Sanctuary (Order of the Ring Book 1)

by Phil Maxey

  She set out anyway. She had been passing through this way since she was a kid, and was confident she wouldn’t get lost, even without seeing where she was going.

  After walking for a few minutes, she looked back from where she came but all she could see was a wall of white particles. She then turned back towards her destination and realized that she couldn’t see further than a few feet in any direction. A wave of vertigo rose inside her making her stop and catch her breath. I’m OK, I just need to keep walking. She felt her pocket for the comforting feeling of her phone and pressed on. Soon she slowed, the snow was two feet thick and coming up to the top of her knees and she still couldn’t see the row of old trees at the far side of the park. The year before a tramp had been found frozen to death not far from where she was, and that winter wasn’t anything near as bad as what she was in the middle of now. Flashes of his ice-covered corpse began to force themselves into her mind. No, no, it’s not far now.

  She tapped her pocket again. The phone was gone. What? She stopped, then pulled her gloves off, and desperately plunged her hand into her other pockets hoping to feel its smooth metal casing, but it wasn’t there. She spun around, and walked back the way she came for a few feet, but it was nowhere to be seen. She felt like screaming. She had only had it for a month and chose not to take out insurance because of the extra cost. Getting a new one wasn’t an option.

  Desperately she tried running back from where she came following the trail she had just created, when her right foot lodged inside something deep down in the ice and twisted. She let out a howl of pain and collapsed sideways not being aware of the large stone that lay hidden beneath the snow. Her head only just glanced it, but it was enough to knock her unconscious.

  * * * * *

  The ancient stones stood proud against the wind and snow, but rarely had they borne witness to a blizzard such as this. The narrow roads surrounding Stonehenge were caked with four-foot-high mounds of snow, meaning the area for miles around was devoid of life, but for one figure seemingly unaffected by the fury of nature as they trekked towards the stone circle.

  The stranger’s robes spiralled and swirled, mimicking the flow of air around them, as their bony hands gripped a square chest. As they entered the centre of the ring of stones, gusts picked up and pushed the snow and ice away in front of them, leaving the bare mud-covered ground and the central altar stone uncovered.

  Placing the chest down, they produced an ornate silver key which they used to unlock it. Flipping the lid back, they carefully took out a small leathery book, looking like it had been grown from bark and skin. The individual’s sinewy fingers turned over a few pages, then they started reciting words that had been long forgotten.

  Over and over they chanted, interpreting symbols which represented what should not be spoken or thought.

  The fury of the storm picked up around the standing stones, sounding like a battle between hell and earth. Shards of ice scattered through the air, and hammered into the ground.

  As their words became one with the world around them, the stones began to vibrate and glow with an inner light which belonged neither in this life or the next. Brighter and brighter until there were no individual blocks, but just a ring of light which surged into the centre igniting the altar stone and causing an explosion of rock and dust. Then darkness.

  The chanting person peered up from where they had been thrown, at the smouldering hole which once housed the six-ton megalith and ran forwards with a cloak in their hand.

  “Please Cyning, clothe thy self, it is too cold to be as you are.”

  The muscular person huddled on the ground, looked up and snatched at the fabric, quickly covering themselves.

  Getting to their feet, the two cloaked figures left the sanctity of the circle and walked back out into the storm.

  CHAPTER 4

  Kat opened her eyes to lush, moss-covered trees and warmth. The fragrance of summer hung in the air along with the whistles of birds. Sitting back on twigs and dirt, she looked at her ankle. I’m sure I fell? Wiggling her foot caused no pain, so she pushed it down onto the ground and stood up. Shafts of light rained down from the blue sky just visible through the ancient twisted trees that surrounded her and she walked forwards allowing the warmth to bathe her face. A vague memory of cold and snow shouted at the edge of her mind, but the scene around her was so vivid that she ignored it.

  Suddenly she became aware of a small creature in front of her. About five inches long, with a prodigious number of spikes. It was a hedgehog and although she had seen a few in videos on the internet, she had never been so close to one. Bending over she held out her hand, unsure what the correct procedure was to greet such an animal. Its nose twitched, then it stood up on its hind legs and smiled.

  Kat stood up in shock. She looked around herself waiting for the camera crew to jump out. Must be a puppet. She was sure animals such as this don’t ‘smile’ despite the numerous images of such behavior online. But there it was five feet from her, smiling.

  “Umm—hello?” She laughed, and shook her head. This is crazy.

  The small creature, then dropped back down on all fours, turned, and started to totter away along a stone path which wound through the undergrowth in front of her. At about fifteen feet away, it turned and went back up on its two legs again and looked at her.

  “Oh, you want me to follow?”

  I’m talking to a hedgehog.

  It then walked away. Kat started to follow and immediately she caught the scent of food. A meaty broth, but with touches of herbs wafted through the forest in the direction her and her spiny friend were moving in.

  As she progressed, pushing leaves and branches from her away, small tinges of pain started to emerge from the base of her right leg, but she shook them off and continued.

  Then she saw it, slowly emerging through the gaps in the foliage ahead of her, a small clearing with what looked like a wooden construction, part built, part grown, with vines and flowers intermingled amongst off kilter windows. At the front was a small garden resplendent with flowers in full bloom, and at the top was a large chimney which was pumping out puffs of white smoke.

  With a creak, the door opened and her grandfather emerged. Although this wasn’t the man from the medical bed she had seen days earlier, this wasn’t even the same person she had glimpsed in old photos. This was a man that despite his aged appearance was full of life and energy.

  He looked at her and smiled, then looked at the hedgehog that was standing on its hind legs at his feet. “Ah, I see you found Agusto, he helps me with the gardening,” said the tall angular man, robed in a vibrant green cloak, with red and yellow embroidering. “He’s also good at helping others who are lost in the woods like, it seems, you were. But I knew you would find your way here eventually.”

  Kat stood looking bewildered. “Granddad?”

  Arnold Ambrose smiled again, and walked to his granddaughter gently placing both of his hands on her shoulders. “It is me, Kat. I know all this must be a bit overwhelming to you, but you are here for a reason. Now, please come inside, we need to talk, I suspect we don’t have long, and I want you to try some of my famous Ambrose stew.”

  He led her along a path of polished flat stones, through the arched wooden door and into a cavernous room, with multiple spiral stairs that stretched upwards to other floors. The walls were hewn from rock, while roots and branches formed shelves which were filled with books and bottles. Elsewhere an unlit stone fireplace resided next to a large wooden chair, and a small table.

  Kat’s ankle started to hurt more intensely and she looked to the closest chair to sit on, which was one in the kitchen consisting of a long wooden table and a stove.

  “Yes, rest your foot, this stew of mine should help with that.”

  The thought of how her grandfather knew about her foot registered then was immediately pushed away.

  A large metal bowl containing a steaming frothy liquid was put down in front of her, together with a wooden spoon.
“This recipe has been in our family for a millennium or more, it’s said to—”

  “Umm—”

  “Yes?”

  “Where are we?”

  Arnold sat opposite her across the table with his own bowl. “Well, our ancestors referred to this place as Avalon, but if you were to ask someone from our generation, maybe a physicist where it was, they would probably say it was just another part of the multiverse.”

  I’m not meant to be here.

  “No, you’re not, at least not yet.” Kat’s eyes widened at him, replying to what she just thought.

  He smiled. “Ha, no I cannot read your thoughts, that’s a kind of magic we Ambrose’s were never privy too, but it was obvious by your expression.”

  Kat noticed he wasn’t wearing his ornate gemstone ring. “Where’s your ring?” She had never seen him without it.

  “The ring could not travel with me to this place, and anyway, it has other uses now.” He looked at her, concerned. “Eat up.”

  Kat looked apologetic and started sipping.

  His expression then turned darker. “I’m sorry for what you are about to go through, I hoped there would have been more time, but certain forces have taken advantage of the events that are about to unfold, to travel to your world, forces that have only one aim in mind, the complete dominance of the old kingdom, and perhaps the world beyond.”

  This is a strange dream. She continued eating the stew, and he was right, it was helping the pain in her leg, but it was still there, it had just been subdued temporarily. “But, I mean, thank you for the stew—” she once again looked around this strange abode that for some reason her mind had taken her to in her sleep. “—But what does any of this have to do with me?”

  Arnold finished his helping of stew and pushed his bowl to one side. “Do you know what day it is today?”

  She frowned. “The twenty-first, my birthday.”

  “Yes, it is the twenty-first, and you are also of twenty-one years, and it is also the winter solstice, these events are not chance Kat. Very rarely does anything happen to an Ambrose by chance.”

  She looked at him confused.

  “More will become clear during the following weeks, but the point is you are about to start out on a path many of us have walked down over the eons. It will not be easy, but it is necessary. When you go back, you will discover that I have left you things. They will help you fight the battle ahead and find the others.”

  Kat’s hand was frozen midscoop. “Battle? Others?” She kept eating, what did any of this matter? She will wake up soon, staring up at the cracked ceiling like she does every morning.

  Arnold raised his hand, then got up, taking his bowl to a part of the rock wall where a trickle of water flowed down into a small pool. “That is all I can tell you for now. We all must walk our own paths, it is the way of things,”

  Kat shivered, she was starting to feel very cold.

  Rinsing his bowl in the water, he walked back and knelt next to his granddaughter. She turned in her chair as he held her hand, which was turning blue.

  “Trust your instincts! You must return now—” He then hugged her, and the world went black.

  Cold, so cold.

  Kat opened her eyes to the roaring blizzard and intense white all around her. Her eyelashes had become tiny icicles and she wasn’t sure of the position of her limbs as she could hardly feel any of them. Arching her head forwards she could just about make out she was lying in a few feet of snow and there was a soreness at the back of her head. She started to wiggle her arms and legs frantically, trying to get the blood flowing back into them. As some semblance of warmth eased its way around her body, a dull throb came from her right ankle, as well as her fingers.

  She sat up and looked around her but there was still no letup in the complete whiteout, and she had no idea whereabouts in the park she was. She then remembered she dropped her phone and looked around her. By luck or fate a corner of black plastic was just visible nearby. She turned on her front and crawled in discomfort towards her phone and slid it back into her pocket.

  The pain in her ankle continued, but she could put pressure on it, and soon she was kneeling, then standing, resisting the howling gusts around her. It felt like she had been lying in the icy crater for hours, but she knew that couldn’t be right as she would be dead by now if she had.

  She spotted her other glove just visible under the snow a foot from her, and quickly put it on her numb fingers, then walked forward, having to step up and over the fresh snow as much as possible. After a few moments of not having any idea of which direction she was going in, she came across a metal pole and sign which was covered in ice, but she didn’t need to read it as she knew it was the sign at the park entrance.

  She picked up her pace and soon was back out in the street outside the park. Peering into the falling snow, the strings of Christmas lights offered a guide as to where the rest of the road and pavement was, and she walked as fast as she could, holding onto fences and walls when the opportunity arose. After a short walk, she was back at the gate of her front garden, exhausted.

  She traipsed up the pathway and knocked at the door being too bewildered to find her keys. Her mother opened it. Kat expected a torrid of questions as to where she had been, instead her mother just stood there. Something’s wrong.

  Kat limped into the hallway, her mother’s eyes not leaving her.

  “I slipped in the snow, I couldn’t get the—” she said breathlessly.

  “There’s something—umm, there’s some news I just heard.”

  Kat stopped pulling her clothes off. “Yes?”

  “Your grandfather has died.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Justin walked across the bus lanes trying not to slip on the snow that was now a few inches thick, and up the steps to the closed entrance to Oxford train station.

  A hastily written sign hung on the inside of the door. “No train service due to weather. Please look at our website for further details.”

  You got to be joking.

  Pulling his phone out of his coat pocket and wiping the flakes of snow from the screen, he opened the browser and quickly typed in the train-lines website address to be greeted by an almost exact copy of the message he was standing a few feet from. Scrolling the screen around, a feeling of discomfort started to settle in his stomach as he realized he had no way of getting home to Kent. What made things worse was his father had planned to take him out for a birthday meal in the evening.

  The time was 1 p.m. lunchtime, it should have been the brightest part of the day, instead the sun hid behind a haze of white drizzle not far above the horizon. He had planned to be back in the town of Tunbridge Wells around late afternoon, but with no train services he wasn’t sure what his options were. Hiring a car wasn’t possible because he still hadn’t passed his driving test yet.

  He stood and looked around him at the few people adventurous enough to be walking in the flurry of snow and wind, and realized he couldn’t stay where he was. It looked like he was going to be spending his birthday in Oxford.

  Walking back the way he came, he was soon moving along a side road, with four-storey Victorian homes on both sides, some of which had signs which signalled they were hotels, but equally all had either “closed for the holidays” or “Fully booked” displayed in their windows as well. As he trudged forwards along this seemingly never-ending road, his small satchel bobbing on his back, he noticed a black lump mostly covered in snow sitting in the centre of the street about a hundred yards away.

  At the same time, a car entered the other end of the road, sliding slightly as it veered around the bend.

  Justin wondered what this small black object could be, and tried to increase his walking speed, as the car was only a few moments away from hitting it. Has the driver seen it?

  As he got to within twenty feet of the dark obstruction, he realized what it was. A cat, evidently alive, but equally not moving. Is it injured? Or just frozen in place?

 
Justin then realized the car was heading in his and the cat’s direction, and started waving his arms, but even if the vehicle did see his warnings, there was no good way for it to stop in time due to the treacherous conditions.

  He broke into a run, trying to balance himself with his arms, and fighting against the wind which seemed opposed to him rescuing the animal.

  Glancing upwards, the cars headlights now lit the ground around him. He hoped the cat would see him and the car racing towards it and realize this would be a good time to move, but as if stuck to the ground by an unknown force it ignored them both. Swooping down, he grabbed the black cat as the car sped past. Unfortunately, his momentum was such that any kind of controlled stopping was out of the question, and he went careering into a parked car throwing the cat out of his arms, which landed perfectly.

  Justin grimaced and rubbed his legs. The cat sat a few feet away looking up at him. Then it turned and ran down a narrow alleyway. It was then Justin noticed the small sign against the fence. Being covered in snow and vine it was hardly visible, but as he drew closer to it, he could read the painted, chipped lettering. “Toper’s House. Bed and Breakfast.” With an impressive coat of arms below the words.

  Looking around there was no obvious bed and breakfast to be seen, just more Victorian residential homes to his left and a group of oak trees to his right, but dividing them both was the small alleyway which the cat disappeared into.

  His face was now losing most of its feeling and each breath burnt his lungs, so he quickly moved along the high-walled, narrow path until the alley ended at an impressive iron gate which intersected the equally high wall which ran up to it on both sides. Through the gate, almost lost in a sea of white blur, stood an impressive Georgian four-storey house.

  He had no idea if this place was open or any good, but spending any more time outside in the bitter cold was something he wanted to avoid, so he opened the gate, and walked up the long pathway. To both sides sat large shapes of carved stone animals completely covered in snow, and beyond them an even thicker blanket of oak trees than that he had seen a few moments before.