Clash of the Worlds

by Chris Columbus

  “The Aged One?” Cordelia asked. “Who is that?”

  Brendan gave her hand a squeeze as they walked.

  “Let’s just go!” he said. “The sooner we get there, the sooner we can find out what happened to Nell.”

  Cordelia nodded and focused on staying right on Celene’s heels. She, Brendan, Cordelia, Adie, Anapos, and Gilbert made their way quickly through the streets of Tinz, eventually weaving their way via alleys and narrow paths into a much quieter section of town marked by large buildings that clearly housed multiple families—almost like an old version of a modern-day apartment complex.

  As they moved deeper into the slums of Tinz, the scene that greeted them was astonishing. The living conditions were nothing short of squalor. The Walkers observed ravaged and hungry villagers rooting through garbage strewn about the alleys. They looked exactly how you’d expect people to look who lived under a greedy and tyrannical reign like Queen Daphne’s. They looked like refugees.

  Suddenly, to Cordelia and Brendan, their cramped apartment near Fisherman’s Wharf didn’t seem that bad at all. Both of them were stung by the guilt of their own ignorant privilege. Even at their family’s worst moments, they had it better than they had ever realized before.

  Nobody spoke as Celene opened a door tucked away in a dark alley. She ushered them all inside and then led the group down a series of dark hallways until they found themselves in a large room with several wooden tables and benches. It looked like a dining hall.

  “Wait here,” Celene said, and disappeared through a door across the room.

  A short time later she returned with an old man. To Brendan, he actually looked less like an old man and more like a walking corpse. He was hunched over a crooked wooden cane and had stringy, thin white hair with a matching beard that covered most of his heavily wrinkled face. His skin was blasted with age spots and it appeared to be a minor miracle that the man was still alive at all, let alone walking and talking.

  But even in spite of looking to be nearly 150 years old, behind the folds of skin surrounding his eyes there was still an edge of intelligence and awareness, almost as if the eyes belonged to someone much younger.

  “Let me introduce you to the Aged One,” Celene said. “In our land, none of the residents get older. Year after year we stay the same. Age does not exist here in our world. Except for this man. Over the years, he has gotten older. And he will be able to explain everything to you.”

  They gathered around the old man as he slowly sat down on a bench. Something about Celene’s comment clicked on a light in Brendan’s brain. It was something he’d read in Kristoff’s Journal—something about the passing of time in the book world. Denver had surmised that time passed differently here, that it moved slower and in some cases never moved at all—that the book characters would never age past what they did in the novel’s text, which meant . . .

  “If you age . . . ,” Brendan said slowly, his voice rising, “then that means you must be from our world! The real world!”

  The old man nodded slowly.

  “He’s been the leader of the Resistance for years now,” Celene said.

  Brendan remembered Celene explaining that the Resistance was a group of villagers, freedom fighters, constantly working to end Queen Daphne’s evil reign over Tinz and the surrounding provinces. He now also remembered something else she had told him back during their first-ever meeting.

  “That’s how you knew!” he said. “That’s how you knew you were a character in a book! It’s how you already knew we were from the outside back then. Because your leader is from the outside too.”

  Everyone looked at the old man again as Celene nodded. The Aged One smiled thinly at the group. Adie just kept watching Brendan looking at Celene like she was a queen or something, and her face was getting redder and redder.

  “Please, Mr. Aged One,” Cordelia said. “Can you tell us where our sister, Eleanor, is?”

  The old man chuckled under his beard. It seemed an odd reaction, but there was nothing but gentle kindness behind it. And a bit of sadness as well.

  “Eleanor is fine. She has not been harmed. For now,” he said, his voice sounding as old as he looked. “But, please, don’t call me the ‘Aged One.’ Call me Eugene. Eugene Kristoff.”

  “You’re Denver’s brother!” Brendan exclaimed. “He told us to find you!”

  “He said that you can help us stop the Wind Witch’s plans,” Cordelia said. “That you can show us how to use the Worldkeepers to seal off the book world forever.”

  The Aged One nodded slowly while stroking his beard.

  “So, it’s happened then?” he said.

  “What has happened?” Brendan asked.

  “The seams between the two worlds must be fraying,” Eugene said. “Denver always suspected this was inevitable. He sent me here many, many years ago to help him keep an eye on The Book of Doom and Desire, and on this world in general.” His gaze passed over Adie, Anapos, and Gilbert in turn as he said this, pausing on each one momentarily. “Unfortunately, I lost track of the book some time ago.”

  “That’s because our little sister wished it out of existence,” Brendan said proudly.

  “Did she?” Eugene said, using his gnarled old fingers to fiddle with his mustache. “Interesting. Interesting indeed. At a great cost, no doubt. But regardless, probably all for the better. I don’t know why Denver didn’t just destroy that blasted thing in the first place. . . .”

  “I’ll tell you why,” Cordelia said. “Because he’s a greedy old son of a—”

  “Can’t disagree,” Eugene interrupted. “But that’s irrelevant, because my main purpose here in this world shifted some time ago, a time well before The Book of Doom and Desire was apparently destroyed. Things here, in many of these book worlds, began to go awry and have only gotten worse over the years. . . .”

  “Wait a second,” Brendan said. “Why would you be willing to give up your whole life to help your selfish older brother guard a book that ruined his life and destroyed his family?”

  “Because I was once a selfish man myself,” Eugene said. “In a somewhat different way, of course. You see, I cared not for money and power the way my brother did, but I still had no regard for other people. I only cared for myself. I only did what made me feel good, however unsuitable those things were for the civilized world. . . . Can you comprehend this selfishness?”

  “Yeah,” Brendan said, suddenly feeling a tight burn in his stomach as he thought about his own father and his gambling addiction. His thoughts also wandered back to the time he willingly split from his sisters to stay at the Colosseum only to look out for himself and what made him happy. Was he really any better than any of these men?

  “It was all about the adrenaline rush of doing something outside the boundaries of the law,” Eugene continued. “I spent much of my youth in search of adventures. And it landed me in various prisons over the years. My life was a mess; I could never seem to fulfill my desire for more excitement. And so when Denver offered me the chance to come to a place where the adventure finds you . . . I couldn’t resist.”

  “Amazing,” Cordelia said. “Every time we’re here we do everything in our power to get out. But you chose to stay.”

  “Oh yes,” Eugene said. “And at first I spent several years traveling from book to book, finding my own adventures and excitement—it was spectacular. But after a while, I began to notice another, more disruptive outside presence in many of the books.”

  “The Wind Witch,” Brendan said.

  “Yes, my very own niece,” Eugene Kristoff confirmed, nodding slowly while shifting his gaze from Brendan to Adie. “Except that it wasn’t her anymore. Not the Dahlia I remembered, anyway. She was now ruthless, and she somehow found a way to actually transform herself into the characters from Denver’s stories. I certainly had my share of fun, but I never interfered with the integrity of the worlds within the novels. Dahlia, however, had other ideas. And she’s only grown more ruthless and powerful in
recent years, spending most of her time as Queen Daphne, torturing the poor and innocent souls within Savage Warriors. Her reign has far exceeded, in the scope of cruelty and savagery, what Denver ever intended. That’s why I joined the Resistance. To try and help restore some of the balance. And now, I’m afraid she’s somehow recruited or enchanted another outsider into helping her with another, even more terrible scheme.”

  “Eleanor!” Cordelia nearly yelled, covering her mouth with shaking hands.

  “I’m afraid so,” Eugene Kristoff said. “Several Resistance spies spotted her inside Castle Corroway with the Wind Witch, preparing a massive invasion—an invasion, I can only assume, of our real world.”

  Cordelia breathed out heavily and tried to fight back tears. Brendan looked from Eugene to Cordelia and then at all his other new friends.

  “We need to go after her!” Cordelia said. “Save her!”

  “And I can help you do that,” Eugene said.

  “But Cordelia needs to leave the room first,” Brendan said suddenly. “She can’t be here while we talk about this.”

  “I’m not going anywhere!” Cordelia said, her eyes glowing icy blue. “I don’t care about my stupid eyes anymore!”

  “You know it isn’t safe, Deal,” Brendan said.

  “I’ve heard enough!” she said, not backing down. “You’re just a selfish glory addict! Just like the last time we were here, back at the Roman Colosseum! You don’t care about helping other people or doing the right thing at all. . . . All you care about is looking like a hero. You’re always thinking of how cool everyone back at school would think you are if they saw you ‘saving the world’ here in Denver’s books. You’re self-involved and borderline narcissistic . . . and I’m tired of letting you get away with it!” When she finished, even she looked shocked at what she’d said.

  Brendan didn’t know how to respond. They’d always squabbled like siblings to a certain degree, but it never involved them saying things so hurtful, so deeply insulting to their very character.

  “That’s not fair,” Brendan said quietly. “You know it’s different now. It’s not my fault that you’re linked to the Wind Witch—”

  “Linked to the Wind Witch?” Eugene asked.

  Brendan quickly explained how they could sometimes see and hear things through each other. Eugene Kristoff looked increasingly alarmed as Brendan spoke.

  “Then I’m afraid young Brendan is correct,” Eugene said to Cordelia gently. “It’s not safe for you, or for any of us for that matter, including Eleanor, for you to be a part of this. In fact, I think it might be better off if you just remain in Tinz altogether for now.”

  “Remain in Tinz!” Cordelia shouted.

  “Yes,” Eugene said. “It’s imperative that you do not take part in our next mission.”

  Cordelia’s angry, frosty-blue eyes looked from Eugene to Brendan and then to Adie, Anapos, and Gilbert. They were all looking at her with pity. Because it was clear that they all agreed with Eugene and Brendan—even in spite of them not fully understanding the nature of the situation.

  “You turned them all against me!” Cordelia shouted, pointing at Brendan, a sob escaping in between sentences. “I hate you! I really, really hate you! I’m so ashamed to have to call you my brother!”

  Before any of them could say another word, she spun on her heels and marched out of one of the doors of the dinning hall. She slammed it shut behind her. Everyone else looked at one another uneasily.

  “Should we go after her?” Adie asked.

  “She’ll be fine,” Brendan said warily, but not really caring one way or another how Cordelia would feel later. He couldn’t get over the awful things she’d said to him. Did she really believe they were true?

  “I know this is difficult, but we must act quickly,” Eugene said. “Did you get the three Worldkeepers?”

  “We’ve got two,” Brendan said. “But I don’t know if Eleanor managed to find the third one before the Wind Witch kidnapped her.”

  “Without the third Worldkeeper, going to the Door of Ways would be pointless,” Eugene said. “The Door of Ways is the magical portal that allows the two worlds to intermix. And the three Worldkeepers are almost like the notches on its only key. . . .”

  “So it can’t be locked without all three Worldkeepers,” Brendan finished for him.

  “Precisely,” Eugene said. “And to make matters even more troubling, the Wind Witch has formed a massive army along the only mountain passage up to the Door of Ways. When it is time, we will need to find a way past that army to get you there.”

  “But first we need to get back Eleanor and the third Worldkeeper,” Brendan said. “Hopefully she found it before the Wind Witch kidnapped her.”

  “You misunderstood me, son,” Eugene said. “I am not convinced Eleanor was kidnapped. My intelligence agents at Castle Corroway have said that Eleanor appears to be there of her own free will. I suspect that she has been enchanted or simply manipulated . . . Dahlia always was good at manipulating people, even back before her soul was corrupted. Either way, I suspect that Eleanor did find the Worldkeeper first.”

  “What makes you think that?” Adie asked.

  “Because the Wind Witch would not have left the Terror on Planet 5X world without it,” Eugene said.

  “Well, there’s only one way to find out,” Adie said. “We need to go there and rescue her.”

  “We know a secret entrance into the castle,” Celene said. “I can lead you there and get a small squad inside.”

  “Great!” Brendan said, standing up. “Let’s go. I don’t want to waste any more time!”

  “Patience, Brendan,” Eugene said. “You must rest for now.”

  “Sleep?” Brendan asked. “Are you kidding me? I gotta rescue my little sister!”

  “I completely understand your passion,” Eugene said. “But you’re weak from lack of nourishment and rest. You need all your strength to get your sister back safely. I suspect that there will be much bloodshed before the day ends tomorrow. Celene will show you to your rooms. When you wake, we can further discuss our plans over dinner. You will leave for Castle Corroway before daybreak.”

  They all stood up uncertainly. Brendan did have to admit that a nap didn’t sound like the worst thing in the world. He was anxious to go and get Eleanor back—to get the last Worldkeeper and finally end this all. But Eugene was right. He wouldn’t do anyone a bit of good in his current state.

  “Wait,” Adie said suddenly, looking worried. “What was all that talk about characters in a novel . . . and you being in the ‘real world’ . . . does all of this mean that I’m . . . that I’m just a character in a book? That I’m not real?”

  “And me?” Anapos asked nervously.

  Brendan looked at them sympathetically, remembering how depressed Will Draper was when he found out that he was a character from a novel and not a real person.

  “I’ll explain on the way to our rooms,” Brendan said. “It’s complicated.”

  “When I first found out that I was a book character, I was very sad and confused,” Celene said to Gilbert’s, Anapos’s, and Adie’s confused faces. “But I eventually came to terms with it. I know what it’s like, so maybe I can come along to help him explain it all?”

  She grabbed Brendan’s hand while she spoke and gave it a squeeze.

  Adie looked at the two of them holding hands and frowned.

  “Actually,” Adie said. “I’m going to go check on Cordelia instead.” She turned and stormed off down the hallway.

  “What got into her?” Celene asked, as she watched Adie leave.

  “I have no idea,” Brendan said, trying to hide his red cheeks.

  Cordelia Walker sat alone in her small room with a plate of food, and stewed. She’d managed to sleep a little while everyone else napped, but was still furious at the group for cutting her out of the plans, especially Brendan, her own brother.

  Not only had they already said she couldn’t go with them to Castle Corroway in
the morning, but now they insisted that she eat dinner alone in her room while they devised a plan together in the dining hall. It was more than she could bear.

  Cordelia was probably the one person who could help them the most in terms of strategizing and organizing. Besides, nobody knew Eleanor quite like she did. If anyone could reason with their little sister it was her. This was the final straw, she decided, throwing down her unfinished plate of food.

  Fueled mostly by anger, resentment, and sleep deprivation, Cordelia Walker snuck out of her room. All the guests had been given rooms in the same hallway as one another, as well as a place to store their things and fresh clothes to help fit in with the locals. Cordelia went from room to room, peeking inside each one until she found Brendan’s.

  She dug through his dirty jeans with the bullet hole in the butt where he’d been shot by Sheriff Abernathy. Just like she’d figured, Brendan had been irresponsible enough to leave Denver’s Journal of Magic and Technology behind while they all ate and planned their invasion of Castle Corroway. This only further justified her actions.

  Cordelia sat on the edge of Brendan’s straw bed and read several pages of the Journal. The words inside filled her with purpose and seemed to cure her of the pent-up stress and frustration, like some kind of miracle drug. She even found a separate passage about the Invictum and discovered it was more powerful than any of them had realized. She planned to read more eventually, but had other ideas for the moment.

  Next, she snuck into Adie’s room and found the talisman still stashed away inside her yellow dress. If she stole the talisman, then they would have to take her with them tomorrow, she reasoned. Then they wouldn’t be able to just leave her there and pretend she was worthless. It would give her a purpose again.

  Cordelia looked down at the glowing blue medallion in her hand. It shimmered as if it were agreeing with her thoughts. She held it up close to her head and slipped the fog tendrils that looked like a translucent ribbon around her neck. In spite of being weightless, the tendrils held. She dropped the talisman into her shirt as it hung from her neck.