The Road
To Illsmore
Written By: Charles Corren, Copyright December 2002
Chapter 3 - Aris and the Bumbledon
Saber Forest was an odd place.
It was your typical forest with trees and flowers and plants.
The differences were that they were no animals, and no sound.
Nothing.
She called out "Hello" a number of times, but there was nothing, not even an echo that greeted her back.
River had warned her to stay away from Brent Home, and she was sure she could do that, since the way there was behind her.
He had also warned her about eating the red berries.
She had to remember that.
She felt it was important.
There was also no path here.
She had followed it for so long that she didn't know which way to go.
The only direction she didn't want to go, was back.
And since the direction she had been travelling in was turning out to be a good one, she decided to continue using that one as her guide.
Forward was a relative term here in the forest
Specifically, there was not forward or backward.
Much the same as there is no up on the surface of a sphere.
So forward really meant the way she was facing, and heaven help her if she got turned around to any degree.
She thought that she had been travelling for a long time.
A quick glance up at the sun told her nothing.
It was still in the same spot, not having moved as much as an inch as far as she could tell.
Still, it had to have been a number of hours since she had "arrived" here.
A few to walk the miles from the sign to here, and another few to get to the sign.
So she figured it had to be at least six hours all tolled.
That figure sounded right.
Just right.
Now assuming that she "arrived" here at say, 11 am, that would make it somewhere around 5 pm or so.
Why did she not feel hungry or thirsty?
That seemed odd indeed.
As if on cue, as soon as she said the words, she felt the old familiar pangs come out to make themselves known.
The odd sounds that were referred to as "bogarigme" by some.
A nonsensical word that meant nothing, but could apply here.
The rumblings took on their own life, and wanted attention.
Since there was no one here to hear it, she didn't mind.
Let it rumble she thought.
I can do without food for one day for corn sake.
But she didn't really believe that anymore than she believed that here was real.
And with that thought, she started to look for something, anything save the red berries, to eat.
Lots of the trees had fruit growing on them, but it was unlike any fruit she had ever seen before.
She picked one from a tree and was amazed as another one grew right back within two minutes.
She couldn't believe her eyes, so she took another piece of fruit to test it out.
She picked the fruit, and immediately a flower took its place.
From there is was like watching a movie in fast forward.
The fruit appeared as a small speck, growing larger and larger all the time, and then two minutes later, a full sized piece of fruit for the eating.
Talk about abundance.
Never having to worry about running our of fruit with these around.
She now had two pieces of fruit in her had and looked down at them.
She had to admit they were the ugliest thing she had ever seen.
There was no way she was going to eat that.
What she had was a cross between an apple and a pineapple.
The outer skin was greenish, it was round, and had the leafy look of the pineapple.
She brought it to her nose and smelled.
Although she couldn't accurately identify the smell, it had a familiar odor to it.
She tentatively opened her mouth, and touched the skin with her tongue.
It was rough, but not nearly as rough as it looked.
She took a small bite.
Not only did it look like an apple, it tasted like one too.
Very tart, juicy and firm.
Just the way she liked it.
She turned it around and wondered why she had thought that it looked like a pineapple at all.
It didn't really.
She had turned the fruit around to the other side, and took a bite from there.
She identified it at once.
It tasted exactly like a pineapple.
She turned it around again.
The other side, the one that tasted like an apple, was untouched.
No bite, nothing to mar the surface.
Perfect in every way.
Now here was a dilemma.
A tree that bore fruit.
Could reproduce that fruit in minutes.
Tasted different each time.
And re-grew when you ate it.
the perfect food.
Feed the world with one tree
She thought the fruit was even better than say a banana.
No skin to deal with.
With that she took another bite.
It tasted just like a banana.
She thought of a strawberry
And took a bite
Exactly like a strawberry.
She though of a watermelon.
And took a bite.
The taste was uncanny.
Exactly like that fruit.
Texture and all.
And no seeds.
She though about a watermelon lemon.
And took a bite.
What she tasted was not watermelon or lemon.
It was awful.
She spit it out quickly.
And though of an orange.
And took a bite.
The taste was there, exactly as before.
And exactly like an orange.
She tried grapes, raspberries, pomegranates, kiwi, pears, and grapefruit.
Each one was as good as the last.
And each one was exactly as it should be.
Right down to the last detail.
After all of the tasting, and eating she was full, and still had a full piece of fruit to take with her.
Full.
She would take another piece with her.
For later.
With the food part taken care of , all she needed now was something to drink and she would be fine.
As soon as the thought crossed her mind, she was thirsty.
It was like everything she was thinking happened.
And all at once.
This was very good.
But, she had no idea how she was going to find water, or anything to drink here.
She stood and gave it some thought.
Obviously staying on the path would have taken her somewhere, but that was not an option now.
As she thought, she heard the distinct sound of a stream, well running water at least.
And it was coming from her left.
She started to walk towards the sound.
Sound…..
She had heard almost nothing at all since she got here, and now here was running water.
All she had to do was think of it.
She quickly thought of an elephant.
She felt, rather than heard the heavy steps that only a beast the size of an elephant could make.
She thought again of water, and there was the sound of running water again.
Talk about heaven, instant gratification just by thinking about whatever she wanted.
The water was close, and she made her way towards it.
The growth was thinning out some as she moved towards the drink
And the land was getting boggy to some degree.
She could see it now.
It was fabulous.
The trees, all about the same size, cleared to allow an unobstructed view of the river.
The river was about 50 feet across and the water moved at a very good pace.
There were a number of rocks in the middle of it, and that was what was making the noise, the water rushing over and by the rocks.
the other side of the river mirrored this side exactly.
There was a slight decline to get to the edge, and she bent down to drink.
She cupped her hands and drank from them.
The water was cool, and fresh, and clean.
She took a second hand full and drank of that as well.
She had finished her third cupping of water when she saw the object reflected in the water.
She wished she could call what she saw a bird.
She wished she could call what she saw anything except for what it was.
She knew two things for sure.
The first was that what she was seeing was impossible, the second was that she had not, nor could she have possibly have been thinking about what she was seeing right now.
What she was looking at was a reflection in the water.
The image was shimmering with the ripples in the water not quite settled back to their stillness.
She looked at the reflection, and then turned her head upward to get a better look.
In the sky, there was nothing there, no hint of what was looking down at her in the water.
There was nothing there that could harm her.
There was in fact, no hint of the darkness that was reflected back to her in the water that she had seen only a few seconds before.
The sky was clear, the sun still shone in its noonish position.
The trees were still there
Everything was as it should be.
Why then had she seen it in the water?
Dreaming?
Crazy?
Imagining things?
Although all of these things were possible, she doubted it.
She new nothing about this place, except that what you thought was right, most likely would turn out to be wrong.
She forced herself to look back into the water again.
It was still there.
The image she was presented with was disturbing to say the least.
She made on quick glanced skyward to verify that it was not the same image she was looking at in the water.
It was not.
The ripples had died down now, and allowed he a more complete, unobstructed view of the woman who looked down into the water, and the world around her.
Even though the image in the water was a supposed to be a mirror image of this world, it was different.
The clouds for instance.
Here in the world above, they were white.
Below, rain clouds dark and ominous.
Above the sun shone.
Below, darkness and gloom.
Above trees and a blooming forest.
Below, a burnt out shell of what had been.
All of this she could accept.
All of this her mind could make sense of, had in fact the first time she looked.
It didn't seem odd, or out of place.
She didn't jump up and run screaming with her heart in her throat at all those images.
In fact her mind had not really even taken notice of all of those things at all.
She had made that comparison herself after she looked skyward.
It was what else she saw that threatened to unglue the hold she had on sanity.
It was what she knew didn't, no couldn't exist at all.
It was what she hoped wasn't real.
It was what she had seen flying above her that scared her.
It was the thing with an 8 foot wingspan that had her terrified.
It was the thing with the leathery looking wings, black and powerful with long legs that was circling above, watching her, moving downward towards where she drank.
It was the thing that had the body of a huge mammal, bat like creature much too large to exist in her own world.
It was the thing that didn't have a bats head.
It was the thing that in fact had a humans head.
It was the thing that had her husbands head.
And her looked pissed.
It hadn't taken long for all of this to transpire.
She had seen the image, registered it, tossed it out as impossible, verified it skyward, and looked back to confirm was her mind was saying was not real, all in a matter of seconds.
Not long, she realized to really examine and make sure what she though she saw was indeed what she was seeing.
But it was still there.
It was John all right
His face, although unremarkable in their world was not difficult to discern on the body of a bat thing.
She was married to him for corn sake, she should be able to tell whether or not it was.
The face was there, and its gaze never left hers.
It was starring, contemplating, planning.
There was evil in the eyes.
Evil that reflected back at her in red.
The Bat Beast looked to be about 15 feet above her.
It was proportional in makeup whatever that meant, and looked like something that had gone really wrong down at the genetics lab one day after a night out with the boys.
The head was human, the body bird, the arms ended in human hands, and the legs were misshapen human appendages that were presumable supposed to be legs.
Everything about it was wrong, but everything about it was right.
John had the same hair, the same goatee, the same face.
What was different were the eyes.
The didn't have a color anymore.
They shone.
And they shone with evil.
A red glow that had all of the makings of any horror movie or book she had ever read or seen.
It was that, above all else that scared her.
That and the fact that the Bat Beast was starting to descend.
It was circling above her.
In long circles with her as the center.
The eyes never varied, the gazed through her at all times.
Like a burning.
A presence she could not put away.
Because this one she felt as well as saw.
Each time the beast circled, it make a pass behind her where she could not seen its reflection in the water.
And each time it reappeared to her right, it was closer to her.
Closer to the ground.
Closer to being able to reach out and pick her up.
Closer to killing her.
On the third pass, the Bat Beast was only about 10 feet above her.
Very close for a beast the size that it was.
Two, three more passes and he would be able to land.
She decided to move right at that point.
She drew on her strength, and had to force herself to move.
What came out was a burst of fury.
She had clenched both fists together and brought them down hard on the surface of the water.
That would allow her to move, to get up, to run.
She knew that if the beast could fly, she had no chance to outrun it.
She would tire quickly while running on legs that took much too much energy to sustain that kind of activity for very long.
While the Bat Beast could leisurely follow above and land when needed.
She took one more glance in the water before she leapt into action.
And it was gone.
The Bat Beast, the clouds, the burnt out forest, the gloom.
All of it gone..
Replaced by the serene images that should have been there to begin with.
She was shaking, trembling trying desperately to both get the images that were now burnt into her mind out, and to make sense of all that she had seen.
Had she conjured up this evil existence?
Had she brought the beast to life?
Had she in this world where reality takes a back seat to imagination created this out of some sort of twisted fear?
She didn't thing so.
There were things about John that scared her.
He was rough, and lately his roughness had turned into something akin to violence.
He didn't hit her.
Not ever.
Instead he would wrestle, or play fight with her, goading her on to join in.
Then he would grab her arm, and try to make her…..what?
He left bruises.
But nothing else.
He never hit her.
Why then was she afraid of it all.
She knew why.
It was because of the bruises you couldn't see.
The ones on her ego and her self esteem.
And the ones on her feelings.
The ones that told her things had changed.
It wasn't loving play fighting any more.
He was the boss.
He was bigger.
He was stronger.
He was the lord and master.
And he owned her.
All of that had started a little over six months ago.
Three months ago she decided it was getting better.
Two months ago she decided to leave him.
One month ago he had found her diary.
Two weeks ago he had come home drunk, tried to force her to have sex with him and told her he had read about her little escape plan.
Told her that he would hunt her down and kill her if she left.
Told her that she was his, and there was nothing she could do about it.
Told her all of this just before he passed out for the night.
He had told her all right.
All of that and much more.
That he had changed.
It was what he hadn't said in words that scared her the most.
Because now she was afraid for her well being.
There was no way she could stay now.
She had to get out.
And if she ever got back to her world with the problems that existed there, she would leave.
She knew that, because facing her husband, her human husband would be a walk in the park compared to the Bat Beast she was facing here.
Nothing could be worse than coming face to face with that.
She got up, and with a redefined focus, moved onward towards the woods.
It wasn't long before the sound of the water was so faint that she could barely make it out.
And not long after that she lost it completely.
The forest was serene, quiet, and calming.
The only thing out of place was that there was no sound.
Nothing at all.
She saw trees, vines, bushes and all the typical things that should be there, but no animals, insects, bugs, or birds (save one) anywhere.
That and no sounds.
She decided to try an experiment.
She found a good sized stick and broke it in two.
The "snap" she expected was felt, but not heard.
It was like it was being absorbed by the air itself .
She broke the branch two more times to test her theory and the result was the same.
Further ahead she saw what looked like glints of red.
She hurried to see what it was.
It was a bush, that had berries growing on its branches.
They were red, full, and plump.
And there were thousands of them.
The smell was a cross between an apple and a strawberry.
Very fragrant.
Very strong.
And she was salivating.
She bent down to the bush and started to pick the berries.
One by one she picked.
Piling them on the ground.
Building up a stack to eat.
Each time she picked a berry from its stem, there was a small "pop" that she heard and a puff of smoke that came from the plant.
The noise and the smoke were odd, odd indeed.
But it was the smell that stopped her.
The smell was distinct.
And powerful.
It was rotten eggs.
That smell that once encountered, never left you again.
And each berry she picked made the smell stronger.
More foul.
The smell combined with the thought of what to do next was forgotten when she heard something say "Don't do that"
She turned around quickly to try to locate the source of the sound.
Nothing.
There was no one, and nothing there.
She decided she imagined it.
"I said, don't do that" came the voice again.
She was frantically scanning everywhere to try to locate the owner of the voice.
"Who said that" she asked her voice more fear than confidence.
"I did" came the reply.
"I can't see you" she said.
"I am right here for goodness sake" the voice said.
"Where?" she asked.
"Here" the voice said.
At the same time she saw movement.
There was a mound of what looked like straw not 10 feet from her.
It was this mound that moved.
The straw, or whatever it was, on the sides moved up, and then fell back again..
"Who are you?" she asked.
"I am known as RicheMalo" it replied. "And who are you?"
"I am Aris" she said.
"Well I am pleased to meet you Aris" RicheMalo said.
"It would appear from your surprise at me that you are not from around here" it continued.
"No I am not" she said.
She looked at him, or it, and tried to decide what it or he was.
He stood about 3 feet high.
Was round.
And had no visible appendages at all.
No legs.
No arms.
He was covered in a kind of straw that seemed to serve as hair.
This "hair" went from the top of him to the ground.
It was mostly light to dark brown in color, but there were small areas where green showed through.
There was also something that came out of the back of him that she thought would serve as a tail.
He moved towards her, and she instinctively moved back.
"Don't be afraid my dear, I won't hurt you" he said.
"What are you?" she asked.
With that he laughed.
And she could see his face.
He had an slightly elongated face protruding from the straw similar to a dogs mouth
On this face was wrinkled skin that made features impossible.
Two of these wrinkles moved upward to reveal eyes.
Kind, soft, loving eyes.
She could make out the shape of a nose somewhat, and a mouth as well.
"I, Aris, am a Bumbldon" he said "And am very pleased to make you acquaintance"
"I am please to meet you" Aris replied.
She stuck our her hand before she thought about it.
He had no hands to shake.
Slowly from the straw mass emerged a wrinkled appendage that she supposed served as a hand.
She grasped it and shook the hand.
It was warm, and soft, and felt wonderful as she shook it.
"Are you here by yourself?" he asked.
"Yes" she said "and where exactly is here?" she said.
"I am not sure how I got to where here is" she continued.
"Here is Endworld. It is a place far from where you come from that serves as the stepping stone to other worlds" he said.
She thought about that, and then asked "Am I dead?"
"Oh no my dear, far from it. You are very much alive." RicheMalo said.
"You are here because someone called you here." He said.
"You, have a mission to complete." he said.
"What mission is that?" she asked.
He laughed again and replied "I am sure I don't know, I am only a Bumbledon after all"
"Ok, now I am totally confused again" she said.
She sat down on a stump and waited for him to speak.
"I can see your angst my dear, let me see if I can fill you in a little" he said.
"Then I will get you something proper to eat".
He told he of this place, starting with the berries she was about to eat.
The berries were poisonous.
And it was then that she remembered the warning from the picture, what was his name? Oh yes River Righteous it was.
He had said, don't eat the red berries.
Very plainly to.
RicheMalo talked about Endworld in great detail, much of which she didn't understand.
There was just too much background to cover to make sense of it all.
The place she had just traveled through was the LINKS.
The Links went from New Haven in the South clear though to Illsmore in the North.
That covered a stretch of about 45 miles or so as the crow flies, more if you are walking.
People came to Endworld, because they were needed here.
They were called to this place.
To do something.
And only the person who called them knew the reason why.
People back home would not miss her at all, he explained.
She must have had a sad look on her face when he said that because he quickly added that this was because to them, she never left.
Her time over here did not match the time back in her own world.
When she returned, and she would return he had assured her, she would be placed right back where she was when she left, at the exact moment she left.
Unless a paradox prevented that.
Once again there must have been the puzzled look on her face for he went on.
"You can never return to the exact second in time when you left. There would be two of you there. So you have to come in one second or so later. This is so the
leaving you doesn't run into to you that is coming back. That is a paradox." RicheMalo explained.
"And say you were walking out into what you call traffic, and at the second you were leaving , a car was very close to you.
When you went back, it would hit you and perhaps kill you.
This is another of the paradoxes." RicheMalo said..
"These paradoxes, along with a few others are not permitted, and cannot happen. Time, not fate makes sure of that" He concluded.
She asked many more questions over the next little while like why her?
He didn't know.
Why now?
Again her didn't know.
Where was she in relation to her world?
That one he did know.
He asked her where and when she came from.
He looked puzzled, and for a bumbledon that is quite a feat, and after a long pause replied.
"You are between here and there. Now and then. Maybe and perhaps. Sometime and never. Will and won't. Stay and go" He said.
She had no idea what any of that meant, and didn't bother to ask.
She asked another question that did get a response.
"How do I know if I am going in the right direction at all?" she said.
"You are drawn by the force, the force that brought you here. It will guide you" he said
She wanted to ask more about him and bumbledons in general, but he began to fade at that point.
She was looking right at him.
He was there his eyes wrinkled little slits appearing out of the hair, and then he was less there.
It is so hard to describe this, he just was less there, and then less.
Until finally, he was not there at all.
She watched the spot for a long time hoping that he would either return or not really be gone.
The spot stayed empty.
She even waved her hands through the spot where he was to make sure she wasn't having problems with her eyes.
She thought that she might have been sitting there for more than an hour when she finally gave up hoping for him to return.
That was the first time she had been able to talk to a live thing since she got here, and the second time she cried.
When the tears came, they would not stop.
She lay down on the forest floor and cried herself to sleep.
Although Aris didn't know it then, the bumbeldon did return, but she was not awake to see it.
Created by James Arrian............................................................................................................................................................Last Updated Decmber 2002