Ravenwild
Peter J. Plasse
Cover art by Mark
Zug at http://www.markzug.com
Letter
graphics on cover by Michael Pierce at
http://www.piercedesign.com
Inner
art by Michael Longenecker
The celtic border surrounding
the character portraits was done by Neil Dring.
Copyright © 2010
by Dr. Peter J. Plasse and Michael L. Longenecker
Visit our
website at http://www.ravenwild.com
ISBN eBook: 978-0-9833400-0-3
Smashwords
Edition
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No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
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The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in
a review.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
First Printing:
November 2010
by Lightning
Source Inc. (US)
ISBN
Trade: 978-0-9833400-1-0
This book is dedicated to the Plasse and Longenecker families, without whose encouragement and support this book would have died as the essence of a wish that was once-upon-a-time most fervently wished.
"Dreams
are ever so much more important than therapy."
-
Katy-Li-of-the-Bindu-Scriptures
Table of Contents
Part 1
Chapter
1: Gnomes inside the castle walls
Chapter
2: "What do you mean, we're inside the acorn?"
Chapter
3: "A wizard? Named Hemlock Simpleton?"
Chapter
4: Stephanie gets hoodwinked
Chapter
5: Trolls and Gnomes, up close and personal
Chapter
6: Erik makes a plea
Chapter
7: Who's the real wizard anyway?
Chapter
8: It isn't brain surgery unless it really is...
Chapter
9: Today I just might kill a wizard
Chapter
10: Wishing something doesn't make it happen
Chapter
11: Sometimes, ya just can't hide
Chapter
12: Run, Doreen, run...
Chapter
13: "These Gnomes have exceptionally keen hearing."
Chapter
14: "Hey Human, wake up..."
Chapter
15: There will come a dark time
Chapter
16: "Shannon, the goats need tending."
Chapter
17: The courage of Norma Webb
Part 2
Chapter
18: A boy is just a boy on any world
Chapter
19: "Daddy's the Emperor now."
Chapter
20: "Whose prisoner is he anyway?"
Chapter
21: "Here's to maybe."
Chapter
22: "I hate waiting."
Chapter
23: What leaders do that non-leaders do not do
Chapter
24: Beauty and brains
Chapter
25: "I hate the hunting channel."
Chapter
26: "Bring it on, Old One."
Chapter
27: "The right tool for the right job"
Chapter
28: The Bindu-ward art of magic and spell
Chapter
29: Now we can be friends
Chapter
30: "This gets a little complicated."
Chapter
31: Probably why we married them
Chapter
32: Jacqueline would be pleased
Chapter
33: "How's everybody?"
Chapter
34: "I am calling Kendra."
There will
come
a dark time...
Rolan Fairman sat admiring the beauty of the predawn sky. In the distance, out beyond the trees, stood the Great Wall. Behind him were snow-capped mountains that soared to dizzying heights. The new day was about to break wide open and the three moons, all full, cast a light nearly as bright as that of day, but softer in a way that gave everything an almost velvety appearance. He loved this time of day. It was the only time when the world seemed truly at peace with itself. Still, he knew it wouldn’t last, for this was a world at war, torn in many directions.
He was weary of war. He had known no other life, neither as a boy, nor as a young man. He was weary even more of being the Commander-in-Chief of his small country.
As the night slowly surrendered to the force of daylight, he sighed. One might have thought the sigh was due to the fact that within minutes he would have to meet with his field commanders and get the obligatory battle reports, troop and supply location updates, and all of the remaining military information specifications of the night just past. But no, the sigh represented nothing more than a tiny sliver of sadness that he would not be able to look upon the three Inam'Ra moons simultaneously full for yet another year, for this phenomenon was precisely that, a yearly one.
“Like so many small pleasures in life,” he thought, “they come and go so quickly.”
Just as quickly, he was forced away from this fleeting moment as his lifelong friend and longtime second in command approached. As usual he was holding a flask of bittersweet that he held out to his King.
“Thargen,” Rolan offered, forcing his gaze away from the beauty in front of him, “I thank you for this. I hope this morning finds you rested and up to the challenges in front of us.”
He knew there was no chance that Thargen was rested. He might have gotten a few hours of interrupted sleep, but it had certainly been years since he had greeted the break of any given day fully rested. Thargen was a giant of a man, a full head taller than his King and half again as wide.
“My Lord,” Thargen returned. “I must say right off that it troubles me that I would find you here outside the castle gate alone and unprotected. I know that most of the fighting is days away, and the Great Wall is still intact, but surely there might be Slovan or Vulturan spies about who would like nothing better than to report to their superiors that they had managed to put an arrow into our King. Where is the guard?” At this, Luke Bowman, Minister of Conquest, Dorin Esselt, Minister of Strategic Unit Deployment, and Borok Dodson, Minister of Planning and Escapes, materialized out of nowhere, along with the remaining twenty or so of the King’s personal guards. All were battle ready. All were battle hardened. Most carried scars from years of service in their King’s army. All were armed with weapons of every sort, the clicking and rattling of which were the predominant sounds as they surrounded Rolan, Thargen, and the three captains.
“We must go,” said Thargen, who began moving towards the castle. “Paulimas awaits inside at the great table. I’m afraid he brings grim news from Minot. The Trolls have broken through at Devil’s Lake. We cannot possibly halt their advance before they make Lexington. But Paulimas will speak to all of these things in greater detail.”
The massive stone gate closed behind them as they entered the castle, the grinding and squealing of the huge gears temporarily obliterating all other sounds.
“Thargen.”
“My Lord?”
“You will begin the debriefing with Paulimas, and the captains of course. I will join you soon. But for now, I will see my son.”
Thargen nodded. “My Lord.”
At the entrance to the Great Hall, Rolan and six of the King’s Guard kept walking down the hallway, three in front of him and three behind. Thargen and the three captains entered the Hall itself, passing through the doorway shoulder to shoulder. Half of the remaining Guard took up defensive positions right outside the entryway. The other half broke away and headed toward responsibilities that needed no discussion or guidance. This was a group that had been together for many years. Well they knew what to do to protect their King. Some went to check passageways in the immediate vicinity, always wary of the possibility of threatening intruders. Others climbed the inner stairways to get reports of anything unusual spotted by the sentries on the wall. Three went straight away to a door that was the entrance to the stairway leading to the dungeons. One of the night patrols had captured a Troll the night before, within a few miles of the Great Wall. Barber, the dungeon master, would be questioning him, and the King would want a report.
As Rolan entered the Prince’s nursery, he caught a view of himself in the mirror on the far wall. He was shy of six feet tall, slight of build, and years of war, with missed meals and never enough sleep, had done nothing to bulk his frame. He was handsome, if thin. His blonde hair was shoulder length, and while clean enough, could have used a good brushing. His jaw was square, and his face, which usually bore a look of kindness, was absolutely beaming with the thought that within moments he would gaze upon his three-day old son.
The royal nursery was quite large, and it took him several strides to cross it. He looked down upon his newborn baby boy. It was a moment frozen in time, and he was so taken by it that he noticed he was holding his breath.
As if on cue, the wet nurse, Rachel Sweetbriar, entered by an adjoining doorway.
“My Lord,” she offered. She looked him straight in the eye. This was significant because the same behavior in the kingdom of Slova, principal enemy of Ravenwild, would have cost her dearly, perhaps her life, or her tongue at least, for it would be unthinkable for a mere servant to look upon the leadership of that barbarous land with the gaze of an equal, and certainly not if the servant was a woman. “I am so pleased for you and the Good Lady Isabella.”
He returned his look towards his son. Again his face shone like the light of dawn.
“Have you and your betrothed decided upon a name yet?” She gave him a playful look, mischievous even. “If I may be so bold, all of us in the castle have been talking about this for weeks and weeks and we have …” And then she died.
The distinctive twang of a crossbow drew the King’s eye to the motion behind the curtain of a nearby wall, and before poor Rachel had hit the floor, Rolan had unsheathed his dagger and buried it in the chest of the assailant hidden behind the drapery. The intruder collapsed in a heap.
He bent to see if there was anything he could do for her, but her eyes alone, wide, vacant, and staring, told it all.
As soon as he had determined that Rachel was indeed in the next world, Rolan snatched his son from his crib, simultaneously drawing his sword. Mere moments later he regretted his decision to remove him from his bed, for it was shrouded by some of the most protective magic in the kingdom, and no force, from that of an evil-intentioned hand to that of a veritable inferno, could have harmed him. But once he picked him up, the power of the layer-upon-layer of spells was null and void. Now he had done it; exactly what they had hoped he would do.
It was then that the invaders, Gnomes all, emerged in unison from hiding places in the large room, numbering more than twenty strong. Rolan knew right away that without help, his cause was lost. He also knew that there was a formidable wizard involved with this surreptitious assault, for there was no way that this many spies could have breached the security of the castle unnoticed without the help of very powerful sorcery. This was not just the Great Wall. This was the castle itself.
Nonetheless, he maintained his battle ready posture, turning slowly to size up his position and decide if there was any reasonable possibility of cutting his way to an escape.
“My good King,” the voice came from somewhere behind him. “Put down your sword, and you have my word that neither you, nor your son, nor your Queen will be harmed. You have no chance. Look around. There are too many of us. It is over. Do not jeopardize your family by playing the fool. Surrender, or die. Surrender and live.”
The voice had a sickening, almost effeminate, quality though the timbre was that of a man.
Continuing his turn, Rolan came face to face with the speaker. He was a Gnome as well and appeared to be half a head taller than the rest of his company. A large scar ran from above his right eye, down across his nose and onto his left cheek, extending all the way to the base of his skull. A devastating wound, it had not gotten the medical attention it clearly needed when it was inflicted, so his face was now literally twisted upon itself. His appearance was, in a word, gruesome.
“Who are you?” asked Rolan, pausing only slightly in his turn to glance at the spokesman for the Gnome attack party.
The Gnome didn’t answer his question, saying instead, “I will only ask you one more time, King. Lay down your sword and surrender, or you and your son will both be dead before you have taken another breath.”
A horrific howl screamed its way into the room from the doorway through which Rolan had entered, and there was a blinding flash as the wall he was facing erupted in red flame. Ten of the Gnomes were instantly incinerated and reduced to piles of ash on the floor. There was clattering as their weapons hit the stone. Rolan took immediate advantage of the confusion by diving forward and to the right, rolling slightly so as not to crush his son, all the while maintaining his grip on his sword. By doing so, he placed a large bench in between himself and the remaining Gnomes. And it’s a good thing that he did, for several crossbow darts buried themselves in the wall in front of which he had stood a moment before. Several Gnomes now charged forward, brandishing their short swords. Rolan was forced to put his son all the way down, pushing him under the bench. The Gnomes pressed the attack, but quickly discovered that there were too many of them to effectively operate in this small space. Two died on Rolan’s first strokes, one whose chest was cleaved wide open, the other suddenly absent of his head. Again the red firestorm erupted, and three more were transmuted to ash. Their number was now reduced to four who shared quick glances of pure panic but continued to attack. Now, however, Thargen and several of the King’s Guard charged in from the doorway Rachel had used and reduced the Gnomes to bloody carcasses in a matter of seconds.
“Where is the Queen?” shouted Rolan as the last of the Gnomes was dispatched.
“She is in the Great Hall, My Lord,” Thargen called out. “She is unharmed.”
“Lead us there!” he commanded. His voice was pure ice.
“My Lord,” said Thargen. He motioned, and guardsmen surrounded their monarch.
With the King holding his baby Prince, they made their way to the Great Hall with all due haste. Rolan was sickened by the death all around him. Guardsmen and regulars lay butchered everywhere he looked. The smell of fresh blood was overwhelming. Several maids and serving women appeared to have shared their fate. This was beyond reason. This was beyond war. This was insanity.
Slamming the doors to the Great Hall behind them, Rolan and his guardsmen bought themselves several minutes of guaranteed safety, for the Great Hall was shielded with the same magic that had been conjured to shroud the Prince’s layette, only this was even more impenetrable because it had been conjured by five different wizards, including the Great Wizard Taber, the only surviving wizard-of-the-first-school. He was standing on the far side of the Great Hall, hovering in front of Queen Isabella with his arms extended in case any threat needed a taste of the red death.
“My love,” Rolan said to the Queen, the relief at her well-being obvious on his face.
“My King,” she returned. She was clearly overjoyed at the sight of her husband and son alive and unhurt.
“Wizard Taber,” Rolan said to the great wizard, handing the Prince off to the Queen, “I did not see you come with us from the nursery.”
Taber gave a wry smile. “Short cut.”
“Wizard, are we secure?” asked Rolan.
“We are.”
“Are you certain?”
“I am.”
“Good. How long?”
“As long as you wish, My Lord. There is no magic on Inam'Ra that could possibly unravel the spells that shroud this hall. But having said that, the longer we stay, the greater the danger of being trapped here. My guess would have to be that there are wizards lurking about outside that are doing everything they can to ensnare us. We must use the tunnels. And we must use them now.”
“Thargen, your thoughts.”
“My Lord, I agree with the good wizard Taber, at least for the Queen and the Prince. They must use the tunnels, and they must use them without delay. They will be safe under his charge. We, however, must fight our way out of this the same way we came in. They are Gnomes. Gnomes.”
He spat the word out as though the very presence of it on his tongue was distasteful.
“No amount of Gnomes can prevail upon us in our own castle. I say we take the fight straight at them. When all of their blood is spilt, we will regroup and make safe our home once again.”
“And what of their wizards? Is it possible they even have wizards? I was unaware that either Gnomes or Trolls even had wizards. Surely doing battle with sword and mace, the Gnomes stand no chance against us, but in the face of magic, which it looks to me that they must have, how great is the risk?”
“My Lord,” said Taber, “There is nothing here that leads me to the inescapable conclusion that they have discovered the use of magic, although it certainly begs the question. For now I think we must assume that they have, but, again, it is not a conclusion I am willing to draw. It would certainly be the first we have ever heard of it. But if they have, their wizards will want to leave as quickly as possible to try and thwart an escape attempt. This was surely planned for a long time, and they have undoubtedly anticipated that we will attempt an escape by the tunnels, with me as the escort. Assuming they have magic, they would have to know that they would need it all against a wizard-of-the-first-school were they to have any chance of success, and even that chance would be pitifully small. Their attempt in the nursery was doomed the moment I arrived.
“I am also sure that they have underestimated our fighting abilities, and when they see they have no chance, man on Gnome, any with a command of magic are going to want to go at once.”
“Anyone else?” asked Rolan. It was his way to petition all present. It was his belief that a good leader always solicits and considers carefully the opinions of trusted subordinates in critical situations as long as there is time. No one spoke.
He decided. “Good Wizard, I entrust you with the safe conduct of the Queen and my son. You will take them via the tunnels to Duck Lake. You know where the boats are hidden. From there you will go to Mount Gothic. There should be a sizable force of our men there who can provide protection for you once you have arrived. We will either meet you there or send for you as soon as we can. Right now, we have Gnomes to kill.”
“Indeed,” said Luke with a nasty smile. He had been sharpening his broadsword during this entire exchange. He wiped it softly over the back of his arm and was rewarded with a showing of hair on the flat of the blade. It was now fit for battle, razor sharp and polished. “Let the games begin.”
As the King was saying a hasty goodbye to Isabella and their as-yet unnamed Prince, he was approached by Borok who was covered in blood from a large gash over his left ear. Cradling her baby protectively in her arms, the Queen then left hurriedly with the wizard Taber through the back entrance of the Great Hall.
“My Lord, we must speak.”
Rolan tore his gaze from his fleeing wife and looked squarely at his commander.
“Speak then. But first, you’re bleeding, man. Dorin, wrap his wound while we speak!” He turned back to Borok. “You’re going to need your strength. I can’t have your sword arm weak while we rid the castle of this vermin.”
Dorin ripped apart some cloth from one of the tables and proceeded to wrap the wound.
“My King, as you know, we captured a Troll spy last night, and although we have been unable to get any information out of him despite Barber’s persuasive methods, among his effects we found something unusual. I can’t think of what to call it, or even how to describe it, but I feel you must see it as soon as possible. There was also a very strange map of lands that do not appear to be of our world.”
“Where are these things, then?”
“In the dungeons, My Lord. Barber summoned third-school wizard Reginald to look at them on my order, and I was going to inform you of them at this morning’s debriefing when this mess broke loose.”
Rolan acknowledged him with a curt nod, saying, “We’ll have a look at them as soon as the castle is secure.”
“Very good, My King. But now, should something happen to me, you know about them. You must see them. I know they are important, although on my life I cannot figure out the why of it.”
Rolan motioned to his men. Battle positions were assumed. Luke and Dorin threw open the massive doors to the Great Hall and they charged out. It was a pitched battle to be sure. The Gnomes had managed to breach the main entrance, having eliminated the four guards in charge of the operating mechanism, all of whom lay dead with multiple arrows protruding from each. The intruders were all about the courtyard and looked to outnumber the castle regiment by about three to one. Nevertheless, the Gnomes, being of much smaller stature and with inferior weapons, stood no chance against the Ravenwild troops.
The air was filled with the clashing of weapons and the screams of the Gnomes as they were skillfully worn down and eliminated by the Ravenwild soldiers. Soon, the few who were left standing threw down their weapons and begged for mercy. They were rounded up and put in irons. One of the castle soldiers took the chain that bound them together and began leading them towards the dungeon entrance.
Thargen and Rolan, along with Luke, Dorin, and Borok, met in a group as they were being led away.
“It appears the good Taber was correct,” mused Luke.
“So it does,” returned Thargen.
“How many did we lose?” asked Rolan. All glanced about the courtyard. Now that the battle was over, it was easy to see that most of the Ravenwild troops who had met their fate had done so while asleep. None of these were in battle positions. It was apparent to all that they had been somehow spelled into some sort of slumber and then hacked to death by the invading Gnomes.
“There is bad magic about. Very bad, very powerful magic,” said Luke.
Thargen grimaced and stepped side-to-side nervously. He was a soldier. No more, no less. Magic, even the discussion of same, made him uncomfortable. He knew it existed and yet had absolutely no comprehension as to its nature. Although keenly aware of its power in the right or wrong hands, the mere mention of it made him anxious. Soldiers fought. The stronger ones, those with superior weapons, the ones better trained, won the encounter. Magic wiped that all out. Give him a good sharp sword, a well-balanced bow with a straight arrow, a properly tooled dagger, and an enemy he could face man-to-man, and he was fine. But show him magic, and he became an unsettled warrior, a warrior who might hesitate when he should be charging ahead.
“I will have the night captain prepare a battle damage report,” he said, “but from the looks of it I would say three to four hundred.”
“What could they hope to accomplish with such an attack?” asked Luke, “Except to lose their entire battalion …”
Rolan caught sight of one of the Gnomes being led away towards the dungeons, towards certain suffering and, surely, some form of torture at the hands of Barber, although the methods used by the dungeon master of Ravenwild were tame compared with those used in Slova. He always attempted to get the information he needed with the most humane methods possible. With the Slovans, torture was the method employed first. It was well known in all three lands that they enjoyed it, as though obtaining intelligence information was almost secondary to the pleasure they got from hearing the screams. But Barber had come to realize very early on in his career that information obtained with brutal methods was, by and large, useless. You could, after all, get a prisoner to say pretty much anything if you tortured him enough.
He noticed a furtive smile on the face of one of the Gnomes. He glanced at another, and another. Whereas he should have seen looks of fear, all seemed quite matter of fact. Something was not as it should be. He leaned close to Thargen. “Take note of the faces of the Gnomes.”
Immediately, Thargen thought what his King had already deduced. The open attack on the castle by way of the main gate, and in all likelihood the failed attempt at kidnapping the King and his son in the nursery, were probably diversionary tactics that had something to do with the dungeons.
He knew what to do. He ordered his three captains to take three squads down to the levels below the dungeons. On his command, they would feign an attack from the front and bring the strongest assault from behind. So sixty Men, Elves, and Dwarves left on a dead run via three separate routes.
It was as Rolan had thought. With the advantage of surprise, and being outflanked on three sides, the enemy troops were vanquished in a matter of minutes. The bad news was that Barber and his covey of deputy wardens were all dead, and the Troll’s belongings were nowhere to be found.
With the castle now secure, Rolan and his officers were in the Great Hall. The damage report was far worse than Thargen had estimated. Well over a thousand troops, including fifty-four of the Castle Guard, had fallen, twenty-eight of them officers. This left a bare bones defense team to hold the castle in the event of an all-out assault. This was dire.
Messengers were promptly dispatched to alert commanders in the field to send reinforcements without delay. Bad enough that the field campaigns were not going well, but to lose the castle would be a blow with the worst possible consequences imaginable to Ravenwild. Still, the Great Wall stood, so losing the castle was almost surely not going to happen, but Rolan and his remaining officers had to figure out how this assault team had managed to breach the Great Wall in the first place. “My Lord, they have overextended themselves on this assault,” said Thargen. “I believe it was a suicide mission from the beginning. I’m sure of it. There is no way they could have an attack force of any substantial numbers even remotely close to us. We would know of it. Messengers from last night have told us of the Troll’s advance to Lexington, but we still have the Wall in between us and any enemy troops that might be out there, not to mention the Silver River and the Belcourt Plains, and our scouts report nothing in the way of any significant enemy forces anywhere near us. You can’t hide an army out in the open. Any army. No, they were here to reclaim the effects that we found on that one captured Troll. Of that there is no question. And they were willing to sacrifice a lot of Gnomes, not surprising, in order to do it.”
Rolan listened without interruption with his chin in his hand.
“I’m sure you’re right,” he said. “And Borok said there were two things on the captured Troll that were out of the ordinary: A map that did not appear to be of our world, very strange, and something else. What did he call it? ‘Unusual.’ Do we know anything more about it? Where is Borok?”
“He left with a squad to commandeer reinforcements, Sire. To answer your first question, unfortunately no, My King. The entire contingent of Barber’s men was wiped out in the encounter, as was the captured Troll. Interestingly, it looks like he was killed by Gnome blades, meaning he was killed by his own allies. That would seem to say that protecting the knowledge of what it is, is of the utmost importance to them.”
“And whatever it is, it appears to have vanished?”
“Correct, My Lord. We have searched high and low for both the map and this other article and have found neither.”
“Well, whatever they are, I’m sure they are things of powerful magic,” said the King.
Thargen’s blood ran cold.
He slowed down to a polite 65 as he sped past the speed trap on Highway 2 and waved to the officer manning the radar gun. In a few seconds he had his friend on his cell phone.
“Corey,” he said.
“Hey Doc,” Corey answered. “Finally headed home?”
“I am,” he answered. “I wanted you to know she’s doing fine. I just left her bedside, and everything looks okay. Dr. Sher was there with me, and he expects we’ll be taking the tube out this afternoon. That’s very good news. I didn’t think he’d be taking it out this soon, but he’s quite sure she’ll be able to fly on her own.”
There was a pause in the conversation as each man thought back to the terror of the night before. Corey’s remembrance was his young wife suddenly gasping for air and croaking, “I can’t breathe! I can’t breathe!” Then there had been the blood, erupting out of her mouth like some malevolent volcano and splattering against the wall some three feet away from the bed.
Not wanting to awaken the children sleeping in the next room, he had tried to keep his voice down as he spoke to the 911 operator. He must have been louder than he wanted because when he hung up the phone, Anna, their 5 year old, was standing in the doorway. Still half asleep, and holding her favorite Teddy, she asked, “What’s wrong with Mommy, Daddy? Is she dying?”
He had yanked a pillowcase off the pillow and started wiping the large clots out of her mouth, preparing to give her mouth-to-mouth, and tried to sound calm as he said, “No honey. She’s going to be all right. The ambulance is coming. Go wake up your brother and get dressed. Wait there until I come get you. Quickly now. Quickly!”
Dr. Strong thought back to A.J.’s report over the med-net.
“Yeah, we have a 32 year old female. Sudden respiratory distress. Coughing up a lot of blood. Say again, a lot of blood. Color was pretty blue when we arrived, and not maintaining her airway, so we tubed her, and she has pinked up nicely. Mental status is good now. She is responsive. Able to squeeze fingers on command. Blood pressure: 150/80. Pulse 150 … E.T.A. is 25 minutes. Over.”
Corey was the first to break the silence, saying, “I can’t thank you enough, Doc. You saved her life.” He sounded as if he was welling up as his voice broke.
“Slight correction,” replied Dr. Strong. “You and A.J. saved her life. Between you getting the blood out of her mouth and clearing her airway, and A.J.’s quick intubation, I didn’t have a lot to do. He also gift-wrapped and handed me the diagnosis on the radio, so all I had to do was give her some medicine while she weathered the storm. You guys did good, Corey. Real good. I’m proud of both of you. Anyway, like I said, I’m sure she’s going to pull through. It was actually a pretty small clot, despite the large show of blood, and there’s no brain damage at all. None. So, if she continues to remain stable, they’ll be taking the tube out later today, and she’ll be much happier. Then we’ll need to try and figure out where the clot came from, in other words, where it was growing before it broke loose, so she’ll have to be in the hospital for a few days. But, one way or another, she’s going to come through this without any harm. Going to have to stop the birth control pills, and smoking of course, but we can all sit down later and talk about all that.”
There was another pause as each man again thought his private thoughts, and Corey said, “Well, thanks again, Doc. That was scary.”
“I’m sure it was, my friend, but as I always say, my kingdom for a happy ending.”
“So are you going fishing?” Corey asked him.
The phone crackled. “Hello … Hello?”
“Nope,” Blake replied. “I’m going to take a nap. Then Orie and Stephanie both have games. Jessica’s going to Stephanie’s and I’m going to Orie’s. Both teams are undefeated, so it should be an absolute hoot.”
“That’s great, Doc. Have fun and tell the kids I said good luck. And thanks again.”
“You’re welcome again. But the real ‘thank-yous’ should be going to A.J. and Jeanette. They deserve them far more than I do.”
“I hear you, Doc. I’ll call them later. I promise.”
“That’d be great. Okay, guy, I’ll catch up with you. I’ll look in on Suzie first thing in the morning. Bye now.”
“Bye Doc. Thanks again.”
He clicked “End” on the cell and thought, “Isn’t it the way. The Doctor gets all of the credit …” When really, he had done very little. A.J. was the man of the moment, not him. Cripes, he had not only gotten the tube in to breathe for her, he had handed him the diagnosis on a platter. So he hadn’t even had to think about it. And Jeanette had once again proven that under the absolute toughest of circumstances in the critical care arena, those being life-saving interventions on a friend, that she was simply the best IV starter in the history of modern medicine. You couldn’t do better than that. He hoped Corey called them. That would mean a lot to A.J. and Jeanette. Prehospital people and nurses hardly ever got the credit they deserved. Wasn’t fair. Oh well.
He slowed down for the exit and turned right onto Route 11. His thoughts turned to the games this afternoon, both against Westerly. These were the big matchups and he could hardly wait. He wished he could go to both games, but since the kids’ games were always on the same day, Jessica and he each alternated so that one parent was at each game. He knew both kids would be pumped. Nothing like the big game to get the old adrenaline going.
He took the exit onto Route 11 at 70 mph or so. He felt the suspension on the Acura tighten as he started into the sharp portion of the curve. “This is a good car,” he thought, “I’m glad we bought this car.”
He bumped it up to 85 as he came out of the curve. Soon he was cruising at a comfortable 90. Nothing but straight, empty highway between him and home now, one of the distinct advantages of practicing in rural Connecticut. No traffic, at least on this particular stretch of road. He zipped under the old railroad bridge on cruise and flipped the radio on. He thought he might catch some news on the recent elections. The preliminary results showed overwhelming defeats by the Republicans, and the Democrats were screaming foul play, of course. After a few moments of boring advertisements, the announcer came on, and he started to pay attention in earnest. It was then that he saw it.
Not good.
Definitely not good.
A motorcycle down, with a rider who had obviously launched and landed face down in the breakdown lane. Dr. Strong was going too fast to be able to note whether or not the rider was breathing, but he definitely wasn’t moving. He checked the rearview and braked hard, but traveling as fast as he was, he was easily a hundred yards beyond the accident scene before he managed to stop. He put it into reverse, all the while eyeing the rearview, and began to back up. It was then that he noticed that the radio had quit. “That’s odd,” he thought. Back he went, as quickly as he could. Back … back … back. “Man,” he thought. “I must have been flying. I thought for sure I would have gotten there by now.” He continued backing up. Nothing. “What the heck?” he thought. He continued back. Nothing. He passed back under the old railroad bridge. “Oh, this is too bizarre,” he said out loud. “I went right by it! I know it was after the bridge.”
It was then that he noticed the odd static coming from the radio, kind of a high-pitched whine. He clicked the radio off, eased it into drive, and started forward again, slower this time. He pushed the “On” button for the radio absentmindedly; same high- pitched whine, otherwise, nothing. He clicked it off again.
“There it is,” he thought. He could see it now, same motorcycle about 30 yards ahead. He gunned it hard and within seconds was at the scene, except the driver, who moments before had been face down in the breakdown lane, was nowhere to be seen. “Oh, come on,” he thought. “Now where the heck did he go?”
It was strange, in that he felt relieved that he really had seen an accident and it was not his mind playing tricks on him because he had been up all night in the ER, but at the same time it bothered him that he had managed to back right by it in broad daylight. And now he had to find the missing driver.
“Hey!” he called out loudly. “Can you hear me?” No response. “Hey! I’m a doctor. I’m here to help you. Is anybody there?”
Nothing.
“Time to call for some help,” he thought. “If he was well enough to crawl away, I can take the time to call the ambulance.” He scanned the scene while he punched in the speed dial for the hospital on his cell phone. To his surprise, when he put the phone to his ear, all he could hear was the same sound that he had heard seconds before coming from the radio. He tried again. Same thing.
“Oh come on now,” he thought. “Now I have to search for this guy.”
He got out of the car and walked past the demolished motorcycle towards where he had seen the driver down. For the third time all he got on the cell phone was the same static. It was then that he saw the blood. He quickened his pace and soon was standing over an ominous looking pool of bright red blood. He called out again; still no answer. He spied the trail, leading away from the highway, and followed it down into the drainage ditch. It was muddy at the bottom, but across from the muddy spot he could see a clear trail leading up over a small rise and into the woods beyond. Spots of blood dotted the trail as far as he could see.
“Poor guy has a head injury and is disoriented,” he thought. “I hope he isn’t combative. That would be very bad.”
Soon, the going got rough as the trail led into some seriously thick brambles. He was forced to crawl. On his hands and knees, he pushed onward as thorns and such clawed at his face, almost as if they were trying to hold him back.
“Gosh dang it,” he cried out as a particularly nasty one ran its way across his cheek, adding a drop of his own blood to the mix. At least it was an obvious trail. He wondered how far this poor fellow was going to lead him off the road. “If this doesn’t beat all heck,” he muttered.
The brambles thinned out and he was able to stand, but the trees were clustered close together, and the going was slow as he focused so as not to lose the trail. He called out again. Silence. He kept onward.
He found himself at the edge of a clearing, and to his amazement, at the far side stood what could only be described as a wizard, dressed in a plain white robe painted with all sorts of strange symbols on the sleeves and front, complete with a long white beard and flowing white hair. He looked as thin as a stick. The wizard spoke first.
“There has been no accident, Doctor,” he said, “I’m sorry to have had to stage that, but I’m afraid it is absolutely necessary that we speak in total privacy. ”His voice had a soft quality, slightly accented. It sounded almost British, or perhaps Australian.
“First of all,” Dr. Strong responded, “who the heck are you, and what the heck are you talking about? I know what I saw, and there surely has been an accident. I just followed a very clear blood trail of the victim up over that hill, and he is obviously seriously disoriented and in need of emergency medical attention. Second, I don’t know where you escaped from, but you had better either point me in his direction, or help me find him, or you’re going to be in serious trouble.”
“To answer your first question, sir, my name is immaterial. You may call me Hemlock if you like. Hemlock Simpleton, even. To answer your second question, ‘What the heck are you talking about?’ it is as I have said. There has been no accident. I repeat, it was all staged so that you and I could speak in private about a matter of the utmost importance. Please believe me. Many, many lives depend on us, on you really.” Almost as an afterthought he added, “And on Jessica as well.”
At this point Dr. Strong realized he was going to get nowhere with this nutcase and he called out again, “Hello! Can you hear me? I’m a doctor. You need help!” He heard nothing.
Hemlock spoke again. “Doctor. Please. Two things: First, I beg of you to not call out again. There are ears who might be listening whom we cannot afford to have hearing us speak. Second, if you would please look at your feet. You'll notice, I’m sure, that the blood trail, indeed the trail itself, ends where you now stand.”
And then there was what might best be described as a flash, although there was no light, and the world went black.
It was the strangest thing. He was wide-awake, but he could see nothing in the total and complete blackness that surrounded him. He tried to touch his finger to his nose. Oddly, he felt like he was moving normally, but he felt nothing.
“Hemlock,” he said. “Are you here?”
“I am,” came the reply.
“Do you mind answering my second question again?”
“You mean, ‘What the heck are you talking about?’”
“Very good,” said Dr. Strong. “That was indeed my second question.”
“Well, that is sort of complicated.”
“Okay, then, let’s start by you telling me where we are,” he said. “This is all starting to tick me off.”
“I don’t think you’ll believe me,” said Hemlock.
“Try me.”
“We are in an acorn.”
“Now what the heck does that mean?” barked Dr. Strong.
“Exactly what I said,” replied Hemlock. “You recall that the clearing in which we were standing was surrounded predominantly by oak trees? Well, that being the case, I had a pressing need to hide us from the owner of those same ears about whom I spoke a minute ago, and one of the acorns that happened to be lying about was the most expedient means to that end.”
There was a pause in the conversation. This was too extraordinary for Dr. Strong to get a handle on. The accident, the radio malfunction, then the cell phone, the wizard, and now this, the darkness, trapped in some cosmic void with seemingly no body, with a most bizarre individual who referred to himself as Hemlock Simpleton. It was too much, way too much. Being an Emergency Room physician, he had found himself in the company of some very strange characters and situations over the last ten years, but this was so beyond anything he had ever experienced; he found himself incapable of any further speech until his intellect could make some sense of it all. Yet, try as he might, he could not. He again tried to move. This time he chose his arms, and while it felt like they were moving, the simple act of bringing his hands together elicited no sense of touch. He tried to put his tongue to the roof of his mouth. Nada.
“Hemlock,” he finally said. “I can’t feel anything. I mean, it’s like I have no body.”
“I know,” Hemlock replied. “And you must believe me when I tell you that you’re handling it quite well. By way of explanation, let me say that, for the moment, you don’t, at least in the conventional sense. As I said, we are in an acorn. I have temporarily stored your body in another place. Now please do not be nervous. It is a temporary circumstance.”
“Can you please tell me how you have done this?” he asked.
“That, I’m afraid, would take considerable explanation, far too lengthy that one. I’m afraid we don’t have the time, Doctor.”
“Well, can you tell me why an acorn?” he asked.
“Yes, but again, the explanation would take up far too much of the time we have at our disposal.”
“I see,” he said.
“Now that,” Hemlock chuckled. “Now that really would be strange.”
There was another long silence. This time it was Hemlock who broke it.
“Your name is Dr. Blake Lee Strong. You were born in Thayer Hospital, now known as the Mid-State Medical Center, in Waterville, Maine on December 2, 1970. You did your undergraduate studies at Colby College, also in Waterville, Maine, despite the fact that your parents had moved to Massachusetts when you were three, right after your father completed his undergraduate studies, also at Colby. You have a brother, Daniel, eighteen months your senior, who currently resides in Woburn, Massachusetts. He is married to his second wife, Jocelyn. You also have two sisters, Susan and Jane. Susan is older. Jane is younger. Shall I go on? I can, you know.”
“Don’t bother,” Blake responded. “I’m sure you can. Personally, I’d rather hear the general overview as to why you have obviously chosen to meet me, and talk to me ‘in total privacy’ as you put it. And why I have no body. And why we are inside of an acorn. You’ve obviously done your homework about me, and my family, and I’m sure you can tell me the names of our horses …”
“Mickey and Johnnie,” Hemlock interrupted.
“Whatever,” Blake continued. “The point is none of that autobiographical junk has anything to do with this twilight-zone stuff. I mean, I’m here having this out-of-body experience, Hemlock. Cut the crap, man. Please tell me what the heck is going on. I’m telling you, if I could see you, and I could use my arms, I’d lay you out. Then again you’d probably immobilize me with your phaser set on stun …”
“Rod Serling and Captain James T. Kirk.”
“Why did I know you were going to say something like that,” Blake muttered. “And by the way, if I temporarily have no body, how is it that I can, a) speak, and, b) hear you?”
“Good questions, both,” Hemlock answered. “And know that I will provide you with what I am sure you will find reasonable answers in good time, all in good time.”
“Well why not now?” Blake asked. “It’s not like we can have a game of racquetball for goodness’ sake.”
“That I can answer. The fact is I have decided I want to give you the big picture in the company of Jessica. When we get out of here. The overview, if you will. We won’t be here much longer. In fact, it is probably safe now. Yes, it is.”
There was another flash without light and Dr. Blake Strong found himself standing in the same clearing where he was at the precise moment before he had first seen the man in the wizard’s outfit, only now he was alone.
“Hemlock,” he called out. There was no response.
He looked down. There was no blood anywhere. He turned around. He could see the signs of the disturbed forest floor where he had crawled his way through the brush but, again, there was no blood at all.
He stood for the longest time as he took this all in.
All he could hear was the wind rustling the leaves in the trees.
“I’ve lost my mind,” he thought. “I’ve really lost my mind.”
He made his way back to the car via the same way he had made his way in. Back through the briars, back through the muddy irrigation ditch, and up to the car. The radio was on. The announcer was the same one, recounting the same piece on the election results. Of course, the motorcycle wreck was gone. He turned the radio off, picked up the cell phone, and punched in the speed dial for home. Jessica answered.
“Hello,” she said.
“Hi,” he responded. “Is everything okay?”
“Sure,” she said. “That’s an odd question. Why wouldn’t it be? Hey, you’re not going to believe this, but both the kids’ games have been canceled. There was some weird flu-like outbreak in Westerly today, so they had to close the school. Ours too. It’s very strange. A lot of kids are quite sick. Nobody has died or anything, but the whole town is in a panic. It’s all over the news. Have you heard anything?… … … Hello? Are you there?”
“Yes, hon. I’m here.”
“Are you all right? Is something wrong? You don’t sound all right. What’s the matter?”
“Nothing's the matter. I’m alright. We’ll talk about it when I get home. How are the kids?”
“They’re good. They’re both disappointed about the games being canceled, but they’ll get over it. They’re doing their homework. We’re having pizza. Check that. They’re having pizza. You and I are having shrimp and a roast. How does that sound?”
“That sounds great. I’ll see you in about twenty minutes.”
“What’s wrong, Blake? You don’t sound well.”
“Nothing. It’s nothing. I’ll see you shortly. Tell the kids I’m proud of them for getting right to their homework.”
“Your father is proud of you for getting right to your homework,” she called out. “Look, Jacqueline needs some help with her history, so I’m going to go. I’ll see you soon. I love you.”
“I love you. Bye.”
“Bye.”
“What the heck happened?” he thought, after he hung up. He glanced down where the wreck had been. The ground was entirely undisturbed. He glanced up at the patch of woods on the knoll to which he had crawled. His thoughts came in one jumbled rush as he put the Acura in drive and checked the rearview for oncoming cars. “Am I having an acute psychotic break? I must be. This is bad.”
What would they do? New onset Schizophrenia? He wasn’t the right age, but he was the right sex. This was too incredible to grasp; a complete loss of reality contact. Yet it had all seemed so real, right down to the weird symbols on Hemlock’s robe. How could he possibly tell this to Jessica? How would he ever be able to continue to practice medicine? This was serious. He would clearly need a full psychiatric evaluation. Heck, he was going to have to be admitted. Please, oh please don’t let it be a malignancy. He thought of his grandfather, Sturgis, who had died of the complications of a Glioblastoma multiforme, a particularly horrible brain cancer. He remembered his grandmother, Ruth, telling him as a boy of how Sturgis had suffered terrible mental status changes early in the disease. But she had never mentioned hallucinations. And this was no ordinary hallucination. This was more like some sort of weird fugue state. He suddenly wished he was more adept at Psychiatric diagnosis. He felt lightheaded. A wave of nausea threatened to overtake him. He took his pulse, 80 and regular. The nausea passed.
His only thought was, “Please don’t let it be a cancer.”
The sound of a horn brought him quickly back to reality as he realized he had strayed into the wrong lane. He swerved just in time to avoid the fatal head-on.
“Dang-it-all!” he yelled out. “Get a grip! Get a hold of yourself, Blake. You’ll get through this. It’s going to work itself out.”
But he only wished he could believe that. He turned the radio on again and tried to concentrate on what the news broadcaster was saying, but he was so overwhelmed with panic he found he couldn’t follow him for more than a sentence or two before he would think back to the deranged experience.
“Alzheimer’s,” he thought. “That has to be it. It has to be Alzheimer’s …”
And so it went for the remaining twenty or so minutes home when, in a total panic state, and sweating profusely, he finally turned into the driveway. Rosie, the dog, was there to greet him. For some strange reason, the sight of her made him so happy he could have cried. Ordinarily, his first thought would have been how they could get rid of her, for despite being a lovable Lab of seven years, she had never outgrown the tendency to poop and pee all over the house. But today, her being there to meet him with her tail wagging happily meant everything to him.
He made his way up the stairs, stopping to look down on the magnificent view of the barn and the lower pond. He had built that barn. With some help from friends, neighbors, and family, to be sure, but nevertheless, he owned most of the nails in it. It was a four-staller, complete with a full-court upstairs for basketball. “Well, at least if I pass soon, they will still have the barn …”
He opened the door to the kitchen off the front deck.
“Hey Dad,” Stephanie and Jacqueline called out. Orie was too engrossed in some complicated math problem to know he had entered.
“Hi guys, where’s your mother?”
Stephanie and Jacq’ both stood and rushed over to give him a welcome home hug. Stephanie noticed right off that her father didn’t look well.
“Dad,” she said, “you look awful. Do you feel all right? You’re all scratched up. What happened? Come, sit down.”
She pulled out a chair for him. Orie looked up, “Oh, hi Dad,” he said. “How’s it going?”
He declined the chair, instead leaning over Orie’s math book to have a look.
“Did you get it solved, professor?” he asked.
“Not yet.” He grinned. “It’s a tough one.”
“Well, you keep working on it, and I’m sure you’ll crack the case.”
“Stephanie’s right, Dad. You look terrible. How’d you get all scratched up like that?”
“What’s wrong, Dad?” Jacqueline chimed in. “Are you sick?”
“I think I am,” he answered. “But not bad. Don’t worry, Mother will make me better.”
“Hi, honey,” Jessica called out as she exited the laundry room.
“Hey, Jess. How’s it going?”
“Terrific,” she sighed. “You know. Same old, same old. Too much laundry. We need to hire someone to help me with this.”
After a quick embrace, she held him back at arm’s length. “I knew something was wrong,” she said. “You look a wreck. What happened to you?” She felt his forehead. “You don’t feel warm. Here, sit down.”
“Is Dad sick, Mom?” Jacqueline asked, then, “Is he going to be okay?”
All the faces of the children registered concern now, as they stared at Jessica waiting for her answer.
“Jess, I’m going upstairs to take a bath,” Blake said. “Could you please come up and have a look at me? I also need to talk to you about something.”
“Sure. Can you draw the tub yourself? No, better, Jacqueline you go draw a tub for him. Stephanie, there’s fresh towels in the laundry room. Orie, you call for the pizza. I’m going to finish this last load of laundry, and I’ll be right up. Will you be all right?”
“I’ll be fine,” said Blake, not feeling fine by any stretch. “I’ll see you upstairs.”
The kids started to move towards their assigned chores. Jacqueline spoke up.
“Tell him about our visitor, Mom.”
“Not now, Jacq’. Daddy doesn’t feel well. Upstairs now. Draw Daddy’s tub.”
Now he sat down. He had to, or he felt he would pass out.
“What visitor, Jacq’?” he called to her with his head in his hands. She had already made it halfway up the stairs.
She stopped, and bounced back down. She finished the last step and punctuated the final jump with, “You tell him, Mom.”
“Well,” she said as she folded a shirt, “Believe it or not, it was one of your old professors from Colby, Doctor Thomas Easton, who happened to be passing through the area and dropped in for a visit. He’s going to a conference in New York on ‘The Biologic Effects of Magnetic Fields’. He said you wrote your senior thesis on this exact topic. Also, he just plain wants to see you; he needs to discuss some things with you. You weren’t here yet, and he had an errand to run, so he left. He said he would be back shortly, but I’ll tell him you don’t feel well. Maybe he can stop in tomorrow. I don’t know when the conference actually starts.”