Fable: Other World Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Whisper is walking in the Bowerstone market, she notices around town that everything seems to be a normal day around the market, but it seems like everything has lost its brightness. It was understandable considering what has transpired. Whisper walks in front of Will’s house. She stands there for what seemed like an eternity for her when in fact it was simply mere minutes. Whisper walks up to the front door and hesitates to knock the first time, but then decides to knock softly. Whisper hears footsteps walking down stairs. The door slowly opens to show Millie. Millie seemed somewhat surprised at first to see Whisper, but then was glad to see a friend.

Millie: Whisper? It’s good to see you.

Whisper: I just thought I would come and check up on you and James.

Millie gave Whisper a gesture to come in the house. The two of them sit at the table with tea in their hands.

Millie: I would have thought you might have moved on by now.

Whisper: Considering all that has occurred I thought it wise for me to stay a little longer.

Millie: That’s kind of you Whisper

Whisper: If you don’t mind me asking how is James?

Millie: He’s fine or at least I think he is fine.

Millie stares up at James’ room.

Millie: He hasn’t been eating much lately and hasn’t been talking to anyone either. I don’t even think it has sunk in yet.

Millie looks as though she is about to burst into tears. She places a hand over her mouth, hoping James would not hear her.

Millie: I knew this would be difficult. I knew the minute I fell in love with him. But I didn’t care; now every morning I look next to me only to see that I am alone in my bed. I know I sound selfish, but I want to see him even if it’s only for one last time.

Whisper placed a hand on her shoulder trying to comfort her as much as she can. For a moment she even thought about telling her about Jacob and what they were doing back at the Guild. The thought quickly left her mind for she did not wish to give her false hope.

Whisper: Millie, if you want I could try and talk to him.

Millie: It is very kind of you to offer Whisper, but I don’t want to trouble you with that.

Whisper: No, no it would be no trouble at all.

Millie wipes the tear from her cheeks and gives Whisper a smile. Whisper hugs Millie and tells her that everything is going to be alright. Whisper stands from the table and slowly walks up the stairs. For a few seconds she somewhat regretted offering to talk to James, because she could not think as to what to say to him. The thought quickly dispersed as she knew she would think of something on the spot if she had too. Whisper finds herself outside James’ door. Softly she knocks to make herself known; slowly she opens the door to see James drawing a picture. James looks over to his door to see Whisper. James gives her a smile and resumes drawing. Whisper slowly enters and sits on the bed. As she is about to say something she suddenly realizes that she has no idea what she is going to discuss with James. She had no idea what to say to James, then she remembers the shipwreck that left her and Thunder stranded on Albion, the feeling of sorrow and loneliness swept over her then she remembered how everyone in the Guild had helped raise the two of them. How the Guild made them apart of their family. Whisper knew now what she was going to say to young James.

Whisper: What are you drawing?

James: Mommy and Daddy and Me.

Whisper leans over to see the picture of the three of them holding hands. James is working on William’s picture with heavy plate armor and holding a big sword.

Whisper: That’s a very good picture. Are you drawing that for your mom?

James: I drew Mommy a different picture, this one is for my Dad.

Whisper is silent for a few moments.

Whisper: How are you doing James? Is there anything you want to talk about?

James: No I’m ok

Whisper: Are you sure? Your Mom, she worries for you.

James: I know she cries at night but everything will be ok.

Whisper: Why’s that?

James: Because she said everything will be ok.

Whisper: Who is “she”?

James: The lady in my dreams, when I was really sad she told me everything will be ok, and then she told me to draw a picture for daddy when I was at school.

Whisper looked puzzled at James for a moment thinking on who this mysterious woman could be. It was alright to dream of her, but to actually think he hears her at school. It must be his way of coping with all that had happened.

Whisper: This lady must be very nice to you.

James: She is.

Whisper: Well as long as you are alright James, if you need someone to talk to then you can always count on me.

James turns around and gives Whisper a loving hug.

James: Thank you auntie Whisper.

Whisper embraced James a tear managed to roll down her cheek.

William awakens to a sky filled with ash and a sun that was as red as blood. William was still hoping this was a bad dream, but he knew that it was real, and that he still had no way to get back home. William places a hood over his face and looks around to see if there had been anything worth of note, however it was the same as yesterday nothing but pure misery and corruption. Will sits back down not wishing to look at the ugly scene any more than he needed too. William kicks the bag accidentally, a note book flies out. William crawls over and picks it up looking over it then something catches his eye. The notebook showed various locations around Albion there were no coordinates simply the names of the location all the way from Greatwood forest to Knothole Glade, but what caught his eye was in the journal was a side note near the wood.

“I have finally mapped out one of the locations to the latest vortex locations, it turns out it will be in Orchard Farm. However the portal will be at its most powerful here, I must take precautions before entering otherwise I may lose more than just my lantern this time around. As for the other locations I have narrowed it down to either Lychfield Graveyard or the Bowerstone Prison, both relatively close to one another, however if I miss this opportunity then I will have to identify the third location, which will be a challenge in and of itself.”

A thought then immediately entered his mind; this must have belonged to the stranger who he had rescued. He was researching these vortexes not as natural disasters, but as portals to other worlds and this journal may have found him his way home to Millie and James.  William quickly packs the journal back in his bag and wraps the cloak around him. The excitement through his veins, finally some good news, but he decided to walk to look less suspicious  to the other towns people, and more importantly the guards. As William walks down the streets he can’t help but see the people so miserable. Will continues to walk the front gate when he feels a tug on his cloak. He stops and turns to see a little girl with long dark hair holding on to his cloak she holds out her other hand.

Girl: Please mister can I have some food?

William looked at the young girl and stood on one knee to meet her eye level.

William: What is your name little one?

The girl looks confused for a second but then smiles.

Girl: My name is Emily

William: Emily, that’s a very pretty name.

Emily’s smiles at the remark, William looks in his bag to see some cheese and bread. William grabs some of the cheese and gives it to Emily. She quickly consumes the cheese, William can’t help but feel regret not giving her the bread. Will did see a small satchel of gold in the bag. William grabs the small satchel and hands it over to the little girl. Emily seemed confused at the gesture.

William: Its ok you can have it go help your family.

Emily holds the satchel in both hands and she quickly became excited. She is about to run off to give the gold back to her family, when she stops suddenly. Emily runs back to William and gives him a hug around his waist.

Emily: Thank you mister!

Those kind words truly warmed William’s heart; Emily runs off into the distance no doubt to her starving family. He is glad he was able to give some people hope in this terrible place, but he is on a mission to return back to his world, back to Millie and James. The portal could only be in one of two locations William had to choose. William closes his eyes and thinks carefully. He knows all too well that this was a hit or miss situation, he will either return to his family or be stuck in this hellish mirror of the world he once knew. Then he felt something, an unknown almost alien feeling wash over him like a warm rain appearing from nothing. Yet somehow he was not frightened by this feeling, he knew he could trust it, but he did not know the reason why. Then the answer ran through his mind.

William: Lychfield.

He walks back to the North gate which would lead him to the undead infested graveyard.

Whisper is walks the halls of the Heroes Guild and up the stairs to see how the progress is going. She stops near the top to see Thunder waiting outside the library.

Whisper: What are you doing out here? Has something happened?

Thunder: Things started to get confusing so I thought I would wait outside

Whisper looked confused at the notion so decides to walk into the library, only to see it turned upside down. It appeared at first glance as though every map and page of every book had been glued onto the walls. Whisper could barely recognize the library. She had to watch her step, because every step she took would result in crushing five to six pages of research. Whisper turns to see The Guildmaster, Briar, and Jacob standing over a table with a large map in the middle of it. Jacob is the first to notice Whisper.

Jacob: Ah Whisper good your back.

Whisper: What happened in here?

Jacob: Research my dear, but that’s not important right now, what is important however is we have narrowed it down to two possible locations where the next vortex may be next.

This news had indeed caught Whispers interest. Finally some good news she thought to herself.

Weaver: And you’re sure it will be in either of these locations?

Jacob: Yes, I can remember writing down something similar in my notes. I can’t recall all of it, but it certainly rings a bell.

Briar: How much from your journal do you actually remember?

Jacob: Very little, I have a hard time paying attention to one thing for too long without going on to something else. That’s the whole reason I had the blasted thing in the first place, so I wouldn’t have to remember every detail.

Whisper: Wait if everything is in your journal in that world, then that means…

Jacob: Correct my dear. Hopefully William has my journal and has already put the pieces together. He could be on his way there right now for all we know.

The news came to a great relief to everyone, but they knew that this was far from over. There was still the off chance that William hadn’t found the journal, or even if he could reach the portal in time. Either way there is hope, and that is all they could ask for. This had brought them all joy, but Jacob seemed troubled by the news.

Whisper: What’s wrong Jacob?

Jacob snaps out of his own thoughts

Jacob: Oh forgive me I was simply thinking of a scenario.

Whisper: Like what?

Jacob: Perhaps later for now we must get to the coordinates we have marked onto the map. Now normally I would suggest we stay together, but do to their being a possibility the vortex may appear in the other coordinates, I believe we should split up. Whisper, you and I will go to these coordinates, while the rest head to the second set.

Everyone agreed to Jacob’s plan and are about to prepare.

Jacob: Now before we go I need to give some final set of instructions.

All of them turned their attention to Jacob, with worrisome eyes.

Jacob: Now I don’t know if we will be able to find these portals active when we arrive. If this is the case then we must be cautious where we step. For one wrong step can lead us from our world to another. Now if this is the case there is a way to detect them. The air will be thick with magical energy, but it will feel like there is a current heading to a random direction, but it will get stronger the closer you are to the vortex. All in all we must not enter the vortex we have no idea what’s on the other side.

The other heroes paid close attention to what Jacob is saying.

Jacob: Right then, let’s get started.

William is walking up the down up the hill to Headman’s Hill, it appeared as though he had already started to walk into the Graveyard, but he knew he wasn’t anywhere close enough to start to see the environment change. Memories started to flow into his mind, as this was the place where he fought Thunder for Lady Grey’s Hand. How stupid he thought to himself, considering he wasn’t even in love with her in the first place. Will couldn’t help, but admire how the land had so radically changed. He looked around and wonders how long it must have taken for it to expand so close. Hours later he finally comes to the top of the hill and sees the path leading to Lychfield Graveyard. William proceeds down to the when he hears something to his side. William unsheathes his sword and quickly gets out of sight. The bushes start to rumble, suddenly William sees a man being thrown across the road. Bandits appear behind him with a large group of prisoners. William could noticed most of these people were from the Bowerstone, he saw them when he was walking around trying to get a handle on his situation. William inspected the bandits gear and could tell that they were no ordinary Bandits, these Bandits were heavily armed with chainmail armor as black as night,

Bandit Leader: Alright boys round up these worthless bums!

The Bandits moved all of the prisoners near the edge of the cliff. William noticed he could sneak past the bandits without them noticing him.

Bandit Leader: Now one of you lot, decided it be funny to go ahead and kill some boys having their jollies yesterday. Now we don’t know the details, but this much we know, we are pretty sure it’s one of you worthless sacks of flesh. So here’s the deal one of you come forward and we go ahead and kill you here and now, while the rest of you just go ahead and jump off the cliff. Otherwise no one steps forward we torture you until someone does. So really this is just a matter of a quick painless death or a slow and painful death. We leave the choice up to you.

William knew it was the bandits he killed the other day from killing the woman and her child. These people were going to suffer because of him, but time was running out if he doesn’t leave now then he will miss quite possibly his last chance to get home. The choice was tearing William apart, could he live with himself knowing these people died because of his actions, or could he live without seeing his family. He doesn’t know what to do, and then William hears a cry coming from the bushes again. The bandits turn around to see two other bandits pulling a girl against her will. Then William realizes it was Emily.

Bandit: Looky here sir looks like we got ourselves a little thief.

The bandit throws the bag of gold Will gave Emily.

Emily: I didn’t steal it! A nice man gave it to me!

Bandit Leader: Yeah right, throw her in the group with the others.

The two bandits throw her in front of the leader, Emily lunges at him and bites his leg. The Leader lets out a painful scream.  

Bandit Leader: AHHH!!! YOU LITTLE BITCH!!!

The bandit kicked the little girl with his other foot and draws his cleaver.

Bandit Leader: You’re the first to die!

He raises his cleaver and is about to strike the little girl. Time seemed to stop for everyone. The cleaver is about to strike the girl when suddenly it had stopped midpoint in the air. Everyone looked up to see William had blocked the cleaver with his sword. William places his other hand on the leader’s chest

Bandit Leader: What the…..

The leader then had launched from William’s hand and hitting two of the other bandits and crushing his head onto a tree.

William: Everyone RUN!

The bandits charged William with weapons drawn, but William already had a plan. He waved his hand and created four blades out of pure magic that attacked the bandits. The bandits were getting cut down from all of William’s swords, but there were still too many for the spell too last, then at the last second William charged up an electricity spell and fried the rest of the bandits. Those who did see Williams powers ran away as fast as their chainmail could allow them. William turns around to see the people terrified of him. He approaches them slowly.

Man: Please Dark Lord, don’t kill us we’ll do what you want!

William: No, no I’m not a dark lord and I don’t want anything I was just trying to help and…

Before William could finish his sentence the town’s people screamed in terror and ran away. This was the second time people were terrified of him, but now they called him a dark lord, what in the hell is happening in this place, he thought to himself. He turns around to see Emily still sitting there with a terrified look on her face. He quickly ran over to her.

William: Emily are you alright?

Emily comes to her senses and see’s Will. Tears start to roll down her face as she begins to cry. She quickly embraces William, and William pats her on the back.

William: It’s alright now; everything is going to be alright.

In the dark halls of the Heroes Guild the Dark Being sits quietly in his throne when something catches his attention. It was a surge of magical energy, though It did not last long it was long enough to catch his eye.

Dark Being: Interesting.

The dark being stands from his throne with his blade held in hand. He holds the blade high to look into the pure darkness the blade holds, how everything around it only seems to get colder and darker.

Dark Being: It seems this stranger holds many surprises.

The dark being stares into the Sword of Aeons.

Dark Being: Most interesting indeed