The two of them trudged on purposefully through the gleaming twilight mists curling around the crumbling trees. The Twilight Woods, it was clear, had been ravaged even more thoroughly than the Eastern Woods. There were glades littered with crumbling logs and branches, as though many of the dead trees were disintegrating into nothing. Phraxdust and phraxcrystals gleamed on the rotten piles of wood like newly falling snow.
However, the mysterious half-light that flooded the forest was perfectly unchanged. Flett and Peatwood began to find their consciousness drift and meander, barely within their control.
"We must speak to each other," said Flett confidently, feeling a warm glow of comfort at his own words. Repeating them afforded him a sense of security. "That's all we have to do, to keep our minds. That's all. To keep our minds, we must speak to each other. If we speak to each other, we keep our minds. We keep…"
"Flett!" cried Peatwood, and Flett felt a shard of ice cascade into his stomach, despite the warmth of his surroundings. He had very nearly let his mind slip away. "I…I…" he spluttered.
"It's okay," said Peatwood reassuringly. "It could happen to anyone here. So many distractions. So many diversions. So many disruptions. So many disturbances. So many…"
"No, Peatwood!" Flett yelled. The woodtroll shook his head, looking a little confused. They passed a jumble of fallen trees, glittering with swirling sepia dust.
"There's only one way to retain our minds in here," said Peatwood, gazing around at the shafts of amber light streaming between still-standing groves of bare trees. "We must remind ourselves continuously of our identities and our destination. It's the one thing that will work."
Flett tried. He anxiously grasped at the knowledge that was threatening to slide away into blackness. "I am…I am Flett Grayle, of Ambristown. I have fled the Great Glade Military, and I seek a new life within the city of Omniphrax at the farthest tip of the Edge. I…I seek freedom."
"I…am Peatwood Timberslice, of Southern Outer City," Flett heard the voice murmuring tentatively from behind him. "I have escaped bondage in Great Glade, and I too wish to reach Omniphrax…in the name of my poor, lost parents, Barkley and Grenda."
They continued on in this manner for some time, each taking turns, each repeating their phrase, altering it slightly each time to ensure that they would retain the meaning, rather than the mere rote memorization of the words. It cost them a terrible effort to think clearly…it was rather like fighting to stay awake when one's eyelids were heavy as leadwood.
Visions popped out at them through the crumbling trees, often disrupting their concentration. Figures from Flett's former life leapt out at him, making tempting promises, but each time Flett forced himself to ignore the spirits. Peatwood, too, was just managing to keep the hallucinations out of his focus. They had no way of knowing how long they had been walking, as the Twilight Woods and its inhabitants were completely divorced from the flow of time. Had it been days? Weeks? Months?
The visions gradually became more aggressive. At one point, Flett was greeted with the sight of the sneering slaughterer from the Great Glade Military. "I'm rising through the ranks!" called the slaughterer. "The Empire is rewarding me! Do you find it unjust? Come…come give me what I deserve…"
When the image finally faded away, it was to be replaced with the sight of two people that made Flett cry out. The figure of Xelius Pulnix stood behind another man…a man Flett had never met in the flesh, but had seen many times on the news back in Ambristown. Not quite as tall as Governor Pulnix, but well-built, the man had a hard, square jaw, a sharp brow, and dark eyes.
"You are a traitor to the Empire," snarled the ghostly vision of Vartolius Xax. "You had it made, a loyal and dedicated servant primed all of your life for glory, and you threw it away on the lies of this woodtroll scum. You'll learn the truth of Omniphrax as soon as you arrive, Flett Grayle. You'll discover the ugly reality of the place you seek. You can never fit in anywhere! You are an enemy to the rebels, and a traitor to the Empire. You are nothing!"
"You're wrong!" screamed Flett, pointing a trembling finger at the Glorious Leader. "You are the liar, not Peatwood! You've lied to the entire Edge! You can't suppress the world forever!"
"Forever! Forever!" echoed the figures.
Flett suddenly realized that Peatwood was shaking him. "It's not real, Flett! It's not real!" the woodtroll was yelling.
"I…I know," said Flett vaguely, looking back at Peatwood. "I know it isn't." And for a long time after that, they continued on in a mundane fashion, repeating the knowledge of their lives aloud, desperate to hold on to reality.
Concentrating as he was upon grasping the knowledge of who he was, Flett didn't register that Peatwood's muttering was growing simpler and simpler. But suddenly, shaking himself back into wakefulness, Flett realized that Peatwood was no longer reminding himself of his identity. Instead, he was simply muttering the names of his parents. "Barkley and Grenda…Barkley and Grenda…"
Suddenly, he stiffened. For a moment, Flett thought that Peatwood had snapped back to reality. But on the contrary, Peatwood's widened, misty eyes were focused on a spot far to their left.
"Mother!" he cried "Father!" He made to run towards the point where he thought he could see his parents, but Flett seized him roughly and held him in place. Peatwood struggled violently, his eyes now blazing. "Let me go!" he shouted. "Let me go! I've found them at last! See them, waving to me from that glade!"
"Peatwood!" yelled Flett, shaking the thrashing woodtroll. "Your parents are dead! We saw them die in the crash! It's…it's the Twilight Woods! It's tricking you, Peatwood! It's all a trick!"
Saying these things filled Flett with courage and energy. They were even more powerful than his repetitive chanting in reminding him of his purpose. He could not—he would not—let the Twilight Woods claim Peatwood. Not after everything they had been through…all the dangers they had faced and conquered together.
"You shan't have Peatwood!" Flett roared, his arms wrapped tightly around his friend's broad waist. "You'll never take him!"
"Take him…take him…" the woods seemed to echo back.
"Leave me!" Peatwood howled. "Mother! Father! I'm coming!" He raised a dark, hairy-knuckled fist and took a swing at Flett's head. Flett ducked to avoid the blow, and dragged Peatwood out of the clearing, half carrying the woodtroll, tapping into strength he didn't know he possessed.
"No!" Peatwood bellowed. "No! No!" The woodtroll suddenly managed to wrench himself free of Flett's grip and dashed back towards the clearing where he had seen the illusion.
With a strangled cry, Flett dived forwards and seized Peatwood's ankles, sending him crashing to the ground in a billowing cloud of sepia dust. Before Peatwood could move a muscle, Flett had tackled him, pinning him to the place where he had landed. Despite Peatwood's stocky, muscular build, Flett was overpowering him through the sheer strength of his desperation to save his friend.
Suddenly, Flett registered a slight thinning of the twilight mists. His mind sharpened. It could only mean one thing. They were at the edge of the Twilight Woods. Their journey was nearly over!
But even now, Peatwood struggled violently, the woods refusing to release him. Tugging and tearing at Flett's grip, Peatwood was growing still harder to hold on to. But Flett could see through a hole in the gnarled trunks a patch of air that was darker and clearer. A thrill of anxiety stabbed at Flett now. Although he knew that the figure of Vartolius Xax has only been a figment of his imagination, the words the dictator had shouted at him rang through his head still. How could he be sure—absolutely sure—that Peatwood was right about Omniphrax? What, exactly, had they braved all those perils to find?
Flett knew, however, that whatever lay in wait for them in Omniphrax, it was surely better than an eternity wandering through the Twilight Woods. Anything was better than that. So he held onto Peatwood as hard as he could, pulling him on towards the slowly growing patch of static, sepia-free air. And suddenly, they broke free, looking upon a sight that Flett could never possibly have imagined.
Like the Empire side of the Twilight Woods, the Omniphrax side was dotted with phraxmines. But the miners here were cleaner, and more fit and alert. They weren't shackled together, and they weren't being whipped. But what drew Flett's eye was the incredible structure several hundred strides away.
It was a colossal fortress of sumpwood, stretching off into the mists of the left and right, and extending too high up for Flett to make out the top. How the Omniphrax academics had managed to get their hands on so much sumpwood, he had no idea. Clusters of dwellings and defense towers protruded from the wall at every level, and Flett knew that the fortress would be able to repel any invasion that the Empire could possibly send.
Finally, Peatwood slipped from Flett's grasp. Flett wheeled around to see Peatwood struggling back towards the luminous glades they had just left, calling for his mother and father. But before he had gotten ten strides, a pair of phraxminers leapt forward and grabbed him.
"Easy now, son," grunted one of them. "Your nightmare is over. You're going to be all right."
Flett barely had time to breathe a sigh of relief before four more phraxminers pounced on him, dragging him back. "Surprising," hissed one of them. "Great Glade soldiers rarely have the courage to follow their victims all the way through the Twilight Woods."
"No, no!" Flett cried desperately. "I…"
"What's going on here?"
Everyone froze, and turned to face the one who had spoken. It was an elderly fourthling, perhaps in her late seventies, but she comported herself with the energy of someone much younger. Her silvery hair was twisted up into a knot at the back of her head. Her green eyes were narrowed, and she stood with her hands on her hips, surveying the scene imperiously. She wore a uniform that seemed to indicate a position of high office…it appeared that, just as with Xelius Pulnix, they had chosen to arrive at the precise moment when a high-ranking government official made an appearance, and at the moment, Flett felt quite as horrified as on the previous occasion.
"High Senator Prade," said one of the phraxminers who had hold of Flett, inclining his head respectfully. "These two came staggering out of the Twilight Woods mere seconds ago. By the looks of them, an escaped Great Glader and a soldier trying to reclaim him."
Flett turned desperately to look at Peatwood. Surely his friend would tell them the truth. Surely Peatwood would vouch for him.
But the woodtroll was still insensible and blinded by the effects of the Twilight Woods. Struggling furiously, he was still calling out "Mother! Father!"
Flett slowly rotated his head, and met the gaze of the High Senator of Omniphrax. Her expression was pitiless and scorching. And once again, the words of the fake Vartolius Xax came back to him. "You are an enemy to the rebels, and a traitor to the Empire. You are nothing!"