At Water's Edge_An Epic Fantasy

by S McPherson

  ‘We’ve been working on making a gethamot for ages,’ she whispers back. ‘We always said we’d cross the portal one day.’

  ‘Yes,’ Yvane nods, pushing her curls from her eyes, ‘but that was meant to be after careful planning. After your Elenfar when traveling the realms is safe.’

  ‘Shush!’

  Yvane frowns, her tone pitched with worry, ‘What if we’re seen by the Vildacruz?’

  ‘It’s been five years,’ Lexovia hisses. ‘I’m prepared this time. One thing I know, though, is that noise is a good way to get us caught.’

  Lexovia glances around her. She shares the same fears as Yvane and flashes of what happened five years ago, flicker in her mind. But she won’t turn back now. She has to know her counterpart survived. There was a reason she had that O.B.E. She was sent there to help and now Lexovia can’t rest until she knows that she did.

  The four of them continue on in silence, the occasional call of a far-off bird, breaking up the rhythm of their pounding feet.

  ‘Okay,’ Lexovia whispers, stopping as they eventually reach a barrier of trees and step across the threshold into a place called Taratesia. The sand strewn ground turns to supple grass and mud, and thick trees arch over their heads.

  ‘This is far enough.’ She digs in her pocket, pulling out the gethamot they spent years making. It is a thick golden ring about the size of her palm, and she gently taps the thin sheet of glass in its centre. The glass begins to spin, slowly at first but then faster and faster until at last it stops and a small sliver of smoke creeps up from around its edge. Lexovia’s hands tremble but she wills herself not to drop the device and hopes the others don’t notice. The smoke starts to twist and change, finally forming an arrow that points straight ahead.

  Holding out her other palm, Lexovia’s ochre eyes shine. Immediately a ball of fire appears, twirling above her outstretched hand. ‘This way.’ And she sets off into the forest, the others close behind her.

  Howard wraps a reassuring arm around Yvane’s shoulders. No longer in Melaxous, and in fact with only the faintest idea where they are, they follow the floating smoke arrow of the gethamot as it constantly changes direction.

  ‘Are you as confident as you seem?’ Milo whispers in Lexovia’s ear as they trample ahead, scanning the sky for signs of danger, glancing into shadows for the threat of vampires and demonic creatures.

  ‘I’m confident I don’t want to get us killed.’ Lexovia frowns, baffled when Milo grins.

  ‘Probably should have thought of that before we entered enemy territory,’ he murmurs without a hint of worry, his dark hair falling into his blazing blue eyes.

  ‘Probably,’ Lexovia grumbles as Milo’s gaze follows the beat of a bird’s wings through the trees, looking as if he’s on a stroll through a park, not on a mission to another realm. Lexovia shakes her head. Somehow Milo always seems calm, as if the dangers of the world don’t phase him. As if a greater danger in fact thrums beneath his skin.

  Yvane’s cry shatters the silence as something fast and brutal sends her flying. She lands face down in the mud, inhaling leaves and mire, swivelling just in time to come face to face with the yellow fanged creature: a Borum Wolf. Thick fur matted with filth, dripping incisors and swirling yellow eyes. The stench of the beast’s rancid breath is hot and she gags, the heat enough to smother her. The weight of its oversized body pressing her into the ground and a thick black claw pinches her skin.

  They say one should never meet a Borum Wolf head-on and so Milo does the next best thing and teleports right behind it. The clash temporarily distracts the hound, and acknowledging his cue, Howard taps into his inner Fuerté. He puffs out his chest and it promptly doubles in size. He flexes his arms and they too increase. Now stacked with rippling muscles, Howard lumbers towards the animal and grapples it in a headlock.

  The beast is strong. It writhes in Howard’s grip, twisting and gnashing its teeth. Howard’s jaw is taut as he squeezes tighter. His entire body trembles and his golden hair falls into his furrowed eyes. His veins bulge as if trying to burst through his skin, his bones crack and his cheeks colour.

  Slightly dazed, Lexovia stands there, amazed by how powerless she feels when in truth she’s the most powerful. The wolf howls and she flinches, struck with shards of terror. No matter how prepared she felt before, she’s now practically paralyzed with fear, feeling once again like that twelve-year-old she had been, in the vampire’s grip, the night the Vildacruz first discovered she existed.

  Every now and then, Milo teleports, a constant whirl of sound and colour, easily distracting the Borum wolf. The beast lunges for him whilst Howard catches his breath and rests his bloated muscles. Then Milo vanishes again, with a thundering clash and a burst of blue.

  His eyes are narrowed each time he appears, his grin, a wicked slash across his face. Though Howard’s power makes him physically stronger, Milo has always been Lexovia’s bravest and most cunning companion. And he never shies away from a challenge. He never seems to shy away from anything.

  The beast howls again, and this time its cry is greeted by several others from numerous directions. Lexovia jolts.

  ‘We could do with some help over here,’ Milo calls. His voice steady, seeming to mock the shuddering fragment’s Lexovia’s insides have been reduced to. This time the wolf gets daringly close to Milo before he again teleports out of reach and Howards hair is plastered to his brow, his body shaking, gasping for air. He can’t hold his Fuerté form much longer. Yvane pulls herself up, attempting to stand, but she seems to have damaged her leg in the fall.

  Lexovia closes her eyes and recalls the words of all the instructors she’s had over the years: ‘If you master your mind, you master your world.’ Inhaling deeply, Lexovia draws confidence from this phrase. Her fear is in her mind, her mind can be mastered. She knew a trek to the other side would not be easy but, apparently, imagining the worst and facing it are two completely separate things.

  At last Lexovia feels the familiar surge of power and her fingers spark amber. She tosses the ball of fire and their only source of light, to the side, thankful when it collides with a shrub on the ground sending it up in flames. The Borum Wolf is slow, so she decides to be fast. Tapping into her Spee’ad abilities, Lexovia is riddled with the sense of vibrations as her outline rapidly wriggles until she is nothing more than a transparent shimmer shooting towards the others.

  She reaches Yvane in no time and instantly adopts her inner Fuerté, causing her own body to double in size. She grabs Yvane under the shoulders and attempts to haul her up but the wolf pounces, loathe to lose his prey and once again crushes Yvane to the ground.

  Milo charges over, also pulling on Yvane’s arms, but the wolf maintains its grip on her, snarling at them; drool dribbling down its fur. Lexovia pulls again and Yvane yelps, her face twisted in pain. If they continue this tug of war, she will be torn limb from limb.

  Yvane shakes her head wildly, begging them to stop. Her cheeks are stained with grit and tears, eyes clenched shut. Howard is on his knees, rippling from Fuerté to ordinary as he strives to regain control of his gifts and get air into his lungs. Though one of the best Fuerté’s in school, only Lexovia is trained for this; for war.

  ‘Lexovia!’ Milo yells over the grunting and growling of those around them and she nods to show she understands. She’s the only one that can tip the scale in their favour.

  Gritting her teeth, Lexovia lunges at the beast—the one thing they say one should never do—crying out at the graze of its fangs on her shoulder as she rams it under the chin, clamping its jaw shut. Her added weight causes the animal to stagger. Stumbling slightly, Howard forces himself to his feet, his Fuerté form mostly holding and he fixes his arms tight around the wolf’s neck again, squeezing the life out of its glowing yellow eyes.

  The howls of other wolves echo through the night, getting louder as they no doubt get closer. They’re running out of time.

  Lexovia glances at her already large hand and her eyes shine �
�� the hand grows. This is a gift she owes to her Elentri heritage; a normal Fuerté can only grow so large. Now her hand is almost too heavy for her arm to hold up but she raises it as high above her head as she can, then lets it drop like a hammer in full force onto the Borum wolf’s head. Its skull caves in. The beast falls and Yvane quickly scrambles from beneath it.

  ‘You alright?’ Milo asks, flicking dirt from the tip of her nose as he helps her stand.

  She nods, testing her ankle, but says nothing, gasping in air and brushing tears from her cheeks.

  ‘Remember when you said this trip was ridiculous?’ Howard gasps, reverting back to his original form and collapsing into the mud, ‘I’m starting to think ridiculous may have meant suicidal.’

  ‘Of course. Didn’t I mention that?’ Lexovia retorts with a half-smile, trying to disguise how violently her hands are shaking.

  They each chuckle; a little too enthusiastically as they try to make light of the situation, but they all know that their journey is still far from over.

  Finally, the arrow stops spinning and instead points directly upwards. Lexovia props the new swirling orb of fire onto her shoulder, the heat soothing her wound, and pulls the book, ‘Practicing Portals and the gethamot’, from her rucksack, flicks through a few pages and reads.

  ‘Once the denomatrix is at its lightest hue, a ray shall form and the portal will open.’ Lexovia observes the gethamot in Yvane’s grasp. Sure enough, the delicate green hand – the denomatrix – ticking anticlockwise is getting lighter. ‘Be warned: The portal stays awake for naught but a shimmer of a window. Those who wish to pass must pass as one.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘We hold hands and run.’ Lexovia snaps the book shut and places it back in her bag. Blowing on her shoulder she causes the ball of fire to disintegrate.

  Swoosh! The pale lime glow extends from the gethamot and the portal materializes. Beatrice brook lies straight ahead. Grabbing hands, they run towards it and a strong force lifts them off the ground. The portal engulfs them and, in an instant, they are gone, yanked from one dimension and into another.

  AND SO WE MEET

  ‘Hello there!’ I’m completely incapacitated and still flat on my back but I wave enthusiastically all the same. I was right, the whiskey didn’t knock me out but I certainly don’t give a toss about the pain anymore.

  The shimmer behind my visitor’s snaps shut. There’s something familiar about it. A faint alarm that it should mean something to me rings in my head but my mind feels as if it’s been stuffed with cotton wool – all thoughts muffled if not smothered entirely – and I cannot make the connection. I sneeze for perhaps the millionth time, and for the millionth time I neglect to wipe the snot off my face.

  Now they are rushing over to me. I hear the faint splash of water as they run across the brook.

  ‘You’re hurt,’ states the one who reaches me first. Maybe it’s just me, but he seems to have three eyes and two noses. One thing is sure, though, he has bright yellow hair, like the sun is on his head. I squint at him.

  ‘Yes, I hurt,’ I whine, ‘hold me.’ I try to wrap my arms around him but they refuse to lift more than a few inches off the ground, feeling as heavy as lead.

  ‘Oh my gosh,’ says a girl with short spiky hair who has caught up, ‘it’s you.’

  Now the blonde is staring from me to the girl and back again.

  ‘Blimey!’ He moves away from me, like I’m contagious; probably am. Misery does love company after all. ‘I didn’t even realise.’

  Now the other two have joined and are doing the same double-take, finally back to me.

  ‘Do I have something in my teeth?’ I cackle eccentrically.

  ‘The counterpart.’ A boy kneels down beside me and my heart constricts. I am positive there is something familiar about him. I blink a few thousand times and shake my head, desperately trying to shift the cotton balls. The alarm is definitely louder.

  ‘I know you,’ I slur. He stares at me, confused, then realisation dawns.

  ‘You must know my counterpart.’ He’s excited but I shatter his hopes, thrusting my index finger in his face and shaking my head – my brain rattles.

  ‘No! No, no, no, no, no... I know you. Right up here in the old noggin.’ I point to my head which throbs angrily in response.

  ‘She’s hurt.’ He turns to the spiky haired girl. ‘You’re up.’

  ‘So much for saving her life.’ She squats beside me, ripping off her rucksack and tossing it in the mud. Things are getting bizarre. I definitely recognise this girl. She places her hands over my torso and moves them up and down. ‘This doesn’t look good.’

  ‘Can we help her?’ Now, the other girl has spoken. Her hair isn’t lanky at all; it’s full with no split ends in sight. Her skin is like milk chocolate, dark and seemingly smooth as the moonlight bounces off it. I wonder how much time she spends forming those ringlets or if they are natural.

  Spiky nods. ‘I think so.’

  Adopting a take-charge demeanour, Ringlets kneels beside me. ‘I know a few spells that might work. You two, go and see if you can find her something warm to change into.’

  The boys agree and head off whilst the girls stay behind. I watch lethargically, sneezing a few more times. I haven’t the foggiest idea what’s going on. Ringlets is chanting incoherently in a language I don’t understand and Spiky is trailing amber sparks from her fingertips along my body, and suddenly I don’t hurt as much.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she murmurs. ‘You’re going to be fine.’

  How drunk am I? I wonder.

  A little while later, I am wearing Spiky’s coat and have Ringlets’ shawl wrapped around my head. They’ve propped me into a sitting position against a tree and are now simply staring at me, as if I’m some sort of foreign species. My head’s still a little fuzzy and I don’t know what to say besides ‘Thank you’ which I’ve already said, quite passionately and about fifteen times.

  However, as things get less hazy, I realise that the reason I recognise Spiky is because she looks an awful lot like me; her eyes are bright ochre, opposed to my pale green ones, she has a nose piercing, pointed ears highlighted by her short and boyish hairdo, and her chin’s slightly sharper, but otherwise we look the same. She doesn’t sound like me, though; her voice is low, raspy and ripe with confidence.

  I hear my old cell mate’s words – something about the last Elentrice – and another chink of recognition links the chain in my head, but I’m still too far gone to make sense of it.

  ‘Who did this to you?’ Spiky asks.

  ‘The physical damage? My brother.’ I lean my head back against the tree trunk. ‘The large amount of alcohol? That would be me.’

  ‘That man was your brother?’ Spiky’s eyes are wide and she talks as if she’s seen Drake. I nod and wish I had more whiskey. The more I sober up the more I realise I actually preferred my alcohol cocoon.

  ‘Dezaray!’ The three of us jump at the sound of my name.

  ‘Who is that?’ squeaks Ringlets.

  ‘Dezaray!’

  Recognising the voice, I smile. ‘Nathaniel,’ then shout, ‘Nathaniel,’ as loud as I can in my current state. Ringlets breathes a sigh of relief but Spiky turns slightly, as if trying to hide her face.

  Seconds later, Nathaniel enters the clearing by the brook. He stares for a moment, no doubt in shock to discover me with people. Me? Socialise? What is the world coming to? Then, spying me slightly hunched with a busted lip and bruised forehead, he rushes over.

  ‘What happened?’ He gasps, gently pulling off the coat I’m wearing and replacing it with his own. ‘I came round to see you. The kitchen is a mess: back door cracked, stools on the floor.’ He scoops me up like he has so many times before—the brother I wish I had—and allows me to drape my arms around his neck and rest my head on his shoulder.

  ‘J...Jmmpph,’ I mumble into his shirt.

  ‘She said it was her brother,’ Ringlets offers apprehensively.

  N
athaniel makes a sound: something between a growl and a sigh. ‘Let’s get you home,’ he says.

  ‘No,’ the three of us bark in unison and I attempt to pull away. ‘He’ll kill me.’

  ‘He’s out, he’s out,’ Nathaniel assures, his grip tightening so I don’t go rolling onto the ground. ‘Let me clean you up and get you some food. We’ll take it from there.’

  I nod, my heart rate rapidly increasing at the thought of having to return. ‘Your...friends can join us if you like.’

  ‘We should probably wait here,’ Spiky says hurriedly, fiddling with her zip, deftly avoiding eye contact.

  ‘Alright. Well, we’re right up there,’ and Nathaniel indicates the house on the top of the hill, just visible through the needles of the trees, ‘if you change your mind.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Spiky nods. ‘Maybe we will.’

  I slowly start to feel better. Nathaniel gave me the un-recommended dosage of four pain killers and made me wash them down with something red, thick and vile, containing a stick of celery and, I am pretty sure, a couple of raw eggs. However, after hurling out my insides a few times, things are getting a whole lot clearer. I no longer feel as if I’m trying to identify the twenty seventh letter of the alphabet and I’ve managed to keep down half a slice of toast. I look at the destruction around me, not quite believing I was a part of it.

  ‘I saw him,’ I say more to myself than Nathaniel.

  ‘I’m sorry?’ he asks absently.

  ‘He was there. In the woods.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘The one from my visions,’ I frown, the realisation only now hitting me.

  Nathaniel glances over his shoulder at me before returning to the dishes. ‘No, you were with two girls.’

  ‘I know, but before, there were two boys there as well.’ Nathaniel is about to argue but is interrupted by a knock on the cracked back door. I peer out the window and almost choke on my mouthful of toast.