Parallel Inversion, page 24
part #1 of The Parellyrian Chronicles Series
“I'll never forget you either.” Aseria floated up off Karen's hand and kissed her on the forehead before hovering back down and through the door of her new residence, wiping the tears from her face.
Karen shuffled slowly out of the fairy town, regathering her focus on the journey ahead. She took one longing look back, then turned and continued toward the portal, resuming her original speed as the sun began to rise behind her.
She found the portal easily, and followed the instructions to use it she had been given by Elinross when she first came to Kulamahar. Once she teleported back off the island, right away she became the focus of attention for the numerous unicorns guarding the entrance to the sacred land. Even as dusk began to set in on that side of the world, they recognized that a human was among them, and began closing in on her to try to force her out.
In order to avoid a confrontation with the unicorns, Karen quickly spotted the opening to the tunnel that had originally led her inside the enclosure. She raced toward it faster than any of the unicorns could move. As soon as she was safely inside, she breathed a sigh of relief and clambered her way through to the other side and out into the surrounding forest.
The enchantment of the forest began to take effect on Karen's magically unprotected mind, and she grew confused. She could not remember where she was or where she wanted to go. Fortunately, the enchantment led all wanderers away from the portal's enclosure and toward Melamina City, so Karen, by chance, was headed in the right direction, however more slowly than she had been traveling earlier.
As Karen moved further away from the portal, the effects of the magic became less intense, and she remembered more. She recalled her destination and started moving more speedily towards it. Before too long, the high towers of Melamina Palace became visible in the distance, under the light of the stars and the full moon, and Karen's faculties returned entirely. She gauged her position based on the landmarks she could recognize and sprinted off toward her destination.
With her incredible speed, Karen made what she considered to be excellent time. But with every mile she crossed under the clear night sky, she felt the air getting colder. With her enhanced vision, she could even see signs of a powerful storm brewing, with heavy clouds gathering and strong winds blowing above the Koyin mountains.
The lights of Phellanore flickered in the rain that poured onto the town. While the weather affected her less as a result of her powers, Karen still would not enjoy spending more time than necessary in a rainstorm. She redoubled her efforts and sped toward Phellanore.
The rain had subsided, and dawn was mere moments away when she arrived at the town. Despite having been running at a breakneck pace for hours on end, Karen did not feel especially tired. Rather, she felt rejuvenated by the experience, and more than a little hungry.
Karen made her way around the town to Dalius's home where, even at such an early hour, Terimor Thorogren was up and about, tending to the horses. He was outside carrying a saddle toward the stable when Karen spotted him. She slowed her pace and cleared her throat from a short distance away so as not to startle Dalius's father.
Terimor spun around and recognized the approaching woman. “Hello there, Karen. Back from Kulamahar, I see.”
“Dalius told you where I went?”
“He did, indeed.”
“Where is he? If you don't mind me asking.”
Terimor tossed the saddle over a fence post and stepped toward the young woman. “He worked a shift at Fhindovar's tavern last night. It's strange that he hasn't come home yet. He's probably still there. Come with me, I'll take you to him. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised by who else is here.”
Karen followed Terimor into town. She was curious to see where Dalius worked, and where he and Niffain had gone without her on her first day in Parellyria. The rain from the previous night had muddied the roads, and a peaceful calm fell on all corners of town. Karen imagined that Dalius had probably fallen asleep shortly after his shift, and she would find him unconscious, face down on a table inside the pub. When she arrived outside Fhindovar's tavern, though, she was in for quite a surprise.
“Oh my!” Terimor said, looking down to the ground near the entrance to the pub. Karen peeked over his shoulder and saw what he was looking at: a great, big man was lying on his side, showing no signs of life.
“Is he okay?” Karen asked.
Terimor inched toward the man and crouched down to inspect him more closely. “He's dead.” Teri rolled the body over to take a look at the man's face. “Oh no, it's Finnegan.”
“You know him?”
“He grew up just down the street from me. When I was about fifteen he used to hide in my back yard when bullies used to pick on him. He was only about seven, but he was so big that ten-year-olds thought he was their age.”
Terimor pulled Finn's body to an upright position, then, with strength much greater than his size and age suggested, he lifted Finn off the ground and draped him over his shoulder.
“When you see Dalius, tell him to meet me at the funeral home.”
Karen said that she would. Terimor sniffed sadly and sauntered away.
When Karen stepped inside Fhindovar's there was no immediate sign of Dalius, but there was plenty of evidence that some kind of brawl had taken place there recently. Tables had been overturned, there were smoldering holes in the ceiling, and almost every chair was broken in some way or another. Most patrons and employees had fled out the back door to the relative comfort and safety of their homes following the incident, leaving the owner, Calvin Fhindovar, who arrived long after everyone else had left, to clean up the mess.
“What happened here?” Karen asked him as he was struggling to lift a large table back onto its feet. Calvin looked up at Karen and shrugged his shoulders. He rubbed his hands together, and returned to his vain efforts to lift the table.
“Here, let me help you with that.” Karen took position next to the man, and together they returned the table to its place with ease.
“Thank you,” said Calvin as he swept the sweat from his eyes with his forearm. He took a quick look around, then started gathering pieces of a broken chair into a wooden box.
Karen continued helping Calvin, careful not to let her feats of strength become too conspicuous. Whenever Calving left carrying useless pieces of broken furniture or shattered bottles outside to toss them away, he would return to find another table back on its feet. Before long, the place looked much more manageable, although still a far cry from being ready to welcome customers again.
“What's all this commotion?”
The deep and decidedly male voice echoed through the room from above the bar. Karen looked up and recognized a face she never imagined, or hoped, she would see in Parellyria. Mike Revis stood shirtless atop a platform that served as access to the four bedrooms that the tavern offered for rent. He leaned forward on a railing, next to a barely dressed woman who was sleepily draped over his shoulder.
“Mike?” said Karen.
Mike recognized the voice directed at him from below, but couldn't quite place it. Still drowsy from the little sleep he had acquired, having been rather preoccupied with his company, he squinted as he stared down. Finally he identified the woman who had addressed him.
“Oh god, Karen!” A hint of panic entered his voice as he scrambled to hide the woman he had spent the night with behind him. “This isn't what it looks like.”
Karen rolled her eyes. “Please. I couldn't care less who you spend your time with.”
Mike blinked. “Really?” He wondered if Karen was even cooler than he had imagined at first. He began to fantasize, as he often did, about the life he hoped to have with her. Her attitude toward his overnight activities was a revelation. Not only would he be able to sleep with other women, but he wouldn't need to sneak around about it either. It was like a dream come true. Karen was unquestionably the perfect woman.
When Mike pulled his mind out of the clouds and looked down again, he saw that Karen had turned his back to him and was walking to the far corner of the room. He wondered now if she was really more upset than she was letting on. He had once heard that women often hid their true feelings from men as a test to see if they could figure them out on their own. But as far as he knew, that had never happened to him. At least, until now, he had never cared enough about a woman's feelings to explore beyond the surface. Mike slid away from Alora and hurried down the stairs. Alora dropped from her position leaning against Mike's back and fell hard to the floor. She considered shouting at Mike, but opted instead go back to sleep on the hardwood.
Mike shoved a couple broken chairs out of his way and caught up with Karen. He tapped her on the shoulder and she turned around to face him.
“What?” she said impatiently.
“Are you sure you're okay with this?”
“Yeah, it's fine. You can spend the night with whoever you like, as long as it's not me.” Karen turned back and continued towards the overturned long table in the corner of the room.
Disappointed by Karen's last comment, Mike followed after her. “But baby, please--”
Mike did not get to finish expressing his thought, as Karen spun around, grabbed him by the throat with one hand, and pushed him back up against a vertical beam. “Don't call me baby! I am not your baby. Got it?”
Mike swallowed. The force with which Karen had pressed him into the post was impressive to say the least, and he got the impression she had not even been using all of her strength. “Got it,” he squeaked.
Karen released him, then once again turned around and headed to the corner of the room. She took the long, overturned table by its edge and flipped it up onto its feet. In doing so, she discovered another familiar face she had not been expecting to see, previously hidden behind the table.
“Professor Romanbak!”
Romanbak was huddled motionless on the floor in the fetal position. Parts of his clothes were charred from Levaricent's magical attack, and his hair was singed. The elf wizard's spell was supposed to paralyze him for a few days. Thankfully for Romanbak, his powers acted as a counter agent to the magic, and reduced the duration of the spell's effects. Levaricent's stun spell had almost completely worn off, but Romanbak was still unconscious. Karen poked him gently with her foot, but he remained asleep.
Karen turned to Mike. “What happened to him?”
“I'unno.”
“This place is a wreck, and you don't know what happened? What were you doing all night?”
“I--”
“Don't answer that.”
Karen crouched down, turned Romanbak over so they were face to face, and screamed, “WAKE UP!”
Romanbak's eyes were wide open before Karen finished yelling. For a moment he felt like he couldn't move, but his sensations gradually spread from just his eyes, to the rest of his face, and throughout his body. He stared into Karen's eyes and realized that he would have a good deal of explaining to do. He was, after all, indirectly responsible for her being in Parellyria. The look on her face told him that she was quite aware of that fact, and none too happy about it. Romanbak took his time before he started moving, so as to avoid her questions for as long as possible while he tried to think of the best way to explain everything to her without implicating himself. But he knew he couldn't avoid her forever, so he stretched out his legs, curled his toes, and sat up.
“Karen,” he said, making sure not to sound surprised so she couldn't accuse him of feigning ignorance of her situation.
“Oh, you remember me?” she said sarcastically. “Mind filling me in on a few things, then?”
“You mean like where you are and how you got here?”
“For starters.”
Romanbak floated up about three feet into the air, lowered his legs, and gently dropped back down to a comfortable standing position. Karen watched in awe as Romanbak accomplished this feat with ease. She had heard from Elinross that he could fly, but in witnessing it occur, began to wonder about the science behind it. She had to remind herself that Parellyria was not subject to the same physical rules as her own world.
Romanbak looked seriously at Karen. “First of all, let me apologize that this happened to you. It was never my intention to send you here, but I am relieved to see that you are well.
“I come from this world, and was sent away against my will twenty years ago. Ever since, I've been trying to replicate the parameters of my departure, so that I could come back. I didn't realize how close I had come until you disappeared from my lab.”
Romanbak's explanation sounded rehearsed, but sincere, so Karen decided to believe him. He continued explaining the magical nature of Parellyria, and other details that Karen had already learned. Every fact she knew, that he later corroborated, strengthened Karen's faith that she was not being deceived.
Romanbak went on to explain to Karen how his cat had given her powers, how he had managed to follow her through the portal, and how Mike had ended up going with him.
“I see,” Karen said as Romanbak wound down his story. “So what happened here, then?”
“Yeah,” said Mike. “Where's sour face and that little dude?”
Romanbak's face dropped. He had not seen what had happened to Niffain and Dalius, but could only imagine what had taken place after one of the elf wizard's spells had knocked him out.
“Levaricent,” he breathed.
“Levaricent?” said Karen. “He was here?”
“Yes.”
“What did he do with Dalius and Niffain?”
“I don't know.”
“Do you think he killed them?”
Romanbak sensed great concern in Karen's voice. He wanted to believe that both Dalius and Niffain were alive, and he wanted to reassure Karen too. At the same time, he did not want to give her false hope. He tried to deduce his friends' most likely fate as best he could, based on his knowledge of Levaricent's motives, before answering Karen.
“Possibly, but I doubt it,” Romanbak said. “Levaricent came here with an agenda. If he only wanted to kill Dalius and Niffain, they would be dead, here. He wanted them for something else, so they're probably still with him, somewhere.”
“Who the hell is Levaricent?” Mike asked, more to be a part of the conversation than anything else.
Romanbak looked over at Mike and decided that he deserved to know what was going on, as ignorant as he was to the most basic facts he was told, and even sometimes to his own surroundings.
“Levaricent is a very powerful, very evil elf wizard who killed Niffain's father,” he said.
“Sounds like a fruit.”
“Mike!” Karen said. “If you're not going to contribute anything helpful, why don't you go back upstairs to your whore?”
Alora's eyes opened at the sound of the last word Karen spoke. She lifted her head and looked down at the conversants to see if she was the subject of their discussion. She saw Karen gesturing towards her, determined that they were indeed talking about her, and rose to her feet to protest.
“I am not a whore!” she said.
Mike, Dalius, and Karen all looked up at once at the scantily clad woman, uncertain how to address her objection.
“Does that mean last night was free?” he said.
Now livid, Alora stormed down the staircase toward Mike and slapped him cleanly across the face. Mike had not been expecting that, and it hurt so much that he needed to drop to one knee to retain consciousness. Alora breathed furiously through her nostrils, and her gaping eyes looked up at Karen, from whom the original insult had come.
“I'm sorry,” said Karen. “I meant to insult Mike, not you.”
Alora blinked and continued breathing to calm herself down.
“It's okay,” she said. Now feeling more awake, she looked around at the tattered surroundings of the pub interior. “What happened here? Another brawl? Must have been a bad one.”
Karen shook her head. “Levaricent.”
Alora's fury was replaced with surprise. She looked to Romanbak for confirmation, and he nodded.
“What was he doing here?” she asked.
“He kidnapped our friends,” Romanbak said.
Karen turned back to Romanbak. “We need to rescue them!”
Romanbak took a step backwards. In the few moments he had been conscious the thought of mounting a rescue had not crossed his mind, even though, having been the champion of Parellyria before being forced off the world, that should have been his natural course of action. All he could think about was how poorly his last two encounters with Levaricent had gone.
“How do you propose we do that?” he asked. “Levaricent is more powerful than ever. We wouldn't stand a chance against him. Also, we don't know where he took them.”
Alora chimed in, “Probably to his lair in the Koyin mountains.”
Romanbak turned to her. “He has a lair in the Koyin mountains?”
Alora shrugged. “That's what everyone says.”
A vague memory from the previous night entered Romanbak's mind, which was still recovering from the effects of Levaricent's spell. “I think Dalius said something about that, too.” The details of the conversation seemed to be lost from his memory.
Feeling confident and determined, Karen looked Romanbak in the eye and said, “What do you say? Want to go?”
Romanbak hesitated. The chance to confront and defeat Levaricent had been a major reason that he had worked so hard to get back. But now all he felt was fear. Fear of being defeated. Fear of being proven inadequate. And he felt he needed to find a way to avoid a confrontation similar to the one he had had last night.
"Levaricent clearly has set some plan in motion,” he said. “One of us should stay here to help protect the kingdom.”
Karen suspected that Romanbak had a different reason for not wanting to go, but chose not to argue with him. “Fine. I'll go into the Koyin mountains myself to rescue Dalius and Niffain.”
“Niffain was kidnapped!?” said Alora.
Karen nodded.
“Wait right here.” Alora dashed upstairs and hopped inside the room she had previously exited with Mike. A moment later she emerged again, now dressed in modest clothes and a heavy jacket, and carrying a large pouch. She held it out to Karen expectantly, with outstretched arms.
