Whistlestop (26 page)

“
I have no plans, dear,” he
replied and then took a sip of his drink. “Do you think I should do
something?”

“
I just thought you didn’t
want us interfering.”

“
Grandma, without Aunt
Sadie doing what she did, my two grandpas would be dead
now.”

“
How did you know
that?”

“
Lilian knows everything,”
Emmanuel noted.

“
You told her?” Angelina
asked.

“
You’re not listening,
Angie. I said Lilian knows
everything
! She’s becoming omniscient,
a chip off the old block if I say so myself.” He
laughed.

“
But that’s not possible,”
Angie argued. “She’s mortal and half human.”

“
Mortal so far,” Emmanuel
corrected her. “Either way, there’s nothing we can do about that
now. That is why I am handling her training personally. Something
like this has never happened in the history of the universe. The
timing of her gift is fascinating, isn’t it?”

“
Grandma, all of the realms
are now moving toward a moment in time when it will be decided
whether Linger wins or the balance is restored. If Linger wins, the
existence of all the realms, possibly including this one will end.
Shortly after he is crowned emperor, there will be no need for
physical existence. Poppy, his brother, and the Creator will have
learned that evil is more powerful than good and the experiment we
call the universe will have no reason to continue. If it is clear
that evil will always succeed, why keep offering both good and
evil? Good will always fail. Either creation continues its spiral
toward depravity and terror or it ends. Why would Poppy allow
eternal pain and suffering, with all beings leading short, terrible
lives and dying miserably?”

“
I wouldn’t,” Emmanuel
interjected. “That is why I honor your sister for saving your
husband and the elves. If Merihem had not been there twisting the
minds of the city, perhaps I would have stopped her. Linger is not
playing fair, and when he twists people’s minds to commit horrific
acts they would never choose to do, it is acceptable that we stop
him.” He yawned. “I am so tired of this.”

“
Go take a nap, Poppy,”
Lilian said. “I’ll watch over creation for you.” Angelina stared
back in disbelief.

Brad Lincoln approached the orderly
lines of humans as they stood for morning roll-call. There was
something different about the way they looked at him, even though
his mind told him the visit by Lilian Winslow was a nightmare
brought on by too much food and drink the night before. The guards
also looked different somehow. On a normal day, they would be
cajoling the slaves into standing straighter and facing forward,
but now they looked cautiously at the crowd as though fearful they
would be attacked. He wondered how a demon from the Lower Realm
could possibly be afraid of a simple human. For a moment he
wondered if his dream had actually happened, with the small girl
taking over his camp and sending him to his death in the Upper
Realm. He quickly pushed the thought away, as such things were
impossible. One of the guards helped him up onto his small platform
and he looked out on the crowd. Brad was accustomed to the people
looking on him with fear and perhaps even loathing, but today
everyone seemed to be happy. Happy to be enslaved, he thought; that
certainly is unlikely. Before his mind could go further down that
line, he saw her. Several rows deep into the group stood a pretty
young woman with long blonde hair and impossibly blue eyes. He had
never seen her before and he could not understand how that might be
possible. He turned to the guard and asked, “Naster, who is the new
blonde girl?”

“
Master, she was found
wondering outside the gates this morning at sunrise. She was
starving and dehydrated. She has now been assigned a bunk and fed
and watered.”

“
Bring her to my office
following roll-call.”

“
Yes, master.”

Brad left the platform and headed back
to the headquarters building. After going into his office, he put
his feet up on his desk and took a sip of coffee. His mind began to
go through mental gymnastics of his dream and the sudden appearance
of the young woman. Were these things related? Could this woman be
Lilian Winslow in disguise back to torture him yet again? There was
a knock on his door and he sat up straight and said, “Come
in!”

The guard Naster entered the office
and stood at the front of his desk. “Master, may I sit? I need to
ask you a question if I may.” Brad pointed to a chair and the beast
sat.

“
Is this about the new
girl?”

“
No, master, it is about
yesterday.”

Brad’s eyes opened too wide and he
struggled to maintain his composure. “I’m sure I have no idea what
you’re talking about.”

“
Master, we were all here
and we feel no different than you. If our father would learn
anything about it, we would all be disgraced, but we are the lucky
ones. You would likely die.”

Brad held his head in his hands and
groaned. “What are we to do, Naster? What are we to do?”

“
We must be of one mind,
Brad. That is our only choice. We must maintain absolute confidence
on the matter of the young girl. My siblings and I discussed this
at length late last night while you and the slaves were asleep.
Linger is a violent beast. Can we count on you?”

“
I am the one who would
die, Naster. Of course you can count on me since I have all the
most to lose.”

“
Brad, I need to know what
happened to you after the wizard stole you away. Did she convince
you to support her?”

Brad jumped to his feet and shouted,
“No! I would never turn on my father.”

“
What did the child tell
you?”

“
She said I was in the
Upper Realm and if I chose to stay there, I would be loved and
accepted.”

“
And what did you
do?”

“
I begged her to release
me. I know that realm is a place of horrors. I was frightened out
of my mind.”

“
Was she alone?” Naster
asked, emphasizing each word.

“
Not at first. There was a
man with a gray beard, but I did not know who he was. He kissed her
and told her she was doing a good job and then left us
alone.”

“
The King of the Angels,”
Naster sighed.

“
Who?”

Naster grabbed Brad by the throat and
held him tight. “Listen to me, ogre, we are going to forget any of
that happened. Your life and our sanity depend on it. Do not tell
our father about the event. Do not tell anyone about it. Do not
even dream about it. If he hears about it from you, I will kill you
myself before my father has the chance.” There was a knock at the
door and Naster released his grip and opened the door. The young
blonde woman was led in by another guard. She was pushed into a
chair and the two beasts left the room and closed the door. Brad
shivered involuntarily from the encounter with the
beast.

“
Are you well, Commandant?”
she asked.

He moved back to his desk and sat down
heavily. Suddenly, the appearance of the beautiful woman outside
the gates the day after the visit by Lilian Winslow struck him as
too coincidental. “Was this yet another test by Linger?” he
wondered. “What is your name, young lady?”

“
Marion Sarah Baxter,” she
replied.

“
How did you come to be
outside our gates this morning?”

She smiled and her brilliant smile
distracted Brad from his train of thought. “I have always lived in
Elko, a small city not far from here. When the monsters came, I hid
in the cellar under our house. I stayed there a long time, until
the food and water ran out. I knew I had to go somewhere else if I
was going to survive. Commandant, I am not a smart woman. I
wandered for days and eventually lost my way. Most people would be
horrified to find themselves outside your prison, but I was
relieved if I can be honest. Commandant, I do not want to
die!”

There was something about this woman
that tugged at Brad. He knew it was wrong, but he was drawn to her.
As he sat watching her, it occurred to him that she might have a
connection to Linger Bartholomew Breakneck. He looked at her but
could not sense anything sinister. Everyone had that streak of evil
within them, but he could not see it in her, and that was not a
good sign. “Ms. Baxter, you are welcome to join us here, but you
will receive no special treatment in this camp. You will do your
work and receive the same benefits as every other slave. Can you
live with that, or should I kill you now and save us both a lot of
time?”

“
Please Commandant, don’t
kill me! I will serve you if you let me live.”

Brad imagined this woman serving him
in the most carnal sense of the word and the thought aroused him.
He knew immediately that was not good. There were many beautiful
women in the camps, but he had never felt this sensation, and now
he wondered why. “I am not sure what to make of you, Ms.
Baxter.”

“
My lord, I swear I will
work very hard if you let me stay!” she begged.

“
Go back to your barracks
and I will consider what to do.”

Merihem rose and walked out of the
commandant’s office. She knew already that she had won. She could
not have imagined it would be this easy. The fear was obvious in
Brad and her brothers. They were hiding a terrible secret, and soon
she would know. While they were skilled at keeping secrets, she
knew the prisoners were too happy, given their situation. They
would tell her, and then she would tell Linger and be his favorite
still. In her heart, she wished Linger would destroy her brothers,
but did not know if that was even possible.

It had been a productive day on
Bastion after the encounter with Pernicious. Their group was now
bivouacked in a large meadow in the middle of the ogre wood.
Several bonfires were lit in the centers of groups of tents. Near
one fire, Antoine was chanting the ancient epic poem about the
arrival of sprites on the planet, the wars that ensued and
ultimately the peace that had reigned for dozens of generations.
The sky over his head was brilliantly lit by hundreds of fairies
singing backup to his verses. Ten more ogres had joined the group
along with nearly a thousand fairies, all from the grove where
Jerry had met Constance Bittermore and her clan. Jerry and Lynn sat
on a small rise at one end of the clearing, watching the group
settle in for the night. He could see Jeremiah Beetleweed
Mosscatcher discussing plans for the next day with Pernicious and
Montrose on the opposite side of the meadow. Lynn put her arm
around his back and rested her head on his shoulder. “Whatever
happened to our lives, Jerry?”

“
It’s all so surreal,
honey. I used to be an accountant, going to the same office every
day, banging on my calculator and doing bank reconciliations. Until
you arrived here, I was training with swords and axes with a giant
ogre who sang songs to me while he swung his blades. This has got
to be a dream or something.”

“
Do you want it to be a
dream?”

He sighed heavily and kissed her
forehead. “Not really, but it doesn’t seem real. Ogres, sprites,
elves and fairies are the stuff of children’s tales, not reality.
One thing Isolde told me made me wonder. I told her I thought these
worlds were medieval compared to Earth, and she said they were
post-modern. I don’t have a clue what that means?”

The fairy Constance flittered in front
of them and landed by their feet. “I would be happy to explain
that, noble knight!”

“
Here’s surreal again,
dear, a four-inch-tall fairy about to explain post-modernism,”
Jerry laughed.

The fairy frowned angrily and
considered flying away, but then she thought how tragic and dull
life must have been for them in the Empty Realm. “If you think this
realm is too childlike, Jeremy Davis Iron-heart II, we can arrange
to return you to the emperor!”

“
I’m sorry, Constance, I
did not mean to offend you; it’s just that this place is so
different from where we used to live.”

Constance sighed and continued, “I
know, Lord Knight, it must have been awful to live in such a
terrible place. The Empty Realm seems like a nightmare to us. Very
long ago, many of the realms were much like your planet. The
constant desire for more property and the urge to get things done
quickly eventually overwhelmed the beings of most worlds. The
desire for things led to competition, which in its ultimate form
led to war and more death and destruction.”

“
Like the Empire of Axis,”
Lynn interjected.

“
That is exactly right,
Lady Seer. Even now, the thirst for wealth and power is felt by
many, but none more so that Karl Galantine. I think only a few
species avoided that phase completely, such as the ogres, yetis,
trolls and thankfully, the fairies. The trolls and yetis are
primitive brutes, living in small tribes, content to forage for
food and live subsistence lives in terrible conditions. The ogres
are just wired differently. Although they appear monstrous and
fierce, they are gentle souls who yearn only for family, food, and
song. I suppose that makes fairies a lot like them and that is why
we get along so well. We are simple beings living simple lives,
content to be together and at peace.”