Three

It was obviously Eric's room, although it appeared more like a small, well furnished apartment, with a sofa and a TV and... and a large oblong where a bed must have once been. But now there was Nothing. In fact, now there was an awful lot of Nothing. The void in his bed's place had grown tendrils which thrashed around the room desperately, like an injured octopus.

'It knows,' breathed Hank, 'it knows he's missing.'

'A portal.' Bobby lifted Uni up out of the bag, cradling her in his arms. 'Whaddya suppose it's trying to do?'

'Put the right people in the right places, I guess...' Diana trailed off, distracted by her own name on the page of an open book on the floor. She stooped to pick it up.

'But Eric's still not here,' added Presto, 'maybe he can't find it where he is.'

Dead men aren't renowned for finding portals...

Hank squeezed his eyes, forcing the thought from his mind.

'And I'm not just gonna hand Uni over to that thing,' Bobby stated, 'how do I know that she'll end up someplace safe?'

Diana snapped the small book shut and slipped it into her jeans pocket along with her shrunken staff.

'OK, so I guess we all go in after him, like we planned in the lake.' She stepped towards the flailing portal, wiping a small buildup of sweat from her forehead as she did.

Sheila caught her wrist.

'You OK, Diana? You look kinda flushed.'

'Um...' Diana stalled. She really didn't want to start broadcasting her discovery. Her many discoveries. She had only flicked through Eric's journal briefly and already she had learned much more than she was ever supposed to about her missing friend, about the way he felt about his parents and his friends and her friends, and her. She didn't want to say that the last thing she had looked at before the pages became blank had been an entry about why he was going to the funfair with the geeky amateur magician and his bunch of goody-two-shoes friends. She didn't want to tell the others that she now knew why Presto had been so ready to blame her for Eric's absence. She should have spotted it. It was so obvious. And why did he pick that stupid flower in the first place? Who was he trying to impress? She couldn't help but agree that it was, kind of, her fault.

'Let's just get that dumb kid out of there while we can, huh?' she said eventually, with false cheer, 'who knows what trouble he's got himself into by now.'

They had no opportunity to venture any closer to the portal. At that moment, it found them. It wrapped its tendrils around them, first Uni, then the others, crackling with recognition as it touched their weapons.

Automatically, they screamed, but the thrashing portal was deaf to them and sucked them into its gaping mouth.

And they fell out of the other side, dressed in their Realm clothes as before, to tumble helplessly into the sands of a vast, empty desert.

-x-

'Eric?'

'Eric!'

'ERIC!'

Bobby slumped back into the sand, scratching at the leather straps covering his chest. 'I'm telling ya, he's not anywhere near here.'

Hank pulled at his own costume. He'd almost forgotten how hot and heavy his leather tunic could get.

'But it makes sense that he would be nearby. The portal was where his bed used to be. It had to be for him.'

'I think Bobby's right this time, Hank.' Sheila sat down next to her brother. 'There's nothing as far as the eye can see but sand.' She picked up a handful of sand to make the point, letting it slip through her fingers and blow away in the slight wind. 'See?'

The group fell silent. Sheila dug her fingers down into the sand again. But this time they struck something smooth and metal. Her eyes widened.

The other side of Bobby, Uni began to bleat, softly and mournfully.

Bobby patted his pet's mane. 'What's up, Uni?'

At the same time, Hank crouched down next to Sheila. 'What is it?'

He watched her eyes as she gazed at him, her mouth opening and closing silently as she slowly pulled the steel boot from the sand.

She didn't look at it at first, and the others didn't notice it straight away. For a moment, he was the only one staring at the empty, buried boot, hoping it wasn't Eric's, knowing that it was.

I knew it! He didn't make it.

Despair began to form a heavy, black ball in the pit of his stomach.

'No!' It was Presto who cried out, alerting the others. Suddenly they were all crowding around the retrieved boot.

'Sheila,' gasped Diana, 'where did you get that?'

Tears were beginning to well in Sheila's eyes. 'It was under the sand. Right here.'

Uni was nuzzling the patch of sand next to Sheila, bleating sadly. As she agitated the sand with her nose, more shining metal became visible.

'Oh no.' Presto pulled another boot from the sand, then golden gauntlets and finally, miserably, a golden breastplate.

'It's not necessarily his...' muttered Sheila, hopefully.

Diana dug a little deeper into the sand, then stopped. She pulled a shirt and leggings from the ditch, both bright blue chainmail. With bitter tears brightening her eyes, she threw the chainmail far from her with all her might. It landed noisily in the sand as she stifled a sob behind her hands.

Hank gazed at them all, then, scowling at the sand, took his turn to dig. If there was anything else to find under there, he would rather he find it than anybody else.

Bobby stood up, fearfully. 'What are you looking for, Hank?'

Hank didn't answer, but scrabbled furiously at the sand with his fingers.

'Hank? What's down there?'

Nothing. There was nothing else. He supposed he should have been relieved, but it only raised further questions.

'His shield's not there,' sighed Hank, 'neither's his cape.'

'But...' choked Diana, 'but is he...'

'No.' Hank cut Diana off before any of the others could take the time to consider what she had meant.

'I don't get it,' sighed Presto, still toying with one of the boots, 'what does all of this mean?'

'Well,' replied Hank, 'I guess it kinda explains why the portal can't find Eric. It looks like he left the lion's share of the Cavalier in the middle of this desert for some reason.' Hank paused. 'It also means that wherever he went from here, he wasn't wearing much. I can't pretend that fills me with confidence.'

'At least he still had his shield,' piped Sheila.

'Unless someone took it from him,' added Bobby.

'Oh.' The others contemplated this.

Hank sighed, the despair in his belly growing larger and thicker.

He was a sitting duck, out here. Somebody took his shield, then stripped him, then...

He squeezed his eyes again, trying to block out the horrendous mental images that were flashing before them.

'So what do we do?' asked Sheila.

Opening his eyes, Hank became aware that the others were all looking at him. He cleared his throat, and tried to do the same to his mind.

'Well, we go out and find him.' (Or what's left of him...) 'We can't just stay in this desert forever, anyway.'

'So what?' Presto got to his feet, dropping the boot. 'Just walk?'

Hank shrugged as confidently as possible, scanning the horizon as he did. 'Sure. We're bound to find a town, or an oasis, or... something...'

So they walked. And they walked. And nothing came along. No town, no oasis. Nothing but more sand and the bright, hot suns. Their attempts to divine water with the bow were unsuccessful this time, and the more dehydrated and exhausted Presto got, the more useless the objects he pulled from his hat became. The suns set, and after a few sleepless hours huddling together against the freezing night, they decided to carry on walking anyway. By dawn, Uni could walk no more, and Hank began carrying her over his shoulder, ignoring Bobby's protestations that he wanted to carry her. The suns had been up for about three hours when Presto collapsed. Uni was passed to Diana and Hank took most of the young Magician's weight over his shoulder. It was about noon when Sheila went, and Diana helped carry the slim redhead, finally allowing Bobby to carry his pet as he'd wished. Five minutes later, however, he too sank to his knees. Hank turned around to the child just in time to see Diana faint under the burden of Sheila's weight.

Well, you can't very well carry them all.

His head felt light. He was suddenly aware that he had dropped Presto. The boy was curled up in the baking sand, moaning faintly.

No...

That wasn't Presto moaning.

That was him.

Hank's knees buckled. He was vaguely aware that he was falling, and all at once there was sand against his face. He couldn't cry. He didn't have the fluid to spare. Where was everyone? Where was Dungeon Master? Where was Eric? Dead, of course. Why had they gone back? Why had they let him go back in the first place? And now they were going to die out here, oh God they were going to die...

A large shadow fell over him.

'What's this?'

Hank blinked, following the shadow. It ended in a pair or leather boots, which in turn ended in a pair of dark suede breeches. Above that, he could see no more.

A pair of hands grabbed Hank by the shoulders and pulled him to his feet. His head reeled. He could see all of the man now, framed in the bright sunlight. The man's torso was covered with a purple linen shirt, and his head with a strange turban that also veiled most of his face. Dark, kohl-lined eyes smiled at him kindly from the small gap in the turban.

'Desert waifs, lazing around in the sand?' The man's voice was comforting. The accent was strange, partly that particular cross between American and English that Hank referred to as 'Realmic' and partly something close to Arabic. It was familiar to Hank, but he had no idea how.

'We can't have that now, can we?'

Hank, disorientated, merely shook his head.

The stranger laughed, fondly as he gently lowered Hank back down to a seated position.

'You're so young,' he muttered into his veil.

'Huh..?'

The strange man shot him an embarrassed glance. 'Nothing. Forget I spoke.' He took a gourd from his belt and opened the stopper.

'Here,' he said, bringing the gourd to Hank's lips. 'I'm afraid I can't get you all to my caravan in this condition. One of you, perhaps...'

Hank batted the gourd away from his lips. 'No. There are others who need help more than me.'

'I know that.' The eyes smiled behind the mask again. 'That's why I need you to regain your strength and help me get the others back safely.'

'Oh.' Hank took a sip of the liquid as the stranger continued speaking.

'Don't worry, Hank,' he murmured quietly, 'I won't leave anyone behind.'

Hank's face twisted up in disgust at the drink. 'It's salty!'

The stranger caught the gourd and brought it back to Hank's protesting mouth.

'You don't just lose water when you dehydrate, you know. This solution's got minerals and nutrients that you'll be lacking.' He made him take another gulp. 'In other words, stop complaining and drink up. It's good for you.'

The stranger, satisfied that Hank had drank enough for now, stood and picked his way over to the others, flinging a large kerchief from tucked under his belt to the Ranger.

'Cover your head,' he ordered, 'you're probably getting sunstroke.'

Hank tied the kerchief as a bandana over his head, watching as the stranger knelt down next to the faintly groaning Barbarian with the gourd of foul, salty water. Hank was sure that, as the man helped Bobby to his elbows to drink, he said the boy's name. He frowned, remembering something the man had said earlier.

'You know our names.'

The turbaned stranger glanced across at him as he forced the younger boy to drink.

'Yes.'

'How?' Hank paused. 'We... don't know you, do we?'

'Do you?'

Hank stared at the man. 'I don't think so.'

'Well, you're the best judge as to whether you know me or not, aren't you.'

Hank nodded. 'So, how do you know who we are?'

'Oh,' the man's eyes smiled again, and seemed to glaze over with a faraway look. 'There are stories of your adventures. A boy was brought to my palace. He told long tales of the great things he did with a group of five children, and a unicorn.'

'Really?' spluttered Bobby through the liquid.

'Yes. Really.' The stranger got up again, and walked over to the fallen girls.

'Was he dark haired,' asked Hank, at once excited at the Eric Trail becoming hot again and concerned at the past tense that the man was using to describe him, 'about my height, carrying a shield?'

The stranger didn't answer him. He was kneeling by Diana, trying to shake her into consciousness.

'Kinda snotty and negative?' added Hank, hopefully.

'Self obsessed?' chipped in Bobby, 'Never knows when to shut up?'

The man turned to them, thoughtfully, the unconscious Acrobat still in his arms. 'Sounds like him.'

'Well, that was Eric!' Hank tried to stand, excitedly, but a wave of dizziness forced him back down to his knees.

'That's who we're looking for,' Bobby continued.

Sheila moaned slightly in the stranger's shadow. He shifted his attention from Diana to her, helping her up and bringing the gourd to her slack, dry lips.

'Do you know where we can find him?' asked Hank.

The stranger didn't turn from Sheila.

'He's gone.'

There was that lump of despair in Hank's gut again.

I knew it! I knew it!

'He... he left?' Bobby asked.

'No.' The man turned to them again, just as Sheila opened her eyes.

'Eric...' Sheila whispered, 'Eric's... dead?'

The stranger took another kerchief from his belt and tied it as a headscarf over Sheila's copper hair, not meeting her eyes.

'I didn't say that. But that boy you described is gone. You shan't see him again.'

Sheila's eyes had begun to tear up again. 'What do you m..?'

But the man cut her off, turning back to the empty desert and letting out a loud, foreign cry.

'Akhalakhalakhala-Hai!' He stood, clapping his hands and crying out again, then paused, scanning the horizon.

'They're coming back,' he informed them, mysteriously. 'Stupid birds.'

He stooped and patted Presto's cheek. The bespectacled boy didn't respond.

'Out for the count,' he muttered, 'endurance never really was his thing...'

Before Hank could say anything, he became aware of large creatures approaching them at great speed. The stranger strode out to meet them - three huge, brown land birds, like giant Rheas, saddled and reigned. As wild as they seemed, they stopped tamely in front of the man, who patted the largest one on the beak, and muttered to it gently in a strange, unrecognisable language.

The man turned to the group again.

'It's a pity I can't get Diana to wake up,' he told them, going back to the Acrobat in question, 'I suppose she's been overdoing it again.' Barely pausing in his speech, he scooped the girl up into his arms and began to carry her over to the largest Rhea. 'Sheila, you and Bobby take Uni on the one with the black saddle, she's the tamest. Hank, if you can take Presto on the other one, that would be great. Don't worry, they're easy to ride.' He swung the unconscious girl onto the back of the largest Rhea, resting her between its saddle and its long neck. The man cocked his head at her. 'Hmm. That felt strangely satisfying...'

Sheila frowned, stepping in to Hank a little.

'Um... Do we know you?'

The turbaned man laughed, fondly, again. 'You know, I just love the way you guys keep asking me that.'

He turned back to Sheila and, finally, met her eyes.

She stared. He had disguised them with a lining of black Kohl, as he had the rest of him with strange clothes, a mask and a thick Arabic accent, but she knew those eyes, dark and fiery and full of mischief. There was no mistaking them. No wonder he hadn't looked straight at her before. Her heart leaped.

'Eric!'

Eric laughed as she bounded towards him, and caught her in a tight hug, swinging her around and marvelling at how small and light she was.

'There was never any fooling you, was there, Sheila?'

'Eric.' Hank wanted to cry with relief about as much as he wanted to punch that dumb kid for stringing them out for so long. 'But you... you said...'

'That's not Eric,' interrupted Bobby. 'He's too big. And his voice is all wrong.'

'I have picked up a bit of an accent, I'll admit.' Eric set Sheila down, his Middle-Eastern accent not wavering. 'And you can put my size down to a wonderful trick of Mother Nature's known as "Growing Up".' His eyes shone at Bobby from behind his mask. 'Maybe someday you'll experience it for yourself, Shortstuff.'

Bobby groaned, rolling his eyes. 'That's Eric, all right.'

Hank eyed Eric with concern. He was much bigger. He'd grown another good half a foot and, while staying fairly slim, had put on a fair bit of muscle. He had a dark tan, and what looked like a large, reddish triangular tattoo on his left hand. And he'd lost his American accent. It seemed that his fears regarding the timescales had been right. Eric had been in the Realm without them for some while.

'Eric...' he muttered, apologetically, 'there's something you should know about Earth and the Realm...'

'Time moves quicker here,' interjected Eric, calmly. 'Yes, I worked that one out when I met Jimmy Whitticker.' He paused. 'Out of curiosity, how long has it been on Earth?'

'Not twenty four hours,' replied Hank.

Eric nodded, stoically.

'And you?' Hank was dreading the answer. He knew it was going to be a long time. 'Six months? Twelve months? More?'

Eric burst into peals of his old hysterical, mocking laughter, although the unkind edge his laugh used to have had been lost along the line somewhere. Still, it made Hank feel uncomfortable.

'Yes, Hank,' he replied, eventually, wiping a Kohl-blackenned tear of amusement from his eye, 'it's been longer.'

Eric paused, then removed his turban.

Hank gasped, his head becoming light again, and Sheila stumbled faintly back into him.

Eric smiled sadly at them, now unveiled.

'It's been fifteen years.'

-x-

Diana stirred into consciousness. She could feel soft, padded silk beneath her. She was warm, but shaded. She moved her hand and felt the silken cushions she was lying on. There was a hand behind her head, pulling her up and bringing a cup of a lukewarm, sweet liquid to her lips.

'Peppermint tea,' murmured a man with a soft, Arabic accent, 'it'll be good for your headache, and a lot nicer than the concoction I was able to offer the others earlier, believe me.'

She opened her eyes, groggily. The tent was small and dark. She could make out Presto, lying unconsciously at the other side of the tent. Apart from him, the only other person there was the man cradling her head and feeding her the tea. She squinted at him. He was dark - Caucasian, but heavily tanned, and around thirty. Longish locks of glossy black hair grew down to his shoulders, strands of it falling over his darkly lined eyes. He had a short beard - a length somewhere between not bothering to shave for a few days and a full facial hairstyle. Her eye was drawn to a tattoo on the back of the hand holding the cup. A triangular pattern of complicated swirls in a Henna brown cascaded from the point between his middle and ring finger down to his wrist. It was pretty. He had good hands. She could feel that the insides of his thumbs and forefingers were slightly calloused, but besides that they were soft, slim and long fingered. Artist's hands, her mother used to call them.

She sat up a little.

'Where are the others?'

He hushed her, gently pushing her back onto her elbows.

'Getting some much needed rest,' he replied, 'as should you. It's a long ride back to the palace tomorrow.'

'But we...' she tried to get up again, but he stopped her. 'We need to find our friend.'

Eric pushed her head back onto the cushion, his face falling into the light as he did.

'He found you, Diana.'

'Eric.'

Eric set the cup down and took her hand. 'Hi.'

For a moment she couldn't speak. Dumbfounded, she gasped as tears began to roll freely down her cheeks, dampening her ears.

'Eric...' she managed to croak, eventually, '...you got old!'

Eric tutted, releasing her hand. 'Thirty is not "old", thankyou very much...'

'But...' she stammered, 'but what happened to your face... your voice?'

'You know me and my fads,' he smiled at her, 'I'm always going in for the latest beards, the latest eye makeup, the latest accents. Anything to stay fashionable.'

'You...' she finally found herself able to meet his smile. 'You're looking good.'

'Thanks.' He began pouring more tea from the nearby pot. 'Although since the last time you saw me I was an amphibian, an improvement in looks wouldn't be difficult.'

He passed her the filled cup again, which she accepted.

She drank the sweet concoction, watching Eric remoisten the towel on Presto's forehead with cold water and swab his mouth with tea.

'I found your journal,' she told him when he had finished.

'Really?' Eric didn't seem too bothered.

She retrieved the small book from under her belt and held it out towards him.

'In your bedroom. It was open.' She looked away, embarrassed. 'I saw my name, so I... read some of it. I'm sorry.'

Eric made no attempt to take the journal from her. 'It's OK, Diana. I'd probably read a diary that had things about me in it, too.' He paused. 'I take it you read a lot of the parts about yourself, then.'

Diana nodded.

'Don't tell me it came as a surprise to you,' he added.

Diana nodded again, apologetically.

'Really.' Eric cocked an eyebrow. 'Now that is surprising. I thought it was obvious. I was hardly Captain Subtlety in my youth.'

'I never knew.' She hesitated. 'Did anybody else?'

Eric smiled calmly down at the comatose Magician, and swabbed his mouth again.

'Presto guessed. I only really needed the one confidante. Anybody else would have probably laughed in my face.'

Diana shook her head. 'So now what?'

Eric shuffled over to sit next to her. 'Well, now you get some rest, and in the morning we'll have some breakfast, pack up camp and go back to the palace until we can work out some kind of long term plan.'

'No.' She reached out and took Eric's hand. 'What now with us?'

Eric sighed, putting an arm around her shoulders. 'Oh, Diana...'

''Cause when I said you were looking good, I meant it,' continued Diana, nervously, 'I mean, I really meant it. And since I read about how you feel about me, I've kinda been thinking about it, especially since I thought I'd lost you, and...'

'Oh, Diana,' reiterated Eric, pressing his head against hers. 'Believe me, Honey, there's a fifteen year old boy deep inside of me that's so happy at what you're saying, he's doing cartwheels. With triple backflips and somersaults.' He brushed a strand of hair away from her face. 'But that's only half of what I am nowadays.'

'I'm not just some little kid,' cried Diana, 'and you said yourself, thirty isn't that old...'

'It isn't just the age...'

Diana slumped, letting the journal fall to the floor. 'You've gone off me.'

Eric laughed slightly. 'Have you seen yourself recently, Diana? I will never "go off you". I'm not insane.'

He took her hand in both of his, and met her eyes, seriously.

'But I am married.'