Miranda shookherself all over and water sprayed everywhere. She then sent amental image through Tigerlilly of a fire and a plate of food. Alfsaid through Burlop that there was no fire but left and returnedwith a blanket. Burlop brought her two fresh fish from a nearbybarrel. That was good enough as far as Miranda was concerned. Sheleft the water, sat and wrapped herself with the blanket andstarted eating the fish. It tasted wonderful and seemed to triggera memory of an eagle eating fresh raw fish in a place where the sunshone brightly.
Feelingincredibly tired she asked Tigerlilly to watch over her and curledup and went to sleep. Tigerlilly watched over her for a while thengot bored so decided to do a little exploring as she had alreadydecided that these people offered no threat. The other ex-slavesall seemed to have things to do and left Miranda to sleep. Each wasquietly lost in their own thoughts remembering how scared andexhausted they had been when they had escaped.
Not long afterfalling asleep Miranda found herself in the dream world again. Thistime she was by herself. She felt quite lonely without havingIronwood around and remembered the horrible bats and rats. Afterplaying by herself for a little while she absent-mindedly calledfor Ironwood. Surprisingly he appeared but looked terrible. Wherebefore, he had looked like a stout fit middle-aged man with a longwell-kept white beard, now he looked a sickly emaciated old manwith a thin straggling fire singed beard.
‘There you are child.’ he said. ‘I’m glad to see you escaped.Have you found a safe hiding place?’
‘Yes.’ she replied. ‘But what has happened to you,Ironwood?’
‘Don’t worry about me child. I have done my job. You are safeand well on the road to recovery. I’m sure you will find a way toget your memory back and then you can look after all the trees andanimals again.’
‘But what happened?’ cried Miranda with tears pouring down herface. ‘Please tell me. I’ll try to help you, like you helpedme.’
‘I’m afraid it’s too late for me.’ replied Ironwood. ‘Afteryou left the angry princess returned to find you had left. Shenoticed my roots that had given you strength and worked out that Ihad helped you recover. She had her guards chop me down and burn mybody. She even had them dig up my roots and destroy them too.Fortunately, they missed one small root. I’m just alive in that.However, I’ve no growing energy left so I’ll be gonesoon.’
‘Don’t go Ironwood. I’ll come back and get you and plant youin the sunshine.’
‘No you mustn’t, Moonbeam. You must stay safe, get strong andfind your memories then you will be able to stop that horribleprincess from harming others.’ and he faded from view.
Miranda criedand cried then looked into the sky and said
‘Please Lady please don’t let Ironwood die. He just tried tolook after me. He shouldn’t have to die for that.’ but nothingseemed to happen.
***
Back at thehealing sanctuary, Princess Gemelica stood watching the dyingembers of the fire that destroyed Ironwood. She was in a very badmood. The officer in charge of her detachment of guards joinedher.
‘I have just had a report from the hunters. The hounds havelost the trail of the Felynx slave. They said she simplydisappeared into thin air from one of the hillocks out there. Theythink that someone probably found her and teleported heraway.’
‘Damn you Aquitain.’ said Gemelica angrily kicking a pile ofsmouldering ashes causing a shower of sparks.
‘You’re going to regret the day you ever decided to interferewith my plans.’
‘Gather your men, officer. I wish to return to thepalace.’
Five minuteslater they were gone and Glammer appeared to see how things wereprogressing with Miranda’s healing. She hovered there looking inutter disbelief at the ashes of the tree with panic gnawing at herbrain. What had happened to Miranda? Her eyes scanned the ashes.Had they killed and burnt Miranda as well? She couldn’t see anyevidence of bones or fur. Maybe they had just captured Miranda;after all she wouldn’t have been able to fight them.
Then she hearda weak whisper.
‘Is that you Glammer? I did the best I could. The druid girlhas healed well and has escaped and is relatively safe at themoment somewhere to the south.’
‘Who did this old man?’ said Glammer with intense anger in hervoice.
‘The angry princess, she seems to think she owns theland.’
‘Rest for now old man you have done your job better than Icould have hoped.’
Glammersearched around for the bit of root containing the spirit ofIronwood and used her power to give it a growth spurt. A thin twiggrew out of the root and on the end of it formed a nut. The nuthardened, the twig withered and the nut containing Ironwood’sspirit fell to the ground. Glammer picked up the nut and said.
‘It is not your time yet, you’ll see the sun again.’ anddisappeared.
Chapter 9 Real orIllusion?
Aquitain ran to theedge of Ironwood’s dreamland and told the Rat Catcher to wake upshe had one more small thing to do before he returned. She imagineda wind then imagined it to be a gale; she changed to an eagle andflew with the gale back to her dreamland. She landed on her beachand imagined a ball of mind clay. Immediately after it formed inher hands, she allowed herself to wake up and was once again theLady Warden.
‘Terren I don’t know whether you can hear me or not. I nowaccept that I am not in a dream. This is the true reality and I aman Agent of Chaos.’ she said.
‘I’ve learnt that Agents of Chaos are important and necessary.In fact I’m growing to like it. The final nail was the real dreamworld. How could I dream when I was already in a dream? I saw dreamsendings from Granddad, my passion flower from Miranda and I alsofound out where chaos matter comes from.’ She said