The Master's Chair (The Chronicles of Terah) (16 page)

“You can’t do that. You really have no choice,” Kalen spoke slowly and quietly, but with an edge to his voice, like an angry parent dealing with an unruly toddler.

“You have no idea how sick I am of hearing that,” Kevin interrupted. “Of course I have a choice. We all do. You act like you can pull the strings and we’ll all jump just like puppets. Well, I’m not jumping.”

“Myron, talent breeds talent. You’re not going to be able to hide yours much longer, and you look just like Yvonne. It won’t take anyone very long to figure out that you’re Badec’s son. There’s going to be a price on your head as soon as news of your father’s coma gets out. You’re scared. Who wouldn’t be? But go to Glendymere. Learn how to use your power. Then decide what to do,” Kalen said, trying to buy some time. 

“If he doesn’t agree to take his place as head of the House of Nordin, I’ll kill him myself, today,” Duane said. “It would be kinder than letting the sorcerers get hold of him. I owe Badec that much.” He turned around and left the living room.

Kevin glared at Duane’s departing back and said, “Go ahead. At least that would put an end to all of this.”

“Kevin, look out the window,”
Xantha said privately to Kevin.

Kevin had heard that voice many times over the years, but always in his sleep. He walked over to the window that looked out over the front yard. Xantha was standing in the middle of the clearing. As their eyes met, Xantha pawed the ground three times and bowed his regal head. At that moment, Kevin knew beyond any doubt that everything Kalen had been saying was true.

The others walked over to see what Kevin was looking at. Xantha lifted his head, pawed the ground again, and spread his wings. No one said a word. They could hardly breathe. Xantha was magnificent.

Finally Kalen said, “I’d like for all of you to meet Xantha. He came with Duane.”

“Okay,” Kevin said softly. Then he spoke louder. “If I do decide to go along with this, if we all do what you want, what do we get out of it?”

“You get to live, at least for today,” Kalen hissed at Kevin. Then he turned around and left the room. Shortly afterwards, they heard the back door slam shut. For a few uncomfortable minutes, no one said a word or even looked at anyone else.

“I don’t know about the rest of you, but I sure could use a cup of coffee. Think I’ll go put another pot on,” Theresa said softly.

After Theresa left for the kitchen, Chris said, “Come on, Kevin. What have we got to lose?”

Kevin stared at Chris. “You could lose your life! Don’t you get it? If what he’s saying is even half true, what chance do any of us have of surviving?”

Darrell shrugged. “I don’t know, but I’d sort of like to give it a try.”

Karl nodded and quietly said, “Anything beats Omaha as far as I’m concerned.”

Kevin studied the faces around him, shook his head, and said, “I give up.” He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly.

Karl nodded and said, “All right. If we’re going to do this, we need to find out as much as we can about this place. Where are we? Where are we going? And how are we going to get there?”

Chris nodded. “We need maps.”

“Kalen said something about Duane teaching us combat and weapons,” Steve said. “We need to know what skills we already have. I was in the Marines for three years but that was over thirty years ago. At that time I was pretty good with a rifle, but I haven’t shot one in over 25 years.”

“I was never in service, but I’m pretty good with a gun, and not too bad with a bow and arrow,” Karl said. “I’ve worked in rodeos. I can handle horses and I know how to use a rope, but I’ve never been a fighter and I’ve never learned much about it.”

“Well, you’re both better off than I am,” Chris said. “I’ve never been in service, and I’ve never even fired a gun. The only arrows I ever shot were the little plastic ones with rubber tips. I ran cross-country in high school, but I didn’t really work at it. I swam with a local swim club, but I wasn’t fast enough for college competitions. I belonged to a boxing gym in New York for a couple of years while I was a teenager, but that was a long time ago. I really don’t see that I’m going to be much help at all.”

“The only thing I know how to do is play football, but I can throw a football, and aim is aim. Maybe that’s something we can build on,” Darrell paused and a far-away look settled over his face. “Actually, I used to be pretty good with a shuriken, too.”

“I may sound dumb, but what’s a shuriken?” Joan asked.

“It’s a small Asian weapon, sometimes called a throwing star. Supposedly, the Ninjas used them at one time. I’m sure you’ve seen them in movies. I’d almost forgotten about all of that,” Darrell said a little hesitantly.

“Do you mean that you know Karate?” Chris asked quickly. “Maybe you could teach us a little of it. It might come in handy.”

“It was some form of martial arts, but I’m not sure which one. My next-door neighbor, Martin, was retired from the military. I saw him working out in his backyard one day when I was maybe eight or nine. I asked him to teach me, and he did. He taught me to throw the stars and fans too, but I haven’t touched any of those things since I was fifteen. Martin moved to Florida then.”

“Well, I’ve never had to fight, but I suppose I could learn,” Joan said. “I’m pretty good at target archery. I don’t think I could shoot a deer, but a man? I don’t know, maybe, under the right circumstances, if it were him or us.”

Since Kevin was the only one who had not spoken up, the others looked at him sort of expectantly. He shrugged and said, “No one ever told me that sorcerers and assassins were going to be out to kill me. I never even went to PE in high school. They let me write a paper about something instead. And when I was in college, I convinced my PE Instructor that I would be more valuable to him as an aide than as a student. Paul did try to get me to take some self-defense classes when I was a teenager, but he didn’t tell me why, so I never gave it much effort.”

“Joan, could I see you for a minute?” Theresa called from the doorway to the kitchen.

When Joan reached the kitchen Theresa was putting seven cups, the sugar jar, spoons, and a cream pitcher on a tray. She asked Joan if she was familiar with herbs and healing plants.

“A little. Actually I know more about the herbs used in cooking and preserving than I do about healing herbs. I recognize the aloe plant over there and I know it’s for burns, but that’s about as far as it goes.”

“My grandmother has an old wood stove, similar to this one, but her door handle’s covered with something so that it stays cool. When I opened this door to put in another piece of wood, I didn’t think about the handle and I burned my whole hand.”

“Let me see it!” Joan said as she reached for the aloe plant.

“No, no, it’s okay. And I mean it’s really okay. Look at it.” Theresa held her palm out for Joan to see. There was no sign of any injury, definitely not of a bad burn. “It was fiery red and starting to swell by the time I cut a piece of the aloe plant. As soon as I touched the burns with the juice – gone! Totally healed. I’ve never seen anything like it. I’ve used aloe for burns all my life, but this was unreal. That burn was bad, and there’s no way our aloe could have done anything like that.”

Theresa looked at her hand again. “My grandmother’s a healer, and she believes in magic, witches, the whole bit. She says that long ago, when the witches were powerful, the herbs were more powerful. I was thinking, since Terah is more magic oriented, do you suppose the herbs here are stronger than the ones on Earth? If so, I know some good ones for wounds, pain, upset stomachs, colds, sore throats, and so on. I could make up a sort of first aid kit out of herbs.”

“Let’s talk to Kalen about this. I don’t know much about herbs, but if you show me what to look for, I’ll be happy to help you gather and prepare them. We can probably find some cloth for bandages, too.” Joan turned back to the stove. “The coffee smells like it’s ready, don’t you think? Let’s take it in to the guys.”

Theresa carried the tray and Joan carried the pot. When they reached the living room, the men were standing around talking about the Final Four in college basketball. All the guys had an opinion about which teams would make it and they were arguing fiercely for their favorites. Joan smiled. It sounded just like the conversations she had heard between Karl and his friends every spring back at home. It sounded right.

Just as Joan poured the first cup of coffee, Kalen walked in. “Duane wants to see each of you individually to get an idea how you move and to find out what you can already do so that we can make out a training plan. Darrell, why don’t you go first?”

Darrell nodded and walked towards the door, mumbling, “I was really looking forward to that coffee.”

After Darrell left, Chris asked, “Do you have any maps of the area? We’d like to know where we are and where we need to go.”

“That’s an excellent idea. Here we go,” Kalen walked over to the desk and pulled out a drawer. It was full of folded bits of paper.

“Are these your maps?” Steve asked, a little disappointed.

“Yes. The brownies make them. They’re really quite good.” Kalen opened one that had been folded over several times and took it into the dining room. As he straightened it out on the table, the map almost tripled in size. At first it looked blank, and then, as they watched, the markings became clear and dark.

“Hey, that looks like North America,” Karl said.

“Your North America, our Calandra.”

“Where are we now?” Karl asked.

“Here.” Kalen pointed to a spot that would have been just south of Lake Winnipeg, Canada, on Earth. “We’re in Brendolanth, but we’re not too far from the northern border of Camden. Here, this river is the boundary between Brendolanth and Camden.” Kalen pointed to the river that the others recognized as the Mississippi.

Steve asked, “Do you have mountains where we do, deserts and rivers where we do? Are the two worlds really alike physically?”

“Pretty much, at least on this continent.” Then Kalen opened a second map, one that showed all of Terah. “The last magic war took place overseas.” Kalen pointed to a blank area that was where Europe was on Earth. “Only within the last hundred years have grasses and small shrubs started growing there again. Where you have mountain ranges, we might have flat lands or even craters.” Kalen shook his head sadly. “Things got rather wild. Rivers evaporated, and then some of them filled up with dirt during the winds that the war unleashed. As far as I know, none of the animals have returned yet. One day life will once again flourish there, but none of us will live to see it. We don’t even have any maps of that area, but other than that, the two worlds are pretty much alike.”

His guests were quiet for a moment, picturing the destruction that Kalen had described. Then Steve pointed to the map of Calandra again. “Where do we have to go to find Kevin’s tutor, this Glendymere?”

Kalen pointed to a spot that would have been in the middle of Colorado on Earth. “Glendymere lives in a cave in the mountains of Nandelia. We’ll provide much more detailed maps for you before you leave, but this is the general area that you want to head for. Then after you leave Glendymere, you’ll want to head here.” He pointed to a spot in what was eastern Tennessee to them. “Badec’s castle is located here, in the town of Milhaven. Again, you’ll have detailed maps of that area, too, before you leave, but this should give you a good idea of where you need to go.”

“I have a question. I don’t see anything that looks like a major highway on this map, just small local roads. Are there other maps for the highways?” Joan asked.

“Well … uh … that’s one of the differences I was talking about. I know all of you are used to traveling by car. Pallor has told me all about them. We don’t have anything like that here.”

“Then how do you travel?” Joan asked.

“By wagons, carriages, on horseback, or on foot.”

“You are kidding, right?” Theresa asked apprehensively.

“Uh … no … actually, I’m very serious.” Kalen fiddled with the maps while he tried to come up with something to help ease them over this hurdle. Pallor had warned him that this might be a stumbling block. “Xantha can help any of you who don’t know how to ride. We haven’t selected horses for you yet because we thought you might want to do that for yourselves. There’s a fairly large herd grazing near here. Most of them are saddle broken, but a few haven’t been trained yet. We thought some of you might prefer to train your own.”

They were all still staring at him. Kalen didn’t know what else to say, but he kept talking anyway, waiting for the shock to subside. “You’ll need a couple of horses for each wagon, too. We weren’t sure how many wagons you’d want, but you’ll need at least one for supplies. We figured that a couple of you would probably rather handle the wagon than ride. Of course, handling wagon horses can be a bit tricky. You know, like when you’re climbing over mountains, crossing streams and rivers, during storms, things like that. You really do need to know what you’re doing to control the horses properly. It’s more complicated than it looks.”

“I have never been on a horse in my life! And you want me to ride to Colorado on one?!” Chris blurted out.

“Well, you could walk if you prefer, but it’s a long way to Glendymere’s, and we do need to get you there as soon as possible,” Kalen said, trying to sound reasonable.

Karl nodded. “It’s not that bad, Chris. I’ve been riding all my life. I’ve also taught a lot of other people to ride, and most people catch on quickly. The worst part is that it does make you sore the first couple of times you ride.” Then he turned to Kalen, grinned, and asked, “When can we see the herd?”          

Before Kalen could answer, Duane called through the back door. “Kalen! Come out here! You’ve got to see this to believe it!”

What now?
Kalen thought as he headed outside with everyone following him.

“We’ve been sparring for at least fifteen minutes, Kalen, and I haven’t been able to touch him. I mean it. Watch!” Duane began circling Darrell, preparing to strike. But whenever Duane threw a punch or a kick, Darrell dodged it. He swung low, jumped, moved to the side, twisted, and in general seemed to flow from one stance to another. Then Duane picked up a wooden practice sword and tried to score on Darrell, but he didn’t have any luck with that either. Darrell out-maneuvered him every time. It was beautiful to watch.