by R N Skye
“That’s fine and all that you repaired it, Miss Ava,” Spoke Edgar, “but I don’t think Droddy is going to like it much see’n how she was the one that wrecked it the last time?”
“What?” Ava said in disbelief. “Why would anyone disable the overland?”
“Ah,” both of the brothers looked at each other as if everything made sense.
“What,” asked Ava?
“I told you it wasn’t a worm,” Rogg chided Edgar. “It travels over land so it obviously be an overland.”
“You never told me that,” Edger retorted.
“Well I would have if you would have given me time before you nearly dumped us to the dirt; free fall’n the hoist like ya did.”
“Guys, guys,” Ava raised her voice. “Who is Droddy and why did she disable the platform panel?”
Both of the little men looked at each other. “You tell her,” said one. “No, you can tell her,” deferred the other. Finally Rogg sighed, “Droddy is our older sister; she’s kind of bossy, if you catch my drift. Ava raised her brow in irritation and the short man continued, “She was a ride’n the conveyance… err… overland… back when the sky fell. It was late and about the same time a great fire fell from the night sky and struck the ground creating a great hole causing the world to shake for miles.” The men seemed to shudder from the memory. “Anyway, the overland continued over the massive hole and then suddenly began to fade as the golden track ended. All of the passengers - Many who were forest tenders fell to the fiery ground below and died a fiery death for sure. Droddy being a smith mage was able to take the fires and while a bit worse for wear from the fall, she came back and told what happened and warned the entire glen not to ride to the fisher-lands anymore.”
“Then,” continued Edgar as Rogg seemed to stop for a breath, “Some young’uns decided that they could ride it a ways and stop before they got to the drop off; they were wrong. The good news was that the molten ground had cooled and there weren’t any heat left from the sky fall. The bad news is that the fall was steep and the rocks left behind were sharp as glass – Long story short not all of em came back. Droddy was so angry I thought she was a fix’n to explode. That’s when she went to the platform and pulled the lumen from the glyphs and then filed em off with a rasp and said no one was to touch it until a Lumen Mage showed up that could fix it all the way to Coh Y Nord.”
Rogg jumped into the conversation once again. “Seeing how you are a Lumen Master and have it all fixed up now we can stop caravanning to the fisher-lands.”
Ava wasn’t sure what to say. She was more curious than ever at the story that the two loquacious brothers had just conveyed, at the same time she didn’t want to get them started on another tangent of conversation; she was really hoping to get the new monorail disks positioned before the days end. “Tell your sister not to tamper with the platform until she talks to me. I’m going to disable it just to be safe but hopefully by the days end, at most in a day or two, I should have it repaired all the way to Coh Y Nord.” Walking back to the panel she activated a new glyph sequence and the audio and the display showed that it was again disabled. Then on gut feeling she etched a hide glyph on the side and activated it causing the panel to disappear.
Placing her scribe back into her satchel she caught the two brothers whispering to each other. “I told you she was a lumen master; you see the way she hid that? Droddy should be fine with how things are now.”
“It was nice meeting you gentlemen,” Ava smiled as she stepped back on board the front compartment. “I need to get going if I’m going to get to the crater before it gets too dark to work.”
“The pleasure is all ours, Miss Ava,” the men rumbled enthusiastically. “We’ll let everyone know that you are going to have things running soon; the clans will be thrilled that we will soon be able to ride to the fisher-lands again.”
Ava activated the controls to the monorail and the doors slid shut. Moving the control forward the long carrier shot forward leaving the platform quickly behind.
“Do you think we should have mentioned the firebirds?” Edgar asked his brother as the monorail disappeared from view.
“Nah, she’s a Lumen Mage I bet she has creatures like them for pets,” replied Rogg.
“Last one to the Glen is a rotten egg,” bellowed Edgar as he bounded off the platform and the two stout forest tenders were off, crashing through the brush like badgers through the hedge in their race to spread the news of their discovery.
It was a half an hour later that Ava saw that she was approaching the crater. She slowed the overland down and began to concentrate on the track ahead watching for the point when it would run out. Shortly the forest seemed to thin and spread like a fortress wall as she approached the large crater that she had often viewed in the portal viewer. Cubit by cubit she inched the monorail forward and soon she was suspended in the air on the single golden glowing rail. She was about two hundred cubits away from the edge when she saw the end. Ever so slowly she backed off the forward control until she was two cubits away from the edge; then she halted the device and deactivated the movement controls.
Moving forward to the front she opened the front doorway and looked over the edge of the front walkway platform. The crater was enormous. Unlike the descriptions that the two forest tenders had mentioned the bottom of the crater was not rocky at all; at least not that she could see. The ground was as she had seen it in the portal viewer; lush and green – odd she thought to herself – given the time of year it was. The giant conifers that surrounded the depression accentuated the depths but the forested basin of the crater was impossible to penetrate due to its density.
I best get started; Ava thought to herself as she went back in and opened the oversized pack and removed the three large disks. After the disks were set aside she retrieved a harness and a large coil of rope that she had packed in the bottom. Buckling on the harness she threaded one end of the rope through a pair of ‘D’ rings on her harness; pulling it through in a weaving fashion then fastening it securely to the handrail inside the car. Casually she tossed the coil out the front of the car letting it dangle to the ground far below. Next she extending her hand away from herself pulling tight on the dangling end of the rope, she slowly backed up until the end tied to the handrail was taut. As a test she lessened the tension on the dangling end and the rope began to slide through the ‘D’ rings. With very little effort she re-extended her arm retightening the coil end and the rope halted. Perfect, she thought. She picked up the first disk and using a clip she latched it on to her harness. While keeping a slight tension on the rope she stepped out of the front and walked out on to the platform.
Carefully she climbed down the front of the platform until she was a foot above the large golden rail that she realized was small by comparison to the larger monorail but was still over a cubit wide. With a slide she hopped off the walkway and onto the rail. She braced herself to land but to her surprise the rail became insubstantial and she fell through it and the rope began to blur as it zipped through the ‘D ’rings. As fast as she could she grasped the rope and extended it and it slowed and then stopped as it became taut through the rings. Ava’s heart raced as she sat suspended from the monorail gently swinging back and forth with a slight spin. With one hand she reached as high as she could and pulled up while keeping the down line tight. Doing two handed pull-ups was difficult – single handed it was impossible. “Argh!” Ava grumped as she looked up trying to calculate what to do.
A chiming in her ear sounded disrupting her thoughts. “Who,” Ava said to the comm chiming in her ear.
“Shane Chason,” returned a nondescript female voice.
“How embarrassing,” she thought out loud.
Touching the comm device attached to her ear she answered, “Hi Shane.”
“Hi Sunshine, just thought I’d call and see how things are going.” Her fiancé said with enthusiasm. “Do you need any help? I have some time.”
Ava grunted as she attempted t
o pull herself up the rope with, again with little success. “No, I’m fine,” she said slightly distracted as she concentrated on keeping the taut line tight while swinging both hand overhead and grasping the line to pull up with two hands. This time she was successful in gaining a foot but had no way to pull the gained slack tight – in fact as she hurried to take up the slack she lost another six inches. “Argh!”
“Look Mon Cher,” She said trying to calm herself. “I’d love to talk right now but I’m in the middle of getting the first disk into position can I call you back?”
“Sure,” Shane replied, “I just wanted to let you know I was reading up on the overland rails and wanted to make sure that you weren’t counting on standing on them, their made of Lumen and photons. They’re basically like air.”
“Oh, do tell.” Ava replied just short of being a retort. “Thanks for the information.”
“Well,” Shane said with a trace of humor in his voice, “if you’re good I’m going to go to Valee and see if I can put together a ball field. Leo and Ahhan think I’m stressing so I’m going to see if there are any players in among the refugees and see about starting a game or two. Oh one thing before I go, I found a good set of variable glyph sets under stationary locus. Check on your instructor they may help you when you get around to working over the crater area.”
Ava was suddenly suspicious. “Shane? Where are you?” She looked up, straining to see if she was alone. All she could see was the monorail suspended above her but could see nothing beyond the rail and the underside of the carriage.
“I’m off,” Shane said quickly, “you have a great afternoon, and I can’t wait to hear how things go when you get back tonight; we can get dinner together in Valee. Bye.”
“Shane? Where are you?” There was no reply. “Shane if I find that you have been here watching me I’m going to kill you!”
With a sigh Ava relaxed. “Thanks for the hint though,” she mumbled. “Instructor, take the shape of a one by one cubit wide stationary square step level with my knees. Instantly a square of stainless steel appeared next to her knees. Using both hands she reached above her and pulled up and then placed her feet on the step provided by her instructor. Standing up she pulled through the slack and began repeating the process. Once she was standing on the front platform again she sat down.
I need to think this through, she thought. Taking Shane’s advice she looked up the glyphs that he had mentioned. Deciding that she would keep the rope attached as a safety measure she used her scribe to etch the required glyphs to the harness and soon she was hovering near the end of the end of the glowing rail.
Carefully she unhooked the first disk from her harness and rotated it until the rail side matched up with the end of the rail. Moving to the side she held it in place and then activated the disks glyphs with lumen. With a flare a new section of rail extended out into the distance. “Excellent,” she half shouted as she attempted a celebratory dance while suspended in the air. “I love magic!”
Once she had maneuvered all of the gear back into the car of the monorail she held her breath as she slowly moved the monorail forward over the new track. Once she was a few cubits forward she stopped half expecting the car to crash at any moment down into the forest below. When nothing happened she moved a little bit further, then further still. Slowly she continued until she was several hundred cubits beyond the new disk and she saw that she was coming to the end of the current rail. Carefully she slowed the cars to a halt and locked the controls.
Donning her harness once again she buckled on another disk and prepared to repeat what she had done on the last section. This one went more quickly and within a few minutes she soon had another rail glowing off into the distance.
As she stood on the front of the monorail admiring her handiwork she noticed a flash of color darting back and forth around the rail. As she looked closer she saw the most colorful bird she had ever seen. Its plumage was like looking at a florescent rainbow. The bird appeared large like an eagle but it seemed to be able to dart like a sparrow. After a few moments of what appeared to be playful aerobatics the large colorful bird glided towards the rail as if to perch upon it. If a look of surprise could be found on the face of a bird then Ava saw it as the bird fell through the glowing rail. The large bird tumbled for a few moments then it soon regained control, flew past the rail a few more times, then dove for the bottom of the crater and disappeared into the trees.
Ava slowly inched the cars forward again until she was satisfied that the new rail was holding as designed and then she increased the speed a bit until the end of the newest rail came into view; where she parked once again just short of the end. Like previously Ava laid out the equipment to put the final disk that he had brought into place; as she lugged the last disk out onto the platform she was startled as she saw the strange colorful bird sitting calmly on the platform, with a shriek Ava and the bird both jumped as they surprised each other. The large golden disk sailed through the air and like a cat chasing a mouse the large bird dove after it. Her heart beating like a timpani in her ribcage, Ava raced to the platforms edge to see where the disk would land. Surprisingly the large bird was able to latch onto it with its talons and began to fly away with it. The load seemed to be too much for it though and it slowly lost altitude and disappeared into the trees.
Ava went back inside the monorail and pulled her portal device from her satchel and began moving the viewer around trying to locate the fallen disk. The thought of why didn’t I use this to place the disks on the first place, ran through her mind as she continued to scan the forest floor far below. She could hear it now; Ari lecturing her on poor planning. Unexpectedly she glimpsed a flash of color and she zoomed in to see the image of the bird perched on the disk with one of its wings folded at an odd angle. Grabbing her satchel she opened a portal near the floundering bird and stepped through.
“Hey there big guy,” she cooed. “Are you okay?” She now had the time to take in the bird close up. To her astonishment it had the head of an Eagle and the body of a Lion. Instead of fur it had very fine shimmering feathers of every hue; although most of its cat areas appeared golden. “What an amazing creature you are,” She carefully reached for it as if to pet it. With a hiss it cowered away from her and flopped around as it tried to fly away and at the same time refusing to let go of the disk. Squawking more loudly as it seemed to injure its wing with each attempt to use it.
Ava backed off and continued to speak soothingly to the gryphon looking animal. Balancing on her toes while sitting on her heels she began to sing a lullaby that her mother had always sung to her as a child when she had had a stubbed toe or a skinned knee. The music calmed the animal to the point that it stopped flopping around and it watched her intently. Ava carefully concentrated on glyph mastery and began to draw some glyphs of mild anesthetics and analgesics into the air. Smoothly she imbued the glyphs and gently pushed the glowing symbols toward the wounded gryphon as she continued to sing. The gryphon gradually closed its eyes and sank comfortably to the ground and soon was asleep. With a sigh Ava stopped her song and using her lumen sight examined the misshapen wing. Ava would have blinked if her eyes weren’t already closed. The gryphon seemed to be pure lumen it was so bright.
How, does one heal something made of pure lumen, she wondered. Carefully she folded the wing so that it seemed to be in a natural position. Feeling more than knowing she decided that she should treat the broken wing like a glyph and simply imbue it with lumen. Placing her hand on the area of the fracture she willed lumen into the wing. Like a dry sponge the wing absorbed the lumen from her as fast as she could provide it. Soon the break was gone; a good thing as she was at her capacity for providing it. With a gasp Ava leaned away from her sleeping patient; feeling like she had just run several milos. Scooting against a nearby tree she sat with her back against the trunk, closed her eyes and leaned back to catch her breath.
When she opened her eyes the forest was noticeably darker and the air cooler but she
felt refreshed. Looking around she saw the sleeping gryphon with its head resting on the monorail disk. “Well my colorful friend,” she said to the slumbering gryphon, “I need my disk and it’s clear you like shiny toys.” Using her instructor she found some useful glyphs and constructed a hollow golden disk like the monorail disk. She gingerly pulled the monorail disk out from under the sleeping lumen bird and just as carefully replaced it with the toy replica. Using her portal she placed the disk back on the monorail front platform then she removed the lumen from the anesthesia glyphs and set a timer for the analgesic glyphs so that they would gradually wear off in case there was some lingering pain. Turning, she nearly collided with another gryphon that hadn’t been there moments before. The second gryphon was every bit as colorful as the injured gryphon but it was significantly larger as it towered above her head cocked slightly looking down at her with one eye.
“I see my little Solaris has been playing with your tools, daughter of Eliom. Are you harmed?” a voice spoke to her mind; not unlike when she communicated mentally with her instructor.
Ava stepped back bringing her hand to her heart, “I beg your pardon, you startled me.” She had to look up to see the enormity of the magical beast. “There was little harm done,” she continued, “we both sort of frightened one another and I dropped one of my … tools… and the little guy here dove for it; he caught it but I’m afraid the weight was a bit more than he expected - I didn’t see it but I believe he crashed into the trees trying to catch it.” Ava told the large gryphon the story of healing the young gryphon and her task of repairing the monorail.
“You have my gratitude for looking after my kin. I am called Kolaria. Solaris is my little brother. Thank you for healing him. It is good to see that the plan of the Elios is coming to pass.”
“It is an honor to meet you, my name is Ava,” she replied politely.