“Whatever peacock. Make sure one of you keeps awake at all times” he said and re-mounted his cob. Then putting heel to flank, he rode away.
Otholo dropped his saddle onto the ground beside a tall birch and lay back on it, the lute across his stomach. Fast fingers picked gently at the strings as he spoke.
“So what does it feel like being a demigod?”
Elora copied him, placing her saddle against the birch beside his and sat on the soft grass. “I feel the same as I did before. Out of my depth. I’m the same girl, but then, I’ve always been a bit different than most. My blood catching fire is something new I suppose. It’s never done that before.”
“That’s because Earth’s magic has suppressed yours. That’s why your uncle brought you hear, expecting that you wouldn’t be able use whatever he thought you’d inherited from your father.”
“Earth has no magic. None that I’ve felt anyway.” She could hear Daisy snorting somewhere below, probably at the stream Diagus mentioned.
“Of course you have. It’s called electricity. You don’t get that on Thea. And not because it’s yet to be discovered. It’s that it doesn’t exist. People have tried to create it and have failed. Thea has its own kind of magic. A force that wouldn’t work here, just like electricity won’t work there. You know, there used to be a little magic on Earth that spilled over from Thea. Every now and then, something slipped through. Only small, say the odd fairy, pixie or even a unicorn. And sometimes something sinister came through, say a goblin, troll or takwich. It used to be common to fear the dark, to not travel alone at night or enter strange forests. But they became old wives’ tales, maybe a couple of hundred years ago. Around the time that men on Earth started to play with electricity. It’s only recently that the barrier has weakened and allows once again, magical creatures through.”
“But now electricity doesn’t work here either,” she said.
“And that, my little demigod, is why your blood catches fire.” He paused, resting his slender fingers against the strings and grinned wickedly showing his perfect white teeth. “I wonder what other powers you have.”
“I don’t know if I have any. What was Solarius capable of, what powers did he have?” She didn’t want to call him father out loud, she felt too ashamed of who he was.
“The same as most gods I suppose; he’s immortal, he can fly, he can manipulate elements but mostly he burned things. That’s what he was best at, his legacy. He tore through Thea and left it blackened, scorched and smouldering.”
“Then maybe it’s better that I don’t try. I don’t want to damage anything.”
“Probably wise. It was said that he razed the city of Tilanis to the ground. Burning the place with enough heat to reduce it to a molten river that ran into the sea.” He lay his lute down and retrieved a bottle of cognac from his saddle. “Try to sleep, I’ll stay awake.”
Elora doubted sleep would find her, but she lay back and closed her eyes. “Otholo, why did you come? You’d made York your home.”
“My home is anywhere; a bard shouldn’t linger too long in one place. Oh, they try to keep me, some cities - some people. Did I mention that I was one-time lover to the princess of Rosland? She would have made a prince of me, you know?”
“I know; you’ve told me that already. So why come?”
Otholo took a deep pull from the bottle. “Because I feel a story unfolding. A big story that songs will be made of and it will be my words, my lips that will craft this adventure. I’ll be with you to the very end, whether it’s a bitter one or no, I can’t say, but I will be the one to make a song of it. Now sleep, your thighs are going to be as sore as a dock whore’s...” Otholo paused, struggling to find a better word for a lady and failed. “They will be sore, demigod or not.”
Elora said goodnight, thankful that she felt so tired that she barely gave a thought to how uncomfortable she was. Yet her mind was plagued with the death her father bestowed upon the Earth. No electricity meant that everyone in a hospital on life support would be dead, anyone on dialysis or with a pacemaker also. All those who would be killed in the near future either from starvation or as an act of direct violence, like the Shadojak predicted. All those lives, gone.
Guilt rose with the numbers that she tallied in her head and tears ran down her cheeks, but she remained silent, swearing to herself that if she had the powers to help, she would use everything which she had for the greater good or die trying.
Sleep must have found her at some point as she jolted awake with a not too gentle nudge to her leg.
“Wake up girl, we’ve got plenty of ground to cover and you’ve yet to catch that damn mare of yours,” Diagus grumbled as he dropped something beside her.
Pain throbbed through Elora’s neck as she sat up, gritty eyes adjusting to the predawn sky. Her side joined in with the pain in her neck, an ache that stretched down one side of her torso and as she clambered to her feet. Her inner thighs screamed at her, drowning out the other pains.
“Put those on and grab your nag,” ordered Diagus, nodding to the boots he had dropped in front of her. “We’ll have breakfast once we’re on the move.”
By the time the sun had risen above the fields and trees, they were making their way back to the road. They would have been well on their way already if Daisy hadn’t kept running off whenever Elora got within a few feet of her. Much to the amusement of Otholo who had easily caught and saddled his horse, laughing as Elora stumbled through the thick grass. It was only when Elora growled at the nuisance mare and threatened to send her to the knacker’s yard that Daisy let her put the bridle over her head. But not before painfully nipping at her shoulder.
Breakfast consisted of dried bread and a large wedge of cheese which Diagus cut from the wheel he had stolen.
By the afternoon they had swapped the road for a country lane with tall hedges to either side, broken occasionally with steel gates leading to fields. The stiffness in Elora’s legs had finally abated and with the sun warming her face she found the gentle motion of Daisy, mixed with the creaking of the leather saddle, pleasant. Under different circumstances she may have enjoyed the ride, even with the moody mare attempting to bite the other horses whenever their rumps came within reach.
“So where are we heading?” Otholo asked.
Diagus stretched his neck to the side, making a sharp clicking sound. “Rams Keep.”
“Never heard of it. What awaits us at Rams Keep?” asked the Bard.
“Why would you have heard of it? It’s a secret place, a bolt-hole that the Shadojaks have been using for centuries. There’ll be food, shelter, supplies.”
“Girls?” cut in Otholo, excitedly.
“A girl, and one that you’d best keep your hands off or she’s as like to take them, along with your stones.”
Otholo produced his bottle of cognac that never appeared to be too far from hand and swallowed a mouthful. “We’ll see what she does with my stones after she’s heard me sing. Maybe the ballad of the piebald swan – it never fails to get the ladies swooning.” He gave a mischievous wink to Elora. “Did I mention that I was the personal songbird to King...”
“Yes,” Elora and Diagus said together, much to the detriment of Otholo.
“Sing what you will peacock, but you’ve been warned.”
Otholo took another swig of his drink, feigned indifference and picked the pace up, trotting in front of them.
“Will Bray be there?” asked Elora, trying to feign indifference herself but felt her face grow warm when she said his name.
“Like as not, if the boy’s got any sense that’s where he’ll be.”
Otholo suddenly stopped, his cob’s hooves scraping against the road, steel upon asphalt. Elora looked passed the bard to see why he had halted and saw a large white strip of plastic, scorched and smelling of petrol, laying above the hedgerow.
She thought it a kind of long flat roof at first, an unusual thing to see across the road, sleek and panelled with tendrils of smoke billowing from its edge. Then she recognised it for what it was. The wing from a large aircraft, but where was the plane itself?
