“Is it…? Do you think…?”
“How many Night Dragons have you seen?” He asked with a gentle smile, working hard to dispel the fear in her eyes.
“A few…” she admitted cautiously. “…Always just passing, though… high across the sky. This one fell… it seemed so close…”
“It wasn’t close… not really…” he assured, shaking his head. “I’ve never told you this, but when I was young – younger than you – I was out on this very balcony one night and I saw a Dragonfall that was close.” Her eyes flew wide in surprise at that revelation. “It came down beyond Small Horn, so close you could hear the shriek as it passed overhead, and I knew it was near because I saw a flash beyond the pass as it struck. The ground shook, I could hear plates and candlesticks rattling on the table inside, and a few seconds later everyone in the castle heard a roar like nothing I’ve ever heard before or since. I was the only royal there than night – it was wartime, and father and Serge were away leading the troops, of course – and I decided then and there that I very much wanted to see this Night Dragon for myself.”
“You went out to look for it… alone…?” She asked with eyes wide, her voice hushed with disbelief.
“Not alone…” he replied with a half-smile. “Randwick was already with us then, although he was far younger… far more reckless than he is now. I convinced him to come with me – to guide and keep me safe – and we took a squad of cavalry, although we left the others at the pass, Randwick and I, and continued on alone. It was after dawn before we reached the top of the pass between Small Horn and The Osterman, and standing there in a drizzling rain we could see all the way down the other side, past the Rodaway Lake. There’s a small tarn there halfway down the slope, and it had struck close by. We thought then that the stories were true, for it seemed that the ‘beast’ had set the forest alight with fire and brimstone. The rain had since quenched the flames, but some of the nearer trees had burned, sure enough, and right at the centre was a crater three hundred feet across and at least fifty deep. The trees there at the rim hadn’t burned at all, mind you: they were all knocked flat and covered with earth thrown out of the hole it had made.”
“Was it there? Was it still there…?”
“Oh, yes,” he grinned, almost chuckling now as he recalled that moment from so many years past. “We found what was left of it right at the centre of that hole, still smoking and hot to the touch. It was a rock, Charli… nothing more than twisted lump of molten rock the size of one of the great cornerstones we use for our watchtowers.”
“A… a rock…?”
“Aye, my girl… a rock, indeed… There were smaller pieces of it lying about here and there, but there was no denying it was the cause of everything. It had never been there before that night – I knew that place well enough – and t’was too large for any man to have left there after… And so we were left with one other explanation: that this steaming lump of black slag had somehow fallen straight out of the sky. I know not what this thing was,” he admitted with a shrug. “I know not what any of the Night Dragons are that streak across our skies between dusk and dawn, but from then on, I did at least now know something that they were not: that they were no living beast, come from the heavens in vengeance and wrath.”
“What did you do?”
“We did nothing… said nothing…” The king gave another shrug. “The men with us were sworn to secrecy, and none had come close enough to see anything of detail anyway. Randwick and I both knew that no good could come of telling another soul about what we’d seen, so we shut our mouths and got on with our lives as best we could.”
“How could you not tell anyone?” She asked, incredulous.
“For the same reason that I would never question the Keepsake Law,” he answered without hesitation. “Because to speak of it – to lay claim that the fire in the sky was something other than a vengeful dragon, hell-bent on destroying the unfaithful and Cleansing the world of Nethug, the evil one – would be nothing less than a challenge to the power of The Brotherhood and the Word of The Shard. If the Night Dragons that fall from the sky now are nothing but lumps of rock, who can say that those that came for The Cleansing were anything more?
“Perhaps these rocks come both larger and smaller – one of the size I saw did damage enough perhaps to shatter the fortress beyond repair – and perhaps The Cleansing did happen just as The Book says, with fire falling from the sky. But… if every one of these dragons is just a stone, flying through the void before it either passes our world or collides with it, then it follows that maybe these encounters are by chance rather than design… and random chance has no place in religion.
“You’ll understand better when you’re older,” he added with a sad smile. “Give the people more time… more free time… and give them an education to go with it… and eventually they’ll see the world as I do… and as you’re beginning to: that it’s a world where people do not need the promise of an afterlife if they have sufficient comfort and happiness in the lives they have now. But that will only change over time – over many, many years – and I fear that I will not live to see that come. You may, however, and a king or queen may do much to influence with subtlety, through means far less dangerous than heresy.”
There was a soft chiming from within her bedroom as the clock against the wall struck the half-hour, and that fact brought reality back to forefront of the king’s mind.
“It is late now, and we leave before dawn. You need sleep, so I’ll bid you goodnight. Never speak of this to anyone – our conversation this night – but I swear we’ll speak more of it soon enough in private. Promise me however, in the meantime, that you will not make any attempt to peek out of your carriage or make any effort to see the outside world on the journey?”
“But, father…!”
“Promise me…!” He insisted sternly, knowing she would never break a promise, once given.
“All right, I promise!” She blurted finally, not at all pleased at being forced into giving her word.
“That’s my darling girl,” he nodded, completely satisfied as he leaned in and kissed her frowning forehead. “Now… off to bed – there’s much to be done this next week and barely enough time for work, let alone sleep.”
Charleroi found sleep to be an elusive thing as she lay in her huge, comfortable bed, tossing and turning and staring at the ceiling through the fine gauze of the white veil that covered the four-poster frame and hung down on either side. Her mind was filled with confusion and doubt regarding what they’d talked about on that balcony, and it was well into the early morning before she finally sunk into a fitful slumber. Even then, she found little rest, and her dreams were haunted by images of picnics with giants, of tiny horses, and strange, metal carriages being slowly swallowed by a dark and ravenous landscape.
V
The Cold Light of Day
The fire had gone out by the time Nev awoke, the soft rumble of her phone’s vibrate alarm eventually forcing its way through to her consciousness after a few final moments of restlessness. She’d fought it initially, her mind fogged by the confusion and displacement of the night before, but it was bitterly cold inside the barn now and the chill was cutting through her cloak and the single blanket that had come with the bedroll.
She rolled over and stared at the darkened ceiling above for a moment or two, the faint light of the pre-dawn visible through gaps in roofing and in the eaves. She didn’t spend too much time on the disappointment that came with the realisation that it hadn’t all been a terrible dream. Nev had carefully honed her capacity for repression and denial a long time ago, and she was able to put it to good use now as she rose quietly, straightened her rumpled clothing and checked that her bag and its contents were all still present and intact.
Godfrey was still asleep, curled up close to the smouldering remnants of the fire, and she took great pains not to wake him as she carefully removed her dry clothes from the line he’d strung up and carried them back to her priv
ate area behind the shutters. There, she was able to fold them as neatly as she could and slip them inside her duffel bag, which was now close to capacity and starting to bulge. She kept her woollen jacket, removing her cloak and slipping it on as further protection against the biting cold. The cloak went back on over the top, the brown of her coat blending fairly well with the greens and tans she already wore.
She slipped on her suede boots and stepped carefully around the other side of the fire, making for the door as quietly as she was able. Godfrey shifted slightly in his sleep once and gave a faint snuffle of some kind, freezing her momentarily to the spot and almost causing a minor heart attack, but he otherwise kept sleeping, snoring softly the whole time. There was no sign of Lester, for which she was grateful for a number of reasons. Whether he too was still asleep up in the loft that took up the forward half of the barn’s ceiling, or whether he was already up and about somewhere else wasn’t really of any interest to her at that moment just so long as he didn’t interfere with her plans.
Amazingly, the door made almost no sound as she pushed it open just far enough to slip through sideways, closing it immediately behind her to prevent the icy breeze from filling the barn and possibly waking anyone else. It struck her with such force that she gasped faintly, glad she’d had the sense to put her jacket on and wondering how much worse it might’ve been without it.
It was the first time she’d had a chance to get a good look at the barn or the farmhouse, the glow on the horizon not much by way of illumination but nevertheless far more than had been present the night before in driving rain beneath a thick layer of black cloud. The house itself wasn’t much better than a hut – dry stone walls and a thatched roof – and it looked very much like the old, Scottish blackhouses she’d researched for a school project in an earlier high school year. It did have a chimney at least, but it otherwise seemed almost identical in style to the images she’d seen.
Never mind that, dopey… she admonished silently, wary of wasting any more time. You’ve got places to go… people to see…! Tick tock…!
Slipping the bag over her shoulders as she had so many times when heading out her front door for school, she took off at a jog across the open fields, not entirely certain of her bearings but remembering well enough that they’d followed the distant line of trees for some time as they’d come south the night before. It stood to reason that reversing the process would take her in the right direction, and that was good enough for the time being: she’d deal with the details later when it became important.
Nev did feel a little guilty about just taking off without them – they’d mostly been nice to her (well, one of them had been, anyway), and Godfrey had almost certainly saved her life into the bargain. The chance to get back to her own world was too great to ignore however, regardless of how slim that chance might actually be, and whatever guilt she might feel would be easily dealt with once she was safe at home.
She headed west across the open fields as her body settled into a well-known pattern of slow, steady jogging, making directly for the cover of the forest ahead and intending to use it as cover as she turned north. There were a few herds of sheep dotted here and there that scattered as she approached with a chorus of unimpressed bleats of complaint, but the fields ahead seemed otherwise empty.
The distance between the barn and trees was probably no more than five hundred metres, although it had seemed far longer in the rain and darkness, and she was surprised to see how fresh and pleasant her surroundings felt in the growing light before dawn. It took just a few minutes to cross that open space, and only once did she feel a moment of real fear as her eyes caught sight of a dark silhouette looming toward her out of the early-morning gloom.
At first she thought she might be trapped or captured, her heart leaping to her mouth, but as she drew nearer she realised that it was no more than a large, vine-covered mound standing about shoulder height, with low shrubs and thick grass obscuring whatever lay beneath. Someone had placed four wooden stakes around it, all painted white at the tip and joined by a thin, white cord that made it look like some weird, abandoned museum exhibit. With the sudden rush of adrenalin coursing through her system from the fright she’d just received, Nev almost giggled at the strangeness of the sight.
At the same moment, a mob of kangaroos moved eerily across the treeline ahead of her, their presence little more than a procession of graceful, leaping ghosts through the mist that lay across the open fields between. That their appearance also sent her heart flying straight into her mouth for a second time went without saying. She’d originally started to wonder, inconceivable as it seemed, if perhaps the flash she’s experienced in that clearing as the horseman has appeared had somehow transported them all to somewhere in Britain during the middle ages: the swords, the style of dress and the fact that everyone appeared to be speaking English making any other possibility even more unlikely; the sight of those exclusively Australian marsupials however completely put paid to that hypothesis.
“What is this place…?” Nev mused softly, actually taking time to bring out her phone and record a short video, despite having no social media to upload to. “The buildings look primitive… medieval… and everyone carries swords and ride horses… but – but there are kangaroos… and gum trees…” she added, looking around “…as if I just walked out my own back door! “And they use Imperial measurements here!” She remarked suddenly, to camera again as the thought occurred to her. “Miles and yards… and I’m sure Godfrey mentioned something about hours last night, so they must use the same measurement of time as we do…" Aussie trees and animals… and white people on horseback… with swords… it’s just not possible…! She added silently, deciding the mound deserved no further attention and jogging off toward the treeline as the roos began to scatter into the bush.
She’d already unconsciously began to classify her experience as being between different ‘worlds’, automatically assigning an ‘us and them’ mentality when referring to either the world she was in right now or her world – the one she’d been dragged out of against her will. Nev knew she wasn’t at her best – considering everything that had happened to her during the last twelve hours, she thought it amazing she hadn’t lost her mind completely – yet be that as it may, she was nevertheless certain enough of her own self-awareness to be confident she was thinking with sufficient clarity to at least try to work out what was happening to her.
The only problem was that nothing likely to actually be possible came even close to fitting the circumstances of her situation. It was clear the portal hadn’t taken her back through time (she’d decided she’d call it a ‘portal’ from now on until a more suitable explanation presented itself): she’d assumed medieval Britain purely because everyone seemed to be speaking English, but the environment and the presence of Australian flora and fauna had killed off that idea pretty quickly.
Nev was an avid reader with a particular love of science-fiction, and that interest had started with piles of second-hand books her father had picked up here and there (a combination of old classics and ‘not-so-classics’) from discount book bins, many of which had probably been out of print for years, while E-books had later provided access to an even greater variety of subjects and genres.
As she reached the treeline and paused again for a moment, she wondered if perhaps this was instead some kind of parallel universe, like those she’d read about in Pratchett and Baxter’s Long Earth series, or H. Beam Piper’s Paratime novels. That would go a long way to explaining a well-established, pre-industrial Caucasian presence on the South-East Australian mainland that – if Godfrey was to be believed – was far more extensive than the few British colonial settlements that had started with the landing of the First Fleet in 1788.
Her train of thought was broken in that moment as the faint sound of horses filtered through to her from the north. With a soft gasp, she instinctively ducked down behind a low line of bushes, sliding her bag from her shoulders to reduce her overall heigh
t, and peered out across the open fields, shifting layers of mist shimmering faintly in the morning half-light. Like the kangaroos she’d seen earlier, the horsemen seemed little more than ghostly wraiths through that mist, appearing for just a few seconds as they passed in an easterly direction. They disappeared again as quickly, although the sound of their travel continued to fade for some time after any visible trace had gone.
They’d been riding in completely the opposite direction by Nev’s reckoning, and that was all well and good in itself, but it nevertheless reminded her that there were potentially far more unpleasant characters than Lester roaming about in the general area – there certainly had been the night before – and that she needed to take a lot more care to remain hidden than she probably had been. Fumbling inside her duffel bag, she drew out the bokken and slipped it through the belt of her jacket, snugging that tighter about her waist to keep the scabbard in place. Much as her stomach lurched queasily at the thought of actually using the thing as a weapon, she knew how much damage one could do if used properly… something she also knew how do to.
She’d held off at least ten minutes before leaving the cover of those bushes, waiting patiently to be certain no further movement could be seen or heard. With just birdsong and the rustle of the wind through the trees as accompaniment, she shrugged the bag over her shoulders again and moved off at a far more cautious pace. The bokken felt comforting resting against her left side and she kept the hilt clear of her cloak, ready to draw it with her right hand in an instant, should any threat present itself.
At least half an hour had passed at a slower, power-walk pace by the time Nev reached what she believed to be the area where Godfrey had set the horses free the night before. There was no way for her to be certain, but her instincts told her it was close enough for her to turn west and head into the forest proper, intending to repeat the path of last night’s escape in reverse and – hopefully – find the original clearing again.
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