Adventure Five: Rowen has a Clever Idea
It was just before sunrise when Belamy decided she could wait no longer to speak with Rowen, because she was so anxious from her encounter with the emperor. She climbed out of bed, squeezed her eyes tight, and crawled into her dream world. When she opened her eyes again, she could see the slightest blue tint of dawn on the horizon, even though the stars still shone brightly above her.
Belamy rose into the sky, treading the air with her arms. She swam higher and higher, careful to watch for men with red wings. She looked down on hills, which turned into mountains a few miles further up. The wind was warm and the air was the clear sweet breath of morning. She hovered for a few seconds more, and then began to quickly soar under the stars.
It did not take her long to reach the snow-capped mountains reflecting brightly in the night sky, which were not nearly as cold as mountains of the real world. She thought she would scan the terrain for her friend, but he was not in the highest peaks of the mountains, nor was his dark form on the crooked cave-ridden slope that led down to the valleys. Belamy flew until the mountains gave way to dense river valley. She landed among the trees to better scout for her friend on the forest floor. Blue had now spread from the very edge of the horizon to about halfway up the sky. The horizon itself was now pink, and a fire-red sliver introduced the sun.
"Rowen?" she called softly. A gray little dinosaur scurried from a patch of ferns and bounded clumsily in the opposite direction of Belamy. "Rowen," she called again, her voice raised a little higher. There was much rustling from this disturbance, and Belamy was about to call again when she heard a quiet grunt of disapproval.
"Excuse me?" Belamy asked in response to the grunt, which seemed to have come from a nearby patch of ferns.
"Psst," the grunter said. And Belamy hunted around the bushes until a hand (human in nature) shot out from within one of them and took her by the arm, and then everything was a blur of twisted color as she did a somersault straight into the heart of a fern.
She fell with an "oof" and, now that she was underneath the tall fronds, she saw that she was accompanied by an individual. All Belamy could see was the fellow's silhouette.
“I suppose you intend to get eaten?" the fellow said harshly, with several waves of his arms. "Are you not familiar with the Rysanorautus Tex?"
"Do you mean Tyranosaurus Rex?" Belamy guessed in a whisper. She was shushed immediately.
"Obviously not." The fellow gave a shake of the head. "How fortunate for you, that you have been spared the knowledge of such a creature's existence. Yet if not for me, your ignorance would have made you food within the hour, make no mistake. Well, we can't have you talking like you are; you will give our position immediately."
"What do you mean?" Belamy asked in the tiniest voice. "You are the one who is talking so casually!"
"Shhh," the fellow pleaded. "I see you are not from around here. Have you not noticed that I do not speak with my voice? Watch me closely and you will see."
"Wh--" Belamy caught herself. "Oh, I see," she mouthed silently, because she was unable to speak the way this fellow was doing, and she was quite astonished by this language. The fellow, she finally noticed, had been speaking entirely in gestures. Her curiosity must have shown on her face (which could now be seen in the ever increasing light), because the fellow said to her;
"It is very simple how I communicate. My whole village is able to do it, and I suppose it is our defense against the Rysanorautus Tex and his acute ears. Has any body ever told you that language is ninety-percent gestures? Well, they weren't fooling with you. One night long ago, when the Tex was out on his prowl, we just stopped using our mouths and discovered we could all still understand each other. Just this past night the Tex was roaming our village. He spotted me on my way to the safety of my hut. I had been out far much longer than I intended, and as he is a night beast, he is only a danger when the sun is down. Well, I ran for my life, and I have been running for hours and hours, and for so long that I fear I am now hopelessly lost. I finally took refuge in this fern here, only a few minutes before you arrived and so nearly gave me away. I am very tired, you understand; I can run no longer, and if I am found by the Tex, I am finished."
Belamy could only nod that she understood this fellow, and they waited in silence until the sky was much lighter and the sun was well over the horizon. Even under the cover of the fern, Belamy could now make out certain features of this individual that had previously been hidden by shade. He had square, pale features, and he was very long and thin. He wore the most peculiar pair of checkered trousers. He did not look like any sort of tribesman Belamy had ever imagined.
"What is your village called?" Belamy finally asked, feeling sure that the Rysanorautus Tex had gone to hide for the day.
"Don't ask questions," the fellow hushed her with a wave of his arm. He peeked over a frond. "Besides, you won't have heard of it."
Belamy climbed out of the cover of the fern and exposed herself to the forest.
"If you're going to make yourself bait, you might as well do it a little further from my little shelter," the fellow called to her. "Now, shoo!" he added.
"Don't be ridiculous," Belamy said. "You are only afraid. The sun is up and there is nothing to fear any longer." She walked away from the hiding man and took up the search of her friend, Rowen. She thought that he should most certainly be in the mountain caves by now, shying from the growing daylight.
Just as she was about to take to the sky again, she spotted the fellow rushing, in a tangle of legs and fronds, out of the fern.
"Hold up there," the fellow called in a real voice, hurrying toward her.
"I thought you were going to stay in that bush," she said.
"Not likely," he replied. "I was growing rather cramped. And besides, I would much like to accompany some body as fearless as your self. You may come of great help, you with your level head, in the event of some danger."
"I am not as fearless as you make me," Belamy told him, but she was grateful for his companionship. "Where are you headed?"
"As I am hopelessly lost and hopeless loss being what it is, I haven't the slightest idea." The fellow began to walk alongside Belamy in a slow, striding fashion. "I have never traveled so far from my village, which is in a great grass land; nothing like this forest, or those hills up ahead."
"I am on my way to meet a friend," Belamy said. "You may join me if you'd like. I am going up into the mountains."
"I am rather inclined toward this direction as much as any other,” he agreed. “It could be the one that will take me back to my own village." And thus, the pair took to the hills.
"My name is Belamy," she said for conversation, having not yet introduced herself to the person she simply thought of as 'the fellow'.
"Mine is Ulysses," said he. "But I was named for my father and I do not favor it. I would rather you call me by my surname, which is Ashbe."
"I will remember to, although I do very much like the name Ulysses.” As they walked up steeper and steeper hills, which turned into rocky, mountainous terrain, they chatted. Ashbe liked to remark on the state of his village (which was hardworking and familial), his occupation (which was tailoring, hence the peculiar clothes), and what Belamy always enjoyed to hear most about (which was animals).
"I employ two pigeons who carry messages to the surrounding villages," Ashbe told her, "and two turtles who fancy swimming in their pond all day long."
"How about a dog?" Belamy inquired. "A dog would be your very best friend."
"Dogs are rather frightening to me," Ashbe said, and Belamy hoped he would not be too afraid of Rowen. She ignored giving Ashbe information detailing his species, and Ashbe himself seemed quite content only knowing that Belamy was trying to find a friend of hers in the mountains. It wasn't until they began to peek into caves that Ashbe grew suspicious.
"Is your friend a kind of hermit?" Ashbe asked after the third cave. "What man lives on the foothills of a mountain, in a dark cave?"
"He is not exactly a man," Belamy finally admitted, climbing into the entry of another cave. "But he has the manners of a gentleman."
"Is he a boy?" Ashbe asked, not understanding.
"About as tall," she answered.
"Well, what is he?" Ashbe strode into the cave after Belamy. Before she could reply, a growly voice protruded from the back of the cave.
"Is that Belamy?" it asked. "You really did know a short cut to this area, then. That journey would have taken any man nearly a week." Rowen padded into the entry of the cave. Ashbe shouted in terror.
"Oh, please don't be frightened!" Belamy pleaded. Ashbe tripped in his rush to exit the cave, and tumbled down the mountain a few feet before flying back onto his feet.
"There is a large wolf standing right beside you, you know!" he called.
Rowen turned his ears away from Ashbe. "That man is very loud," he said to Belamy. "Why did you bring him? Is he your mate?"
"I am only nine years old," Belamy said.
"Is that young?" Rowen asked. "Wolves mate at three years, on the average."
"Are you three years?" she asked.
"I am four."
"I shall find you a mate, Rowen," Belamy said. "You must be very lonely up here with no other wolves for company. Who would you fancy?"
"One who has a healthy coat, I should say. I would also like one who might sing with me at night."
"I will surely keep my eyes looking for her," Belamy said.
Rowen glanced in the direction of Ashbe, who had taken to slinking forward bit by bit. When they met eyes, the fellow trodded back a few paces.
"Who is this man, then?" Rowen asked.
"He is a friend, who saved me from a Rynoso... Rotano..."
"Rysanorautus Tex," Ashbe called.
"I think he has made it up," Rowen said to Belamy, eyeing the fellow.
"I do not," she assured him. "He was very anxious about it when I met him. At any rate, I have come to you for two reasons. The first was to fulfill my promise to meet you here, and that I have done. The second was to tell you about a strange thing that happened to me last night, and I hope you will be able to help me think it through."
"You have helped me more than I could ever repay you," Rowen said. "What you ask, I will do, to the best of my humble abilities."
"Yes, I can see those teeth are quite humble," Ashbe called from his position down the mountain.
"If you are going to be impolite as a guest," Belamy called back to him, "you may leave."
"No, no. I will stay with you," Ashbe said.
"Then you must meet our host, and you must enter his home without fear, and speak to him as an equal," Belamy said.
"That is asking very much of a man," Rowen commented, watching Ashbe's hesitant approach.
"That is asking only little from a friend," she replied.
Ashbe slunk carefully into the cave, just behind Belamy.
"Do you swear you are a friend?" he asked the wolf. "I ask because you are unknown to me, not simply because you are fearsome, although you are that as well."
"I swear," Rowen growled patiently.
Ashbe extended his hand, finally. "Ulysses Ashbe," he said. "But just Ashbe is fine."
Rowen gave Ashbe's hand a bump with his large nose. "I am Rowen, and only Rowen."
Ashbe propped himself against the cave wall and let out a small sigh of relief. He was a little calmer now that he had met the wolf, and he listened quietly to Belamy as she told her curious dream to Rowen. She told him about meeting the Emperor Milo and how he wanted to travel to different lands. World traveling was something Rowen understood because he was already living in his second country. Ashbe was entirely lost, and had to interrupt Belamy's speech.
"Do you mean to say that there are other lands than this one?" he asked, doubtfully.
"I come from another such place," Rowen answered for Belamy. "She is telling the truth."
"That is very strange," Ashbe said. "Very strange, indeed. I have never thought of other places."
Belamy thus concluded her speech; "This emperor seems to have great knowledge of these other lands, but he is unable to travel to them as I can. He wants me to help him like I helped you, Rowen. But unlike you, he wants to rule every land he enters. And before I awoke, he gave me such a horrible look. It was as if he knew he would see me again." She paused, and then thought of something. "And he could, couldn't he? He altered my thoughts to call me to him. What would stop him from calling me back to him and keeping me in his grand palace as a prisoner?" The thought made her shiver.
"That is certainly a dangerous man," Rowen said.
"Not some body I would want to cross," Ashbe added.
Rowen sat on his haunches and thought for some time. Belamy waited patiently, because she knew he was coming up with some solution. Ashbe, who could not read wolf expressions as well as Belamy, did not know why there was such a long silence.
"Are we leaving, then?" he asked, uncomfortable. Belamy hushed him and he bothered her for a bit longer with questioning gestures.
Finally, Rowen spoke.
"I can think of nothing else but this," the wolf said. "As a predator myself, and as this man certainly is himself, I understand the danger you could be in. I have devised a plan. We must call together our defenses should this man ever invade another land."
Belamy was shocked. "Invade?" she echoed. "How could he invade? He told me that he needed my help."
"If he is as great a leader of war as he claims, and is also a man of great thought, then there is no reason that he may not find his own way into another land, without your help. It is my guess that he has a second plan, since his first failed when you refused to help him. Perhaps your help would have only quickened the invasion that would come inevitably. I do not understand men very well, but I do understand predators. And predators always develop a strategy for catching their prey."
Rowen spoke perfect sense, and Belamy surely did not want trouble in her world.
"So what are our defenses?" Belamy asked the wolf.
"The pack of my old family," Rowen said.
"My village," Ashbe offered.
"I know a couple of Heroes," Belamy added.
Rowen nodded. "These are a start. It would be a good idea to have a meeting."
"That is a problem," Belamy told him. “I cannot take too many people from one place into another. A village or a pack contain far too many for me to displace, especially when we must travel through my tiny bedroom."
"They must stay where they are, then," Rowen said. "One person from each land would be enough for our meeting."
"That is still too many people,” Belamy said. "There are so very many lands." She tried to calculate in her head how many there might be. Hundreds and hundreds, she knew.
"We should first figure which lands would be the most likely an emperor would want to invade," Rowen said. "Let us narrow it down to a small number, and then Belamy can bring one person from each of those lands to a meeting that will be held here, since two of us already live in this place. Would you be able to do that Belamy?"
"It does not sound too complicated," she said.
"Now, what is it that emperors like to invade?" Rowen asked.
"Large, beautiful cities," Belamy said, thinking of the home of the Heroes.
"Wide landscapes, for building more castles," Ashbe suggested, thinking of his homeland.
Rowen turned to Belamy. “If you found the rulers of only the largest cities and the widest landscapes, do you think you would be able to convince enough people to come together and decide what we should do about this emperor?”
“Of course,” Belamy said.
“Then go," Rowen instructed her. "Go to those chosen lands. Find the good men of power and tell them about the emperor. Do all you can to convince them to come back here with you."
"Where will we have our meeting?" Belamy asked him. "It may take a long time for them to reach this cave."
"We will meet where we first entered into this place together," Rowen said. "Do you remember where that is?"
"I always end up back there," she replied. "It will be easy to take each man to that exact location."
"Very well," he said. He eyed Ashbe, carefully. "It will probably take your friend several days to climb over this mountain. Let us decide to meet in five days’ time. You, then, will also have five days to find the rulers who will accompany you here."
"It will be a difficult task," Belamy said.
"You are incredibly brave," Ashbe assured her.
"And you are of great heart," Rowen added.
And so the three friends left the cave, ready to set out on their journeys. Belamy was sure it would not take Ashbe longer than five days to reach their destination with a wolf accompanying. She watched Ashbe traverse up the mountain, with Rowen beside him, keeping steady pace. She waited until they were small moving dots in the distance, and then she leapt up into the air with a heavy heart, ready to bring her dreams together for the very first time.
Adventure Six: Boris and the Masquerade
Copyright 2010
