Shadows
Chapter Seventeen: The Magic Number

Robert woke with a start. He blinked and groaned as he stretched his limbs, rolling his neck to release the stiffness of an awkward sleep. He couldn’t really remember falling asleep, but knew it had been past dawn before he’d finally given into exhaustion and allowed himself to slip into the arms of Morpheus. Robert was relieved to see the Orb was still where he’d left it – nestled between his hands, resting on his chest. He pulled himself to his feet, and realised he’d fallen asleep between the roots of a tree, sheltered in a little nook against the trunk of a mighty fir. Robert craned his neck and looked around for any sign of Keliashyrr, but couldn’t see her.

“K-Keliashyrr?” he called out cautiously. There were no sounds except for those of nature: the calling of birds, the rustling of wind through leaves; the distant trickle of a stream. It was then Robert realised how thirsty he was, and began to sleepily stumble over towards the sound of running water.

As he reached the river, crystal clear water running smoothly through a dip in the forest floor, Robert knelt down and gratefully scooped handfuls of the refreshing cool liquid into his mouth. Several handfuls in, Robert was acutely reminded of another basic human need. Making sure no-one was looking he tucked the Orb into his rolled up shirt, pulled down the waistband of his trousers, and answered the call of nature.

“Morning!” chirped Keliashyrr, appearing round a tree.

“Ah!” yelped Robert, twisting sideways away from her and clenching up. “I w-wonder if you could give me a m-minute, please?”

“Oh,” replied Keliashyrr surprised. “I thought you called me?”

“I did, b-but when you didn’t appear I, um… c-could you please just give me a minute first, then we can talk?”

“Oh, of course.”

There was a pause.

“I wonder if you c-could, indeed, give me a minute alone?”

A brief, embarrassed minute later Robert called out and Keliashyrr appeared round from the back of the tree again, still completely oblivious to the situation.

“R-right, sorry about that,” Robert muttered, looking intently at his feet. “Shall we continue?”

“Fine by me,” nodded Keliashyrr.

“W-where were you this morning?” asked Robert as they set off again through the forest.

“Oh, I was just taking a stroll through the woods. I climbed a couple of trees just to see what was at the top of them, which was quite fun. I’m getting better at getting back down as well – that’s harder than you’d think.”

“Right…” replied Robert, trailing off. “You l-like all this nature stuff then?”

“I love it!” smiled Keliashyrr. “I think I could happily just stay out here forever, just enjoying all the sights and sounds on offer.”

“Really? I c-can’t say I’ve experienced that much of nature so f-far, but I think I prefer the comforts of the city.”

“A city?” Keliashyrr beamed. “There’s a city near here? I’d love to see that too!” Then she paused for a moment, as if listening to some far-off voice, before continuing: “Actually, I don’t think I’d want to. I imagine there’s too many people and it might be quite dangerous.”

“Well, it is busier than out here,” acknowledged Robert, gesturing to the empty woods around them. “And it’s only d-dangerous if you meet the wrong people. That’s, err, the main reason I’m out here r-really. I got in a fight with the wrong people, and h-had to leave.”

“Oh, how awful,” exclaimed Keliashyrr. “So you can’t return to the city then?”

“Not if I want to stay alive apparently,” sighed Robert. “It’s a d-damn shame.”

“Why do you do that with your voice?”

“D-do what?”

“That thing you just did now, when you seem to repeat a sound.”

“I d-don’t know. I just happens. It’s a nuisance, really.”

“Why don’t you try not doing it?”

“Oh, yes,” grumbled Robert, “In s-seventeen years of life I didn’t think of just trying not to do it. M-marvellous advice.”

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“It’s alright,” sighed Robert, pinching the bridge of his nose. “It’s just been a long few days and I didn’t sleep well. I c-could have sworn someone was whispering in my ears all night.”

“Not guilty,” shrugged Keliashyrr. “Though I can understand how voices in your head could get annoying at times.” There was a pause, then she murmured quietly: “Sorry, father.”

“Pardon?” asked Robert.

“Oh, nothing,” smiled Keliashyrr unconvincingly.

“It’s j-just, I don’t want to be rude but you do seem to talk to yourself a lot.”

“I don’t talk to myself,” bristled Keliashyrr.

“Then who do you talk to? I thought I heard you say ‘sorry, father’ just now.”

“No, no – I said, um… well, I did say ‘sorry, father’, but I wasn’t talking to him. It’s not like I have his voice in my head or anything like that!” she laughed nervously. “It’s just, when I’m thinking about what best to say, I think: ‘what would my father say at a time like this?’ And, and then I say it, you know?”

“No.”

“Well, don’t you ever think about someone you know when you need guidance?” asked Keliashyrr, looking panicked.

“No. I suppose if I need guidance I think about a b-book I’ve read. For example, if I need to know which wild berries are safe to eat or not, I think back to Merryweather’s Compendium of Berries.”

“There’s a book solely about berries?”

“One book, t-ten v-volumes.”

The pair walked on in silence for a bit, and Robert began to regret having brought up berries. He was starting to get hungry, but they’d only just got walking and couldn’t really afford to stop for food. For all he knew the Skadirr had killed Angie, and was still after him. He hoped he hadn’t promised Keliashyrr a friend that was dead.

But perhaps more importantly, came a thought from deep in his mind, I hope Angie isn’t dead for my sake too – I enjoyed talking with her and it would be a shame if I couldn’t again. She may have read my diary, but I… suppose I can live with that if she can.

He’d have to get a new one now anyway, unless there was some way for him to get back to Clifftop to retrieve it. All that work, lost…

Robert’s stomach grumbled loudly and snapped him back to the present.

“You’re hungry?” asked Keliashyrr.

“Yes,” admitted Robert, “but we can’t afford to stop for food now. We’ve only just got moving again.”

“That’s alright, I can hunt on the way,” beamed the girl. “I’m good at hunting.”

“I can see,” said Robert, nodding at her coat of rabbit pelts. “D-did you kill all of them yourself?”

“I did,” said Keliashyrr proudly. “All you have to do is creep up behind them quietly, aim carefully, let loose your arrow, and there you have it! One dead rabbit.”

Robert paused for a second.

“Where’s your bow?”

“My what?” asked Keliashyrr innocently.

“Your bow,” repeated Robert, “for hunting.”

Keliashyrr’s face remained impassive.

“You know, a bow. Curved bit of wood with a bit of string c-connecting the ends?”

“Oh,” hesitated Keliashyrr. “Oh, yes… my bow… whoops, there I go… leaving it behind again. Clumsy me! I’ll, um… never mind, use my hands or something?”

“To fire arrows?” asked Robert, confused.

“Who told you?!” gasped Keliashyrr defensively.

“I’m sorry?”

“Who told you I could fire arrows from my hands?”

“No-one.”

There was a sceptical pause.

“No-one… no, that’s right, because… because humans can’t do that, can they? Silly, isn’t it? I didn’t mean to, err…” Keliashyrr bit her lip nervously. “Rabbits, hmm? Let’s go, um…” She gestured forwards and walked off at a fast pace, keeping her eyes firmly away from Robert’s gaze.

What an odd girl, thought Robert. I wonder if that’s how people view me?

He knows! Thought Keliashyrr, pacing away from Robert at speed. He knows, father!

“Well my daughter, I can tell you this much – I’ve certainly met better liars than you. Not that that’s a good thing to be, of course.” Ambriel added.

“But he knows! He knows I can fire arrows from my hands, he knows I can use magic!”

“I’m not entirely sure he does,” mused Ambriel. “He seems to be a very logical and literal individual, so it’s entirely possible he just got the wrong end of the stick. In fact, I reckon if you used that saying around him he’d ask which was the right end.”[29]

“But you’re always saying be cautious! Surely the best decision now is just to run away from him?”

“Normally I would agree, but I don’t believe this boy is going to cause you harm. Besides, he holds the Orb and that rather changes things.”

“Why?”

“Well, for reasons I can’t explain I replace myself drawn to it.”

“I felt that too,” nodded Keliashyrr. “As if it wants me to touch it.”

“Yes, and that’s an urge I don’t think you should give in to. That probably should be a rule in general, really. Besides, there’s another reason I want you to keep that Orb safe.”

“What? Why do I need to keep it safe?”

“Well, because it’s the heart of our people. Both in a figurative and literal sense.”

“What’s the literal side of it?” asked Keliashyrr, confused.

“I say literal – it’s theorised. A long held belief amongst Olossan scholars is that in order to gain power from the Orb our ancestors had to tie their life-blood to it through various… unsavoury rituals. Whilst that granted them exceptional power, it also came with a price – if the Orb were to be damaged or destroyed, so too would our people.”

“If the Orb’s destroyed so are we?! You could have said that earlier! I’ve watched him falling over all the time, he could break it at any minute!” Keliashyrr gasped in horror, looking back towards Robert who gave a sheepish smile.

“My dear child,” comforted Ambriel, “if the Orb could be destroyed so easily our race would never have made it out the front door. It’s a remarkably resilient thing, the Orb. It had existed for long before our ancestors first found it, and I bet it will exist long after us.”

“So what can destroy it?”

“I don’t know,” admitted Ambriel. “Very powerful magic, perhaps? I can’t imagine the humans didn’t try to destroy it after we were defeated, so I can only imagine it must be very difficult to do.”

“I just want to make one thing clear though, father – if the Orb is destroyed, do I die?” There was silence inside Keliashyrr’s head for a few seconds, then Ambriel replied:

“Possibly. As I’ve said before, you’re only half Olossa so you could be okay, but I don’t know. There’s no precedent for this type of thing, you understand. Even if you were only half-killed though, I don’t think that’s a risk worth taking – reason being I’ve seen people ‘only half dead’, and it doesn’t take much for them to end up going all the way.”

“So I have to keep the Orb safe?”

“So you have to keep the Orb safe,” agreed Ambriel.

Damn thing, grumbled Keliashyrr to herself. I don’t want to be stuck babysitting some sphere of rock for the rest of my life.

Robert watched Keliashyrr striding off into the distance, muttering away to herself. At one point she shot back a look of shock at him, and he smiled awkwardly back at her. He was half-regretting his offer of friendship to her, but friends stuck with each other through thick and thin, and Robert wasn’t about to go back on his word. Besides, he thought, she knows how to hunt rabbits and I don’t.

Well, he did, insofar as he’d read several books about rabbits and several books about hunting, but then he’d read books about exercise and running before and the reality had turned out to be a lot different to what he’d been imagining. It had seemed so straightforward and easy in the books – no-one had mentioned how out of breath you could get, or how warm, or how a sharp stabbing pain in your side would surprise you at unpleasant intervals.

For the first time in his life Robert began to think that maybe people who wrote books about running were people who were good at running. Though this made sense to him, of course – you wouldn’t want amateurs writing books to guide people on how to do things. For example, Merryweather’s Compendium of Berries might have been a great deal shorter if she hadn’t had some idea of which berries were safe to eat when she first approached the project.[30]

Robert’s stomach rumbled again.

“I um, hate to interrupt your conversation… with yourself,” Robert shouted out to Keliashyrr, “but I am g-getting a bit peckish. Do you think w-we could get to hunting for some food?”

“Uh, yes,” answered the girl after some thought. “But, how about you stay here whilst I go and replace some rabbits, hmm?”

“Can’t I come with?” asked Robert. “J-just I’d like to see how it’s done.”

“No!” replied Keliashyrr, a bit too quickly. “Um, it’s just rabbits can be quite nervous and run off easily. Best that I go do it alone and come meet you back here once I’ve caught some?”

“Oh,” sighed Robert, a tad deflated. “Well, alright then. I n-need to keep moving though, so d-do you want to catch me up?”

“How will I know where you are?”

“I’ll just be that way,” said Robert gesturing off into the forests further to the north. At least, he thought it was the north. He wasn’t entirely sure which way he was going, and the tree canopy was too thick to see the sun’s position at the moment. Robert wondered if Keliashyrr could sense his uncertainty, as she seemed reluctant to let him out of her sight.

“I’d much rather you stayed here,” she said.

“I can see why you’d say t-that,” Robert nodded, “b-but if the Skadirr’s still after me I’d rather keep moving. I promised Angie I would.”

“Okay,” Keliashyrr replied hesitantly. “How about you follow the path of this river?” she asked, gesturing to a small stream winding along in a gulley next to them. “That way neither of us will get lost, and I’ll know where to replace you.”

“What if the river stops?”

“Well, would you mind stopping there? Hopefully I shouldn’t be too long hunting rabbits and I’ll catch you up before that becomes a possibility.”

“Hmm,” Robert mumbled, pondering the girl’s plan. “I did promise I’d keep moving…”

“Well how about this?” Keliashyrr asked desperately, “What if I promise to be back before you reach the top of the river?”

“If you promised?” asked Robert.

“Yes,” Keliashyrr nodded frantically.

“I should think that would be agreeable,” nodded Robert in response.

“Excellent!” beamed Keliashyrr, and Robert thought the girl looked relieved. “Keep yourself and the Orb safe and don’t wander too far from the river – I’ll be back soon!” With that Keliashyrr turned and jogged away into the trees, occasionally looking back at Robert as he continued walking on, before she disappeared beneath a dip in the ground.

What a nice girl, thought Robert. Definitely odd, but definitely nice too. I hope that is how people view me.

Angie trudged on through the woods at a slow but steady pace, wondering just how far Robert had gone and if she was even on the right track. Polo was at the moment absorbed in sniffing the ground in front of her, though he occasionally stopped to bite an attractive looking bit of wood or urinate against a tree. Angie had tried to play fetch with him at one point, but Polo hadn’t really seemed to understand the rules. Maybe it was true that you couldn’t teach an old dog new tricks. How old was Polo anyway? Thought Angie, as she searched for some train of thought to keep her interested while walking through the very same-y tree-filled landscape.

Verne had had him as long as Angie had known, which, factoring in that no-one tended to remember their first few years of life,[31] made him at least fourteen or fifteen? Verne had tried to explain the concept of dog years to Angie once, but it had been surprisingly complicated. The only thing that had stuck with her was that each human year equalled about seven dog years, though she wasn’t sure if Verne had said that was right or not. If it was right, then Polo must have been about… 98 – 105? That didn’t seem right.

“I hope I’m as sprightly as you when I’m your age, Polo,” Angie sighed as Polo yipped and happily bounded headfirst into a fallen log. How could she not remember what Verne had said? Angie agonised to herself. Verne had only… died… two days ago, but already she was forgetting things he’d told her? Fair enough, it hadn’t been that important a conversation at the time, but how long would it be before she was forgetting the important conversations? How many times had Verne tried to tell her something important and she hadn’t been listening? What if there’d been things he’d always wanted to tell her, and now he would never get the chance?

Angie wiped a fledgling tear away from her eye and kept walking. Just because the Skadirr’s gone doesn’t mean you’re out of danger, she muttered to herself. On the contrary, who’s to say whoever was controlling it doesn’t send out another one, or something worse? Stay angry, stay focused, she told herself, repeating it like a mantra.

Right now I’m angry with this forest, Angie groaned. How is anyone supposed to replace their way through here? Angie was used to the streets of Velayne which, whilst often twisting and confusing in their own right, were familiar. They had names as well, on clearly marked street signs,[32] so that even if you did get lost you could easily replace your way again. None of the trees were being very helpful, that was for sure. She felt certain their branches ought to be pointing in the right direction to go, or at least they shouldn’t look like every other tree for what seemed like miles around. There were no landmarks!

That was when Angie spotted a rabbit in the distance. That, at least, was not another tree. The only other rabbit she’d seen alive before had been owned by one of the girls at the Pausday School in Velayne, whose parents had bought it for her as a birthday present. Angie had wanted one, but her work for Mrs Gable had never really given her enough free time to look after one properly. Besides, Mr Catteriron hadn’t allowed the tenants at the Sailor’s Jaunt to own pets after a previous tenant had owned a budgerigar that despite its small size had managed to redecorate the entirety of the bar with ease.

That was when Polo noticed the rabbit. With a playful bark he set off at a lazy gambol after the rabbit, which turned and began to hop away in a panic. They rounded a tree and disappeared out of sight.

“Polo, get back here!” Angie barked, speeding up after the dog. “Don’t you dare harm that rabbit! If you’re hungry I’ve got food in here!” she shouted after Polo’s retreating outline, gesturing to the supplies sack slung over her shoulder. After a brief period of laboured pursuit Angie decided to drop the sack in order to have any chance of catching up to Polo. “Come on Angie, he’s a centenarian – you can catch him,” she muttered to herself.

Several yards later she rounded another tree and caught sight of Polo and his quarry again.

“Leave it alone!” she cried, just as a thin bolt of silver shot across in front of her eyes and narrowly missed skewering the rabbit. Polo screeched to a halt and yapped in alarm, whilst the rabbit dived over a tree root to safety. “Bloody hell!” Angie gasped, dropping to the floor and out of sight of any potential hunters. “Don’t shoot! And don’t shoot my dog, either!” she added angrily. Why did everything seem to happen to her? Couldn’t she have a minute where someone wasn’t trying to kill her?

There was a tense silence, filled only by the nervous growling of Polo. Angie crawled across the forest towards him, and wrapped him in her arms. As she did so, two fur-clad feet landed lightly on the ground in front of her face.

“Slowly get to your feet,” ordered a girl’s voice. Angie carefully stood, keeping as much weight off her bad leg as she could, and glanced cautiously at her assailant. She was indeed a young woman, probably a similar age to Angie, with light olive skin and long, straight raven hair that cascaded down her back. Her eyes were dark, but afire with life. Despite the girl having ordered her around, Angie thought she looked quite kindly on the whole. Best not to risk anything though, she thought, especially seeing as this girl is armed with a bow and obviously knows how to use it.

Though, come to think of it…

“Where’s your bow?” asked Angie.

[29] Also, which stick?

[30] ‘I Can Maketh thou a Paragon of Confidence: The Power to Goeth for anything thou Desireth!’ was probably not written by anyone lacking confidence, that was for sure.

[31] A travelling scholar who Angie had once caught giving a talk about this topic had said it was to do with some sort of hippo in the brain that wasn’t good at remembering when you were young. Verne had always said it was because being born into the world was so bloody traumatic it took a few years to recover and start to accept your lot in life.

[32] Apart from the sign for Shutshivel Street, which had been removed due to near-constant defacement issues.