Bakkian Chronicles, Book I - The Prophecy (5 page)

Steve reached in and pulled out a sack. The weight of the bag surprised him. He opened it and let out a shout.

“
Holy cow! It’s gold! This thing is full of gold coins! Not American. Or European. Ummm…” he picked up a coin and squinted at it. “I have no idea where it’s from. Some marks on the front and a picture of a griffin on the back. That’s odd. It kinda looks like that griffin,” he said, pointing to the griffin standing on the pedestal.

“
Do you think that’s real gold? What are in the other ones?” Sarah asked, pointing to the other two sacks.

Steve reached in and pulled out the other two. He opened one and pulled out something that shimmered in the light.

Sarah took the object from Steve. “What’s this?”

“
No clue. There’s about half as many of these as there are of those.”

Sarah studied the object. It appeared to be made of some type of crystal, and was practically transparent with a slightly smoky color to it. The crystal was shaped roughly like a coin, but had (she counted) nine sides to it. She couldn’t make out any markings on its surface.

“
Another type of currency?” Sarah wondered aloud. Then with a sudden jolt of realization, she looked at Steve. “Hon, this is the safe. It has to be! Think about it! A sack of gold coins and a sack of these things. What’s in the last one?”

Steve opened the bag to reveal… marbles. Smoke-colored marbles. Steve pulled one out and almost dropped it.

“
It’s vibrating! This thing is vibrating! And it’s warm, almost like it’s generating its own heat!” He handed it to Sarah.

As she studied the marble, Steve pulled out the small pewter box and opened it. The object inside reminded him of those old skeleton keys you’d find in those big, ancient houses. However, this key didn’t appear to be made of metal. It looked like it was made from another type of crystal. A deep, vivid dark green colored crystal. He had to admit, it was the prettiest key he’d ever seen.

“
Hey, forget about that marble and take a look at this!” Steve passed the key to his wife.

Sarah took the key out of the box and ran her fingers along the surface.

“
I’d love to see what this opens.” Then Sarah fell silent as she thought for a moment. “Actually, there’s only one possible door that this could unlock.”

“
Hon, maybe you’ve noticed, but we checked out the house. There’s no green, crystal doors in there.”

“
Honey, think about it!” Sarah sometimes had to explain the obvious to her husband. “Of all the rooms and doors we saw in that house, do any of them stand out to you?”

Steve detected the I-can’t-believe-you-haven’t-figured-this-out-yet tone from his wife and decided not to make too much of an issue out of it. Yet.

“
If you’re going to tell me we saw a green door and I don’t remember it, then I’ll personally run out to Walgreen’s and pick up some ginkgo.”

Sarah sighed.

“
The master bedroom. With the huge, carved doors? Remember them? I’ll bet this key is for the lock on those doors.”

“
Well, maybe you’re right” Steve admitted, “but if that key is for those doors, then we don’t need it. The doors are unlocked and open, remember?”

“
I remember.” Sarah’s curiosity had been piqued. “But I still want to see if this key does fit those doors and why it needs such an unusual key to lock them.”

“
Okay, I’m game.”

Steve put the sacks back into the safe, closed the panel, and followed Sarah out to the foyer.

They started climbing stairs.

“
You know, I’ve been thinking…”

“
What would you think…”

Both of them laughed as neither one heard what the other said.

Steve smiled. “You first.”

“
Okay. I’ll be honest with you. I really like this house. I don’t want to give it up. I think we should keep it.” Sarah gave her husband her best attempt at her Bambi eyes. Steve, staring straight ahead, didn’t notice.

“
Well, that makes what I was going to say a lot easier. I don’t think we should sell it, either. There’s something about this place. I’m seriously starting to consider relocating here. I know it’s a resort town, but hey, we don’t have any family in Twin Falls. And I can finally start up my own business.” He paused. “I’m getting way ahead of myself. Why don’t you want to get rid of it?”

Sarah simply stared at her husband. “Did you not
see
the garden?”

They reached the top floor and proceeded to the master bedroom. The doors were massive and looked as though they weighed a ton each.

“
Okay He-Man, close ‘em up.”

Steve eyed the doors. “Yeah, sure. Give me a minute.”

The doors were much easier to move than he had anticipated. They smoothly slid into place and with a resounding clang, both doors were closed.

Sarah approached the doors and ran her hands over the picture that was carved onto both of them. She took out the key and automatically started moving toward the doorknob, only no doorknobs were to be found.

Steve blinked. “No doorknobs? Now what?”

Sarah, too, was studying the doors. This key couldn’t be for a set of doors without doorknobs. Maybe she was mistaken. She was about ready to tell Steve she was obviously wrong when she noticed the carving of the castle. It was carved with exquisite detail, including the drawbridge and windows. One window didn’t have a regular, rectangular window, but had what appeared to be a hole. A key hole.

“
Hon, I think we have a winner! Look at this window on the castle!”

Without waiting for his reaction, she inserted the key into the opening and turned.

At first, nothing happened. Steve was glancing around the room, waiting for a hidden door to appear, when both of them felt the floor shudder slightly. Sarah let go of the key and shared a glance with her husband. The two of them looked around the room once more. So what was supposed to happen? Maybe a secret panel would appear on one of one of the walls?

“
Well, I don’t see…” She suddenly pulled her husband close and pointed to the massive doors. “Honey! Where’s the seam?! There’s supposed to be two doors!!”

The huge doors had merged seamlessly together and the frames had started to glow. The carved relief rippled outward from the castle, as if a stone had been dropped in the middle of a pond.

“
Listen! Do you hear that?” Steve motioned for Sarah to be quiet. “The humming is back. It’s stronger, and this time there’s no mystery about where it’s coming from.”

The surface of the doors became increasingly turbulent, and then faded out to reveal a realistic, life-sized scene of an outdoor path winding through a coniferous forest. Pine trees nearly a hundred feet high were visible as far as the eye could see.

Coeur d’Alene’s newest residents reacted with astonishment as wafts of fragrant air flowed through the doorframe on the back of a gentle breeze. The sounds of a distant waterfall could also be heard. Small mammals were seen darting through the treetops at amazing speeds.

Since most people do not normally discover a doorway leading into a forest on the third floor of their house, both husband and wife were naturally left quite speechless. Sarah recovered her composure first.

“
Now there’s something you don’t see everyday.”

Steve’s
response was a few degrees less than
formal. “That is no bullshit, hands down, the god-damnedest thing I’ve ever seen.” He took several steps toward the “doors” and stopped. “Sweetie, that looks real! It looks like we could stroll right across and be walking on that path!” He grabbed Sarah’s hand and started pulling her towards him.

“
Now wait.” Sarah was struggling very hard not to lose her grip on her sanity. “I’ll grant you that it looks very realistic, but there’s no way that we can go strolling through that and find ourselves in that forest. It
has
to be some type of optical illusion.”

Steve shook his head. “Do you smell that? I can smell pine trees. Flowers. I think I even smell water as well. It sounds like there might be a waterfall or something in the area.”

“
Okay, I haven’t figured out how it can smell like there’s a real forest, but I’m working on it! I mean, if that ride at Disneyland can use aromatics, so could this thing.”

“
I doubt this is an illusion. Wait a minute. I have an idea.” Steve walked over to the desk and grabbed a piece of paper. He folded it into a
pathetic-looking
airplane and tossed it through the doorway. The airplane sailed through the air and landed nose first on the path.

“
Hah! Did you see that? This is a portal! A portal that will lead us to, ummm, to…” Steve shrugged and hooked a thumb in the direction of the activated portal, “wherever that is.”

Steve took Sarah’s hand again and pulled her up to the threshold of the door.

“
Now. You’re telling me that if we walk through that,” he looked pointedly at the portal, “then we won’t end up on that path, but instead we’d end up walking into the master bedroom? No, better yet, since the doors are closed, we’d run into them?”

Sarah was reluctant to abandon her common sense. “There has
got
to be an explanation for this. This type of thing just doesn’t exist. It has to be an illusion of some type.”

Steve held out his hand. “How certain are you of that?”

Her hand smacked into his. Together, they walked through the door. Through, he noted, but not into.

To Steve, it passed as smoothly as stepping into the outdoors. They stood blinking in the bright sunlight, staring at the scenery before them.

“
We’re through! Omigod, we’re in the forest!” Sarah bent down to smell the pretty blue flowers she had noticed from the house. “It’s so beautiful here!”

Steve couldn’t stop grinning. He was going from rock to tree to flower as if verify this wasn’t a figment of his imagination.

“
There’s nothing that’s illusory about this place, believe you me!” He took a deep breath. “Smell that air! I wonder where we are. Nowhere near a city, that’s for sure.”

It was at this time that Sarah regained most of her senses.

“
Okay, why in the world…” She paused. “No, better yet, how did a magical door get into your grandparents house? Hmmm, let me backtrack a little more. Who made it? Certainly not by us. The Japanese are good, but not that good.” Sarah began to pace.

The light of comprehension finally shone a few rays in Steve’s direction.

“
Are you saying that, uh, someone
else
created those doors? Alright, alright, let’s think about this.” His turn to pace. “You’re right. There’s nobody out there that has successfully teleported something, let alone someone, from point A to point B. This sort of thing is straight out of Star Trek.”

“
There’s something else that’s bothering me.” Sarah thought for a moment. “Okay, the creators of those doors are obviously more technologically advanced than we are. By leaps and bounds, I’d say. Who knows where we are now? I mean, there are tons of trees, plants, and flowers around here and I don’t recognize any of them!”

Steve sighed. “Hon, there are thousands of trees and flowers. Can’t be expected to know all of them.”

“
True. However, I can usually recognize something! My grandmother ran a floral shop for years. I’ve spent a lot of time with her. Steve, nothing here is familiar. I mean, look at this flower, for example.” Sarah pointed to what looked like a brightly colored rose.