The Dark Rider (Fading Light)

by Andrew Critchell

  Alex pinched herself but it made no difference for everything remained the same. She tried to rationalise what she was seeing. Was she hallucinating? Had she gone mad, a switch just flicking off in her mind? Before she could think any more, movement on the far side of the clearing caught her eye. Suddenly a group of people appeared as if from within the trees, walking towards her. At the head was a tall woman dressed in flowing white and behind her marched several men and women. Some were carrying banners and some swords. Then sword armed archers on horseback appeared riding behind them and fanning out slowly to encompass the clearing with an exciting energy of barely controlled power and violence. All were dressed in clothes of light browns, faded yellows and deep gold which merged with the autumn colour behind them to give an almost perfect camouflage.

  Alex stared incredulously around her and then fixed her gaze in the woman as she approached, and it was only when the woman was in front of her that she realised it was Aunt Gwen, but it was Aunt Gwen as she must have been when she was twenty for the woman was young, her face fresh and her eyes radiating a powerful beauty.

  As Gwen reached Alex, she stopped and studied her with an intense look in her eyes and then she met Alex’s gaze and smiled in greeting.

  ‘Welcome to our wood, Alex.’

  Alex found a sense of reality pervading through her consciousness, as if everything that was happening was perfectly normal and that there was nothing to worry about. Her disbelief melted away and she calmly gathered her wits and spoke.

  ‘Thank you, Gwen,’ she said and then asked. ‘You are Gwen aren’t you?’

  Gwen smiled again, an act that sent a sense of well-being and goodness flowing through Alex.

  ‘You must have many questions,’ said Gwen. ‘For which I do not have the answers.’

  Gwen moved forward putting her hands on Alex’s shoulders. The touch was electric.

  ‘Gwen is one of my names.’

  ‘So this is the wood Paul always spoke about,’ said Alex looking all around.

  ‘Yes,’ replied Gwen simply. ‘I wish there had been a reason to show you before.’

  Alex bit down on her tongue to quell the sudden flash of anger.

  ‘So where exactly am I?’ she asked.

  Gwen gripped Alex’s shoulders firmly, sending more comfort and normality through her consciousness.

  ‘Let me speak, Alex. Time is short here and we are not the only ones who can sense you.’ Gwen took Alex’s hand. ‘Come, walk with me.’

  Alex followed trancelike, letting herself be led by the woman into the wood. The armed men and women followed them but as they moved deeper into the trees they melted away until Alex was sure she was alone with Gwen.

  ‘Our wood is a mirror of your world Alex. What happens there happens here also.’

  Alex remained silent as she tried to take it all in and to accept that perhaps Paul had been right.

  ‘I can no longer see your brother,’ said Gwen. ‘I fear something is happening that I cannot control.’

  The two stopped walking and Gwen turned to face Alex.

  ‘It is very important that I see him soon.’ Gwen looked deep into Alex’s eyes. ‘Since I left your world I can no longer pass back into it. I therefore ask that you find your brother and bring him to me here. You will know how when the time comes.’

  ‘I saw him two days ago. He was scared,’ said Alex. ‘Something was bothering him.’

  Gwen stared at her intently for a few moments before speaking.

  ‘That is why you must find him.’

  Gwen knelt down and picked a fallen leaf from the woodland floor. She turned it over in her hands seeming to absorb its natural beauty. She then took Alex’s hand and pressed the leaf into her palm.

  ‘Take this leaf. So that you will remember.’

  Gwen closed her hands around Alex’s. She then reached forwards, touching Alex’s forehead, and suddenly Alex felt dizzy and then all was darkness.

  Alex opened her eyes. She blinked hard, trying to shake the tiredness away, the feeling that she was waking from an unusually deep sleep. Everything was as before. Her computer still hummed away in front of her. The muted sounds and atmosphere of the office still surrounded her. The trees still shimmered in the heat haze outside.

  Trees.

  Woodland.

  Gwen.

  Paul.

  Alex looked down at her clenched hand, her fingers opening slowly. She stared in disbelief at the golden brown leaf lying in her palm. She looked around her, heart pounding. Suddenly the room felt stifling hot, the air breathless, devoid of oxygen. The walls began to tilt alarmingly towards her, closing in on her. All around her people sat at their computers staring into the white grey screens, fingers tapping on keys, while behind two people were holding a muted conversation. She heard someone let out a low laugh. Had they seen the leaf? Did they know? Alex turned, but they were not looking at her. In fact no one was paying her the slightest bit of attention. She stood up and made for the door to the corridor, her feet unsteady, her hand shut tight crushing the leaf between her fingers. She pushed herself through, and was immediately alone in the cool, shadowed corridor. Breathing heavily she leaned back against the wall, fists against her head. She tried to calm her panicking body but too many thoughts were racing through her mind. It had to be real. How could she deny it while the proof pushed against her skin? Without that it was a vivid daydream, a hallucination, but Gwen had removed any possible doubt from her mind. Now years of thoughts and feelings were unravelling around her. Guilt was wrapping itself around the memories of her actions and a sick feeling was knotting her stomach.

  Alex sucked in a deep breath, letting her arms drop back down to her sides. She watched in fascination as the leaf fell from her hand rotating slowly as it neared the floor. A sudden gust of wind lifted it upwards and it began to disintegrate before her eyes, flecks of gold turning to dust, and in seconds it was gone. This seemed to change something in Alex’s mind. The leaf was gone. It had not been real. She had imagined the whole thing. She turned and walked as quickly as she dared along the corridor to the toilets. Pushing through the door she leaned against the rim of a sink and turned on the tap. Splashing water on her face she looked up relieved to see herself looking relatively normal. That was it. There was nothing wrong with her. She had just had a particularly strange and vivid daydream.

  Her blackberry vibrated in her pocket. Alex pulled it out and saw the email from her manager asking for an update on one of the more pressing problems she was dealing with.

  ‘It just never ends,’ she muttered to herself. Checking again that she was looking calm and collected Alex went back out into the corridor, already drafting in her head what she had to say.

  Paul stood on the cliff top embracing the moon that now lit the dancing surface of the sea in ebony light. A restless, dream filled sleep had driven him outside into the cool of the night where he found comfort in the darkness where no human moved, where his thoughts could flow and his mind forget the body that caged it. He felt a growing sense of freedom and darkness rising in his soul and his thoughts called out to the moon and to the star lit sky above, to the black shadow of the land that surrounded him and he felt he was answered as a surge of electrical emotion swept through his body. As he called to the sky, dark clouds boiled up from the horizon filling the sky with thunder and lightning as the storm raced in from the sea. Wind tugged at his clothes and whipped the sea into a frenzy of foaming white spray as it crashed against the rocks below.

  The loud whinnying of a horse snapped into Paul’s mind and he looked down and around himself, realising his power and potential, enjoying the feel of the cool armour on his skin and the powerful war-horse he was mounted on.

  So this was how it was to be.

  He was in his dream but this time the dream was real.

  There was something else.

  On the horizon he felt her, felt her pulling him towards herself. With an imperceptible command he urged the warhorse
on and they galloped through the storm, moving swiftly along the cliff tops towards her. Only when he was near did he rein in his horse to a stop and jump down. There he stood waiting. Waiting for the time when she would come to him and they would be joined once more.

  Chapter Seven

  Nicola’s dream had been very vivid. She had been in a deep sleep until something had awoken her, a tingling sensation along her bare, slender arm. She slowly opened her eyes knowing that it would be him. Their gazes met, his face almost a shadow, lit only by the glow of dying embers. His deep blue eyes gleamed in the darkness connecting himself to her as they always did, telling her now that it was time. He leaned forward and kissed her softly before pulling back, his index finger moving to his lips urging her to be quiet. She dressed quickly in layers of linens and a thick fur hide while he stood watching by the doorway. He was not rushing her but she felt the desperate urgency in his actions.

  When she was ready he pulled back the skins and stepped outside and she followed him out into the biting cold to where the great beast of a warhorse stood waiting. He leapt up onto its back before reaching down and grabbing her arm helping her to swing up onto the saddle in front of him. He took the reins in his hands and she gripped his arms. In the distance, carried gently on the still air of the coming night, she heard the shouts of men and could almost feel the deep rumbling of horses’ hooves against the land and in her heart she felt a flutter of fear.

  He looked behind them, his eyes searching and then with an imperceptible command they were off, threading their way through the woodland towards open fields. Soon they were in open farmland and he urged the horse on, the animal quickly picking up speed into a gallop. She looked back to see a thin column of smoke already rising from the trees where the hut had stood, where she had been sleeping but minutes before, and her eyes widened in fear. She looked up into his face but his gaze was fixed on the horizon, his eyes unreadable in the half light. A sudden tiredness washed over her and despite her fear and the cold she felt herself drifting away, lulled by the rhythmic movement of the horse, the heavy pounding of its hooves on the land and then the movement fell away and she opened her eyes and below, far below, were fields and woods, while around her the sky was filled with crimson clouds. They headed west, fleeing the shadows of the night, while all around them the sky boiled red.

  Nicola awoke, the dream still filling her consciousness. Vivid images and emotions churned in her stomach, while her heart ached for the mysterious rider. How was it possible to feel such powerful feelings from a dream? Clutching the duvet she slipped out of bed and padded over to the patio window where she sat and stared out across the bay to the sea. She allowed the sun to warm her, hoping that the rugged scenery would still her heart and make the feelings go away, but they would not, and all the time, as she sat by the window, its panes still covered with raindrops, she was unseeing of the marks in the grass outside, of a horse’s hooves.

  Nicola walked along the deserted beach, her swimming towel clutched in her hand. The sun shone down from a cloudless sky, the low angle of its light turning the sea a deep blue. Looking around, Nicola realised how lucky she was to have this, to experience this small paradise, deep in the west of the land, when all that awaited her back home were crowds of busy, bustling, blinkered people, all rushing around at top speed, always looking forwards, upwards and outwards, but never seeing themselves. Never looking inwards, where the real questions lay and where the real answers could be found.

  Nicola realised that soon she would have to go back. Her short stay away from her other life could not last forever and, although she drank in and craved for the beauty and passion of the land and its wild force that was so intense here, she wanted contact again with her friends and family. She knew her situation with Stefan would have to be sorted out, that she could not hide away from it forever. She also knew that she would have to sort her own self out. She was desperate to break out of the corporate prison factory she had become entangled within. She no longer wanted to face having to spend the rest of her life sitting at a desk and staring at a computer screen, every second of the day filled with dull, grey tedium.

  Although she had never believed in this intense drive and desire to make as much money as possible, this master that enslaved and deadened people for life and produced endless rows of computer filled offices worked by equally endless rows of spectacle wearing humans, like battery hens, but producing bigger and bigger circles of money rather than eggs, she was a part of it. Despite her unwillingness she served the same master and she had to get out. The only problem was that she didn’t know how. But now she was free. This sudden realisation hit her. She had no ties, no boyfriend or mortgage to tie her down. She had no idea what she was going to do but it was a start.

  Nicola strode into the surf, the chill water splashing against her legs, until she was waist deep and then she dived down into the water and began swimming along, parallel with the beach. The coldness of the sea slowly soothed the chaos of her thoughts and she swam along, her mind gradually emptying, trying to forget itself, and after a while she just knew of the movements of her arms and the kicking of her legs against the water and she felt the dreamlike quality of swimming, how, as she closed her eyes, she could imagine herself moving through a void, floating in a silky darkness where nothing else existed.

  It was then that the sudden, strong feeling of being watched returned and Nicola’s eyes snapped open. She looked quickly up to the cliffs but could see no one there and it was then that she noticed a man standing on the beach near to where her towel was and she saw that he was watching her swim and shivers ran through her body amplified by the coldness of the water. Nicola swam on, hoping that the man would go away but he did not and soon cold forced her to stop swimming. Nicola stood up in the water and looked all around. The beach was deserted and she felt suddenly vulnerable. Walking slowly through the waves towards the beach several metres away from the man, she looked more closely at him and realised that he was quite young, looking in his late teens. Their eyes met and the boy smiled, calling out to Nicola across the surf.

  ‘I don't mean to scare you. I was watching you swim. You seemed to be enjoying yourself very much.’

  ‘I was until I noticed you,’ called Nicola as she walked out of the surf onto the warm, dry sand of the beach. She walked towards the boy looking at the way he stood, the way he held himself. There was something about him that made her believe she knew him.

  ‘I was at the hotel. They said this was a nice place for a walk,’ he said, lowering his voice as Nicola approached and stood in front of him. ‘I’m sorry if I have bothered you.’

  ‘It’s no bother,’ said Nicola noticing for the first time his eyes. They burned with an intensity that filled her, their colour a deep blue, like that of the sea, and she could not bring herself to look away.

  ‘Are you staying at the hotel?’ asked the boy.

  ‘Only for a few more days,’ answered Nicola. ‘I have to go home soon.’

  The boy studied her, his eyes burning into her. Nicola suddenly felt as if he was looking into her soul.

  ‘Is this a holiday or work commitments?’ the boy asked.

  ‘Holiday,’ answered Nicola, ‘I was here with my boyfriend, but.’ Nicola looked away not finishing her sentence. The boy watched Nicola for a moment and then looked past her to the wide sweep of the bay.

  ‘They were certainly right,’ he said.

  ‘About what?’ asked Nicola, suddenly confused.

  ‘This is a beautiful place,’ he said.

  Nicola looked out across the sands, golden in the morning light. Suddenly she felt so alive. As if life itself was filling her veins and tingling on her skin. She turned to the boy. ‘It is,’ she said, wanting to talk to him, to be with him. ‘I come down and swim in the mornings, when there’s no one else around.’ Nicola paused, overtaken by the beauty of the bay. ‘It is beautiful.’

  ‘You must want to stay forever,’ he said watching her as she seem
ed to glow with the energy of the place.

  ‘I pretend it’s mine,’ said Nicola looking up at him, seeing a depth in his eyes that made her heart race. ‘My own beach and my own island. Somewhere no one else can come and bother me.’

  ‘I am sorry I have spoilt your paradise,’ he said.

  Nicola laughed, ‘I don’t think you have,’ she said. The boy smiled and then looked away breaking the eye contact that had so drawn Nicola into him. He looked up at the sky, feeling the breeze increasing as it blew across him. ‘I think it’s going to rain soon,’ he said.

  ‘What makes you say that?’ asked Nicola in surprise.

  ‘Just a feeling,’ he said. ‘And the clouds that are building up behind us.’

  Nicola turned and saw a mass of dark looking cloud moving across the land behind them, towards the sun that still lit the bay in deep gold. The cloud seemed to be growing as she watched and soon it had hidden the sun, plunging the bay into shadow. Nicola shivered. The boy bent down and picked up Nicola’s towel and gave it to her.

  ‘We’d better get inside,’ he said.

  Nicola wrapped the towel around her but could not stop shivering. Seeing this, the boy took off his thick jumper and handed it to Nicola.

  ‘Here, wear this, it will keep you warm.’

  ‘But I’ve been swimming,’ said Nicola. ‘I don’t want to get your jumper mucky.’

  ‘It’s no bother,’ said the boy. ‘Come on. It will keep you warm on the way back.’

  Nicola put her arms in the sleeves of the jumper and then pulled it over her head. It was indeed very warm, although it was too big for her and looked like a big baggy dress. The boy laughed, taking her towel for her.

  ‘It suits you,’ he said.

  Nicola looked down at herself and then up at the boy.

  ‘Do you think so,’ she said, her eyes glinting. ‘Or are you just making fun?’ As she spoke the first drops of rain began to fall on them and on the beach, making little dark spots on the sand.