17 :: Terror-blind

It didn’t take long for Nora to parse through the papers she found. Her gains were considerable. The records showed that at the time of Henrick’s disappearance, he had been in the process of scouring the underground city and its surrounding area for whatever device or magical artifact had been causing people to be transported here. Thus far, his efforts had been met with disappointment. Nothing in the frustrated scribbles seemed to indicate that Henrik was afraid of anything. There was absolutely nothing to suggest his fate.

Nora took a bite from some kind of salty dried meat. Vigdis had been by at some point this morning and had left a plate of food for her. There had been a couple of small fruits, but the majority of the plate had been salted meat. Nora couldn’t complain. It had been awhile since her last meal, and though her pebble-crushing had done wonders for restoring her energy reserves, it had left her stomach empty.

She rolled a pebble between her fingers as her other hand thumbed idly through the pages. The biggest find of the evening by far was a record of correspondence between Henrik and a man named Wilbur Iskam. This man appeared to be the Warden of a neighboring realm. He had been sent to the Outer Realms along with Henrik in order to investigate some of the recent abnormal happenings.

The letters had revealed much about the Wardens’ activities in this region. It seemed that multiple realms in this region had been experiencing abnormalities. Nora was surprised to note that the two had been sent to investigate nearly ten years ago. This was well before the Wardens began disappearing, according to Kurt. The disappearances seemed to be little more than the most recent chronicle in a long history of oddities plaguing the Outer Realms. Several other realms had experienced mass disappearances, but surprisingly, this was the only realm where people had been appearing. All of the people who had appeared on the white plains had come from other realms, but none of those realms could be found in the Outer Realms.

Nora frowned to herself as she creased her eyebrows. She flicked the edge of the paper absentmindedly. The research in these papers was something. It helped her get a little better grasp on the situation, but it wasn't enough. It was clear that this Wilbur was her best shot at continuing her investigation. The correspondence clearly indicated the identifying code of the realm where he was located, and she had recovered enough energy over the course of the night to reach it. She would liked to have spent more time investigating the appearance phenomenon, but she needed to keep her priorities in mind. She needed Wilbur to find the missing Wardens. Her next step was clear. She pulled a blank sheet of paper from the desk and jotted down a quick note to Vigdis. She would leave immediately.

Nora threw the remaining scraps of meat, as well as some of Henrik’s letters, into her storage dimension and heaved her rucksack over her shoulder, marveling briefly at how much the weight had decreased during the evening. She would have to gamble on the attire of the next realm yet again but hopefully her usual nondescript traveling cloak wouldn’t seem out of place. Reaching for the next realm inside her mind, she closed her eyes. When she opened them, she was in a dark alley. The sounds of the city echoed around her. She reasoned that this must be a relatively modern realm. This complicated things a bit. Schools were much more difficult to find in cities. The bigger the city, the harder to navigate.

A look at the sky confirmed that it was, indeed, nighttime. Steam rose from drainage grates set into the concrete, painting the crumbling bricks and rusting metal wet with condensation. Her leather boots tread softly over the grates. Each step clanged and crunched as she hurried along the alley, but the sounds disappeared unnoticed into the clamor of the city. Anybody could tell that this wasn’t a good part of the city and she wanted to put it behind her as fast as possible. She was far more likely to encounter trouble than a school down here.

She turned a corner and headed up a short flight of steps. The new street appeared to be more well-traveled. Brightly glowing signs could be seen illuminating the street from either side. Small tables were set up outside shops where fat old men sat on stools eating a wide assortment of foods as they played games with cards or dice. A couple children giggled amongst themselves as they chased some kind of large, filthy, rabbit-like creature with a small set of antlers. Their mothers tutted to themselves as they browsed the wares of the various street vendors.

The people didn’t seem to belong to any one specific race. Their faces contained a broad range of features that differed drastically from person to person. Some had pale skin while others had dark. Nora wasn’t sure that she had ever seen such a wide assortment of hair colors. Their clothing was loose and hung from their bodies in layers, making little distinction between age or gender. The cloth itself was as vibrant as the people wearing it. The bright colors were covered in intricate patterns making each piece a work of art. Nora pulled her hood around her as she strolled leisurely down the street, doing her best to stand out as little as possible. She couldn’t make out what language the people were speaking, so she figured it must be some kind of hybrid language. The written words on the signs she observed seemed equally unfamiliar.

She continued to weave her way through the throng of pedestrians as she meandered along the street. Every once in awhile, she would find another staircase between buildings that led to the next tier, and so she would continue along that street until it too revealed a staircase. The city seemed to rise in layers like a cake. Up and up she climbed, the steam from the lower levels dissipating as small gusts of wind swept dirt and garbage into weak funnels that danced along the filthy cobbled streets. Though the climate was mild, the wind howled and groaned as it blew through the ramshackle buildings lining the streets. As she continued higher, her surroundings seemed to become cleaner and more hospitable.

Nora’s cloak billowed around her as she paused to catch her breath. A breath of wind blew past her cheek and she spun out of the way just in time to see an axe crash into the stone where she had been standing, sending up showers of chipped rock. Her eyes flickered up to meet the man wielding the axe. A seven foot tall barbarian with a thick beard of fiery red bellowed as he hoisted the enormous steel weapon back into the air.

“I have been waiting for you, fiend!” he snarled in Latin as he sent the axe crashing back into the earth at Nora’s feet. His eyes trembled with fear and each shudder that passed through his body sent his axe careening off target. Nora swept her legs out of the way and adopted a ready stance. The Latin confused her. She had been certain that none of the natives of this world had been speaking Latin as she wandered the streets. A few shouts rose from the surrounding crowd confirming that Latin was not the local language. Shouts became cheers and within a few seconds, a ring of raucous spectators had formed around the two.

“I mean you no harm!” Nora shouted back over the din of the crowd, raising her hands in surrender.

“You killed them all, demon! I know you! You won't get me, though! I’ve been waiting for you!” the man raved as he continued his wild swinging. “I'm the last one left and I'm going to kill you if it takes all I've got!”

“I don't know what you're talking about!” Nora shouted between dodging blows. Her words met the attacker’s ears like a brick wall, forcing her to make the difficult decision to change her strategy. Her hands reached for her waist, fingers curling around the grips of her pistols.

“Don’t move!” she demanded, slinging them out in front of her. “I’ll shoot!” The man stood poised with his axe high above him, ready to swing down at any second. He looked down at the pistols resting inches away from his chest. Fury glazed his eyes over as he swung. Nora froze, stunned by his response. She managed to roll out of the way just in time.

“What are you doing?” she screamed, “Stop!”

The blows continued, unceasingly. Panic painted Nora’s vision white as each swing brought the axe closer and closer. Her dodges became less and less precise as the fear of death eroded her composure. Her feet began to trip over themselves. The jeers of the crowd grew louder and louder, drowning her thoughts in a sea of noise and adrenaline.

As suddenly as they began, the blows stopped. Nora stumbled to her feet, frantically glancing about in an effort to disclose the location of her attacker. The gazes of the crowd led her to a patch of cobblestone where blood was beginning to pool. Their voices had fallen silent at the sight of the much-larger man who had fallen for seemingly no reason. In the center of his left breast, a clean hole could be seen reaching all the way through the body.

Nora glanced at the pistol in her hand. She didn’t remember pulling the trigger. She hadn’t felt the recoil, and yet, here a man laid dead from wounds that it had clearly caused. She cautiously approached the man, the spectators granting her a wide berth, their fearful eyes fixated on the devices in her hands. It was her first time killing a man and it had been accidental.

As she neared, she inhaled sharply. The man had been wearing a leather vest over a loose crimson and gold patterned shirt. As he had fallen, the leather vest had fallen back to reveal a glossy, bronze badge depicting a four-pointed star set within a Möbius strip. Her attacker had been a Warden, and most likely, the man she had come here to find: Wilbur Iskam. Nora reached down and pulled the badge from his chest, stowing it in her pocket. She patted down the rest of his body, looking for anything else that might be useful. Finding nothing, she turned around and began to walk away from the body. Without any regard for her surroundings, she disappeared into her personal realm, leaving the small crowd that had gathered gaping in bewilderment.