Such was her excitementthat she told him about everything she could see. She guided himalmost every step of the way down an old zigzagging path to thebeach below. Every now and again he said ‘Thanks Miranda,’ just soshe knew he was still there.
From the beach it wasonly a five-minute walk to the ruined village. Scattered among thepalm trees and fruit trees were the burnt out remains of huts madefrom local materials. He could see that they had been burnt outrecently, since the ashes looked fresh. It was now his turn todescribe what he saw to Miranda flying above.
‘These huts look likethey were burnt out recently. There are no weeds or plants growingin amongst the ashes. Wait, here’s a torch. This looks like amilitary torch like those back at Twin Towers. I’ll bring it withme so that you can have a look later.’ He picked it up andcontinued walking.
‘This looks like alarge communal building of some sort. There are some small bakedclay pots and bowls amongst the ashes. I haven’t seen any bonesyet. Here are more clay bowls and some clay spoons; some bits ofrope and woven cane on the ground; some large newman footprintshere in the ashes. They’re heading towards the back of the village.Keep a keen watch, Alpha.
‘I’m heading towardsthe rear of the village area. There are a lot of small footprintsin the area, all going towards the rear of the village. They don’tlook like small newman footprints. Close your eyes and make sureyou don’t crash. I’m going to send you an image of the footprints.+<image of footprints>.’
‘By the Lady, is thathow you see things? It isn’t very clear.’
‘Logicons don’t havevery good vision. Why do you think I keep changing to my newmanform? It’s not to look pretty. It’s so I can see properly.’
‘Oh, so you want to geta better look at me do you?’
‘Perhaps, or maybe it’sso I don’t scare you.’
‘Ha. That’ll be theday. I’m much more used to being with creatures than newmans.’
‘Do you think of me asa creature or a newman?’
‘That’s not a fairquestion, wizard. There is a path up ahead of you. I noticedearlier this morning that it goes up a rise for several hundredpaces, then there is a shrine to Jacintra the Lord of cats. It wasnear there that I felt uneasy. Be careful, wizard.’
Aquitain kept walkinguntil he reached the path. It was quite wide and well-worn as if itwas often used.
‘It looks like theanswer to the mystery lies up ahead. All the footprints led to thistrack. I’ll keep going up to that shrine you saw.’
‘Are you sure, wizard?I’m feeling a little uneasy about this.’
‘I’m sure, Miranda. Weneed to get to the bottom of this. If I was in my newman body I’dbe quite excited by now,’ he said, but Miranda said nothing.
He walked up the track.The sun shone down. It was a beautiful day, but silent. He suddenlyrealized that there were none of the normal jungle noises. It was alittle unreal and to a newman it would be very unsettling, but hewas in a Logicon body. It didn’t cause any undue alarm. How doLogicons survive, he wondered. If they have no fear they must dostupid things and get wiped out. Was this a stupid thing that hewas doing?
He reached the top of arise and was surprised by the sight that greeted him. There was acircular gully with high walls all round, about a hundred pacesacross. The ground in the gully was flat like a table and coveredonly with a course brown grass, which in places reached knee high.Facing the track was a large cave perhaps ten paces wide and fivehigh, opening into the hillside. The curious thing was that thecave resembled the open mouth of a cat, complete with whitestalactites hanging down from the ceiling of the cave entrance andtwo cat eyes painted on the rock above the cave.
The ground around theentrance to the cave was a bright red brown colour, and blackenedas if there had been a recent fire just outside it. He strodeacross the grass towards the shrine entrance. There was absolutesilence and no breeze, but the air felt cool. Miranda was circlingaround in tight circles above him.
‘You’re right Miranda,there’s a really weird feeling down here and it’s emanating fromthe shrine.’
As he approached themouth of the shrine he smelt it.
‘Something’s died inthere. There’s a really strong stench of death coming from theentrance.’ He walked closer still and felt a strong feeling ofgrief and fear. Had he been in his newman body he would have beenrunning away at this stage. He stood considering what to do. Hecould back off and not find out what the problem was, or confrontit head on. Sometimes the only substance to fear was the fearitself. He was a mind wizard he knew fear was a weapon but also adefence. Which one was it here?
He retreated back tothe centre of the clearing and slithered out of his body shell toreform as a newman. Miranda screamed at him through the mindlink.
‘Have you gone mad,wizard? What are you doing?’
‘I’m going in to findout what’s happened.’
‘Don’t be a foolwizard, I can feel it from here. There’s something very evil inthat cave.’
‘Perhaps and perhapsnot. There are evil things and evil deeds and there is magic. It’stime to find out which one we are dealing with,’ and he pulled outa small bag of powerstones and tipped them out on his body shell.Next he got out the ball of chaos matter, closed his eyes andreformed it into the shape of a golden headband. He then sortedthrough the powerstones and one at a time held each stone againstthe body of the band and watched the metal flow around and grip it,then placed the band on his head. Finally, he detached Alpha, askedit to grow legs, and placed it in his hair on top of his head.
Miranda spiralled down,landed near to him and reformed to her newman shape.
‘By the Lady
