|
|
Post by twyrch on May 13, 2005 7:09:45 GMT -5
Getting the book was the easy part. Getting out of the house was the hard part. His command of the Force was somewhat tenuous and he didn't want to exhaust himself. Finally he saw a clear route... but the anti-stealing charm on the book began to take effect. It swelled until it could not go through the doorway. Ian tried to let go, but his hand was stuck. He ran back inside the house and let go of the book. It fell from his hands with a soft plop, as it landed face down on the floor. Thinking quickly, the ran out of the house and tried something he'd read in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. "Axio Book!" he screamed... All at once the front door of the house exploded into splinters as the book broke the anti-stealing spell placed on it and flew into his hands. |
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 13, 2005 8:50:19 GMT -5
He staggered back, staring at the book in amazement. Of course, NaNa had told him that the things he read in the books were real, but actually seeing the strange techniques work for him was anther thing altogether. He wished Nana were here so he could ask her more questions, as he tied the book to his back and crept into the secret tunnel. He had to get out of the castle.
He, at least, would obey the Emergency Drill rules Father and his Paladin had practiced repeatedly with him. Had any of them survived? He longed to go back, but that had been the first rule. "Do not return to the castle under any circumstances if the King even looks to be dead. Wait till someone comes for you with the secret password."
Ian hoped there would be someone left to come.
|
|
|
|
Post by Child of Immanuel on May 13, 2005 14:34:03 GMT -5
He sat... and he sat... and he sat. Then he sat some more. And more. And more. And still more. He grew faint from hunger, and realized that he must leave in order to survive. He walked out into the victor's camp.
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 13, 2005 14:46:51 GMT -5
Of course, he did so stealthily, but it wasn't enough. One of the guards saw him and ordered him to stop. Ian didn't realise he had fallen till he opened his eyes and found himself in the center of a ring of soldiers.
"Is it him?" one said.
Another shrugged. "Can't be sure. Better take him to Lord Mareskipan."
|
|
|
|
Post by dgan on May 15, 2005 7:15:09 GMT -5
His legs dragging, he allowed them to pull him toward his destination. He decided it best to save his strength for whatever trial lay ahead. Anyway, they probably would have obliged to drag him regardless of any attempts to walk.
He had thought himself clever until he saw the entrance to the impressive tent looming before him. Two enourmous guards with the eyes of angry predatory birds stood at either side of the entrance with less than inviting expressions on their faces. The structure itself was nearly twice as large as his own father's camp tent and the material was of something he had never set eyes on before.
His gazing interrupted with the point of a spear, his captors accompanied their wary prisoner inside. Everything he had seen thus far in no way prepared him for the man that greeted him...
|
|
|
|
Post by Child of Immanuel on May 15, 2005 7:44:22 GMT -5
... who indeed was not a man. It was the Wild Bluebird of Ekklsindorfia. Ian almost fainted. "Is-is the book true, then?"
The Bluebird simply stared at him imperiously, then jerked his beak. Guards came forward and removed Ian.
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 16, 2005 12:49:45 GMT -5
He found himself incarcerated in his own dungeons in a cell next to a man in blue jeans, who looked eerily similar to the description of Ingmar. The man turned to Ian.
"Is this the Gap of Rohan? Do you happen to have a herring knife?"
A man wearing a cloak with a ten-rayed star crashed his gauntleted hand against the dungeon gate.
"By the authority of Ni, be silent!"
"The knights that say Ni!" Ingmar gasped. "How did I come here? You must help me, boy."
|
|
|
|
Post by Child of Immanuel on May 16, 2005 16:16:22 GMT -5
"Er... sure," Ian replied. "If I can."
"First of all, we need to escape," Ingmar replied. "Any ideas?"
"How about... when the knights of Ni! open the door to shove that prisoner in, we go out," Ian suggested, pointing out the glassy walls. He frowned. The new prisoner bore a remarkable resemblance to Harry Potter. He seemed to have lost his wand, though.
Ian reached for the Force to hold the guards back as they escaped. With a surge of panic, he realized he couldn't find it!
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 16, 2005 22:12:34 GMT -5
A hissing sound distracted him from his lack of power and strange new ability to see through walls and the four floors of dirt between him and Harry Potter. He turned to see a snake eel its way out of a crack in the rocks. With a strange hiccup it spit out a slender stick and slid into the crack again.
Turning, he realised his view of the outside had been obscured. Once again, he was closed in by heavy stone walls.
|
|
|
|
Post by cree8ivone on May 17, 2005 12:37:51 GMT -5
What happened next was so dizzying it caused Ian to blackout.
Ingmar’s cell seemed to start spinning around Ian’s cell and he was shouting something at Ian. But Ian could only hear a loud rushing wind noise in his ears; and it was getting louder.
He dropped to his knees to maintain his balance, covered his ears and managed to squeeze out the word, “Help” from his compressing lungs. When the sound of that word reached his own ears two things happened simultaneously; a grappling hook clinked into place on the bars of Ingmar’s cell window and the guard banged Ian’s cell bars, telling him to be quiet.
There was a silent pause that seemed to last forever as the guard turned his head and realized what the grappling hook signified. Time stopped. Breathing stopped. In the space of 3 heartbeats, the silence was horrendously broken.
Ian was nearly deafened by the tremendous crash when the cell window and much of the wall around it was ripped away from Ingmar’s cell. Through the huge hole of rubble, Ian could see a girl with long flowing hair like his NaNa’s sitting on an extremely large horse and untying a rope while signaling to Ingmar to escape.
Of course the guard saw all of this as well. However when he turned to raise the alarm, he didn’t even take one step before an arrow wedged deep in his neck. As he gurgled and writhed on the floor, Ian’s NaNa appeared at his cell door with a key and smiled a surreal smile.
That’s when the blackness came pulling at the edge of his mind with the abstract absurdities he had recently witnessed.
- Ingmar, someone from his books was alive and well and in the cell next to him. And if the book were true this person was supposed to have died 50 years ago.
- His NaNa, who he also thought was dead, was now rescuing him.
- At the same time Ingmar was being rescued by a girl who looked like his NaNa only much younger.
- And if that wasn’t enough he had seen his father killed, seen through walls, and seen the Wild Bluebird of Ekklsindorfia.
It was too much for the young boy.
Ian awoke in the middle of the night. His NaNa was tending a small fire. They appeared to be deep in the forest and his stomach hurt.
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 17, 2005 13:02:48 GMT -5
NaNa smiled at him. "I'm glad to see you're awake, Dear."
He groaned and pushed himself up.
"No, lay down!" She pushed him back, but the dizzyness would have knocked him over anyway.
"What happened?"
NaNa sat beside him quietly for a moment, then stroked his forehead. "Someone gave you a huge dose of hallucinogens, enough to kill you. Your father sent you from the castle with me while he searches for the perpetrator."
He gaped at her. "The Blue Bird...Harry...Ingmar...the knights...the gorgeous girl that looked like you...Were they all just dreams?"
"Well.." She sighed and smiled at him. "Rest now. We'll talk later. There is much you need to know."
|
|
|
|
Post by Child of Immanuel on May 17, 2005 14:23:31 GMT -5
Try as he might, Ian kept having bizarre hallucinations which left him exhausted and aching. And if that were not enough, NaNa fell prey to them too. In his lucid periods, Ingmar realized that the hallucinogen was being given daily, and now the assassin need hide no longer. But he had no strength to move.
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 17, 2005 14:35:41 GMT -5
How could the assassin reach them in the forest? He had seen noone aside from NaNa. He tried to stay awake and keep watch, but kept dozing.
Finally, in one of his more lucid moments, he saw a strange little twig man standing over NaNa. Wait...a twig man?
"What are you doing? Are you a Green Man?"
He fell back before he heard the answer, his ears filled with a harsh roaring sound. Convinced he was about to die, Ian closed his eyes and waited. He could do little else. He wished he had the strength to defend NaNa.
|
|
|
|
Post by dgan on May 19, 2005 7:25:09 GMT -5
Ian faded momentarily from his mind's uncontrolled creativity to a sudden feeling of acute awareness.
"I swear upon the Seven Sacred Sacrificial Souls that if I see the king of jelly rolls, I will in no doubt kill myself if I am able."
With that thought, he succumbed once again to the hazy nostalgia that engulfed his young mind.
|
|
|
|
Post by karenee on May 19, 2005 7:47:43 GMT -5
When he finally woke, clear-minded and energized, NaNa was nowhere about. He pushed his blanket to the side, set his feet in the lush grass that rippled down the smooth slope before him, and walked carefully down the the stream.
Splashing his face with the cool water, he lifted his head and looked around. "Hello! Anybody here?"
Behind him, the rough edges of the forest towered, gloomy and intimidating. He decided his memories were suspect and looked for the person who must have accompanied him. What had really been going on? Were any of his memories true?
|
|
Twyrch /|\
