Read Online The Nothing: A Book of the Between by Kerry Schafer - Free Book Online
Authors: Kerry Schafer
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nothing.”
The only paths led off at right angles, straight as an arrow as far as the eye could see through a field of pure white snow. Blue sky above, sun blazing down and turning the snow crystals to diamond so that it was too bright to look at for long. Paths were irrelevant, in any case. None of them were going to be walking.
Vivian’s eyes watered from staring into the blaze. Already the dragon was flying upward toward the top of the glacier, his flight path jagged and irregular because of the damaged wing. Poe stayed closer to earth, practicing his moves, flying in a small figure eight, and then a larger one, looping upward and drifting down.
“We go over,” Vivian said, her gaze following the lines of the glacier, up, up, against the hard sky.
“And if gravity comes back while we’re in the process?” Zee drifted up beside her, his head also tipped back, surveying the obstacle ahead. She had thought of that already. Of the sudden, helpless crash to the earth far below. How many nights had she jerked awake out of just such a dream? But this wasn’t Dreamworld; this was the Between. And if she didn’t stop it, there would be no more Dreamworlds to fall out of.
“Do we have another option?”
“We go back to the Black Gates, take another path. The way is longer, but perhaps not so perilous.”
“Do we have time for that?”
“No. But I don’t like this.”
“We have to do something,” Zee said. “Go back or go forward. If we stay here, we freeze to death.”
This was truth. As they discussed things, the snow field had extended beneath them. Vivian was shivering already, her feet and her cheeks gone numb. She’d seen victims of the cold when she’d worked the ER, the blackened skin on noses and toes, the surgery to remove the dead flesh. And beyond the fear of disfigurement, of course, the looming threat of death.
She searched inside herself for any sign of her dragon nature. If she could shift, here and now, it would be an easy thing to carry the others not only up and over, but all the way to their destination. But only a tiny spark responded to her inquiry. The dragon part of her was very nearly dead, and certainly not strong enough to support a shift or to stay alive if she managed it.
“We go over,” she said. “Quickly, before the rules change again. I think every time a world dies, it’s going to throw off the balance. Do you know how far to the next door, Callyn?”
“A half day’s journey, perhaps. Beyond the glacier. Unless the height of the thing is part of the distance as things have warped, and then we’re likely to find the door at the very top.”
That was a whole lot of might. Making plans in the Between was always a crapshoot, though. Any movement was better than slowly freezing to death.
“Let’s go.” Making sweeping movements with her arms, she drew herself upward into the sky.
Six
J ARED HAD plenty of opportunity to practice using his altered leg.
Kraal kept a pace that was steady for a Giant, which meant a jog for a human. Jared tried to take in his surroundings, which surpassed anything his imagination could have conjured up. Stone mansions that were true wonders of engineering and art. Paved roads fashioned of cobblestones cut from ruby, sapphire, emerald. Everywhere he looked, he found brilliant color and some new use for stone.
When at last they stopped, though, it was in front of a small cottage with a thatched roof and flat stone porch. Nothing extravagant or noteworthy, and Jared felt a welling of disappointment.
A woman answered Kraal’s knock. She was small of stature and rail-thin. She was also ancient, with a face so creased with wrinkles, there was no smooth skin to be seen. Only the eyes were young, bright blue and searching. She wore a simple blue gown and her gray hair hung long and unbraided down the center of her back.
Kraal bent a knee to her, and for a flash of an instant, Jared thought he’d been mistaken and she must be
The only paths led off at right angles, straight as an arrow as far as the eye could see through a field of pure white snow. Blue sky above, sun blazing down and turning the snow crystals to diamond so that it was too bright to look at for long. Paths were irrelevant, in any case. None of them were going to be walking.
Vivian’s eyes watered from staring into the blaze. Already the dragon was flying upward toward the top of the glacier, his flight path jagged and irregular because of the damaged wing. Poe stayed closer to earth, practicing his moves, flying in a small figure eight, and then a larger one, looping upward and drifting down.
“We go over,” Vivian said, her gaze following the lines of the glacier, up, up, against the hard sky.
“And if gravity comes back while we’re in the process?” Zee drifted up beside her, his head also tipped back, surveying the obstacle ahead. She had thought of that already. Of the sudden, helpless crash to the earth far below. How many nights had she jerked awake out of just such a dream? But this wasn’t Dreamworld; this was the Between. And if she didn’t stop it, there would be no more Dreamworlds to fall out of.
“Do we have another option?”
“We go back to the Black Gates, take another path. The way is longer, but perhaps not so perilous.”
“Do we have time for that?”
“No. But I don’t like this.”
“We have to do something,” Zee said. “Go back or go forward. If we stay here, we freeze to death.”
This was truth. As they discussed things, the snow field had extended beneath them. Vivian was shivering already, her feet and her cheeks gone numb. She’d seen victims of the cold when she’d worked the ER, the blackened skin on noses and toes, the surgery to remove the dead flesh. And beyond the fear of disfigurement, of course, the looming threat of death.
She searched inside herself for any sign of her dragon nature. If she could shift, here and now, it would be an easy thing to carry the others not only up and over, but all the way to their destination. But only a tiny spark responded to her inquiry. The dragon part of her was very nearly dead, and certainly not strong enough to support a shift or to stay alive if she managed it.
“We go over,” she said. “Quickly, before the rules change again. I think every time a world dies, it’s going to throw off the balance. Do you know how far to the next door, Callyn?”
“A half day’s journey, perhaps. Beyond the glacier. Unless the height of the thing is part of the distance as things have warped, and then we’re likely to find the door at the very top.”
That was a whole lot of might. Making plans in the Between was always a crapshoot, though. Any movement was better than slowly freezing to death.
“Let’s go.” Making sweeping movements with her arms, she drew herself upward into the sky.
Six
J ARED HAD plenty of opportunity to practice using his altered leg.
Kraal kept a pace that was steady for a Giant, which meant a jog for a human. Jared tried to take in his surroundings, which surpassed anything his imagination could have conjured up. Stone mansions that were true wonders of engineering and art. Paved roads fashioned of cobblestones cut from ruby, sapphire, emerald. Everywhere he looked, he found brilliant color and some new use for stone.
When at last they stopped, though, it was in front of a small cottage with a thatched roof and flat stone porch. Nothing extravagant or noteworthy, and Jared felt a welling of disappointment.
A woman answered Kraal’s knock. She was small of stature and rail-thin. She was also ancient, with a face so creased with wrinkles, there was no smooth skin to be seen. Only the eyes were young, bright blue and searching. She wore a simple blue gown and her gray hair hung long and unbraided down the center of her back.
Kraal bent a knee to her, and for a flash of an instant, Jared thought he’d been mistaken and she must be
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