Sorceress' Blood (9 page)

The next time Rebecca woke up they were on the ground and Ashley was
tugging at her arm.

“Wake up, Rebecca,” she was saying from somewhere far
away in a world where people had their eyes open and moved their
bodies around. Rebecca didn’t want to go back there just yet.
It had been so long since she could sleep properly and now, just when
the Land of Nod was enjoying its summer – the best time of year
to visit the Land of Nod – she had to leave and go back to that
world of running around and protecting Ashley and shooting Thralls.
The Land of Nod was a much better place to be. “Come on!”
Ashley was closer now and pleading with her. It was time to get up,
no doubt about it.

“Alright. Just stop pulling my arm.” Rebecca answered and
forced her eyes open wide. “How long since we landed?”

“Only a few seconds but they opened the door for us and said we
have to leave.”

“Did they say where we’re going?”

“No. They just said we have to go.” Rebecca tried to
stand up, forgetting that she still had her seatbelt wrapped around
her. She fell right back into her seat. Once she had unbuckled her
seat-belt, her next attempts at standing were more successful.

“Let’s go then.”

They disembarked into the airport and already they as if like they
didn’t belong. Rebecca thought that she must be feeling much
like a young child – even younger than Ashley – must
feel. She was looking at everything for the very first time. Everyone
looked different to her and the signs were all written in writing she
didn’t understand. Every door and path led away to places she’d
never seen and arrows pointed in every direction, leaving her
completely disorientated and confused.

“Where do we go?” Rebecca asked no one in particular.

“That way!” Ashley exclaimed excitedly.

“How do you know?”

“Because that man over there is holding a sign with your name
on it.”

“Oh. You’re right.” Rebecca took Ashley by the hand
and led her over to the man holding their names on a piece of paper.
He was a Chinese man in a dark suit and dark sunglasses. Rebecca
thought that the clothing worn by fancy chauffeurs were the same
clothes worn by government agents in movies. When they got close to
him Rebecca immediately noticed the tattoo of black lines twisting
down the right side of his face. She recognised the same tattoo worn
by all of Lord Sebastian’s Knights.

“Rebecca Williams?” He spoke English perfectly with an
accent toned down by years of switching from his own language to
English.

“Yes,” Rebecca answered and smiled politely at him.
Ashley wasn’t saying anything.

“Please come with me. It is a long journey. Do you have any
bags?”

“No.”

“Then we will go.”

“Go? We don’t need passports or anything?”

“You do not need to go through customs in this building.
International flights come and go from a different one and you are
not coming internationally, are you, Ms Williams.” The emphasis
he put on ‘
are you
’ meant he wasn’t asking a
question.

“No, I guess not.”

“Follow me.” Rebecca looked down at Ashley briefly and
gave her hand a comforting squeeze before she started after the
knight.

He didn’t talk at all to Rebecca and Ashley as he led them
through the airport and they didn’t try to start a conversation
with him. Experience had taught Rebecca that the Knights of -
whatever they called themselves
- weren’t much for
conversation. So they walked quietly from their gate without looking
back and taking a final glimpse of the plane. Somewhere deep inside,
Rebecca knew that looking at the plane would be too hard. That was
their last link to home and they would never see it again –
their home or the plane. Neither was open to them any more.

All three sat just as quietly in an ordinary-looking blue car. The
chilling touch of déjà vu brushed over her. Rebecca
realised that she’d done this before. There was a silent knight
riding in the front and he was taking them – two girls swept
unwillingly into a world out of their control – to some far
away castle to meet with a Lord they’d never heard of. He would
give them gourmet dinners and show them the world of magic. Without
any tricks or illusions and without using a single mirror or smoke
machine, he would do the impossible and then tell one of his knights
to teach Ashley the impossible. But Rebecca wasn’t important to
this Lord or his knights and so she would be left as an idle
hanger-on with nothing to do. What would happen next? Would they find
her? Could they? Of course they could. They’d found them twice
before.
Oh god
. Rebecca's throat felt sore as she choked back
tears. It was beginning all over again. She'd been there before and
it was all going the same way. She was trapped in that horrible
nightmare that she couldn't escape. A nightmare that just looped
forever and ever. In a week she would be running away from burning
wreckage again and she'd have nowhere to go and no one to help her.
Before she knew it she'd be in some other country being driven by
some other knight who doesn’t talk and it would all begin
again! It was the most horrible thought she’d ever had and
worst of all was how real it all felt. This wasn’t a nightmare.
A nightmare, a true nightmare, ended. This was something much worse
than a nightmare. This was real life and life’s a bigger bitch
than your dreams could ever be.

The man in the sunglasses drove them both directly out of the city
just like Sir Julian had done when all of this started. That day
passed them quietly and the man in the sunglasses didn't even turn on
the radio. Ashley sat staring intently at her hands for a long time
but she never said anything. Rebecca tried to sleep but found she was
no longer tired enough to even doze. The landscape beyond the city
was different to what she was used to seeing and, if she had come to
China as a tourist and not a... A what? A refugee? A prisoner? A
fugitive? Rebecca couldn't find the right word to describe what she
was. What kind of person who has done nothing wrong is forced to run
from their own home and leave everything they knew behind them
without even a word as to why? But then what could she have told her
friends if she did have the chance? She couldn't tell them why she
was running, because she didn't know. Ultimately, that was all
Rebecca could say about her situation. She didn't know anything. She
looked down at Ashley. She was still looking at her hands, palms
upwards, and focused with a frightening intensity. Rebecca thought
that the little dark-haired girl probably knew more than her. What
had Benjamin told her? What secrets of the world was this small girl
now carrying with her? Did she know about the knight's order? Did she
know what extends beyond the reaches of the universe? Could she read
minds like Benjamin and used her power to find out what the man in
the glasses was thinking?

Rebecca turned away and looked out the window again. Whatever Ashley
knew, she wasn't going to find out by becoming paranoid. They were in
this together. There was comfort in those words because it meant she
wasn't really alone. Maybe Ashley did know more than her about the
surreal turn life had taken in so few days, but even if that was true
they were still in this together. Rebecca closed her eyes and tried
to think of something else.

Her mind went to her mother, something it often did. Rebecca missed
her mother but not in the tearful mourning way. She had never really
mourned her mother because the idea of her dying had never really hit
her the way it does when you're an adult. Rebecca didn't feel as
though her mother was gone so much as she felt her mother may never
have really been there at all. She was just a dream, a really nice
dream of a woman who took care of her and made her smile and always
had time for her. Any time Rebecca needed her she could still find
her in her dreams, because that's where she had always been. Rebecca
even remembered her mother in the way you remember a vivid dream you
had the night before. Everything is just at the edge of your
consciousness but slowly fading and leaving you just a hint what you
had been dreaming about. They were silhouettes of people and echoes
of conversation that you know had happened in your dream but you
couldn't put the details into words because the details were only
there when you were falling asleep again. Going back to that Land of
Nod where everything is only as real as a dream.

Once, in her dreams of a mother, Rebecca had been at the beach in a
purple one-piece bathing suit. It was hot and sunny but there was no
one else at the beach. Of course there were other people there. There
was no such thing as an empty beach on a hot day. But she couldn't
remember anyone else being there. She just remembered herself and her
mother at the beach. They were splashing around in the water; a wave
that was unusually big crashed onshore and washed over them, knocking
Rebecca from her feet. Her mother reached down quickly and, with one
arm, pulled her out of the water. She was fine and what water she had
swallowed she coughed up immediately. Her mother asked her if she
wanted to back onto the sand and rest but Rebecca wanted to stay in
the water. That's exactly what they did and they didn't come out of
the water for hours. Rebecca had gotten tired of jumping around and
so her mother took her by the hand and led her back onto dry land.
The sand was hot and squeaked with every quick step Rebecca took. Her
mother didn't seem to mind it being so hot and she didn't remember
her being especially tired either. Her mother seemed to have
limitless stamina when they were playing as they had been in that
dream of the beach. She probably was tired. She probably wasn't as
fast as Rebecca remembered her being, either. No one is that
perfect,. Rebecca told herself that she was just idealising the
memory of her mother but part of her didn't believe what she was
saying. She liked having a perfect mother, even if she was just a
dream.

The sun was low in the west when the man in the sunglasses finally
stopped driving. Rebecca looked around but she couldn't see any signs
of life. There were no houses or cars or people anywhere around them.
She could see mountains towards the horizon and plains of tall grass
around her.

“Why are we stopping?” Rebecca asked and the thought that
this was a trap crossed her mind.

“We wait.” The man in the sunglasses answered and got out
of the car. Ashley got out of the car to look around and Rebecca,
even though she had been planning to stay, followed her out.

“What are we waiting for?”

“A lift. Unless you'd rather walk?”

“Why can't we drive?”

“It gets the car too dirty and then I have to wash it.”

“So how do we get there?” The man in the sunglasses
turned around and looked at Rebecca. A cigarette hung in his the side
of his mouth. He struck a match and lit it.

“You ask too many questions.” He said without removing
the cigarette from his lips.

“A horse!” Ashley suddenly shouted. The man in the
sunglasses smiled at her.

“Smart kid.” He looked around them. Rebecca was doing the
same but neither of them could see anything. “How about that?”
He turned around again and looked at Ashley. “How did you know
you're going by horse?”

“I can see it. It's a horse and it's pulling a carriage.”

“I don't see anything.” Rebecca said while she was still
looking around.

Ashley snorted. “Of course you can't. It's too far away. I can
see it though.”

“How?”

The man in the glasses laughed and tapped the ash off his cigarette.
“The kid's got a touch of magic in her.”

Ashley nodded. “Benjamin taught me how to see things that are
far away.”

“How far away is it?” the man in the sunglasses asked.

“I don't know. It's just far away.”

“Well, at least it's on its way. You're sure to fit right in
around here.”

What had been nothing soon became a dot far off in the distance. It
lacked any kind of features or form to distinguish it but everyone
had an idea of what it was. Then it grew bigger as it came closer and
eventually they could recognise it as the horse and carriage Ashley
had told them was coming. The driver was a Chinese man in sandals,
cargo shorts, a sports coat and a cap. Rebecca starred at him with
the kind of bafflement you get when someone looks as if they got
dressed after drinking heavily. The driver of the carriage had a big
grin on his face that stretched under his big nose from ear to ear.
He pulled on the horse's reigns, tipped his cap to Rebecca and Ashley
and then looked at the driver and they exchanged words in Chinese.

When they were done, the driver looked at Rebecca and said, “He'll
take you to the castle. He doesn't speak any English though, so don't
bother asking questions, because you won't be getting any answers.
Lord Edward will be waiting for you when you arrive at the castle.”
He walked back over to his car. Rebecca and Ashley got into the
carriage. There was no top and the sides were low. Two benches had
been nailed down into the floor and Rebecca and Ashley each took one.
It didn't strike Rebecca as a wagon that had been intended for people
to ride in.

“Nervous?” Rebecca asked. Ashley shook her head and even
gave her a small smile. The carriage started moving across the grass,
back the way it had come. Rebecca watched as the car they'd come in
started up and drove back towards the city. Soon she couldn't even
hear the sound of its engine and everything had become a picture or
rural serenity. Rebecca's nerves had calmed and she didn't feel
anxious any more either. For the first time she could enjoy the
beauty of her surroundings and the freshness of the air blowing down
from the mountains. For the first time, things seemed like they were
going to be okay.

Lord Edward's castle sat a stone's throw away from the foot of a
mountain range and was separated from them by fields growing rice,
vegetables and from a barn with cows wondering around outside. Around
the edge of the fields were little houses and as the carriage rolled
up the dusty road to the castle Rebecca could see men and women
farming. Lord Sebastian had lived comfortably like any wealthy man of
the modern world. Lord Edward's estate was nothing short of kingly
and Rebecca thought that if she ever saw another home like this it
would be the palace of a true king. To the side of the castle was a
pagoda five stories high and, when the doors were closed, as they
were when they arrived, the picture of two dragons entwined in combat
was carved into the wood. The whole estate was awesome and Rebecca
couldn't find a single word in all her mind to fully sum up how the
place had surprised her. While she gazed at her surroundings she
thought she saw someone standing on the roof but then the figure was
gone in the blink of an eye. The incident did little to distract her
from looking for more beautiful details on the house like the white
stone statues of fierce monsters standing guard by the front door.