by Joshua Cook
So random chance was the only way he could do this. Slowly, he opened the door, feeling somewhat relieved that the room was empty. He entered and paused for a minute, enjoying the feeling of permanence and solidity that filled the room. The feeling had already become something that lifted his spirits here in this new world he’d found himself in.
Approaching the barrier board, he took a breath before removing his focus. The last time he touched this thing, he’d had that vision of the past. It had thrown him for a loop and really drained him. The others had said that that was a onetime thing, but he couldn’t help hesitating.
His fingers touching the key made a slight electric feeling shoot up his arm, but other than that, there were no other effects. Grasping it fully, he felt complete. It was odd, but until he had it in his hand, he wasn’t aware of the slight feeling of something missing. Now, he was acutely aware. Strange that it had already intertwined with who he was.
Quickly, he left the barrier room, pausing only to confirm that the light that signified his focus was in its place was indeed out. He also listened hard to try to make sure no one was coming, but he heard nothing. Happy that so far no one had discovered what he was up to, Cendan sprinted back to the Maker wing. He stood in front of the door again and paused.
Chapter Eight
There was no keyhole on the door, nor any depression or sign of where the key might need to be placed. Truthfully, he was guessing that he needed the key to unlock it, though it made logical sense. Grasping the door handle once more, it still would not budge. With a deep breath, he took the key and touched it to the door. He heard an audible click, and the door hissed as fresh air rushed into the rooms and hallways beyond.
His stomach gave a flip, and Cendan found himself somewhat unwilling to enter. This was what he had come to do, however, and it needed to be done. Steeling himself and grasping his focus firmly in his hand, Cendan pushed the door the rest of the way open and walked into the hallway beyond.
At first glance, the hallway didn’t appear much different from the ones on the other side of the door. It had the same floor and the same rounded ceiling. The first difference he noted was the lights. Before, the lights had been wild things, different from each other in terms of the light source—each of them had been a globe on a stick, torches stuck onto the walls. In this area, each had the same overall theme, but instead of globes, they were perfectly square, and each light source appeared to be the same. Considering how random things were elsewhere, this change was a bit jarring.
Closing the door behind him, Cendan headed down the hallway. The next thing he noticed right away—each door was the same, exactly the same. They had a red, brass handle and exposed door hinges made of the same brassy metal. Everything was shiny, untarnished, and appeared to be nearly perfect in its preservation. No door was labeled, though, so it was going to be a ‘seek and study’ thing. Next time, Cendan would have to bring something to write with so he could make a map of the area...
The first door he opened was a storeroom stocked with every manner and size of multiple different things. There were light source parts mixed with various woods, metals, and tools strewn about, some of which whose purpose he couldn’t even guess. Everything was clean and free of dust as though the last users of the items had simply stepped away for lunch and would be right back.
The room after that held parts that Cendan guessed could only be for the EVA. The pipes and fittings were the same as the ones he had seen in the EVA room. Bottles of strange fluids stood in one corner, and some of them were nearly full. Even stranger, one appeared to be in motion. Poking around a bit more, Cendan was disappointed to find no notes or guidelines for how the EVA was built or even anything written about it at all.
The third room proved to be what he was really after. Books lined the wall, and one overly large book graced a well-worn table in the middle of the room. Examination of the book showed it was handwritten—in fact, each book was handwritten, he discovered as he took a few off shelves. Each book was crammed full of notes, design details, diagrams, and images of various foci, machines, and other creations that he could only guess at.
Cendan wished for someone to transcribe the mess, as every notebook seemed to be written in different handwriting, which meant some were easy to read, but others were nigh impossible to make out the words. As he examined the large book, Cendan felt his excitement rise—this was the main thing he had hoped to find! Diagrams for the EVA were here—good, detailed drawings, even a rudimentary flowchart of the system. Then, his elation fell. The notes were encoded. Why couldn’t anything be easy when it came to Bridgefinder stuff?
A quick flip through the book proved that this book, unlike the others, was written in the same hand, but the whole thing was encoded—front to when it stopped, about three quarters of the way through the book. It must have belonged to Oakheart. This was what he really needed, and it was still out of reach. Frustration threatened to overwhelm him for a second.
“Now what?” Cendan asked. “Unless I can find some cypher key around here, I’m almost back to where I started.”
“Not quite,” a voice said from the hallway. Cendan jumped up to see Marcus and Jasmine standing there, studying him with a mixture of awe and concern.
“You,” Marcus said. “You’re a Maker.” His brow furrowed. “Why didn’t you say anything? You knew we were losing out, but you still didn’t say anything!” His voice was tinged with anger.
“Cendan, just tell us how this happened.” Jasmine was calmer, but Cendan heard the fear in her voice.
Slumping down in the chair in front of Oakhearts journal, Cendan rubbed his face. He’d forgotten to lock the stupid door behind him. “To answer your first question, I didn’t know I was a Maker, not really. Not until today. I suspected I might be, but my encounter with Grellnot and what happened after cemented it.”
“What do you mean?” Marcus asked, still angry. “Your story about Grellnot didn’t add up, so what really happened? And what happened after? No more secrets.”
There was no point anymore in being less than one hundred percent honest, and the time for skirting around things was over. “It started like I said, I was cornered by Grellnot. And he was angry I didn’t have my focus with me, very angry. But what I left out was the fact that he tried to steal whatever abilities I have. He tried and failed. For whatever reason trying to steal my powers caused him pain, a lot of pain. He screamed out the word Maker at me before he left, and I passed out.”
Cendan took a deep breath. “I didn’t say anything for one main reason. You all keep saying Maker this and Maker that. Only a Maker can do it, over and over again. Jasmine, you know my hesitation here. You know me. Me telling you all I was a Maker? That I’m some sort of super special Bridgefinder that can save the day? When I’m still not comfortable with even being a normal Bridgefinder?”
Jasmine started to ask a question, but Cendan held up his hand. “Wait, let me tell you about what happened next. While I was passed out, I had a visit from the Slyph.”
Marcus slammed his fist into the wall and was silent for a moment. “Why and how?” was all he said, turning away from Cendan.
“Apparently she can do that with Makers. Talk to them I mean, in dreams or when they are unconscious. She and I had a chat… I know a few things now. One, the reason they call the last Maker Oakheart? He’s still alive, but the Slyph has turned him into a tree, a huge oak tree. She’s been draining him slowly to make creatures. Grellnot is just one of them.” Cendan paused and took a breath. “And the next part may be hard to hear, but please bear with me.”
Marcus said nothing, but Jasmine motioned for him to continue.
“I know that you all believe that what you do is an inborn talent, like being flexible, or being able to touch your nose with your tongue. A quirk of genes. And in some ways it is. But… It’s magic.” Cendan saw the black rage start to creep across Marcus’s face. “Listen. It’s magic that the Slyph doesn’t control, Marcus. It’s on
e reason she hates us. All of the magic of the Echo World is at her disposal. But the magic of this world, that only a few people can touch, that is outside her grasp. And she hates it. It’s always just out of reach.”
Cendan continued before either of them could open their mouths. “It’s why she captured that poor bastard Oakheart. Through him, she could touch, use, and control the magic of this world. It’s the whole reason she wants to take down the barrier between our world and hers. She wants the magic of our world to be under her control as well. And taking down the barrier, she believes, will do just that.”
“It. Not she, it,” Marcus growled, but said nothing else.
“Cendan… The Slyph is probably lying to you. How could you believe anything that creature says?” Jasmine asked. “The fact you’re a Maker is obviously true, but the whole story about magic, it’s some kind of trick of the Slyph.”
Cendan realized at that moment that they weren’t going to believe him. They couldn’t—at least not right now. Marcus and Jasmine were Bridgefinders of whole generations of Bridgefinders. There was a lot of almost automatic belief with them, things they’d been taught over and over to never question. One of those was the fact that magic was wrong, evil, and a tool of the Slyph and her creatures. Accepting the idea that they could actually use magic, and in fact were using magic every time they banished a creature, every time they closed a Bridge, was hard for them to accept.
Sal might be far more receptive, but he wasn’t there. Cendan made a metal note to talk to him privately, assuming Marcus let him. He had a feeling that the nominal leader of the Bridgefinders was going to keep a very close watch on him now. Sensing that saying anything else about magic would get him in deeper trouble, Cendan changed the subject.
“I did, however, find the notes for the creation of the EVA, and multiple notes on the creation of foci. But… it’s all encoded.” Cendan saw multiple branches of choices in his mind, overlaying the room. They weren’t his choices this time, but theirs. He needed to prod them to head down the right path if his plan were to succeed.
“So… we need to find the cypher key. It’s got to be here somewhere. With it, I can decode this and maybe fix the EVA.” Cendan hoped this would push them the way he needed them to go. “Can we plan on searching these rooms tomorrow?” He could see the other choices start to fade out as the decision came.
Marcus spoke first. “Cendan… I don’t understand why you didn’t speak up earlier. Why all this cloak and dagger stuff of sneaking around? I don’t accept that we use magic, and I don’t want to hear that ever again. The Slyph wants to remove the barrier simply so she can kill us all. She hates humans, hates us. With the barrier down, the worlds will merge, and she and her creatures will raze us, the humans, down to dust and grit.”
“All that being said,” Marcus continued. “If we can get the EVA back to working order, we can finally start to push back against the Slyph in ways we never could have in over a thousand years. For that reason, I’ll be happy to spend as many days as it takes to search this place from top to bottom to find the key to that cypher.”
“I don’t know what to say, really,” Jasmine said, sounding far from happy. “You’re a Maker, the one thing that could really turn this around, and yet you hide this from us. You don’t tell us, you don’t want us to know, and you lie to us. But, you also came clean, and without you, we’ll lose this fight, one way or another.”
Cendan nodded, holding up his hands. “I know. I just… I just wanted to be sure before I said anything. I wanted to see if I could prove it not just to you all, but to myself. I’m a factual logical person, all of this has been way beyond my normal areas of comfort. But you’re right, let’s find the cypher, and then see if I can figure out how and what to do.”
Marcus and Jasmine glanced at each other and nodded. “But not tonight, not now. Sleep now—I don’t want to let tiredness lead us to breaking something that important,” Marcus said.
“We’ll leave this area, go back to bed, and really search this in the morning,” Jasmine said. “Besides, Sal would have a fit if he knew we started searching this area without him.”
Cendan nodded, his mind already in motion. The truth was, there was no cypher. There was only one person who knew how to decode that book, and it was Oakheart. How he knew there wasn’t a cypher, he wasn’t sure. He was, however, as sure of it as he was that his name was Cendan Key—which led him to the other path, the dangerous one. He had to go to the Echo World.
They exited the Maker wing together, Marcus being the last one to pull the door shut. Cendan considered locking the door but didn’t. If he needed to lock it, it was better the others didn’t know how he had done it. None of them talked as they walked back toward the barrier room, Cendan holding his key tightly. When they finally arrived there, a thought occurred to him. “Marcus, how did you know I was in there?”
Marcus gave a rare smile, but there was no warmth in it. “As the leader of the Bridgefinders, I know when a focus is taken or added from the board. Yours being picked up woke me, and I woke Jasmine as her room is the closest one to mine, in case I needed backup for some reason.”
Cendan said nothing, but winced internally. That could make things more difficult. Timing was going to have to be near perfect to lock that wing back up, coinciding with a Bridge close or he wasn’t ever going to be able to lock that door. He placed the key back in its place in the pattern, feeling the familiar pang of loss the moment he let go of it.
Sleep claimed him surprisingly quickly though he knew he was exhausted. Dreams of Grellnot and the Slyph haunted him, but they were normal dreams, not the dream communication he had been exposed to before.
He awoke with a start, forgetting for a second that he was in the lair and not at his house. His house. His clients. He figured he needed to call them and bow out of all of that work. Maybe put the house up for sale as it had already become clear he’d be here almost all the time. That, he would deal with later, though—for now, he had to figure out his plan for this place.
The search for the cypher would be fruitless, but it could still be very useful. Turning up anything in that area would be a good thing. There were at least a dozen rooms in that wing that none of them had even opened the door to—who knew what they would find? The real problem was going to be the one that had an answer, but not a how. He had to get to the Echo World, find some way to communicate with Oakheart, learn what he needed to know, and then find a way back to this world—all the while avoiding the Slyph and any of her creatures.
He had less to fear from Grellnot now, at least in terms of feeding on his powers, though he was highly unsure if this protection extended to his actual physical form. A fragment of a dream made him shudder, thinking of Grellnots teeth biting and tearing his flesh.
“This just sounds like a walk in the park, Cendan,” he said out loud. Talking to himself was a habit he’d developed to help him explain things. He would have to mull that over for a bit, see how it could happen. Firstly though, a shower, and then breakfast, explaining everything all over again to Sal, and then the search. Of course, if a Bridge formed, everything would get put on hold, and they’d all run off to close it. Would the knowledge that the Bridgefinders had a Maker again change where and when the Slyph wanted to make a Bridge?
He was still mulling that over in his head when he finally got to the kitchen, freshly showered and hungry. Surprisingly, no one else was there, which meant either they were all already in the Maker wing, or Jasmine and Marcus were talking to Sal privately first. Cendan didn’t see any real reason that they would be searching without him, and suspected the talk was going on elsewhere, away from him.
It had been that magic talk. Marcus treated magic as an anathema. The thought, the very idea that they were using magic in any way was revolting to him. Sal, however, might be receptive to the idea, not having been brought up in the Bridgefinder lore. Jasmine didn’t seem to hate the idea the same way Marcus did, but she didn’t believe it, eithe
r. She just seemed to reject it without thought.
He had eaten and was on his second cup of coffee when they all appeared—Marcus first, determined, Jasmine with a decidedly neutral cast to her face, and Sal, who was grinning from ear to ear. Sal took one look at Cendan and burst out with a cheer, one that drew annoyance from Marcus.
“So you’re a Maker?” Sal asked. “Cendan, man, that’s awesome! The others were filling me in—can’t wait to explore that wing. I’ve dreamed of seeing past that door since I came here. This is going to be great!” Sal was more excited than any of the others at the idea of Cendan being a Maker. If he didn’t stop smiling that grin was going to get stuck on his face.
“Yeah, that’s what they tell me,” Cendan replied. His next words were cut off by an alarm cutting through the air that sounded like the wail of a cello. “Bridge!” Marcus took off running towards what Cendan thought was the map room. They all followed—Cendan mostly because he wanted to see the map in actual action. They came into the room right behind Marcus and all of them fixed their eyes on the wooden map covering the wall.
There were two lights going on with the map, and both were growing branches with leaves. Marcus swore up and down upon seeing that. “Double bridge! Both with creature releases!” Marcus looked at Jasmine. “Divide and close. You take Cendan, I’ll take Sal.” He took off for the barrier room.
Jasmine followed and yelled back to Cendan and Sal who were standing there. “Get moving! Get your focus and let’s go!”
“Oh, right,” Sal muttered and took off after her, Cendan following close behind. Cendan was pretty sure the reason for two bridges was to test things now that a Maker was involved. By the time he arrived, the others were already putting their foci somewhere safe.