by Des Pensable
‘That should suffice,’ she thought, hurrying back to the living room.
The spider had transformed into a woman wearing a camouflage cloak and equipped with a magic staff. The Crin Enforcer wore golden scale armour and carried two deadly looking short swords; the third person was another Crin, smaller than the Enforcer and equipped with chain armour and a halberd.
‘We are ready Princess,’ said the wizard who had been a spider.
‘Form for teleport!’ she said, and they placed a left arm on her shoulder and nodded. Moments later they were outside the cave near the waterfall then they transported again to the marker near the hideout.
Immediately the area around them went black, but she could see perfectly through the goggles of night vision. Her three guards rushed out forming a triangle around her about ten to fifteen paces from her. She turned herself invisible. The three guards sounded an all clear and she strode powerfully and purposefully to the hatch.
‘Sanson first, Allalanllea next then me, you stay and guard our backs,’ she commanded using mindspeak.
The Crin Enforcer yanked the hatch cover off and dived into the darkness then raced down the corridor to the living room. There was nothing there.
‘It seems to be all clear, Princess,’ said the Enforcer, using mindspeak.
The wizard calmly strolled in joining the Enforcer. ‘All clear Princess.’
Finally Miranda went in and walked through to the living room. Lying on the dusty floor was a leg. She picked it up and hugged it.
‘So little left of a brave spirit,’ she said with tears running down her cheeks.
‘Leave me and guard the other exit, Sanson,’ she commanded.
‘Remain here Allalanllea. Please swear to me that you will not reveal to my mother what I’m about to do.’
‘That is difficult for she is the Queen, and you are the Princess,’ said the wizard.
‘Please Allalanllea!’
‘I am old and blind,’ she suddenly said, ‘quite often I see things that are not there and sometimes don’t see things that are there.’
‘Thank you,’ said Miranda then took off her mother’s silver flower pendant and began chanting a prayer to the Lady of the Jungle. Following that she invoked the power in the pendant and continued chanting.
Aquitain didn’t see the green ray beamed towards him but he did feel his body disappear in a cloud of dust. There was a brief sharp pain all over and that was it. He looked down to where his body used to be and he saw the floor littered with bits of him. There were his two metal feet, his arm and some bits of the gear that he carried. Alpha was also there when it should have been sitting on top of his head. I don’t like the look of this, he thought to himself. He remembered the feeling. It was like when his spirit had moved from his newman body into the Logicon body. Then his mind began to wander and he began recalling events from his past life.
An urgent message broke into his reverie: ‘Aquitain, join with me.’
He ignored Alpha and began to think of the recent past. His life had been normal for that of a magical instrument maker. He remembered clearly how his life had changed when he had suddenly become a shape shifter, and then when he had become a Logicon. He’d had a brief but exciting few weeks and now he was dead. He wished he could shed a tear for his family and Miranda, but spirits have no tears to shed. He lingered, wishing that he had done more with his life.
Miranda chanted in an ancient tongue totally unknown to Aquitain, but suddenly he could hear her words loud and clear. Alpha moved around from behind the barrel to listen and watch.
‘Aquitain, Spirit of Aquitain, I am calling you. Do not depart yet, for I wish to help you to live. As a druid and a friend, I humbly beg my gracious and loving mistress, the Almighty Goddess of Nature, the Lady of the Jungle to give you another chance at life. I humbly plead that She might look into your spirit and use Her great wisdom to decide what creature you most resemble. I beg Her to create a new body for you to act as a vessel to hold your spirit. I ask you, the spirit of Aquitain, to accept this gift of friendship from me, your friend. I ask you, the spirit of Aquitain, to accept this gift from the most gracious and infinitely powerful Goddess of Nature, the Lady of the Jungle. I ask you Aquitain, to decide to once more accompany me in the world of the living.’
As Miranda chanted with teary eyes, a green mist appeared in front of him. The mist slowly took form. A large ball of green clay started to appear. Insubstantial and ghostlike at first, then as she continued chanting, the ball became more solid, more real. On Miranda chanted!
‘Tain, my dear friend I call on you to make your decision. You must now decide whether you wish to inhabit this body or not. If you choose not to return to us, it will not count against you in any way, in your afterlife. I make this offer freely and in the true spirit of love and friendship. Return to me if you will.’
Aquitain looked at the large green ball of clay and thought to himself.
‘So this is how they do it. I always wondered. I guess this is the moment of truth. Perhaps the Lady will give me a newman body. That would be wonderful. I’m coming Miranda!’ and he flowed his spirit into the green ball.
Moments later, the ball took the shape of a large brown bear. A little later again, a groggy bear rose to his feet and looked around.
He saw the face of Miranda. At first she seemed horrified and screamed ‘Why Lady?’ then in a more humble voice.
‘Forgive me, Lady, I know not your mind but I accept your wisdom,’ and she smiled at him, hugged him around the neck and said
‘Welcome back, Tain.’ Alpha happily greeted his return as well.
He was alive and somewhat larger than he used to be. He moved his arms and legs to see if they worked. They did. He roared loudly like a large bear and Miranda seemed delighted.
He turned to Miranda and thought:
‘Thanks Mandy you are the most wonderful loving friend, the body seems to work okay, but what am I?’
Miranda’s facial expressions changed. She had heard him think. No! He had talked to her telepathically like he did with Alpha. Miranda smiled back and replied:
‘You’re a brown bear, Tain. The Lady has made you one of the most ferocious beasts in the jungle.’
‘Good,’ he thought. ‘Somehow my new brain can work telepathically. I mightn’t be able to talk with my voice but I can still talk with my mind. I’m now Aquitain, the telepathic brown bear. Sorry, the ferocious telepathic bear.’ He checked his source. It was intact, and seemed to be marginally larger.
He looked around and breathed deeply, his mind was swamped with dozens of subtle scents. He felt all sorts of emotions rushing around. It was wonderful to be alive. He felt like smiling, laughing, shouting, but couldn’t because bears can’t show any facial expressions and can’t speak. In the end he said telepathically: ‘By the Powers Miranda, I’m hungry!’
She raced to the storeroom and returned with a box of biscuits.
‘Eat my dear friend, but not too heartily, as we will have better food tonight.’
She called Sanson and Allalanllea.
‘Thank you for helping me once more, I am in your debt. It seems that we missed the wizard and nothing else happened. What a shame, I would have liked to catch him. Never mind, there will be another time. You might as well return to your normal jobs. I will see you later.’ The wizard and the Crin nodded and left.
‘Who are they?’ asked Alpha.
‘Good friends in a fight,’ she said. ‘They are two champions that have never been bested. Now, can you tell me what happened?’
Alpha told her how the assassin wizard had used a power to cast a state of confusion on her and how Aquitain had coaxed her to teleport away, but that just as he had the attacker had disintegrated him. He also told her about Jaztrix appearing and creating an illusory wall to help buy Aquitain time before they could teleport away, and how Jaztrix had minded their backpack. The assassin had taken Aquitain’s equipment and after it had left, Jaztrix had reappea
red from the wall. She had told Alpha that she expected Miranda to come back soon, and left her backpack against the wall before returning to Twin Towers.
‘Those bastards at Twin Towers have betrayed us. Only Featherdown and Quab knew where we were. One of them sent the assassin. They will pay for their treachery. If Aquitain hadn’t teleported me away, I would probably be powder on the floor as well. Who would have brought either of us back to life when they didn’t know where we were?’
‘Vengeance will solve nothing,’ Alpha advised.
‘How do you know, stone! I am the one with fire running in my veins.’
‘Then take care lest it consume you. I would hate to see Aquitain alive and you dead. You are two sides of a coin, yet he can’t return people to life. If you die you will stay dead.’
‘Perhaps and perhaps not,’ she said. ‘But first I will take Aquitain to a safe place. If you wish to come you had better climb aboard.’
Alpha raced up Aquitain’s strong hairy foreleg and took up a position on his head. She picked up the ball of chaos matter and said. ‘He will need several days rest before he can think normally. Then we will have to let him come to terms with this momentous change in his life.’
‘I have known him all his life. His mind is even tougher than this new body. I think you will be pleasantly surprised at his rate of recovery,’ said Alpha.
‘I hope you are correct, stone.’
‘Thank you again Miranda, for returning Aquitain to life. You will never live to regret what you did today.’
‘I sincerely hope not, stone.’ And she retrieved the dimension bag, stowed his metal Logicon leg in it, and put it around her shoulders. She grabbed hold of one of Aquitain’s ears and gently said:
‘Tain, we are going to meet new friends. Remember they are our friends. Please treat them with kindness and courtesy, and please don’t eat any of them. We’ll have to leave this food, but I promise you more soon.’
Aquitain nodded while still munching tough military biscuits, and they teleported to the side of a hill covered only in short grass. At the bottom of the hill was a dirt road, and on it were dozens of the small dog-sized ant-like Crin, carrying wood, food and other items.
‘We come in peace,’ she said and held up the palms of her two hands.
‘Why are you equipped for war Princess Miranda?’ asked a voice in her head.
‘I was equipped this way to save a friend, this bear, Your Highness. He is not what he appears to be. He is much more. He is the spirit of a great wizard in the body of a bear. The Lady has granted him a new life. He is still dizzy and unused to his new body, and needs several days of protection and rest to recover. I seek refuge for him.’
‘Will you guarantee his good behaviour?’ asked Queen Beatrix.
‘Yes, Your Highness,’ replied Miranda.
‘Then it is granted. Will you be staying as well?’
‘For a short time only, Your Highness. I have some words to deliver which may take a day or two.’
Miranda hugged him around the neck to show the Crin her affection for him, and asked him to follow her. She took him down to the road and then followed a line of Crin workers down into the depths of their city, on the way picking up a Crin Enforcer and several Crin fighters, who guided her to a dead-end passage with a circular six-pace-wide room covered with hay.
‘What does it eat?’ asked the enforcer using mindspeak.
‘He will eat almost anything. However, give him a couple of buckets of plant food and a large bucket of water each day. In the water put a sprinkle of this herb’ and she removed a small packet of powder from her leg bag. ‘He needs sleep above anything else.’
‘Tain, lie down and sleep so that you can regain your mind, and we will track down an assassin and a father. Remember these are friends - you must not harm them.’ Aquitain agreed, and lay down to sleep.
‘I’ll ensure he causes no harm,’ said Alpha, using mind speak. ‘Remember what I said about vengeance.’
She ignored Alpha, thinking ‘That stone seems to be a little too smart for my liking.’
She removed Aquitain’s arm and leg from the dimension bag and bound them with some cord so that she could sling them over her shoulder. Leaving the bag against the wall, she left.
Fifty paces down the tunnel she spoke to the Enforcer.
‘He has had a traumatic experience. He died and has been reborn today. Keep clear and let him recover. Above all, do not injure him in any way or he may turn into a beast and you will lose many good warriors.’
The Enforcer agreed and advised Miranda that the Queen wished to see her before she left. Miranda wasn’t in the mood for niceties; she wanted to maintain her rage, so the chat with the Queen was brief though cordial. As she left the city she let her anger grow. Only Quab or Featherdown knew where she and Aquitain were, so either one or perhaps both were responsible for Aquitain’s murder, and it was time to show that she wasn’t going to allow them to get away with it.
She teleported to the marker outside Twin Towers, and using her marvellous golden boots ran at a supernatural speed up the track through the town to a position between the two wizard towers where she stopped and threw Aquitain’s body parts on the ground in front of her. She said a prayer to the Lady then thrust the hilt of the gnarled old staff she carried at the ground. The whole of town of Twin Towers shook and rocked as if from an earth tremor and a beam of light shot a thousand paces into the sky; a black cloud began to grow and spread out across the sky, casting a huge shadow over the town.
She pointed the staff at Featherdown’s tower and a huge bolt of lightning hit the tower and rocked it to its foundations.
‘Come out wizard,’ she commanded.
Featherdown was sitting in his lounge entertaining an Archon who had happened to turn up a day earlier than expected, when he felt the earth tremor and his tower shook. He excused himself and quickly teleported to the front door and looked out, to see Miranda standing there armed for battle and looking very angry. His first thought was that she’d decided to take on the Archon, then the lightning bolt struck his tower and she called him out.
‘Oh no,’ he thought. ‘Something’s happened to Aquitain!’
He threw off his decorative cloak, closed his eyes and snapped a command. A patched brown leather cloak that had seen much death and destruction over the years appeared in one hand; as he snapped a second command a black wooden staff shod in brass appeared in the other. He quickly cast protective magic on himself that might confer some protection against lightning, and strode out to meet her. The Archon came to the doorway to watch.
‘What brings my friend Princess Miranda here wielding the Staff of Storms?’
‘Look on the ground in front of me, wizard. There lie the remains of Aquitain, foully murdered by your assassin. I only escaped by a whisker, due mainly to Aquitain’s quick thinking. Only you and Quab knew of his whereabouts, so one of you betrayed him and when I find out which one that person will die.’
Zephira felt the tremor and ran out of her barracks.
‘What was that?’ she wondered, just as a guard ran up shouting.
‘The druid woman called Miranda had come here prepared for battle. Call out the guard.’
Her heart almost stopped. This could only mean one thing. She looked into the sky and saw the dark cloud forming overhead, and jumped as the lightning bolt struck Featherdown’s tower.
She ran toward the tower and stopped when she saw Miranda dressed for battle. She watched Featherdown come out of his tower dressed in battle robes and then saw Aquitain’s arm and leg lying on the ground in front of Miranda.
‘No!’ she screamed and raced over to kneel by her cousin’s remains.
Miranda looked down at her with tears in her eyes.
‘I’m sorry Zephira, I failed him. A cowardly wizard cloaked in invisibility to hide his face killed him using a disintegration ray. He turned to dust leaving nothing of his body remaining except these metal parts. With his final breat
h he saved my life, and I will repay that debt by seeking out those responsible and exacting justice. Tell your family that he will be avenged.’
Miranda again glared at Featherdown and continued:
‘I have been raised with a fierce distrust of wizards. Mark my words, wizard, if it was you that betrayed us then you will have a tempest after your blood,’ with that she teleported back to her home.
Featherdown calmly walked over to Aquitain’s remains and picked up the arm and leg and looked closely at where it was sheared off. It definitely looked as if disintegration magic had caused it. He had seen it used in back alleys by assassins on several occasions. The Archon came over.
‘That display of powerful magic must be illegal. If you wish to swear a warrant I will pursue the case, Your Excellency.’
‘No one was injured. I saw no excessive use of magic and I make the rules here. Here lie the remains of Aquitain the Logicon whom you seek. It seems that some assassin has beaten you to your quarry. Take the remains, if you must verify his demise.’
‘You just recently told me that you didn’t know the whereabouts of the criminal that I was seeking, yet that angry woman claimed you did,’ said the Archon.
‘That is correct. I have received information about several locations where the Logicon was thought to be, though all that I have checked to date were incorrect. Had you not come when you did I would have been able to check that location, and perhaps avert this disaster.’
‘My apologies, Your Excellency, I will take the evidence and present it to the complainant. If they are satisfied then you will hear no more. If not, I may be back to get a statement from that angry young woman who claimed to have seen the criminal killed.’
‘That angry young woman is a member of a royal family. I don’t expect that she is likely to give you a statement, nor do I expect you will be able to force her to. If you wish I will give you a written statement, saying that I witnessed her stating that she had seen your quarry killed.’
The Archon agreed with Featherdown’s suggestion and agreed to come back later. It picked up Aquitain’s remains, labelled them with tags, and teleported away. Zephira was devastated. She was in shock. She had failed Aquitain, her only cousin, whom she had been specifically sent here to protect - instead had spent the time making love to a bard. How could she possibly explain this to her family?