While they rose impatiently in the lift, a security officer was checking out the car which had arrived at such a strange hour.
The lift ride was only two floors up but it felt like an agonizing age to Martay whose eyes were fixated on the digital read out of the floor.
An automated Italian voice declared they were on the ground floor, where the emergency reception was, and the lift doors slid open again. Their eyes quickly searched for the nearest worker and they hurried over to the desk where a receptionist greeted them with extraordinarily raised eyebrows.
“Please help! My friend has knocked herself unconscious and we cannot wake her up!”
Martay used English because his Italian was exceptionally poor. Unfortunately, the receptionists English was as bad as Martay’s Italian and her eyebrows changed from raised to furrowed as she tried to understand what he was saying.
Snipping was getting impatient, uncomfortable with their entire surroundings and general predicament. He relayed the message again in rapid, fluid Italian. He and the nurse conversed back and forth briefly before she picked up what looked like a phone handset and, based on a nurse’s prompt appearance through a side door, had evidently called for her.
“What did you tell her exactly?” Martay murmured quietly to Snipping in Hungarian.
“That we were camping and she hit her head after she slipped and fell whilst climbing a small cliff. Also, I said that I am her younger brother and you are our cousin, so stick to it. By the way, it’s only a matter of time before they try to find out who her parents are and call them. I can say that I already did call them, but when they don’t show up after a while, the staff will get suspicious.”
Despite his apprehension Martay still felt surprise at Snipping’s perfect pronunciation, grammar and properness when he spoke Hungarian. It was a strong contrast to his bizarre English. He made a note to ask Snipping about it later.
The nurse had bustled over and started inspecting Amy where she lay in Martay's arms. She checked her breathing and pulse then lifted her eyelids and waved a little torch back and forth in front of her eyes, then carefully shifted her hair to try and check the back of her head since Snipping had said she had hit it when she fell.
She spoke quickly with Snipping then beckoned them to follow her into a triage area where Martay could finally lay her down on a bed.
“She says a doctor will come by soon to look at her,” Snipping explained after the nurse fired off another fast sentence and proceeded down the hall.
They didn’t have to wait long before the nurse returned with a doctor in step who, to Martay's annoyance, was smiling as though he was amused at the situation.
He handed a clipboard over to Martay along with a pen and a sentence Martay didn’t understand. The nurse quickly corrected the doctor’s mistake.
“Oh, my apologies. Could you please be so kind as to fill out the paperwork for your cousin’s admission. I believe your younger cousin can help you but is not old enough to complete them himself.”
“Thank you,” replied Martay lamely and started looking over the sheet while the doctor bent over Amy and started repeating the checks the nurse had just performed.
He was conversing slowly with the nurse as he did so.
Martay bent down to show Snipping the sheet but Snipping was listening too intently to the conversation taking place to notice. The inevitable was coming. He knew they were about to be backed into a corner and sure enough, the questions started.
“When was she hurt?”
The doctor used English out of courtesy towards Martay. But what was he to say? If he admitted how long it had been the doctor might suspect some kind of foul play.
“Last night. We drove her here through the night.”
The doctor’s expression gave away his disbelief.
“And how far did she fall?”
“Two, maybe three meters? Is she going to be alright?”
He was nervous about the doctor’s questions but his voice held genuine concern.
“Yes, I think she will be fine but I would like to arrange an x-ray. Would you please excuse me while I organise this? Thank you.”
The doctor gave a flicker of a smile, turned on his heel and left.
“Do you think he believes me Snipping?”
Martay reverted to Hungarian again since the nurse was still there, waiting for the doctor’s return.
“I doubt it. You couldn’t understand them but the doctor and the nurse agree that Amy’s state is unusual and even suspicious.”
Despite their fears, the doctor returned relatively promptly and announced that he would take Amy through immediately. The nurse lowered the level of the bed Amy was on, unlocked the wheels and then, with the doctor’s help, proceeded to push Amy through some double doors.
As the doors swung shut behind them Martay felt increasingly restless.
“Snipping…”,
“Yes, what?”
“What if one of them is being controlled?”
“Then we’re stuffed and probably won’t see her again but I don’t believe they are being controlled. For one thing, their cognitive abilities are too flawless.”
It took the longest half hour of Martay's life pacing back and forth before Amy was wheeled back into the room by a now utterly serious looking doctor and nurse.
“This girl did not fall two meters and hit her head. What really happened?”
Martay attempted surprise but the doctor wouldn’t have it.
“A fall of two or three meters onto rock should have left significant damage. There is none. There is a little dry blood in her hair but no sign of damage to the head itself. In fact, there is no sign of external damage to anything. Yet her vital signs are like a coma patient. Was it drugs of some kind? Experimenting? I need to know if I am to help her.”
“No doctor! There were no drugs at all. She did hit her head it was just… longer ago than we said. Her wounds have had time to heal.”
“No head wound heals so quickly, it-”
A loud bang of a door flying open interrupted the argument and they turned to see a policeman enter with the hospital receptionist. They were talking rapidly and the receptionist pointed over at Martay suggestively. The check on the car had been completed.
Martay didn’t know this and assumed the worst. Without giving any thought to the other people in the room he practically bellowed at the policeman, so loudly in fact, that he didn’t hear Amy groan.
“You can’t have her! You’ll have to kill me first!”
He was yelling in Hungarian, which only unsettled the bewildered policeman even more. He thought Martay was mad and as the boy started rushing towards him, he drew his weapon. The boy was about to attack him!
Martay broke into a run, ignoring the very immediate peril and at the same moment Amy sat bolt upright to see the policeman squeezing the trigger.
“Nooooooooo!!!”
Her yell was so loud that her voice cracked under the strain. There was a shattering crack of a pistol shot, and at the same time a pulse of burning light exploded out from Amy. Martay fell to the floor. The policeman was thrown backwards against the door with the force of a bomb. He was dead.
✽ ✽ ✽
Oszterhaz was the proud centerpiece of the eastern human provinces. It was initially built as a castle many centuries ago but given its only strategic benefit was to defend access from the east, it had never been used for such a purpose.
In the past the elves had always inhabited the great forest realm only a few days travel from the border. It was with the help of elvish architects that Oszterhaz had been expanded into more of a palace, surrounded by and intertwined with expansive gardens. Nevertheless, the original castle still included a war room and it was there that Lord Kestel was bickering with the other local nobles.
“I know what the Duke said!” Kestel barked angrily. “What I am telling you is that it’s nonsense! Samuka would never betray his own people. I knew him as a lad when he was trai
ning in arms. His heart is as true as ours!”
Lord Kestel was easily the oldest of the nobles from the surrounding area and was rapidly approaching his seventies. He had more grey than black in his hair, but he was hardened like oak and had always commanded a great deal of respect from his younger peers.
“Are you suggesting then that the Duke is in fact corrupt?”
The question came from Lord Malkely, a short, sallow skinned youth who had inherited the north east estate, and who had always been thought of by Kestel as ‘a smarmy bugger who needed watching’.
Everyone in the room had taken a sharp inward breath and the unspoken word ‘treason’ hung ominously in the ensuing silence.
“Of course not! Use your head Malkely, I’m suggesting he may have got the wrong information and accused the wrong man! I think it’s clear some disgusting rat has been fraternizing with the enemy as yet unknown. The question is, who’s the rat? And the one thing I am certain of is that it wasn’t Samuka!”
He slammed his slightly wrinkled fist on the table, making a very impressive thunk.
The assembled Lords and Ladies were nodding in approval. The majority of them had had dealings with Samuka and wholeheartedly agreed with Kestel. It was only those few who lived closer to the Kingdom’s capital that were more uneasy.
“Gellert thinks that it could have been Samuka. There haven’t been any attacks since his disappearance after all.”
This came from a central province lady.
“Not that he is taking the Duke’s proclamation for granted of course.”
Gellert was the most powerful of the Western Lords.
“To hell with Gellert if he’s going to denounce Samuka,” Kestel retorted. “In fact, I find that kind of attitude damned suspicious.”
“And I find it suspicious that the attacks have stopped since Samuka disappeared!” said Malkely.
There was murming at this. Even Kestel couldn’t argue with the fact.
“You mark my words boy,” he said pointedly, “the attacks aren’t over yet. It’s just a matter of time. Whoever, or whatever the enemy is, we haven’t even seen it. That takes more than just inside information, and an enemy that well organized doesn’t just give up. If you ask me their probably smart enough to realize that all the southern provinces are arming themselves. The next attacks will be on the unsuspecting. I for one have already put my troops on alert and increased all border patrols. I’ll even consider conscripting if I have to to protect my people. Hell, I’m arming everyone already.”
This seemed to meet approval from most attendees but Malkely was going to have the last word.
He stood up to leave and said, “Yes, you are. The Duke has noticed.”
Then he slunk out of the room with a sour look at the others.
Kestel frowned. The boy had a point. The whole Kingdom was spiraling into a state of distrust, division and fear. Arming the people could look bad but ultimately, he told himself, the immediate safety of the people came first.
✽ ✽ ✽
Arnorial, Eva and Samuka peered down at the pass from a rocky precipice high above and waited patiently. Eva and Samuka were much more uncomfortable than the elf. Strange bird-like creatures with piercing cries and lethal looking talons had passed overhead a number of times. Arnorial said they were called Hartiani and had explained that they lived by draining the essence of life magic out of their surroundings. Eva and Samuka wished he hadn’t explained this but he had also assured them that he could protect them from the effects very easily.
“That is all very good,” Samuka had said, “but what will stop them from spotting us and tearing us apart? There are swarms of them in this pass.”
The response had not been overly comforting.
“Oh, just regular care and concealment.”
Samuka had grumbled at this but not argued. He was a trained ranger after all and he was, by no means, a coward. He just felt that if they were going to run such a high risk, they could have done it long ago at the Citadel.
In the present, Eva was concentrating on a point roughly three meters above them and starting to suspect that it wasn’t just regular concealment hiding them right now. Something about the light above them was wrong. It almost seemed as if there was a barely visible glass bubble which distorted the light if you looked hard enough. She looked quizzically at Arnorial but he was focused on the place below them. Samuka was intent on their objective well. Now that they were executing a plan, he was in his element.
“About five minutes to nightfall. We should start making our way down to the slave quarters.”
Samuka’s voice was hushed but not a whisper. A whisper would have carried further. Arnorial nodded his agreement and the three of them started to flit between the rocky outcrops down into the pass.
The light steadily faded and by the time they reached the outskirts of the mining camp it was very dark indeed. They had waited for a cloudy night with little moonlight.
Each rudimentary hut made by the slaves for themselves had a solitary torch hung over the door.
“Alright,” Arnorial began, “from now I must sit and concentrate. Remember both of you, no more than ten or my limits will be stretched. Better to risk extra time explaining that we will return than trying to get too many out at one time.”
Eva and Samuka nodded their understanding, then started creeping towards the huts.
They felt naked and exposed. They had absolutely no cover and had to rely entirely on Arnorial’s promise that he could keep them hidden. Nevertheless, the short period of risk passed uneventfully and they quickly opened a hut door and closed it behind themselves as silently as they could.
“Who’s there? Speak up!” barked a defiant voice.
With the door closed, the inside of the hut was pitch black but Eva could smell the occupants easily. The poor souls probably hadn’t bathed in a long time. The sound of chains clinking, along with the muffled movement of feet on wood filled out the sensory picture of the space.
“It is I, Lord Samuka of Southerland.”
Samuka kept his voice low but clear.
“Samuka!?” A number of voices had cried out at once.
“Sssshhh! Please my good people, we haven’t much time, you must listen. We are here to free all that we can-“
There was an outbreak of excited hubbub.
“- but we can only free a small number at a time.”
There was more hurried whispering until a voice cut across it. Samuka thought it was the same voice which had raised the challenge before.
“Quiet people, quiet!”
There was a lull in response.
“How many can you take my Lord?”
“No more than ten tonight but we hope to free more in time.”
The volume rose to its loudest point after this comment. There were groans of dismay and Samuka heard someone mutter, “Only ten? Why bother.”
“Silence you fools!”
The authoritative voice hissed the command.
“We should be grateful for any help. As you say Lord, ten. We could make up that number in this hut with women and children.”
“No,” Samuka responded with a heavy heart, “we cannot take only the women and children unless they are all of them able builders, hunters or fighters. We have prepared a basic camp but it will need to be expanded and the freed will need to supply the food and expand the shelter while we seek to free others.”
“Not enough capacity at base Lord? Who is the we?”
“An old friend is here with me now, Eva, and another friend awaits us when we depart but we are only three alone.”
There was a stiff silence before the voice responded, trying to hide its surprise.
“Only three… Ah, understood Lord. Yes, well, a mix then? Yes, that will be best. It need not be man heavy. Some of the women here come from the wilderland borders and are very capable hunters. I can put together a good ten for you.”
“Choose only nine, good man, I will need the l
eadership you show.”
“No Lord, with all due respect. Whatever leadership I have in me, it will be most useful here, planning for your return and stopping excited mouths from getting carried away.”
Samuka was impressed. The man made a lot of sense.
“Very well, let’s get to it then, quickly.”
Fifty meters away, hidden behind a lonely tree, Arnorial waited patiently. It was fully ten minutes before his extremely adept ears, listening out for the sound, heard the hut door open again. His brow twitched as he strained to sense the new life forces leaving the building and shield them. Perhaps ten had been too many for him…
The group made their way at seeming snails pace towards Arnorial. Samuka’s instructions had been clear; keep hold of each other and no matter what happened, make no noise and don’t break away. Eyes popping in terror at the sense of blatant exposure, they nevertheless obeyed. They had covered half the distance when a minotaur, huge and black, emerged on the pathway to their right. Samuka stopped dead and could feel the grip of those holding on to him tighten. A vague odour told him that one of the party had been unable to stop the fear running down their leg, probably one of the three children. The minotaur kept walking until it was almost level with them. Despite being a mere ten meters away with nothing between them, the minotaur could clearly see nothing. But they heard as it snuffed at the air. Then they saw its head turn towards them. It took a step off the path in their direction, sniffing deeply and quickly.
A little further away, Arnorial was bathed in sweat as he tried to maintain the group’s defences whilst invoking a barrier for the smell. The concentration required was so immense that he actually had to mouth the instructions for the new barrier, something he hadn’t needed to do for centuries.
It had worked. Near the path, the sniffs of the minotaur slowed and with a shrug of its huge shoulders, it carried on up the path. The party of twelve humans moved on again until they passed Arnorial’s hiding place. As part of the plan, they would not stop until they were deep in the forest.
Arnorial struggled until they were out of sight, then let the light and scent barriers fall. He breathed heavily, his muscled shook. With an effort, he got up and followed them stealthily.
Bridge Between the Worlds (Dreamwalker Book 1) Page 33