but no other evidence of the cull caravan – save for the tracks worn into the mud and the scarred underbrush where the trail had been crudely cut over the hillsides.
The staging area where the cull had gathered to cross the obscuring field was easy to spot. Besides the tracks of wagons and livestock, the prints left by hundreds of barefoot people caught the light traces of overnight snow, melting in the light of day into a muddy morass. Colin motioned for the lead scout to start down the trace made by the cull.
The lead scout goaded his trogus forward. The animal took several steps and then floundered; it fell to the ground and the scout fell into the mud next to the trogus. Both squirmed in the mud trying to regain their footing but neither man nor mount was able to escape the instant effects of the obscuring field and both flailed about. A second scout dismounted and started to run forward to help; she made it almost half of the distance to the first scout before she fell to her knees, also losing her footing in the mud. She yelled in fear. She could not identify the source of her discomfort or the extent of the mire and her every motion moved her deeper into the obscuring field. A third rider dismounted and started to run to help the others.
“Stop,” Colin shouted, and the rider stopped at the edge of the obscuring field.
“Get a rope,” someone yelled.
One of the riders came forward with a rope. He dismounted and moved to the edge of the zone. The rider tossed the rope, catching the leg of the closest scout, and pulled her to safety. It took two attempts before he caught the leg of the first scout and pulled him from the bog. The two riders lay in the mud outside the obscuring field, panting, and slowly regained their balance.
“What about my trogus?” the first scout finally asked.
The rider threw the rope again, and caught one of the trogus’ hind legs. Then he threw a second rope and caught another leg. The two ropes were tied to the pommels of two trogus and the riders pulled the heavy animal to the edge of the field; it lay on the ground snorting and mewing.
“Sire, what do you wish for us to do now?” Colin’s lead rider asked.
“We cannot cross here. Our best chance is to pick our way along the edge of this field and see if we can find a path in,” Colin said. “Consort Alec said that this obscuring field runs all the way around the elves’ city like a big moat. I guess we will find out if that is true.”
“So be it,” the lead rider answered, looking at the established path through the muddy field, and then at the rocky terrain surrounding it.
Travel around the edge of the obscuring field was not easy. Occasionally Colin would spur his trogus towards the field, and carefully move forward until he could start to feel the effects. Then he would ride back to the riders.
“Does the prince know what he is doing?” he overheard one rider ask another as he rejoined his group late in the afternoon.
“He is certainly taking his time poking around,” the second man answered. “Elves we can handle, and even the dragon would not concern me in a fair fight, but if we get caught in a storm, we will be at grave risk. This time of year, in these mountains, who knows when a blizzard could come and trap us?”
Colin rode up to his lead rider. “We camp here for tonight,” he said, “and tomorrow we will continue to make headway. Our riders have winter gear for the night. We will have to keep probing the field until we find a place that is easier to cross.” Colin was keenly aware that his devil-may-care reputation would not serve him well if the situation did not improve. He sat alone by his small campfire late into the night, watching the twin crescents of two moons slide across the cold and unforgiving sky.
✽✽✽
The next morning, he could feel the discontent of his riders as they threaded through the highlands, but towards mid-day he could see, then hear, a distant display of pyrotechnics.
“That must be coming from the elves’ city,” the lead scout said, staring at the faint glow in the sky.
“Ha ha!” Colin chuckled. He could sense the perturbations in the dark energy background. That looks like the work of Consort Alec, he thought confidently. “Prepare!” he called out. “We may have a battle today!” With that call, the riders rallied. Colin could feel their anxiety slip away. Battle was their way of life.
The lead rider soon found an open meadow along the edge of the obscuring field that would give them a combat advantage with their trogus, and the riders positioned themselves in battle formation among the trees along the edge of the meadow. But minutes turned into hours as the shadows of the trees moved from morning-side to evening-side. No enemy appeared. The tedium of waiting began to wear on the riders; they began to occupy themselves with time-filling chores: honing razor-sharp edges on their weapons, brushing their trogus, plaiting cords from the mountain grass.
“Something is different,” Colin said, late in the afternoon. “I can sense it. Send a rider across to the area where the obscuring field lies.”
A lone rider cautiously rode his trogus across the meadow to the far side. Then the rider returned. “No sign of the obscuring field,” the rider reported to Colin.
The rider returned to his place and everyone continued to wait. As the first moon rose over the distant peaks and the afternoon sun began to waver a bit, the lead rider saw a slight movement on the far side of the meadow, and then watched warily as several strings of drones began to appear in the distance, emerging from the trees towards the open meadow.
“Alert,” he called, and the riders quickly scrambled into position.
Colin squinted at the straplines. “These do not look like fighters! It looks like each string has a couple of dozen men strapped together some way, and they do not look like they are in any kind of battle formation!”
“Not only that,” the lead rider agreed, “but there are both men and women in those lines, and most of them look like they are barefoot and naked. How can they work – or fight – like that, in these conditions?”
The lead scout shielded his eyes with his hand, also looking at the strings of people. “They look like elf drones,” he said. “I’ve seen elf drones up here, sometimes, when I’ve come up here hunting, and that’s what they look like. Naked, and all strapped together in a line. And those guys,” he said pointing to four men who had just come into view, “look like elf clutchmen. They would be in charge, and they would be our adversaries.”
“Can you tell if any of the strapped ones are our riders?” Colin asked.
“No, they all look alike, anyway at this distance. But we had about thirty riders, and there’s a lot more people than that over there,” the scout answered. “Looks like almost a hundred.”
“Look, Sire, there are more strings of men coming from the woods over there!” The lead rider pointed across the meadow.
“We will free the captive drones,” Colin decided. “Some of them may be our people. Four riders, pursue – run down the clutchmen. Everyone else wait in reserve, in case these are a decoy and there are more warriors.”
The Theland riders raised their spears and headed straight for the clutchmen, loudly voicing their battle cry. But as they neared, the lead clutchman threw down his weapon and spread his arms wide; the expression on his face was not one of fear, but of sheer delight.
Then the lead clutchman whistled a piercing battle call; the other three clutchmen ran to his side, also without weapons, and repeated the shrill sound.
The Theland battle trogus were well-trained for these encounters. At the sound of the whistle, training took over, and the racing animals veered to the side, just as the four riders were prepared to gore their opponents. The riders looked startled.
Then one of the riders slid from his trogus and ran towards the first clutchman, locking him in a strong embrace.
“Reuben!” he cried. “My brother!”
“‘Sword and claw, sword and claw!’” screamed the second clutchman, jumping up and down in excitement, repeating the riders’ motto. “Well met, my fellow riders!”
By now all four riders were off their mounts, hugging the clutchmen and slapping shoulders; about a dozen of the strapline drones dropped their tethers and raced towards the riders in a happy throng.
“What is going on?” exclaimed Colin to the lead rider, watching the scene from his vantage point at the edge of the meadow. “This does not look like a hardened elf strike force!”
“Sire,” the lead rider replied, grinning broadly, “I think we have found our missing riders!”
Colin and the lead rider soon reached the joyful group in the center of the muddy meadow, still cautious that they might be running into a trap. But the excitement was contagious, and soon they were surrounded by the muddy ‘drones’ and the four ‘clutchmen.’