Ascension (15 page)

The world moved with such unexpected force that Laura found herself hundreds of feet in the air, arms and legs flailing, falling quickly toward the ground. 

Quickly, she relented on the force she was sending through the
torrial
, and caught herself in the air just as the mountainside the opposite way to meet her.  She landed forcefully, and with less grace than she hoped, sending a jolt of pain through her entire body.  Her injured leg cried out in protest. 

It took her a few moments to ward off the pain in her leg.  When it subsided, slightly, she hobbled to the edge and looked down.  Laura marveled at the sight.  She had made it up not just onto the first enormous slab of rock, but onto the
third
one.  No wonder the landing hurt. 

She looked around her.  The top of the slab was much like the side: bare, dark rock.  The angles of it were so perfectly straight that it looked like it had been carved by a human hand, rather than created by forces of nature.  But Laura knew that the dream realm mirrored the real world, and so this mountain must have been formed naturally. 

She had a higher vantage point now than before, and saw that the entire land around the mountain was flat and bare.  It extended in all directions as far as she could see, ending only at the horizon.  Scaling the mountain seemed to have been the right choice: it was the only thing around here for miles.  And, of course, there must have been a reason the
torrial
brought her before it.

She turned and looked up.  The mountain continued on as high as she could see, connecting the enormous slabs of rock to one another in a pyramid that rose higher and higher.  Now more in tune with how strongly the figurine
torrial
magnified her power, Laura ran forward, jumped, and pushed the world down.

This time, her control was better.  She went up into the air just high enough to land deftly on the next highest peak.  She smiled.  The verticality she achieved with the
torrial
was thrilling.  Scaling the mountain like this was actually fun.

She ran toward the next rock, jumped, and pushed the world down again.  Once more, she timed it all to land perfectly on the next peak.  Not wasting any time, she ran at the next slab, jumped, and pushed the world down.  She landed and kept moving, running toward the next slab and jumping up, pushing the world down, and landing gracefully.  Over and over she repeated the process, until she had reached the first level of clouds.

Chapter Thirteen

~A Cabin~

That was when Laura stopped and did a double take.  The mountain that she was sure extended high into the sky simply stopped.  It was as if the upper half of it had been cleaved right off.

 She looked back over the edge, and couldn’t see anything below the cloud.  She was becoming less sure that this mountain was a natural formation.  It cut off right when the clouds, and not an inch lower or higher.  From the ground, anybody would be right to assume that the menacing mountain would just keep going up.  But it did not.  Instead, it plateaued strangely.

Laura took a step forward.  Here, the mountain was shrouded in cloud, and the misty fog made it difficult to see very far.  Was this it?  Had she arrived where she needed to go?

That would make sense, except that there was nothing there.  Well, nothing that she could see immediately, anyway.  The fog from the clouds prevented her from seeing farther than twenty feet away.

She picked her way forward carefully.  She might have expected there to be howling winds up here, but there was absolutely nothing.  The air was still, keeping the clouds at bay.  Why was it that she thought she saw them swirling before, when she was on the ground?  Nothing about this place made much sense.

The top of the mountain might have been anywhere from a few miles to a few hundred feet in diameter, and Laura would not have known the difference.  Once she stepped away from the edge, misty cloud just swallowed everything up.

She proceeded forward carefully.  She was acutely aware that this was not just any random place in the dream realm; no, this was one of the
Vassiz
elder’s dreams.  How much influence did he have over this place?  She did not know.  But she knew she had to find the elder before he did her.

It was eerie how quiet it was up here.  Not a single sound penetrated the white barrier of the cloud.  Laura could barely even hear her own footsteps against the rock.  There could be anything lurking beside her, and she would not even know of it until it was right on her.

Laura kept walking until she saw a dark shape ahead.  Instinctively, she froze.  The shape did not move.  She counted ten breaths to see if the shape moved at all.  It did not.  It was about the height of a man, although significantly wider than any she had seen.  Laura crept forward carefully.  She was on edge; she did not know what the shape belonged to.

She came a little bit closer.  The shape still did not move.  In fact, from where Laura stood, it looked more like an upright rock than the figure of a man.  She relaxed slightly.  Hopefully, there was nothing to worry about.

She walked even closer, until she was a mere ten feet away.  The foggy cloud still obscured her eyesight, but she could now tell that the shape was no ordinary rock.  It was the carving of an unclothed man, and he towered over her.  His back was to her, but she could see the heavy muscles running from his shoulders to his waist.  She came closer, and started to circle around to look at him from the front when her foot caught on something.

She nearly stumbled, but caught herself in time to avoid falling over.  She looked down.  There, carved into the ground, was an odd hollow that extended from the statue at her side out until it was hidden by the clouds.  She couldn’t see where it led.  But she noticed that it curved inward slightly, in the direction the man was facing.

Laura turned her attention back to the carving of the man.  She saw now, from up close, that the features of his face had washed away over time.  The carving was probably ancient.  Cracks ran along parts of the rock that made up the man’s torso.  In one hand, he held a long spear, fixed sturdily to the ground.  In the other, a circular shield, although the lower half of it had broken off a long time ago.  It was nowhere to be seen.

Laura wondered what the statue was for, and why it was here.  She looked up at the face again.  At one point, the eyes would have stared straight over her into the distance.  At what?  The carving reminded her of a guard, a sentry of some sort.  She wondered what it was protecting.

The curving hollow caught her eye again.  Even though Laura could not see far, the way it angled inwards made her feel like it was part of a larger circle.  She decided to investigate. 

Laura walked away from the statue until it was lost in the fog behind her.  She followed the path of the hollow, staying to one side of it.  It was about the width of her wrist, and maybe an inch or two deep.  It made her think of a river bed, although what its purpose possibly was, she could not say.

She was right about the curve of the hollow.  It never strayed from its circular angle.  Laura continued walking along the hollow, wondering where it led, when she spotted another shape in the distance.  This one had the familiar form of the previous sentry.  She walked up to it, unafraid, and found that it was a replica of the carving she had seen earlier.  The wear on the rock was different, of course, and this one had his whole shield intact. 

Laura traced her path back.  By her estimate, this statue was about a quarter of the way along the hollow.  This statue’s gaze was also directed inward.  She wondered what was there.  That was where she would go, she decided, but first she wanted to see if there were other statues along the circle.

She walked quickly, and found another sculpture, exactly like the ones before, standing exactly a quarter of the way from the last one.  If she were a betting woman, she would have guessed there would be a fourth statue another quarter of the way away, at the halfway point between this one and the first one.  She walked on, and after a while found the last carving.  She went right past it, following the hollow all the way back to the first statue.

Sure enough, the hollow made a complete circle.  It was almost as if it was some kind of warding.  Laura could not see far, but she felt sure there was something in the middle.  Perhaps even what she came here for.

She ventured forward slowly.  She had an uncomfortable feeling that she was being watched.  She strained her ears, listening for the tiniest noise that would give away the watcher.  None came.  Everything around her was quiet, blanketed by the discomforting fog.  There could be somebody twenty feet away, and she wouldn’t know at all.

She did not like how helpless the fog made her feel.  It was almost an unnatural creation.  And, it seemed to grow thicker the deeper she went into the circle.  She tried willing it away, making it dissipate using her control over the dream realm.  Nothing happened.  She frowned to herself.  That was supposed to be a simple thing.  Perhaps she needed more control?  She reached through the
torrial
, using it to influence the world… again, nothing happened.  The blue aura around the three figurines sprung to life, but Laura couldn’t manage to do anything with it.

Suddenly she noticed a pale light breaking through the fog.  It came from in front of her.  She went toward it carefully, aware of how vulnerable she was right now.  Any attacker who knew the land would have her at his mercy. 

By her estimate, the light came from somewhere near the middle of the circle.  However, it was impossible to tell without a clear view.  Laura wandered closer, and abruptly the sky overhead darkened.  She heard a roll of thunder in the distance and froze.  The noise was the first to break the barrier of cloud.  It sounded ominous.

She looked ahead.  In the darkened landscape, the light before her was more prevalent.  She felt uneasy.  She did not like how the sun just disappeared.  It was as if it had been swallowed up by some beast. 

She went to the light, and as she got closer, a shape revealed itself to her.  It surrounded the light.  It was hard to see through the mist, so Laura went even closer.  She was ten feet away when she finally saw the source of the light.

There, in the middle of the circular clearing, stood a small wooden cabin.  It was completely at odds with this place.  The walls were made of freshly lacquered wood, and the roof of tile bricks.  Unlike the statues that surrounded it, the cabin showed no signs of wear.  In fact, none of it matched what was here.  It looked like it had just dropped out of the sky.

There was one window on the side facing Laura.  That was the source of the light.  She saw now, from the flickering shadows dancing on the ground before her, that the light came from some sort of fire. 

Laura approached the cabin carefully, and held on tightly to the three
torrial
in her pocket.  Just because they afforded her greater control did not mean she could be stupid.  The elders were more experienced, more sinister, and that undoubtedly gave them the advantage.  Even with the
torrial
, she knew that her odds of matching one of them were slim to none.  Still, she had to try.

She circled the cabin, keeping one eye on it and the other on the fog around her.  The window that she had seen was the only one.  The only other feature that broke the uniform outer façade was a medium-sized door, just tall enough for her to fit through. 

She completed one circle, and, seeing nothing else, proceeded toward the cabin.  She came to the door and stopped.  What if this was some sort of trap?  Surely the elder knew she was here by now.  What if the cabin was a set-up, a way of getting Laura to put herself in some vulnerable position?  But, at the same time, she couldn’t shy away now.  The
torrial
that Gabrielle used had brought her here for a reason. 
Specifically
here, to this barren land, right before the mountain.  There was something here for her, and it was based on her need to kill the elders. 

She put her hand on the door and gently pushed it open.  It swung easily on freshly-oiled hinges.  The interior revealed itself to her.

The cabin was empty except for a single bed and a roaring fireplace on the opposing wall.  The flames gave no heat.  But that wasn’t what held her attention.

Seated on the bed, facing away from her, was a dark-haired man.  He had his head between his hands, and by the way his body shook Laura thought he was sobbing.  His hair was tied back in a ponytail.

Laura crept into the cabin, careful to not make a noise.  She felt a… pull… toward the man, and knew she had to be cautious.  Could he be one of the elders?  For some reason, she had always imagined them as frail, aging men, with hair as white as snow and skin leathery from too many years of living.  Yet even from behind, Laura could tell the man before her was middle-aged and in possession of good health. 

Just as Laura was about to step in front of him, the man looked up.  And Laura saw that he had not been sobbing.  He had been laughing. 

Upon seeing his face Laura’s estimate was confirmed.  The man was right in his middle-years, and some might say in the prime of his life.  He had a strong if not handsome face, and a full beard that reached half-way down his chest.  The clothes he wore were expensive.  Laura had not seen luxuriant robes before, but the ones he had on gave no doubt to their worth.  The seams were lined with threads of gold, and the outside lapels had magnificent animal stitched into them.  A boar, a wolf, and a snake, among others that Laura did not recognized, twisted all the way around the collar of his jacket.