Authors: CJ Rutherford,Colin Rutherford
As they stood there, gazing intensely at each other, she also saw surprise on his features, as if he, like Katheryne had been in denial until this moment. Neither of them seemed capable of movement, as to do so would break the spell. They were lost in each other.
“Well, this is awkward,” said another voice, and it wasn’t until then both girls realised there was someone else standing behind the man.
He smiled crookedly, and Katheryne’s heart skipped a beat as he did so, but he moved sideways far enough to reveal a slim woman with the palest blonde hair, and eyes like morning dew.
“I think what my brother neglected to ask was, ‘May we come in?’” said the woman in a musical voice with a vaguely English accent, before gliding past the man, glancing up at him with the same lopsided grin, “Men!” she snorted.
8 – Switzerland – The Rabbit Hole
Four years earlier
“It’s working,” said Julia, her eyes alight with excitement as she watched the display. She couldn’t decipher visually what was happening, but the instruments were programmed to display the events happening at the sub-quantum level in an easy to understand fashion. Easy, that is, for an accredited holder of the Nobel Prize for Physics, or his senior lab assistant at least.
“No, it’s not,” said Jason, cursing under his breath. “Emitters are destabilising on the number four array. We’re going to have to collapse the field.”
“Shit, Jason. It’s only just out of variance,” said Julia. “It’s taken us five years to get this far. If we stop now…We’re so close. Come on, let’s ride the storm.”
“The storm is exactly what we’d be riding if this reaction got away from us, Jules. You know that. Beginning shutdown sequence.”
Jason typed a code into the master console and watched the displays as the super magnets moved the particle beams out of collision configuration.
“In the words of the great man himself, ‘Better to have lived to fight another day than have your atoms smashed to, well… atoms.’ Anyway, I need an early night. I have a flight to catch at 5am.”
“You know, for a scientist with so many credentials, your devotion to your family is just, well... weird,” teased Julia.
“You’re just biased due to your own terrible record in that department,” retorted her boss. “I mean, why do you keep doing it? It’s what, three divorces now?”
“Two. I wasn’t married to Mark,” Julia snapped indignantly. “Oh, and there was the fact he was an asshole.”
“Hmmm, yes, I’d forgotten that. I’m not sure how, though, seeing as you continue to bring it up,” said Jason, teasing her. “Maybe there’s more there than you’re willing to admit?”
“Bite me.” Jules snickered, sticking her tongue out briefly.
Jason smiled. Jules had been with him for the last seven years, ever since she’d debunked a theory of his during a lecture at MIT, while on a consulting tour of the USA. Jason was of the opinion that, if a grad student her age had the sheer balls to argue the validity of two of his published papers, in front of a crowd of his peers and her seniors, he was fully entitled to get his own back.
The form of his revenge, however, had been to offer her a post on his team. A very junior one, at least until she’d finished her education. He’d offered to pick up the tab, of course, and the rest, as they say, is history.
“You know, maybe you were right all along.” Jules became thoughtful. An idea was rolling around in her head, just barely formed, but gathering momentum.
Jason saw her expression go vacant as she grappled with whatever was hatching in her mind.
“Far be it for me to argue with you, but what are you accusing me of being right about? You make it your hobby to prove me wrong at every turn.”
“Oh stop it! That was seven years ago. Can we drop it already?” Jules laughed, but she stopped the rest of her reply as the thought popped into clarity.
“In fact, let’s not stop it, because that’s what I meant. What if you were right and I was wrong all along?”
“About?” Jason was confused, but he was used to his junior going off on a tangent like this. Some of her best ideas had come this way.
“Well, you have to admit, your basic universe theory—that there are multiple universes out there, each one created by different choices—well, that’s pretty much out there.” She smiled as she spun a finger in a circle around her temple.
Jason chuckled at the blatant insult.
“But what if you were right about the rest, Jason? Specifically, the barriers.” Jules was on a roll. “I mean, all along we’ve assumed the quantum level of matter is identical, and behaves according to the same laws of the universe, wherever it is. The theory agrees. In fact, everyone agrees with this.”
“Okay, I’m not sure where you’re going with this, but you seem to be trying to rubbish my first two theoretical papers, while at the same time you contradict my third. This third paper which, incidentally, was written after you pointed out the errors in my first two.”
He worked over what he had just said and came to the conclusion there was logic in there... somewhere.
“It’s the barriers Jason!” enthused Jules. “I mean, all along we’ve been working on the assumption the barriers between dimensions, realities, worked to our set of rules and our physical laws. We’ve been chasing a white rabbit down a rabbit hole for years, but the one thing we’ve always been looking for is the rabbit hole.”
“So what you’re saying is even though there is proof the barriers between alternate realities do exist, there may be other ways to travel between them than breaking through them?”
Jason sat back, put his hand inside his lab coat pocket and pulled out a pipe. Not that he’d ever think about lighting it in here, however, but it was one of the tools he used to focus his concentration.
Julia got up from her chair and started pacing back and forth across the small cramped laboratory, keeping herself distracted from the outside world while the idea fully formed.
Jason was just one step behind, and as they looked at each other, a spark of thought jumped between them as they simultaneously realised the possibility. That they may have just solved a conundrum which had stymied the scientific community, ever since the theory behind the Einstein-Rosen Bridge had been proven to be sound.
“So our white rabbit could be using a foxhole, or a badger’s hole,” said Jules.
“In fact, anything except a rabbit hole,” Jason concurred, finishing her thought. “Okay, that’s certainly going to prove hard to sell to our colleagues. Unless, of course, we can generate a shred of proof.”
“Well, Dr,” said Jules, “I think I feel like hunting some rabbits this evening, how about you?”
If they were right, and it was a huge if, Jason thought, then they were on the brink of a discovery which could revolutionise the future of the human race. For decades, man had dreamt about reaching other worlds, walking on alien soil, but the distances involved were immense. With the spaceship technology available to mankind today, it would take hundreds of years to travel to even the nearest sun, and keeping any sort of crew alive for this length of time was currently impossible.
Of course, there were the various experiments ongoing in fields such as cryogenic suspension, where the body was frozen to temperatures far below zero, so it could be preserved much longer than a normal lifespan. These ideas, however, were in their infancy, and there was no certainty they would ever be proven workable.
So imagine if a method could be found to link two points, separated by hundreds, perhaps thousands of light years, allowing a person to step in at one side of the portal and be transported instantly to the other. Faster than light theory had been proven, indeed the experiment currently being carried out here had successfully harvested millions of exotic matter particles, which exhibited all the characteristics of superluminal existence. If it could be proven this void between worlds existed, and the evidence gathered by his team during the current round of procedures definitely pointed to it, the next step would be finding a way to navigate within it.
Then there was the only slightly gigantic task of finding a point to link to and creating the link. Simple, he thought ironically.
Jason put the pipe in his mouth and clasped it tightly, the stale tobacco taste allowing him to relax as he turned to his friend, smiling broadly.
“Ah, screw it; I can sleep on the plane.”
9 – The Glade – Exploding rivers and mermaids
Present day
“So, what has Gwenyth done this time?” asked Hallor, moodily.
“Or should I say, what have they done? I can’t imagine my daughter wouldn’t try to rope her chief accomplice into whatever she’s decided to break.”
Kon’s mouth twitched briefly before he managed to regain the composure fit for a Magister of the Council.
“And I take it you’re here because they have managed to break something... again!” Hallor walked over to the seating area, beckoning his friend to sit.
“Actually, this time your daughter and her friend managed to cause a small explosion.” The smile was impossible for Kon to hide this time. “No small feat when you consider they blew up a river.”
Hallor’s eyes widened in shock, “How could anyone blow up a river?” Hallor spoke quietly, but Kon heard the disbelief in his voice. He decided it was time to inject a bit of humour into the occasion.
“I believe one possible answer to your question is, ‘quite spectacularly’.” Kon’s ebony face lost its ability to hide his mirth, as his niece’s antics had the usual effect of amusing him extremely.
Hallor looked at his brother in law with disapproval before he too smiled, albeit with an expression of exasperation. It was a feeling he had become used to over the last few years.
Ever since Calleyne had arrived at the citadel sixteen years ago with the baby girl wrapped in his cloak, Hallor had felt out of his depth. His wife Marissa had fallen in love with her instantly, however, and indeed so had he at the time. All the Council had agreed to the adoption, but although he had loved her dearly, her increasing appetite for trouble over the last few years had continually alarmed him.
“She is a good child, Hallor, and though you judge Amilee harshly, she is also,” said Kon. His dark skin heightened his smile. “Brother, they are young, why can’t you relax a little and let them have some fun?”
Hallor snorted, “Because ‘fun’ for those two normally means destruction, Kon.” The exasperation was evident again in his expression. “Her ability continues to grow. By the great one, how does anyone blow up a river? Was anyone hurt?”
“On this occasion the damage was limited to a sandbank on the lower banks of the estuary,” explained Kon, “though there are rumours a mermaid may have gotten her tail singed.” Kon looked on the verge of laughing out loud.
Hallor, however, was not amused.
“Mermaids again! What is it she sees in those creatures? They are dangerous, undisciplined. Why does she keep confronting them like she does?” he asked.
Kon laughed, heartily and loudly. “For the great one’s sake Hallor, can’t you see?” He gave his sister’s husband a mischievous look, “They are kindred spirits, and she isn’t confronting them, she’s playing with them, trying to compete with their power over the water. And judging by the display today, she has already surpassed them.”
Hallor didn’t know whether to feel proud, angry, or terrified at the vision his friend painted. Gwenyth, the child who had been brought before them by the youth Calleyne almost 16 years ago was special. Even as a babe she possessed a power, a perception beyond her years. The questions she began to ask as a toddler dispelled any notion she was Eldar, even if the lobes on her round ears were not a clear indication in themselves.
And if her increasing power, her ability to shape and control the magical fabric of this world she had arrived in marked her as special, it frightened her adopted father. The other one, Amilee, the cousin of Calleyne, born to his aunt and uncle shortly after Gwenyth’s arrival, was her twin.
Impish, troublesome, and hot-headed, she was not the companion he would have chosen for his daughter. But the choice hadn’t been his. Marissa loved Amilee like a second daughter, so he had buried his objections, deep enough so nobody could see the fear and jealousy within him.
“I suppose I have been hard on them,” he lied, “harder than I should be perhaps, but Kon, you know I love them.”
Only part of Hallor believed what he’d just said. There had been a time, years ago, when he would have found this whole episode as humorous as Kon. But now everything she did put his plans in jeopardy, and he was terrified of being found out before they came to fruition.
Fortunately for Hallor, Kon was blind to the fear lurking behind his friend’s eyes. He was much younger and less experienced than Hallor, and full of the innocence and purity of the Lands around him. He had, however, risen rapidly in the ranks of the Magisters, the enforcers of the peace here in the Veiled Lands, which was testament to his own ability. This was why his niece’s growing power delighted him so much. He saw a kindred spirit within her, one he thought he could nurture and bring into the Magistry. Her power at this young age was phenomenal. It was still raw and unskilled, but with instruction she could be great among their ranks, great enough even to eventually rival the Elders, he thought.
Only one person in the room thought this was a good thing.
Hallor had been ambitious all of his long life and it had served him well, leading him to the seat at the head of the Council of the Eldar. The Council had ruled and protected the people of this world since the beginning, when the Veil had hidden the Land and its magic from the enemy, Tenybris.
Tenybris had sought to use the magic which lay at the core of Teralia to conquer and enslave the entire universe. Indeed he had almost succeeded. If it hadn’t been for the actions of the great one, Olumé, who hid the Lands and all their magic behind the great Veil, the universe and all the worlds and beings upon them would be a ghost of what had been. All of them would exist to serve Tenybris. But without the magic, his forces had been defeated.
Tenybris, however, had escaped and still remained hidden, even to this day.
In the thousands of years of history of these Veiled Lands there had never been any major strife or conflict; indeed, why should there be any when the Land provided everything for its people? The Magistry existed to mediate any minor disagreements which arose. Frictions between the various races living here were always minor and short lived, thanks to their strength and wisdom.
There had been occurrences, stretching back over a century now, but becoming more frequent, which threatened to disrupt the harmony. Like the affliction which had decimated so many of the great herds of deer and bison, or the unexplained disappearances of travellers journeying through the deep forest.
“You know, Hallor,” said Kon, “if these rumours bear any substance, we may need all the help we can get.”
Hallor snorted. “Rumours are what they are, Kon. Nothing more than stories made up in an attempt to disrupt the peace of the Glade.”
“But might it not be wise to send a scouting party into the forest? Hallor, there have been three disappearances this year alone.”
“Yes, and of these three, two have been known troublemakers. I’m sure the Faer have simply been leading them a merry dance through the deep, in revenge for them trespassing in their groves. They will turn up, eventually.”
Kon clearly didn’t agree, but he wasn’t about to overstep his authority. Hallor may be his bother-in-law, but Kon was still a junior member of the Magistry.
“I suppose you’re right, my friend,” he said, “anyway, I have work to do. Will I see you at dinner later?”
“Yes, I have matters to discuss with the Council, but tell Marissa I won’t be late.”
Kon bowed before leaving the room.
Hallor had been chosen to lead the Council, but he had also been chosen to carry out another far more important task... It was he who was to ensure the release of the magic and the destruction of the Veil. So the great Olumé had told him in the visions. But he had been warned by Olumé to move slowly and secretly, to bear the burden of fear upon his own shoulders, knowing panic would sweep the land if it was known the time of battle was so close. Hallor knew he had to remain in power long enough for the Veil to be broken, for according to Olumé, his plan had failed utterly and magic was the universe’s only hope.
A small part of him quailed at what he might be forced to do, but someday, soon, he would have to deal with his daughter.