Red Leaves and the Living Token

chapter ONE





R aj Handers pushed through the over sized hospital room door; his heavy leather work apron swung in behind him. He had a habit of forgetting to take it if off after work. Not that he made much of an effort to remember. His physical appearance had slipped far from the top of his concerns. He was sure he was breaking some sort of social code of conduct to be seen publicly in work clothes, given his standing. But then, it wasn’t his own reputation that would be called into question. It’d be his in laws. He was sure if they saw him in his work apron he’d hear all about it.

Rinacht struggled through the door after him, balancing a small stack of books in each hand. His small Petra form and formal servant attire contrasted harshly against Raj, his much larger Zoen employer. Petra weren’t small. Rinacht, though, had been the blessed recipient of exceptional genetics. He was small and exceptionally so. In his own land, it had been a peculiarity. Odd, but not enough to stop you in the street. Here, though, he was a peculiar variety of an almost non existent breed. There were almost no other Petra here, and the few that were, were large and intimidating. To see a miniature one? That was enough to stop you in the street.

"We got you some new books!" Raj said as he circled around to the back of the hospital bed that filled most of the room.

"Yes, we..." Rinacht lifted the stack still in his arms to emphasize the word, "brought you all that we could carry."

Emret looked up from a weathered old green book he had spread out over the bed covers next to him and sat back against a pillow. "Hey dad, Rinacht."

Emret was just crossing into those awkward teenage years. Raj was having a hard time seeing him as anything other than how he’d always seen him - as his little boy. Only now he was stretched out a little funny. And he seemed to disagree with him a lot more than he used to.

The boy's attractive young Botann nurse closed the book softly and stood. "Hello Mr. Handers." She greeted him with something slightly more than a friendly smile.

Moslin was beautiful. The Botann were a beautiful people. There was no question about that. They weren't hunched over fury messes like the Zo, or cold unforgiving clumps of mass like the Petra. No. They were slender, elegant. Their skin was a smooth creamy green that flowed in graceful, long curves with only the thinnest hint of fuzz. He couldn’t imagine what it would be like not to have to deal with his thick pelt.

Emret picked up the book they had open and put it on his lap. They'd been reading it together... again, Raj thought, as he returned the smile. He took her hand and bowed slightly. "Miss Moslin."

Despite the annoyance of her continual disregard for his desire that she not read that particular book to his son, he couldn't help but smile when she was in the room.

"What happened?" Emrett asked, a bit surprised.

"What?" Handers leaned to the side to see his boy around the lovely Moslin. He followed the boy's glance down to his apron. The thick leather had long gouges cut down its full length. It appeared as though a large set of claws had raked across it a few times.

"Oh. The Attly Clan's bears. They've become a little aggressive lately, stopped responding to clan issues. I've had to work with them all week."

He leaned over by his son and kissed him on the forehead. "How you feeling today?"

"Fantastic." Emret answered dryly.

Handers stared at the aged green book that looked like it belonged in a museum rather than a kids hands. "What are you guys reading?"

Moslin looked away, uncomfortable.

Emret stared at the book. "Same thing."

Raj turned his attention to the nurse. "I appreciate you taking so much time with my son."

"My pleasure," She replied.

"Although, you run the risk of making your other patients jealous." He jested.

She laughed. "I don't think it's the other patients I have to worry about."

He smiled.

She picked up the green book off the bed and stepped past Raj towards the exit.

"Where're you going?" Emret asked.

"Your father's right. I do have other patients."

"Thanks Dad." Emret muttered sarcastically.

"Don't worry, sweetie. I'll be back later." She said as she slipped out the door.

"Didn't you two just finish that book?" Raj asked as he turned back to the bed.

"Yeah why?"

"Well, how many time have you read it?"

"I don't know."

"Don't you have other books you could read?"

"Dad! Seriously."

A scratching noise reverberated from the wall across from the foot of the bed. They both turned abruptly, startled by the noise.

At the base of the wall near the door was a small ornately trimmed hole. The scratching grew louder until a small rodent scampered out onto the lip of the trim and hopped down onto the floor.

It scurried across the tile and stopped in front of Handers with its chest exposed. A metal plate engraved with the crest of his wife's family hung to the underside of the small animal.

Raj dropped his shoulders. It was such an ugly creature. And it stunk. Fit the message, he supposed, chuckling to himself.

The rodent rubbed his hands together for a few seconds then scampered back the way it came.

Rinacht got up from his seat and moved towards the door. "Shall I admit them, sir?"

Raj stared at him for a moment before responding. What if he said no, he thought. He could. He could simply not let them in. That wouldn't be that bad, would it?

He looked back at his son who was watching him with a disapproving look. "Yes, of course. Why would you need to ask that, Rinacht?" He delivered an uncomfortable fake laugh to his son and then pointed at Rinacht as though he didn't know what had gotten in to him.

He followed his glum servant to the door to meet the arriving guests. "And we were having such a nice day." He muttered.

Rinacht turned to him and whispered, "She could fall. Ya know... accidentally. The floors are quite slippery."

Raj laughed. "You're a good man, my friend."

A light rap on the door cut off their exchange. Rinacht opened the door and made a welcoming gesture to the guests standing outside. "Please come in."

Emret's grandparents and an aunt danced into the room with an explosion of chatter. Rinacht bowed politely. "Sirs and Madam."

They side stepped Raj and Rinacht without a word of acknowledgment and continued their exaggerated waltz towards their grandchild, singing his woes all the way to his bed side.

Emret leaned forward to greet them as they wrapped him up in a warm and loud embrace.

His grandpa grabbed a handful of Emret's hospital gown and pulled on his stomach skin. "What're they feeding ya in here boy? You're ten pounds heavier every time I see ya."

"So when do we getta break ya outa here?" Asked his aunt.

"Yes that's a good question.” The boy’s grandmother said, then paused. “Raj?"

Handers glanced over from his hiding place in the corner. "I'm sorry?"

She didn't turn to face him. "When is he coming home?"

"We don't know yet. Exactly."

This time she turned. "What do you mean you don't know yet. The poor boy's been here over a month! You should know everything you need to know by now."

"Well, they're..." He tried to answer.

"What're you trying to do to the poor boy?"

"The... the doctors are doing everything they can." He stammered, uncomfortable with the direction the questions were headed.

She stared at him coldly. "Are they?"

Raj scowled, then grunted to himself as he looked away, shaking his head. She knew that she could speak to him however she wished and he'd give no resistance. What would you call a person who took advantage of a mans guilt? Foul, treacherous, conniving? That was part of the problem. He couldn't call her anything. Such was the power of guilt.

She knew the power that she held over him and she used it every time he failed to avoid her.

A knock on the door broke the tension. Moslin entered without waiting for permission. "Excuse me. I need to check his vitals."

"If you'll excuse me. I'll be back in one moment." Raj said as he slipped out the door.

Moslin stopped in front of Emret's grandmother on the way to his bed. "I understand you have a concern about Emret's treatment? If you'd accompany me outside, I can answer any questions you might have."

"Oh, that won't be necessary," she answered with a polite smile.

"With all due respect ma'am, The hospital staff as well as your son are doing everything in our power to help Emret. Please refrain from antagonizing patients or their family while in this hospital.

"Raj isn't my son." The old woman answered.

"Visiting hours are over. You have five minutes." She turned and left the room.



-



Moslin hurried down the cold plaster hallway. "Raj wait." She called.

He stopped at the other end of the hallway and turned to her.

"You don't have to leave. As Emret's legal guardian you have the right to restrict his visitors for any reason." She explained.

He laughed. "Thanks, but... Any pain saved now would be paid back in measure later. Besides they're good for Emret. He needs their enthusiasm."

"She's wrong you know."

"She's wrong a lot but I've never had the privilege of telling her." He smiled. "Now I'm jealous."

"Oh, you heard that?" She looked away, embarrassed.

"Thing is, though," He paused, unsure of how to explain. His mother in law had a knack for finding his weak points and drilling them. "What if...?"

"Uh, Oh. Don't go down that road. Trust me." She warned.

"Am I doing everything I possibly can? I don't know. What if there's something else I haven't tried. Maybe I'm not pushing the doctors hard enough. Maybe this isn't the best hospital for what he needs. Maybe there's a doctor with more experience with his symptoms."

"Then you push and you try and you ask and you do everything you know how to do. That's your job. You make sure they do their job to best of their abilities."

He looked at her for a moment then nodded his head.

"I know you'd never give up on him. No matter what people said or how hard it got. You're a good father. Don't ever doubt that."

He stared at her. "Thank you. Sounds like you're speaking from experience."

"I've been through this in one form or another. One of the worst parts of my job." She looked up at him. "Can I share something with you?"

He nodded his head.

"Come with me to the next service." She handed him a card with the date and time of a church meeting. A Botann church meeting. He frowned, not sure how to respond.

"I know you're not of the same... you know... its just, it offers a lot of comfort. You've got a lot of difficult questions ahead of you. The kind that people don't have answers to."

He looked at the card again. "Thanks but I don't..."

"Think about it. Just an invitation, that's all."

"Mr. Handers!"

Two Zo doctors had come up the hallway behind them. One of the doctors motioned for Raj's attention.

"Mr. Handers, I've been looking for you. Can we speak in my office for a moment?" He gestured for Raj to follow.

"Sure, Dr. Eghart." He followed him around the corner to his office. The doctor let him in and shut the door behind.

"Please, have a seat." He pointed to a chair.

Handers sat down while Dr. Eghart put some charts up on a white board. Each chart had his son's name written on a label in the corner. He had no idea what they were for. One was some sort of graph. Another a strange series of lines.

"First of all, thank you for your patience this last month with this long series of test. I know its extremely difficult not knowing. We believe we've discovered the underlying cause of your sons condition."

"Great. That's good news."

"Well it is. And it isn't." He put his hands together and paused. "Um, We believe your son's binding... Well, we believe he's becoming unbound."

"What?"

"I know its difficult to understand, you..."

"That's not possible. He's never missed a single day of manea."

"Unfortunately, we don't understand what is causing his bond to deteriorate. Because of that we haven't been able to stop its progression."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm afraid we're running out of alternatives."

Raj sat back in his chair. His head was spinning. This isn't what they told him when he came. They said it was a minor issue, a chemical imbalance of some sort. A month of test later and his condition deteriorates to this? How was that possible? Something, somewhere must've gotten mixed up. Someone switched the charts.

"I don't understand what's happened? You said..."

I know this is not what you were expecting to hear. We've waited to inform you until we were absolutely sure. The tests are conclusive.

Raj leaned forward rubbing his head. This was not real. This was not possible.

"I'm sorry Mr. Handers. There are very few prescribed treatments for this type of situation. None of them have been able to stabilize his bond."

He took a deep breath, trying to clear his head. He tried to see the situation clearly through the fog of emotion. If the Doctor was right he had to figure out what to do next. He had to fix this. "What happens when his binding fails completely?" He asked.

"His body will begin to revert. He'll loose his higher functions. You have to be aware, It's not a condition he's likely to survive."

"So what do we do now. What the next step?"

"I'm sorry Mr. Handers. Our options were limited from the beginning. Of course, we'll continue to do everything we can, but..."

"So that it? You're saying he's going to die because you can't think of anything else to try?" The anger began to swell up in his face, pushing out through heavy, labored, breaths. He struggled to reign it in, to keep himself from completely breaking down.

"We can't simply throw random treatments at him and hope that something works. The wrong treatment could kill him." The Doctor explained.

"He's already going to die! You're telling me there's nothing else you could possible try. No experimental treatment, something unproven?" He was shouting now. The rage had ripped itself free of his meager attempt to restrain it.

"Mr. Handers..." The Doctor tried to interject.

"Something off the beaten path. I refuse to accept that you've done everything possible. There's always more to try?" Raj was on his feet now.

"Mr. Handers, please. You have to understand. Any loving parent would exhaust all effort looking for something to heal their child. I understand that. You'd go to go to the ends of the earth if needs be." The Doctor stood up to try and calm him down.

"What I want you to understand is that that is not necessarily what he needs right now. That's not what you need right now. A natural part of the grieving process is coming to terms with an outcome beyond your control. The unending quest for new and exotic methods is contrary to that grieving process."

"It's a desperate attempt to control something that has proven itself to be uncontrollable. Believe or not, the powers of modern medicine are in fact, finite. We can't cure everything... yet."

"But...

"Endless searching will only prolong the pain and rob you of the time you do have left to say good bye. Your son's last day will pass. You can't control that. What you can control is how you prepare yourself and your son for it."

"How can you tell a parent to stop trying? That's not grieving, that's giving up! How can I give up on my son?"

Raj grabbed his coat and slammed the door as he left.



-



Moslin hurried down the cold plaster hallway. "Raj wait." She called.

He stopped at the other end of the hallway and turned to her.

"You don't have to leave. As Emret's legal guardian, you have the right to restrict his visitors for any reason." She explained.

He laughed. "Thanks, but... Any pain saved now would be paid back in measure later. Besides they're good for Emret. He needs their enthusiasm."

"She's wrong you know."

"She's wrong a lot, but I've never had the privilege of telling her." He smiled. "Now I'm jealous."

"Oh, you heard that?" She looked away, embarrassed.

"Thing is, though," He paused, unsure of how to explain. His mother in law had a knack for finding his weak points and drilling them. "What if...?"

"Uh, Oh. Don't go down that road. Trust me." She warned.

"Am I doing everything I possibly can? I don't know. What if there's something else I haven't tried. Maybe I'm not pushing the doctors hard enough. Maybe this isn't the best hospital for what he needs. Maybe there's a doctor with more experience with his symptoms."

"Then you push, and you try, and you ask, and you do everything you know how to do. That's your job. You make sure they do their job to best of their abilities."

He looked at her for a moment then nodded his head.

"I know you'd never give up on him. No matter what people said or how hard it got. You're a good father, don't ever doubt that."

He stared at her. "Thank you. Sounds like you're speaking from experience."

"I've been through this in one form or another. One of the worst parts of my job." She looked up at him. "Can I share something with you?"

He nodded his head.

"Come with me to the next service." She handed him a card with the date and time of a church meeting, a Botann church meeting. He frowned, not sure how to respond.

"I know you're not of the same... you know... its just, it offers a lot of comfort. You've got a lot of difficult questions ahead of you. The kind that people don't have answers to."

He looked at the card again. "Thanks but I don't..."

"Think about it. Just an invitation, that's all."

"Mr. Handers!"

Two Zo doctors had come up the hallway behind them. One of the doctors motioned for Raj's attention.

"Mr. Handers, I've been looking for you. Can we speak in my office for a moment?" He gestured for Raj to follow.

"Sure, Dr. Eghart." He followed him around the corner to his office. The doctor let him in and shut the door behind.

"Please, have a seat." He pointed to a chair.

Handers sat down while Dr. Eghart put some charts up on a white board. Each chart had his son's name written on a label in the corner. He had no idea what they were for. One was some sort of graph. Another was a strange series of lines.

"First of all, thank you for your patience this last month with this long series of test. I know it's extremely difficult not knowing. We believe we've discovered the underlying cause of your son's condition."

"Great. That's good news."

"Well it is, and it isn't." He put his hands together and paused. "Um, We believe your son's binding... Well, we believe he's becoming unbound."

"What?"

"I know its difficult to understand, you..."

"That's not possible. He's never missed a single day of Manea."

"Unfortunately, we don't understand what is causing his bond to deteriorate. Because of that we haven't been able to stop its progression."

"What do you mean?"

"We don’t have a solution yet, but we’re hopeful, with time, that will change."

“How much time do you need? How much time does Emret have?”

“That, of course, is our greatest concern right now, and, unfortunately, we don’t have the answer.”

Raj sat back in his chair. His head was spinning. This isn't what they told him when he came. They said it was a minor issue, a chemical imbalance of some sort. A month of test later and his condition deteriorates to this? How was that possible? Something, somewhere must've gotten mixed up. Someone switched the charts.

"I don't understand what's happened? You said..."

“I know this is not what you were expecting to hear.” The doctor said calmly.

Raj leaned forward rubbing his head. This was not real. This was not possible.

"I'm sorry Mr. Handers. This is an extremely rare condition. Because of that we’ve had little chance to understand it. There are only a few prescribed treatments, and none of them have been able to stabilize his bond."

He took a deep breath, trying to clear his head. He tried to see the situation clearly through the fog of emotion. If the Doctor was right, he had to figure out what to do next. He had to fix this. "What happens when his binding fails completely?" He asked.

"His body will begin to revert. He'll lose his higher functions. You have to be aware; It's not a condition he's likely to survive."

"So what do we do now? What the next step?"

"I'm sorry Mr. Handers. We’re already doing everything we can."

"So that's it? You're saying he's going to die because you can't think of anything else to try right now? But maybe you’ll think of something later?" The anger began to swell up in his face, pushing out through heavy, labored, breaths. He struggled to rein it in, to keep himself from completely breaking down.

"We can't simply throw random treatments at him and hope that something works. The wrong treatment could kill him." The Doctor explained.

"But if you take your time debating about what might and might not work, he’ll die anyway. I think its time to take some risks here." He was shouting now. The rage had ripped itself free of his meager attempt to restrain it.

"Mr. Handers..." The Doctor tried to interject.

"I refuse to accept that there isn’t a better way to do this. There's always a better way!" Raj was on his feet now.

"Mr. Handers, please. You have to understand. Any loving parent would exhaust all effort looking for something to heal their child. I understand that. You'd go to go to the ends of the earth if needs be." The Doctor stood up to try to calm him down.

"What I want you to understand is that is not necessarily what he needs right now. That's not what you need right now. A natural part of the grieving process is coming to terms with an outcome beyond your control. The unending quest for new and exotic methods is contrary to that grieving process."

"It's a desperate attempt to control something that has proven itself to be uncontrollable. Believe or not, the powers of modern medicine are, in fact, finite. We can't cure everything... yet."

"But...

"Endless searching will only prolong the pain and rob you of the time you do have left to say good bye. Let us worry about finding the solution. You worry about the time you spend with your son. If your son's last day comes soon, that will not be something you can control. What you can control is how you prepare yourself and your son for it."

Raj grabbed his coat and slammed the door as he left.



-



He found himself wandering out the back of the hospital and down the dark street that led to the sea cliffs. It was the first place that came to his mind when he thought of somewhere he could be alone.

A steep stair case, cut into the black rock, lead down from the coastal street to the sandy beach below. He stumbled down the steps, holding an arm in front of his eyes to shield against the sand blown off the rocks.

He'd come here before for the same purpose; he remembered. The same thought had come to him. To come here. To be alone. To think.

He wandered out onto the wet sand and felt the spray on his face as the dark waves crashed against the beach. Night had come while he'd been in the hospital. Yet the night, with the moon glowing through a thin layer of clouds, seemed to add to the environment he was seeking. He tried to avoid the thoughts that were stirring in his mind, the thoughts of her, of the last time he'd come here from the hospital. It'd taken him so long to forget, to push the memories back far enough that they stopped hurting. He had to. He had his son.

The moon went dark behind a cloud. A flash of lighting flickered from the horizon, giving a momentary glimpse of the approaching storm. He felt the crushing weight growing from inside, pushing down on him. He couldn't afford this, not now. He had to fight it back.

He dropped to his knees, digging into the soft sand. The dried top layer caught in the gusts of wind and swirled around him. He looked up into the darkness above him. He didn't know what he was looking for. Sometimes just seeing something above him staring back down was reassuring. He got no such comfort from the black, star-less void above him. The crushing weight increased, almost as though the void above had reached a slender finger down to him and was working its way inside him. His desperation grew to panic.

"Please," he voiced into the wind. "Help me."

Another flicker of light flashed across the sky, showing for a brief instant the beauty of the clouds as the lighting etched its zigzag through them. The illusion of emptiness broke. The slender finger withdrew.

"Please," he begged. "Don't take my son away too!" He called out.

He turned away from the sky. What right did he have to ask such things? Why should he expect such favors? The proposition was ludicrous.

He looked up once more. Ludicrous or not, he had nothing left.

"Please."

He shifted his weight to move his knee off a sharp rock that had been poking him from under the sand.

Another flicker lit up the sky. As he looked down into the depression that his knee had left, he noticed a faint trace of light had remained after the lighting's bright flash.

As the wind blew the trace of light grew into a glow. The sharp stone that he'd felt under his knee was emitting light. As the wind continued to clear away the sand, the object grew in size and complexity. It was some sort of carving, the figure of a small plant or a miniaturized tree! There was something else, something on the tree. He wanted to reach down and feel it, to pick it up, but he hesitated. It wasn't natural. The wind cleared away the sand down to the base of the figure. It had a long bird curved around its thin trunk and a solid round base of roots.

His curiosity overcame his apprehension, and he reached down to pick it up. As his fingers made contact a Flash of blinding white light filled his vision. His ears rang with a high pitched whine. After a moment, his sight and hearing returned, but he was no longer on the beach. He was standing in the street a few block from the hospital. Directly in front of him, an ancient stone archway rose up out of the ground, completely blocking the road. A stone pathway extended beyond it but not in front of it.

He couldn't imagine that it had been there long. It would've been blocking traffic, had there been any. He stepped towards it.

Flash, his vision turned to white. After a moment the color returned, and he was standing somewhere else - outside an old school. He was sure he'd seen it before but wasn't sure where it was. He remembered he'd been impressed by the high stone wall that surrounded the school. In the street beside the wall of the school, he saw another archway. This one, unlike the first, was made of white stone and seemed rather modern. At least the stones seemed almost perfectly cut. Yet, it too seemed completely out of place as it blocked the road.

His vision flashed to white again. When it receded he found him self again in another place. This time he was on a mountain top in the middle of the day. A meadow stretched out in front of him. At the end of that meadow, a beautiful white structure made of white stone sat, its spires leading his eyes up to the bright sky. The blue burned into white.

Then he saw his son crumpled on the wet forest floor. A wave of red light washed over him. He opened his eyes, then stood up. The forest blanked to white again.

His sight cleared, and he found himself back on the beach. A stabbing pain registered in his finger tips. He jerked his hand back from the glowing figure. His fingers were bleeding where he had touched it. He took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wrapped it around the figure and tucked it into his jacket.



-



Rinacht stepped up onto a rock overlooking the beach. He could see Mr. Handers kneeling down in the sand below.

"Mr. Handers!" He called.

Suddenly his employer got to his feet, with out seeming to acknowledge him, lifted something in his hands, then wrapped it up and put into his jacket. Rinacht may not have seen it clearly, but it had appeared as though the object he held was glowing. He watched Raj turn and walk away down the beach. He must not have heard his call; he thought. So he hopped down off the rock and rushed over to the stair way leading down to see if he could catch up.



-



Raj hurried through the thinly populated city streets. He knew the one he wanted wasn't far. He just wasn't sure exactly which way. He turned the corner and looked up. It looked familiar. He walked around the side of the building to get a view of the open street. There taking up more than half the road was the archaic stone archway. Just as he'd seen.

He pulled himself back behind the building and hid himself up against the wall, shaking his head. This was not good. To dream about it, to see it in your mind, sure, fine. But to see it there in front of you, awake. That was a problem. He leaned out again, peering around the building. It was still there.

"How...?" He took a deep breath to calm himself. There had to be some way of making sense of it. He'd have to get a closer look. Perhaps it was a trick of his mind, a latent image of some sort. He hurried up to it. The stones, worn with age, stacked tightly without mortar, gave no impression of illusion. Proximity had only further solidified the reality of its presence. Perhaps to touch it would help, he thought.

He pushed hard against one of the stones, catching himself in case he fell through it. The stones were cold to his touch and held firmly against his weight. Either this truly was here blocking the entire road or he was simply, insane. To confound further his dilemma with reality, as he stared through the stone arches, a pathway, made of a large, irregularly shaped rocks stones, was cut into the small and well worn cobble stone road. The pathway extended out the back and continued down the street. He was positive these rocks were not there a moment ago.

He backed away and circled around to the front of the arches to look at the path from another angle. But now the path was gone! Without a sign of it ever having been there. He took a calming breath. Perhaps this was still part of his previous episode, part of some kind of odd dream.

He doubled back behind the arch and sure enough the pathway had returned. This would induce a migraine; he was sure of it. He stepped sideways enough to see around the stone pillar. Now he could see through and around it at the same time. The path was clearly both there and not there! Viewed through the archway it extended down the street and into the city. Viewed from outside, it did not exist.

The illusion was fantastic! His mind began to wander. What would happen if he stepped through it? Would it remain when he tried to step on it, or was it like a mirage, always just out of reach? How good was the illusion, really?

He took a quick step through to see what would happen. His foot landed firmly on the first stone of the pathway. He stepped back, surprised. Apparently he had become comfortable with the idea that this was just a trick of the eye, and a trick of the eye was not something you were supposed to feel under your feet.

So this was not an illusion. He laughed to himself. Nether was the enormous stone archway blocking the road. Nether made sense to a rational mind. It looked like he'd have to make a decision, as trying to prove or disprove the reality of this thing was pointless. He could walk a way or walk through. He stared at it, imagining the out comes of both scenarios. What was the worst that could happen? Well, he could die. There was always that possibility. He could be tortured. Several rather unpleasant scenarios played out in his head. And what was the best possible outcome?

He remembered what had led him to this point, the larger context of the experience, his overwhelming need to find a solution for his son. A moment later he found himself hurrying down the strange and unexplainable path.



-



Rinacht turned the corner and stopped behind the building that Raj had stopped at only moments earlier. His employer was in the middle of the street in front of him. He felt the automatic urge to call out to him but suppressed it. Raj had his hands up in the air as though he were leaning on something. Only there wasn't anything there. He then paced back and forth, circling around as though there were an object in the way. After what appeared to be a moment of deliberation he turned and marched straight down the road.

Rinacht tried to add it up in his head. He found something highly unusual on the beach. Now here he was wandering about the city in the middle of the night, pantomiming in the empty street. The worst had finally come, he feared, as he slipped into the dark and followed quietly behind.



-



Raj rushed down the path rough cut rocks, anxious to get to where ever it may be leading him. He rounded a corner and found a heavy stone wall rising up in front of him. The high wall extended a considerable distance in both directions. A little way to his right, it wound around to a large gated entrance. The entrance looked familiar. Then it came to him. This was the old school that he'd recognized earlier.

If that were true then would he see a second archway? He wondered. His path turned down an alley beside the school wall. At the end of the alley, the path turned again. He raced down the alley way and turned to follow the back of the school wall.

About halfway down to the next building he found what he was looking for. A large white stone archway stretched half way across the road, making it difficult to go around. He approached quickly, checking behind him to see if anyone was around. The last thing he wanted was crowd. Fortunately there didn't seem to be anyone around.

Up close the archway was quite different from the other. The white stone blocks were cut perfectly smooth and perfectly square. The stone gave off a glow like the little figurine he found. Cut into the stone on each pillar were two figures. One on each side, one male, one female. He studied their details. They weren't stooped over in posture like the Zo. Nor where they squat and rounded like the Petra or twisted and stretched like the Botann. They were unusual, to say the least, he thought.

The pathway beyond the arch seemed to be made of the same white stone. Not surprising, it seemed to be playing the same visual trick. When viewed from the side, the path was the same as the one he was on. From through the arch it became white and glowed.

The school to the side of him sat on a high point in the city. Through the archway, he could see the street drop off into the distant expanse of buildings and roads. He traced the glowing line of the path as it wound down into the city. He could see it emerge on the other side and disappear into the green line of the forest. Even from a distance he could spot where it peaked out here and there from under the trees, continuing with the forest as it lifted up into the maintain range. He could see it then rising up right up to one of the peaks.

He blinked as he realized what he was looking at. Without thinking, he'd followed an impossibly thin line across the city, through the forest and up to the top of the mountain. Some how he could still see it. He could see the path leading up to a white building, a building below the mountain peak. He squinted. There was no way he should be able to see a building on the side of a mountain a thousand miles away, at night. This was making his head hurt, he thought, as he turned away.

Still, he'd come this far. Was this enough for him to reconsider? No, he supposed. He stepped forward through the archway. As he passed, his vision burned to white. After a disorienting moment of blindness, the flash receded, and he found himself standing on a mountain, below the peak where saw the path had led. In front of him was the same white building he had seen from a far.

The scene burned to white. A moment later he found himself standing in a room with impressively high walls of white stone. He was inside the building he'd just been staring at, he assumed. There were two sets of stairs on opposite sides of the room. One led up, and the other led down.

As soon as he took notice of them, he felt himself move. In an instant, he was in the upper room beyond the stairs. In the center of the new room, he noticed a large basin of water. He moved closer again with the thought. Below the surface of the water was an assortment of weapons and armor. One long sword he noticed in particular was unsheathed and had a blinding white blade.

With a flash of white, Raj found himself again somewhere else. Now he stood in an open field. In front of him, a wall of soldiers advanced. He spun around. Another wall of men stood behind him, their eyes fixed on him, with their weapons half raised, waiting. He looked down. Held tightly in his hand was the long white sword with the blade of white. His arms, chest, and legs were covered in armor, white armor.

With an uncomfortable jar, he felt himself turn around to face the opposing army. Without issuing the command to his body, his arm lifted the sword high into the air. His voice rang out with a horrible cry, and his legs bolted forward. His cry was multiplied into a deafening roar by the thousands of men who followed behind him. An echo of that cry sounded from the hordes in front of him as they advanced from a slow march forward to full sprint.

He watched helplessly as death approached him. His body refused his panic and flung itself full speed into peril.

White. The blur faded and he was back on the street standing under the arch. After a moment of disorientation, he stepped back out from under the arch.

"Crazy!" He muttered. "This is crazy!"

He turned and stumbled away, down the street and into the city.



-



Around the corner, hidden by the wall of the school, Riancht watched Raj back up, turn, and disappear down the street.

"What did you find, my friend?"