Rakara

by Steve Shilstone

  As the Berry spoke in a liquid jamlike voice, it floated back and then forth in front of Kar, waving its tiny arms and wiggling its tiny fingers. At the conclusion of its recitation it glided to one of the goldglow wall panels, clasped both sets of its tiny hands to rest on its bulbous plumptitude, and stared frowning with half-closed red bead eyes at the ceiling.

  “We have two more questions to ask it,” said Kar.

  “If the mirrors come back, I’ll lose myself,” I said, trembling.

  True, I did feel a boost of relief when I heard my own voice from inside my own head speaking singly all alone. I turned my gaze to the Berry. It haughtily ignored us. Such seemed so. But, fact revealed, it waited for the final two questions. Such I know from what happened next.

  “There’s a Book Room behind that panel. That’s what the Berry said. If we get into the Book Room, something better might happen. I’ll ask it how to get in there,” reasoned Kar.

  “If this Realm is knocking me over, what might the others do?” I asked, feeling not much at all like continuing the adventure.

  “Bek, Bek, I am the first jrabe jroon. It will get easier. I know things,” soothed Kar, and she winked!

  Well, so such, a wink from Kar provided a comfort. I shrugged. I trusted her. She winked again and turned to face the Berry.

  “Blue Truth Berry, I am the jrabe jroon Rakara,” she boldly proclaimed. “This is Bekka, a bendo dreen as you have guessed. We are on a challenge to reach the Realm Beyond Realms. Such being so, I will ask you one of my two remaining questions. How do we get into the Book Room?”

  Without uttering a word or even looking at us, the Blue Berry spun slowly to tap with a tiny finger on the goldglow panel. The panel slid open. The Berry floated through. We followed, and as we followed, a terribly bad idea occurred to me. I thought it wonderfully good, but it was terribly bad. I whispered it to Kar. Sadly so such, she, too, thought it wonderfully good.

  “You have one question left, but I have six, don’t I?” was what I whispered.

  “That’s right!” agreed Kar. Then she called to the Berry, “Hold, Blue Truth Berry, I have yet only one more question, but Bek has six. Right?”

  “Wrong. I find the final question answered. Too bad. Here you are in the Book Room. You’ll find no exit from here. Good-bye.”

  The Blue Berry departed abruptly, the entrance panel slamming shut behind it. Kar and I were abandoned without clue in the Book Room. A formed cube like the mirrored room, the Book Room’s walls were shelved, wooden floor to wooden ceiling, with books and books and books.

  “Oops,” said Kar.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Book of the Ramp

  “Well, Kar, that was a bad idea. Now what?”

  “That’s what I’m supposed to say!”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Dak said I’d need you in the library. He didn’t say what library or where library, but I’m looking at books on shelves. When I see this many books on that many shelves, such means a library to me. Now, do you have a hint of a feel about anything to do?”

  “Me? I … well … we could examine the books. See if there might be something so such … a clue. We could have asked the Truth Berry if I hadn’t …”

  “Potch kit! Forget that! Go forward. That’s what Ragaba says. Remember? She used to say that even when she was Zinna, and we were both of us such and so small.”

  “I remember. Kar, I feel strange. Is it yesterday yet? How long a span of time do you think has passed since Ripple Bight sent us through O’Tan’s Gate. I’ve lost measure. I’m not sleepy. I’m not hungry. Should I be? Is it yesterday yet? Dosh … the serpents … the Blue Truth Berry … the …”

  “Don’t think, Bek. I don’t think. You shouldn’t think either. Except about what to do in this room. Don’t muddle with time. Here. This has to be a puzzle. There’s got to be a Ramp. We’ll be the first to get through WITHOUT the help of the Truth Berry.”

  “The Berry said there was no exit. I didn’t like its eyes.”

  “The Berry lied. It was a Lie Berry, not a Truth Berry! Lie Berry! Ha! Get it? We’re in the Lie Berry’s Library! Ha! Get it?”

  “Kar, settle. I don’t need you to be such and so jark dweg right now. I need you to be jrabe jroon. I need to be Chronicler. It is a library. Here are books. I suppose we should look at ‘em.”

  “Wait! Wait! Which one last? Which one should we look at last?”

  “Last? You mean first?”

  “No, I mean last. Pick one to look at last. That’ll be the one.”

  “Why?”

  “It always is.”

  “Kar, you’re not helping my mood. That one then. So such. The blue binding. Bottom shelf.”

  “Good. I’ll start on this wall, top shelf. You start on that wall, top shelf. These ladders look fun. You can ride ‘em, I bet. Yeeee!”

  “We’re trapped here forever, probably, Kar. Why are you having fun? Oh, never mind … blank pages … yellow … I wonder what sorts of oats and dyes got mixed to make such a smooth….”

  “Don’t dawdle, Bek. Move along.”

  “Me dawdle? You’ve done nothing but ride the ladder! Don’t dawdle yourself! There are a thousand and more books in this room. If you know the blue one on the bottom is what we’re looking for, why don’t I just …”

  “No! It has to be last. Every other book in this room has to be pulled and its pages riffled before that blue you picked. Such is importantly so!”

  “Why? More secrets?”

  “Yes! Such!”

  “I wish I was hungry … blank … blank … blank … I wish I was sleepy … blank … blank … Are you sure it isn’t yesterday yet? … blank … blank … I wish I was anything but bored, which I am.”

  “Plod forward, Bek. Plod forward.”

  “Blank … blank … blank … blank … blank … blank … blank … blank …”

  * * * *

  “Blank … and … blank. That’s all of ‘em except the blue.”

  “Funny to have a library of books with all blank pages, isn’t it, Bek?”

  “Should I pull the blue or you?”

  “I’ll take it … and open it. There! What do you make of that, Chronicler Bekka of Thorns? What does it say?”

  “Oh. It’s the language of the world down the Well! Only I can read it. Only I.”

  “Such is the why that Dak said I needed you. Such! Such! Such! Don’t stand there like a kankweed, Bek. What does it say? What does it say?”

  “It says ‘The Book of the Ramp’.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Puzzling

  The letters spelled out ‘The Book of the Ramp’ all green and shiny on the first yellow page. Kar peered at ‘em over my shoulder. She silently waited for me to read. I turned the page. Blank! The page was blank. I turned another, another, another. Blank, blank, blank.

  “Keep turning ‘em, all of ‘em every one,” hissed Kar into my ear.

  “Is it yesterday yet?” I pleaded, not knowing why, my mind still not right.

  Kar nudged me in the back. I turned the pages carefully, one at a time. They were blank. I counted the pages as I turned ‘em. “Four, thirty-three, two, seven thousand, etc., and so on …” My mind was not right. The final page was blank. I lifted it up and over and stared at the sturdy blue back cover of the book. Kar nudged me in the back.

  “Start over,” she hissed.

  I blurted out a laugh. My brain was curdled like thorn jelly left out too long. It was not right. I started over. The letters on the first page no longer shone green. They remained shiny, but now orange. They no longer spelled ‘The Book of the Ramp’. Instead, they spelled ‘Pick the right mirror’.

  “It’s orange now,” said Kar, “and different. What does it say?”

  “Pick the right mirror,” I droned. I heard buzzing.

  “Hmmmm … not enough. Turn the pages. Turn ‘em,” said Kar, nudging me again.

  I turned the pages. Such and so each of ‘em w
as blank just like before. I reached again the sturdy blue back cover, and paused all dreamy. The buzzing grew louder.

  “Start over. Start over!” hissed Kar.

  The book weighed of a sudden as much as a sub-cave forge anvil, or so and such it seemed to me. I staggered under the burden, but managed to turn to the first page once more. The letters loomed off the page, black and shiny. They spelled ‘Door to the Cube of Mirrors, Open!’ I dropped the book. It rang a CLANG! as it hit the floor.

  “What did it say?! What did it say?!” insisted Kar, gripping my shoulders.

  “Door to the Cube of Mirrors, Open!” I recited in a flat voice, not at all like my own.

  A panel in the wall of books slammed open, revealing the room of mirrors. And there, looking at us, stood the Blue Truth Berry.

  “I find you have found the book,” it called with a red frown.

  “I can’t go back in there. My mind … Is it yesterday yet?” I pleaded wildly, shrinking back against Kar.

  “Settle, Bek. I have enough information. Close your eyes. I’ll guide you,” said Kar.

  I lurched forward, pushed and held by Kar. My mind tossed about like a raft in a stormy sea. I could barely hear Kar and the Berry arguing above the roaring rage.

  “Truth Berry! Ha! You are a Lie Berry! No exit, you said. We found the exit. Bek knows so such how to read the strange language! Such! So! We WILL find the Ramp!” shouted Kar.

  “Find it then! Why do you delay? Go ahead, youngling! I find that you have yet to solve my puzzle!” shouted the Berry.

  My eyes were clamped shut. I tipped and tossed. Waves crashed and smashed. My raft mind was battered in the churn. I felt Kar’s arms grow bony.

  “Ye be no puzzle to Rakara, the jrabe! Observe! I float right. I float right!” howled the wind in my mind.

  “No! It can’t be!” drifted the Berry’s words off into the distance and away from my splintered raft mind on the now calm sea.

  “Ye may open your eyes now, Bek,” breathed Rakara into my ear.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The Third Ramp

  “What happened? Why is …”

  “I solved the puzzle. We’re on the Ramp.”

  “Weren’t you just Rakara? I thought … Were you? Is it yesterday yet? Why do I keep saying that?”

  “Move if you’re going to move! I find I

  can’t stay stretched forever. I’ll snap you

  into the Between if you don’t hurry up.

  And don’t step on ANY of my mouths or

  eyes! If I find you do, I’ll roll you

  something fierce!”

  “Don’t mind the Lie Berry’s grumbling mouths, Bek. Keep to the blue. Such. Let’s walk.”

  “The Lie … Truth Berry is the Ramp with all these extra eyes and mouths? How?”

  “You read to me the clue in the book, Bek. Book Bek. Ha! The orange letters said ‘Pick the right mirror’ is just so such what you told me. When we reentered the mirror cube, I shifted to Rakara and floated right to the right mirror on the right! Simplicity! When I touched the mirror -Ploof! -all the panels fell up and away, all of ‘em! The Lie Berry lengthened into the arch such as you see here spanning this blackness. I don’t know the why about the extra mouths and eyes. I plopped us on here and shifted back to me. I’m the first jrabe jroon to perform such a marvel!”

  “I find this tedious! Hurry along. I’ll snap!

  I warn you! I’ll snap!”

  “Kar, why don’t you shift to Dragon and fly us? I don’t like bothering the Berry. What do you think the Third Realm is? Do you know? Are we going to yesterday? Do you have secrets from Dak or Ragaba to share now? Do you? Kar? Kar?!”

  “I’m thinking. Keep running, Bek. I can’t shift to fly. If we leave the Ramp, it disappears. Such Dak warned me.”

  “Another secret?”

  “Another secret.”

  “And about the Third Realm? Secrets?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I find I do! You may have passed my

  Realm, but I find it certain that you will

  be stuck forever in the Third Realm.

  Watch it! Step carefully! Your boots

  are rough enough on my noble blue skin.

  You’ll find that I bite! You will!”

  “Keep clear of the mouths, Bek.”

  “And my eyes! Keep clear of my eyes,

  or you’ll repent!”

  “And the eyes.”

  “Kar, can you see far enough into the past to tell me when yesterday will be visited and forgotten?”

  “Bek, don’t talk. Think about thorn pudding.”

  “I find that the Third Realm will destroy

  what little is left of the bendo dreen’s

  mind. I find it! Oh, I find it!”

  “Silence, Lie Berry! Bekka is safe with me! Bek? Bek?”

  “Is it yesterday yet?”

  “Bek, take my hand. Step carefully. Do you see that door ahead? We’re going to go through it.”

  “Stuck forever I find! Destroyed!”

  Chapter Twenty

  The Third Realm

  The door hung there in the blackness. It was a blue two shades paler than the blue of the Blue Berry Ramp. Kar touched it. A silent explosion threw us whirling. I heard myself screaming from somewhere deep in my broken mind. Flashes blinded. Rainbows flickered. Then, all was still. I sat on a hill. Strange hill. Such was so. Vivid blue moss carpet. Strange sky. White sky. Not white with clouds. No. White with sky. Such was so. Such was so. A round oat yellow sun perched high in the distant white. A forest of trees below circled the vivid blue hill. Tall thin straight oat sun yellow trunks they had. Each of ‘em was topped by a ball of clumped leaves. I stared at the palms of my yellow green hands. Such did their color match perfectly the mops of leaves on the tall strange trees. Not one thing moved. There was no sound.

  “Third Realm, Bek,” said Kar, damaging the silence.

  “Are you sure this isn’t yesterday yet?” I asked for no known reason.

  Kar patted my shoulder and told me we were on our way and doing well and I should try to catch hold of my wits and she was the jark dweg, not me, and she knew more things she couldn’t tell me yet but if I was patient enough to practice patience, sabeek orrun, she would get us through because she was the first and only jrabe jroon and had powers yet untapped which she would tap when the time for tapping came and we needed ‘em.

  “The sky is white,” I said.

  Kar patted my shoulder and said she knew the sky was white so such but we should maybe explore the Realm to search out some or some other creature to ask about the next Ramp and probably be challenged with another kind of a sort of puzzle which she needed me with my thorn sharp Chronicler mind to be ready to help her solve.

  “The leaves are me and us,” I said.

  Kar gently lifted me to my feet and said she noticed that, too, and why didn’t we walk down the hill and wander through the forest of odd tall yellow trees with their tufts of bendo dreen leaves and see what we could see.

  She led me down the hill. I was fragile. My mind was a balloon barely tethered to my body by a strand of gossamer. So was the such that it seemed. With each step the balloon swayed. I clung to Kar’s voice to help hold it near.

  We wandered through the forest. I walked with my face turned up to the canopy of yellow green bendo dreen tufts and the white sky above ‘em. The ground crunched. It was vivid blue. Too vivid. Such was the why that I kept my gaze upward. Soon the tufts numbered fewer. Soon after that, they numbered none. We had crunched out of the forest.

  “Look, a stream, Bek. We’ll follow that,” said Kar.

  I lowered my chin to my chest and saw the tricklestream. Vivid blue ferns and grasses arched above it. The water was white, white as milk, white as the sky.

  “Is it yesterday yet?” My feeble balloon of a mind made me ask.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Violet

  We followed the tricklestream, crunchin
g along beside it in the vivid blue grass. Simple flowers, an oddly burned red in color, grew singly and far apart on the carpet of vivid blue. Kar led me by the hand, and my head began to pound with ache.

  “Kar … my head,” I groaned.

  “Oh, such! I remember now,” she announced, dropping to her knees by the tricklestream. “Dak warned me. Your wits, Bek. I’ll take care of ‘em.”

  She scooped white milk water from the stream and splashed it into my face. Icy cold it was. I gasped, and in the blink of a nince, the pounding in my head was swept away. I gasped again with clarity of thought returned.

  “Kar, I’m not hungry. I’m not thirsty. I don’t care about yesterday! My head doesn’t hurt! Why?” I blurted out, feeling lightning lively.

  “It’s the way of the Realms is all. Such is so. Dak told me that a splash of white would keep a bendo dreen sharply alive. I didn’t know what he meant. He wouldn’t explain. But now I know. I know now. You do feel sharply alive, Bek, don’t you? Don’t you feel sharply alive?” said Kar happily.

  “I … DO feel sharply alive,” I answered, and to prove it I danced a few steps, leaping from one side of the tricklestream to the other, ending each leap with a sweeping bow.

  Not to be outdone, Kar rolled into the tricklestream, kicking, splashing, and singing the Thorn Song at full scream. I joined her. We had a great wrestle water fight, singing and laughing. We dragged our dripping drenched selves onto the vivid blue grass. We stretched out and stared at the white of the sky. I pulled the Carven Flute from my belt and played a likely tune. Kar reached to unhook my chonka and rattle banged it, keeping time. We played tunes and tunes, all I could think of, and we dried off under the oat yellow sun.

  “Kar?” I mused when we had finished with songs and were resting in comfortable silence. “That sun. That oat yellow sun. Has it moved at all?”