Dorlief

by Annin Brothers

Genres: Epic Fantasy; Fantasy action & adventure; Science Fiction Fantasy; Dystopian; Parallel world

Synopsis

It all begins with Daniel Bertridge, a university student, chancing upon an exhibition of a mysterious artist, Felix Thornton, on the first day of his vacation. The eerie world presented in the pictures, something evasive yet familiar, draws the young man, captures his soul. He realizes his whole life has been split in half: one half – before Thornton's pictures, and the other – afterward. Christine Willis, eager to help her friend, starts amassing information on the artist of genius. It turns out that he was involved in Daniel's grandfather's death somehow. Before he died, Daniel's grandfather had given his grandson a wad of paper and asked him not to unravel it, not to look inside, not to show it to anyone, and not to tell anyone about it. Daniel learns what is inside the wad eight years later. The eerie thing with its weird properties takes Dan and Mat (Christine too, later on) into a World that is beyond the borderline of accessibility, a World at once incredibly far-off and quite close-by. Two guys carry to a placeless place the Sacred Word that according to the prophecy could help people to overpower those who would settle in the Emptied Lake. In the usual world, there's love and tragedy in store for Dan. In the other, an inquiry that might result in a dreadful verdict – execution. His fate hinges on his friends and enemies in the midst of a fierce battle.

Release date: January 27, 2026

Publisher: Independently published

Print pages: 623

Sample

 

Sample one

Part One

The Call of Mystery

 

Chapter One

‘I’m both here and there’

 

Daniel Bertridge was walking down the street with no regard for the aspects of the passersby, whether known or unknown, nor for the aspects of the radiant summer day, for the invitingly flimsy dresses that the dissolute breeze was chatting up, unashamed. Driven by some reflex, he hardly knew where he was heading, mindless of the first day of his first university vacation. He seemed to be shrouded in the veil of heady impressions which unraveled and drank up his own thoughts. He was exalted, shattered and lost, all at once, aware that his soul would be asking (was actually asking) for something magnetically vague that had been left behind in the picture gallery, in the canvases of Felix Thornton. Perchance, all around them.

Once back home, Daniel felt no relief. He craved nothing but the painful joy that had taken possession of him there. There was nothing for it but to talk to himself. Nay, not so much talk as relate his impressions to his other self that was listening . . . that much he was sure of.

‘Should I go back to the gallery? Peer into those . . . into that weird world? And . . . get lost there? If only I could suddenly become one of those thousands of brush strokes. Felix Thornton, I wish I was a stroke of your frenzied brush . . . Should I go back . . . ?’

Daniel never knew how he found himself in the bathroom, took his time washing his hands, then undressed, went to the shower and stood there as if waiting for that phony rain to wash off the day.

‘Where are you, my . . . old homeless folks? How I wish I could join you . . . You’d be chattering nineteen to the dozen. I’d love to have gone down the depths of your dig . . . and furrow my way into it. To hell with the gallery! May this Thornton go to hell . . .’

But Daniel’s old folks were on an archeological dig, same as most of the time in the course of his nineteen years, and could not hear him.

‘A good thing though they aren’t around—no nosey parkers to fight off . . .’

Daniel looked in the kitchen. He wasn’t hungry. He opened the fridge and took a pack of orange juice. He used a straw to take a swallow or two and headed for his den, never pausing at the living room: it didn’t look inviting. With a glance around the familiar walls, he grinned and landed full-length on the sofa.

‘Infected,’ he groaned. ‘Infected by that daub.’

Daniel got up and went to the window: it looked somewhat glassy.

‘It’s okay. This calls for a look. Another look—that’s the ticket. Stop in front of that daub and look. Genius. He’s got genius, this Felix Thornton. What have I got to do with it? What . . . what? I can feel it . . . Ugly. Everything’s ugly. I’ve got a feeling that the genius had dipped his brush in my gut, sprayed me and smeared me all over the canvas. I’m there now. Two or three strokes at least. And I want it that way. I’m here and there now. That’s why I’m being drawn there, me in my entirety . . . I’ve caught the bug, and I’m driven mad.’

Something has to be done, thought Daniel—the one of the two who was listening. In a few seconds he heard a familiar voice in his cell phone.

‘Yes?’ said the familiar voice.

‘Chris . . . hi. Listen. I . . . I’ve got something to tell you. I can’t help it. Don’t answer right away.’

‘That you, Dan? What’s wrong? Your hi sounds like no hi, and your voice is somewhat . . .’

‘It isn’t just my voice. It’s . . . I mean I’m sort of . . . Chris, I need your help. Even if you’re busy or have plans . . .’

‘Calm down, Dan. I want you to know I have no particular plans for the very near future, and you can depend on me.’

‘Thanks, Chris. You know . . . you’re still your old dear self, the way you were . . . in second, fifth, seventh grade. And thanks to you I’m coming back.’

‘Where from, Dan?’ Chris chuckled.

‘Where from . . . ? From a parallel world . . . Does the name Felix Thornton ring any bells?’

‘Felix Thornton . . . ? Why yes. I read something the other day on the Art. Riddles and Discoveries site. The Eifmann Gallery’s about to exhibit his pictures. They must be displayed even now; I read the article three days ago. You been there?’

‘All in good time, Chris. I’ve been there and seen . . . well, that can wait. What do you know?’

‘Next to nothing. A man, whatsisname, did his best to have that collection displayed in galleries all over the country. Some of those galleries won’t have them shown for a variety of reasons though, you know, the writer hinted that this Thornton was controversial and shrouded his name in mystery, I think. Truth to tell, I didn’t think it anything much. Just what’s your interest, Dan?’

‘Everything!’ cried Daniel. ‘All there is about him. Whatever you can find. You see . . . I don’t know what’s happening to me. I don’t know what he’s done to me . . . what his La vue en dedans has done to me—it’s the work of a genius.’

‘Why La vue en dedans?’

‘Because that’s what his exhibition’s called. Each of his pictures is called that.’

‘Sorry, Dan, it quite escaped me, but the name of the exhibition was mentioned several times in the notice. I thought it was nothing much at the time, but now you’ve mentioned it, I’m quite intrigued. You don’t have to ask me to visit the exhibition right now.’

‘It isn’t just that, Chris. Please, find out all you can about it. All you can. Make it your priority. As soon as you can. I should’ve done it myself, but I’m psyched out.’

‘Dan . . . Dan, I ask you to calm down and keep out of the parallel world. I’ll do my damnedest (always hoping I can) and call you right away.’

‘Yes, thanks a lot . . . Hold on, Chris . . .’ He had meant to say something else but lost it and had to sign off. ‘See you.’

Daniel found the gallery number in the directory and dialed it.

‘Hi. Could you tell me how long the Felix Thornton exhibition will last? Thanks . . . Tomorrow’s the last day,’ Daniel echoed the gallery voice. ‘That means we’ll meet yet again, Felix Thornton.’

 

* * *

Daniel spent over five hours in the gallery. Then roamed the city until nightfall, balanced between the here and now and La vue en dedans. He came home exhausted. He overdosed his sleeping pills and they knocked him out.

At ten am the next day Daniel was woken up by a phone call.

‘Morning, Dan. How are you?’

‘I caught some sleep.’

‘I’ve found something interesting on Felix Thornton. Been surfing some newspaper sites. I’ve printed out all I found—it’s quite a compilation. Oh, and I visited the exhibition first thing the day before yesterday. It may have genius, but to my mind . . . No offense meant, Dan, but it’s nothing short of a schizo seeing things. Anyway, I wouldn’t try to get to the bottom of it, let alone torment myself. That was the emotional part of it. Now for the facts: the exhibition is taken around the country by a Timothy Bail, the current owner of the collection, who inherited it from Felix Thornton.’

‘Not another word, Chris. Sorry, but I need you here. Along with all the artifacts and things, as my old folks would put it.’

‘Okay, Dan. On my way.’

 

Chapter Two

The Warp

 

Twenty years earlier.

The entry door barked back on being kicked open, and swallowed its exasperation at its inability to force the hinges and catch up with the offender. The words were rushing up the stairs to the fourth floor, ahead of the fourteen-year-old, bouncing off the walls and ceiling and echoing the inherent ire and exasperation, as the wooden obstacles finally and nonchalantly soaked in their passion. The boy seemed to be rehearsing a theatrical part as he repeated the words:

‘I hate ’im! I’ll kill ’im! I hate ’im! I’ll kill ’im!’

Just one door gave way to the pressure of the sounds which had despaired of finding vent.

‘Hi, neighbor. Come and have some tea. And then we’ll do the killing. Unless we change our minds.’

The boy looked up: a pleasantly warped face, unlike other faces, confronted him. Warped in every way, in its broad grin, its huge smiling eyes, its long hooked nose, in the hair casually streaming down the shoulders, and in the long, lean stooping figure. He must have run past the downstairs neighbor before; he must have even dropped a casual ‘Hi’ his way, but he had never stumbled over this warp before or looked it in the face. The boy was about to hurl a contemptuous ‘Bugger off!’ only to find himself accepting the invitation: the warp had drawn him in.

‘Come on in. Make yourself at home . . . or don’t. Suit yourself.’

The moment the boy entered the room, its walls and ceiling crashed chaos all over him and captured his feelings and imagination. It was a chaos wrought in paint and a multitude of mirror shards. They were scattered helter-skelter about the walls and ceiling. Once they reflected something, they turned into fragments of nature and civilization, life and death, reality and mysticism. Dotted here and there were numerous morbid eyes, distorted faces and living creatures, turned inside out as it were.

‘Don’t be frightened, or do. Just suit yourself.’ No one pronounced these words; they sort of originated inside the boy on their own. In an attempt at restoring reality, he tried to say something out loud, but his tongue had become a stiff lump. He was standing in the middle of the room, all atremble . . . only to feel a hand on his shoulder—and feel at ease.

‘These are just pictures. I had spied those eyes over there.’ The neighbor nodded toward the window. ‘No more treachery for them on the receiving end here, nor will they be tempted to be treacherous themselves.’

‘You a painter?’ blurted the boy at last.

‘Primarily a contemplator. Then, a painter. Let’s go to wash away the schoolroom canker, and partake of the board.’

The singularity of the situation had made the boy docile. The water hissed and he started washing his hands just as the painter was saying:

‘All grownups have betrayed their childhood. To enhance the truth, one might preface it with “almost,” but that can hardly bring on good luck. Here’s the towel. Let’s go to the kitchen . . . Take a seat . . . Do you want some salad? Here’s the meat dish. Don’t hesitate to help yourself to some more. I’ll take something too, to keep you company. Strange . . . Strange, isn’t it: kids growing up and letting down their childhood. Letting themselves down.’

The boy looked up at his new acquaintance, only to drop his eyes. The artist responded to the tacit question:

‘Given time, you’ll know whether I let my childhood down or not. Later still, you’ll have the answer to a harder question: if you betrayed your childhood yourself. It’s like this: once you realize . . . come to realize that you’re going to betray your childhood, will there be much point to feeling hurt when confronted with betrayal on the part of others, on the part of adults?’

‘Why, he’s a teach.’ A sullen look was craving support, the boy quite ready to bolt unless the ‘stinker’ was forthcoming.

‘It’s just my guess, but he’s no teacher. We should choose our own teachers. That one is nothing but a faulty mouthpiece.’

‘I wish I could tell him to bugger off or have it out in a fair fight.’

‘This is what makes this life so ugly. Help yourself to another piece of pie; I’ll pour you another cuppa. If it’s good we’ll help ourselves to more of the same.’

The boy was dying to tell him what had happened at school. He would have the culprit verbally punished outright by this singular man, who had just told him the gospel truth.

‘I hate his filthy guts!’ he blurted out, and felt unease.

‘Did that mouthpiece of a teacher resort to smut? You don’t have to tell me if it hurts.’

The boy’s lips suggested he was about to cry, but he contained the urge.

‘I dropped it accidentally . . . the globe. Honest Injun! He said . . .’ The boy lowered his eyes only to raise them again. ‘He said I’d been breaking wind. Everyone laughed. Well, I wasn’t.’

(The schoolboy had bent to pick up and replace the globe he’d accidentally upset. That was when the geography teacher’s voice hit him like a rod:

‘D’you know what you’ve just upset, Mister Hub of This World?’

‘I didn’t mean to.’

The teacher came up to the boy, clutched his sleeve between his forefinger and thumb and turned him to face the class.

‘Do you think—provided you choose to use your brains—you’ll find yourself there?’ He poked his finger at the globe. ‘Be it a magnifying glass. Be it a microscope. Would you spot yourself there? I don’t think you’re capable of anything but an SBD. Fortunately, the planet can survive that.’)

‘It’d have been right to teach him a lesson,’ the painter said calmly and resolutely. ‘Provided you’d had a plan to.’

The boy hadn’t expected to hear anything like that—his eyes were a study in incredulity. The artist went on:

‘And I’d be right to help you do it. Unfortunately, we can't get back at them all, those stinkers. I chose to leave for my world. It’d be an even better idea to find another country. One that has no room for those who let down their childhood, where the soul is free from hate and vengeance.’

‘What rot!’ blurted the boy: the idea was gall to him; he hadn’t expected to hear such rot from a man he’d come to like.

‘What rot?’

‘About the country.’

‘It’d have been tommy rot if your teacher had said it. Because he’s ignorant. Pray don’t lump me with him. A country like that does exist, and I’ll tell you about it in good time. If you don’t stand to lose much here, we’ll move to that country. We’ll live by a different clock there.’ The artist’s face was transformed, as if he’d glimpsed that unknown land for a moment.

‘Come again?’ The boy didn’t understand the part of it about the clock.

The painter’s eyes came back.

‘More tea?’

‘No thanks, I must be going: Mom will soon be back from work.’

 

* * *

Another twenty years earlier.

‘Felix?’

Felix was sitting at the table and drawing. He went on drawing when his mother addressed him. She had just come home and was eager to say something to her son.

‘Felix, you hear me? Please, stop what you’re doing for a moment. I’ve been to Desmond Burdick’s studio and talked to him about you.’

Felix forced himself to lay down his pencil and faced his mother.

‘He’s got to see your drawings before he makes up his mind whether he accepts you. He asked to see some of your drawings tomorrow. Select the ones you want to show him, and we’ll take them there.’

‘Nope,’ said Felix.

‘What do you mean?’ His mother was aghast.

‘I don’t want to show him any.’

‘But you do want to take a drawing class?’

‘Dunno.’ Neither his voice nor his eyes tried to undeceive his mother.

‘Your dad and I have discussed it with you. Your gift has to be worked on under tutorship. I thought you were all for my going to the studio to talk about you.

‘Okay. I’ll show him some of my drawings.’ His tone was as dry as dust as he resumed drawing.

‘No offense meant, son. You may have a flare for seeing things your own way . . . the way artists do. Even a gifted person needs schooling. And so do you. What you need is the technique of transferring what you see on to canvas to duly supplement your flare.’

There was no response on the part of Felix to what his mother had said; one couldn’t be sure he was listening.

. . . Desmond Burdick had been looking at Felix’s drawings for nearly an hour. There were three of them of the same room. The drawings were captioned Room, Draught, Someone Hiding. The one called Room was a pleasant surprise and the artist delighted in it. But he fought shy of praising his students, let alone applicants. He held back the words of delight. But when he laid it aside to take another, the words, even tacit ones, were overwhelmed by what he felt. Draught gave him gooseflesh and made the hair of his mustache and beard stand on end. The master looked on and on, now closing, now opening his eyes, aware that he could not get to the bottom of the boy’s feat wrought in pencil alone. His exacting gaze dwelled most on that sketch. It was the foretaste of seeing something just as singular and potent, yet another hidden aspect of the room, that made him tear away his gaze from Draught. ‘What a frenzied pencil,’ Burdick thought when the last sketch confronted him. The next moment his face grew grim and his hands shook, as if he was the one lurking in the room, as if his was the face that the sinister shadow of the one he was hiding from had been cast on. Burdick clumsily turned the sheet over and rose. He paced the room for some time paying no attention to Felix: he had to regain his composure. Then he addressed the boy:

‘I liked your drawings a lot. Have you been long at the game?’

‘Dunno.’

‘Has anyone taught you to draw?’

‘No, no one has.’

‘You can do your parents proud—I accept you.’

Felix rose to go.

‘Felix, have you tried to draw faces?’ asked Burdick with something on his mind.

He felt like looking the little craftsman in the eye and feel for his soul (there was something out of the ordinary in it). But he had realized that a face looking out of a sketch would tell him more than the real but closed face. He had realized that Felix the artist could not hide behind the guise that Felix the man was wearing without a difference. He had realised that the kid would reveal himself through a self-portrait.

‘Yes,’ was Felix’s answer, altogether too laconic and nonchalant.

‘In this case I suggest a deal: draw yourself, your face . . . Say, a self-portrait in pencil (your mother says you also use paints). I hope this task is all right with you?

‘Yes.’

‘Good. Let’s meet here at four two days from now. You bring your sketch, and we begin classes in the studio.’

Felix came up to the table, picked up his drawings without saying a word, and made for the door.

‘Bye,’ he said without looking Burdick’s way.

‘Take care.’

. . . Felix’s crumpled faces were hitting the floor one by one. Felix was angry: the self-portrait wouldn’t come out. Each of the faces he’d drawn was merely a mirror image of his face—not a trace of what he felt inside. He had spent in front of his mother’s cheval glass in her bedroom all day one and half of day two, always mindful that the master had given him two days only. At some point, despair took hold of him and made him hurl his favorite tool at that intransigent glass that kept gawping and mimicking him, insensible to feeling, making Felix’s aspects in pencil just as insensible. The mirror developed a crack, and Felix’s reflection sported a lengthy scar that warped his features. Felix grabbed the pencil and took moments in a frenzy to accomplish what he had failed to do for two days. Moments—that was what it felt like doing his first and last self-portrait.

‘I broke the mirror, Mom,’ said Felix when his mother was back home after work.

She knew he had been hard at work on his master’s first assignment and never said a word of reproach that might irk him. But a few minutes later she called him:

‘Come upstairs, please, Felix . . . Did you mean my cheval glass?’

‘I sure did.’

‘But it’s intact. Look.’

Felix approached the mirror and scrutinized it for a long time . . .

Desmond Burdick acted as planned. He took Felix’s folder with the coveted portrait and slid it in his leather briefcase. This was the time he had to devote himself to the students, while Felix’s new sketch would call for a lot of time and as much feeling. But above all, he wanted to delight in the boy’s effort all alone, in his home, for a genuine artist can only revel in another genuine artist’s work all by himself.

. . . Now in for the sweet moment! Burdick made some coffee . . . made himself comfortable in an easy chair . . . sipped from the cup . . . opened the briefcase and produced the folder . . . Another sip, and he opened the folder and tremulously removed the sheet. Just a few moments to savor the triumph of his surmise that the sketch would reveal the real Felix. Just a few moments. Revealed to him all of a sudden was what made his heart throb in the gullet—he found himself short of breath. He was struggling for air and gazing. He could not help it: what was on the sheet would not let his gaze go.

‘It can’t be true!’ Desmond Burdick gasped and died, his eyes popping out with an air of being caught between the dead dark and the warp come to life.

 

Chapter Three

The Expedition

 

‘You’ve been to the gallery again!’ Christine was incredulous and even frightened when she saw Daniel in the doorway. ‘What’s wrong? Have you looked in the mirror? All gaunt, and shadows under the eyes! Caught some sleep, my ass! It’s been barely three days since I saw you last, and I no longer know you.’

‘I’m still in the gallery in my mind’s eye, Chris. I’ll always be there . . . on his world. It’s . . . It’s my world, too. You may think I’m out of my mind, but I feel: what’s in Thornton’s pictures has always been there, inside me . . . Always there . . . I never so much as guessed that before. Couldn’t so much as conjecture.’

‘Always? Inside you? Dan, you’ve been caught in a trap! A psychic trap of sorts. You’ve got hooked on an obscure, infinitesimal detail that you can hardly . . . no, that you’re completely unaware of. It could be the gallery curator’s scent. The scent your mother used to wear when you were sucking in this world in your cot. Now that room, that space (whoever it’s filled by—Thornton or a fragrant curatoress) is the cot for you.’

‘Stop it, Chris,’ Daniel interrupted her. ‘I’m no fool and I’m not a shrink’s case. My greatest fear was that you’d not believe me.’

‘Why not? I do believe you. And I want to help you get out of it.’

‘Well, I want to understand—’

‘Understand what? Those inside views? What are they all about? What must I get inside of to see that? Is it my gut? I don’t care for that, and I refuse to try and fathom things like those . . . Guillotine. Inside view . . . Recherché, my ass!’

‘That’s imagery, Chris . . . Please, sit down on that sofa,’ Daniel said as they entered the living room.

He positioned the coffee table to peruse the matter Christine had brought in grater comfort. Christine was still at it:

‘Imagery? D’you know the way Thornton passed away? He ordered a guillotine a few months before his death, an honest-to-goodness guillotine (no mockups for him) to portray its likeness, as it were. And engineered an inside view for it . . . perchance for himself, too.’

‘Wait a bit. Did he kill himself? So he knew he’d be killing himself. Painting in that knowledge. Perhaps he saw . . . ? Are those canvases his visions? What a pity . . . There’s no meeting or talking to him now . . .’

Christine saw that Daniel had withdrawn into himself, crestfallen. She kept silent, just looking at him and pitying him. It irked her that a sea change had come to pass: there was something wrong with Dan, there was no putting it right—there was nothing for it but to drift.

‘Chris, what was it you said about Thornton’s heir?’

‘Thornton had bequeathed his pictures to Timothy Bail, who is now touring the country with the exhibition which is a great success—judging by you. Nothing else about the man that’s noteworthy. Apropos of which, Thornton’s older brother never made it to the funeral because of that will.’

‘I can quite understand.’

‘Particularly considering that his house (reported to be quite expensive) and entire estate have passed on to Bail.’

‘That’s strange.’

‘Thornton was strange—a recluse, no family of his own (unlike Bail, who has a wife and a daughter), no contacts with his brother. Broke off with him after the meteorite hunters’ expedition, but that’s another story, rather enigmatic, too.’

‘I wonder.’

Christine produced a folder from her bag and opened it.

‘You’d better read this. This is what they write about the exhibition. This is about his death. This compilation is perhaps of greatest interest.’ Christine thought it best to humor him. ‘It’s all about Thornton’s disappearance and return.’

This latter did indeed make Daniel perk up. Disappearance. Return. His consciousness had picked up a mysterious communion, however tentative, that he could hardly put his finger on, a link between himself, the ‘inside views’ and those words. He couldn’t help crying out:

‘Chris, that’s classy! Thanks.’

‘All thanks should go to the French for their invention: most of the articles on Thornton appeared after he had parted company with his head of genius. It even goes for Thornton’s disappearance—he’d been quite forgotten for thirty years.’

‘I don’t care who’s forgotten what. What matters is that there’s a hidden door in my soul. And there’s something I know nothing about behind that door. But I will find it, Chris. I’ll find my way there, and you’ll help me. What we need is a prompt, and we’ll find one. Just don’t leave me alone vis-à-vis this.’

. . . They sat, the two of them, into the small hours of the morning. They took turns reading the stories out loud. They reread them. They argued. When Christine was rustling up dinner in the kitchen, Daniel went on searching, hopeful of coming across an event, a word that would provide a prompt, a lead, a witness—something tangible, rather than an interjection-like emanation of the overwrought imagination.

Weariness caught them up when it was going on for two in the morning. Christine was going to leave. She wanted to wind up the intervening hours with something pleasant for Daniel, something to do with his newly found enthusiasm. She thought she had it in her, she wasn’t acting a lie.

‘Oh Dan, I was forgetting—I did like one picture by Thornton. As I was standing in front of it in the gallery, I thought—’

‘Which one, Chris?’ Daniel interrupted her, for he no longer had time for patience. ‘Sorry.’

‘It’s all right, I can quite understand. I must tell you in advance: its caption isn’t to my mind’s liking . . . or my heart’s, for that matter, either.’

‘Which is it, Chris?’

‘The Placeless Place. Inside View. Remember?’

‘I’d seen it!’ cried Daniel, whipped by an impulse, over and over again, as if he was afraid he’d forget having seen it. ‘I’d seen it! I’d seen it! Before! I’d seen it before! Not yesterday! Nor the day before! Much earlier, Chris!’

He’d given Christine quite a turn; she was quavering in response to the air that had been electrified inside Daniel, and was now taking a bite at everything around it.

‘You can’t have seen it before, Dan. You can’t have seen it. You can’t have seen it for one good reason: the picture was exhibited for the first time. You couldn’t have ignored the notice Exhibited for the first time that was crying out in much the same way you’re doing now. The Placeless Place is just under that notice. I remember right. Just because that was the only picture that caught my fancy. Because that was the only picture I regarded as a picture. And no one had seen it before. Nor you, Dan, either. Besides, the caption suggests that the place is nonexistent. It was just Thornton’s fancy.’

Having splashed out the words full of despair, Christine ran out of the house. And burst into tears . . . When Daniel came to his senses and emerged in the street, she was gone.

 

* * *

Christine was sitting behind the steering wheel of the red Honda—her parents’ gift to her for successfully graduating school. The car was eagerly cleaving the air that was full of gold which melted and slid down its glossy shape on to the sheeny bronze tarmac. The car was happy: she was giving her friend a good ride.

Way back, when a plan was germinating in Christine’s head how to help Dan, she was rehearsing a speech she would deliver, now flowing with tears, now laughing through the tears (a speech she could only mumble to herself, her head being anything but fresh) as she handed him the gift.

‘Dear Dan . . . No . . . My dear Dan . . . No, that’s too much . . . Daniel . . . Too formal . . . Dear Daniel, I want to give you a present. Well no, I haven’t got it on me. It’s in me . . . here.’ She held a hand to her heart. ‘I mean this ride . . . these two rides, but more about the second one later on. I can quite understand that you are about to turn over a new leaf. I’m not about to be a spoilsport: I haven’t got the power or the inclination to stop you. I’ll try . . . not to be in the way. But I think you should . . . make an about turn. An about turn to head for a new life, to face fact and ordinary people, who precisely because of their ordinariness will help you to see the light at the end of this macabre tunnel . . . and, truth be told, to get out of the gut, saving your presence . . . spewed by the imagination of a schizo, or maybe a charlatan and look at it all with a human eye. And I believe that this ride will be the first step toward the recovery of the Daniel I used to know as a schoolmate . . .

‘That’s self-serving: I’m giving Dan a ride that will restore the former Dan to me as a present,’ Christine summed up the speech that has now become a thing of the past.

The day had had an auspicious beginning for Christine: she’d found out the phone number of Ashley Wood, a member of the expedition that involved Felix Thornton, got him on the phone and arranged a meeting, however reluctant, with him. She was enraptured: her plan was under way!

Daniel, on the wing of Christine’s inimitable patience and benevolence and hopeful of a speedy approach to the mystery’s solution, soared on high as soon as they were out of the city’s bounds and sped on; he had now scooted over the azure off-the-road space for about eighty miles when a familiar voice had spanned the two-foot expanse between reality and dream after an umpteenth try:

‘Daniel Bertridge, wake up and shine! So much for the sleep of the just.’

‘Chris?’ He gave her a puzzled look and gawped around. ‘Are we there?’

‘We are. His name is Ashley Wood. There, you seem to be recovering from a coma. Number ninety-one . . . There’s his house.’ Christine stopped the car. ‘You ready?’

‘There’s a bit of a buzz in my head. Ashley Wood, number ninety-one.’

Christine laughed.

‘This isn’t a prison visit. It isn’t “Ashley Wood, number ninety-one, out with you!” but a house number ninety-one. We’ve stopped right across the way, and I’m waiting for you to come to finally.’

‘I have. Let’s go.’

‘Now I can see you have.’

Daniel pressed the button of an antediluvian bell several times. The wait was alive with the thumping of a wooden object and husky mumbling. The door opened without the usual standby queries and faltering answers. Confronting Daniel and Christine was a tall man of about sixty leaning on the shoulder of his wooden assistant. Either countenance suggested that they were both as dry as dust both physically and spiritually.

‘Good afternoon,’ faltered Christine somewhat belatedly. ‘Are you Ashley Wood?’

‘What can I do for you?’

‘I . . . I called you this morning. We arranged an appointment. A propos of Felix Thornton . . . his part in the expedition? Remember?’ Christine was looking at Ashley Wood, doubtful that the morning had been all that auspicious.’

Ashley Wood was still silent, appraising his visitors.

‘My name’s Christine Willis, this is my friend, Daniel Bertridge.’

‘I’m not asking you in: the pain is all over the place—the wrong sort of thing for your springtime faces unused to pain. We’ll talk over there.’ He waved his crutch in the direction of an arbor.’

The visitors found it easier to breathe . . .

When they settled on the bench surrounding the table, Christine decided to repeat what she had told Wood over the phone.

‘The point is we’re students, not reporters. We’re amassing matter on the life and work of Felix Thornton. Won’t you tell us about the expedition from which he was reported missing?’

‘I’ll tell you all I know, all I remember.’

Ashley Wood didn’t have to be talked into telling things. He was quite prepared to relate everything, his sins, too: his soul had long been conditioned for penance by a terminal disease. The rather that they were not reporters (he could see that), whose guts he hated because given a word of sincerity, they would sell it to the devil. Also, he needed money.

‘The fee up front . . . I need medication: my condition calls for that.’ He looked aside. ‘Sorry, kids.’

‘Yes, sure thing.’ Somewhat embarrassed, Christine hastened to produce the money from her purse. She handed Wood two hundred-bills. ‘Here you are.’

He accepted them without a word and clasped them in his fist, thus suppressing his shame which had a way of manifesting itself out of turn, and rose a bit to shove them into his breech pocket.

‘It was the most useless hike of all I’ve been party to, much against our better judgment. Well, I’ve been to so many such, my mind would go astray were I to list them. It was a sorry excuse of an expedition. All because of that devil of a daubster, I guess. There was invariably a foursome of us starting out. We knew one another well enough, and had no patience with a stranger, much less that Thornton Jr. However, his older brother, Eddie, had managed to talk Dick Slaton into taking the guy along. Dick’s word was a law with all of us, me too: he was quite a character and would brook no opposition. It was a straightforward deal: he keeps himself to himself and looks for no iron . . .

‘The weather turned the very first day, there was a thunderstorm and torrential rain. It couldn’t have been worse with all those slippery boulder hazards around. The metal detector was out of the question. Twiddling your thumbs in camp is a sore trial. Well, that cove . . . started hopping around like one mad and hollering heavenward: “Give them hell! Show what you’re worth! I crave you!” and things like that. Which it did: lightning set alight a tree some twenty yards from him. He was still at it, like, “That was good! Let’s have more of the same. Get a bead on it. I’m here. I’m yours.” I could stand it no longer and made for him. Like everyone else, I wanted to teach him a lesson. I’d sure have let off steam and given the scamp a hell of a hiding. But Eddie stepped in and somehow prevailed on his brother to desist. The dauber had made no friends, immune to reason as he was. He had a way of looking down his nose at people.’

‘Did he draw?’ Daniel wondered.

‘Kept at it all the time. Each time I went by, he hand was busy swishing over some paper. A glance told you it was nature . . . say, a boulder, the sky . . . However, later on, he imparted some sort of ugly life to it. I don’t know what it was exactly. I don’t know how to put it. But it was something revolting, something his head bred . . . No, he wasn’t a genuine artist . . .’

Several seconds later Ashley Wood went on with a grin:

‘Truth to tell, Dick’s likeness was all right. The eyes, the smirk . . . he hit them off to the life. Even his character was there, too, somehow. But he was all wrong . . . as an individual . . . Took his meals by himself, talked with a taunt in his eyes . . . and that sort of thing. He was tolerated for the sake of his brother—his brother’s all right . . . a good worker . . .’

Wood fell silent. He clenched his teeth and closed his eyes waiting for the pain to subside.

‘But one day we found we could stand it no more. Robby, Robert Fletcher, stumbled on Thornton Jr picking at the ground, casting aside stones. He was so engrossed he never saw Robby. Robby told about it to Dick, Eddie and me. We all thought the artist had hit iron and decided to make sure. He spotted us when we were some thirty yards off and dashed off toward the forest. Dick said he would fetch him and raced off. He returned when it was quite dark. He’d lost him. That was what he said . . . We searched for him the next day. A day later we decided to call the rescue team. Iron was the least of our concerns, and we struck camp. Eddie stayed behind with the rescuers. All to no avail—the dauber was gone with the wind. Eddie had to call the police, they gave us a hell of a time. Dick was a suspect. Three months later your frigging Thornton turned up.’

‘Mr Wood?’

‘Ashley. Just call me Ashley.’

‘Ashley, what was it that Felix Thornton found? Why did he run away?’ said Christine.

‘Eddie said it was some rare coin. The daubster then sold it to a wealthy collector. It fetched quite a price. I don’t think he would have got that much for his pictures. That’s all I know . . . Sorry, it’s past my medication time.’

There was nothing personal when Wood cut the conversation short—the pain was eating at his body, leaving no room for answers.

Link to the book: https://www.amazon.com/Dorlief-Annin-Brothers-ebook/dp/B0GK1KR9BK/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0

 

 

https://www.amazon.com/Dorlief-Annin-Brothers-ebook/dp/B0GK1KR9BK/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_02sample

Sample two

Part Six

Returning to Himself

 

Chapter Two

Catalepsy

 

The breeze wafted in through the sash of Daniel’s room, swept across his face as a facile wave, touched his lids and lifted them as if in passing, by chance, letting in light.

‘A classy dream!’ said Daniel when he opened his eyes and grasped that what he had seen a second, a minute or an hour before and what had been happening to him a second, minute or hour before was a dream, a classy dream unreal in its reality and its lucidity. What were they called? That old man . . . a humpback? What a dream to have—a humpbacked old man! How did he land in my head? What’s his name? Ah yes, Malam. Malam of all that’s wonderful. Like a Malam in my head. How would one account for all that? No way . . . except it’s a word circle. Curiouser and curiouser. Wherefrom would they emerge . . . ? Now, that guy . . . where was he taking Matthew and me? Led on and on. Hmm, I was there with Matthew. I’ll tell him one of these days . . . Semimes . . . Semimes, Malam’s son . . . It was at the tip of my tongue, like half of something . . . Who else was there? I’ve just seen them . . . The fireplace! Us sitting by the fireplace. Who’s everybody . . . ? I don’t remember anyone else . . . Who did I think of just now? Who, who? I meant to remember who was by the fireside and suddenly thought of someone, the thought coming of its own accord, flashing quite close by. A recollection flashing by. Like a presence nearby . . . That’s it, gotcha! I fell in love with her, was mad about her. Her name was . . . I can’t recall, of all that’s wonderful! Her face . . . (Daniel shut and opened his eyes again—only to recoil.) Here it is . . . right in front of me. She’s thinking about me. She’s wondering why I forsook her. She doesn’t know it’s a dream and she’s part of my dream. What’s her name? The face is there but what about the name? No name . . . Gone. (Daniel closed and opened his eyes again.) Okay, I might see you on the street and ask your name. And I’d know it’s you . . . That’s where I saw her, on the street in my dream. What street? What was the place? Some unfamiliar town . . . And orange houses! Round orange houses! But I saw it all . . . saw it for real! Where was it? That’s right, in the picture! In the picture of that artist—Felix Thornton! Yesterday, in the gallery. Felix Thornton. That’s where all these visions come from. Felix Thornton . . . Christine was to call me, it suddenly dawned on Daniel. She promised. She said she’d go to the gallery . . . I’ll call her.

Daniel glanced at the digital clock on a bookcase shelf . . . and was stunned. It was not the glowing hours and minutes that had given him a shock.

‘Can I have slept for a whole month? I must be raving!’

Daniel jumped out of his bed and stepped to the desk to make sure he had indeed been away from the real world too long—too long for an honest-to-goodness guy. His cell wasn't there. He pulled open the top drawer and—to his joy—found the old one. Incomplete joy: the cell phone needed charging. He booted up his computer—the whole month had really passed. In a few minutes his hand groped for the cell phone again to let Daniel hear the honest-to-goodness voice of the honest-to-goodness person he had talked to, like, the day before—Christine's cell phone seemed to be nonexistent. The landline answering machine took over in her mother’s voice:

‘Hi. Calling Christine? Keep in mind that she’s traveling far from home and is expected back early in September.’

An hour later, Daniel was crossing the threshold of a café with the improbable name—The Last Chance. It had an improbable ring at first glance only, for it was across the way from a high school and was there to give the wretches there a good chance to, as it were, sugar the pill of nerve-rending lack of freedom and frustration with things that were keen on chance. It was members of this estate that whetted their wits on that frivolous shingle, but, having got a taste of a different shingle, did not hesitate to drop their superciliousness and frequent The Last Chance.

Daniel found it increasingly difficult to keep his own company after resurrection from the catalepsy, and he resorted to the tried and only way of escaping himself . . . Judging by the response of his old cell phone (he must have mislaid his new one), Christine, who invariably tended to his aches, was indeed out of reach until early September. Mat? he thought. What a pity you aren’t available, feather: you’d at least dispel my . . . (Daniel substituted another, more innocuous, word for the one that was very much to the point but spelled disgrace—he had Googled four items on near-death experiences) . . . you’d dispel my apprehensions about the precious and precarious 3-D construct around me. But Matthew was unavailable, and his best chance was running into a familiar face . . .

Daniel flung the door open—the starkly bright sun dazzled him and made him pause: confronting him were faces . . . two faces in this purblind bleary space swept by the waves of blond strands, enlightened, with eyes that spelled benignity.

‘Sufus and Safasy!’ Daniel mouthed. ‘Sufus and Safasy,’ his consciousness chimed in recalling something . . . recalling only to lose it the next moment.

Sufus and Safasy smiled in response and vanished as suddenly as they had appeared.

‘A classy dream,’ Daniel comforted himself and hastened to resign himself to the habitual course.

Daniel sipped his cappuccino thinking that he might sit like this for an eternity eyeing these honest-to-goodness people who were keen on chance. The people and the cappuccino and the appetizing smells his nose was so keen on seemed to be saying: ‘You’re back, cove, so you’re still the same old Dan who’s put in seven hours of sleep (rather than a month), been to school every day, to finally find yourself at one of these tables.’

‘That you, Bertridge?’ Someone touched his shoulder with the words and made him look back. ‘Sure, it’s you. Hi, buddy.’

‘Eddie! You’re just the man!’ Daniel was overjoyed.

‘Do you mind? How are you? Shoot. It’s a year since we met last, Bertridge. Now we’re in The Last Chance, it looks like we haven’t left and there wasn’t that long year in between. Bugger all, eh? Isn’t that the way you feel?’

‘Sure, Eddie: bugger all . . .’

‘What gives?’

‘. . . Nothing much. (Daniel had suddenly discovered he had nothing to say: the frigging dream had proved stronger than the reality he had lived theretofore, and eclipsed it to the point of obscurity).

‘“Nothing much” calls for a hard drink rather than coffee. What’s wrong? You look bleary-eyed . . .’

Daniel hesitated, shrugged and said nothing.

‘Out with it, buddy. You can’t fool me: I’m a third-generation psychiatrist,’ Eddie tried to liven up his schoolmate, aware that Daniel was at odds both with himself and his silence. ‘That’s my idea of bragging.’

‘Got your scholarship?’

‘You bet. I’ve been at it for a year doing the frigging thing.’

‘You’re a godsend, Eddie Zelman.’

‘Am I, now? Hmm, at your service, buddy . . . What makes you hesitate? I can see you’re dying to spill your guts. Do: this is just the place.’

‘I’ve slept for a year. Lived for a year in my dream without waking up. It’s catalepsy, isn’t it?’

Eddie smirked.

‘Joking, aren’t you: me a psychiatrist, you a loony?’

‘I fell asleep a month ago and woke up only today. It’s up to you to decide whether I’m a loony or not.’

‘Do you mean it? Went to sleep and never woke up, not even for a pee? Let me give you a look . . .’

‘What do you say, third-generation psychiatrist?’

‘What do I say? Come to see me in, say, six years. I’m out of my depth at the moment. That’s what I say.’

Daniel looked aside: no offense taken, but something in him did feel hurt—because of his own weakness, rather than because of what Eddie had said.

‘I say, Dan! Da-an? Eddie Zelman here. Have you forgotten I’m a godsend? I thought you were telling me to bugger off. What was that you saw out the window?’

‘I saw my embarrassment: imposing on you . . .’

‘Whoa, whoa, whoa! You’re doing right. If I were you I, too, would shit in my pants and take my trouble to Zelman Sr. You do right imposing on me: I’ll be addressing your problem right now.’

Eddie produced his cell phone from his jeans pocket and started scrolling the screen with his forefinger.

‘Wait, Eddie, what’s on your mind?’

‘Just a mo, buddy. It’s my turn to worm myself . . . Hi, Pops. It’s me. There’s a problem sitting next to me, just up your street . . . I’m in a café but that’s beside the point. The upshot is: my classmate, Danny Bertridge . . . Good, so you remember him . . . Danny has slept for a month . . . Slept in every sense of the word: went to bed a month ago and woke up today . . . No, he’s not pulling my leg. He’s afraid it was catalepsy, and he doesn’t know what’s in store for him . . . Good, Pops.’

‘I’m embarrassed shitless, Eddie.’

‘Danny, that’s what we’re in the business for. What would we do without you, loonies?’ Eddie parried (it was clear he was enjoying every bit of it).

‘Well?’

‘I’ll call back Zelman Sr in five minutes. Well, what’s your trouble? Just get me posted.’

‘Zelman Jr’s question to his first patient?’

‘A question from one patient of a dearly loved greasy spoon to another patient of just as loved a greasy spoon.’

‘Okay. I think Felix Thornton’s at the bottom of it all.’

‘Do I know him? Wait a bit . . . I know: he’s an artist. Mom was at his picture exhibition a month ago exactly. She’s a sucker for all sorts of schizo artists. You know what her treatise is called? Schizophrenia and Artistic Trends. Whatever possessed you to go?’

‘I don’t know . . . Just dropped by. Must be fate. I was still there inside those pictures when I left. You know the rest.’

‘I say!’

‘In my dream I lived in a town. Everything happened as if for real. The town’s in one of Thornton’s pictures. What if I wake up here today and show up there in a month’s time? It would be anyone’s guess which is reality and which is a dream.’

‘D’you remember everything well . . . in your dream?’

‘Not exactly. I remember something very well. Some people’s faces are there alive in front of my eyes. I remember some names . . . Something’s gone . . . You see: the visual images are gone but some perceptions are still there: you remember them and you don’t.’

‘Cool. I’m calling Pop immediately,’ said Eddie pedaling his words down with a jocular tone. ‘It’s me, Pops . . . Speak, I’ll pass it on. He sure can: I’ll take him there. Thanks, Pop. See you.’

‘Where’re you taking me?’

‘To a cool cove. I know him: he’s been to see my father.’

‘A colleague?’

‘You bet. Come, we’ve got to make haste: father said he’ll see you right away. Consider yourself privileged: you’ll dump your glitches on Job Cohan.’

* * *

‘Give your rue to fire,’ flashed across Daniel’s head as if someone had screeched the words in him when Job Cohan stepped forward to meet him. There was fire in his mop of hair (fiery-red, it sent the ambient light packing), in his eyes (the fire inside seemed to bathe their blackness with the flames warning that it was hot enough to singe), and in him (no man can so visibly, perceptibly ooze energy the moment you see the first footsteps, the first gestures unless there is fire inside). He came up to Daniel, held out his hand (forty, stocky, with a broad forehead and a raven beak) and said, with Daniel’s hand still in his:

‘I want to hear from the horse’s mouth how you’ve managed to sleep a whole month, young man,’ he pronounced the sounds as if it was not his tongue, but a shovel scraping at gravel that was popping along. ‘Job Cohan at your service for an hour.’

‘Much obliged. Daniel Bertridge.’

‘Take a seat, Daniel,’ Cohan motioned toward the beige leather chair. ‘Or else pace the room if that makes you feel better. I must ask you to answer my questions spontaneously and matter-of-factly. I’m listening.’

Despite the obvious advantages of ‘talking as we walk,’ Daniel sank into the chair. Cohan took the one facing it.

‘You know, doctor, when I woke up, it never occurred to me to count the hours I’d slept. I woke up and said to myself, “It was a classy dream.” And then I glanced at the clock and realized I’d been asleep for a month. I couldn’t fill the month with real events no matter how I tried: they just weren’t there. So here I am, even though I hadn’t considered seeing a shrink in my wildest dreams. The Last Chance’s to blame.’

‘Very good. Are you on drugs?’ The shovel was at the gravel again.

‘What was that?’

‘I want a spontaneous answer, not a question or conjecture. Drugs . . .’

‘No, I’ve never had any.’

‘Very good. Glue-sniffing?’

‘No, perish the thought.’

‘Oh, they do sniff: they think it cool and they do. Were you stressed the day or two before? Dismay, compunctions?’

‘You might call it a stressful situation: a month ago I went to an exhibition of pictures by Felix Thornton. It was them . . . You see, doctor, there’s something in his work—at the subconscious level—that I could feel inside me . . . Or should I say I’d captured a link between myself and what was in the pictures. I felt without grasping it. It wouldn’t let me go. I thirsted to grasp . . . and you may think it all rot, but I thirsted not to be at the gallery but inside those pictures, in the world of Thornton’s pictures, and the thirst wouldn’t let me go . . . I spent the next day in the gallery scrutinizing them. It quite exhausted me. So that I took a sleeping draft before I went to bed (I’ve just remembered).’

‘What draft, do you remember?’

‘No, but I read the instructions before I took it. It said: one to two pills before sleep. I took three as far as I remember. Could it be . . . ?’

‘Let me have your hand . . . Good. Do twenty sit-ups.’

Daniel got up and started doing the sit-ups.

‘That’ll do. Your hand . . . Do some more, briskly this time . . . Enough. Your hand, please . . . Very good.’

‘Meaning good or well-done?’

‘Well-done! Both. That means you last took food a month ago before this morning?’

‘Looks like it.’

‘Was there anyone to look after you while you were asleep?’

‘No, I’m on my own now. My parents are archeologists staying away from home for long, if the word “home” applies.’

‘Were you perceptive of your room when you slept?’

‘I perceived what I dreamt.’

‘A lot of fat burnt off?’

‘Come again?’

‘Did you slim a lot in the course of the month?’

‘I don’t think I’ve slimmed.’

‘Do you feel giddy in the morning? Did you, today?’

‘No, but . . .’ Daniel hesitated.

‘But what? Please, answer me as per our arrangement.’

‘I see pictures in my mind’s eye, from my dream. Faces, objects. You’ve asked me about the room, and I thought I’d remembered a room from my dream, a room in the house I lived in my dream. A momentary impression rather than a picture . . . a remembrance of something real. But there was no such room in my life.’

‘Very good. That was very apt. Now we’ll get into you dream.’

Daniel looked questioningly at Cohan.

‘A brief session of hypnosis. We’re both interested in one, aren’t we?’

‘I don’t know: I haven’t considered it. But if it’s any use . . .’

‘Will you get up, please? Raise you right leg, will you?

‘Raise how?’

‘Bent at the knee. Now your left one. Once more your right and your left. Are they hard to lift? Lead-loaded?’

‘No, that was okay.’

‘Very good, Daniel. Sit down at the table and fill out this form—your consent to a session.’

. . . Cohan looked through the paper signed by Daniel.

‘Very good. Put on these on top of your shoes,’ he motioned toward the box of booties next to the door. ‘Now come to this room.’

Cohan was the first to enter and flipped a switch—the room was filled with lilac twilight. Daniel was startled as he remembered something.

‘It may be important, doctor . . .’

‘Speak without hesitation.’

‘The sky in my dream was violet.’

‘Very good, it’s very important. I’ll supply that in my hypnotic set. Sit in that chair. (There was nothing but a chair with a sloping back in that room—no windows.) Recline and relax with your feet on the footrest. Relax: you must feel comfortable.’

‘I’m quite comfortable in this cozy chair.’

‘Okay, we’ll begin. I’ll switch on what I call a snake. Pray: concentrate on it and my words. And no foolish or smart-aleck questions.’

As soon as Cohan said it, a turquoise light snake appeared a foot in front of Daniel’s eyes in the lilac space. It was suspended vertically, its light was not monochrome or still: a soft turquoise flowing gently and producing the impression of the snake continually wriggling . . .

A minute later, Cohan began speaking in undertones and not so pushfully as before. Daniel listened intently to the sounds which were strung together into trains of words. He listened and listened. There was some power in those sounds and words, something that drew him. He felt like following and divining them. Strangely enough, he could not make out a single word, could make no sense of what Cohan was saying. But the turquoise snake and the undeciphered words lured and led Daniel on . . . taking him further and further. Where . . . ? Perchance, into the lilac distance where some mystery would be solved. What mystery? Daniel was looking and listening . . . look-stening and look-stening . . .

. . . Tapping intruded on his sleep, slight and frequent. It was unending, seemingly loaded with anxiety. Daniel suddenly realized they were coming from the outside, they had nothing to do with his sleep and, surprised at the idea, he woke up . . . They were tapping on the window frame. He sat up. Darkness had not yet subsided hiding whoever had introduced anxiety into the serenity of the night. Daniel thought it was an appeal that someone wanted to remain secret. “Leoely,’ crossed his head. He got up, pulled on his jeans and neared the window. The tapping stopped, and a minute later, someone’s hand beckoned him and somebody’s barely audible voice called him:

‘Danad, Danad.’

‘Leoely,’ Daniel whispered and opened the window—lilac semi-darkness opened up . . .

‘Very good.’ (Daniel started). ‘Wake up, wake up,’ the voice suddenly became familiar.

Cohan would not torture Daniel with questions at once. He had him seated in the beige chair and pressed a cup of coffee on him. He had one, too.

‘Well, we seem to have quite come to. Let’s go on searching for the truth.’

Daniel fancied Cohan’s intonation had somehow altered. Perhaps, in the course of the session he had learnt facts that had made him lean toward his strange patient and relent.

‘I wish we could find it.’

‘Do you remember anything of our communication during the session, any of my questions or your answers?’

Daniel considered it and could only think back to the beginning—the luminous snake and the doctor’s cunning gobbledygook.

‘Nothing at all. Did I tell anything of interest?’

‘Pretty curious things, Daniel. In a minute, I’ll give you a few names that you fished out of your memory with ease. I assume with a weighted degree of probability that the events associated with those names took place shortly before your mysterious dream. But I’ll anticipate that with a few questions. The rules are the same: question—answer unburdened with fancy.’

‘I’ve learned that lesson, doctor.’

‘Very good.’ (Someone must have turned a key in Cohan to put him in a different mode of operation). ‘Are you writing a novel?’

‘What?’ Daniel was nonplussed.

‘So you’ve learned it, haven’t you?’

‘Sorry, doctor. The answer is no, I’m not.’

‘Do you go in for computer games? Aren’t you hung up on the wish to move to one of them . . . or, rather, weren’t you hung up on it as a fixed idea before you visited the gallery?’

What was it I told him? Daniel thought and smirked.

‘It was a long time ago, but thinking back, I’d frankly say: No, no such hangups.’

‘Very good, I thought as much,’ Cohan said conversationally, only to add in a counter-intuitive manner, as if to catch him in the act:

‘Are you Danad?’

Daniel was confused indeed, and it made him pause. He did recall he was Danad, but looked for the answer (basically, for himself) as to where it was from: Why Danad . . . ? Cohan did not urge him on: he was sure Daniel was not weighting his answer; he was merely looking for one.

‘I only know I’m not Danad in this life,’ he said at last.

‘Is there a different one?’

This question nonplussed him, too. Cohan patiently waited.

‘I think it’s in my dream. I was called that in my dream, as far as I can remember . . . It’s just glimpses: now it’s there, now it’s gone.’

‘That was an apt remark.’

‘An apt remark?’

‘Your “as far as I can remember.” Let’s proceed. Did you make straight for home after the gallery, or did you stop by a bar, to relax?’

‘Hmm, that’s right: I did stop by a bar. I’ve told you what was going on that day. I couldn’t think straight. I was all at sixes and sevens; I dropped by a bar. I don’t remember which, frankly speaking.’

‘Very good. Now the names, just as I promised. You merely comment in brief: what I need is a primary association. There goes: Christine.’

‘That’s easy. You might say she’s my pal in life. We go way back: school and college together.’

‘Matthew, I dare say, is another lifelong pal?’

‘Good guess: he’s my best friend: we go back a long way—way back to the swing on my grandparents’ lawn.’

‘Very good. Leoely.’

‘Leoely?’ There was a quiet delight in Daniel’s eyes and in the way he uttered the word. ‘That’s the name I meant to recall when I woke up this morning. But couldn’t. It’s the name of my girlfriend from the dream.’

‘Perhaps, not just from the dream, Daniel? Perhaps, you met her at the bar? That night after the gallery?’

‘Not that I remember,’ said Daniel, only to think: That would be great. And said out loud, ‘She’s the girl from my dream.’

‘Are you sure she didn’t get teleported from the bar to your dream?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Does this name say anything to you: Falafy?’

‘My granny,’ said Daniel without thinking.

‘The one that has your and Matthew’s swing on her lawn?’

Daniel hastened to make amends (as he had come to his senses):

‘I didn’t mean that, doctor. Not quite: Falafy is my granny from the catalepsy.’

‘What about real life?’

‘My real granny’s name is Margaret. You probably thought I had a split personality: Daniel and Danad, Margaret and Falafy.’

‘Malam, Semimes, Groyorg. Do you know these people?’

‘Malam was my host. Semimes is his son. Groyorg was also staying with them. We were by the fireside.’

‘And all of them are characters in your dream?’

Daniel did not say anything: he, too, thought it weird. And he was sorry he had come here to . . . ask to be certified.

‘Moron,’ he said through clenched teeth (somehow he wanted Cohan to hear that self-assessment).

‘Very good!’ hollered Cohan (but quite amicably). ‘You call into question what brought you here in the first place, to wit: the idea that you had been in catalepsy for the past month.’

‘Isn’t that the case, doctor?’

‘I’m sure it isn’t. Let’s advance from the simple to the complex. You’re physically quite fit: your muscle tone is fine, your heart rate is that of an astronaut. I’d sooner believe that you’ve been scaling mountains or white-water rafting, rather than spending a month as a dead man. Your psyche, though, has been affected by one of those people with cyclic names, among whom you were known as Danad. Leoely, I think, played the part of bait of her own free will or through coercion in this shady story (and did well, parenthetically). This whole story is all about being in the right place at the right time, to wit: in a bar, when the girl in question was refreshing herself. It’s like your unplanned visit to Doctor Cohan: the dread of uncertainty took you to The Last Chance, where Eddie Zelman picked you up; you spilt the beans to him—how couldn’t you?—and found yourself here. But back to business. Who could benefit by it, you might ask. It looks like some community. Look: standard orange dwellings round in shape (I inferred as much from the session). It could be a sect. Look: palindromes—cyclic names that read either way, suggestive of eternity and infinity—the ideas of unearthly eternal living. It could be a shared interest drew them together, notably of the mercantile kind, I dare say. Actually, ideas, whether mystical or religious, are a tool to dupe or cover up. Apropos of your dream: I won’t talk nonsense of a past or future life—we’ll leave that to the charlatans. You dreamed what had been associated this way or that with your actual life over the past month. One question—quite grave—remains: why don’t you remember? There was likely a conflict between you and the guys of the sect. What led to it? Any number of things. For instance, Leoely could’ve been the contention. No substances are involved, as far as I can judge. Otherwise, you could’ve forgotten who you are. There would be nothing left of you: no name, no address, no mom or dad, no Christine—nothing but the desire to eat. Yours is a minor case: you’ve been blocked by suggestion, the suggestion being uncommonly powerful, I could feel. As the result, you’re closed to yourself. Danad’s closed off to Daniel. I had a similar case in my practice. I must admit I never opened it up, and the lady patient had to come to terms with the blanks in her memory. She wouldn’t be committed to the clinic where the success rate is fifty-fifty: I’d told her as much. Besides, all those lab tests and things—instrumentation . . . a life in its own right—are mostly for the science, not the patient, him still locked in the cycle and its side-effects which are as many as ever, to say the least. I’m talking as a friend of you friend’s father. Would you like to be committed?

Daniel smirked.

‘No, thank you, doctor.’

‘Get a life, man!’ Cohan was nearly hollering. ‘Life goes on. If you remember, so much the better. If you don’t . . . Well, let us not estimate this eventuality. My advice is—or, rather, not mine but my mentor’s (I won’t take his name in vain: it’ll mean nothing to you) . . . My advice is: look for the beginning, for the secret door in the wall . . . Are you all right?’ Cohan could see his last words had hooked Daniel: what little had flared up in his soul had been reflected in his eyes and the suppressed impulse to say something. The doctor’s anxiety spurred Daniel on.

‘It really happened. I could feel it had. It’s in my brain, somewhere close by, in some past but very perceptible life.’

‘What exactly?’

‘The secret door. Perhaps, not the words but the idea behind them . . . There was a door, a padlocked door. No, it isn’t that. But it’s close by, doctor. There’s something I can’t grasp, but it’s close by.’

‘Very good. It’s close by but you can’t grasp it. Very good: that’s what I’m talking about, or, rather, not me but my teacher. Find the beginning. It’s somewhere near. It can be anything: an object (for instance, a picture from the collection of the artist that has enchanted you), a place, that is the bit of space where you can find your soul’s impulse you’ve lost; it can be an event—anything. The beginning is what holds the emotional upheaval. In the end, it could prove to be a word. Look: the way you’ve reacted to the word I said—it gave you gooseflesh. Look for the beginning—and you’ll unravel the chain.’

‘I got you, doctor. I’ll be looking.’

‘And another thing. When you wake up try to remember as much as you can of your dream, as many specific details as you can.’

‘I’ve done it today.’

‘Very good. Sudden immersion in reverie (it happens) may result in faints. Don’t be scared: it’s all right, for animated explicit recollections would divest you of reality . . . It’s still a beginning. Any questions? Perhaps, those you laid by? Try to remember.’

‘Yes, I have one. In the course of the session, did you grasp when I fell asleep?’

‘Oh, sorry! I left out the most important thing for you. I stand corrected: yesterday.’

‘Yesterday?’ Daniel echoed in surprise (no catalepsy was one thing, but yesterday quite another!)

‘Yesterday,’ Cohan repeated leaving no doubt as to his accuracy if only by his manner alone. ‘To all appearances, someone gave you a lift home. If I got the sense of what you said right, you hitchhiked. You found the place unfamiliar (I twice tried you with pointed questions). You gave your address several times, obviously to the driver.’

‘Search me.’

‘But much of what I wanted to know wasn’t disclosed. For instance, how you got to that road. More questions, Daniel?’

‘I don’t think so. Yes, your fee?’

‘Here’s my business card, call me. Should Leoely or one of those guys turn up, I think you’d better call the police: they’ve robbed you of your memory. As to my fee, see my assistant—you’ve met her. Well, Daniel, all the best to you,’ Cohan said smiling goodbye and holding out his hand.

Link to the book: https://www.amazon.com/Dorlief-Annin-Brothers-ebook/dp/B0GK1KR9BK/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0

 

 

https://www.amazon.com/Dorlief-Annin-Brothers-ebook/dp/B0GK1KR9BK/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_03sample

Sample Three

Part Two

In Days of Yore

 

Chapter One

Shwarrawsh Is Coming

 

It came on suddenly, the way it had hundreds and thousands of years before. There could not have been any foreknowledge. It had given no sign of its immediate advent. Nature, though sensitive, continued untroubled, intent on her usual games that the inhabitants of Dorlief and other villages had got accustomed to and took in their stride. Night alone on occasion bred dreams redolent of trouble. And those dreams hovered over habitations and would invade their worlds of dreams leaving them shaken and anxious to hide away in vain, flee, holler voicelessly and wake up in tears, cold sweat and the horror which unaccountably followed them from the World of Dreams into the Waking World. Prophetic dreams were the talk of the neighborhood which gurgled their way into the inhabitants, each of them, inspiring anxiety and fear that fed on their memories and extracted as if out of oblivion, one word that drowned out all other words and sounds: ‘Shwarrawsh . . . Shwarrawsh . . .’ And people could no longer live the lives they were used to before they were besieged by dream and rumor, but rather different lives encumbered by the invisible and yet encroaching shadow of Shwarrawsh. They started checking the security of their cellars and the stocks in them. They would remind their kids now and again not to wander off too far from home. They would now look the way of the Wild Woods, now toward the Tanuth Range, now toward Lake Lefend, now skyward, into the alien middle distance, with eyes that were purblind . . .

 

* * *

‘Norron! What roused thee at this unearthly drowsy hour? Perchance an alien sound harped on thy wary ear? Or an obscure call jarred on thy anxious soul? Or else a crooked face out of the World of Dreams set thee all atremble?’

‘I thought I could hear a knock,’ said Norron in response to the unseen voice. ‘I’ll go have a look.’

‘Stay. Render thy ear: the children’s chambers are all peace. Look at Marramy: not an eyelid has stirred. It is merely thy fancy. Night has a way of insinuating what is not.’

‘There’s that knock again. I can hear a knock on the door.’

‘Stay, Norron! Stay! Dorlief is all dreams, all quiet. It is just thy heart. It is thudding louder and faster than usual. It is echoing the steps of dicing doom. What doom has in store for thee is best confronted face to face but once. Stay! Do not anticipate the moments lest thou mayst be sorry.’

Norron, taking no heed of the unearthly voice, left the room and made for the hallway. The words of caution caught him up again. This time they were even more anxious and insistent, as though whoever it was wanted to spare him some sinister and irreparable encounter.

‘Norron, beware! Come back! Lie down and embrace peace. If you, the Keeper, approach the door and comply with the illusion, it will be too late. There will be no way back.’

‘Why did you say Keeper? What has my onus to do with it all? Why Keeper?’ cried Norron.

The door shook clanging the bolt as the thuds grew impatient. Norron took a step forward.

‘Thou standest to lose thy kid son,’ declared the unseen voice. ‘Thou wilt lose Natan. Stay!’

‘I can’t . . . I can’t lose Natan . . . I can’t lose Natan.’ Norron’s soul was aflutter. He was anxious to take his son in his arms and cling to him lest he should lose him. ‘I can’t lose Natan.’

But it was too late. The door was flung violently open—Norron was paralyzed with horror: confronting him was the one rumor had secretly been afloat about, the one the human soul abhorred. Horror dissolved Norron the man outright, Norron the man ready to stand his ground, Norron the father ready to stand up for his son. Standing in the doorway and shaking with fear was the boy named Norron, his hand clasping the hand of another boy, Natan. No way would his hand release that hand! No way! His hand . . . A moment later, an irresistible force made Norron . . . unclasp his hand and Natan step over the threshold. And the Natan that had been before he took that step vanished in the thin air.

Norron emerged from the nightmare mouthing something unable to find his voice and let loose the lump of sounds that formed a name dear to him—Natan.

‘It was just a dream . . . a mere dream. It hasn’t happened. It couldn’t have . . . Dream,’ he softly stirred the air, not to wake up Marramy, to see if it would respond in the unbidden voice.

The air mutely swallowed the words . . . so mutely Norron thought he could not hear them either. Just like dense air, he thought starting and getting up to check on Natan immediately. He made past the older boys’ rooms for Natan’s. His heart was throbbing again. It took him a few moments to bring himself to open the door a crack and peep inside, the way he would in the night when one of the kids was sick. Finally he opened the door all the way—and recoiled with his hands over his head. Struggling his way through confusion and the dense air that made him clumsy, he made for where he had just been rendered unable in his dream to save his son.

Natan was standing in the doorway, his back to him. Norron had the scare of a lifetime—there, a couple of paces from where the baby Natan was standing, was the edge between his home and an abyss. Natan was immobile facing the abyss, as if awaiting the verdict. There was nothing he could do.

Crossing his mind were fragmentary thoughts which could neither explain things nor suggest the solution: What had brought him to that boundary . . . ? He’s little, too little to . . . What force was driving him on . . . ? Grip him? No, I can’t. I’d tried my best in my dream, only to enrage him enough to split us apart . . . What’s wrong? What is it that I fail to understand . . . ? Where’s Marramy? Will she be able to talk him out of it . . . ? Why can’t I see the back of his head? Why did the abyss draw his gaze . . . ? Am I as impotent as that? What, what must I do . . . ? The dream . . . What else was there in it . . . ? Why Keeper?

Suddenly Natan turned his head and looked at his father in such a way as to make him drop to his knees in desperate impotence. The next moment Norron hunched the tentativeness of things around him. Nor was he wrong: everything stirred, went to pieces and started dropping, as if the abyss were devouring the very ground that had been holding things together. As he dropped into blackness, Norron had his eyes on Natan who stood framed by the doorway that was still there, no longer the entryway into their home . . .

 

* * *

Norron spent the morning in brown study. He was trying to understand what the World of Dreams Lord had told him, what he had warned him against by lifting the veil over things to come, which way in the Waking World had been marked by Him with His secret sign.

The call horn had summoned the Dorlief inhabitants to the downtown square. Each house had delegated a representative; some families had arrived in their entirety. It was anticipation that had bought them there, the anticipation that had pervaded the air of Dorlief, the anticipation that everyone breathed, big and small, the anticipation that seemed unending. Anticipation made people look for a mainstay in communion.

Flamalf, secretary to the Governing Council, had this to say:

‘Dorliefans, you are here today at the bidding of Keeper Norron, member of the Governing Council and as bidden by your goodwill. Keeper Norron will address you.

Norron got unto the dais. Dorlief held its breath as it directed hundreds of eyes at him. Norron took his time imbibing them all.

‘Friends,’ he began softly. It was not an address, not yet. He addressed that word to himself: it meant for him what he had seen in Dorlief’s eyes.

‘Friends,’ Norron addressed them, ‘I had to see you today. I had to talk to you today.’

There were cries in the crowd: ‘Stick to the point, Norron we are listening.’

‘I have to tell you that from now on, my thoughts and acts hinge on the World of Dreams Lord, for I believe that what He has revealed to me will pass on from His World into my World, Waking World. Friends, I had a dream last night which I deem prophetic. I did not understand all that was presented to me, for dreams are mysterious and tentative. But I understood the main thing.’

‘What’s in store for us, Norron? Tell us.’

‘Darkness . . . to which even our nights are as nothing . . .’ Norron paused: it was hard for him to impart what he could barely admit the inevitability of to himself. ‘Darkness which will consume life . . .’

‘Did you see it?’

‘The World of Dreams Lord showed it to me.’

‘Shhh . . .’ It was as if the wind had caught Norron’s drift, was the first to guess who Dorlief was asking about, dropped a hint and abated in fright. But it was too late, for the hint had dropped on people’s lips.

‘Shwarrawsh? Was it Shwarrawsh? Speak up, Norron!’

‘Never fear, Norron, speak up! Out with it. Did you dream of Shwarrawsh’s advent?’

‘I said to myself this morning . . .’

Dorlief seemed petrified for a moment.

‘I said to myself: Shwarrawsh is coming. Now I say to you: Shwarrawsh is coming.’

Norron caught confusion in Dorlief’s eyes. It was running like an unseen wave from person to person and extinguished all specks of life that had enlivened them moments before.

‘My friends, we have no time for despondency. That is not what I have summoned you here for. Darkness would not be what it is, we would not make it out, unless there ever was light in its way. No, we do not know as yet how to confront Shwarrawsh; we can only, like so many wild animals, go to earth. Each of us is within his rights either to run to earth each on his own or as a Dorlief community. But before we do, we have to put in some communal work. We have to get brushwood ready for fires about Dorlief. Remember: fires are the beginning of a new life, fires are Dorlief, its soul, a living memory of light. That is what our forefathers believed who had the ill fortune to witness Shwarrawsh’s advent . . . If your food stock is short, go to the warehouses. The Governing Council will have issued the requisite order. I would like to ask ferling fanciers to send the birds with messages of the imminent trouble to neighboring villages. Do that before you get down to work.’

The crowd was inspired.

‘We’ll do everything, Norron. Never you fret.’

‘Lutul the Beanstalk has a dozen ferlings or so. He has a family of ferlings, on top of himself.’

‘Look, Lutul’s got his kid ferling along. He’s teaching him how to fly. Lutul, show us how you do it.’

The square livened up. Lutul the Beanstalk, whose beady eyes and hooked nose put one in mind of a ferling, was embarrassed, unlike his white fledgling flecked with silver and perched on his shoulder, who knew his worth. (Dorliefans kept ferlings of every color; Lutul would have none but silvery ones).

‘Old Rutp, I mean Rupt, that old man—blast his twisted name!—spends all his days sending ferlings to his daughters with wishes of all the best on the occasion of yet another newborn. He has married his daughters off to every neighboring village. Lost count, haven’t you, old man?’

‘He’s as good as new. His wife, Dorrody, is going to give him yet another daughter one of these days.’

Norron had raised his hand waiting for attention:

‘Thank you, friends. Something has just crossed my mind. I’ve remembered making our first roof of measureless between us. Old Ruptatpur—even though his name defies some of us—was the first to open his heart to the new business, and his home, to living light.’

Old Ruptatpur was inwardly fighting back his detractors as evidenced to the bystanders by the violence of his stirring mustache; however, on hearing praise, he became all smiles and sank into reverie.

Norron went on:

‘Many of us were opposed to the novelty, at first calling it just as useless as the plant itself, not good enough as feed or herbal medicine, or anything else for that matter. But the moment they stepped over Ruptatpur’s threshold, their eyes brightened, they flocked to his workshop to order new roofing, and helped all they could. You are now used to living in your light-filled houses; it is a habit we now have in common, it is what has made our hearts open to one another . . . Where was I . . . ? And then . . . You know what . . . there had to be a then . . .’

Norron was agitated. The lump in his throat would not let him finish. But the Dorliefans unwittingly attended nonetheless.

‘Pray do not let darkness fill your souls, each of you, and doom you to aloneness, do not let darkness scale your eyes and rid you of the gift of seeing one another. Then . . . emerge from your shelters (your hearts will tell you when), make your way to the appointed places and light fires. The fires will attract others. Talk to one another. Recollect. Dream your dreams. And sort Dorlief’s life, our life, out in the firelight. And you will see in New Light Day. You are sure to see in New Light Day.’

‘We’ll see it in with you, Keeper!’ The emotional cry echoed all around the square was expressive of Dorlief’s overall mood.

‘We’ll do as you bid, Keeper.’

‘Thank you, Keeper. Keeper . . . Keeper . . . Keeper . . .’

Norron’s countenance had suddenly undergone a change, as if he had been left alone with himself. He had just had notion of yet another sign apportioned in the nightmare by the World of Dreams Lord; he had cracked the riddle he had spent the morning solving . . . Norron’s thoughts and feelings turned back to the people. He raised his hand again and the square fell silent.

‘Thank you, friends. Thank you for your trust,’ said Norron.

A short but meaningful pause later, he spoke the words whose genuine meaning was known to him alone, the future alone could reveal it to the rest, not all of them but such as are most perspicacious. At the moment, however, those words were taken to mean the Keeper was sorry he could do for them no more:

‘Dorliefans, pardon Keeper Norron’s weakness.’

The Governing Council was not long in session. The four Keepers and members of the Council, unburdened by the honorable and valued onus, knew Norron too well to question his moves. Each took leave of each and left the Council in the knowledge of what he was to do as trouble loomed nigh.

 

Chapter Two

Keeper’s Abdication

 

When Norron came back home his wife, daughter and kid son were waiting in the living room.

‘How was it, Norron?’ asked Marramy.

‘The Council carried my motions, and work will begin today. Bring my travel bag, I’m leaving.’

‘Everything’s ready.’ Marramy indicated the chair with the bag, cape, girdle, dagger and hatchet. ‘I never thought it’d be this soon but got them ready just in case. I guessed right.’

‘Where are Novon and Ratitar?’

‘Away at the shelter helping people to settle.’

Norron shook his head:

‘Another guess?’

‘They were at the general assembly. Then came back home for a moment to take something to eat with them. And chattered fit to kill. They had Gelleg and another guy along, a forestman, I keep forgetting his name.’

‘Paltrian, Mom,’ said Falafy.

‘Falafy was very nearly going with them, I had a hard time telling her to stay.’

‘I want to, too—Mom won’t let me.’ Natan would have his injured feelings on his sleeve.

‘Natan, you’re coming with me. Right now. Get ready.’

Marramy and Falafy looked at Norron, puzzled: he looked firm.

‘Are we going to ride Porrop?’ Natan’s eyes shone.

‘Yes sonny.’

‘Mom, help me pack my travel bag.’

Marramy glanced at Norron again—there was nothing for it but to get her son ready for the road.

‘Falafy, honey,’ said Norron to his daughter. ‘Pray, stay at home today, stay put, by your mother’s side, always by your mother’s side. And help her all you can.’

He stroked her head.

‘And now get Porrop out, it’s time to leave.’

‘Never fear, Pop: Mom and I’ll be all right, we’re staying behind in a sturdy house. Besides, Ratitar and Novon said they’d be back as soon as they can. Do come back soon, Natan and you,’ Falafy’s look was full of sadness: unlike her words, her look could not play along with her wishes, for it was to do with a hunch. ‘Will you, Pop?’

Norron smiled at his daughter. She was off to get the horse out.

When the father, mother and kid brother emerged in the yard, Falafy had already bridled Porrop and was busy whispering in his ear and patting its withers. On seeing her parents’ faces in this dear piece of her birthplace space, in this gentle air aloft between earth and sky, she suddenly went pale with fright: it seemed to her for as moment, perchance her hunch had reached something hidden from eyes to reveal its veiled face and make her soul writhe—she had the impression that all this would be gone as soon as her father left. She went limp, dropped to her knees, cupped her face with her hands and burst into tears. Everybody rushed to her side. Norron lifted and hugged her. Natan held her hand murmuring endearments:

‘Don’t cry, Fal. Pop and I aren’t leaving for good. We want to help people. We’ll help them and come back.’ He looked at his father. ‘And I’ll tell you and Ratitar and Novon all about it. Next time Pop and I’ll take you along. Of course, we won’t manage, all of us, on Porrop—you’ll be riding Soros, will you?’

Falafy’s whimpering hooked a giggle, and another, and another to be finally replaced by them. Marramy put her hand on her daughter’s shoulder—Falafy took the hint.

‘I know, Mom. Let Pop and Nat go. I’m all right. Go, Pop. I’ll be waiting, Nat.’ She stroked her brother’s hair.

Norron embraced his wife and said softly to her:

‘Marramy . . .’

‘I love you,’ Marramy whispered in reply.

Norron held Natan up, sat him on the horse and hopped on, too. They started out. Norron was not urging Porrop on. Marramy and himself looked at each other long in parting, until they could no longer make out the dear features, much like two leaves on a branch fearful of a coming storm.

‘Hold tight now,’ Norron warned his son letting the horse gallop . . .

He galloped away from Dorlief’s eyes. He would have galloped like that for all eternity just not to have to do what was in store for him. Porrop’s hooves pushed against the ground, and the Dorlief soil seemed to be responding to that gallop with just one word which throbbed in Norron’s temples: Kee-per, Kee-per . . . The wind resisted that gallop: it burned Norron’s chest, resting on which was what made him Keeper, it seemed to be reminding him of it. But, contrary to the voice of the Dorlief soil and the will of the wind, Norron had to tear away from his chest what it was his lot to safeguard as a holy of holies, for the World of Dreams Lord had offered two outcomes only—he had chosen the forbidden one, the one that would burden him with the onus of self-abnegation.

Oblivious to everything, Natan was reveling in that fleeting flight. He had never traveled that fast, not even with his father. But at some point he was alerted by protracted silence, so long as if there were no one back of them. On such trips (far it was from him that they were traveling on business) his father used to be different: companionable and facile. The silence had suggested to Natan a hunch: something was wrong. He fidgeted, turning back and looking at his father. And Norron realized he would no longer cope both with himself and his son in another moment. He reined in Porrop making him stop. Porrop bucked snorting, hoofing the ground, and thus releasing the energy of its fiery muscles.

Norron jumped off the mount and helped Natan get off.

‘Hold Porrop, Nat. When I call out, come up to me immediately leaving Porrop here.

‘Where are you going, Pop?’ cried Natan.

Norron was a few steps away, but Natan’s anxiety made him come back. He put his hand on his son’s shoulder and said calmly:

‘Fear nothing, Natan, and try to do as I say. It’s very important. I’ve got to find something. I’ll call you as soon as I do. I’ll be within your sight: it isn’t far off.’

‘What are you going to look for?’

‘You’ll see when I find it. Just wait.’

Natan watched him, all eyes. Norron took some forty paces, paused, and walked on. He was now stepping slowly, warily, changing tack. He seemed to be stalking someone, afraid of spooking the prey. (Is Father trying to catch a butterfly for Fal, as a bribe for being left behind?) He kept his right hand extended. (He’ll next be snatching it.)

‘Nat!’ Natan started at the call. ‘Come here, Nat.’

He hurried to his father. What he saw surprised him: his father froze standing, his hand extended in front of him but there seemed to be no butterfly in it . . .

‘Pop, is this . . . ?’

‘You know what it is,’ said Norron calmly, though firmly (he seemed to be in a hurry). ‘Come closer. Look. Look here. Do you see?’

‘I’m scared, Pop.’

‘Did you see?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ll pass it on to you. Don’t be afraid. Take it. Extend your hand. Right . . . Do you see?’

‘No.’

‘Try shifting it right. Take your time.’

‘I can see it, Pop. I’m scared.’

‘Listen, Nat. we don’t have much time. I can see you’re frightened. But you must do it. For your sake. For mine. For all of us. Look that way again. D’you see?’

‘Yes,’ whispered Natan.

Norron sized his son up. He had his bag strapped across his back.

‘Come here, sonny,’ he commanded.

Natan looked at his father, and suddenly saw in his eyes what told him to comply . . . He stepped forward and again heard voice behind his back:

‘Keep walking there, inside. Don’t stop. Whatever you do, don’t stop.’

 

Chapter Three

Faddaf

 

Norron was riding to his people. He would work with the Dorliefans. He would work with the Dorliefans toward meeting Shwarrawsh. They would call him Norron the Keeper. They would heed his word. No, he would not disclose his secret to them. He would not tell them he had breached the Dorlief law, that he was no longer Keeper, no longer Norron, because he no longer thought he was. He would say nothing to them, lest they lose faith in him, and in their potential. He would work and wait.

Norron was riding to his people. But his soul, which had betrayed the Waking World, was unclaimed by the Spirit World back where he had taken leave of his son. Looking for solace, it ran into the name of Faddaf. Faddaf . . . How could they forget . . . ? How could he have forgotten? In his prophesy he had warned us about the advent of Shwarrawsh. Content with a life of peace, we had lost our connection with the past. I should have remembered and told the Dorliefans of his prophesy. Faddaf’s words, once confirmed by my dream, would have left no doubt even in those of them who would stick to them and abstain from action to their detriment. Faddaf’s words are clear and potent . . . But Faddaf had not only warned of Shwarrawsh’s advent. He had mentioned another trouble . . . and the Word, the secret Word whose Path is long and hard . . . As often as not, we act blindly and in desperation not just because we can’t see, but because we are not aware of what we see. I wish . . . Norron’s soul was illumined by a ray of hope.

No one had seen Faddaf for nine hundred years. Many believed the myth that he had left for the Wild Woods and sunk in the Dark Waters. Some believed that he had shifted his shape and turned into a bear forever doomed to hunt down Dorlief’s ill-wishers. And just a few of the forestmen, who had a reputation for being the best guides and pathfinders had had a trail revealed to them which they associated with the old hermit.

Some called Faddaf a prophet. Others, a wizard. The only tongue known to him was that of the Waking World. But he did understand the tongue and secrets of the World of Dreams, and invariably spied the right direction in the intricate dream mazes. Each Dorliefan had known as a kid that the souls of the fallen and the slain go to the Spirit World. But Faddaf alone had in his lifetime experienced a whiff of that World and fought back its call and clutch when exploring the Path at the request of the Dorliefans.

 

* * *

When Faddaf was seventeen, he approached the Governing Council and asked to have his say.

‘I’m too young to disturb Dorliefan life with my word. But the vision I’ve had is too clear-cut to withhold the inherent thoughts and words. Do I speak, or do you wait for further signs?’

‘Can you put the sum total of your vision in a nutshell?’ said Maruram.

‘Three words will be plenty, by your leave.’

‘Speak up.’

‘Death or war.’

‘But Dorliefans haven’t fought from time immemorial, for there’s no one to fight. All our neighbors are as gentle and peace-loving as ourselves. All of them are our friends,’ Gordrog, the oldest Council member, said. He merely meant to steer the youngster to a weighted statement, rather than humble him with mistrust.

‘I’ve seen: many of them will be among the fallen on the invasion day,’ said Faddaf, his face a picture of confidence and anxiety, with not a trace of doubt.

Gordrog nodded, gratified: the youngster’s argument seemed cogent to him.

‘Who are the ones that will impose war on us? Whence will they come? Drop from heaven, will they?’ smirked Tragart. ‘Answer, if your vision is as clear-cut as all that.’

‘I saw stones. Living stones. Hosts of them. I saw their eyes. They had an inside look, as it were. There was intelligence and malice in them.’

‘Has anyone of you, esteemed Council members, seen such stones, if only once in a lifetime?’ asked Tragart and looked around the assembly.

The Council members exchanged glances and shrugged, perplexed.

‘The same question to you, my young friend.’

‘The World of Dreams Lord didn’t reveal the stones’ vital essence but let me in on the essence of their doing. I saw dismembered people. There was a rider in my vision. He said he was the only one to stay whole . . . I’ve no knowledge whence the stones have come, or what village the rider’s from. I couldn’t place him.’

‘What do you think of your vision, Faddaf? What else do you have to say to the Council?’ said Tlanalt.

‘I’m sure it’ll come to pass. I’m afraid the Dorliefans haven’t much time.’

‘Can you say how much?’

‘On rousing, I asked myself how much and started counting. I arrived at one hundred and seven when I saw the war-mongers again. I feel an uncommon anxiety in my gut. Dorliefans have to arm themselves. We have to ask forestmen for assistance. And pass the communication on to the neighboring villages.’

‘Very well, Faddaf. You may go. The Council will let you know its decision,’ concluded Gordrog.

‘We thank you, Faddaf. You did right taking your anxiety to the Governing Council,’ Tlanalt thought it best to add to Gordrog’s words.

The next day the Governing Council called the people to a general assembly. Faddaf took the floor. On hearing him out, the Dorliefans decided they had to get ready for war. The call horn sounded eight times in a row: Dorlief thus appealed to the forestmen’s Lord to respond under egregious circumstances.

Link to the book: https://www.amazon.com/Dorlief-Annin-Brothers-ebook/dp/B0GK1KR9BK/ref=tmm_kin_swatch_0