Magic

Avalon 9.0 Pestilence, part 4 of 6

M G Kizzia Leave a comment

The travelers bought the young nobleman wine, explained about being pilgrims headed toward Rome, and said they would be leaving in the morning.  They basically lied their way out of being arrested.  They said the man must have mistaken them for someone else.

“Are you English?” the young man asked.  “Are you Celtic, from Bretagne? Your French is very good.”

“German,” Lockhart said quickly.  “From around Basel.”  It was the only thing he could think to say.

“And Scandinavian,” Katie said, and clarified.  “Mostly Swedish.”

“I have some French in me,” Lincoln said.  “On my mother’s side.”

“Italian,” Tony raised his hand.  “From south of Rome.”

“Africa,” Decker said.  “Not Muslim.”  He gave Nanette a small kiss.  “We find Europe fascinating and different than expected.”

Everyone looked at Elder Stow, but he was prepared.  “My daughter and I are from far in the east.  It is a good land with plenty of snow.”

“Slavic?” the man asked, and Elder Stow nodded.  Slavic was close enough, though he really wanted to say he lived thousands of light years not miles away.

“We found Elder Stow in Jericho,” Lincoln remembered.  “He and his daughter were separated, but we found her all the way over on the coast, in Gaza.  We rescued her.  She might have been killed.”

“So, you have been to the holy land.”  The young man nodded and spoke in English.  “The man said you were English.”

Elder Stow, Sukki, Nanette, and Tony all recognized the change in the language, but Nanette and Tony in particular, were not as practiced in switching their tongues when confronted with two languages, so they kept silent.  Lincoln looked at Lockhart and said nothing for a change.  Decker kept silent and nibbled on the remains of his supper.  Lockhart looked at Katie and dredged up a few words in German from all the way back in Genevive’s day.  “What words are these?”  He did not do the best acting job.

“English,” Katie told Lockhart in English like she was explaining.  She turned back to the man and answered him in French, the local tongue, which in that time zone came most naturally to the travelers.  “Our understanding of English is limited since we have had no reason to learn it.”

“I see,” the young noble said and finally sipped his wine.  He made a face, like it was not the best wine he tasted.  “The man must have been mistaken.”  He stood.  “All the same, if you are leaving first thing in the morning, that would be best.”  He gave a slight bow, turned, and marched out, his soldiers following.  The travelers all breathed and sat quietly for a time.

Four days later, having made good progress in the French countryside, the travelers began to climb into the foothills of the alps.  The road stayed good, and they found villages all along the way where they could stop for the night.  No one bothered them, though Katie swore they were being followed.  Nanette closed her eyes, held out her hand, and tried to focus back on the trail.  She did that several times over those days but could not bring anything into her mind for sure.  She could only confirm Katie’s feeling that they were being followed, and shrug.

When they moved up into the foothills, they came across their first way station.  All along the main ways through the alps there were stations roughly every fifteen to twenty miles.  Many were built by the Romans as places where travelers could stop and get a meal and a bed for the night.  They were Hauses, Hostels, or Hospitals, as in hospitality places.  Some were Toll Hauses, though the taking of tolls from the merchants who mostly traveled the roads was frowned upon.  At the first one the travelers came to they found an old man looking for help over the mountains.

“There are thieves in the mountains, and in a month the snows will come and make the passes impossible for travelers.  Please.  I heard there is a great sickness in Genoa, and it has spread to Pisa.  I am worried about my family.  Please.  I left my train some days ago.  They will make the trip to the low countries and return in the spring, hopefully with a profit, but I must see to the safety of my family.”

“We are not inclined to travel with strangers,” Katie said.  She looked at Nanette and Lincoln, both of whom thought the man looked like the old man who sat alone by the fireplace in Lyon, but the others did not see it.

“Do you have a name?” Lockhart asked.

“Dagnanus,” the man said.  “I am a simple merchant from Pisa where the grapes grow thick.  I bring Tuscan wine to the world, and even to the French who only think they know how to make wine.  Ha…”  He scoffed.  “But please.  I have been over the mountains many times.  I know the way, and the ways to avoid, but I will not make it alone, and the weather is turning.  I must go to save my family, but I need help.”

Lockhart stared at Lincoln and Nanette who he later told they had to keep one eye on the man, but he spoke.  “Dagnanus.  We leave in the morning right after breakfast. Be up and ready if you want to go with us.”

“I will.  I will go and pack my few things right now.  Thank you.  Thank you.” The man hurried up the stairs.

“He is spritely for an old man,” Katie remarked.

“Dagnabit,” Decker said through whatever he was chewing on.  He looked like he wanted to spit, but he held it back while Nanette smiled.

Two days later, well up into the mountains, some friends of Dagnanus blocked the road and surrounded the travelers.  Everyone stopped moving, but only Lincoln said anything.

“I knew it.”

Dagnanus moved ahead and got down from his horse next to the leader of the group.  His appearance changed as he moved, like the man wore a glamour that whole time, which told the others he had magic of some sort at his fingertips.  He proved to be the man Nanette saw in the street, and she almost echoed Lincoln’s I knew it comment.  Then Dagnanus said something that surprised everyone, and at the same time, did not surprise anyone.

“The Travelers from Avalon, as promised.”

“Good,” the brigand leader grunted.  “Malore and her old lady Babara have the Kairos in sight.  If we can kill her at an inopportune time and stop her rebirths, then all we need to do is remove these annoyances traveling through time and the future can be shaped the way the Masters want.”

“I am to serve,” Dagnanus said, but Elder Stow spoke at the same time.

“There.  I have put up Decker Screens all around us.  You may fire when ready.”

“Good,” Decker said.  He pulled his rifle and began to shoot the ones that might have ended up inside the screens.  The others reacted more slowly, except Nanette, who got mad.  She whipped out her wand and caught Dagnanus and the brigand leader in her own magic.  She lifted them two feet off the ground so they could not run away, and she growled at them.  She studied the face of the brigand leader even as Lincoln shot the man.  When they turned to Dagnanus, however, they saw that he escaped somehow.

The confrontation did not take long.  The brigands quickly hurried away.  Several arrows came in their direction and bounced off Elder Stows screens, but then everything went quiet.

“We have to hurry,” Lockhart said.  “Ready?  Is Ghost ready?”

“Ready,” Tony said, and he pulled the mule in close.

“Okay, Elder Stow.  Cut the screens.  Everybody ride.”

They hurried as well as they could.  It was all uphill, so a strain for the horses, but no more arrows came in their direction, and they soon got out of range.  They left ten dead men behind them, including the brigand leader.  There were still ten or more out there in the woods, and Dagnanus.  Nanette refused to curse to think of it, so Lincoln cursed for her.

“He may have taken us off the main road without us realizing it,” Katie said, as soon as they got about a mile away and slowed to let the horses catch their breath in the cold.  They saw some early snow in the area.

“My mother,” Elder Stow responded to Katie’s concern as he pushed forward.  “I was thinking the same thing, but I see in my scanner that this path soon returns to the main path.  I can hardly call it a road.”

“Good thing we ditched the wagon,” Lincoln said.

Lockhart nodded.  “Decker and Elder Stow, stay in close.  Sukki, you have the point.”

“Yes boss,” Sukki said, echoing the response Boston would have given, and she pushed her horse, Cocoa, out ahead of the others to scout the area.

That evening, the travelers might have frozen if not for their fairy weave clothes, which they made as thick as possible, and their fairy weave tents, which they also thickened and made waterproof.  It began to snow.  Fortunately, they had plenty of fairy weave blankets which they draped over Ghost and the horses and shaped to imitate real medieval blankets that fell to the ground.

“At least the horses won’t freeze,” Sukki said.

That night, Elder Stow surrounded the camp with a screen no normal thing could break through, though they understood Dagnanus might contrive some magical way to get inside the screens.  With that in mind, Nanette and Katie kept their senses on high alert and worried in the night.  Elder Stow set the alarm on his scanner so if anything bigger than a marmot or an owl came into the area and got through the screens, they would be alerted.  The big predators, like lynx and wolves could be kept out by the screens, along with people.  The return of the brigands would be bad, but they also did not need a bear stumbling into the camp.

Avalon 9.0 Pestilence, part 1 of 6

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After 1312 A.D. The Alps

Kairos lifetime 111: Prudenza Doria D’Amalfi de Genoa

Recording …

Nanette stepped up to the porch out in front of the inn.  She paused to look on the streets of Lyon.  She came a long way from Rome—she and Tony.  He was Professor Fleming’s graduate student.  She was the Professor’s administrative assistant, but that was in 1905.  Decker insisted on the title of administrative assistant, though in truth, she was simply the professor’s darkie in 1905.  The professor taught antiquities and classics, but his special love was Rome.  He taught about the fall of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Roman Empire.  In fact, he was speaking on that very subject when the whole house they were staying in got picked up from 1905 Rome and sent back to the days of Julius Caesar.  She lived in those days for seven years—she and Tony.  They would still be living there if the travelers had not come along.

Nanette sat down on a chair to watch the soldiers and the strange looking man that the soldiers talked to.  She pulled her fairy weave shawl tight around her shoulders against the chill.  She even told the shawl to thicken a little and marveled at the material.  She could change the size, shape, texture, color, and all with a word.   It was not any magic on her part.  The magic was in the material itself, and she understood in this way the travelers could dress like the locals no matter what time zone they entered.  Presently, they were somewhere in the fourteenth century.

Nanette paused in her thoughts.  She thought the man in the street looked familiar, but they had traveled a long way over the last year and a half, from 44 B. C., time zone by time zone, to the present.  Since this was now the fourteenth century A. D., of course the man could not be familiar.

Nanette shrugged it off and thought about Decker.  Lieutenant Colonel Milton Decker was now her husband.  Milton, with the other travelers, came from 2010, not 1905.  As a couple, they had things to work out, to say the least, but she had no complaints.  Of course, he dd not like the name Milton.  Everyone called him Decker, or Colonel.  She thought Milton was a fine name for 1905.  Nanette sighed.  They had things to work through, not to mention both being black Americans from what sometimes seemed like two different worlds.  Nanette’s grandmother was a plantation slave freed by the Republicans and that wonderful Mister Lincoln; God rest his soul.  Decker’s grandmother lived in the segregated south, and he grew up in the hood, whatever that was.  And he claimed to be a Democrat, the very ones who forced segregation, wore hoods, and lynched negroes at every opportunity.  A Democrat?  Nanette steamed before she changed it from “lynched negroes” to “lynched blacks”, and then “lynched African Americans”.  It was like learning a whole new language, but she was learning.

Wait…  She remembered Elder Stow and Sukki were not even human, originally.  Well, she was assured they were human, just not homo sapiens. They were Neanderthals who got taken off the Earth at the time of the flood.  She never heard of Neanderthals before.  Elder Stow was the result of thousands of years of learning, or evolution, as Decker said.  He had devices he carried around—Lockhart called them gadgets—which seemed miraculous.  He had a screen device which could make an invisible barrier that nothing could break through.  He had a scanner that could far-see and tell him what was over the horizon.  He had other things, including a sonic device, and a weapon—a powerful handgun that could melt metal or set whole buildings on fire.  And he could fly and go invisible.  She often forgot he was a Gott-Druk, as the Neanderthals called themselves.  He wore a glamour that made him look like an elderly human, well, a homo sapiens, and he seemed such a nice man.

Sukki was also a Gott-Druk, at first.  She actually got taken off the Earth at the time of the flood with Elder Stow’s ancestors and slept in a chamber of some sort where she did not age at all.  When she arrived on her new home world, she joined a small group of Gott-Druk determined to return to Earth and repopulate their ancient territory.  By the time they got back to Earth, it was thousands of years later, and she was the only survivor of that fateful trip.  The travelers took her with them knowing she would never survive in that day and age on her own.  Elder Stow adopted her as his daughter.  But then things changed.

Sukki said she never felt comfortable as a Gott-Druk traveling with humans through a human world.  When the travelers arrived in Rome and Nanette and Tony joined the group as the only relatively safe way to make it back to their own time, Suki begged to be changed, before the gods went away, she said.  Nanette saw the goddesses appear in her living room in that Roman house.  They transformed Sukki from Neanderthal to homo sapiens and gifted her with all sorts of special things.  She could fly, and produce her own heat ray, as Lockhart called it, and more.  Decker said the goddesses empowered the poor girl like a superhero.  Nanette was not sure what a superhero was, but she got the idea.  Sukki was sweet, shy, and a good girl, and Nanette imagined that was why the goddesses did not mind gifting her with so much power.

More curious from Nanette’s point of view, was the fact that she was not without some power of her own.  She reached in the side sack Alexis used to carry and touched her wand.  She understood her ability to do magic would come and go as they traveled though time, depending on the position of the Other Earth, whatever the Other Earth was.  But basically, she would be empowered for three hundred years, and then be without her magic for three hundred years.

Nanette’s hand touched something else.  It was Boston’s Beretta, gifted to her when Boston and Alexis made the jump through the Heart of Time back into the future.  They had to be elves to do that, but Alexis’ father, Boston’s father-in-law was dying.  They had to go.  The rest of them, the humans still had to get back to the future the slow way, time gate by time gate.

Nanette was not happy carrying around a handgun, but she understood that sadly it might come in handy during those years when she was without her magic.

Nanette paused when the man in the street pointed at her, or at the inn.  The soldiers all looked in her direction before one of them said something and they once again faced each other.  What was that about? Nanette wondered, before she thought again about Decker and her companions.

Come to think of it, of the eight people traveling through time, only four remained from the original group.  Colonel Decker was her husband.  Lockhart, the leader of this expedition through time, was the Assistant Director of something called the Men in Black.  He, and Major Katherine Lockhart, or Katie, an elect, which is a one-in-a-million warrior woman, were the other married couple in the group.  And then there was Lincoln, a former spy who carried the database.  The database had all the relevant historical information about the time zones they went though, including information about whatever life the Kairos was living where he or she stood at the center of the time zone, equidistant from both time gates.

Nanette considered the time jumps.  When they came through a time gate, they traveled usually between six and sixty years into the future in one step.  Then they crossed the time zone, about two to three hundred miles to the Kairos and another two to three hundred miles to the next time gate.  If only it was that simple, Nanette thought and rolled her eyes.  They inevitably ran into trouble in every time zone.

Lockhart came out to the porch.  “Are you coming in?” he asked.  “Katie and Sukki are comparing their amulets to figure out where we are going, and they are comparing it to the map in Lincoln’s database.”

Nanette glanced at the street.  The street conference broke up.  The soldiers marched away, and that strange man was not to be seen.  She glanced at the barn and stables just down from the inn.  Decker and Elder Stow had the horse duty for the day, and apparently, they were taking their time.

“Might as well,” she said.  “But I am more curious about who the Kairos is in this time zone.”

“Prudencia, no Prudenza,” Lockhart said.

“Prudence,” Nanette responded as she stood, and Lockhart held the door.  “Seven years of living in ancient Rome and speaking Latin every day has to be worth something.”

“I wouldn’t know,” Lockhart responded with a smile.  “One of the gifts of the Kairos when we started this journey was to be able to hear and respond in English to everything, and sound to the other person like we are speaking their native language.  Even the written word automatically translates to English in my head.”

Nanette frowned.  “I know.  I was kind of hoping we could get to a point where I could practice my French.  Now, that is not going to happen.”  Nanette stopped in the doorway and glanced once more at the street.

“What?” Lockhart asked.

Nanette shook her head as she spoke.  “I saw someone in the street talking to some soldiers and pointing at the inn.  I don’t know if it means anything, but I thought he looked familiar.”

“The Masters have repeat people,” Lockhart responded.  “It may have been one.  The Kairos told us if we see any repeat people and they are not one of the good guys, we need to consider them the enemy.”

Nanette nodded.  “But it might not have been someone I saw before.  Maybe I was just picking up a bad sense about him.”

“A bad vibe.”  Lockhart rubbed his chin.  “Alexis told me before she left us that apart from Katie and her elect senses, where she can detect danger and enemies in the distance, you know.  Apart from her, you are the only one we have to count on when you have your magic.  She said you have something near telepathy, not that you can read minds, exactly, but you can sense intentions, like what a person might be thinking about and how they feel about that.  I’m not sure what Alexis was saying, but do you understand?”

Nanette stared at the door before she nodded.  “That was it.  It was us, not the inn that he was pointing at.  I sensed he wants to hurt us in some way.  I wish I had thought of that.  Alexis taught me how to focus and concentrate.  I’m sorry I didn’t do that.  I just picked up the bad feelings—bad vibes with a casual glance.”

“It’s okay,” Lockhart said and smiled.  “Next time.”  Nanette agreed and went inside.  Lockhart followed.

M4 Margueritte: Negotiations, part 1 of 4

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After the Count of LeMans got driven from the farm fields, and the Viscount of Angers got prevented from encircling the village, Margueritte opted to talk and Ragenfrid obliged.  King David, Count Michael, Count duBois, Peppin in the place of Count Tomberlain, and Childemund in the place of Charles, all accompanied her down the hill.  Besides the Count Garrold of LeMans and Viscount Talliso of Angers, Ragenfrid brought Count Amager of Tours, Baron Bouchart of Vendome and Sir Creasy, Lord of Dun from the other side.

Margueritte tussled with the Count of LeMans when she surveyed the lands west of the Sarthe.  She found that over the years, LeMans claimed a large portion of the land.  She took it back, one might say she liberated it, and the people were glad to get out from under the greedy count.  LeMans twice sent men over the river, but Margueritte’s troop drove them back, decisively.  If that had been it, Margueritte might have let it go, but know it or not, this rebellion would be the end of Count Garrold’s lands and title, if Margueritte had anything to say about it.

Margueritte also met Count Amager in Tours.  The man seemed a reasonable and honorable man, at least in front of Charles.  She felt rather disappointed to see him supporting Ragenfrid, and she wondered if she might talk to him privately and help him have second thoughts.

She did not know the other three, but the cruelty of Talliso of Angers had been reported to her by more than one man who moved his family out of Talliso’s territory.  The Baron Bouchart came across as dim witted.  And Sir Creasy of Dun seemed too slick and smarmy for his own good.  Margueritte felt surprised Ragenfrid put up with Creasy.  She figured the man must have a large number of soldiers, or money, or both.

Margueritte sent men first to put up a canopy and set a dozen chairs and a long table on the neutral ground at the bottom of the hill beside the Paris Road.  When she walked casually to the meeting with Ragenfrid, she had the dwarf wives bring a light meal of chicken, with a fine dwarf cheese, elf bread, and several bottles of an excellent Bordeaux wine, a gift from Duke Odo of Aquitaine.  She took the end seat and put King David and Michael to her left.  She set duBois on her right and placed Childemund and Peppin beside him, though their backs would be toward the enemy.

Ragenfrid did not hesitate to take the other end seat, and Garrold of LeMans sat to his right.  The others were not sure what they were supposed to do at this unusual gathering.  Count Amager of Tours started to sit next to Garrold, but Margueritte stopped him.

“No, no.  Amager, please sit next to Michael, Count of Nantes, and it is wonderful to see you again.”

“Lady,” Amager acknowledged her and took his assigned seat.  That got the others to sit.  Talliso of Angers sat between LeMans and Amager.  Bouchart and Creasy sat in the last two seats with the little Creasy next to the imposing Peppin.  Margueritte felt sorry that Peppin would probably get indigestion watching the greasy little slime eat.

“Gentlemen,” Margueritte said, and raised her glass.  “My treat, and please enjoy it before it gets cold.”  Again, the enemy hesitated until Ragenfrid laughed and dug in.  Once the meal got started, not much got said.  The food tasted that good.  And when they had finished, the dwarf wives appeared out of nowhere, cleared the table, and left honey sweetened pastries, sliced apples, and a hearty burgundy for dessert.

At last, Margueritte began.  “I have asked to speak with you so we may devise a way to settle all of our differences without the further need for bloodshed.”  She raised her glass.  “I would like to propose a toast for peace.”  Her men joined her right away.  The enemy moved a bit slow, but Ragenfrid lifted his glass and agreed.

“Peace is always preferred.”

“Exactly,” Margueritte agreed cheerfully.  “And I have drawn up a list of the grievances these men have voiced, and I will gladly counterbalance that with your concerns, as you voice them, and then we will see if we can find common ground and a mutually equitable solution that does not involve war and blood.”

“As you well know, the grievance I have is ultimately with Charles,” Ragenfrid said.  “And what can you guarantee about that?”

Margueritte got distracted.  She looked up the hill to where Pomadoro and his monks were holding a magical shield around the canopy area, so that the sorcerer could not interfere with honest and fair negotiations.  Suddenly, Pomadoro fell to his knees, and Margueritte stood and shouted at the sky.  She raised her hands without realizing it and felt almost like an observer in her own skin as her primal calling took over.  The sky overhead turned black, nearly as dark as night, and a great bolt of lightning struck the middle of Ragenfrid’s camp.  It looked like the explosion of a cruise missile.  Men, animals, tents, and wagons were shredded, thrown in the air, and charred beyond recognition.  Then, as soon as it began, it all stopped.  Margueritte lowered her hands, her hair stopped writhing in the wind like so many snakes, the sky returned to a beautiful spring blue, and Margueritte smiled.  She sighed, sweetly.

“I beg your pardon, gentlemen.  The spirits of the earth were threatened by an unnatural force.  That has now been removed.  Lord Ragenfrid, your sorcerer got taken away at the last second, but now I know who did it.”  They watched Margueritte’s green eyes turn fire golden as she turned her head up and shouted at the sky.

“Abraxas.  Nameless gave you the coward’s option of suicide.  You could do the honorable thing and give up your flesh and blood and go over to the other side.  In any case, you have no place in Frankish or Breton lands.  You are coming very close to being banished from the Lands of Danna.  And the lands of Olympus, and the waters of Amphitrite.  If you want to play with the armies of Islam, Junior will only interfere if you screw up, but be warned.  You come here at your own risk.  You better hear me.”

Margueritte fell to her knees and King David and Count duBois were right there to lift her gently and help her back to her chair where she took a moment to recover before she spoke again.

“You will forgive me if I take a rest.  I know our business is important, and I ask you please not to do anything rash in the night, but right now I have a need for a time of quiet.  Please, let us begin again tomorrow.  I will see what the cooks can do with a bit of beef, if you don’t mind.”  She stood, looking a bit shaky.

David and duBois took her arms again and helped her back up the hill.  Michael and Childemund followed while Peppin looked to see Ragenfrid and his companions march back across the field.  Once they reached the top and were out of sight from the enemy, Margueritte let go, took a moment to brush the dust from her dress and turned to David.

“That was a frightening but fortuitous moment.  I should have brought Thomas of Evandell with me.  He is really an excellent actor as well as a bard.”  She looked and sounded not the least bit tired.  She smiled for the others.  “I believe that went as well as could be expected.  Peppin?”  She walked to where Pomadoro and his monks were settled and chanting something.

“They will return tomorrow, at least.  But Ragenfrid is not known for patience.  No telling how long we may be able to keep it up.”

“I pray we keep it up long enough to negotiate peace, though that is the least likely scenario.”  Margueritte leaned down, heedless of the elf ritual of meditation they were performing, an exercise which she knew perfectly well, and she kissed Pomadoro on the forehead.  Then she went back to climb the castle wall to where Margo, Elsbeth, Jennifer, Rotrude, and quite a number of the women, including Calista and Melanie, were taking the sun and saw the whole thing.  All the while the men were asking Margueritte and pressing Peppin for answers as to what they were doing and what they were talking about.

“Ragenfrid will break first,” Rotrude said.

“My money is on LeMans,” Margo said.  “After the drubbing you gave him, it is a wonder he can show his face.”

Walaric came up to join the conference.  He felt unhappy at being left out, but he understood someone needed to keep the men to their duties.  Elsbeth saw him and thought to nudge him.

“The drubbing would have been worse five years from now, after all those young men get properly trained.”  Elsbeth did not really know what she was talking about, but she heard Margueritte say things like that, and she looked up at Peppin, not meaning to leave him out.

“Yes, that was a remarkable use of horsemen, unheard of,” David said.

“Heavy horse,” Margueritte said.  “It’s the new thing, very modern.  You should get some.”

“I’m with Lady Elsbeth,” Peppin grumped.  “It would have been a massacre with fully trained horsemen.  But it is hard to train men and horses when we only have their attention for two or three months in the summer.”

“But it is all we have for now,” Margueritte sighed

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

MONDAY

There may be a chance as long as Margueritte can keep Ragenfrid talking.  Too bad Ragenfrid is not known for patience.  Until then, Happy Reading.

*

Avalon 7.10 Guarding the Future, part 2 of 6

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The travelers did not get very far in the morning.  It quickly became too hot to travel.  They sheltered the afternoon under a rock cliff that provided a little shade.  The horses did not mind the rough grasses, but the people had nothing to eat other than elf bread crackers.  Boston heated a cup of water in her hands in order to turn the crackers into bread.  Lockhart asked Elder Stow about his sonic device and maybe heating up one of the rocks so they could cook something, if they found anything to cook; but Elder Stow nixed that idea.

“It is all volcanic rock of some sort and gets hot enough in this climate.  The sonic device might heat them enough to make them pop or explode.  Not a good idea.”

“How goes the screen device?” Alexis asked, changing the subject.

Elder Stow shook his head.  “It is about ready for testing, but in this sandy environment, I have to be very careful.”

Mostly, people did not have much to say in the heat.  Decker, Tony, and Lincoln all took siestas.  The women passed some small talk and worried about the horses.  Sukki and Nanette gave Ghost the mule some extra attention.  The poor mule appeared to be suffering in the heat, though Katie suggested it was just a ploy to get attention.  Lockhart worried about getting everyone safely back to the future and wondered how much longer this trip was going to take.  Then the sun headed toward the horizon, and Lockhart got everyone up and moving.  They traveled into the night, but only managed about twenty miles on that day.

The following morning, Decker saw a group of mountain goats and shot one.  He feared he might have to climb the mountain to fetch it, but Elder Stow volunteered to fly up, and with an anti-gravity disc, he brought it down to be butchered.  Alexis complained about no greens, and this time, Nanette joined her, but the meat at least gave them something to supplement the bread crackers.  They could be sustained for a long time on just elf bread, but it did get boring.

After their long afternoon naps, Elder Stow used his scanning device to direct them to some surface water, which was a very small oasis not far off the caravan path they were following.  They camped for the night in that place, having only moved roughly another twenty miles, but they felt drained from traveling through such intense dry heat.  People were tempted to strip down to as little clothing as possible, but Alexis vetoed that idea.  She got out the sunscreen and made sure that everyone got covered.  Then she insisted on long pants and long sleeves, or something like long sleeve dresses with head coverings and face masks.

“You don’t see the Arabs riding around on their camels in short-shorts and tank tops,” she explained.  “Besides, you will do better if you wear something to absorb the sweat.  This is like being at sea and having the sun glare off the water, and the salt in the air drying you out.  True, the desert has no salt, but the sand glares just as bad as the water, and the sand and heat will dry you out just as much, so don’t dress stupid.”  That last, she told to Lincoln, but everyone got the message.

Several were surprised at how cold it got in the night.  They did not feel it as much that first night when they were still moving through most of it.  It did not get frost cold, but it got down close to it.  Lockhart insisted on the regular watch, and the watchers huddled for warmth.

They camped a little way back from the water, where the land flattened out, and it looked like where others had camped.  They found plenty of good grass there, being water fed.  It appeared a bit camel chewed but seemed like gold for the horses.  The travelers had a bit of the meat that had not yet turned in the heat, and mostly bread crackers.  Boring.  Then, in the night, the travelers got surprised by how many visitors came to the water.

They saw a couple of spotted animals, one of which was probably a leopard, but whatever they were, they kept their distance from the humans.  At least two herds of grazing animals came.  One looked like gazelles.  The other looked a bit like cows, but with very long, straight spikes for horns.  Lincoln was not awake at the time to identify them in the database.  They saw what looked like cats and dogs, though the dogs may have been small wolves.  Katie thought they were probably foxes.  They also saw a white tailed something that looked especially small.  They might have missed it, but it went for a swim.

The only trouble they faced, came when Decker and Elder Stow watched during the wee hours of the morning.  Nanette got up, thirsty.  They were all thirsty.  She walked down to the water and ran into a half-dozen hyenas.  The beasts were trying to sneak up on the horses.  Nanette screamed.  She tried to use her magic to make the hyenas back off, but nothing happened.  She screamed louder as the gang of Hyenas growled at her and appeared to change their mind about the horses.  This human seemed an easy meal.

Decker came running.  He wounded one beast in the dark and killed one.  Elder Stow turned on his light that could be seen for miles.  The hyenas ran, including the one that had a bullet in its side.  It ran dripping blood.  The dead one went nowhere.

Decker grabbed his rope and looped it several times around the dead animal.  He dragged it as far from the water and the camp as he could, guided by Elder Stow’s light, and then dropped it, retrieving his rope.  When he got back to the camp, pretty much everyone was up.  He had to pause, while Nanette threw herself into his arms and cried.  All Decker could do was look at Lockhart and Lincoln and say, “Shut up.”

Eventually, he got to ask why Nanette did not use her magic to keep the hyenas away or escape herself.

“I tried,” she said, and turned to Alexis.  “I honestly tried, but it is like I never had any magic—like it was all an illusion.”

Lincoln looked it up, since he would not be able to sleep any time soon.  “The other earth went out of phase in 375 AD.  That would have been when Bahati turned twenty.  The record says she came to Arabia in her late twenties, so the magic energy, or I should call it, the creative and variable energy that leaks into this world from the other earth is currently diminished below the useable point for most people.  You probably won’t get your magic back for another three hundred years.”

“What am I going to do?” Nanette fretted.

“Be our sister,” Boston said, and nudged Sukki, who nodded.

“Just be yourself,” Alexis said, and smiled.

“Be happy.  You are safe among friends,” Tony said.

“Family,” Elder Stow corrected the word friends.

“Stick with Decker,” Lockhart said, and tried not to grin.  “He will take care of you.”  He had to turn and walk to his tent so Decker could only see his back.  Katie took his arm to go with him, but she slapped that arm softly on the way.

Avalon 7.9 The Inns and Outs, part 5 of 6

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The travelers arrived in the bay after dark.  The tide had already gone out, so they had to wait until the early morning hours to dock and unload the horses.  Lockhart set Pinto’s hands free, thinking the man could not do anything, and he needed to be able to feed himself.  Besides, he wanted his handcuffs back.  All the same, people slept on the deck with their weapons handy.  Boston slept with one ear on the horses below, and Lincoln slept with their money bag nestled securely between himself and Alexis.  Alexis complained, but she felt tired enough to sleep no matter what.

Sure enough, in the early hours, a couple of crew members joined Pinto in stealing the long boat.  They rowed to shore where they could get lost in the crowd and not have to answer any questions the harbor master and his legionnaires might ask.  Captain Ardacles said good riddance, and a mate is no good if you can’t trust him.  The travelers did not believe him.  Several suspected that after they got unloaded, Pinto and his friends would be back on board to continue their thieving ways.

Once free of the dock, all the papers signed in duplicate, they found the dozen monks of Barke, waiting patiently for them.  Deacon Galarius introduced them all, but only Alexis, and maybe Nanette and Katie would remember all those names.  Lincoln was quick to thank them for helping the ship get safely through the storm.  They nodded, smiled, and said don’t mention it.

“We will walk with you on the road to Nicaea,” Deacon Galarius said, and several monks nodded.  “That way, we can keep the wraith away, not to mention the thieves.  The road is full of thieves looking for an isolated priest or bishop with a bag of gold.”

Lockhart looked around at the group and did not argue, even if it meant walking the whole way.  They all began to walk, together, and brought the wagon along, slowly.

“What has that creature got against you folks, anyway?” Father Flavius opened the conversation.

“Not sure,” Lockhart answered.

“If it is the same one,” Lincoln said.  “And not everyone agrees that it is.”  He paused to start again.  “If it is the same one, it followed us through a time gate about three thousand years ago and stayed mostly hidden until after the time of dissolution.”

“What is that?” Deacon Galarius asked.  “The time of dissolution?”

“It is when the old gods gave up their flesh and blood and went back to being forces of nature.”  Lockhart offered what he understood.

“It is when the holding places for the spirits of the dead, like Hades, gave up their dead,” Katie added.

“The advent of our Lord,” Father Flavius suggested with a nod.

“Basically,” Alexis agreed.

“Anyway,” Lincoln continued.  “This wraith somehow got the idea that she is supposed to have our souls, and so far, we have not been able to stop her or talk her out of that idea.”

“I see,” Father Flavius said, though he did not explain exactly what he saw.

In the afternoon, they began the slow climb into the hills and Deacon Galarius came up front to warn the travelers.  “The thieves are mostly here in the high country.  The legion patrols the valleys, but apparently, they don’t get paid enough to climb into the hills.  Besides, the hills are filled with off-road trails where a few men can scurry away to hide among the trees and rocks.”

“Welcome to Sherwood,” Lockhart said.

After a moment, Katie guessed, “Robin Hood?”

The group camped in a field where they had a fair view all around.  They did not find much game, but the monks brought food stuffs for the journey.  It included plenty of vegetables so Alexis, Boston, Sukki, and Elder Stow were happy.  They also brought some beer, which helped everyone relax as they settled in for a night of careful watch.  The thieves stayed away, but one visitor did show up in the early hours when Boston and Sukki awaited the sunrise.

“What?” Boston said, much too loud.  “What do you want?”

The wraith hovered over the grass, just outside Elder Stow’s screen.  The slight breeze that blew her ragged dress around, showed no feet to stand on beneath the dress.  She looked old, a bit like a wrinkled and rotten fruit, but her many teeth looked clean and plenty sharp.  Her voice sounded like the creak in the shutters of an old barn.

“I don’t want you, little spirit.  You are no longer of any consequence,” she said, with a grin that showed all those teeth, but suggested she might change her mind.  “And I have no interest in the elder ones, either the girl beside you that used to be an elder, nor the elder man that continues to travel with you.  Nor do I have a claim on the new ones, neither the man, nor Nanette, who has proved a great disappointment.  But the other five…”  The wraith held up her hand.  The fingers appeared wispy and seemed to have a hard time solidifying and coming into focus, but it was enough to count.  “Yes, five.  You must give them to me.  I am charged by Domnu herself to feast upon their fear and drag their souls to the land of the dead where they will live in eternal torment.”

“The land of the dead has been emptied,” Deacon Galarius said as he stepped up behind Boston and Sukki.

“Yeah,” Boston spouted.  “When was the last time you went there and checked?”

The wraith grew suddenly angry.  The people took one step back in the face of that fury, but all the wraith could do was pound on Elder Stow’s screen and yell, “You lie.  Give me the mortals.  Give them to me.”

By then, the two monks on the watch stepped forward, and with Deacon Galarius, they appeared to pray.  A mist, barely discernable, came from the monks and slipped right through the screens.  It caught the wraith in mid-curse and pushed her further and further from the camp, until she disappeared behind a far hill.  The yelling and cursing could be heard until the end.

Decker came running up, rifle in his hand.  Nanette followed him, only a couple of paces behind.  “Damn,” Decker said.  He fired once in the general direction before Nanette caught him and took his arm.

“Next time,” Nanette said.  Decker did not answer.

As the travelers and their escort followed the river down into the valley, toward the lake and the city of Nicaea, Alexis asked a serious question.  “I thought the church frowned on sorcery.”

Father Flavius nodded as Deacon Galarius explained.  “The church frowns on the misuse of power and the ungodly misuse of whatever talents or position the Lord gives.  To violate a person’s conscience is the temptation—because with every gift there is temptation.”

“The Lords and rulers in this age, instead of leading and guiding people, they have most often sought to control people,” Father Flavius said.  “They tried to make people think, act, and talk a certain way, and for years, threatened torture and death if, for example, the people were unwilling to sacrifice to the emperor.  The government is not to be worshiped.”

“People need to make their own decision how they will act, think, and talk.  People must come to Christ in their own heart, and neither threats nor magical trickery will do,” Deacon Galarius said.  “The monks of Barke understand this and do everything that they do with prayer and supplication, being most careful not to violate others in their work.”

“It is for salvations sake,” Father Flavius agreed.  “All gifts and talents are given for the building up of the body of Christ.  Magic is a most rare, and honestly, most dangerous gift to be treated with the utmost care and oversight.  But when it is misused in order to force or control others, or make things come out the way the magic user wishes, then it is sorcery, and the church does frown on that.”

“So, what you are saying.” Lincoln wanted to get it straight.  “Nothing is evil of itself.  It all depends on what people do with what they have been given.”

“God created all things and called them good,” Father Flavius said.  “Without Christ, nothing was made that was made.  Magic was made.”

“The rich man and the poor man lived side by side, and when they died, the rich man went to torment and the poor man went to paradise.”  Deacon Galarius tried to explain.  “When the rich man complained, he was told he had every good thing in life, and he did nothing to relieve the suffering of the poor man.  Now, in death, the poor man has every good thing, and the rich man gets to suffer.”

“That is not exactly the story,” Father Flavius said.  “But the rich young ruler was told to sell all that he had and give to the poor and come and follow Jesus.  The rich man went away sad, because he had many things.”

Alexis offered her thought.  “Back home, some think the rich should be forced to give up their money so it can be given to the poor.”

“No, no,” Father Flavius said.  “Conscience, remember?  The rich have been given a great gift, but they must find it in their hearts to give and help those in need.  That is when it means something, has value, and God will bless.  To take, by which I assume you mean steal, will accomplish only evil.”

“There are many talents and gifts with which the Lord gifts his people,” Deacon Galarius said.  “Don’t make the gift of magic more than it is.  Personally, I believe the most gifted person in the monastery of Barke is the cook.  Without any magic whatsoever, he can take the most meagre rations and produce a feast worthy of the name.”

“Now, I’m hungry,” Father Flavius said.

Lockhart overheard and called, “Lunch.”

They stopped on the last small rise before the lake and the city, both of which they could see perfectly well down the hill.  Elder Stow did not need his scanner.  Decker did not need to meditate and let his eagle totem show him the countryside.  Decker did, however, get out his binoculars.  He sensed something wrong.  All of the monks and the travelers that were sensitive to such things felt the same.

“Fire in the city,” Decker said, and handed his binoculars to Lincoln so he could have a look.  Katie got out the scope for her rifle while Lockhart got her binoculars, which he handed around so some of the others could take a look.

M3 Festuscato: The Jutes, part 2 of 3

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Mirowen went on to whisper the king’s response.

“He is thanking the fine ship builder for his thoughtfulness and is offering him a ring of gold for his trouble.”  The king stood and gave the gift.  “He is telling Ingut to stay and be refreshed.  He will get the finest rooms to spend the evening and can make a fresh start home in the morning.

“Ingut says his poor dear daughter will miss him in the night, and how he hates to be away from his only living kin.”

“The king says, here.  This inlaid necklace should soothe her fears.  Now please be seated and say no more about it.”  The king sat back down while men at the table to the king’s left moved down to make room for the shipwright.  Festuscato took Mirowen by the wrist and stepped forward.

“Festuscato Cassius Agitus, Senator of Imperial Rome and Ambassador of his most August Emperor, Valentinian III, the Divine Caesar, ruler of the Western World, it is an honor to be at your table,” he said, Mirowen translating.  The king slowly grinned.

“Ruler of the Western World?” he questioned.  There were a couple of muffled laughs at that.

“The civilized world,” Festuscato said, eliciting a very loud burp from a man at the back. “And many a man has underestimated the power and reach of Rome.”  He spoke plainly, not threatening.

“We have no quarrel, Roman,” the king said.  He made no other comment and looked over the crew, instead.

“Lady Mirowen.” Festuscato began the introductions with her.  “The big Britain is Bran the Sword, and these other good men are Gregor One Eye, the Saxon, Seamus the cleric, is Irish, Luckless from the mines of Wales, Mousden, the Pixie from Cornwall, and of course you know Vingevourt, king of the sprites of the Baltic.”  Festuscato began to look around.

“I was not aware they had names,” King Hroden said.

“And ah, there he is.”  Festuscato pointed.  “And Hrugen the Sailor.”  He knew better than to name the Dane, as a Dane, but then Hrugen surprised them by stepping forward.

“I am Hrugen son of Unferth, grandson of Edglaf of the Danes,” he said, proudly.  Several benches got shoved back and several men reached for their weapons, but the king stopped them with his hand.

“I have heard of your father,” Hroden said.

“I fled my home twelve years ago when my father killed his two brothers,” Hrugen said. “I feared for my life, but I have conquered that fear and I am returning home to confront my sire, once and for all.” He sounded far braver and more confident in that assembly than he really was.

“He is a stinking drunk,” Hroden said.  “He sits at Hrothgar’s feet in Heorot and fears the monster that assails them.  He is a drunk and a coward.”  The king baited Hrugen, but Hrugen did not bite.

“What you say may be true,” Hrugen said.  “I have not been home in all these years.”

The king frowned at his lack of success, so he broadened his jibes.  “Still, I suppose we can encourage enmity between Danes. You may stay.  As for the rest of your crew, however, they seem no threat. Even the big one looks docile enough. Stay and eat.”

“I thank the king for his generosity,” Festuscato said.  “But before you underestimate Rome, may I suggest a friendly contest or two?”

“Eh?”  The shrewdness returned to the king’s eyes.

“Something to entertain and pass the time,” Festuscato shrugged.  “Perhaps archery to start, if you have a target.”

The king nodded. He indicated to a man who called for the target.  “But what if you lose?” the king asked.

“Mousden.” Festuscato called.  The Pixie came forward and produced a small leather purse out of nowhere.  He handed it to Festuscato and flew back to the others.  Festuscato took out a couple of pieces of gold as if judging how much to bet.  He looked around, and then smiled, dumped half the bag of nuggets on the table before the king and set the rest of the bag beside it.  “But what if we win?”  Festuscato countered.  The king’s wide eyes looked up at the Roman.  “Rome is a fat cow,” he reminded the king.

“Enough,” the king promised.  “I will give enough.”  He stood. “But my men will not lose.”  He roared to be sure everyone got the message.  A table, one back from the front, was cleared for the strangers, but the king stopped Festuscato.  “You sit with me,” he said.  “And the Lady of Light.”  He literally threw a man out of his seat to make room at his own table.  When he sat back down, the man beside him whispered in his ear.  He laughed. “Olaf the Swede has bet on you and your crew.”  He laughed again.  “Yonstrom!” He called out.  The king’s hunter stepped forward, arrow already on the string. A line got drawn on the floor and the target set across the room far enough away to not make it too easy. Yonstrom shot, and it appeared a good shot.  It was not centered, but close enough to take down a stag.  The king smiled and looked at Festuscato.

“Mirowen.” That was all he said, without looking. She jumped on the table itself, adding another twelve yards distance to the target, produced a bow seemingly out of thin air and shot, not once, but two arrows so close together the second was away before the first one hit the target.  The first hit dead center and the second one hit so perfectly on the end it drove the first nearly all the way through the hardwood, but without splitting the first shaft.

Mirowen got back in her seat, the bow gone, and she looked demure and sweet before the men could hardly react.  Then they broke out.  Some hooted. Some hollered.  All praised her, in amazement, and only Festuscato noticed that she turned a little red.  When the king bent over to say something, she spoke first to cut him off.

“My Lord Agitus is far better than I am,” she said.  Festuscato shook his head.  He knew his reflection in the past, Diana, his genetic twin, had been graced by both the goddess Justitia and the goddess Diana, her namesake.  He reflected her sense of justice and power of negotiation as well as her ability to hunt and use the bow, to fire the arrow of justice as he called it, but Mirowen remained the best he had ever seen.

“Perhaps,” the king said.  “But he did not shoot.  Magic does not count.  I will have the target examined in the morning to see if the arrows are still there or if it was all just illusion.”  He looked at Festuscato and considered whether or not he might be better than the elf.  “We will call it a draw,” the king concluded.  “Swords.”  He announced.

Mirowen wanted to protest, but Festuscato held her hand down.  He looked.  Bran did not have to be called.  His opponent was a big Jute, though not quite Bran’s size.  Neither was the Jute’s sword as big as Bran’s early broadsword. They did not wait for the word, but went at it evenly at first.  When Bran looked to be gaining the advantage, and the Jute appeared to be tiring, a man at the table stuck out his own weapon, and Bran lost his grip.  The broadsword clattered across the floor and king Hroden looked pleased.

Festuscato showed no emotion as the big Jute moved in for what he believed would be the deciding blow, but as he moved in close to strike, Bran did the opposite of what was expected.  Instead of backing away, Bran stepped in even closer and hit the Jute with a wicked uppercut followed by two jabs and a right hook that slammed the Jute against the wall, unconscious.  Bran rubbed his knuckles a bit before he retrieved his broadsword and laid it at the Jute’s throat.

“One for me.” Festuscato said to the king’s great displeasure.  He called for food and thought quietly while everyone ate and drank.  He called a man close and whispered to him.

Avalon 6.4 Stories, part 3 of 4

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“Millie agreed to go with me into the past, to see if we could piece together how the Republic got started.  Wallace insisted on coming with us when Nanette showed up at the time gate.  Wallace wanted to stay with Nanette.  Tony talked about heading into the future, but he said he could not leave the professor to fend for himself.  Of course, I don’t believe the Nanette who went with us was actually Nanette.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, all went well enough until we arrived in Sicily.  But Nanette seemed changed from the start.  She did not talk to us.  Her warm and friendly personality changed into a sour personality.  She got plain rude, and mean to Millie.  But when we got to Sicily, she began to be able to do things—impossible things.  I don’t know. Like magic or something.  Like she had powers all of a sudden.  It was just little things at first, but her personality got worse with everything she learned she could do.  It was like the magic made her turn evil.  Millie said she noticed some things earlier, when we were traveling through China, somewhere in there.”

“Sicily?” Katie interrupted.

“That was the time when Pyrrhus of Epirus got invited to drive the Carthaginians off the island.  I guessed the year at 279 or so.  Millie and I discussed making the long trek to Rome. This would be on the eve of the Punic wars.  But Nanette forced us through the next time gate, and after a while, she followed us, or so it seems.”

“But why do you say it was not Nanette?” Lincoln asked.

“Because of the way she acted, and many things she said.  She talked about still being there with Professor Fleming, and how she would never leave him.  But there she was with us.  She talked about being in two places at once, and how hard that was.  And she talked about Janus, the two-faced god of the Romans, you know, one face comedy and one face tragedy.”

“One face good and one face evil,” Katie said.

“We met him, once, in the Alps,” Lockhart remembered

“So, maybe Janus split her into two Nanettes,” Boston blurted out.

“You mean, the god?” Evan had to ask.

“Don’t underestimate what the gods can do,” Lockhart said.

“We met the wicked witch, briefly,” Alexis said.

“Nanette?”

“Yeah,” Lincoln said.  “She’s taken up with some cowboys.  1870s?”  He looked at Boston.

“!870s,” Boston nodded. “I got shot.”

“Same age our horses came from,” Katie added.  The others had not realized that.

“Benjamin,” Alexis did not spell it out.

“Just coming to it,” Lincoln said, and after a minute he reported from the database.  “The Other Earth reaches half full in 525 BC, and is good until 225 BC.  Then we go into dark moon until 75 AD.  We are in a dark period right now, since 825 BC.  Now let’s see…”  Lincoln fell silent for a minute.  “Interesting…”  more silence. “I put in Sicily.  Umma from Carthage.  323-267 BC.  After her, Meng Shi in China.  267-228 BC. They both live in days when magic is possible.”  They had to explain for Evan, and Sukki, since it had not come up before.  Once again, they all looked to Lockhart to explain.

“The Other Earth fills the same relative space as our own earth, but in another dimension.  As it has been explained to me, it is what they call a physics universe, not a parallel earth.  As I understand it, the further you travel across the physical dimensions, the more the laws of physics that we know break down or cease altogether.  You don’t have to go far before life itself becomes impossible.  In the case of the Other Earth, it may be closer to the core than our own universe, because all of the laws of physics we understand function there too, but it has an additional force or energy like gravity or magnetism that we don’t have.”

“It is called creative and variable energy,” Alexis interrupted.

Lockhart nodded.  “We common folks call it magic.  Magic energy.  And some people, not many, can somehow tap into it and do miraculous things.”

Alexis spoke up again.  “Even in our day, we have not determined the genetic component, but it does tend to follow bloodlines.  It sometimes skips a generation, like grandmother and granddaughter, but not the mother.  It shows up about two-thirds in women and one-third in men.  No one knows why.”

“So, Nanette is a witch.  She can tap into this magic power…”

“…Creative and variable energy,” Alexis corrected.

“But what does this Other Earth have to do with her?” Evan wondered.

“Camp first,” Lockhart said, and pointed to the next group of trees, which looked like the edge of a forest. “I know it is early, but there are too many eyes in the sky.”  He pointed back; the way he had to look to be able to explain things to the others.  People looked.  A larger ship moved slowly across the sky, and Lockhart finished his thought.  “They are either surveying the area or looking for something.”

“Or someone,” Katie agreed, and she headed out to find an acceptable, defensible campsite.

Once the camp got set up, and the horses got their fair share of time, the people settled in around the fire, hoping the deer Katie bagged would be more edible than the goat Decker provided for lunch.

“Okay,” Lockhart began.  “The Other Earth has two differences to our earth, besides the magic energy we told you about.  One is, the Kairos never got born on the Other Earth.  At some point, the gods went to war with one another.  The landscape got shoved around pretty good and most of life got wiped out.  As for the humans, there were no survivors.  One of the gods who survived over there was Poseidon.  Somehow, he got the other surviving gods on that earth to agree to try and merge the two earths.  It did not work, for several reasons, as the Kairos explained it to me.  For one, Poseidon and the gods in our earth were not keen on the idea of merging with another version of themselves from another universe.  Second, the Other Earth existed as a mirror image of our own, with Europe pointing east instead of west, and so on.  And third, as the two worlds came into what they called conjunction, all this magic energy began to leak into our universe and caused all sorts of problems.”

“You mean, the people in our world suddenly became witches and warlocks.”

“Wizards, not Warlocks,” Boston said, and turned up her nose.

“Not many.  Never many, but some,” Alexis said.

Lockhart coughed.  People quieted.  “When the worlds got close, the Kairos Amphitrite figured out how to make a hole between the worlds and travel from one to the other.  The gods on the Other Earth wanted people, and life restored there, so they could have someone to be gods over, I suppose.  Amphitrite made the agreement.  Plenty of ordinary people crossed over, but especially those who were gifted to use the magic energy that world offered.  The gods of that earth set it in motion, relative to ours. Every six-hundred years, the worlds come into conjunction, and some people cross over.

“Not many come into our world,” Alexis said.  “But some went there, especially in the ages when witches get burned at the stake.”

Lockhart continued.  “The best way I have been told to picture it is to look at the moon.  Between the half to half-moon, through the full moon, we get close enough to the other world, so like increased moonlight, we get magic energy leaking into our world. That is when travel becomes possible between worlds, though it takes considerable magic to do it.  From half to half through the dark of the moon, the leakage really is not enough to activate any magic potential.”

“Right now, we are in a dark time,” Lincoln said.  “We should go through the light time from 525 to 225 BC, which would make the full moon in 375.  You said Nanette began to show signs of magic after entering the Chinese time zone. That had to be after 228, up to 323 BC, so well within the light time.”

“I see,” Evan said, whether he saw exactly or not.

“It sounds like Nanette had the potential,” Alexis said.  “The world went light around 1875, but by 1905 she maybe did not have enough light to bring out her potential.  Going back in time to where the light started in 225, and you landed about 279or 280 in Sicily, that sounds like light enough to bring out her magic.”

“If you were traveling with evil Nanette,” Lincoln said.  “You are probably lucky to have escaped.”

“But that is not the only way magic can happen,” Alexis added, and waited for Evan to look at her before she explained. “Most of the spirits, such as greater, lesser, and even most of the little spirits have natural magic inside them. Also, half-breeds can do things, though lesser and lesser, even down to the seventh generation. The blood is not considered fully human again until the tenth generation, for example…”

Evan looked at Boston, the elf.

“Mine is mostly fire magic,” Boston said.

“I guessed from the red hair,” Evan smiled, then looked at Alexis again.  “Don’t tell me you are a witch.”

“Lincoln only calls me a witch on my bad days,” Alexis admitted. “Boston and I are not dependent on how close or far away the Other Earth might be.  My magic is in the wind, and healing magic.  I used to be an elf.  Boston used to be human.”

“From Massachusetts.  You know, Salem witches and all that.”

“But how can that be?  What do you mean you used to be an elf?”

“Boston became an elf to marry my brother, Roland,” Alexis admitted.  “I became human to marry Benjamin.”

“I didn’t know you could do that,” Evan said.

“It isn’t done, except in special cases.”

“The Kairos?” Evan asked.  Everyone nodded.  Then they quieted to give Evan some room to breathe.  It was a lot to take in.  They ate.  Finally, Alexis became concerned about the look on Evan’s face.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Wondering if Millie made it to safety,” he said.  “I pray for her every night.”

“I pray for Roland,” Boston said. “He disappeared.  We are believing he got a free ride back to the future. But there was a wolf.  Not a wolv, but a real werewolf, and he may have gotten torn up.  We don’t know.”

“Same,” Evan said.  “Except mine was a Wolv.”

“I can pray for Millie, too.”

“And Roland?”  Evan was not sure of the name, but Boston nodded.  After that, Evan seemed to relax around Boston, even if she was an elf.

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Don’t miss tomorrows post for the end of the story.

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R6 Greta: The Persian, part 1 of 3

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The man’s cap looked like a wizard’s cone hat, but bent so it flopped over in the front.  It showed the image of a fingernail moon, while the man’s wizard cloak of the same color as the cap, a deep navy, almost black, looked studded with a thousand stars.  The man himself looked richly tanned and stared at her with dark eyes beneath full and black brows.

“Persian,” Greta called him, and Vedix came up to stand beside her.

“Kairos.”  The Persian returned a word to show that he certainly knew who she was.  Greta looked for Lucius and found him standing back, quietly watching.  Lucius had his sword put away and made no hostile move as the Persian talked and stepped toward the center of the room.  “That was a beautiful trick, sharing false information.  You have the Wolv all searching for you up river, but I saw through your clever ruse and now I stand between you and the Road of Dreams.”

Greta looked again at the Persian and understood what she had to do, dangerous as it might be.  “Jupiter is dead,” she said with a smile.  “He went over to the other side as all the gods should.  And your pretend Jupiter, the lion-headed freak is dead as well.”

The Persian paused, uncertain how to respond. Greta assumed from his perspective there was so much wrong with what she said, he choked on where to begin.  “He was not a pretend Jupiter,” the Persian spit out at last.  “He was the true god.”

“No,” Greta interrupted, with a kind and friendly shake of her head.  “If he was a true god he would have gone over to the other side some time ago with all the real gods.”

The Persian got flustered.  “He was a real god.”

Greta shook her head.  “Well, he was not exactly immortal.  Why, he was no more a god than you are.”  Greta forced a casual laugh.  “What are you, a third-rate magician?”

“I – I…”  The Persian stuttered before he threw his hands in her direction.  “This should have been done a long time ago.”

Greta felt herself turning into a donkey and quickly went away so Junior could stand in her place.  Junior was a true god of the Middle East as well as Egypt, and while he technically did not cover Persia, he had plenty of dealings there in ancient days and so imprinted his impression on the Persian people.  Junior shook his finger at the Persian, like the Persian was a naughty boy, and Junior smiled as the Persian’s eyes filled with a touch of fear and he took a step back.

“You picked up a matter transformer from the Wolv,” Junior said, like he was Greta speaking, which in a way, he was.  “Very impressive, but still just a trick.”  He tossed a bit of dirt in the air and Greta came back to have the dirt fall on her.  Immediately, the compulsion to become a jackass went away and she returned fully to her ordinary, human self.

“I have no matter trasfigurer, or whatever you said,” the Persian raised his voice.

“Sure,” Greta rolled her eyes.  “I forgot.  You are pretending to be a god.”

“But I am a god.”  Greta just stared at the man like the man had a few loose screws.  “But I am,” he repeated.

“I tell you what,” Greta said in a very casual voice. “I figure you have your tricks set up in this room so it would not be a good test.  Let’s go back out by the river, into the sunlight and see what you are made of.”  Greta grabbed Vedix’ hand and dragged him behind her.  She walked quickly, and the Persian followed, still mumbling.

“But I am a god.”

Outside, Greta waved to Alesander and Briana who stood, concerned, but then curious to see what she was up to.  When the Persian came into the light, and blinked at the sudden brightness, Briana drew her knife and growled like Vedix.  Greta thought it must be a Celtic thing.  She turned and faced the man only when she got near the docks.  The lion-headed one had been a god of the sky, the air and lightning.  The sun-runner, whichever that one was, appeared as a fire demon with a whip of fire.  Mithrasis, the Nymphus stood for Venus, the water one.  Greta wondered why women were always the water ones.  It hardly seemed fair.  But then the Roc flew over the beasts of the earth, quite literally from five thousand feet up, while the soldier stood over the human race, again of the earth, though it seemed like the Wolv were willing to play his game as well. That left the father figure, the Pater, but Greta figured he stayed above it all.  And the Persian, over the moon and the stars, had to be over the fifth element, ether.  That meant earth air water and fire were not his forte, so this might work.

“So, magician,” Greta turned and spoke up as soon as she reached the edge of the water by the ship and the dock.  “Lets see what you got out here in broad daylight. I’ll be watching to see if I can figure out the trick.”

“It is not tricks.”  The Persian turned from confusion and upset to anger.  This became the dangerous point and Greta had to be careful.  The Persian let his anger touch the sky and with a wave of his hand, dark, foreboding clouds moved in and lightning flashed between the clouds.  The thunder echoed through the village, and Alesander and Briana grabbed each other while Vedix jumped.  It began to rain, hard, but Greta laughed.

“That was very good.”  Greta knew a compliment would be needed to soothe the Persian’s anger. “I did not see how you did that, at all. Excellent.”  The Persian grinned.  “But really.”  Greta pointed to the sky.  “Five-year-old children on Katawba Three can change the weather with a push of a button. Weather control is old hat.”  The Persian looked deflated as Greta whistled for her air sprites and thought her instructions rather than speak out loud. The sprites began to push at the darkness and enlisted a couple of spirits of the winter winds to help.  The thunder stopped and the rain slowly slackened and stopped as the sun returned to the dock.

Greta felt glad of one thing, the one advantage she had in this game of wits.

“The Persian has no wits?” Festuscato asked in Greta’s mind.

“That’s wit with a “t”,” Gerraint said, and after a very brief pause, he said, “Twit.”

No, Greta thought to herself along with the words, “shut up.”  The Persian could not read her mind, thank God.  Given her knowledge of the actual future, sometimes called the most dangerous knowledge in the universe, even the gods were prevented from reading her mind, and that prohibition included the Persian.  He would have no way of knowing that matter transmutation was way beyond humanoid technology, so he could not have gotten a machine from the Wolv to do it. And it would be a thousand years in the future before the people on the planet of Katawba had the technical capacity to change the weather with the push of a button, but Greta was not going to be deterred by the details.  What the Persian did not know, she would not tell him.

“Hey!” Greta shouted as she leaned over and wrung her hair out on the dock.  “I may be willing to confess you are a real wizard and not just a magician with a bag of tricks. But if that is the case, where is your familiar?  I thought all witches and wizards had a familiar.”  Greta remembered there was something, like the lion-headed man had a serpent by his feet, but she could not exactly remember what the Persian had.

The Persian still looked angry as he watched his storm get pushed away, but soon enough, his expression turned to sly.  “Indeed,” he said, and he did not even protest that he was a god, not a wizard.  “You should meet my familiar.”

R6 Festuscato: 6 The Witch of Balmoor, part 3 of 3

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Patrick started down the rough path, which became a bit of a climb to reach the floor of the hollow.  Bran and Greta followed him, and Giolla came and pushed up to stay near the priest.  Lord Flahartagh followed reluctantly, and Fionn came last and looked like a man who got caught with his hand in the cookie jar.

“Come, come,” the old woman cackled.  “I have been expecting you, but tell me, druid, how did things turn?”

“You failed, old woman.  The priest lives, and I should take my money back.”

“Curious,” the old woman cackled.  “They were the most poisonous serpents in the world. But who can control serpents?”

“Patrick can,” Giolla shouted.  “He cast your serpents into the sea where they all drowned.”

“You paid her to attack the priest?”  Lord Flahartagh caught up with what was going on and he hit his druid and knocked him down.  “You know what happened last time,” he roared.

“What happened?” Greta asked.  She wanted the conversation to continue while she thought of what to do.  She felt sure any direct movement toward the hole in the world would be stopped by the witch.

Lord Flahartagh explained.  “My father’s grandfather got cheated by the MacNeills and the King of Leinster when the King ruled in favor of the MacNeills and they took possession of the whole of the fens.  He came to the witch and she called up the dragons who terrorized our lands as readily as they terrorized MacNeill and Leinster.”

“Who can control a dragon?” the witch asked in a gleeful voice.

“Festuscato can,” Bran said, and Greta looked up at the man.

“Hey, I healed the dragon.  Oh, okay.”  Greta threw up her hands and went away so Festuscato could fill his own boots.  The witch looked startled, and the Irish yelled again, though not as loud as the last time.  Festuscato returned in his white tunic with the dragon on the front, and sent the cloak of Athena away.  “Good to be back,” he said, and winked at Patrick, while he walked around as if seeing things for the first time, and in truth positioned himself to take a stab at the branches as soon as the opportunity arose.

“You are the dragon,” the witch said, and with the sound of respect in her voice.  “I have heard of you.”  Clearly, hearing and understanding what she heard were two different things.  No human witch, no matter how powerful, could probe the depths of the Kairos.

“So, what’s cooking?” Festuscato asked and leaned over as if to get a look.

“The soup of life in the cauldron of life.”

“That is never the cauldron of life,” Festuscato objected.  “Dagda’s Cauldron was big enough for a man to stand inside it.  Cauldron of life?”  Festuscato scoffed.

“Patrick’s words are the words of eternal life,” Giolla spoke up.

“Jesus is the giver of life,” Patrick said, and the witch screamed and covered her ears.  That told Festuscato that the witch was not just a sorceress, she was demon possessed, a complication, and no doubt the source of her knowledge.

“I control life here,” the witch insisted and she lifted her spoon to mumble incoherently and wave her hand above the bubbles.  Spiders began to crawl over the edge of the cauldron and several bats flew up into the sky, to dive bomb the people.

“Mousden!”  Festuscato called, and since Mirowen presently held the boy’s hand, she came with him.

Mousden took one look at the witch, reverted to his pixie form, screamed and raced to hide behind Patrick’s robes.

“Mousden, come here,” Mirowen scolded and Mousden looked up and took a breath long enough to mouth another word.

“Lunch.”  The bats flew for their lives.  The spiders were not so lucky.

By the time the witch closed her mouth at the unexpected turn of events, Festuscato had Wyrd out of his sheath.  One swipe of that sword, and the old branches got cut off. He punched the remains of the branches, hurt his hand, and the wood popped out the other side of the hole, somewhere on the other earth.  The hole itself snapped shut with an audible SNAP.

The witch screamed.  Mousden screamed again on principle.  Festuscato more accurately shouted his words.  “Get out of the hollow!”  He grabbed Patrick’s robe as Mirowen scooped up Mousden, and they began to climb.  Bran went right there with them, but the others were a bit behind.  When the witch collapsed, she began to decay rapidly. She had to be over ninety.  Maybe she was over a hundred-years-old.  Maybe she was already dead and just being propped up by the demons that inhabited her.  They would never know.  As they reached the ground level above, the walls all around the hollow gave way and the hollow filled rapidly with water.  They watched while in the end it became a pond in the wilderness, and when it overflowed in one spot, it became a little stream.

“There is some water worth avoiding,” Lord Flahartagh said.

“No,” Festuscato shook his head.  “What do you think, Springs?”

A little head popped up from the stream and spoke. Flahartagh got startled, but he did not yell this time.  “Lots of muck in the water from that blasted soup the witch was cooking.  Come back this time next year and we will get things nice and cleaned up for you.  That old witch kept us out for a long time, but I knew she could not keep us out forever.”

“Thank you, Springs,” Festuscato said.  “Good to see you.”

“My pleasure.”  Springs saluted, and broke apart into the water from whence he came.

“I see you have lots of friends,” Lord Flahartagh said, and Festuscato nodded.

“Like my housekeeper Mirowen, and her ward, Mousden.” Mousden went back to walking, looking again like a nine-year-old, and it would have been easy to forget his pixie appearance or blame it on the witch casting illusions, but Mousden chose that moment to let out a big belch, and Mirowen scolded him.  “He ate too much,” Festuscato suggested.  Lord Flahartagh’s eyes got big for a second before he began to laugh.

Patrick and Fionn the Druid kept up a lively debate all the way back to the road.  To be sure, Fionn did not want to crowd his lord and remind him he went to the witch in the first place.  No one really listened to the debate, unless Bran listened, but it did seem to the casual observers that Fionn kept losing.

By the time they reached the road, Fionn started reaching for arguments that were no more than thinly disguised insults, like a man who lost the debate, and knew it, but was damned if he would admit it. He started insulting Patrick when they reached the road and Patrick had enough.

“No one is forcing you to listen to the good news, but as young Giolla plainly told you, what I am bringing is the word of life.” Patrick slammed the butt of his shepherd’s crook on the ground for emphasis.  Unfortunately, the ground seemed extra soft on the side of the road and the staff sank into the muck.  A second later, Patrick had to let go as the staff got hot.  They all watched as the staff sprouted leaves, and they watched the roots grow.

“Dern,” Festuscato said.  “I liked that staff.”

Fionn got scared when they went to see the witch. He got frightened out of his mind when he saw the pixie, and then the water sprite, but he could pretend they did not exist.  This became too much.  The fear covered Fionn’s face and he yelled the last weapon in his arsenal.

“I will call upon the gods and tell them to strike you down.”

“I don’t think that will work,” Festuscato said. “The gods don’t appreciate being told what to do.”  He stepped aside and traded places through time with Danna.  She called sweetly, “Rhiannon.”

Rhiannon did not have to come, but she came because it is polite when Mother calls.  “What is it this time?”

“This druid wants you to strike down Patrick.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t.  He is such a nice man.”

“That’s what I thought.  I told him the gods did not like being told what to do.”

“Oh, don’t I know it.  Mannanon can be as stubborn as the sea.”

“He can’t help it.”

“Oh, I almost forgot.  Clugh ate a whole goat and slept for almost twenty-four hours.”

“He is growing up.  You did cook the goat.”

“Of course, He made the cutest little whine when I tried to give it to him raw, so I cooked it for him and he squealed.  He was so happy.”

“So, you’re not mad at me for giving you the dragon?”

“Oh, how could I ever be mad at you, Mother.” Rhiannon stepped up and kissed Danna on the cheek, waved to everyone and vanished.  Danna turned to the Druid who stared, mouth wide open.  She stuck her finger in his face.

“Listen to Patrick.  He is telling you the truth.  In the words of my good friend Yul Brenner, his god is God.  Now close your mouth, and if you are good, and I said if, mind you, you just might find something special in your stocking … no, wait … Frosty the Snowman.  Anyway.” Danna hugged Patrick, and then she gave him three pieces of gold and some advice.

“The women, especially rich women will give you gifts.  Remember in this culture, they will be insulted if you don’t accept them.  But on the other hand, men will accuse you of accepting gifts from women.  You will have to do your best to turn those gifts to the church to answer your critics, and otherwise, go with God.  Use the gold to buy a new shepherd’s crook.  It suits you.”  Danna stepped back.  “The old way has gone.”

“The new way has come,” Patrick said, and Danna vanished, and she took Bran, Mirowen and Mousden with her.

They appeared on the road just beyond MacNeill’s fort, and Danna changed back to Festuscato.  He let his armor and weapons go away in favor of his comfortable clothes, and he spoke.  “I believe I have tempted history here far enough.”

“So, explain how the shepherd’s crook sprouted and grew,” Bran wondered.

“Maybe if he had some natural magic in him,” Mirowen started, but Festuscato interrupted.

“Can’t be natural.  The source of the magic got cut off when the hole closed between this earth and the other earth.”

“But then, how?”  Now Mirowen was curious.

“Some mysteries are best left alone.  It is time that we go,” Festuscato said, but he paused when he saw a half-dozen wagons beside the fort where they blocked the view of the town and dock.  Festuscato made sure Mirowen had her glamour on and Mousden stayed in his big size. “I smell visitors, and something else.”

“Yourself,” Mirowen suggested.  “You need a bath.”

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MONDAY

R6 Festuscato: 7 Travelers: The tinkers bring spooks with them.  Don’t miss it.

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R5 Greta: The Lady’s Doom, part 3 of 3

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“You see, my lady.  I am the Nameless god.  That is why your Mithras does not dare to show up and help you now.  I would kick his butt.”  He thought to Thorn.  “Now.”  And he unlocked the door for them and caused the guards to come and see the jackass in the making so there would be no risk and no one standing in the way of the escape of the others.

Nameless laughed a hearty, healthy laugh such as Brunhild could never imitate, and then changed back to Greta just as Brunhild let out her first “Hee-Haw!”.  Greta thought the woman recognized her for one instance, but then the light of understanding seemed to die in Brunhild’s eyes.  “Bragi, hold the Lady,” Greta said.

“Sister.” Bragi, free of Brunhild’s spell, acknowledged his sister and took hold of the donkey’s neck.  “Mother Greta, I should say.”  He gently stroked the donkey’s nose and spoke soothing words to keep it from panic.  Greta grabbed Eldegard’s good hand and Vasen’s hand as well.

“The rest of you have about ten minutes to grab your friends and get down the Temple Mount before the Temple is blown sky high by the explosion.  I mean it.” No one moved.  “All right then, stay here and die.”  That got them.  They tripped over each other as they ran in mass and rushed out just after Gregor, Finbear and Thorn.

“What about us?” Bragi asked as he struggled a bit to keep his new pet under control.  Greta sighed.  She would not make Brunhild suffer the final indignity by making a bit for her mouth. Let her have Avalon.  The Isles beyond the seven were innumerable, after all. Surely one could be found where she could live out her days without struggle or fear.

“We go the easy way,” Greta said, and against the same wall where Brunhild called up the pictures of the preparation for battle, Greta called up the door to Usgard.  As soon as she opened it, the donkey leapt toward the grass which looked greener than any grass ought to be, and the aroma became too much for the beast. In Avalon, all looked more vivid and more real than anything on Earth.  Bragi, of course, followed after the donkey almost heedless of where he headed. Greta brought Vasen and Eldegard more slowly.  “Like Dorothy going from black and while to color,” she said,

“Are you all right?”  She generally asked the men, but Eldegard stared around and wandered off without answering, and Vasen wept, so she expected no answer there, either. The door closed behind them and vanished.

“Hey!”  Greta yelled, dropped her hands and stepped forward.  “That’s my brother, and that’s my donkey, too.”

Two gnome-like creatures were about to throw a net over the donkey who was contentedly grazing and utterly ignoring them. Bragi was on his back looking up with fright at the horrifically shaped black cloud that hovered over him.

“Stop it.”  She turned to yell at the fire sprite who stuck his head out of the lantern which hung from the tree and the water sprite, who just started to rise from the bubbling stream.  “You two strike at the same time and you will just put each other out.”

“Sorry, Lady.”  The fire sprite spoke up.  “Foam was just going to slip your feet out from beneath.”

“Yeah,” Foam said.  “And Flick was going to fall on you from above.”

“Yeah,” Flick said.

“Exactly the plan,” Foam said.

“Exactly right,” Flick said.

“Yeah,” Foam said.

“Enough.”  Greta did not have time for this.  She introduced her companions.  “This is Eldegard.  This is Vasen the Priest.  That one is my brother, Bragi, and the donkey is Lady Brunhild.”  The two gnomes tipped their hats to the donkey while the cloud over Bragi took on a friendlier appearance and offered his hand.

“Sir Bragi,” he said.  “An honor to meet you.”

“Yes.”  Bragi looked unsure, but he accepted the hand and the help back to his feet.

“My name is Cloudhook, and my little friends are Noblink and Mrs. Weebles.  Of course, Flick and Foam have already named themselves.”

“That’s right,” Foam said.  “I named Flick.”

“And I named Foam,” Flick said.

“You might say we named each other,” Foam added

“Or, we said each other’s names,” Flick amended

“Yeah,” Foam said.

“Ahem.”  Cloudhook interrupted the perpetual “Yeah” with a cough which sounded a bit like distant thunder.  “Our job is to guard the door and be wary of strangers.  No hard feelings, I hope, Sir Bragi.”

“No,” Bragi said, very graciously.  “I would say you do your jobs very well.”  Then he rushed to Greta’s side.  “What is happening with Thissle?  Is she all right?”

“Quiet,” Greta said, and even the brook stopped bubbling for a minute.  She closed her eyes and reached out.  It seemed an easy thing to do from Usgard where all ways lead to her little ones. “Thissle is just fine, and she found Thorn and they are dancing.”

“I’m glad,” Bragi said.  “Good for her.”  Then he got quiet because clearly Greta had not finished.

All right, Madwick.  Burns, Scorch, Miss Spark, be careful.

She saw the sprites leap out of their safe havens like blow torches and touch the nearest barrels.  Madwick and Burns were close enough not to even vacate their safe havens entirely.  Scorch made it back, but Spark had a way to go.  The explosion came as she grabbed on to the dolphin for dear life.  She just sucked herself inside as the statue clunked to the ground in front of them, a smoking hulk.  There were lights headed their way, as odd as that sounded on a bright, cloudless day.  Eldegard pointed them out.  Vasen looked, though he clearly looked like a man, raptured with more delight and joy than his old frame could handle.

“That would be Lady Thumbelin, the fairy queen and her court come to collect the statue.”  Cloudhook said.  “Probably make a big deal out of the job and Madwick and Burns will have swelled heads for a hundred years.”

“Too late.”  Noblink mumbled.  “Already swelled.”  Weeble stomped on his toe and curtsied for Greta.

Madwick and Burns pulled themselves from the wreckage at that moment and took on human form.  They looked dizzy and appeared as if they had been through a war.  Then Scorch and Spark appeared together, talking and holding hands.  Scorch had grabbed her at the last second and pulled her to safety.  Madwick got ready to say how hard that was, but he was glad to make the sacrifice, when Spark beat him to the punch.

“That was fun!”  She yelled and ran to Greta’s side.  “Can we do that again?”  She appeared a very pretty sprite, and Greta saw that Scorch thought so, too.

“Yeah,” Scorch said, sounding very much like Flick. “Can we do that again.”

“Please, no,” Greta said.  “I hope we never have to do that again.”

They looked sad for a minute, but then Spark looked up with hope.  “I volunteer if you ever want to blowed something up again, though.  You will remember.  You won’t forget me.”

Greta touched Spark’s hot cheek, gently.  “I won’t forget you, Spark,” she said, and Spark smiled, shyly.

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MONDAY

Brunhild has made an ass of herself… but there remains a battle raging on the earth.  Greta’s work is not yet done.  Don’t miss it, Monday.  Until then, Happy Reading.

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