That revelation staggered him so much that he had to sit down on one of the Chaises Longue close by.
“How did you know?” was all he could say, lamely. Although he wasn’t about to give anything away to any Tom, Dick or Harriet, it was obvious to him she was special, and it would be safe to share certain things with her.
“It is called Omni,” he started, “you know, the place I’ve been to?”
They moved quietly back to the drawing room to be more comfortable in the great, deep leather armchairs by the chimney breast fireplace. Its grate by now was glowing fiercely from a log fire which had been set in their absence. Although he missed out no important factor, he gave her a much edited and slicker version of his Omni adventures; otherwise they would still have been there a week later. Even so, late afternoon changed to mid-evening before he had finished his story. Throughout she remained silent, neither interrupting nor asking the sort of questions most other youngsters would have thrown at him. It was almost as if she knew and was simply awaiting his confirmation of her intuition.
“You were right,” he finished. “I was there when we were in the mirror room. These paintings on the walls, I think, are all of some aspect of Omni, and what is more they are all active, alive, moving, albeit very slowly. I spent what seemed like an age under the eaves of a forest I have been to before, many times; the Shifting Forest of Linden. I saw gathering companies of horsemen in their war armour, mounted on huge black horses, moving to battle. I seemed to be there from late afternoon to that twilight time which ushers in the velvety black dark of night.”
“But,” she stammered, incredulous at what she had heard, “you were gone only long enough for me to notice; only seconds, the mere blinking of an eye. How is that possible?”
During the time he had been recounting his story, they had moved slowly along a wide, thickly carpeted passageway whose walls were festooned with rich tapestries. This had the effect of deadening everything they had to say; where words hit the walls and were absorbed by the tapestries. Suddenly, passing what seemed to be a dark doorway, which was recessed quite deeply into the thick walls, Jimmy experienced a distinct tingling sensation throughout his body; a tingling he had felt many times before. He stopped in front of the doorway, his hand lightly resting on Ursula’s forearm, signalling her to stop. He noticed a door in the depths of the recess’s gloom, which was fashioned from thick oaken staves, stained dark and giving off a slight sheen. The most surprising thing about it, however, was that no handle or knob could be seen.
“What’s behind that door?” Jimmy croaked, almost inaudibly.
“Why?” she asked in return.
“It’s important,” he hissed. “Just tell me and I’ll explain later.”
“My father’s study,” she answered, not knowing why it was so important but noticing the startling effect this information had on her companion.
Yes, it was Omni Jimmy had found himself in, fleetingly in his real time, but several hours Omni time. The horsemen, he had never seen before, but they were very real and were preparing for war, although Jimmy did not know whether they were for good or ill. In his previous time in Omni, whilst there were periods when there was slight concern over the outcome of his actions, there was never any real doubt as to whether he would survive. He had had that much confidence in his guardians. Now, however, was an entirely different matter. The situation he found himself in was much more serious, and seemed to be running away from him, being no longer a game. The stakes were much higher and the outcome was now, for the first time, in doubt.
“Why were you so concerned about my father’s study?” Ursula asked, once they had reached the lounge at the back of the house. Of giant proportions and fully carpeted, this room was different from all the others he had seen. Although magnificently furnished and decorated two major points struck him immediately they sat down. There was no oak in the room at all, and the walls were entirely bare of pictures and paintings. For some reason, the room was airier, lighter and less oppressive than elsewhere in the house. Even though dusk was creeping in, the huge conservatory seemed to generate light, probably because it was west-facing and the last vestiges of sun always lingered longest at this side of the house.
“Two reasons really; whenever I visited my Uncle Reuben’s,” he explained, “I always felt a tingling sensation as I approached his house. It’s how I knew I was there, as most of the houses in the streets around were almost identical. Secondly, the door not only bore a striking resemblance to his study door, it also shared the same lack of a handle. I know this one is used regularly because the floor carpet to it is well-worn, so there must be some way in. Another thing; when I visited my uncle the other day, there was no tingle, and his house was empty; it was for sale.”
“Are you suggesting that my father is in some way tied up with the disappearance of your uncle?” Ursula asked rather sharply. “My father, I’ll have you know, is a respected scientist so he can’t be involved!”
“I wasn’t suggesting for a moment he was!” Jimmy replied defensively. “I was simply suggesting that there were certain similarities. If your father could help me to track down my Uncle Reuben I should be mightily grateful.”
A great rolling boom split the night, splashing intense blue light across the Southern Standing Stones. In the after-flash the tall figure of a black rider was visible standing in the stirrups of an equally black steed. The Faceless Horseman only appeared at times of greatest need, and matters seemed to be moving inexorably towards an unthinkable conclusion. The Stones lit up again to reveal a change in the rider’s position. Still standing in the stirrups, horse unmoving save the occasional flick of the tail and snorting of the nostrils, he remained upright, every sinew stretched and taut, straining to catch the subtle changes he had recognised in the vapours above him. He turned deliberately, the back of his head swivelling slowly side to side, as if sensing the air to detect any unusual activity; any developing threat. Without warning his face was revealed; that empty and featureless visage, seen during his last visit to this on-going conflict, now had eyes of an incalculable depth and sharpness! Those eyes could see what his mind had long since known. Now, he was more than ready for the test.
Chapter Eighteen
“Why are there no family photographs in your house?” Jimmy asked at Saturday lunch, his mouth full of Victoria sponge.
“Why do you ask?” she replied, rather puzzled at his strange interest.
“Well,” he explained, “most people I have visited have at least one photo of either someone in their house, or a family group shot. My mum says ... “
“Mum and dad were always too busy with the important things of life to waste time having photos taken,” she broke in sharply. “They always said that thoughts and memories were much more important and lasted much longer than an image on a piece of shiny paper.”
“I know your dad’s a scientist,” Jimmy stated matter-of-factly, “and a very important one I am sure,” he added hurriedly, realising that his first statement sounded condescendingly abrupt, drawing a slight smile from Ursula. Jimmy hoped it didn’t seem that he was trying too hard not to offend, which Ursula obviously appreciated. “But what did your mum do, apart from being a mum, of course. What was she called?”
Ursula pondered for a few moments, a slightly wistful look clouding her face, before she replied. “She was very beautiful, with dark brown hair and deep eyes; that much I recollect vividly. I don’t really know what she did, but I think it involved a lot of travelling to other ... places. She was called Miriel.”
Miriel! Did she say Miriel? Jimmy dropped his cake fork with an almighty clatter. He felt his lower lip slowly fall open, making him look silly and feel like he had publicly made a huge fool of himself. He tried to utter the name, but couldn’t even approximate its sound. Was Miriel the young girl in Seth’s castle who helped him to escape? Was she the reason why he was now here? Was she really
the same person, a sorcerer’s daughter and another’s niece, who is the mother of the friend now sitting before him? This could not be!
“I once knew a girl,” Jimmy started slowly, after several minutes of thoughtful silence, “who was the daughter of a powerful sorcerer for good, and also the niece of another powerful sorcerer but for evil. She has a special place in my heart because it was she who saved my life by helping our Tommy and me to escape the clutches of her uncle the evil Lord of Seth, otherwise known as Tar-igor. Her father, Gor-ifan, had been defeated by his brother and his body supposedly buried in the mountains. That girl’s name was Miriel.”
At this Ursula’s countenance gradually drained of colour, to take on that ashen hue of someone who is about to pass out. Hearing Jimmy’s description, and the story of his escape, those names resurrected a recognition deep within her subconscious.
“I am convinced that the Miriel who saved you was my mother,” said Ursula shakily.
“But that’s impossible!” Jimmy blurted out. “She was only my age when I was in Omni for the first time, and that’s only about three months ago in ... our time.” His last words dropped out of real time and slowed to a complete halt half way through “time”. The ending of the word he simply mouthed soundlessly. He had remembered, of course, that ‘real’ time is much slower than Omni time, and so a lifetime could have passed in the few months he had been back in his world. That would explain to some extent the apparent advanced age of Tarna.
“Who then is your father? Is he someone I’ve already met in Omni or is he really a scientist?” Jimmy asked seriously, knowing her ancestry but not actually knowing anything about them. “I know your grandfather, or at least I’ve met him fleetingly. He was the Old Man of the Mountains, and a very frightening man, I can tell you!”
“I’ve never met him,” Ursula replied, “but we have an early portrait of him in the Great Hall.”
“Wow!” was all that Jimmy could say, quite overwhelmed by this little snippet of news. At times, Ursula seemed to talk in snippets; little pieces of what seemed to be innocuous information but which were quite important. “Can we see it?”
“Of course,” she replied. “Come on.” She was out of her seat and away down the passageway before he had stood up. He had to move quickly so that he didn’t lose her. Now, this passageway seemed familiar, and should, he thought, have led to her father’s study. But no; the carpet was different and showed hardly any signs of wear, which meant the corridor had been little used. The walls were bare of all hangings, whether portraits or tapestries, and there were no hidden doorways. The passageway seemed to bend and curve first one way then another and Jimmy had great difficulty keeping up with his companion, let alone catching her. Very briefly he caught a glimpse of her back disappearing around the next-corner-but-one as he reached each in turn. Suddenly, rounding a blind corner, he exploded into an enormous Great Hall, as a cork would explode from a bottle of shaken fizzy wine, his momentum had been so great. Had he not smacked his shins on a large footstool blocking his way and then catapulted into an enormously deep and soft settee, his headlong trajectory would have taken him through one of the huge arched windows, which filled one wall of the room.
Inside the room he saw a high ceiling, with a great expanse of painted walls and relief moulding, depicting images of what could only be described as generally ‘Omni’ country life. One wall of the room was made up entirely of arched windows, each of which was perhaps two to three times his height, essentially making a wall of glass. This looked out onto the rolling countryside which was not countryside at all, but the extensive grounds in which the house was set. The outer end of the room allowed passage to a formal rose garden through a spectacular set of rose wood French doors. Jimmy found Ursula waiting for him at the end of a very long wall, which was dressed with row upon row of portraits.
“Wow!” Jimmy gasped. “Is this all your ancestry?”
“I don’t know,” Ursula replied. “I think so. I know that lots of these” – and here she swept her arm across the whole wall – “are ancestors, but how many, I’m not rightly sure.” She paused for a brief moment, head lowered, brows furrowed, deep in thought, and then continued moving quickly to the middle of the wall. “This is my grandfather, whose name I didn’t know until you told it to me earlier. I knew him only as Gangan.”
The face was a little less hairy than the last time he had seen him, but there could be no doubt that this was the Old Man of the Mountains, Gor-ifan, Ursula’s grandfather. As soon as Jimmy saw the eyes he was transfixed, in the same way his attention had been held when he and Tommy had met the old sorcerer before. It was almost as if the picture was trying to probe his mind, but that wasn’t possible. A picture was simply paint, with no life of its own; only, Jimmy wasn’t so sure. His attention was finally drawn away from the picture only when Ursula interrupted his thoughts.
“Is this how you remember him?” she said.
“More or less,” he replied, dragging his eyes across to meet her gaze, “give or take a little of the facial hair.” His eyes drifted back slowly, as if trying to sneak a look when he had been told not to. “He’s moved!” he blurted out. “The picture’s not the same!”
“That’s not possible!” Ursula returned. “Pictures are not alive. They can’t just ... move.”
“I’m telling you it has!” he argued, almost hopping from foot to foot. “If you remember, his was a full-face portrait. It’s how I recognised him because it’s how I saw him last. Now the picture is in profile, you know, side view. Look!”
She followed his pointing finger and realised at once that he was right. The portrait had changed its position and now a power had begun to wax in the picture, drawing them to it so that they were almost touching its surface with their noses. They strained to resist, eyelids screwed shut in an effort not to make contact with the canvas. Unexpectedly, they were released and as they opened their eyes slowly as if waking after a long sleep, they felt the caressing warmth of a welcoming sun on their faces. They were in the southern hills of Omni confronted by a grizzled old man with sharp, deep eyes.
“So we meet at last,” he growled in a deep guttural drawl. It was Gor-ifan, the Old Man of the Mountains, Ursula’s grandfather.
“Grandfather,” Ursula whispered, quite overcome with emotion, although it didn’t sit well with her. “I never thought... “Her voice tailed off, as tears began to well in her eyes.
“My child,” he growled softly, reaching out to her with one old and gnarled hand. Such touches of tenderness towards another had been alien to him over recent years, particularly since his brother had been largely instrumental in his demise. Perhaps now that he was regaining his powers, slowly, painstakingly, surreptitiously, he might once again retake his rightful place in what had become an alien world to him.
Although at this moment Ursula felt nothing for this world, her inner feelings told her she had always known this man, as if he had always been part of her. Deep inside stirred a desire for, and to know more about, the world she had never visited until now. It fused through her very bones, the countless generations of contact, line on line, to her, the latest, and possibly the last. She was not about to lose her grandfather now and she was prepared to do whatever it might take to stay here with him. Unfortunately, as Jimmy had found before, Omni travel could neither be guaranteed nor relied upon. When it was your time to return that world would find a way to bring you back. The same was true in reverse, as she discovered. With one blink she stood in front of her grandfather, holding his great hairy hand tightly, and the next they were in the grounds of her home, standing with her nose to a knotty oak tree and grasping Jimmy’s hand as tightly as she could.
“Hand please Ursula,” Jimmy said quietly.
“What?” she replied, still really in Omni. “What do you mean?”
“Your finger nails are nearly through my almost dead hand!” he grimaced in pain, tryin
g to draw his hand away from hers.
“Can we not go back?” she said to him, earnestly gazing into his eyes. “You know, like straight away, now?”
“I’m afraid it doesn’t quite work like that,” he told her quite authoritatively, speaking from experience. “Omni travel is not a bus service where you can hop on whenever you have a mind. It decides when it wants to take you, and usually there is some purpose to it. It’s not just a day out, you know.”
“I know,” she nodded quite wistfully, “but that’s the first time I’ve seen my grandfather, and now he’s gone.” She turned to Jimmy, eyes pleading whilst tears rolled down her cheeks, and automatically he slipped his arm around her heaving shoulders, in an attempt to comfort her.
That night Jimmy slept the most soundly he had slept for many weeks and so he awoke and arose refreshed and revitalised. Although breakfast was a bright affair it wasn’t matched by the weather. Chill, dull and drizzly, it seemed to have left the last vestiges of summer behind and was rushing headlong into an early winter. Ursula was late for breakfast and sat down in front of Jimmy, her eyes betraying her lack of sleep. She seemed distracted and distant, no doubt feeling keenly the loss of her grandfather so soon after finding him for the first time.
“That’s the only time I’ve been there,” she said finally. “I’ve always felt there was somewhere, another place, because of being around my mother. That I know now. I always knew I was different from everyone else because I never “fitted” in wherever I was. When do you think we might return?”
“You never can tell, really,” he replied quietly, sensing the sensitivity of the moment and her impatience. “Once you’ve been, Omni can call you back any time it needs you, as I told you yesterday. It was yesterday, wasn’t it? Seems like forever ago. Let’s go for a wander down the corridor by your father’s study, you know, where we felt the tingle. You never know, you might get lucky.”
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