Garrett leaves the impromptu gathering of father and uncle, relieved that he has not been called upon for an immediate report. His mind is elsewhere, set upon the task he wishes to accomplish before he has time to lose his nerve. He strides through the corridors purposefully, looking authoritative even though he isn't exactly certain how to get where he needs to go. Deeper into the mountain and down, he guesses, basing his assumptions on the location of the room in Amber's castle and allowing for his father's own quirks. He tries to call upon whatever imprinting lay deep in his genes, opening up to allow some unexplainable "feeling" to lead him. Whether it will work or not, he doesn't know, but he has plenty of time to try.
Garrett follows his genes. They're apparently able to get him thoroughly lost.
Ahead, deep under the mountain, he comes to a door that looks different than the others. There's no sign and the lights are dim, but the door looks heavy.
Garrett isn't sure he could find it again on a bet. He's not sure he could find his way out, for that matter.
The floor looks natural, rather than hewn passages.
Leaving the concern about finding his way out of the passage for later, Garrett tugs on the door, hoping it's unlocked.
Garrett tugs on the door and hears a sharp snap! He looks and sees that the lock has broken. It probably won't go back the way it was, but the door should open.
Garrett curses softly, automatically thinking he's going to be docked until he remembers his place again. He pulls the door open a few inches and peeks inside before entering.
The door creaks open. If he weren't so far underground, Garrett would've been sure the entire castle could hear.
In the darkness inside, Garrett sees rows and rows of metal tubes. There's a desk near the door, with a single sheet of paper on it.
Well, it doesn't look like the room he was seeking, but it still could be interesting. He enters and checks on the desk for a candle or a lamp and flint to light it, unsure if the 'e-lec-tric' wiring extents down this far. "Anyone here?" he calls out softly, trying to keep his voice from carrying outside the still-open doorway.
No one answers. The air inside is quite still. There is a lantern on the desk with some sort of mechanical sparker. Also on the desk is a single sheet of parchment, unfolded, with writing on it.
Garrett fiddles with the sparker to light the lantern. When it flames into life, he pulls the parchment over to read it.
The note says:
MartinThese are for later.
~R.
"These what?" he mutters with a puzzled glance toward the metal tubes. Picking up the lantern, he carries it over to the tubes for a closer look.
The objects are long bundled tubes of dark metal with an extension on the end of some sort of strange material that Garrett doesn't recognize. There's some sort of metalwork underneath the tubes where they meet the extension that reminds him of a strange buckle.
Garrett has a vague memory of seeing things like them somewhere before, but it's been a long time. Before the Sundering, he thinks.
On closer inspection, Garrett knows what these are. He was but a lad when a wagonload of these things was hauled back from the battle where King Eric died. He and his mates had climbed into nearby trees to get a better look. From their perches, they could hear incredulous mutterings from the soldiers:
"Saved the day."
"Spouted fire and dropped 'em from afar."
"Guns, they call 'em."
Yes, he remembers, though he's never seen one up close. He runs a finger down the cold metal of the tube, resting it on the unfamiliar material at the bottom. "But why are they here?" he wonders out loud.
They smell of rainstorms.
He shakes his head, knowing no answers are forthcoming, and moves off to examine the rest of the room. He runs his fingers along the walls as he walks, looking for anything that might indicate a hidden door. If there's any correspondence between this castle and the old one, the door to the pattern room probably is not in here, but since he's here anyway, it's best not to overlook anything.
Before he leaves the room, he checks the desk where the note was, opening all the drawers (if there are any), in search of anything interesting. "A key would be nice," he mutters wryly.
In the desk Garrett finds a key, but it only opens a locked cabinet. The cabinet holds row after row of small cylinders. Each one in engraved with a pair of crossed drumsticks.
Garrett picks one up and examines it. Whatever they are, they probably have something to do with the guns since there are so many of them. Perhaps they're projectiles, like the bolts for a crossbow. "Hmm," he says thoughtfully, wondering what kind of battle his father is gearing up for. The thought simply makes him more determined to finish what he's started.
It's got some sort of a bump on one end and it's also got a jagged line drawn on it. Other than that, it might as well be some hobgoblin's knuckle-bones for all Garrett can tell about it. It smells funny.
Garrett gives the rest of the room a thorough going over. This doesn't look like it's anyone's office, but as if it's ready for an armorer to arrive.
Towards the back are normal weapons: swords, pikes, crossbows and such. There are a few complicated weapons that look like they're made for Benedict or Bleys, but they're just gathering dust down here. Well, they're gathering dust now that the door is open.
When he's finishes examining the room, Garrett puts everything back where he found it, except for a useful-looking dagger he found on a back shelf. That he fastens to his belt on the opposite side from his sword. You never know when such a thing might come in handy. He also picks up a crossbow bolt and takes it with him.
He closes the door behind him when he goes back into the hallway and starts on his search for the pattern room again. This time though, at every corner he turns, he uses the crossbow bolt to scratch an "X" on the wall so he can find his way back if he gets lost further down.
The door doesn't close well since the lock is broken, but it does close well enough. Garrett continues into the depths. Before very long, he's not sure how to get back, although if he climbs up and east enough, he should end up in inhabited corridors.
Ahead, Garrett smells something salty. There's brackish water nearby. He turns a corner and finds himself looking across a pond of some sort.
Holding back his growing frustration, Garrett stares out over the pond and does his best to think this through objectively. He recalled no pond on the way to the Amber pattern room, but that does not necessarily mean anything. Amber casts - used to cast - shadows, but Xanadu is not a shadow. It's a new kingdom in its own right. There might be no correlation between the locations of the patterns in each place. He frowns sourly, but is not deterred from exploration. He searches the shore for a small rock to toss into the water.
Garrett finds a likely looking rock and flings it out past the range of his lamplit vision. The stone must've skipped across the surface, because Garrett distinctly hears two splashes.
Garrett looks surprised. He hadn't tried to skip the rock. He pulls the dagger out and holds it ready at his side. "Alrighty then..." he mutters warily as he turns to his left and begins to walk along the edge of the pond, following a hunch. He remembers that back in the tunnels on the way to the Amber pattern room, there had been a passage that seemed to lead to someplace wet. Perhaps he's starting from a similar wet place and there is a passage here somewhere that will lead him back on track. He continues to mark his path periodically with the bolt.
Garrett walks around the edge and moves closer to the water. Soon the ground goes from dry and rocky to muddy. Somehow, at some point, dirt was washed down here and perhaps the water level varies. There's a passage up ahead, and it looks like it's got some sand or shells lining it.
Garrett approaches the passage warily, the dagger out in front of him now. At its edge, he crouches down to examine the passage and the shells more closely.
[A few questions here. First, are the shells similar in type to anything he's seen in either Amber or Xanadu so far?]
Garrett doesn't recognize the shells, but they're clearly shells. Although on closer investigation, there's also a reasonably large number of fish skeleton parts. They're not as brightly white as the shells.
[Second, does it look like there's a tidal line here, and if so, is it fresh? He'd hate to get stuck down below with the tide coming in.]
Garrett doesn't think he could possibly have gotten down to sea-level from where he started.
While looking for a tidal line Garrett sees tracks. Clawed feet, maybe two feet across. They're at the far edge of this muddy patch, by a cave entrance.
Garrett gulps and looks up from his examination of the beach to the cave beyond. "So. You're a carnivore. Lovely," he mutters softly, with a glance downward at his woefully inadequate weapons. He steps away from the muddy section and back to the drier part of the beach.
[Is that back the way Garrett came? If so, where's he going?]
[Yep. Back the way he came.]
[Another question - are the passage and the cave one and the same, or two different things?]
[the cave entrance is off the side of the passageway, but you could call it one and the same, as the one leads to the other. Does that help?]
[It does, thanks.]
Scowling, Garrett turns around and begins following his marks back toward the armory. No one so far has mentioned wet caves with large clawed... things... on the way down to the Pattern, and he figures that's an important detail that _someone_ would've thought worth noting. "Must've taken a wrong turn," he mutters, more to hear a friendly voice than anything.
On his way back, he runs a line through each of his previous marks to indicate he's been there already. Otherwise though, he holds his lantern low, near the floor, in hopes of seeing footprints or scuff marks besides his own that might indicate someone else had passed that way recently.
Garrett eventually finds himself in front of an elaborate door, which is closed. It has a big keyhole in the middle.
He runs his fingers over the face of the door, appreciating the intricate details. Then he tries pushing or pulling it to see if it's indeed locked.
The door is made of a dark, burled wood that looks very hard and feels almost stonelike. It is covered with carvings in low relief depicting simple images of fruits and fish and other items common to the city.
If Garret had to guess, he'd guess the door had been here for centuries.
There's a ledge above the door and a welcome mat in front of it.
Garrett tries the door on the off-chance that it's not locked. If it is though, he reaches above to the ledge, running a hand along its length to see if there might be a key up there.
There is a key up there. It's large and looks to be made of a light metal and it would easily go into the lock.
Garrett pulls it down, but before he can put it into the lock, he fights back a pang of guilt. He's not used to disobeying orders and this order was as direct as they come. He chews his lip indecisively, the key mere inches from its goal.
In a moment, he shakes it off, impatient with himself. "There's nothing you can do for Amber as an unbroken foal," he growls under his breath. He shoves the key into the keyhole and turns.
Shoving the key into the keyhole presses some kind of trigger. The key sprays Garrett with purple ink, which gets all over his clothes, hands, and face. Then it turns against the tumblers with a satisfying snick.
Garrett recoils against the sudden spray, throwing an arm across his face to protect his eyes. Swearing with the vehemence of a seasoned sailor, he spits ink out of his mouth and wipes his dripping forelock on the sleeve of his painted shirt. Carefully now, he opens the door, watching for signs of pointed crossbows or buckets of water over the doorframe.
From the doorway, Garrett sees a vast room filled with a glowing red filigree embedded into the very stone. He can see, some distance down the side, where it starts. He knows he should step on the line just there.
The device looks like Bleys' sword. It looks right.
Garrett enters the room silently, despite all the noise he made to get there. For a moment, he simply stares, completely awestruck at the vastness of it. He's never been here before but the shimmering tracery feels so familiar to him. Like home.
He begins walking around the edge quietly, reverently, tracing a finger along the wall to keep himself from straying onto the Pattern because he cannot take his eyes off it as he walks. A rhythm stirs within him and his feet step to the music in his mind. One-two-three, one-two-three... It sounds like a guitar strumming in his head, played by Folly or Martin. Played like he someday hopes to play. Like he now knows he can. Someday.
At the point that he knows is the start; the point that corresponds to where Solange indicated on the broken pattern of Amber, he stops. It occurs to him that no one but Solange knows he's here. That if he dies here, no one will know where he's gone. Because there won't be a body left to... no. Stop. He gulps, forcing back the thought.
Turning away, Garrett sets his crossbow guide-bolt down against the wall. He should've brought a note, he thinks, but it's too late now. Besides, what would he say? Sorry?
Instead, he takes off his shirt, covered as it is with purple ink. He snorts as he wonders if Folly had a hand in that trap. If not, he's sure she'd get a kick out of it. He folds the shirt carefully, almost ritually, and lays it on top of the bolt. He reaches deep into his pocket and pulls out something else. Another key. The Amber one. The one that he was supposed to return to Caine. He lays it on top of the shirt and hopes Solange doesn't get in too much trouble for his not returning it.
And one more thing. A single horseshoe nail. That too, is laid on top of the shirt.
Turning back, he regards the Pattern again, breathing deeply. In and out. The music, the rhythm, is still inside his head - a slow, insistent strumming. Calling him. After several deep, calming breaths, he is ready.
"On three," he whispers, nodding slightly with the beats. One. Two. On three, he steps forward, entering the dance.
Garrett's first step onto the pattern sends an electric chill through his body, like a cymbal rolled to crescendo. Bare-chested, he shivers, but counts himself lucky not to have been struck dead on the first step. He walks on with care, feet on the crimson line, the pattern music running through his every nerve. Keep walking. Don't stop, no matter what, he reminds himself. Red sparks begin to rise around his worn leather boots.
Those boots. A vestige from his past; one he can't bear to give up. It's comfortable, his past. As the sparks rise higher, Garrett remembers. At a large wooden table in a tiny cramped flat, his gramma read from a faded broadsheet, patiently sounding out words for the small blue-eyed boy beside her. Was he ever truly that small? Yes. Even smaller once. Granda held him on the docks, squinting leathery brows against the sun as he pointed out the flags in the rigging; flags from a double dozen worlds. So colorful as they flapped along the tops of the masts. The breeze whipped the lad's unruly hair into his face and stung his nose with the smell of salt.
How long ago that was...
Garrett walks, pushing against the resistance beginning to build under his feet. Like cold molasses. Like the spider web. He remembers.
Dad used to carry him on his shoulders. Garrett loved that. From Dad's shoulders you could see for miles, or at least it had seemed so. If you stood at a certain spot just outside and to the left of the main gate, you could see all the way to the ocean. Dad had taught him to ride too. In truth, Dad had taught him almost everything there was to know about horses. About everything else too. He was understanding and patient...
Step. Harder now... step...
Patient with Mum too.
Step... Mum.
The strength of Garrett's emotions at the word catches him off-guard. His feet slow until he forces his mind back to the task. But it wanders again. He remembers the spider web dreams. They had terrified him, but every time he awoke crying and frightened, Mum had been there. She held him and sometimes even made him touch a spider web. "You're much stronger than any old spider web" she said and he believed her. Always there, she was. Every night, she rocked him by the fire. He could still hear her voice, singing him lullabies.
The memory lulls him and he slows once again. His eyelids sag. So tired. Remembering the task, he forces his eyes open, but he still sees a small boy in his mother's arms in the light of the fire, rocking gently, twirling a lock of his mother's dark hair in his tiny fingers. So warm... so safe... so...
His eyes close again and he sighs, his feet barely moving.
"Are you on fire?" a strange voice whispers, seemingly next to his ear, rousing him from his dangerous lethargy. He starts and is amazed at how high the sparks are flying now. Garrett berates himself for falling under the spell and shoves his feet forward through the resistance. "It'll show you whatever it needs to to make you stop," he breathes a reminder to himself. He pushes harder.
And suddenly, he is through. The red sparks settle lower and Garrett looks back. A veil. That must've been a veil, he thinks. The young prince strides forward, the sweat on his chest now cold as the effort passes and he moves more freely. "Memories," he reasons out loud. "They're just memories. Don't let them distract you. You are strong," he encourages himself.
He had always been strong, he remembers. It had caused problems sometimes. When he was ten, he had smashed a boy's face after the bully tormented his friend Phoebe. Blood spattered up to his elbows as Mason's nose shattered under Garrett's fist. He could see it even now, see the blood.
No. Those are sparks. More sparks...
Step...
He was strong enough to handle the horses too. Donovan had taught him how, but the strength was all his own. He could control them when they became unruly, but he was gentle too. He could read them. Like Bet. Garrett grins automatically. Bet was something special. They'd written him off as untrainable, but Garrett knew better. Bet just needed his head once in a while. He needed to run. He needed a rider who would let him. The twists, the turns, flying down the mountain road like the wind. They were one, he and Bet, the road curving this way and -- no. The Pattern. The red pattern road is under his feet, curving and twisting. Careful now. Watch your step.
Step...
The resistance grows again, making every step an effort. Like climbing the mountain. They climbed as children, all of them. Scrambling over the rocks, ever higher. Pushing themselves. Testing themselves. Later, it was just the two of them. Garrett and Sparrow. They would climb and talk. And later... He had kissed her there, on the ledge that overlooked the castle. More too. They had lost themselves to each other on the mountain. Garrett's mind and body remembered like it was yesterday and he shuddered, his breath ragged, explosions of passion firing in his brain and elsewhere. He wants her. Why did he chase her away? When they were together, he felt alive. He can feel it even now. The heat. The fire. He wants her.
"Are you on fire?" breathes the mysterious voice. It startles Garrett like a slap in the face.
"Who are you?!" Garrett snaps, as much at himself as the voice. Silence. He grits his teeth and strains forward against what must be another veil. His feet feel like the stone of the mountain, barely creeping along the fine red line. Beads of purple-stained sweat drip into Garrett's eyes. Panting, he wipes them away roughly, shoving everything he has into his left foot.
Step...
And then he is through. A pair of ornately carved double doors opens before him. Beyond the vestibule is an immense room, two stories high, that stretches out expansively in both directions. Huge floor-to-ceiling windows line the far wall. Light radiates through them, filling the room with warmth. Awestruck, Garrett gapes at the rows upon rows of books. It feels right.
Step...
Standing on the seat of a carriage at the edge of a vast sea of people, Garrett is at attention, dressed in his finest livery to observe a spectacle that most people in Amber thought they would never see. A coronation. As one, the crowd goes to its knees. Gerard says in a booming voice that carries far more than it should: "Long live the King!"
"Long live the King!" Garrett responds from where he kneels on the carriage seat. Though he shouted, his voice is lost in the crowd.
Step...
Mama is in the king's office, screaming, crying, pleading desperately for the return of the son who has been taken from her. Donovan carries her away bodily as she continues to flail, kicking and beating him to be released. He holds back his own anguish with a stoic set of his jaw as he takes her blows without flinching. The king continues to drum, oblivious. Garrett chokes at the image.
Step...
"They'll take you away from me!" Mama sobs.
"Her worst nightmare has come true," Hannah says, though he can't see her.
"Give me my son! Bring him back!"
Garrett cringes, but muscles through the vision.
Step...
The wind roars. Glass crashes. Lightning flashes a constant rhythm, with thunder that rumbles menacingly, shaking the ground under his feet. Hurricane-force gusts batter the small stone cottage, shredding the thatch as the rain pours in undaunted. Water flows like rivers inside the house, turning the dirt floor to mud. His sisters cry and scream. He shoves them all under a soggy straw mattress, where they hear the world fall apart. A catastrophic concussion jolts the earth and the roof comes crashing down. Holding... holding... holding until his arms can hold no more and still not letting go of the mattress that protects them all. Mama trembles. The girls scream. Garrett holds.
Step...
The resistance comes again, harder this time, an enemy to be fought and conquered. "I lived through the Sundering, dammit!" he shouts, a futile argument against the strengthening opposition. He shoves.
Step...
Tearing through rubble, his hands bruised and bloody. Rubble higher than a grown man's head.
"Where is he?!"
"Careful, Garrett. You'll collapse it!"
"I've gotta find him!" Clawing at stones and timbers, he can't rest. He will never rest. If it takes a day, a week, longer, he won't rest. Mortar, wood, hay -- hair? Digging, clawing, scratching, blood. A mare. Dead. The sparks of the pattern rekindle the stench of burning horseflesh. Garrett tries to hold his breath, but can't.
Step...
The grooms carry the horsemaster out between them, trying to hide the body from the boy in the rubble but the boy sees. The corpse is bloody and broken, his head hanging at a strange, obviously fatal angle. The man's eyes are open to the morning light but see nothing. The boy edges closer and stares into the dead man's green eyes. Donovan's eyes.
"NO!" Garrett screams in despair, his fists clenched against his temples, sparks shooting up into his eyes. Grief rips at his heart and weakens his knees. He wants to run, but his feet won't move.
"Are you on fire?" the sinister voice hisses.
"NO!" Garrett snarls back at it, fiercely this time. He throws the force of his will into his thighs, his knees, his feet. They move. Slowly.
Step... step...
He breaks through the third veil, panting and sore. He has never been this tired; this bone-numbingly exhausted before. Ever. "When will it end," he whimpers, forcing his feet forward and willing his knees not to buckle. Knowing there is still one more veil.
A breeze chills his sweat-drenched hair and Garrett looks up from the glowing red line. A hillside rises before him and he inches toward it, following the crimson tracery as it arches in a graceful curve. Clouds roil around the hill -- ominous clouds, like those that preceded the Great Storm. Garrett hears voices, but as far as he can tell, he's alone. The hillside is deserted.
"It will burn your soul, even if it doesn't burn your body."
Garrett recognizes the faint voice. Brennan.
"It's instant death to do it wrong."
Garrett's head spins to look behind him, certain he heard his father.
The wind whips up to a gale, fluttering even the hair that is plastered to his face. The voices surround Garrett, emanating from the storm itself as the whirlwind encircles him.
Step...
They close in. Louder. More insistent.
"Celina was forced to it too early..."
"There are those who are of the blood who have died trying..."
Martin. Lilly.
"That's it then. You're alone."
"No. Not Sparrow too," he whispers, anguished.
Garrett strains against the growing force holding his feet.
Step...
The voices grow deafening, coming at him relentlessly.
"It will tear you apart..."
"Not even a corpse left to bury..."
"Instant death..."
"No second chances..."
"Too early..."
"Burn your soul..."
"STOP IT!" Garrett shouts against the roar. He covers his ears to try to shut them out but it's no use. The voices remain inside his head -- pounding, lashing, shrieking, clambering to escape.
"You're alone..."
"Died trying..."
"Burn your body..."
"Tear you apart..."
Garrett feels himself starting to panic. He breathes in ragged gasps as his chest closes in. His palms grow cold and clammy despite the heat around him. It feels like an eternity since he took his last step. "Walk, dammit! Walk!" he screams at himself, but his knees wobble and prepare to cave beneath him. He grits his teeth, forcing the energy of the next impending scream into his feet.
Step... a feeble one, but a step...
"No second chances..."
"Burn your soul..."
He clenches his fists and presses them hard against his head, forcing himself to think. Forcing back the crippling fear. How long would it take to die here, he wonders. The eternal Now, Brennan had called the Final Veil. To die here would be to live in this agony forever. Strangely, that thought gives him some strength. He hears Solange. "Are you going to survive if you walk?"
"I'll survive," he whispers unconvincingly.
Step...
New voices join the maelstrom, taking a different tack, but still slashing at Garrett like blows from Jerod's kusari-gama.
"What is the role of a son of a king?" Random demands.
"You have no idea what princes of Amber do or what it means to be one," Martin sneers.
Above those, Garrett hears a wail.
"I want my son back!"
"Mama?!" Garrett cries out, but his voice is lost in the wind.
"Your mother fought to keep you," Lilly says. It sounds like an accusation now.
"Do you want to be royalty, Garrett?"
"Folly?!" Garrett calls out desperately.
"A serf in fine robes with no authority..."
"Her worst fears have all come true..."
Garrett tries to shut them out, but the jeers and shouts force themselves upon him painfully. They sting, swarming around him like angry hornets. They slash his bare skin like the shards of a broken sword. The red line below his feet blurs behind tears and sweat and sparks. But it is still there.
Step...
"I want my son back!" Anna is shrieking now. Her words stab at his back, rending his flesh. "The girls and I need you too, Garrett!" she screams. Slashing.
"A serf in fine robes..." Tearing.
"A son of a king..." Biting
"You have no idea..." Crushing.
"Do you want to be royalty?" Piercing.
"Her worst fears..." Ripping.
Garrett tries to lock them out. The taunts wrench at his heart and shred his body. He sobs out loud, but forces his foot forward.
Step...
"GARRETT!!" Anna pleads in hysterical sobs.
"Mama, I'm sorry," he cries, inching his foot forward as his tears hiss against the sparks.
"I want my son back! Come home, Garrett! Please!" she wails, begging.
"I can't!"
"Come back where you belong!" she cries.
"I belong HERE!" he bellows into the wind.
As soon as the words are out, Garrett senses something... different.
"You're of the Blood of Amber."
Martin had said that on the day he helped Garrett buckle on the sword.
The sword.
Fighting to keep his feet creeping along the line, Garrett draws the sword hanging at his hip. He slashes against the encroaching whirlwind, slicing cleanly through the clouds. The voices falter, then come at him again. Harder.
Step... slash...
Through the gap, a memory. Holding a sword before him, arms outstretched and eyes closed. "What is it to be a prince, my Prince?" Abd-allah quizzes him calmly.
Step... slash...
The hostile voices cringe and another memory overtakes them. Folly grasps his chin and checks his hair before court, smiling up at him with satisfaction.
Step... slash...
The voices cower this time and he sees Lilly, her eyes moist in the red twilight of the big windows. "And now I am not afraid," she smiles at him.
Step... slash...
"You can't not be a Prince," Father says over coffee.
Step... slash...
"You're stronger than they are," he himself tells Lilly about the demons before her own walk.
With each blow, the clouds bearing his own demons retreat a little farther. With each blow, Garrett moves ever so slightly forward. It is progress, but it is not done. With one final blow, the wind subsides and the clouds dissipate into a foggy mist, revealing a looming black shape on the tracery before him. Just beyond it, he can see his goal -- the end of the glowing red line. If he had the energy, he would've cursed. So close!
It's the spider. The giant spider now blocks his path.
Having come through what he just did, Garrett does not relent. He keeps pressing forward, inch by hard-fought inch.
The enormous arachnid had never attacked him in his childhood nightmares, though he had feared its presence with his entire being. In truth, in his nightmares, he had never even seen it. Only imagined it. Until now.
"Garrett the stableboy," it spits derisively, its voice not truly a voice but more like the sound of claws on slate. "Be gone from here. Common, lowborn bastard of a dockside whore. You are not worthy," it seethes contemptuously.
Exhausted, ripped apart and pasted back together, Garrett smirks at the creature smugly.
"And you..." he pants, "are... not... REAL!!" On the last word, Garrett's sword flashes forward, impaling the beast with one swift thrust. Without a sound, the spider melts into quicksilver around the blade. Garrett yanks the sword back quickly, hoping he hasn't damaged it, and pushes his foot forward.
Before he steps into it, however, the quicksilver puddle resolves itself into something else. Nose, mane, withers of not one but several majestic horses rise from the floor before him and gallop ahead, seemingly oblivious to his presence. Garrett grins and sheaths his sword, straining his foot to move that one final step to the finish.
Done. He's done. As he stands at the center of the pattern with his hands leaning heavily on his knees and his ragged breath searing his chest, Garrett sees the herd running free before him on a grassy plain under a wide blue sky. And as his knees finally collapse under him and consciousness fades away, he thinks his face hits grass.
Last modified: 22 March 2008