by Chris Ward
Secret Doorway
‘You can’t go back,’ Jeremiah said. ‘Not through the Source. The best you can do is glimpse aspects of their lives … and in some cases, haunt them.’
‘My brother saw me.’
Jeremiah nodded. ‘Some can. My sister was able to see me. My brother and my parents … nothing. Some are more susceptible than others to what we have become.’
‘I was a ghost?’
The old man sighed. ‘That would be too simple a way to put it. Time has no meaning here. The Source has both no time and all time. When you step into that water, you return to where you came from, but you are nowhere and everywhere at once.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You can’t be in any single place or time. That is why you appear as you appear to them—like a shadow, an outline, sometimes a translucent figure. Like a ghost.’
‘But I went back?’
‘To everywhere and nowhere, to all time and no time. Our primitive human minds are unable to comprehend the enormity of it, which is why we see just short visions. You cannot choose.’
Benjamin rubbed his temples. ‘Is this all there is? If there is no way through the Source, how can I go home?’
‘You can’t. Yet many try. Many refuse to give up. You saw them out there. Did they call to you? They no longer control their own minds, but they so hate to be alone. I have made it my life’s work to turn them away, but I am so old now. It becomes harder to discourage them with each passing day.’ The old man stood up and stumped a few steps across the cave, then he stopped and turned back. ‘Did you see my dragons?’ he asked. ‘For a while I found peace with them. Are they still beautiful?’ A light had come into his eyes, a glimmer of ancient longing.
‘They are magnificent,’ Benjamin said. ‘You did well.’
The old man sighed once more. ‘Good, good. How I dream of seeing them again … I was so foolish. If only I had known. Now, it is too late.’ He shrugged and sat down, this time on the floor. ‘But you don’t need to make my choice. You still have time.’
‘What happened to you? You disappeared hundreds of years ago. How can you still be here?’
Jeremiah shook his head. ‘Like you, I wanted to leave. I wandered to the ends of the world and found only an impenetrable wall of gas and wind. Source Mountain was my best chance. I stood in the water, as you did, and I gave myself over to the visions. I watched for years and years, and saw the lives of my old family. I watched their births and deaths. I saw everything, and the misery of it became too great. I turned away from it, and when I did, I saw the foolishness of my ways. I saw I still had time to help others, to stop them from losing their souls to the Source, as I almost had. I used my last magic to create this place, and from here, I have waited and watched ever since, giving counsel to those, like yourself, who come seeking their old lives, turning them away when I can.’
‘Why can’t you leave?’
Jeremiah laughed. ‘What you see around you, dear Benjamin, is the result of pure magic. What you think of as rock is just life with the life taken away. I draw from it, and it keeps me alive, but if I leave, it will no longer protect me.’
‘And you’ll die?’
Jeremiah spread his hands and smiled, the look in his eyes almost romantic. ‘I’ll vanish quicker than a gust of wind.’
‘Am I stuck here now, too?’
‘No, my dear boy, you are not. The magic is protecting you, but youth is protecting you, as well. You can leave any time you want.’
Benjamin clenched his fists, holding back the urge to cry. ‘I’ve come so far … I’ve tried so hard … I just want to go home.’
Jeremiah’s eyes became watery, and he cocked his head, giving Benjamin a long, regretful stare. ‘Imagine how much that feeling will have grown five hundred human years from now. Sometimes, there aren’t answers, Benjamin, just the quest, and each of us has to find our own way to move forward, our own reason to carry on. Mine is to protect people like you from becoming people like them.’ He flapped a hand at the cave roof, and although Benjamin doubted Jeremiah’s cave was quite where geology suggested it should be, he understood the gesture. ‘Maybe there is a way back. I failed to find it, but that doesn’t mean you won’t, in time. You’re still young. You are a Summoner; you have great power. And you have a whole world building itself in front of you.’ He smiled again. ‘Endinfinium belongs to you. There’s nothing you can’t achieve.’
‘But I just want to go back to England. I don’t want to stay here. Everyone I’ve met, they all had a past they didn’t miss. But my family … I love them so much.’
‘Perhaps that’s a mystery yet to be solved. Stay strong, Benjamin. You have far more resolve than I ever had.’
Benjamin fell silent as a great weight pressed down on his chest. He had come so far, yet he was no closer to getting any answers. Some questions still nagged at him, though, like a dog tugging on the leg of his trousers, refusing to let go.
‘Those people I saw, are they still alive?’
‘Some, maybe. Wanderers still appear from time to time. A few every year. Others are long dead.’
‘Are they in pain?’
Jeremiah laughed. ‘Depends what you call pain. Did you take joy or sadness from seeing your old life?’
‘Both.’
‘Then that is your answer. Few whose lives were hard came here. They accept their new lives in Endinfinium, building small frontier villages far from here, living in quiet peace. There are always those who crave knowing, though, like you or me.’
‘Can we free them?’
Jeremiah shook his head. ‘Only by stopping the water, but there is no power in Endinfinium great enough to do that. Do you think they want to be freed? Maybe they have found contentment.’
‘It’s so sad.’
‘Only from your point of view, or mine. Living in an eternal dreamlike state, forever watching those you loved … for some, that is rapture.’
‘I want to look again.’
‘Are you sure?’
Benjamin took a deep breath. ‘You talked about finding a quest, Jeremiah. I need to find mine.’
The ancient man nodded. ‘That is your choice.’
‘Can you pull me back?’
Jeremiah shook his head. ‘I don’t have the strength to bring you here twice. The water affects you in a way I can’t explain. If I let you go now, the best I can do is try to expel you safely, before the water claims you, not as a prisoner, but as a victim.’
‘Then this is goodbye.’
Jeremiah smiled. ‘Say hello to the two suns, and to my dragons.’
‘And your old friend, Basil.’
Jeremiah’s eyes lit up. ‘That old fool still lives?’
‘In a sense, I guess.’
Jeremiah’s head rocked backwards in a silent laugh. ‘Does he really? Those folk of Underfloor really had things figured out. Cajole him into a final flight, if you can, dear Benjamin. Tell him … tell him I found my quest.’
‘I will.’
Jeremiah closed his eyes. ‘Goodbye, Benjamin Forrest, it was a pleasure to meet you.’
Benjamin looked up. ‘How did you know my—’
Mum doesn’t know where David is. He’s supposed to be napping upstairs while she’s watching her afternoon TV shows. After waiting for her to settle down with a cup of tea, though, he has sneaked out the back door and has taken his bike from the shed.
He hasn’t been out alone since Benjamin disappeared, and since he woke up from the coma after the accident.
Over his shoulder, he has a little backpack with a picture of Spiderman on it. It’s too small to be of any great use, but it’s big enough for a banana and a small packet of digestive biscuits. He’s forgotten to bring any drink, but he doesn’t expect to be gone for too long.
He pushes the bike around to the front of the house, ducks down as he wheels it past Mum’s parked car, then jumps onto the pedals to get it moving down the driveway’s slope to the road. The living room window
faces out onto the street, so if Mum stands up at the wrong moment, she’ll see him, and while David might think he’s moving fast, even Mum could probably outrun his little pedal bike. The other kids at school think he’s stupid, but he isn’t. He knows how to get away, and he knows which roads to take to get to the forest where the accident happened.
He’s so pleased, he talks to himself as he rides, telling himself how happy Benjamin will be when he finds out what he is planning to do.
But Benjamin already knows, because Benjamin is along for the ride with him. If it were all of Benjamin, the bike would surely topple over; however, Benjamin is present in part only. Perhaps soon David will realise. Perhaps not.
He heads for that section of road where the accident happened. He remembers nothing, other than being on his bike one moment, then waking up in hospital an indefinite time later.
The road, curving downhill through the trees and arcing out of sight a short distance farther on, looks the same, and David parks his bike up by the side of the road to walk out into the middle.
He sits down. His fingers trace lines in the tarmac. Yes, this is the place.
This is where he found the door.
Over in the trees, something glows orange. Could be the eyes of a cat or a fox, except that it’s morning and nothing could reflect back the light. It’s one of them, he knows, one of those things that appear to him but not to other people. Mum thinks he’s crazy, and the kids at school laugh at him if he says anything about it, but he knows the truth. The orange things aren’t from Basingstoke or even from England; they come from somewhere else, though sometimes they find themselves pulled here.
He didn’t realise it at first, but it’s he, David, who is doing the pulling.
The tarmac begins to fold backwards, neatly rolling up like a carpet being packed away and the roar of gushing water immediately fills the stillness of the forest. Looking over David’s shoulder, Benjamin has the sudden urge to push the road back into place.
David leans over, peering into a hole that appears to reveal an underground water culvert that gushes whitewater rushing past so quickly, he can’t clearly make out the objects it carries.
‘Are you in there, Benjamin?’ David calls. ‘Here. This is for you.’ He pulls out a little object from his pocket. It’s a toy robot with a silver head and a black body. One arm has broken off and been fixed again with a piece of black duct tape. David leans over toward the river flowing under the rolled-back section of road, then pulls the robot back at the last minute.
‘Almost forgot!’ His fingers fumble with a catch on the front of the body cavity and it flips open to reveal a little space inside. From out of his pocket David pulls a piece of coloured paper folded down to the size of a thumbnail, puts it inside the cavity, and clicks shut the little door. Then, waving goodbye to the robot as if it was a friend leaving a birthday party, he drops it into the water.
In a second it is gone, caught in a roll of whitewater and dragged away. David lets out a contented sigh, then leans forward to touch the rolled-up section of road, which folds back into place, leaving neither creak nor bump to suggest it was ever displaced.
The sound of an engine makes David start. He climbs to his feet and drags his bike to the side of the road, just as a vehicle comes roaring around the corner. Benjamin gasps, recognising the same white van that had struck his brother. It roars past, the backdraft around its rear sending a flurry of leaves up into the air. One comes to rest on David’s head, and he plucks it off, holds it between his fingers.
Benjamin, still a shadow at his little brother’s shoulder, stares as the leaf bends and folds itself into a rough man-shape. It dances a little jig on David’s palm before David flicks it away into the air, where it spins and comes to land on the road as just an ordinary little leaf once again.
David climbs back onto his bike and turns it toward home. Benjamin sighs, and finally allows himself to blink—
Benjamin knew he was screaming, but water covered every part of his body, so no sound came. While he spun over and over, caught in a tempest of churning violence, arms and legs flailing like the branches of a tree caught in a wild storm, there was no breath in his lungs and no chance for any, as the water battered him from all sides.
This is it, he thought. This is the end.
Then, as quickly as it had begun, the ordeal was over. The suffocating press of water gave way to air as he broke through the surface at the top of a gushing fountain.
The euphoria of flying had lasted only a moment before he struck the water’s surface, side on. The impact knocked the wind out of him, then the water claimed him again, and he flailed to keep his head above the surface as it cascaded down all around. But as he desperately kicked and flapped his arms, the thundering rain began to subside.
His strength was almost gone. But then, as he briefly slipped under the water and came up coughing, he remembered his magic. Using his remaining strength, Benjamin pulled at the water, urging it to push him forward.
A small wave lifted behind him, and dense patches of water felt like hands holding him up. His mind heaved and his temples throbbed, and cuts opened up on his arms and legs, just as they had done before he had learned how to control it.
He had failed—the magic was out of his control, his strength was gone, and he could swim no longer.
Then, something brushed his shoe. He stretched down and felt solid ground beneath his feet. He released the magic and struggled the last few steps toward the shore.
Benjamin pulled himself up onto a grey, shingle beach and lay gasping with the water lapping at his feet. All around, cliffs of grey stone rose up to form the crater’s rim, while the yellow sun hung high above him to the east, signaling morning. Benjamin gazed up at it for a few seconds before exhaustion overtook him.
He closed his eyes, head slumping down into the grey shingle, which felt more comfortable than any pillow he had ever known.
39
Shenlong
‘Jeremiah Flowers called the Great Dragon Shenlong,’ Jim Green was saying as the little skiff chugged out from beneath the shadow of the cliffs. ‘It’s a name that comes from Chinese mythology. Shenlong was the dragon master of storms and rain. Farmers would do well not to displease him, or he would blast away their crops, but not with fire as dragons usually do in stories, with great floods and torrential rain. It makes sense, don’t you think, that the Great Dragon should be a master of water?’
Miranda glanced up at Cuttlefur, who gave her a little wink. Most of the other pupils leaned precariously over the boat’s railings, peering down into the water in the hope of catching a glimpse of something huge and majestic.
‘Won’t he breathe fire, too?’ asked Tommy Cale, as the boat topped a little swell then dropped into a short plunge, making several pupils squeal with excitement. ‘If he’s the master of storms?’
‘Yes, but this isn’t the real Shenlong,’ Jim Green said. ‘It’s just the name that Jeremiah Flowers gave to the Great Dragon. He might not be able to do any of those things.’
‘Then he wouldn’t be very great, would he?’
Several pupils laughed. Miranda moved a bit farther down the boat, closer to Cuttlefur. The boat had a lower deck, with stairs leading up to a smaller, upper viewing platform, where Cherise and Amy both stood. As Miranda approached, Cuttlefur glanced up and gave a little smile, making her tingle with jealousy, but when she came out from under the shadow of the upper deck and looked to see who he had acknowledged, she saw only Alan Barnacle leaning on a rail above her, his huge body looking capable of breaking right through it, his clothes damp from the spray.
She didn’t feel right being out on the water without the teachers. No one had seen Edgar, Ms. Ito, or Professor Eaves since yesterday. Barnacle claimed they were sick, and Jim Green usually agreed with whatever Barnacle said. Cuttlefur told her not to worry, that they would be gone soon anyway. He still refused to tell her how, insisting that secrecy was of great importance. The farther they go
t from the shore, though, and out into the open waters from where the very edge of the world was almost visible, the more she felt like a mouse out in an open field, trying to hide from a circling hawk.
‘Has anyone ever seen Shenlong?’ Snout asked. ‘Like, ever?’
‘Many have claimed sightings,’ Jim Green said, at which a half-dozen heads leaned over the railing again to peer down into the water. ‘But perhaps you’re looking in the wrong place. Consider this: if Shenlong is related to the paper dragons of the bay, wouldn’t he be at risk from the seawater, the same as them? How might he have countered that threat?’
‘Got a swimsuit,’ someone said.
‘Grew wings!’ shouted someone else.
‘Ping-pong,’ Jim Green said, lifting a hand. ‘All supposed sightings of Shenlong have claimed he could fly; that he wasn’t like the paper dragons at all, but some giant flying beast.’ He paused for emphasis as the pupils gasped and muttered shocked exclamations. Then, with a wide grin, he walked to the railing and pointed at the horizon. ‘And there, in the lee of the winds that buffet the edge of the world, is his lair. Behold, Dragon Rock.’
Miranda couldn’t stop herself from looking. At first she saw nothing, but then as whoops from the other pupils began, she spotted it.
On the horizon, so close to the edge of the world it gave her knots in her stomach, stood a little black dot.
‘Are we going there? Are we going there?’ chorused several boys crowding around Jim Green as though waiting for him to start handing out cakes.
Miranda looked at Cuttlefur, but he was staring up at the second level again. She glanced up and saw Barnacle meeting his gaze.
‘I’m afraid we can’t go all the way there,’ Jim Green said. ‘It’s too close to the edge. The currents are strong, and discovering what’s over the edge of the world isn’t on today’s itinerary.’ He grinned again. ‘We’ll go close enough to get a good look, though.’
More whoops and cheers rose up, and Jim Green led them in a fist pump, then climbed down from the stage and headed back to a refreshments cabinet to get something to drink while several other kids headed for the upper level to get a better look as they approached Dragon Rock. Miranda turned to look for Cuttlefur, who was marching toward the upper deck.