The Four Stones

Before anyone could answer something strange happened. The greenish reddish rock, with a human face pushing up from the inside (just what you would expect if you pushed your face against a thin rubber membrane), spoke. The booming, anguished voice, echoed off the mist sounding as if whomever had spoken was all around them. James had never heard a voice twisted by such torment--it was almost unbearable to listen to.

"Beware," it said, the image in the rock moving as if it were suddenly made of soft material, "she does this to all her slaves, and if she catches you, you will be her slave. We are adrift in this foul mist for eternity. Never does the tide take us beyond the mist and never can we leave the stone. To hunger and thirst, yet never to eat or drink; to need breath, yet never to breathe; to wish to walk free and tall, yet never to have legs. Only enough of the mind is not frozen so that we contemplate our fate but are powerless to escape. There is not even the release of death for there is no longer any body to die."

Sir Rindow stepped forward and kneeled next to the stone. He placed the lantern nearby so that he could look more closely. "Poor soul that you are, is there nothing that thou can sayest that shall help my sword release you from your bondage?"

"Dear knight, only the death of the Witch can do such a thing. And that shall never be, for all the horrid creatures of the world are her eyes and ears, they do her bidding. You must turn back out of the mist. If you go on you shall see the island that lies to your port side with its inviting high cliffs and waterfalls that look still in the distance and without peril. But once upon the sand, her power shall bind you. And the demons that have crossed the River Tarnea will fix you to this stone. And they shall dance over you as your soul is poured into the rock and your body is thrown to the fish."

Sir Rindow touched the rough, top edge of the rock. He peered into the disembodied face, a face that wore a despairing expression too painful to gaze at for long. The knight suddenly felt that his own strength was ebbing, flowing out of him into the thick mist that enshrouded them. He abruptly stood.

"We must leave this place at once!" His voice was urgent and clear. He knelt and picked up the rock looking at the face one last time before gently and silently placing it in the water. The oarsmen began immediately setting their shoulders into their work turning the boat toward the distant sound of the horn.

But the mist was thickening as if upon command, becoming so dense that the small boat was barely making way. The sound of the horn was growing more distant and it was far less clear from which direction the sound was coming. Was it port? Yes! No! It's a bit to that side--or--is it that side? James jumped up. "Sir Knight," (he was beginning to speak in the way the people around him spoke, and strangely, it felt comfortable), "it would be best if one of the Ost-Realmers were to hold me out over the bow. When I couldn't see, I learned to hear real well."

James was held as far out into the heavy mist as the huge man beasts could bear. When James looked back toward the boat all he could see were their enormous forearms, studded with curly thick boar-like hair, disappearing back into the mist.

At first the horn was further away and off to port. Then it was closer and off to starboard. James found that instinctively he was turning his head from left to right so he stopped. There! The sound was more clearly coming from one direction. "Row slightly to port!" he screamed into the mist. The little boat began to move and bob, but the direction was imperceptible to James except that the horn was drawing nearer. "Straighten out!"

"Sir Rindow!" James said with all his might into the mist, "please ask the Ost-Realmers to call out in their loudest voice. Perhaps the others will hear us and can blow the horn more often!"

The Ost-Realmers were very large and powerful creatures. Their kingdom, ruled by an old hunch-back boar who was known for his mercy, was a wild place. There were glaciers of red ice and freezing north winds that would kill a boy in a moment. The nights were long and very, very dark. And the forests were filled with giant trees that spread their leaves so thickly that very little light ever reached the floor. In that dark, moist world, creatures of all sorts lived and died, struggling against the brutal environment. As masters of this place, the Ost-Realmers had developed great strength. But the effect of the Witch's magic on their realm was different from other places in Threspalia.

Instead of reversing entirely their realm was slowly dying. The great trees became ill, the crops shriveled and the deep, clear ponds that filled with the crystal runoff of the mountains began to dry. Where once there had been great expanses of park like grass, now there were desert-oceans of sizzling, golden sand.

So when Sir Rindow asked them to "Scream for Osten-Realm! Scream as if every little boar and sow's life depended on it!" the huge creatures sent a bristling roar, that by its very power, parted the mist. Immediately, the horn on the Underdawn began to blow more regularly and it was clearer.

"Straight ahead, now!" James yelled. When the bow of the boat had almost touched the Underdawn, James said, "Here it is!"

Sir Hameo, with Princess Eleanor at his side, had a rope ladder thrown over and everyone aboard the away boat scampered hastily into the ship. Eleanor went out of her way to take James' arm and help him into the Underdawn but James instinctively drew away. He didn't need the help of any girl but he thanked her anyway remembering what his aunt had taught him about correct manners.

"Sir Hameo," Rindow said, his voice deep, still tinged with urgency, "we must put out of this fog at once. Reverse course and let us go by the way we came."

"Aye, Sir Rindow, but there is no reference. We may find that thou order, is doom, for we may move within and never without the fog."

"And the lookouts above?" Sir Rindow said.

"Aye, the fog is no less thick there. There is no sign of a break."

"Then turn the bow to where the stern points and let the oarsmen row for their lives."