Golden Door Chapter 19 Chris Down Under

May 7, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“Come on, now.” Deathwalker wanted to get them off the castle dock. “Careful where you step.” They slipped and slid to the end of the wood at the edge of the wet grass where they stopped and looked up the castle hill at the main gate. They could not see it well because of the fog that filled the air. It wafted through the air, hot ash mixed with sea water steam, and it smelled of sulfur.

“Careful,” Deathwalker said. “There will be guards.”

“There already are.” Watcher pointed. Rats poured out of rat holes dug beneath the main wall. Some came from the gate and some scrambled down from holes in the wall designed for archers. They began to swarm and soon looked like a bubbling river beneath the castle wall. They blotted out the grass and made the whole area look like a squirming rat color.

“Into the water. No, Rats can swim. Back to the boat. The grass is too wet to fire. Knives ready. Run!” Everyone said something, except Silverstain who simply screamed, even as a brilliant light appeared beside them. Crystal, the oread of the mountain, stepped out of a bright hole from some unknown place. Several dozen shepherd-like dogs followed her. They were all pure white except for a touch of pink inside the ears. Chris feared at first that this might be worse than the rats, until Deathwalker said a word with a sound of great relief.

“Hellhounds.”

Chris watched the dogs charge the rats. The rats abandoned their swarm and it looked like every rat for himself. He was about to say something when Redeyes tapped him on the shoulder and pointed. Catbird, Chris’ golden retriever, ran right in the middle of the dogs, barking his head off. He did not bite anything but looked to be having a great time dancing around, barking, like the best playtime.

Chris shouted, and Catbird came right up to him, panting and wagging his tail. The dog was not fooled or put off by Chris’ appearance, and he even let Silverstain pet him before he bounded off again to frolic and join the fun.

“Now’s our chance,” Deathwalker said and started forward toward the gate. He was the only one who really paid attention. The dogs had driven the rats down, around a corner of the castle wall. There were still a few rats between them and the gate; stragglers that escaped the main force of dogs and might still be tempted to attack the original target, but everyone had their knives ready and waiting.

Stalker and Crusher took the perimeter and kept most of the rats away. Redeyes cut one. Broomwick fried one and Watcher grabbed it for lunch, which Chris preferred not to watch. They made good progress up the castle hill but stopped within sight of their goal. There was a giant three-headed dog pulling against its chain, barking, and growling, and looking very hungry.

“Cerberus.” Deathwalker identified the beast.

“We could transition through the wall,” Redeyes suggested.

“No good,” Stalker said with a shake of his dark head. “Walls have guards which luckily can’t see well because of the mist.”

“No good,” Deathwalker echoed. “Transitioning through the wall sets off the alarm. The only alarm-free way in is the gate.”

“Transitioning?” Chris asked.

“Becoming insubstantial and walking through the wall. Like when we go to ground when the sun comes up.” Silverstain whispered and licked Chris’ ear. “You taste good.”

Chris was not sure how to take that, but Crusher interrupted with a word. “We got company.”

“Rats?” Watcher squeaked. All heads turned, expecting to see a pack of rats that escaped the dogs, but instead jaws dropped into the silence. Deathwalker finally named the visitor.

“A Knight of the Lance.”

Chris heard the respect in Deathwalker’s tone. He did not know what made this one a Knight of the Lance, whatever that was, but he saw the knight in shining armor with the lance pointed toward the three-headed, snarling dog, riding on a horse that looked to be running on air. Chris’ only thought became please, don’t kill the beast. They saw a brilliant flash of light just before the lance struck home. The goblins all moaned and covered their eyes. Chris and the fire sprites saw the knight vanish and the dog collapse.

“I’m blind,” Watcher yelled.

Broomwick quickly covered Watcher’s mouth. “Quiet.”

“The eyes will recover,” Stalker said.

“Quick, while the beast is down,” Deathwalker commanded. They staggered forward. Chris grabbed a blinking Silverstain with one hand and Redeyes with the other and move them forward. Heathfire took Stalker and Deathwalker by the arms. Broomwick brought Watcher and helped Crusher, though the troll insisted he could see.

When they reached the wall, teary eyes were working well enough. Chris wondered who had the key, but Deathwalker killed that notion. “We can transition through the gate without alarming anyone. Quickly now but stay hidden and quiet when you get inside.”

Chris kept looking at Cerberus. “Just sleeping,” Silverstain said with a smile, even as one of the dog heads began to snore. “Transition,” Silverstain added, and Chris looked up to see her half swallowed by the solid door with only her front half sticking out from the wood. “Think insubstantial,” she said and gave a little tug on Chris’ hand.

“It’s easy,” Redeyes said, and Chris watched while the goblin disappeared right through the gate. Redeyes’ head alone stuck out from the gate as the goblin must have turned around, and he whispered again, “It’s easy,” and the head disappeared.

“Come on.” Silverstain gave another tug on Chris’ hand.

“If I bump my nose, I’ll find a way to get even,” Chris said.

“Promises, promises,” Silverstain said, and she pulled Chris to where he saw his own hand disappear into the door before he thought to pull back. At that point, there was nothing to do but follow with the rest of his body.

“It feels funny, sort of like a ghost,” Chris said.

“Shh!” Silverstain hushed him as they came out on the other side, inside the castle. There were big boxes and bags dumped by the castle gate, like a delivery that no one bothered to put away. Deathwalker grabbed Chris’ free hand and pulled him and Silverstain behind the nearest box. The others all hid and waited.

“We need to move from cover to cover as much as possible,” Deathwalker whispered. “Hiding in the shadows doesn’t do much against goblin sight.” Chris nodded. He could see where the shadows were, but with his goblin eyes he could see them as only slightly less bright than the rest of the courtyard. There were torches at various points along the wall and a fire pit in the center of the courtyard, but they were harder to see than the shadow areas. With that, he truly realized what a bane the sun could be.

The group moved out slowly, crouched down, headed for the columns that ran along the edge of the courtyard. They got about half-way there when they heard a shout. At once, the yard filled with arrows and people started running as fast as possible back to the crates. Watcher took an arrow in his leg. Crusher took one in his side and roared.

Deathwalker pulled Chris’ head down and shouted at him. “What did the Angel tell you to say?”

“What?” Chris asked before he remembered. “He said, don’t be afraid.”

“What?” Deathwalker balked and the arrows did not cease. “Angels don’t talk that way. I was standing just on the other side of the door.”

“He said, don’t be afraid,” Chris insisted. “Don’t be afraid.”

“Do not, not don’t.” Deathwalker shouted again.

“You have to say the exact words,” Redeyes spoke up, even as he leaned in Chris’ direction. He got an arrow in his arm for his troubles and fell to the ground, face up, but in pain.

“All right,” Chris said, with an annoyed look on his face. “He said do not be afraid.”

Deathwalker threw his hat to the ground and swore. “Stupid and stubborn teenagers.”

Silverstain ran to her brother. “You have to say the whole thing, exactly for the magic to work.”

“Angel said,” Deathwalker prompted.

“Do not be afraid.” Chris shrugged. He had the right words in his mind, but he did not like being called stupid and stubborn. Just for that, he was going to be stupid and stubborn.

“The whole thing.” Deathwalker shouted a third time. “Angel told you to tell them what?”

Chris shook his head in the pretense that he did not remember.

Silverstain suddenly arched her back. She took an arrow in her kidneys, and Chris shouted. “Angel said do not be afraid.” The arrows stopped. They heard any number of archers fall to the ground. A few staggered out into the open and came up close for fear of the damage they might have done.

Heathfire and Broomwick popped out of the fire pit to rejoin them. Crusher bled badly from the wound in his side. Watcher held his leg and stared at it like he feared he might lose it. Stalker held his hand against his shoulder where an arrow scraped him and opened a big gash. Redeyes cried. Silverstain breathed rather shallow.

Deathwalker retrieved his hat and walked out into the courtyard without a word. Chris tried to think of every reason why this was not his fault, but he could not think of any. Deathwalker was right. He knew exactly what Angel told him to say almost from the start, but he felt determined to be stupid and stubborn, exactly as was said. For one brief moment, in an event most rare in all of history wherever teenagers have lived, this teenager felt a moment of remorse and whispered, “Sorry.”

A very goblin looking man ran up to Silverstain. “Doctor Burns!” he roared and tried to help Silverstain off Redeyes. The doctor came straight away and stopped the goblin’s hand.

“Don’t move her. Sorry Redeyes,” he said. “Back up.” The big goblin took a big step back.

“Lord Deepdigger,” Deathwalker called.

“Professor Deathwalker,” the big goblin turned.

“Let the doctor work. We have to free Goldenvein and the other ladies.”

The big goblin glanced back once before he said, “Right.”

Meanwhile, Heathfire and Broomwick each took Chris by an arm to help him along. “Don’t worry,” Heathfire said. “The doctor is my uncle. Silverstain is in the best hands.”

Chris swallowed to keep his eyes free of tears and his face straight. “So, are you planning on going to medical school?” Heathfire gave him a strange look. Broomwick laughed before he could stop himself.

************************

MONDAY

Beth struggles to enter the castle, but when they succeed, they are betrayed and beth has no memory of Angel telling her to say anything. Meanwhile, David and James try to set the women free. Until Next Time, Happy Reading

Golden Door Chapter 18 James at the Door, part 2 of 2

May 6, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Picker and Poker screamed, and Grubby let out a string of invectives which would have even horrified the most loose tongued redneck, if anyone listened. But before the panic could set in, the group found their escape route blocked by several winged creatures that came down to the lowest tree branches and grabbed on with their feet-claws with prehensile toes so they could keep their hands free. They were muddy colored with a kind of dark green mold color splattered around their skin, like army camouflage, and they were not more than three feet tall, but there were plenty of them. One of them spoke up against the rain.

“Lady Copperpot. Sir Pug. You must make a dash for the gate while you can. We will keep the bats busy for a time, but there are so many I don’t know if even we can kill and eat them all.”

“My thanks, good pixies,” Pug offered a salute.

“To the gate,” Mrs. Copperpot yelled, and turned her wolf.

James realized that the pixies were the reason everyone kept looking up during their journey. They were being followed from above for a long time, but of course, Mrs. Copperpot worried because she had no way of knowing if they were on the right side of things or if they had become slaves to Ashtoreth. James almost shrieked when the pixies first appeared, but he held his tongue and was now glad, because he had to save his shriek for when they came to the edge of the trees before the gate. They saw a beast, the biggest serpent of all lounging right in front of the door, and everyone stopped short. James added words to his shriek.

“What is that?”

“I don’t know,” Warthead said. He had stayed alongside James the whole way from the ogre lair, but now he stepped out on the main path for a better look.

James yelled, “No!”

Grubby yelled, “Warthead, No!”

The giant serpent lifted its head to gaze on the ogre, and Mrs. Copperpot breathed one word. “Basilisk.”

Pug added to the yelling. “Don’t look in its eyes.” Picker and Poker had their hands over their eyes so they would not have to look at the bats. There was no worry there, but for James, being human, the minute he heard “Don’t look in the eyes,” that became the thing he most wanted to do in all the universe. He would have looked, too, but for the distraction of localized thunder that sounded like it rumbled right down the main path. He looked there, instead, and saw a knight covered head to toe in plate armor, with a big lance held tight beneath the arm, riding on a tremendous steed that sounded like thunder as it charged.

Warthead had stopped moving where he left plenty of room for the knight to ride by. The basilisk, however, rapidly uncurled as it seemed to recognize the challenge and danger it faced. The knight grew close. The basilisk poised to strike when there came a tremendous flash of light, and everyone blinked. When they looked again, the knight had disappeared, and the basilisk began to thrash around. Pug recognized what happened.

“He blinded the beast.”

Mrs. Copperpot needed no more invitation than that. “Hurry.” She dismounted. “Run to the gate.” The serpent started whipping around, and while they faced the danger of someone being struck, the basilisk inevitably moving away from the gate.

“Run now!” Pug yelled and drove Picker and Poker ahead of him. Bogus and Reese stayed with the wolves, and after shouting ‘Good luck,” they rode off as fast as they could.

Grubby dismounted, grabbed James’ hand, and went straight to Warthead. “We got to go now,” Grubby yelled. James felt more worried and touched the ogre on the knee, just below eye level. He feared the ogre had turned to stone, but Warthead shook his head and looked down, so James hollered up.

“Go in the gate!” He turned and ran, and Grubby ran beside him with Warthead following.

“Ogre is half-stone already. Basilisk would have to look overtime to finish the job,” Grubby said.

Mrs. Copperpot rapped her cooking spoon against the door three times, and they heard the lock open. Then she and Pug and two motivated young dwarfs shoved the gate open. Once Warthead made it in, him being the last, they appreciated his help in closing the solid oak door that stood about twelve feet tall. It clicked when it shut. The lock fell back into place, and everyone breathed to be safe. The basilisk had been blinded and the bats remained outside the walls where they tried not to end up pixie food.

“That was a Knight of the Lance,” Mrs. Copperpot said, between deep breaths.

“Now, I don’t know,” Pug doubted it. “No one has seen a Knight of the Lance in Avalon for a thousand years, and with due respect, even you are not old enough to have seen one for sure.”

Mrs. Copperpot frowned at the gnome. “What else could it have been?” Pug prepared to answer her but got interrupted by a new, commanding voice.

“Stand where you are. We have you surrounded.” A hearty dwarf stood before them, hands on a big ax, surrounded by a dozen more, some armed with crossbows.

“Noen.” Mrs. Copperpot identified the speaker without adding his honorific, “Lord.”

“Grandmother,” Lord Noen responded. “You are a traitor to the realm, all of you, and you will be held in the dungeon pending trial.”

Warthead expressed exactly what everyone felt. “What?”

James had a different thought, and though his voice stayed soft and very unassuming, he said what he was told to say. “Angel said, do not be afraid.”

The dwarfs staggered. A couple collapsed to their knees. Most put their hands to their heads and shook them, like they were removing cobwebs. Noen staggered forward a few steps, his eyes on the ground. Then he looked up and seemed to see the group for the first time, and he spoke.

“Grandma. What are you doing here? You know it isn’t safe.”

“Noen,” Mrs. Copperpot commanded her grandson. “You need to take us to the dungeon. We have to set the ladies free first of all.”

Golden Door Chapter 18 James at the Door, part 1 of 2

May 5, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“Before we move off,” Pug rubbed his bearded chin as he spoke. “I’ve been thinking about James fallin’ off the bear. Let me see if there is something I can do.” He put fingers to his lips and let out a shrill whistle. The bear returned, moving carefully on the rocky path. Two mountain goats followed, far less concerned than the bear about slipping on the wet stones. Picker and Poker got one goat. James and Grubby got up on the other, which left Pug and Mrs. Copperpot to ride the bear. Warthead did not need the help, and they were not sure he was coming until he followed them down from the cave.

Down at the bottom of the hill, Pug made them get down and stop and wait. The goats, not comfortable so near the bear, headed back into the hills to be lost among the rocks. The bear also wandered off, but James got the impression it would be close if needed. It got uncomfortable when the rain started again, but they sheltered under the edge of the trees, which helped a bit. Mrs. Copperpot pulled out her cooking spoon and stared at James. She had something in mind but at the moment, James really did not want to know. He preferred to listen to Grubby complain about the rain.

“Don’t you know that I’m like cotton candy. I’m gonna wither and melt in the rain, like the Wicked Witch of the West. Why do you think imps live in the desert? I’m like a sponge and all this rain is gonna make me swell up until I’m Warthead’s size and you’re gonna have to wring me out like a wet washcloth and hang me on a line to dry. The rain is getting in through my hair.” He did have a hairy little body for one so young. “It’s gonna soak my insides all the way to my spine and I’m gonna get ricketies and Arthur-itis and have to walk bent over like old dotter human people. Sheesh!”

Mrs. Copperpot ignored the imp and clunked James on the head with her spoon. She held both Picker’s and Poker’s hands with one hand so she could give James a real bonk.

“Ouch.” James felt his head and imagined he would find a lump any minute.

“I should have done this right from the start, but it is hard to remember what human people are like,” Mrs. Copperpot said. “Now you got some dwarf endurance and no excuse for not keeping up. You will never run with the elves, but you can set a spritely pace and keep it up all day.”

“Thank you,” James said before they heard a rustling of leaves in the forest. A pack of a dozen wolves poked their heads out from the trees and two came right up to Pug.

Pug introduced the gnomes riding on those two wolves as Bogus and Reese, and they got down to join the others. James thought Smurfs, but he hoped he did not say it out loud. Besides, they were not blue.

“Now it is our turn,” Pug said, even when James realized that Reese was a girl. She stepped up first, and they all took turns with Pug giving James a big hug. That was it. There was no singing or chanting or dancing or pelting James with dust or dirt or grass or anything; and there was no hitting on the head either, for which James was grateful. When they were done, a she wolf stepped right up to James. James felt surprised to know it was a she wolf, but she wolf or he wolf, James still had to hold his feet to the ground and not run. The wolf thought at him. That was how James described it, like a picture suddenly transported into his mind. Then the wolf licked his face and James tried not to say, “Eww.”

“Ride with me,” the she-wolf thought, and James did not dare argue. He got on the wolf’s back as carefully as he could to avoid pulling the wolf’s hair.

“Hold on with your knees, like on a horse,” Pug instructed, though James had never ridden a horse so he could only guess. “And there is a handful of skin at the back of the wolf’s neck you can grab. It won’t hurt her.”

Pug got everyone up on other members of the pack, though Picker and Poker were rightly scared, and Warthead, of course, needed no such help, having very long legs to carry him along. Neither was there a wolf that could hold him. Even the bear would have struggled with Warthead’s weight, despite Warthead’s youth. But at last, when everyone got ready, Pug led them into the dark, rain-soaked forest. Bogus and Reese brought up the rear with the pups in the pack.

It did not take long to reach the spot where they encountered the spiders. Mrs. Copperpot, Pug and Grubby kept looking up whenever they came to a clear spot, though James imagined it had to be impossible to see anything through the rain. James did not want to look, and he did not feel happy about being out in the wilderness when he started to hear the thunder and lightning in the distance.

“Rain’s gonna get dangerous when the lightning catches us,” Bogus yelled from the rear.

“Keep your eyes open for tornadoes,” Reese added, and Picker and Poker both yelped at the idea of tornadoes. Grubby did not mind so much because he thought Reese said watch out for the tomatoes.

They came to the rough, side path that led to the postern gate and moved carefully, eyes, ears, and noses as open as they could be. It was not long before they came to the wall, and the path took them to the left, toward the gate itself.

“And I thought this little, forgettable gate might be unguarded,” Mrs. Copperpot mumbled.

“I thought the same,” Pug agreed. “I said I have been watching this gate, but the demon in the castle doesn’t miss a trick. She has all the basic guards here, like all the gates. You found the snakes. The spiders were a bit of a surprise. Then, we got the bats.”

“Bats?” Mrs. Copperpot interrupted.

“Oh, sure,” Pug said, clearly not thinking about what he was saying. “Vampire bats, big as your dwarf arm.”

“Bats,” Mrs. Copperpot yelled, and the wolves certainly understood something. They began to turn around even as the sky filed with a cloud darker than the rainclouds, and one that flapped and screeched.

Golden Door Chapter 17 David Home Free, part 2 of 2

April 30, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

Floren ignored the old elf, having her eyes focused on the castle. “The front gate is bound to be guarded. We could swim over the wall at some point,” she suggested.

“Not recommended,” a new voice spoke, and David squinted to see who or what it was, thinking at first one of the mermen followed them. Then he imagined it must be a merchild because the voice had a child-like quality to it. A figure formed in the water, like one made out of water, and it looked to David like a jelly baby or maybe a translucent gingerbread man. The figure continued.

“Going over the wall sets off alarms. The gate is guarded, but my people can lead them away. Where is the son of the Kairos?”

“Here.” David raised his hand. He had learned he had to admit that much and there was no use in hiding. He knew his father was the Kairos even if he was still not certain exactly who this Kairos was. At once he found himself surrounded by jelly babies. They pressed up against him and swirled around him in a way that made him start to swirl with them. The current they created turned him around and around until he got dizzy. He swallowed hard when the swirling stopped, because he thought it would be impolite to throw up.

“Now the young lord can have some say over wind and wave if you manage to escape the creature in the castle and get back to the surface,” the first jelly baby said.

“My thanks, Lord Sweetwater,” Inaros returned a warm smile. The jelly baby turned to him.

“Don’t mention it, you old coot of a pirate. Just be ready to go when the time comes.” Lord Sweetwater broke the gingerbread outline that held his body together and blended back into the sea. It felt strange to watch. David found himself staring.

“Water sprites,” Floren explained for David. “They are as anxious as the rest of us to overcome Ashtoreth and the demons trying to destroy our home.” And they waited and watched.

It looked to David like a great fist formed in the water. The fist looked made of water, but it had the same kind of Jell-O-like look the water sprite used to hold his form together. It crashed hard into the gate, pulled back and crashed a second time. After it crashed the third time, the fist came apart into a hundred different sprites. Mermen, enchanted mermen as Inaros explained, came pouring out of the gate with cattle prods. Apparently, they intended to give the nearest sprite a jolt. Fortunately, the sprites were quick. They easily lead the mermen down the hill and across the underwater meadow, away from the gate.

“Now!” Inaros and Floren spoke at the same time and the swimmers made a dash for the gate. They would have made it, too, if a tentacle did not shoot out from the caste and wrap around Inaros. The suckers on that tentacle said this was no ordinary squid. A second tentacle caught David by the arm and a third caught Floren by one leg. The boys both screamed as the squid squeezed out from beneath the portcullis.

David screamed with the boys as he tried to peel the tentacle from his arm. Floren yelled for help as they saw Mickey O’Mac arrive with the strangest sight David had yet seen in this strange world. It was a knight in armor, covered head to toe in shining plate, riding a white horse, a lance tucked neatly under his arm. It looked to be riding as it might have ridden on flat, dry ground, and being underwater did not appear to make the least bit of difference.

The knight charged for the kill, but that is not what it did. One touch of the lance and the giant squid exploded, just like the water fist, but instead of sending out a hundred water sprites, it turned into hundreds of tiny squid that littered the castle hill and splattered against the castle wall. David watched as the knight faded from sight before entering the castle. “It just vanished,” he said later, to anyone who would listen.

Floren and Inaros recovered quickly and grabbed David. Alden and Oren were ahead of them for a change, and Mickey went right with them. They all entered the gate and came into a courtyard where they fell to the ground. The water did not follow them in.

“Hold it right there, you traitors.” An elf in bright golden armor stood in front of them and a dozen elves holding elf bows with arrows at the ready had them surrounded.

“Father?” Floren spoke to the armored elf who was in fact, Lord Strongheart.

“Did we transition to the upper castle?” Mickey whispered.

“Air bubble,” Inaros answered in not so quiet a voice. “The water is still up to the gate and overhead. There’s a storm above the sea, but not raining here.”

David had his hands up in surrender, like he had seen in a million movies. “What can we do now?” he asked to no one in particular.

“What did Angel tell you?” Inaros saved that question all through the journey. He was not certain Angel told David anything, but he hoped.

“Angel said, do not be afraid.” David came right out with it. He kind of whispered it and kind of asked it like a question, but the words were spoken. The elf in armor immediately doubled over like a man hit in the gut. Oren raced toward his father, while the elves around them fell to the ground and trembled. Floren followed her brother, but by the time she arrived, their father started recovering.

“Floren? Oren?” Strongheart grabbed his children and gave them great hugs. “But what are you doing here?” He looked around. “Where are we?”

“Castle under the sea,” Inaros said as he stepped up and bowed to his Lord.

“I remember,” Strongheart said, and his face turned to anger and hate. It appeared terrible to see, but he quickly looked away and into the castle where the demon Ashtoreth was located.

“No time for that,” Mickey shouted to be sure he was heard. “Dungeon first to free the ladies.”

“You can put your hands down,” Inaros told David, and Alden helped him lower his hands while Strongheart stood.

“This way,” the elf Lord commanded, and they headed toward the dungeon, but now as liberators rather than prisoners.

************************

MONDAY

James reaches the back door but it is no easier getting into the castle than it was for David. Chris also finds the castle door guarded. Until Monday, Happy Reading

Golden Door Chapter 17 David Home Free, part 1 of 2

April 29, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

It took a few minutes for all the swimmers to get their bearings, not to mention coming to realize that they were not going to drown. They left the naiad’s grotto, in part being pulled out by the current, and went to sea. They needed to find the underwater castle of Amphitrite. David had asked who Amphitrite was, but all Inaros said was “Your father.” It seemed to David his father was practically everyone.

David looked around, more surprised that his eyes did not sting from the salt water than he was about being able to see at that depth with a darkening sky overhead. Back home, David hated to get his eyes wet and never opened them in a pool, let alone in the ocean at the beach. But here, he saw quite well, and certainly well enough to see skinny old Inaros, with his long legs and long arms, looking very much like a frog. Floren undulated her body, more like a snake, or he imagined a mermaid. It felt hard to tell how Oren and Alden looked in swimming because they were already playing shark and about to fall behind.

“Keep up,” Floren yelled at them, and David got startled. He did not know they could talk underwater.

“We got a coral reef ahead,” a different voice startled David. Mickey O’Mac swam beside him, laying on his back with his hands behind his head and kicking with his feet. He grinned as he turned again to his stomach and swam down toward the coral. David followed.

The reef appeared all pink and green, but the colors were dulled because the light was dim. “Must be a real blow going on up there,” Inaros said. He saw David and Mickey and followed them down, but David did not see him, so he jumped again. “Sorry. Can’t hear well down here. You never know when someone might be sneaking up on you.”

David nodded and felt a bump on his leg. He figured it was Alden or Oren, but when he turned, he saw the teeth of the shark as it turned and opened its mouth. A string of some kind shot out from between David and Inaros. It slapped the shark in the mouth and left a thin layer of something like jell or plastic which effectively cut off the danger from the teeth. The shark turned aside and David looked at Mickey. He appeared dazed from the exertion of whatever that stringy magic was.

David felt his hand grabbed by Inaros and he, in turn, grabbed Mickey by the scruff of his collar. “More coming,” Inaros said as he headed them straight toward the reef. There were a dozen sharks, not far off, and coming on fast. David wanted no part of it. “In here,” Inaros said, dragging David toward a hole in the coral no more than ten inches in diameter.

“I can’t fit in there.” David started into his liturgy of protest, but Mickey, somewhat recovered, cut him off.

“Get small,” he said and he and Inaros both yanked on David’s hands and pulled him right into the little hole.

The big shark, a great white, which had gotten mostly free of its mouth covering, came seconds behind. It smashed its own snout into the hole with enough force to collapse the coral all around. If a shark could be said to be angry, this was an angry shark. The hole became covered with debris that blocked their exit, but Mickey hollered at them from the back.

“There’s another way out at the back of the reef.” David and Inaros both sighed relief and followed. The way through the coral seemed full of twists and turns, and some jagged spots where they had to be careful, but soon enough they popped out of the coral and resumed their normal sizes. Immediately, David wanted to get small again, but he was not sure how. The great white, its mouth now free, showed a remarkable degree of intelligence and swam over the top of the reef to get at them on the other side.

“Run!” Mickey shouted. He went left and Inaros went right, but David stayed frozen for a moment in the face of those terrible teeth. The great mouth started to open when two spears shot straight into that maw. Again, the shark turned aside and began to thrash about in an attempt to dislodge the projectiles. Its jaws snapped shut and sliced right though the metal spear shafts, but it was the damage on the inside that it could not do anything about. The shark had no gag reflex to rid itself of anything, once eaten.

Two mermen came up alongside David. They had something like crossbows in their hands, and the weapons were loaded. They only seemed to be waiting for a clear shot to finish the monster. Floren came wiggling up and grabbed David by his shirt collar in much the same way he had grabbed Mickey, and she hauled him off in the direction of Inaros. Together, with Oren and Alden, they entered an underwater forest where the weeds grew thirty and forty feet high.

Floren and Inaros lead the way while David sought for safety and squeezed between Oren and Alden. The boys stayed quiet, but Alden especially looked around for monsters hiding between the weed trees, or sharks that might be following them. Oren was the one who pointed out the mermaids who paced them, mostly hidden in the weeds. David could not be sure, but he imagined they were giggling. They seemed to regularly point at Inaros and his frog stroke. David did not blame them for giggling.

They stopped at the edge of the forest and looked out on the castle hill. It looked exactly like the one above, with more towers and spires than David could count, some of which went right up out of sight to poke above the surface of the sea. Far off to their right, the sea appeared to be boiling. There were occasional flashes of red and it looked like a mound was slowly building.

Inaros explained. “An underwater volcano, but I don’t know if a new island is forming in the archipelago or if Avalon is slowly falling apart.” He shook his head, sadly.

Golden Door Chapter 16 Beth in Flight, part 2 of 2

April 28, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“We should have fair weather.” Zinnia suggested.

“But sometimes in June we get a brief storm or two.” Mistletoe guessed.

“Yes, but this does not look like a brief storm to me.” Mrs. Aster pointed, and the girls finally looked to see a massive dark gray cloud on the horizon, coming on fast. Beth thought she saw a bit of lightning. But before they could respond again, before Beth could ask what they might do to avoid the storm, Holly came rushing up, followed by the other two girls.

“Carrion eaters!” Holly shrieked and zipped back to Beth’s shoulder to hide in Beth’s hair. Beth looked, and there were indeed, a bunch of black spots coming rapidly toward them from the opposite direction. The carrion eaters looked something like vultures and something like people, and they were between them and their objective; or at least in the direction they were headed.

“Geese!” Hyacinth said sharply. She pointed toward the storm, and indeed, it looked like a whole gaggle fleeing from the weather. “Swans!” The fairies cheered, and Beth wondered until Mrs. Aster explained.

“The swan people have not given into the demon-goddess, and they despise the carrion eaters.”

All the same, it looked like they would be in the middle of the fray when those two opposing forces met. Beth became suddenly frightened, until she got distracted from above. Three new fairies descended upon them.

“Dogwood!” Mistletoe shouted at the one dressed all in white, and she zoomed ahead which let Beth know just how much they had actually slowed down to accommodate her much slower air speed.

“The others are Pinoak and Cherry.” Holly whispered in Beth’s ear even as Beth realized that these were men, or perhaps young men. Holly still hid in her hair. Zinnia joined her on Beth’s other shoulder, as the young ones seemed shy in front of the men.

“Straight up! This way!” Pinoak shouted and Mrs. Aster agreed. Of course, fairies never fly in a straight line, but in this case, they tried as that line of darkness started coming on much too fast, and the closer it came, the more frightening it looked.

They started up, but soon realized that Beth was going too slow.

“We aren’t going to make it!” Dogwood yelled over the growing din of the storm as he came back to grab Beth’s hand, or her finger. Cherry grabbed her other hand, and they began to drag her up.

“Hurry!” Holly shouted as the black clouds were almost on them. She and Zinnia followed Mistletoe to where they began to push from below. Beth could hardly register a complaint, though, before the girls shrieked and zoomed past her. Dogwood and Cherry also had to let go at the last as the blackness enveloped Beth.

Beth held her breath and felt more like she was underwater than in a cloud. She was instantly soaked, and almost had to swim to the surface more than fly. When her head broke free, she heard Mrs. Aster and the girls. “Beth! Beth!” Beth did not stop at the surface of the wet, but broke free and continued upward only to be enveloped almost immediately with real, black storm clouds. The rain started to pour with very little preliminaries, and once again Beth could hardly see, though at least she could breathe.

“Beth.” She heard Mrs. Aster again and saw a bright light beside her. The others came to that light, surrounded her, and began to generate their own fairy lights. They glowed like little angels in the darkness. Beth did her best to add her glow to the mix, but it seemed a pitiful thing next to the fairies.

“We have to get above the storm,” Dogwood insisted. Again, Mrs. Aster agreed, and so they still went up and up. They had to stop, though, when a great stroke of lightning flashed through the darkness not a hundred yards above their heads. The thunder sounded deafening.

“Tornado!” Daffodil spotted the terror barreling down on their position as if it had a mind to find and destroy them. The fairies bravely rushed between Beth and the monstrous whirlwind, as if somehow to protect her. Beth turned and saw Fluffy and Flitter close by; or at least she thought it was them, with about ten more and they were holding hands, or cloudy mittens and dancing in a circle. They began to chant.

“Nimbus, Nimbus, come and save us,

Hear our cry through wind and rain.

Nimbus, Nimbus, Kairos’ daughter

Come before we call again.”

Of course, they repeated the chant over and over until Beth saw a blackness darker than the storm clouds; dark enough to rival the black water below. Beth gasped, but the blackness first passed over them and seemed to strike the tornado to send it spinning away in another direction. Then the blackness turned, and Beth felt sure this thing had something to direct it. In a breath of time, it had swallowed them all.

Inside the blackness, Beth and the fairies found a chamber of sorts, completely cloud free. The first thing Beth noticed, however, was the silence, as the fury of the storm became suddenly cut off from their perception.

“My thanks, Lord Nimbus.” Mrs. Aster breathed heavily. “I am getting too old for this.” The other fairies, men and women, said nothing. They hovered quiet and appeared respectful.

“We all are,” Beth said.

Beth jumped when she heard the voice she expected, though not the way she expected it. The voice itself rumbled, more softly, but like the very thunder which moments ago had frightened her half to death. Then she saw a face form on one of the walls of the chamber. It appeared a full bearded face that looked stern, though not unkind. “Kairos’ daughter. Let me look at you,” the face said. Beth found herself unable to move until Holly and Zinnia gave her a little push from behind. “Yes. Turn around.” Beth hardly had a choice as the wind caught her and turned her twice. “I see,” Lord Nimbus said. “She has been given gifts. Flight ought to be a natural thing, but the beauty I don’t understand.” Beth turned once more. “But now the sight? You fee have eyes of eagles, better than eagles; but I would have guessed this was beyond your magic. She has eyes to scan the surface of the sun.”

Mrs. Aster shook her head. “We did not do this,” she said. “It was the glorious one.”

“Eh?”

“The Servant of the Source,” Mrs. Aster said quietly, and she was going to say no more.

Lord Nimbus paused. “I see.” He spoke with utmost seriousness before he brightened. “Still, with all that, she is hardly in a position to defend herself if that should prove necessary.” Without asking, a bolt of lightning shot from the eyes of the face on the wall, struck Beth in the solar plexus and knocked her back against the far wall, which fortunately stayed cloud soft. Beth felt dazed, but fine as the fairies all gathered around her with worried looks. As Beth stood, she began to glow with a glow as strong as the fairies.

“There,” Lord Nimbus said. “Now she can make her own light, I should think, though I suppose it will not likely make a difference in the castle. She should have a little left over as well.”

“Like this.” Mrs. Aster tried to get Beth’s attention. She stripped the glow from herself and held a glowing ball in her hands, like holding a lit light bulb.

“This?” Beth shook her head to clear her thoughts. She held out her hands and tried to concentrate, but that started to give her a headache, so she just let it happen, and shortly, she had a much larger glowing ball in her own hands.

“Now let it go,” Mrs. Aster said, and she let her ball float free.

Beth also let go and watched her ball float up toward the center of the room to give light to all.

“Now enough.” Mrs. Aster said, and she clapped her hands and her ball of light dissipated. Beth also clapped her hands, but her light sparkled first before the electricity went off.

“Very good,” Mrs. Aster said; but by then the words of Lord Nimbus caught up to Beth’s mind.

“What do you mean a little left over?” she asked, but the face had gone, and in a moment the whole crew got ejected onto a field of grass. The sky still rained, and the wind felt horrendous, but they seemed to have been deposited on solid ground, and there did not seem to be any more tornados about.

“Ash,” Mrs. Aster identified something that looked to have turned the grass gray. Beth thought it was just the lighting under the storm, but Mistletoe agreed, and the fairies went to the edge of the field. They saw a dull orange light far off down below. Holly named it.

“Volcano.”

It looked to Beth like one of the mountaintops down below cracked open, and then she thought to step back from the edge, even if she could fly.

In truth, she found a castle in the sky, and one not made out of clouds. The grass out front and in the court looked just as lush, and the hills out back looked just as forested, and with real trees, and while the number of spires and towers on this castle could hardly be counted, it seemed curious because some of the tops of towers appeared to come up through the clouds from some other castle down below.

Golden Door Chapter 16 Beth in Flight, part 1 of 2

April 23, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“But Mistletoe,” Beth said in a sudden surge of common sense. “How long will I be able to fly?”

Mistletoe was not sure. “A year at least,” she said. “More? Honestly? Probably your whole life. But anyway, it has the virtue of stopping only when your feet are firmly back on the ground. The magic won’t stop when you are still in the air.”

Beth was not sure if that sounded quite right. She remembered in the back of her mind that the little ones, as Mistletoe called them, could be tricky; but the feeling of flying felt too exhilarating to think anymore. She happily followed Mistletoe right up to the clouds.

When they arrived at cloud level, they found Hyacinth, Daffodil and Holly playing “swirlies” in the cloud. They spun around and around as they slowly fell to make little whirlpools in the white fluff. Mistletoe and Zinnia tried it once before they prevailed on Beth to try. She was flying big, of course, and she made such a whirlpool, the others squealed in delight. Beth was delighted in turn by the sound of their fairy laughter, which is known to be a powerful enchantment, but then Beth made the mistake of looking down. This did not agree with her at all, and so she began to look to the left and right instead as she tried to get her head to stop spinning.

She realized again that they were indeed on an island. She had caught sight of the distant sea on her way up, but she was not exactly sure even then if it was an island or a peninsula because there were some very high mountains in the distance, so she thought to ask.

“It is an island. The hills rise up to the mountains before falling away again to the sea,” Mistletoe explained.

There were also other islands Beth could see in the distance.

“The archipelago,” Holly said. She zoomed up to Beth’s ear to try out the word.

“The islands of the Kairos,” Mistletoe continued to explain. “No one knows exactly how many islands there are. Some fall away now and then, but there are more being added all of the time.”

“There’s Dragon Island, and Amazon Island,” Daffodil said.

“The isle of the pretty maids.” Zinnia posed in mid-air and the others razzed her.

“There’s an island for the centaurs and fauns, one for the Were people, and even an island just for horses, though the dragons visit there once in a while to keep the population down,” Hyacinth said.

“And there’s a gypsy island, though it isn’t tied down,” Holly said.

“All the islands move once in a while,” Mistletoe said. “You can never be completely certain which one is on the horizon.”

“But the gypsy island moves all the time,” Holly said.

“Like that?” Beth pointed out to sea. But no, she thought that looked like three islands moving along and kind of bobbing and weaving through the water. All the fairies looked, and all screamed at once.

“Sea Monster!” They hid in the folds of Beth’s clothes, except Holly who rushed to hide in Beth’s hair. Beth laughed.

“Now I really don’t think that monster can reach all of the way up here. Besides, it does look to be moving away from us.”

Daffodil spoke first. “I knew that.” She said, but the others laughed at her because, to be sure, she had not thought of that.

By then the game of swirlies was forgotten, and Holly started pulling again. “Come-ony.”

The next cloud up looked covered with a field of beautiful pink colored puffs, like cotton puffs died a soft shade of sunset. It looked to Beth that the girls were picking and eating the pink fluff, like cotton candy, or little pink strawberries. Zinnia came up.

“Try one,” she encouraged. Beth first looked at the fairy closely, but then opened her mouth and closed her eyes. Zinnia threw the biggest one she could find into Beth’s mouth. It did, indeed, taste a little like a strawberry, but sweeter and without the grit or seedy skin. She marveled at the flavor when she heard the word of protest.

“Hey! No stealing the puffberries. We worked hard to grow them, isn’t that right Fluffy?”

“Right you are, Flitter.” Beth heard the female voice, but she could not see who was speaking. “Hard work it is, too, so no pinching them.”

All the fairies, except Mistletoe, darted behind Beth’s back and looked like children with their hands caught in the cookie jar.

“Flitter! There’s a ground clunker up here!” The female voice sounded astonished.

“So there is, Fluffy. A clunker for sure.” Flitter responded, and Beth finally recognized the speakers. They looked like little clouds, except with animated arms, legs, and shaking heads which stuck up slightly from the rest of their cloud-like bodies. They had cute little faces too, and Beth had to try hard to hold on to a serious expression.

“We are very sorry,” Beth said. “I did not know these were yours. I apologize.”

“Well, they’re not ours, exactly,” Fluffy said.

“Not exactly.”

“But, Hey! How did you get up here?”

“Yea, how?”

“Kairos’ daughter,” Mistletoe said, as if that explained everything. Beth saw the male remove a hat which she had not even realized he was wearing.

“Oh, well, that differentiates things,” Flitter said.

“All differentiated.” Fluffy agreed as she gave a little curtsey. They were agreeable creatures, to be sure, and the fairies came out slowly from behind Beth’s back.

“Can you show us the way to the castle?” Mistletoe asked to change the subject.

“Why sure,” Fluffy said. “Just one trail up. Can’t miss it.”

“Sticks up right there.” Flitter pointed at a misty shape through the cloud. “Run right into it.”

“Plenty of puffberries there,” Fluffy added.

“Puffberries every night,” Flitter said, plainly.

“Thank you kindly,” Mistletoe said for all as the girls that already dashed ahead.

“Thank you.” Beth echoed Mistletoe while the sprites bowed and went back to their puffberry field. Mistletoe started out and Beth followed right along; but her mind felt perplexed as every encounter seemed to raise new questions. The cloud or air sprites raised a whole host of thoughts. “So how can there be a real castle in the sky?” she asked out loud. She thought of a cloud castle like she might have seen from the ground. “If it was a real castle, wouldn’t it fall through the clouds and go crashing down to the earth?”

Mistletoe shook her head as she screwed up her beautiful face. This was clearly something she never considered before.

“All connected,” Zinnia said. “The castle here and the castle on the ground are all connected.” That did not really explain much.

“You have a room here, and down below. Same room,” Hyacinth said.

“I do?” Beth felt surprised to hear she had her own room in the castle, though not surprised if her father was indeed this Kairos they talked about.

“All goes together.” Daffodil tried to explain better. Beth wondered if it would be too unsteady to make her home in the clouds.

“But not connected at the same time,” Mistletoe added in a serious tone. “Junior’s castle in the sky is also an island in the chain of islands. When you stay here, you will find it a castle on an island surrounded by sea.”

Beth looked around and saw the blue sky around the clouds, but it did not seem like water in the least.

“Hard to explain.” Holly tried very hard to be serious, like her sister, but she was not entirely successful. “Everything here folds and curves in new and crazy ways, and it is not like back on Earth.” Holly stopped and touched her head like she might be getting a little fairy headache.

“You just got to be here,” Mistletoe said. She flitted over to hug her sister which brought back a smile. “You get used to it.”

One more cloud up and they rejoined Mrs. Aster. She hovered to wait for them and concentrate on something in the distance. “I don’t like the look of the sky,” Mrs. Aster said as they started moving again. The sun was out where they were, and the clouds looked soft and white, so the others did not know what she was talking about.

************************

MONDAY

Beth runs into trouble but find the castle in the clouds. David finds the castle under the sea but getting in proves difficult. Until Next Time, Happy Reading

Golden Door Chapter 15 Chris in the Camp, part 2 of 2

April 22, 2025March 9, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

There followed a half-dozen waves altogether, but the last ones got progressively smaller. The underground sea calmed and Deathwalker yelled at Crusher to turn toward the castle as quickly as possible. “The ash and steam are almost upon us!”

Chris stood and separated again from Silverstain who looked suddenly innocent and demure and returned to her seat. Chris brushed himself off while the others began to rise, except Watcher who appeared content to hide under his hood.

“Incoming!” They all heard the word, but it took a second to realize Heathfire had abandoned the furnace, and Broomwick was with her. They struck Chris, still in fire form, and Chris became covered in flame. He was on fire, but curiously not burnt, and as soon as Heathfire and Broomwick retreated to the furnace, the fire began to go out. Heathfire spoke again out of the furnace, and it had the metallic echo Chris expected.

“Volcanic ash burns. Now Chris will be able to make his own fire,” she did not explain as the ash slowly settled into the sea and began to sizzle all around them. A number of flakes hit the boat and Redeyes, Crusher and Silverstain received a few burns, but none seemed severe. Chris felt some on his head and arms and put his hand out to catch one. It felt plenty warm, but no worse than a warm rain, and even his hair resisted the flames. The boat, however, caught fire in a few places and they had to douse the flames while Deathwalker, Redeyes, and a reluctant Watcher joined in some magic that put something like an invisible umbrella over the top of the ship.

Crusher kept them pointed toward the castle island while the fire sprites turned up the steam.

“More faggots!” Broomwick echoed from inside the furnace. Stalker made to reach for Watcher, but Watcher jumped back.

“Not funny!”

The goblin laughed, a truly evil sounding laugh, even as Deathwalker hit him in the shoulder, and they turned to feed the furnace with more coal.

Chris reached for Silverstain’s hand. “Let me see it,” he said, but she turned her arm away from him.

“It doesn’t hurt.”

“Come on,” he insisted.

Redeyes butted up with a bit of sarcasm. “He just wants to hold your hand.”

“Oh,” Silverstain breathed and gave her brother an evil look, like only a true goblin can give, and held out her arm. Chris examined the small blister and thought to kiss it, but his tongue got ahead of him, so he ended up licking the burn. The blister immediately shrank and disappeared, and the redness went away. “Oh,” Silverstain breathed again, but this time it sounded like surprise. Deathwalker spoke to Redeyes.

“He is the son of the Kairos. The attraction can’t be helped.”

Redeyes nodded. No doubt he felt it too, but his mouth shouted something else. “Kraken!”

A long strand of seaweed came up over the rail of the ship, but it slithered like a snake. It wrapped around Silverstain, and she screamed—a chilling, earsplitting sound. A second strand grabbed Crusher around the leg. A third and fourth strand flopped on to the deck, but Heathfire and Broomwick were right there to flame the seaweed tentacles, and they quickly withdrew, not liking the fire at all.

Chris grabbed the weed around Silverstain while Redeyes grabbed his sister to keep her from being dragged overboard. Chris felt the flame, having caught Heathfire out of the corner of his eye. In a moment, his hands were on fire and something at sea let out a low moan that rapidly rose to a high-pitched squeal. The strand of seaweed uncoiled from Silverstain, but it was damaged, and the fire did not go out until it struck the water.

Crusher snapped the weed around his leg and tossed the dead end back into the sea. Deathwalker shouted at the sprites. “Get those paddles moving. It is far off, but it will get closer.” He had a sword in his hand. Who knew where he got it from, but as Chris looked, he saw the whole crew was armed. There were two axes along with the sword, and several wicked looking knives.

“How do you know how far away it is?” Chris asked as Silverstain pulled a stiletto from some unseen pocket. Chris imagined she did not have enough clothes on to carry such a weapon, but Redeyes distracted him with an answer.

“Very small, leading-edge tentacles. The closer it gets, the bigger the tentacles will get.”

“Great,” Chris said in his best sarcastic voice, and he began to look around for a weapon of his own. The next ten minutes were spent hacking, chopping, and burning Kraken tentacles which were indeed getting larger, but then Watcher shouted into the dark.

“Firedrake!”

Chris’ first thought was, great, with an extra dose of sarcasm. He imagined they had their hands full already. But when he looked, he saw some bird-like animal that glowed a deep red. It seemed hard to tell at that distance, like it was hard to tell what the Kraken in the distance might look like, until the bird, or whatever it was, spewed a great burst of flame. Something caught fire that appeared to be five stories high and as wide as a city block. The tentacles withdrew from the ship and Chris saw waterspouts shoot up into the sky and douse the flames that had to be on the Kraken’s head. The firedrake had to thread carefully between the spouts. It swooped over the ship and headed back out to flame the Kraken again from above.

“That’s Uncle Burns drake riding,” Heathfire shouted and clapped.

“Get this tub moving,” Deathwalker shouted back. “A single drake might startle the beast, but the Kraken will be back. It has touched soft flesh.”

“Can’t be talking about me,” Crusher said with a tusky grin, as he turned the ship back toward the castle island.

“They usually stay in the deep.” Deathwalker said to Chris. “The earthquake must have shaken it to the surface.”

“Earthquake?” Chris pointed at what he finally realized was lava pouring out of a crack in the wall.

“Volcanic result,” Deathwalker said. “That is how the firedrake got loose, but it has to go back now to refuel, you might say.”

Something bumped the bottom of the ship. “Get ready,” Redeyes said, though Chris wondered how ready they could get. That bump felt and sounded like a very big tentacle. Several smaller tentacles crept up the side of the ship and the ship stopped moving altogether.

“Over the side,” Crusher yelled.

“No wait!” Deathwalker shouted above the noise of creaking, cracking planks. Something blue, some electrical charge ran down the sides of the ship and the Kraken let go. They all heard the low moan again and saw when the moan rose to the shrill shriek. The Kraken in the distance became covered in blue sparkles, and Chris understood that something or someone was electrocuting the beast. He watched it submerge even as he lost his footing and collapsed to the deck. The boat got picked right out of the water and started flying toward the castle. Watcher lost his footing. Silverstain spread her legs and fell to her hands. Stalker, Redeyes and Deathwalker held themselves upright by gripping with their toes. Crusher, of course, had the tiller, and Broomwick and Heathfire still burned in the furnace until the ship steadied. They came out and took solid form which Chris then understood was not their natural form.

“Lady Alice?” Chris asked.

Deathwalker shook his head. “My guess would be Crystal, the oread of the mountain.”

They got deposited at the castle dock. It looked soaked from the tidal waves that went through, as was most of the hill, but they saw a woman on the dock, and she looked to be pacing despite the dock being slippery when wet. She also held one hand to her side like a person who might have a bad muscle cramp.

“Let me see him.” The woman did not shout, but she was heard by all. Stalker and Watcher got busy making the boat fast to the dock. Redeyes, Silverstain and Crusher kept back. A demigoddess was not someone they wanted to mess with. Fortunately, Chris did not really understand the dynamics, so he was not put off when Deathwalker took him by the arm and moved him forward.

Crystal, the oread, walked all the way around Chris and complimented Deathwalker. “The disguise is good. He looks very average. And I see you made his lungs able to withstand the toxic fumes you sometimes encounter underground.”

“That was Stalker who came up with that,” Deathwalker admitted. “Lady Alice picked him.”

“And no doubt for good reason,” Crystal said, and she let out the hint of a smile. All this time, her hand remained on her side. Chris felt curious but held his tongue. This woman had skin the color of fine marble and hair that doubled for her clothes, but it was her eyes that intrigued Chris the most. The pupils were as clear and colorless as a mountain spring, but like prisms, they showed a kaleidoscope of every color, like little rainbows every time her eyes moved. Chris hardly paid attention when the woman said, “One more thing is needed.” He felt startled, briefly, when she raised her hand and placed it on his head.

“A gift?” Mister Walker asked.

“Insubstantial, but not invisible at Lady Alice’s insistence. She said she did not want her son’s molecules scattered all over creation.”

“Lady!” Redeyes gasped and spoke. They all noticed the bleeding gash on the Lady’s side where her hand had been.

“He will now be able to walk through the earth and stone, and castle walls.” She did smile while Chris looked quickly at her cut and then shot his eyes to the crack in the cavern wall where the lava continued to seep out and flow into the sea. “I am the mountain,” the Lady said, and vanished. The goblins and Crusher all bowed their heads, but Chris looked around and caught Silverstain’s eye.

“You have a mirror?” Deathwalker spoke quickly. Of course, she did.

“Now, don’t panic. You can take off the frightening aspect with a bit of concentration and look like your old, normal self whenever you please.”

“And put it back on again, whenever,” Redeyes added.

“But it will stay on without having to think about it until you deliberately take it off,” Deathwalker finished.

Chris examined himself as well as he could in the little pocket mirror. He had teeth to make a vampire proud, little horns of bone above his pointed ears, orange eyes with cat pupils that ran up and down, and a long, snake-like forked tongue to match Silverstain. His hands had something of a claw look to them as well.

“I like it,” Chris said, and practiced his trademark grin. Silverstain stepped up and hugged him, and Chris almost dropped the mirror.

“Seven years’ bad luck,” he said, but Silverstain shook her head.

“For us, that is seven years’ good luck.”

Golden Door Chapter 15 Chris in the Camp, part 1 of 2

April 21, 2025March 3, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

“Chris!” Chris heard his name and was grateful for the excuse to turn away from the melted creature. “You gotta be Chris!”

“Redeyes!” Heathfire identified the caller as she stepped up to help Chris back to his feet. Chris was more than glad to get away from the huge fellow with the big teeth.

“Chris!” A red face ran up the beach while a hand with rather remarkable claws waved. Heathfire snuggled against Chris’ shoulder and pointed. “Heathfire, leave him alone!” Redeyes hollered.

“What if I don’t want to?” Heathfire hollered back. Chris thought the wisest move was to let go of Heathfire’s hand and step away. He certainly did not want to start anything.

“Hey,” Redeyes said like a simple hello when he came to a screeching stop in front of Chris. Broomwick came up, grabbed Heathfire’s hand and gave Chris a jealous look. Chris put his hands up in surrender.

“Too hot for me to handle,” he said, and Broomwick smiled.

“She is that.”

“I must be losing my touch.” Heathfire commented to herself,

“The ship?” Deathwalker changed the subject from teenage foolishness.

“Fine. Hidden just down the shore,” Redeyes reported while Chris got a good look at the goblin. Redeyes had pink skin around those red, beady eyes, and two little red horns that stuck up through black hair. Chris could not help bending over, as he had with Deathwalker, to see if the goblin had the tail to complete the outfit. He did not.

“All right, Chris,” Deathwalker said as he placed his own claw on Chris’ shoulder. “Redeyes and Crusher.” He introduced the two newcomers and added one note. “Crusher is a troll.”

“Troll?” Chris asked, remembering they had traveled down a troll road.

Crusher got close to Chris’ face so he could not turn away, and he drooled a little as he spoke. “That just means I like my meat more raw.”

Chris returned his trademark grin, the same one he used on his younger brothers or when his parents asked him to do something around the house. It was Crusher who had to turn away. “Bless my stinky feet. That grin could scare a basilisk.”

“But where is the rest of the crew?” Deathwalker once again attempted to get people back on topic.

“Guarding the ship,” Redeyes responded, and he led the way. Until then, Redeyes kept standing on his toes. Being a bit short, he wanted to appear more Chris’ height. Oddly enough, Chris found that comforting as it reminded him of a short friend that lived down the street.

Deathwalker paced Chris and whispered as they walked, not that he thought the others might not hear, but to indicate that this was supposed to be private, so they all better keep their mouths shut. “Now, I don’t want you to be shocked when you meet the others. Stalker is more of a true goblin, you might say. His face is so dark it is hard to see his features apart from the glowing yellow eyes. He is a quiet one, but one Alice picked.”

“Alice?” Chris asked. “You planned all this ahead of time, didn’t you?” Chris just figured that out.

“Lady Alice did,” Deathwalker said and then clarified. “Your father. She brought me together with these young ones, more your age, give or take. She found us the boat and then she brought me safe to the others in the Golden Door. She said we had to pray for help, and not to her. She figured out that given the chance, you children would follow your mother into Avalon.”

Chris merely nodded. He had met the Lady Alice.

“Oh, and one more thing. Watcher is a hobgoblin. Watch out for him that he doesn’t steal your shirt. Most of our kind don’t care for the hobs much.”

Chris nodded again, but before he could ask what was wrong with the hobgoblins, they arrived and climbed aboard a small steamboat. Chris had recently seen the movie the African Queen, and thought this boat looked similar. Apart from the furnace amid ship that ran the small paddles on each side, it also had a small rigging for a sail and oars as a last resort. Chris imagined being reluctant if they were headed toward the ocean, but even with his dark elf enhanced senses, though he could not tell how far it was to the castle, he thought it was relatively close, and this underground lake, as big as it was, might be passable in that little ship.

“Here.” Chris heard a female voice and looked up to see her tap the seat beside herself. It was a young girl about Chris’ age, very pretty, and apart from her silver hair she appeared utterly human. Then the woman licked her upper lip with a long and decidedly forked tongue, and Chris knew better.

“Come on up front,” Redeyes encouraged Chris to follow, but he preferred the back, sat opposite the silver haired girl and only then realized that put him close to Crusher who stood on the tiller.

“Silverstain,” the girl said and put out her hand to shake. She smiled. She had ordinary enough hands and Chris decided the teeth were not too sharp. He reached across the boat to shake, but immediately found Redeyes on one side and an unknown on his other. He guessed the unknown was Watcher. The hobgoblin still had a bit of a goblin look about him, only not so much, and his ears were pointed, more like Inaros the elf.

Chris felt trapped and knew he would have both of his ears talked off for the journey, and now it was too late to change his mind. Stalker, the dark one with the yellow eyes took the seat beside Silverstain.

Heathfire caught the look between Chris and Silverstain and it was one look on two faces. She sighed. “I guess I better get this tub moving.”

“Can I come?” Broomwick asked permission and Heathfire teased him. She pretended to think about it.

“Okay,” she said at last, and smiled for the sprite. Chris watched as they both turned utterly to flame and shot into the furnace. It only took a moment after that to steam up and begin moving.

Deathwalker paced up front, marked their passage and communicated somehow with the troll on the tiller. Crusher got the messages and adjusted their course as needed, but that did not keep him from the conversation. Most of it was about raw meat and rock music. Crusher remembered Big Sur. Redeyes went to Woodstock. Chris dared not ask them how old they were; besides, his eyes kept returning to Silverstain even as his ears tuned out the topic of NASCAR. Redeyes finally noticed.

“My little sister,” he pointed at the girl. She looked up and Chris offered his grin, but she shook her head, sadly.

“You need the teeth,” she said before she stood and hauled Chris to his feet. “Hey Deathwalker,” she raised her voice. “I just realized. Chris can’t go into the castle looking all human, if you’ll pardon the expression.”

Deathwalker turned to the group. Everyone stared at each other, dumbfounded, when he said, “Frightening aspect.”

“Will it hurt?” Chris asked as soon as the rest of the crew stood, grinned evilly and surrounded him in a threatening manner.

“No,” Mister Walker said. “At least I don’t think so,” and Chris ducked. Everyone roared and squealed and howled the most frightening noises, and they pelted him with whatever dirt and grime they could reach. Crusher slapped the back of his head with a piece of raw meat the troll had been chewing on. Then Silverstain stepped up and grabbed him around the middle. She pressed her lips against his and wrapped her long, forked tongue around his even as he felt his own tongue wrap around hers. She had something to say when they separated.

“Wow.”

“Want to go with me to the Prom?”

“Absolutely.”

Both grinned, when there was an explosion far to starboard, against the far wall of the huge cavern. The water began to churn. Everyone had to sit or fall over. Stones began to drop from the impossibly high ceiling. A few boulders just missed the boat but struck the water near enough to send great splashes up on to the deck. A second explosion brought a light, as a great yellow-orange crack opened in that far wall. It lit up a great cloud of something black and moving that spread out from the explosion and headed in their direction. The crack itself looked like an open wound leaking down the wall and into the underground sea. Where the light touched the water, another cloud rose up and it also began to creep though the cavern.

Everyone started shouting and held on to something. Deathwalker staggered up to the tiller where he began to yell. “Turn it into the light! Turn the boat toward the light!”

Watcher, the hobgoblin pulled a hood over his head and tried to make himself as small as possible in his seat, but Stalker with the dark face and yellow eyes stood and grabbed Redeyes by the hand. Chris and Silverstain were still standing and holding on to each other as Stalker grabbed Silverstain’s hand. He joined Silverstain’s and Redeye’s hands and put one claw over top of the two. He put his other claw on Chris’ head, drew close to Chris’ stunned, unmoving face, and exhaled a great breath.

Chris caught the exhale full force. It stung his eyes, burned in his nose and down in his lungs, and tasted like rotten eggs in his mouth. Chris hacked and coughed as the three goblins backed up. Redeyes dropped his sister’s hand when Stalker let go and spoke in a voice as chilling as expected from a goblin.

“Now, no matter how toxic or poisonous the air, he will still be able to breathe.”

The boat shook, and everyone dropped to the deck and held on for dear life. The ship tilted left and then right, took on water from both sides, but not quite enough to swamp them. Chris worried briefly about Heathfire and Broomwick in the furnace. He feared enough water to put the furnace out might kill the fire sprites. But then he had no time to think as he wrapped his arms around the chair leg that was fastened to the deck, and Silverstain crawled up to wrap around him. They were pointed toward the light, a volcanic crack in the wall, and just in time. The first big wave came upon them.

The ship rose up and up at a precipitous angle to where Chris almost felt like he was standing upright. It flattened out again suddenly and with a crash on to the top of the wave before it shot down the back side of the water in one great rush. There came a moment of calm at the bottom of the wave.

“More waves coming!” Deathwalker shouted.

“Let’s do it again,” Silverstain whispered in Chris’ ear, and she licked his ear with that long, forked tongue. Chris licked his own nose with his own forked tongue and wondered what his grin looked like with his new, sharp teeth.

Golden Door Chapter 14 James and the Ogre, part 3 of 3

April 16, 2025March 3, 2025M G Kizzia Leave a comment

James felt groggy, but he only had to sit down for a few minutes in the rain. The ogre, and that was what it was, apparently suffered the worst of it, being thrown back by the blue lightening to crash into the cave wall. Luckily, ogres are very hard to damage, and he rather damaged the stone wall of the cave.

“Are you all right?” Grubby asked James in most uncharacteristically impish fashion. Nature would have had an imp rolling on the floor with laughter over such an encounter, but James was the son of the Kairos.

James nodded, though one hand stayed on his head. The ogre shook his head and spoke. “That little guy is powerful. I never been beat up before.”

“First time for everything,” Grubby said, and puffed out his chest a little. “Storyteller’s son.”

“But my Ma and Da said to watch the cave and don’t let in strangers.

“His name’s James. Now he’s not a stranger.”

“At least not any stranger than you guys,” James mumbled while Grubby helped him to his feet and got him out of the rain. It looked ready to pour.

“James.” The ogre caught that much. “Good to meet you.” Warthead stuck out his tremendous hand and James’ hand got completely swallowed up in the big mitt. He would have been better to shake one of Warthead’s fingers. But then, James watched the handshake because he could hardly look at the ugly puss of the ogre, and besides, he did not feel altogether certain if there might be more blue lightening. It turned out to be safe enough, and James could not imagine anything more special than making friends with an ogre, so he looked up at last, but when the ogre smiled in delight, James had to quickly look away to avoid throwing up.

“Ma and Da aren’t here,” Warthead repeated himself in his gravel-deep voice. “They gone up to the castle for special visitor, I think. I don’t rightly remember.”

“Woah!” Grubby was by the entrance to the cave. “There must be a monster storm coming. Listen to that thunder.” They heard a dull roar in the distance, but it was growing. James paid close attention and after a moment he voiced his skepticism.

“I don’t think that is thunder,” he said.

Warthead, who was not particularly able to follow their thoughts, looked around instead and pointed at something else. “Spiders.” Grubby and James looked quickly. They were at the bottom of the mountain, quite a long way, but obviously excited as if sensing they were getting close to their prey. They began to climb the hill at a rapid pace.

“James!” The word came wafting down from above with the wind and the rain.

“James!” It was Mrs. Copperpot, Picker and Poker.

“Grubby! James!” Pug was with them, and the trio in the cave had to go outside to look up.

They were soon spotted, though the dwarfs and the gnome were quite high up the mountainside above them. “Up here, James. Quick! Tsunami!” Pug pointed in the direction of the roar which was becoming very pronounced. They began to hear trees crash in the wave.

James looked for a way, but there was no easy way. The cave was carved out of a small cliff. Meanwhile, Warthead scratched his head and Grubby had his eyes glued on the spiders. He saw when they abandoned the rush up the hill and began climbing trees in an attempt to get above the onrushing water.

“Hurry James!”

“There’s no way up!” James shouted.

Grubby picked up a stone and threw it at a spider which was ahead of its fellows. It cracked against the spider’s back but did no real damage. James spun around to see. The spider was almost as big as him, and he might have screamed at the sight if the water did not come first. With a great roar and something like the sound of freight trains, the wave crashed through the last trees like a flood breaking through a levy.

“Water!” James shouted, and Warthead moved. He grabbed Grubby in one big paw and James in the other and stretched his arms as high in the air as he could, which was almost high enough for James to reach the rock ledge above the cave mouth, but not quite.

“Spider!” Grubby shouted, as the water quickly rose above the ogre’s mouth. A spider had made the jump to Warthead’s arm and zeroed in on James. James panicked, but tried kicking first, and to his surprise, he caved in the beast’s head in a way that Grubby’s stone had not. A second kick sent the spider flying off into the drink, as the water was now up to Warthead’s elbows. It actually reached to his upraised wrists, and the water stayed up for a few minutes before it began to recede almost as fast as it came in. James understood that if the tidal water did not drown them or crash them and crush their bones against something hard while coming in, it could still do the same, or drag them for miles on the way out, and just as easily.

The time went by slowly, slow enough for Pug and Mrs. Copperpot to climb down almost within reach. Mrs. Copperpot looked full of fret and worry, but Pug seemed a rock of calm and kept assuring them that everything was going to be all right.

Warthead stood that whole time with his arms raised straight up to keep Grubby and James above the water. James felt a little surprised the ogre was not brushed aside in that torrent, but he was not. He stood like the stones themselves, unmoving, even long after James imagined the poor ogre drowned and had to be dead and gone. As the water went down somewhat slowly, it felt agonizing to watch the big creature, hoping against hope for signs of life. When the water was once again below the chin and it started to pick up the pace of retreat, Warthead looked like no more than a statue, and James imagined he might stand in that pose for a thousand years. He wanted to cry, and Mrs. Copperpot did not help with her words about the ogre’s bravery and heroic stand. Then Warthead shook his head and opened his eyes.

“Warthead!” James and Grubby shouted together.

“Are the spiders gone?” Warthead asked. “That one tickled and I almost laughed.”

“But how did you?” James could not decide what to ask. “The water was up for a half hour at least, or twenty minutes or more. How?”

“I held my breath,” Warthead said, in an intuitive moment—a very rare thing in an ogre.

“Good choice.” Grubby praised the ogre’s thinking. It was a fifty-fifty proposition of Warthead coming up with the notion of holding his breath underwater.

James twisted his face. “I thought after so many minutes without oxygen the brain cells started dying.”

“No fear of that,” Grubby said, and waved off the whole problem with his hand. “He hasn’t got any to lose.”

Warthead grinned and nodded and began to wonder why he kept holding his arms straight up in the air.

It was still an hour or more before Picker and Poker found a way down from above and the water went down enough to gather in the cave entrance. The others were a bit leery of the ogre, but he seemed such a good fellow, and Mrs. Copperpot recognized how young he was. Why, converted to human ages, she imagined that Warthead might be the youngest of the lot, despite his hulking size.

“You know,” she said, as she sighed and accepted that she now had five, a full handful of boys to watch. “Now that the spiders are washed away, the path to the gate should be open.”

“At least for a little while.” Pug agreed. “And we ought to go before it gets dark.”

Mrs. Copperpot looked up at the sky where there was a genuine stroke of lightning and boom of thunder, and the rain began to strengthen. “Yes.” She agreed, before she added, “And I don’t like the look of that sky.”

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MONDAY

Chris boards the ship to cross the underground sea but the cavern wall cracks and the volcano bring up a monster from the deep while Beth flies above it all and gets to taste sweet puffberries. Until Monday. Happy Reading