“It looks like a long night ahead,” Shatz Abel said. “But they did tell us to wait. So we’ll wait.”
“No problem there, mate!” Ralf said. “No way you gets me out into that eeriness, no wise.”
“Ri’!” his friend said.
“Why don’t we take shifts?” Dalin offered. “Say, four hours?”
“Talk all you want about shifts,” Shatz Abel said seriously, his grip on his weapon tightening. “But I’ll stay awake all night anyway.”
“Suit yourself, then,” Dalin said, and settled himself down in one corner, with his arm for a pillow, while the pirate continued to stare glumly through the front port and Enry and Ralf settled down to a game of cards, cheating one another.
Dalin awoke with light in his eyes and Shatz Abel saying, “We’ve got visitors, Sire.”
Stretching, the king stood up to see yellow fog floating four or five feet above the ground, and a contingent of feet marching below it, the upper bodies of the marchers hidden in the mist. Dalin counted at least a dozen figures.
There came a loud knock on the hold of the ship; Enry looked to Shatz Abel, who nodded.
“Let them in,” the pirate said, positioning himself to the side of the lock; Enry activated it and the lock opened to let in a foul stench and yellow roiling fog.
Too late, Shatz Abel realized that they had been gassed; he shouted “Down!” and fired out into the fog as he dropped to the deck.
Dalin dropped, too; but the gas was fast-acting and clung to the floor as well as the ceiling, and in a few moments Dalin was swooning toward unconsciousness and watched his three companions falter along with him.
He saw two sets of boots approach him, then nothing.
He awoke with a headache, aware of being under the influence of some sort of transportation.
When his wits had fairly cleared, he realized that he had been trussed and hung on a pole, like any hunter’s catch. For a moment he thought of a deer or elk, and wondered if indeed they had fallen into the province of mutant hunters or, worse, cannibals. But a further clearing of his head as well as his vision brought his face into close proximity with that of a happy-looking young man, no more than twelve or thirteen, who was not, at least, dressed as any cannibal, but rather in a mishmash of military gear; his boots did not match but looked sturdy enough, and the cap he wore on his head was reminiscent of that worn by Dalin’s own palace guards at one time: a tall, red, tasseled thing with a chin strap.
“Awake!” the boy cried with glee; Dalin now saw that the boy was one of four bearers of Dalin’s pole, which was affixed with cross struts at either end.
“Thank God!” came a voice from the other side of the pole-bearing contraption. “Now he can walk on his own!”
Dalin was lowered to the ground and cut loose. In a moment he was being roughly helped to his feet and prodded along by something hard in his back, which on inspection turned out to be a raser rifle, borne by another smiling soldier, this one somewhat older than the first.
Behind their little caravan were three other bearing parties; Enry and Ralf were still borne, while Shatz Abel, surrounded by six unsmiling looking guards, plodded along, holding his head.
The soldier with the raser rifle prodded the king again. “Along you go, then,” he said, and the march continued.
They were in country little different from that they had landed in; the ground underfoot was sparsely covered with dried grass and there was no life to speak of. The fog had dispersed; but the sky was not much more of a pleasant color, the Sun a wan yellow blot marking its path past noon. There was a faint, insidious odor like burned meat, and Dalin’s mouth was unnaturally dry.
“May I have a drink of water?” he asked.
His four guards laughed. “Water? You must be joking.”
“How ‘bout a swim in the lake?” another asked, and again there was general levity.
“I take it you don’t have fresh water,” Dalin asked.
“Perhaps later,” the young guard answered. “If the hunt is successful.”
“You have people out hunting for water?” Dalin asked.
“Never you mind,” the guard with the rifle said, prodding him onward.
They stopped, separated from the other groups, and rested while the Sun was still up. Dalin was given something that looked like a dried brown root; only when the others began to chew it voraciously did he sample it himself.
It proved to be dry on the outside but providing of moisture in the center; in a few moments Dalin was devouring it with appetite.
Only when he had finished it completely did he notice his four sentinels staring at him expectantly, with grins on their faces.
“Have I done something to make you laugh?” Dahn said.
The four broke out in laughter, and the one with the rifle said, “I’ll say!”
“Feel anything … interesting?” the boy with the funny hat asked.
“Not really …” Dalin said, but then he did feel a rumbling in his belly.
Now he noticed that the others had not consumed their roots but only chewed on them, drawing out moisture, before spitting out the pieces.
“Oh, Lord,” Dalin said, as his bowels flipped over.
One of his guards followed him a short ways off while he voided himself in relative privacy, while the others laughed uproariously.
“How … long will this … last?” Dalin gasped, between bouts.
“Not long. An hour or two.”
Dalin said, “Next … time I’ll just … chew…”
His companion laughed and said, “I’ll bet you will at that.”
There came a sudden far-off, deep-seated thudding sound; the guard’s demeanor instantly turned wary and listening, his face tight and grim.
“What was that?” Dalin asked.
The thud was gone as quickly as it had come; and there was silence.
“Never mind,” the guard said.
They resumed their march, with Dalin stopping the line every once in a while to relieve himself; eventually, though, the bouts lessened and, as promised, were gone in a couple of hours. When offered another root as they walked, he gladly accepted it but carefully avoided swallowing any of the pieces.
Darkness overcame them, and with it the sky cleared somewhat; they paused as another distant thud sounded, farther away than the first; and then, suddenly, they reached their destination.
Dalin was aware of abruptly being surrounded by a multitude. He heard before he saw them: a rustle that deepened as they walked on and eventually became a murmur of voices. In the darkness he could not make out his surroundings but deduced that they were a little lusher than what they had been traveling through; twice he bumped into foliage that did not splinter into decay at his touch but rather gave back with a springiness that indicated life. Then a single tent turned into a row of tents and then a city of tents; he was in a clearing circled by shanties and huts of semi-permanent nature; a few fires burned beneath high lean-tos, which covered them and dissipated their smoke.
“Cornelian’s satellites can pick up our fires if we don’t hide them,” said a voice that Dalin thought he knew. “Two of our other encampments were destroyed by concussion bombs when they got careless. By now, the ship you arrived in has been destroyed, also.”
“We heard the hit an hour ago,” Dalin’s young guard reported.
“So did we.”
From nearby, cries of dismay went up from Enry and Ralf.
A face drew near in the weak firelight, peered into Dalin’s own.
“Yes, it’s him,” Erik proclaimed, quietly and firmly. “A bit older, a bit rougher around the edges, hopefully a bit more mature and without his eyelids—but yes, it’s him.”
Erik took his hand firmly, and looked into his eyes. “At least you’re not wearing women’s clothing as you were the last time we met.” He smiled warmly. “Welcome home, Sire.”
A great cheer went up nearby; it swelled and spread and Dalin was aware that he was in a ve
ry large encampment indeed.
Someone cried, “All hail to Dalin, King Shar, rightful heir to the throne of Sarat Shar and ruler of Earth!”
“Hail!” the mighty multitude shouted, in one gleeful, boisterous voice.
Twice more they repeated the cry.
Silence fell like an ax, and Dalin, nearly overcome with the reception, said quietly, “It’s … good to be here. To be home.”
Erik, still holding the king’s hand in a firm grip, said, “We’re bloodied but not beaten, Sire. The vermin Cornelian has desiccated most of the cities and many of our camps in the Lost Lands. We had to move farther in to avoid his bombs. He’s destroyed his own puppet government in hopes of neutralizing Earth entirely.” He let go of Dalin’s hand and reached out to brush the king’s eyes. “We have people who can do something about your eyes, make them whole again. It’s clear you haven’t escaped your own troubles, Sire.”
“They’re little enough compared to what your people must have gone through.”
“Your people, King Dalin.”
Shatz Abel made his way toward the duo and stood regarding Erik as if measuring him up.
Dalin introduced the pirate.
Taking Shatz Abel’s grip, Erik said, “We know plenty about the legendary Shatz Abel. I hope he’ll let us find room in our army for a leader like him.”
Putting a beefy arm around the king’s shoulder, the pirate said, “I’d be honored.”
Overhead in the night there was a sliver of pockmarked Moon. Nearby, in the ecliptic, was an impossibly bright star, and below it, in the hazy, poisoned sky near the horizon, another of reddish cast.
“There they are,” Erik said.
“Yes,” Dalin said, and Shatz Abel’s gaze, as well as that of Enry and Ralf and all of the thousands of others in the camp rose to the two beacons, so tiny in a sky full of stars, so large in their importance. Dalin looked at Mars, where his true love Tabrel Kris waited; and then he looked at Venus, the shining prize, a second Earth that would determine all their fates.
He looked at Shatz Abel—though his gaze took in all his people, all the people of Earth.
“That is where it ends,” the king said.
Table of Contents
JOURNEY: THE FIVE WORLDS SAGA, BOOK 2
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Journey - Book II of the Five Worlds Trilogy Page 20