Chapter Two
Alexandra opened her eyes to a dark green landscape, felt something flat, and spongy beneath her, and breathed in a breath of fresh air.
Moments earlier she had felt pressure as though she were underwater – but now this calm, clarity – it stole the dazed stupor she had felt in the wood and let her past life creep back into mind.
Suddenly she knew who she was and where she had come from much better, and so she stood, and turned to look around, and saw him.
He was still beside her – but she, unconsciously, had let go of his hand.
A thousand questions flooded her mind, and she was startled at her own rapidity to break the tranquility.
"Who are you?" she asked. "What am I doing here!" (the second, because she already somewhat knew the answer, was more of an exclamation, just to get it out of her system.)
He looked up at her with startled blue eyes, and then weakly stood, gasping a little, as though he had trouble breathing.
"I'm Nihl – and you never told me your name, either." He had a very quiet voice, and after he spoke, if they had not both been breathing somewhat loudly or quickly, there could have been no other sound so soft in the entire world.
"Alexandra," she said, almost stumbling over her own name. Then she paused.
"Where's this? 'Wild London'?"
He looked very serious, as if he couldn't tell that she was being sarcastic.
"Have you been here before?"
She turned.
"No. I mean—" and then she just stopped, and started walking, looking upward, instead of at her feet. He trailed after her, a few feet apart, and followed her gaze.
The great trees around them were very thick, very, very large – and yet not so tall. One had only to stand on the tips of their toes and reach very hard upward to touch the spread of foliage coming from the thick branches.
As she remembered things from home, and America (and places on Earth), Alex thought that the trees were very much like extremely large Bonsai trees, those tiny little plants that you can buy at plants shops, that are supposed to have come from Japan. But now, of course, there didn't really seem to be any Japan.
That made her think, then, for one horrible, cold-insides moment, that perhaps in this world the ways were like those her own world, only she was more than ten times smaller than everything else Smaller than people and animals – and trees.That seemed horrible, and instantly she jerked her hand to the pocket on the breast of her coat that held the green ring, and felt, just to make sure it was still there.
A little bit assured, she looked back at Nihl.
"Come on," she said (because she had nothing better to say), and then started walking again.
He followed her over the thick green ground – which, you could say, was covered with grass – but not really, because it was more like a very dense, yet spongy, moss that was very dark green, and did not reveal any brown dirt beneath it. It looked hard, as far as the eye went, but it was actually quite soft, and somewhat squishy, almost as though someone had gone through the little wood and carpeted the whole thing with that rich, deep green color.
They walked for a time, unspeaking, and both, maybe, liked it that way, or at least for a while.
But after many minutes passed, it grew in the heads of both that the other might not like them, and that was why it was so silent. But yet neither could think of anything really meaningful to say, so it continued being that way, until they were both very glad when things changed a little.
Alexandra stopped walking first, for she was in the lead, and tilted her chin upward a bit, because this new view was very tall.
It was a great stone building, and one couldn't help feeling that it was somewhat like a temple. The material was dark grey, and there was not much space between the walls and the great double doors leading inside the building. They were so tall that it might have taken twenty men standing on each others' shoulders to touch the top – and this reminded Alexandra of a previous thought of hers, the one about giants, and things being larger here than in her world.
But the building was so very unlike any building in her world that she thought perhaps this was not a good assumption.
It was not just plain dark grey – for there were bright, glowing cerulean stripes that went straight up and down and around it, and bent sometimes, out of the way, for square-ish patterns and symbols – but always got back to going straight again.
As she observed this, she had a funny feeling that she was missing something. She finally realized what it was, as suddenly the large door began to rumble, as though it would collapse – for there were two small, silver rings near the bottom of the door. They were door handles, and far too low for a giant to reach. Now, they were turning, shaking…
Quite unexpectedly, they spun away and disappeared, right into the dark grey material they had been part of – and the great doors, instead of swing dramatically open, slid mechanically aside, vanishing – and most unexpected of all came someone very small, down the enormous dark grey stairs.
She stepped very lightly, her large, light blue kimono swishing against her hidden legs. Not even her hands or feet showed beneath its length.
Her hair was fair and golden, and pulled into two tight buns, symmetrically placed on either side of her head, just above, and a little behind her ears. She had a few shorter strands of hair in the front that were too short to put up, and this swayed freely in the light breeze at the frame of her face.
Her eyes were a bit downcast, and her lips were moving, as though she were talking to someone. But there didn't appear to be anyone there beside her…
Her hands, which had been pressed together under the folds of fabric that covered them in front of her, went to her sides, and she called out:
"Alowan!"
In a sharp, but light voice, so that both Alexandra and Nihl stopped, and somewhat jumped, because they knew that she was talking to them.
She shuffled forward, keeping her hands at her sides, and bowed low to them.
"Visitors from Akharashafin?" she said, putting her hands back in front of her and raising her head.
The two before her were dumbfounded.
"You speak Zamachein?" she asked, seeing their blank expressions.
This time Nihl stepped forward, looking very shy, and more worn, now that they were in broad daylight, and the sun of mid-morn.
"I – I'm actually looking for something, Miss."
"Oh?" she asked, with a soft, sweet voice.
"Yes, but—" he faltered, as though there was a lack of words in his vocabulary for him to express himself with.
"It is mid-morn, is it not?" she asked, "and you must be hungry, no?"
"No, I just ate dinner," Alexandra mumbled, and Nihl thought silently for a moment, and then said; "Where I come from, it is the middle of the night. But that isn't…" again he paused, as though unable to speak, or out of breath.
"You have taken a long journey, then, from a capitol, hhn!" she exclaimed, surprise in her bright blue eyes. "Come, you must dine with my clan."
The two looked a little surprised as she started away, but they followed, anyhow, into the great dark grey building.
The first hallway they passed through was filled with cerulean blue doors, the colors of the patterns on the front of the building. The second (in between which was a large, round, empty room, except for a blue square in the middle of it, and a few vases in notches in the walls) was filled with blue patterns, and was much shorter. At the end of this hall, there was a turn to the left, and at the right, where there was no turn, a blue square, on the wall, a little higher than the average height of a person's head.
The way they took, to the left, led into a short hallway, and a very large, circular room again. But in the middle of the room was a low, blue table. Around the table were four beings – a fair skinned, grey haired man (who somehow resembled their guide), a ragged youth with olive skin and black, slick hair, and a creature. Sitting, with the old man at the right head of the table, the dragon to his right, and the young man a seat down from the man's left, by himself.
The creature was the first to turn and greet them.
"Alowan, Candock, guests," it said, nodding in first to the girl, and second to the two behind her. "Are we ready to breakfast?"
"Yes, Ogwatchu," Candock said, sitting beside the scaly beast on one of the square blue cushions.
Alexandra and Nihl warily seated themselves at the last two remaining seats, Alexandra beside the kind girl, leaving Nihl to go around and sit at the left of the grey-haired man, beside the dark looking youth.
As soon as they were all seated, the grey-haired man bowed his head, and the others did the same – Alexandra and Nihl quickly emulating the action.
"Dearest Master," the man said softly. "Thank You for this meal which we about to receive by the grace of Your hand. Let it nourish and strengthen us. And please be with these our new guests, and thank You for bringing them here – by Your unbroken will."
Alexandra, who felt somewhat familiar with the short speech (she would have called it a prayer, or blessing) was waiting for the man to say "Amen" at the end. But when he didn't she cautiously looked around, and saw that the others had all unfolded their hands and raised their heads, and she did the same.
"So, my two young friends, what brings you to Zamachei, and the house of my clan-Louz?"
Alexandra realized he was speaking to her, but she was already so bewildered with the whole few past events that she was really quite dazed. She felt like a character in a fiction novel, and thought maybe it was how she ought to act.
"We're on a… quest," she said (which was really how she almost did think of, for Nihl had said he was looking for… something, and that was a good enough quest, for her. She felt that she ought to help him out – he seemed so gentle, and dazed…).
The man looked like he was waiting for a little something at the end, so she quickly added: "Sir."
This didn't seem to be quite what he was looking for, but he allowed it to pass.
"A quest, from Akharashafin, ahn?" he seemed to wait a moment for a response, but then continued again when none was heard. "…And what noble capitol is it that you come from?"
"…W-Welkin," Nihl said.
"Earth," Alexandra said.
They had both misunderstood the question.
The man looked somewhat confused, his brow furrowed.
"Are these… towns, then, ahn?"
The two seemed to realize their mistake.
"No… Sir-" Nihl stumbled, and then breathily added; "But it is where I come from."
"Hhn," the man said, and there was silence, where the two newcomers caught the feeling that they were all waiting for something.
There was a very curious silence – and then suddenly a slight rattling (Alexandra did not hear it), like the sound that silverware makes when you set it down on a wooden dinner table a little too quickly, vibrating – or when someone drops a dinner bowl from a small height, and it begins to spin…
And then suddenly, Oh!
In front of each seat at the table, in the little blue place squares, appeared six silver bowls, each filled with long, green noodles, and each with a pair of what might have been called chopsticks (also of silver) stuck in the very center of them.
The grey-haired man at the head of the table clapped his hands, and everyone picked up their chopsticks – except for Alexandra, who had reached for hers early, and then stopped halfway because it had seemed the wrong thing to do. So she was the last to reach back and grab her own – or so she thought.
Then they all leaned a bit forward, and ate with one hand holding the bowl against the table, one hand working the chopsticks.
No one seemed to have noticed, at this time, that Nihl had not taken up his bowl. He was sitting with his legs properly crossed under him, as everyone else – but he was slouching a little, and his eyes were at his hands, which were in his lap. His face looked rather green.
The first few moments of eating slowed a bit, until there was a little conversation.
"…You travelers, you know, are not the first to be strangers in clan-Louz," the scaly creature spoke, craning its long neck across the table to get a look at Alexandra with its large, green eyes.
She thought now, as she looked at it, that it was just like a little person-size dragon, one from fairytales, or right our of a picture-book illustration. But she was still frightfully anxious to talk to it, though she very much enjoyed talking with people who would start conversation – which was what the dragon was doing. Still, she was quiet, though, as it continued.
"This youth, there, from the looks of it, is a pure blood from Akharashafin. We found him in the Oubonzi forest, there, in front of clan-Louz – where Candock found you."
"Oh," Alexandra said, and used her chopsticks to pick up some noodles (she had been to Chinese restaurants many times before, and liked chopsticks) and eat them rather skillfully.
"He doesn't speak, though," the dragon added, glancing at the young man. "Perhaps… deaf and mute?"
The black-haired youth had already finished his bowl of noodles, and was sitting on the front edge of his cushion, his dark hands clasped in front of him below his empty bowl. None of them might have guessed that his dark eyes, hidden behind the greasy strands of his black hair, were watching the boy, Nihl, who sat to his right.
The dragon turned back to its food, and for a moment everything was silent as the others ate.
The youth leaned backward in his seat, then shifted back even farther, pushed a greasy strand away from his right eye, for a moment, and stared out of the corner of his eye at the boy, who sat frozen, but his body shaking.
The youth was breathing very heavily, and his eyes darted downward as though he were studying in his mind how to approach the situation. But he did not say a word.
One of his hands shifted, awkwardly across the table, grabbed the grey-haired man's left hand, and brought it down in a stiff action onto Nihl's hand.
The whole company turned to stare, and then was shocked.
Nihl's skin might have been defined as a whole new shade of green. His eyes were half closed, and he looked as if the faintest action would bring him to unconsciousness.
The man with the grey hair brought his light colored hand out of the youth's olive one and pressed it against the forehead of the younger boy.
He still did not utter a word as he stood fully, gently lifted Nihl and carried him out of the room.
Candock immediately rose, bowed away from the table, and ran in a fashion most un-lady-like into the hallway after the man. Alex jumped up too, because she already felt like she ought to have known that something was wrong the boy she took to this world. The dragon, Ogwatchu, leapt out of his seat and into the air on leathery wings, making also a sort of bow in the air before flying out of the room. Alex did not bow as she followed.
They all left the black haired youth sitting at his place in the table, gripping the hard material, looking down at his legs and breathing heavily.