by Terry Persun
Floom stared for a moment. “For us, you must start before you shift. You must concentrate and repeat…”
“Repeat what?” Storret said.
“It's simple, really, we repeat the name of a loved one. Someone special. And we imagine them in human form while doing so. I don't know, but somehow that keeps us firmly connected to our human image even during a quick shift. Coming back is easy then.”
Storret looked to the person stroking the fox's head.
The man closed his eyes. “She's my wife,” he said.
“What's your name?”
“Radmal,” he said.
Storret looked around. “Everyone, stare at Radmal, repeat his name over and over. Detail his face as you do so, imagine someone you love. Feel the love that…”
“Seana,” Radmal said.
“That Seana has for her husband.” Storret closed his eyes and recreated Radmal's face in his mind. He allowed the love he felt for Breel to fill his heart. Then he began to repeat out loud, “Radmal, Radmal, Radmal…” in the sweetest voice he could make, as though he loved Radmal as much as he loved Breel.
Soon the other foxes and Floom and Breel were whispering Radmal's name as well.
Storret placed a hand over Seana's head and willed the vibration of his words and his heart to move down his arm and into her. He entered the other realm more easily than he thought was possible. In that realm he stood beside Seana and whispered in her ear. Over and over, Storret chanted in two realms. The others chanted Radmal with feeling until one of the foxes interrupted the chant. “Look.”
Storret opened his eyes and Seana's arm was human.
Her legs lengthened. Her hair grew longer as the redish fox fur stretched. Her smooth cheek twitched in the pain of the shift.
Tears streaked down Storret's face. Several of the foxes cried openly.
Floom shook his head as though he couldn't believe it. “What have you done, my friend?”
“Thank you,” Storret said to Floom. “We must all learn this. Why it was not part of all of us I do not know.” He turned to Breel and she collapsed into his arms.
Seana reached for her husband.
Radmal held to Seana with one arm and reached his other across her body to grip Storret's hand. Nothing was said.
“Could we do this for Therin?” Breel said.
Storret's chest tightened into a fist. Floom answered before Storret was forced to. “It will be too late,” he said.
“We could try,” she said. “You didn't think this would work.”
Floom turned his eyes from her. “If that would make you happy,” he said.
“We'll do everything we can,” Storret said.
As the group began to break up and Seana rose to her feet, several rat doublesight scurried into the clearing. “Come quickly. A lookout has spotted a thylacine running this way.”
“Therin,” Breel screamed out. She ran after the doublesight, following them northward.
Storret turned to Radmal. “Rest. All of you,” he said, then ran with Floom after Breel.
Just north of the practice clearing, rat doublesight lined the path with swords ready. “Is that him?” Storret asked Breel, even while pulling his sword from its sheath.
“No. It's Brok.” She ran toward her brother and kneeled for him to leap into her arms.
The thylacine panted. Its chest heaved. It let out a yelp and a short growl as Storret stepped closer.
“He's not shifting,” Storret said.
“He is,” Breel said. “Slowly though. He's exhausted, but I can feel the shift occurring.”
Storret stood back with Floom and the others as he watched Brok twist and stretch during the shift. Legs stretched and became arms. His torso expanded and contracted as he heaved. A human cough escaped his mouth even though Storret couldn't see his head, which was cradled in Breel's arms.
“Oh,” she said with relief. “He's fine.”
She looked back at Storret, who was forced to say what she couldn't say, “Where's Therin?”
Brok pushed into a kneeling position and held to Breel's shoulders. “Therin's dead,” he said between breaths. “He saved my life. He retained human thought to the end. I know he did.”
Breel cried, turned away, and fell to the ground.
Storret went to her.
Brok looked at him in question. But when Breel climbed into Storret's arms, Brok's expression turned to understanding. “It is a time of sorrow, I know. But we must move soon. Castle Weilk harbors a mad gryphon, the king's son.”
“King Belford? A gryphon?” Floom stepped forward.
Brok nodded. “Not a dragon. And they've captured Lankor and Zimp.”
“How did you escape? What happened to Raik? Where's he?” Storret said.
“Raik is a traitor. He's probably leading them to you at this very minute. I escaped because I went back to save Therin.”
“And then he saved you,” Breel said.
“Family first,” Brok said. “Now, I stay with you.”
42
LANKOR HELD A BAR in each hand. The look of surprise on the guards’ faces was enough for him to know that they either saw in his face or sensed in his stance that there was no turning back from this battle.
Zimp crouched near a bench behind them all.
Lankor blocked a swing from one of the swords that came at him from the side. The ceiling hung much too low to get a good overhead swing, and Lankor sensed the awkwardness of the guard's attack. They were at the disadvantage.
Lankor placed his swing across the back of one guard's neck, the bar cracking bones loudly. That guard down, Lankor brought both bars together in front of him on either side of the second guard's jaw line. Another fatal blow. Blood gushed from the man's mouth as his knees gave out and he slumped to the floor.
Lankor swung around and reached down for one of the swords. He handed it to Zimp. “Who in the name of the Six Shapeless Gods were you talking to?”
Zimp's eyes filled with tears. “Oronice is dead.”
“You knew that before.”
“But I saw her. I felt her words. They were everywhere in this room.” Zimp's lips quivered.
“What'd she say?”
“I don't know.”
“But, if you heard her…” Lankor picked up the other sword from the ground.
“I felt her words in my chest and arms. Along my neck. It was about Memory Tower. The souls of the statues are pushing through to this realm.”
Lankor stopped moving. What was she saying? What did it mean? “You're hearing too many voices from the other realms. You haven't been able to decipher them up to now. Why do you believe this story?”
“It's not a story.” A fire appeared behind her eyes. “You don't trust it, do you? You don't trust me.”
“It doesn't matter.” Lankor pulled her up by her elbow. “We've got work to do. I'm not waiting down here for another second.”
Zimp stopped him. “Is there a human in your bloodline?”
Lankor couldn't answer the question. He performed a quick memory search and found no answer. “I don't know.”
“You could be one of them,” she said. Then she reached out and hugged him, squeezing his body close to hers.
Lankor felt his heart race and the blood run to the surface of his body. He loved her touch, but it wasn't right. He didn't want to like it at all. What if one of them died? There was no time to consider anything but their mission. Draklan and the three sisters were a threat to The Great Land, a threat to the doublesight. A war could wipe out their race. It must be stopped now.
Lankor shoved her away. “Your visions are getting in the way of your sanity. We've got to go.” He led the way through the next hall. The walls in some areas brushed his arms on both sides of his body. He felt the fear of death rise inside him. It slowed his progress.
Zimp's hands touched his back. “Keep going.”
They heard guards talking near the entrance to the dungeon. Another passage broke off to the right. Lankor pivote
d on one foot and flattened his back against the wall. “I don't remember another door.”
“I do,” Zimp said.
Lankor had been so preoccupied by the pressure of the walls and ceiling that he walked with his eyes closed much of the way to their cell. He felt ashamed. Zimp was not to be trusted to know what was going on. He should have paid closer attention. “Now what?”
Zimp charged toward the door and yelled out, “Hey, your friends back there might need some help.”
Lankor held back.
“How did you get outta there?” a guard said. The door bolt rattled loose and the door opened. “Get her!”
Lankor heard several men run into the opening. He jumped out and ran to take position in front of Zimp. They would never get past him. Still holding one of the bars, he slammed the first guard in the ear and lifted his sword through the crotch of the second guard as the man tried to step over the first. The third guard turned to run.
Lankor bent down to move the men from his path. Zimp hopped over him, rolled across the floor and rose to her feet a short distance from the running guard. She placed her knife between his shoulder blades and he fell forward with a splat of flesh against stone.
Lankor caught up with her. “They don't waste many guards down here,” he said as he led the way up a set of winding stairs, leaping three at a time. Near the top, he stopped and listened. He recalled the hall the stairs emptied into. Its width would be welcome, and the height of the ceiling double that of the lower chambers.
Zimp squeezed past him. “Let me,” she said as her body shriveled and turned black. Her crow image flew toward the opening at a steep upward angle.
Lankor kneeled on the steps to allow there to be room overhead. He felt as though the ceiling was already upon him and that his movements were continually stymied. He edged up two more steps and was about to stand when he heard Zimp whisper that the hall was clear.
He broke into the open space and spread his arms and closed his eyes. A tingling sensation spread across his skin, like being unchained or let loose from a small cage. He twirled once around. He wanted to howl with delight.
“Lankor,” Zimp whispered louder.
He opened his eyes and saw her at the end of the hall about to mount a second set of stairs, the ones that led to the great chamber where Draklan and King Belford had first greeted them. As he passed a room to his right, Lankor caught a glimpse of something inside and stopped to investigate it.
“No,” Zimp ran toward him. “Don't look in there.”
At the door, Lankor placed his face against the bars and in the far corner a child dragged its snake-half across the floor. The little girl's smudged and dirty face looked sad. She had been crying. Lines of clean skin streaked down her filthy cheeks. She propped herself up on her hands. She looked frightened. Her eyes asked him, why?
Lankor had no answer for her.
She began to shift.
Zimp stood at his side and pulled at his shoulder. “Come on. We must go now.”
He jerked from her grip, unable to turn away from the girl's eyes. He watched as her mouth opened to scream but only a hissing sound came out. New tears fell and her face tensed against what appeared to be immense pain and a need for understanding. Her head fell forward onto the floor, where it thinned and stretched into a copperhead's upper torso, but the snake's tail that was there a moment ago grew and filled in. It split into the spindly legs of the sweet little girl whose other half stared at Lankor a moment ago.
Then the snake's head did something totally unexpected. It turned on its own body and struck at the thin legs. The mouth opened wide, the head swaying as though trying to empty the poison from its fangs.
Lankor could see where it had struck at itself many times. Pairs of tiny holes lined her legs. He reached up and took the bars in his hands and shook them.
The snake's head swung around and began to shift back into the girl, brown hair growing from its tiny head.
He let his arms drop.
Zimp stood close to him and placed the back of her hand against his neck.
The little girl hissed at him.
Recalling what Zimp had said in the dungeon, he asked, “Am I one of them? Is my clan a throwback?”
“Not if there are no humans in your bloodline. Dragons were one of the original creatures designed by the Six Shapeless Gods.” She pulled at him to move on.
“Raik and Draklan are right, aren't they? Something horrible is happening to the doublesight.”
“Only when doublesight and human mix. Oro said that it has to do with the souls of the gargoyle statues,” she said.
“Can you be sure? Is your connection with the next realm that secure, that fluid, that clear?”
She stared back at him and shook her head. “But I'll find out.”
“What do we do now?” he asked. “Fight for the doublesight so that they may live, or accept the horror that lies before us and…”
“We don't give up,” she said. “We stop this insanity right here. And we start with Draklan.”
They moved to the next door and against Zimp's instruction, Lankor glanced into the cell. This time a hairy beast with wings like the harpies and the face of a fox slept in the corner. It curled its head between its legs.
“Please,” Zimp said.
“I'll kill them all,” Lankor said. “How can they allow this to go on?” He charged toward the stairs and again took them three at a time.
Zimp ran behind him.
Lankor burst into the hall at the top of the stairs without caring if anyone was around. His lungs burned as he stopped to allow Zimp to catch up.
Guards outside the throne chamber yelled out when they saw him. Three of them advanced and one ran for help. Each of the guards had a long spear and a sword. They charged Lankor with the spears held side by side.
Lankor pointed to a window to the right of the guards. “Get out of here,” he said to Zimp. “Fly to the council grounds and tell The Few.”
“I fight with you,” she said.
Swinging his sword over his head, Lankor let it loose and the guards dived out of its way. He ran forward and grabbed the closest spear, gripped it firmly and yanked it from the guard's hands. Like a staff, he swung the blunt end into the head of the guard next to the first, then pulled the spear back and rammed it into the chest of its original owner.
The third guard thrust the tip of his spear at Lankor, ripping a hole in his shirt and drawing blood along his shoulder.
Lankor tried to duck and while doing so, Zimp slid across the floor and stabbed the guard's shin, toppling him over.
Other guards rushed from both sides of the chamber entrance.
“Run,” Lankor said.
Zimp began to dash toward the window when the chamber doors opened and Draklan's voice boomed for them to stop.
The guards held still, lowering their weapons to their sides.
Lankor nodded toward Zimp to continue toward the window, but she held fast to her position. He couldn't tell if she failed to see him nod or if she listened to Oro's voice coming from another realm.
“Let them enter,” Draklan said.
The guards stepped to the side and allowed Lankor to walk forward.
Draklan jumped from the throne where he had been sitting, and landed at the base of the few stairs. King Belford stood to the side and screamed for his son to stop. “Not here,” he said.
“You've no doubt seen the Sisters’ children,” Draklan said. “Don't be concerned. They seldom live long.” Lankor watched as Draklan's eyes drank in the size and shape of the expansive throne room and calculated something dark and secret.
Lankor charged forward. His mind raced with the images of the children in the cells and the truth of their births. Anger surged through his veins. He held fast to the spear he had commandeered from the guard. Before him, Draklan crouched down. Was he reaching for a dagger? Was he taking a fighting pose? Would he soon dash to the side or leap upon Lankor? It took him a moment to r
ealize that Draklan had begun to shift. Already the man's body grew in size while shifting in shape.
Lankor dropped his weapon and spread his arms to his sides. His dragon image shoved forward as though nothing stood in its way. He screamed out, attempting to shift faster without losing his ability to remain in human thought. Bones felt and sounded as though they cracked. Wings stretched to his sides.
But Draklan had shifted faster. He lifted onto his lion's legs and ran toward Lankor, who could not turn away until his dragon image had fully shifted into existence.
Zimp screamed from behind him and he heard her footsteps as she ran away.
Draklan ran into Lankor, who fell backwards as he completed the last of his shift. The gryphon's head pulled back ready to strike with its eagle beak.
Lankor swiped the air in front of him with the claw at the end of his wing.
The gryphon reared back.
Lankor blew fire toward it. The beast was gone. The dragon image rolled to its stomach and pushed into the air. Although the chamber was large, there was little room to fly. Lankor's mind grew stronger and weaker with human thought, careful not to begin a shift or he would be killed in an instant.
The chamber had changed color. Dragon eyes were so different than human eyes that the strangeness of the world took a few moments to get used to. The walls burned red and the people were blue. He glanced around to find Draklan. The gryphon held to a corner of the room. Somehow Lankor knew that the eagle eyes could pinpoint any target to attack on his dragon image. He had a choice. He could spit fire or fly. The gas in his chest that allowed both to happen had been diminished only slightly by his first firey attack on Draklan. Lankor lept off the ground, circled the chamber, and closed his wings close to his sides. Facing the gryphon in the corner, he dropped straight toward the floor. Blue men scurried out of the room, yelling in a language he couldn't understand. Before he splattered into the stone, Lankor opened his wings, caught the air and glided down. His dragon image naturally bowed forward, a shape that wouldn't allow him to bend backwards and look into the air very well. Spitting fire would steal his ability to fly and maintain a strategic position. He approached human thought with too much effort, considering how to fight the gryphon, so he fell back into dragon mind. The dragon reacted to Draklan's movement toward it, spewing fire half the distance to the corner.