Hilda - Lycadea (24 page)

"I am not like the others," Hilda growled.
"Take-your-hand-from-my-shoulder..."

William had no trouble picking up on Hilda's
ideas. The tone in her voice said it all. As she turned and raised
a hand, he invoked a spell. His timing was perfect.

Tarkan hung in the air, surprise on his face
and his feet kicking as the ground suddenly had gone from under
them.

"You are not supposed to touch a witch,"
Hilda said, loud and clear. "Unless invited. And I did not invite
you. You will hang there for some time, while we help ourselves to
some tea."

"Get me down!" Tarkan commanded. He was a
slow learner.

As Hilda and her companions sauntered off to
a silent part of the triangular square, a few helpful villagers
clung to Tarkan's legs, but their efforts were to no avail so they
abandoned their attempts. The fact that their leader was screaming
at them to leave him be, despite having asked to be taken down,
caused some commotion and chatter. The majority of people then
trailed after the witch and her friends.

"Is it okay with you if I turn a cart into
some furniture?" William asked Sodor.

"Yes, of course," said the man. He cast a
careful glance at the dangling leader.

Moments later, the group sat down. Villagers
ran off, to return with stools and small chairs, making themselves
comfortable near the travellers.

Tarkan screamed, until William snipped his
fingers. Then a blissful silence spread over the square.

After everyone around had been supplied with
tea (another cart had been sacrificed to make the cups), Hilda
asked around if anyone had an idea why the whole of both Lycadean
societies were so fixated on her presence. The answer that she
would be the witch who would make right what was wrong did not
really come as a surprise, but she had hoped for something better,
like perhaps how she was supposed to pull that off.

"Maybe Tarkan knows," a helpful soul offered,
but that option was still in the air, and not likely to be
supportive soon.

"Meanwhile I would really like to know if
there is a place where we can stay while we're here," Hilda said.
"Do you folks have any houses that are free?"

The assembled villagers shook heads. All the
houses in the village were occupied, and there were no spaces
available.

"There are the caves though," someone
suggested.

"Caves. Right. We are people that look like
we can be happy in caves." Hilda's stare almost drilled a hole in
the eyes of the man who had suggested the caves.

Maurizio however said: "How far away are
these caves? And do you have some things for us to make life
somewhat comfortable there?"

"I'm not going to live in a cave!" Hilda
exclaimed. "Their prophecy dragged our asses all over the cosmos
and now they want us to live like cave people?"

"Hilda. Calm down. We'll sort this out."
William's voice was calm.

"Don't you calm down me, wizard," Hilda
glared at him. "I'm done with all this."

William took pity on Hilda. He had a fairly
good idea how much she was suffering, lacking her magic. He took
her hand. "Come with me. Please?" He knew he had to talk with her
for a moment, before she would explode the wrong way.

With no protest at all, Hilda came with
William, and as they walked away from the square, he said:
"Sweetwitch, try to keep yourself together, will you? I know you
are having a really rough time. This is not easy on anyone, and it
must be devastating for you. I am really trying to understand. But
we went on this trip, to find these people. You had a major vote in
it as well. It would be good if we can all see this through."

Hilda said nothing as they kept walking. They
were already outside the village when she sudden stood still. She
looked at William. "I want to go home, William. I don't know how
much longer I can take this. I am not even half the person I am. I
miss my magic. I miss the link with you. I…"

William put his arms around the witch and
just held her. He had never seen her so helpless and ready to quit,
and he knew that this was not really Hilda. There was something he
should be able to do about this situation, he thought. Without
knowing it, he did the only thing that worked.

"You must really think I'm an idiot," Hilda's
voice came muffled from his shoulder. She had pressed her face
against it.

"I don't. I just try to be there for
you."

"You'd better. Without you I'd have gone
crazy long ago." Hilda felt small and helpless for a few
never-ending moments.

"Let's go back and see what we can do about
finding a place to sleep," William suggested. "We've weathered a
lot together, I am sure we can manage this situation as well."

"Yes. And not a word, wizard."

William grinned, as Hilda put her good old
self back up.

Together they walked to the group and said
they'd go and have a look at the caves. Sodor and Kyru offered to
come along, to guide the way to the mountains.

"They can be hard to find."

Hilda wondered how mountains could be hard to
find, but the two were right: they had to travel through a part of
forest where the trees were growing so close together that it was
impossible to know where you were going unless you knew where you
were going.

"And we are supposed to find the way back,
right?" Hilda wondered as they rounded yet another group of big
high trees.

"Honestly, honoured witch, we do not know
what you are supposed to do," Kyra said. "But we are almost
there."

Grimalkin, hanging over Hilda's shoulder,
meowed softly, keeping her big yellow eyes on the people ahead who
led the way.

"I know, sweetie," said Hilda as she petted
the black head, "I feel that way too."

Kerna walked with Rebel and Maurizio.
Obsidian had moved to Maurizio's shoulders for a while. Kerna had
gotten very tired of carrying the cat and the captain had noticed
it. Kerna however did stay close to the man, as if she did not want
to be too far away from Obsi.

Hilda stopped and stared at a big tree. A
very big tree. "Crappedy crap, William, look at that. You can make
a house inside that thing!"

Everyone agreed that this was the mother of
all trees. The witch and wizard started to walk around it. It took
them almost five minutes to complete the round.

"This is a big tree," Hilda stated. "A really
big one."

Sodor frowned. He was already aware of that
fact.

A few trees later, they were out of the
forest.

"Crappedy crap."

The view that jumped them warranted that
remark. They stood at the start of a wide open area, filled with
pebbles in many colours, and red, yellow, blue and white prevailed.
Randomly across the pebble plain, small green plants with tiny
yellow flowers has sprouted.

About two hundred feet from where the group
stood, a calm river floated along. Beyond the river, mountains rose
up. They were not impressively high, but they were covered with
shrubs and something that looked like insanely large patches of red
and brown moss. Low trees grew at the foot of the mountains.

The travellers stared at the scene for a
while, as the serene beauty overwhelmed them all.

"This is just plain pretty," Rebel said. She
picked up a red pebble and examined it. "Tell you what, folks. This
pebble… isn't a pebble." The woman, her leather outfit quite
smudged by now, closed her hand around the red rock for a moment. A
dim light shone through her fingers for a moment.

"Look." Rebel held out her hand, and on her
palm lay a shiny rough ruby. "The blue ones are probably sapphires,
the yellow ones topaz and the white ones-"

"Diamonds?" Maurizio asked.

"No. They're real pebbles."

Kyru looked at Sodor and Kerna. Then she
asked: "What is so special about these stones?"

Four pairs of eyes looked at her. Rebel
explained that these 'stones' were considered very valuable in the
world they came from.

"Oh." Kyru did not seem very impressed.
"These things are everywhere."

Sodor suggested they'd move on. He led them
to a spot in the river where a wide lane of large rocks was made.
The rocks had been flattened, to make crossing the river easy.
Water ran through narrow slits that were left between the rocky
slabs.

Hilda marvelled at the sound of the water
that ran underneath the stones. "William, look how clear the water
is. Just like home. And listen. I never heard water sound like
this!"

As they reached the other side of the river,
Kyru pointed at a pair of trees a bit to their left. "That is where
we are going. There is a footpath that leads to the entrance of the
caves."

"More walking," Hilda sighed. "Good thing
there is enough wood around here to make a broom."

William took over Grimalkin from the witch,
and they set off again.

The footpath Kyru had mentioned did hardly
deserve its name. Hilda accused the woman and Sodor of being
hunters who could follow the trail of a flying wasp that had flown
close to the ground. "This is not a place where people can
walk!"

Miraculously though, the people walked there,
and after a rather steep climb, Sodor pushed aside a curtain of
hanging plants, which revealed the entrance to a cave.

"Welcome home," Hilda grumbled as she stepped
into the dark hole. Then: "Suck an elf!"

William rushed inside, to find out what the
witch was so wild about. As he entered the cave, he saw and was
amazed as well. "Holy Bejeebus…"

As Rebel and Maurizio entered the cave as
well, followed by Kerna, Sodor and Kyru, they too gasped.

Instead of cavey darkness, lights were
everywhere. The walls, the ceilings, even the floor twinkled with
yellow light, making the cave as bright as one would like.

"How is that possible?" William wondered out
loud.

Sodor and Kyru explained that there were
reflecting stones in the rock that guided the outside light into
the caves. "The same yellow stones you saw outside and find so
precious."

"I'll be damned," William said, "the
mountain's littered with gems."

Kerna reached out and held on to Hilda.

"What's wrong, kid?" the witch asked. Kerna
was not the touchy kind, so there had to be something.

"I'm not feeling so well suddenly," the kid
replied.

"Come, I'll take you outside."

As the two left the cave, William and Rebel
looked at each other and wondered.

"I'll go with them," Kyru said and followed
the other two women.

"So this is the cave," Sodor then said. "It
is the best we can do for you."

"We'll turn it into something homely," Rebel
said. "Thanks for the trouble of taking us here. William, you think
we can whip up some flying thing again?"

"Sure," said the wizard.

"With decent seats?" Maurizio asked promptly.
They all laughed, except Sodor who did not get the joke.

"If you insist," William grinned. "We'll be
fine here, once we got some furniture inside."

"We are sorry we can't provide that," Sodor
said.

"Don't worry about that, Sodor. As long as
there's wood and such, we'll get things done."

Sodor nodded. He took the others outside and
pointed into the direction of their village. "If you need one of
us, we will usually be there. Or someone will know where we
are."

"As long as we don't have to talk to- Oh..."
William frowned. "I think we left your leader hanging in the air."
He snipped his fingers. "Should be fixed now."

They located Hilda, Kerna and Kyru sitting
under a tree. Kerna looked well again, she was laughing at
something Hilda said.

Kyru and Sodor said their goodbyes and
promised to come back the next day. As the two left, Rebel and
William got to work and arranged for chairs, a table and some beds.
As the wizard magicked up the last bits of what they might need,
Rebel went into the forest to find some game for dinner. Most of
them were definitely ready for a good meal.

Maurizio sat with Kerna as William took Hilda
to the side. "Sweetwitch, there's something I have to tell you. I
don't know if you noticed it too."

"What's that, wizard?"

"When we crossed the river. The water in the
river jumped higher than some of the rocks that made the bridge.
But it never fell on the stone slabs."

"Crappedy crap..." Hilda stared at him. "You
are certain, aren't you? I'd have to see that."

"We can arrange that..."

William had, as he made the furniture, also
made a simple broom. He summoned it and held it up. "Maurizio,
Kerna, we're going to scoot down to the river. We'll be back before
dinner."

"Good," Maurizio waved.

"Can you bring water?" Kerna asked, which was
a good question.

William, with Hilda in front of him, made the
broom fly off.

Obsi and Grim sat with the two that were left
behind and felt left behind.

Hilda enjoyed the broom flight. It was as
close to the real thing as she could come, but it was still a lot
better than the weird contraption they had left the pyramid city
with.

After touching down near the river, they
walked towards the stone bridge and stared at the water.

"Dragon balls, that's strange," Hilda agreed.
"As if the water bounces away from the stone." She held out her
hand and caught some of the water. "Looks normal. Feels
normal."

It was just ordinary water.

"I wonder what's up with this place," William
said. "Perhaps it is something in the stones."

The wizard started unpacking lots of small
things from his pockets and enlarged them, until he found a box
with pots in them. "How did these... I'd better not ask."

"Indeed. Just fill them with water," said
Hilda as she walked up and down the bridge to see if she could find
what made the water avoid touching the stones.