The Bonding Chronicles Ch. 06

Andrew gripped Sara's hips and chuckled as he savored the sight of her exposed breasts. "We must finish this later, sexy." His voice was playful and his anticipation showed through his strong grip on the sides of her body. She ran her hands along his exposed chest, dragging her nails against his soft skin and eliciting a surprised and excited groan before she stood. Sara grinned while she listened to Andrew exclaim, "Not fair."

Sara winked at Karen with a playful smile while she walked over and picked up their shirts. Andrew caught his shirt while standing and laughed at Sara's confident display as she pulled her blouse over her head with a purposeful delay before covering her pert breasts. Karen marveled at how comfortable the young couple was, and was surprised by how aroused they both still seemed despite her spell's efforts to prevent those emotions.

"Thanks, Karen. That could have been awkward." Sara hugged her friend, noticing that Karen's musky feminine scent still hung heavy in the air. "You OK? Smells like you might have some needs of your own. Need some alone time?"

Karen rolled her eyes and tried to stifle her laugh as Andrew came up and wrapped Sara in his arms from behind. Andrew's face appeared around Sara's side as he asked, "So, everyone OK now?"

"That's a relative question, Andrew, and not one easily answered."

Andrew could hear the concern in Karen's voice. "What's going on, Karen? What happened to you out there?"

The older woman walked towards the ward as she considered the limited information she had. "At this point, I'm uncertain what happened." She could feel warm slick moisture slithering down her thigh as she progressed towards the ornate design ahead of her. "From what you said of your gifts, this place seems somehow appropriate to your needs. Though I would recommend taking care before bringing anyone else here."

The young couple shared a serious glance while they finished tidying their clothes. Andrew knew that Karen was right.

"I was following you through the forest when I thought I heard something out in the trees. I stopped for just a moment to look..." Andrew and Sara could both hear the panic rising in Karen's voice as she relived this moment. "When I looked back you were gone. I knew which direction you had headed, but..." She again paused to take a deep breath, fighting back the dread from her memory. "Well, after a few steps I thought I heard your voice off to the side, and so I rushed after it. That same thing repeated more times than I can remember, and my recollection from that moment gets hazy and confusing."

Karen reached the ward and set down her backpack before kneeling beside it as she wiped a worried tear from her eye. "I swear I mean you no harm, but that had to be the protection ward. I have felt the effects before, but this shadowed my previous experience like an eclipse. Protection wards cause a vague sense of dread, and a subtle urge to change course or stop..." Karen inspected the circle as her voice trailed off. "I became more and more confused the longer I searched, and I was just about to flee when I think Sara found me. The next thing I remember is coming out of it here, with you talking to me."

Looking at Sara and Andrew she added, "It wasn't until Sara grabbed my hand that the confusion stopped building. I think that if you plan on bringing anyone else here you must maintain physical contact with them."

"I am so sorry, Karen. If only we had known. I guess that is kind of the reason we came here tonight. To figure this stuff out. It's super crazy that the ward would have that kind of an effect on you though. Doesn't your magic protect you or shield you somehow?"

Karen laughed as she studied the circle before her. "No, Andrew. Generally speaking, magic doesn't work like that. I'm sure there are spells and artifacts which can protect one from the mental manipulations of a ward, but that's something that would need to be prepared or activated in advance. Further, that is not a skill which I possess. Though I appreciate your optimistic view of my gifts."

Sara began scouting the inside of the glade while Karen continued trying to understand the powerful ward. Andrew walked back to the pond, giving Karen time to explore his creation and settle her troubled thoughts. He pulled a handful of cool water from its crisp clean body and moved further away from Karen and the ward.

He began pouring small amounts of water out of his hand, raising his hand in small increments between each pour until eventually he smiled and drank the last of its contents. The water tasted delicious and refreshing. Its flavor was intense and somehow undefinable; not sweet, not savory. There was nothing about it that he could relate to any food or drink he had ever had, he just knew that it tasted amazing and that was enough for him.

Holding out his hand he found a drop of water that was descending with lazy determination towards his feet and began counting as soon as it crossed beside his hand. By the time the water disappeared into the mossy floor of the forest he had reached thirty. Looking over he realized that Sara and Karen were both watching him with confused expressions on their faces. Karen had noticed the slowly moving rain but dismissed it in favor of studying the ward which she knew was the cause of everything happening around them.

"OK, if what I think is happening is actually happening that is fucking insane." A massive grin was spread across Andrew's face as he looked between the two women. He could see that they were confused and did not understand what he had just discovered. "Before I explain, I want to try and confirm. Sara, mind giving me a hand?"

She shook her head and gave him a playful laugh as she responded, "Of course not, but what do you think is going on?"

"I will tell you after this experiment." His tone was excited as he explained what he wanted her to do. "OK, you have much better vision than me so here is what I am going to do. I want you to stand here." He lead her to a place near the edge of the glade, just at the boundary where everything had seemed to expand. "I am going sprint into the woods and turn around. I will hold up my arm and my fist will be closed. As soon as my fist is fully open I want you to start counting out the seconds. As soon as you see me start to close my fist I want you to stop counting. I will come back to you and we will see what happened."

Andrew was almost vibrating with excited energy as he sped through his explanation.

"Let's do this, sweetie." Sara said.

Andrew sprinted off into the woods, and as he crossed the threshold where the glade seemed to expand, his movements began to slow until he seemed to be moving in slow motion. His progress became painfully slow and Sara was getting bored as she had to wait a few minutes for Andrew to get into position with his hand raised. As soon as his palm was fully open she began counting. Sixty two seconds later he began closing his hand and she stopped. It took Andrew less time to re-enter the glade, but Sara became so bored she went back to Karen and asked her how her studies were going.

"Not great, actually." Karen's brow furrowed with frustration as she looked at Sara. There was confusion written in her eyes as she grimaced in annoyance.

"Really? What's up? Too complicated?" Sara's voice echoed with sympathy.

"Well, yes, that would be a problem I suspect. Except..." Karen trailed off as she again looked at the design on the forest floor. "Whenever I look at this damnable thing, by the time I think I have an idea how a couple of the symbols relate to each other I forget about what symbol I was thinking of. Looking back nothing seems familiar. With each glance, every part of this thing looks new and unfamiliar." She exhaled in disgust as she fell back on her butt. "I give up, I can never remember any of this long enough to make any sense of anything. We have been here for how long? Twenty minutes, and every time I look at this it's like I've never seen it before."

Sara wanted to give Karen a hug to try and sooth her frustration, but knew that their relationship was never like that. As she looked at the ward she realized that none of it looked familiar to her either. She stared at it for a few moments, scanning its entire surface and by the time she reached where she started she had already forgotten what she had seen.

"That's messed up!" Sara exclaimed as she looked at the ward in frustration.

Karen let out a loud exhale as she chuckled in relief. "Thank you. I was beginning to worry that my little excursion in the woods had done some serious damage."

"What did you get up to?" Andrew's voice reaches them with eager excitement. They both turned and Sara shook her head as she saw the happy smile on his joyous face.

"Sixty two."

Andrew's exultation was loud as it overrode the baritone thrum of the storm above them. "That is absolutely insane. Like serious, fuck reality, fuck time, fuckity fuck fuck this is crazy." He spun around admiring the view as he laughed. Sara giggled at Andrew's antics while Karen smiled, taken out of her funk by his infectious joy.

"Seriously, baby, what the hell has you so excited?" Sara asked once Andrew settled down enough to listen.

Sprinting over, Andrew took a seat on the soft moss bed atop the circle and kicked off his shoes and socks. As he began wiggling his toes through the lush spongy plants he smiled and began explaining, "When I was counting out the descent of that drop earlier, that was the exact height it took water from the pond to fall for one second."

Sara and Karen considered what he had just said, and Andrew waited while he ran his feet and hands over the comforting moss around him.

"So, the rain is falling at one thirtieth its normal speed." Karen speculated.

"Or we are all moving thirty times faster than the rain." Sara observed.

"Correct." Andrew said.

"Wait, which one of us is correct?" Sara asked with frustration as Karen nodded her agreement with Sara's question.

"You both are." He looked between them with a broad grin. Realizing that this was not as obvious to them, he rubbed Sara's shoulder as he explained, "As Einstein determined, time is relative. If someone was traveling passed you at near light speed, and you could see what they were doing within the craft, they would appear to be moving about the ship at a snail's pace. If they could see you, then you would appear to be moving at incredible speeds. A second for the person in the craft could mean the passage of a day, or a decade to the person on earth. It's very fascinating stuff. Not that I ever thought I would be able to apply it in a practical way."

Andrew studied the women before him, and could see that Sara seemed to find little understanding from his explanation, while Karen was struggling to see its relevance to their situation.

"So if I am following your example, we are the travellers in the ship?" Karen's question was shrouded with uncertainty.

"No, as insane as it is to understand, we are the person on earth from that example. Everything outside of this glade would be inside of the ship." Andrew's voice was full of questioning unease as he began contemplating something else. "Karen, could I see the hourglass please?"

Karen pulled her bag into her lap and as she opened the top zipper, emerald and lilac light flooded out. She reached in and pulled out the moonstone, which glowed with a bright intensity of dancing purple and green light. "Well, that's interesting." Karen said as she set the moonstone down. Reaching into her bag, she pulled out and handed across the hourglass. Its vibrant twinkling sands suspended in place, unmoving within Karen's grip.

As Andrew took the device, he let out a relieved sigh as he turned it in his hand and saw that the sands remained unmoving despite the extreme pitch and angle of the artifact as he tipped it in the air. Sara and Karen let out surprised gasps as Andrew looked at them with an excited grin. Handing the device to Sara he again looked relieved as the sands remained unmoving. She studied the captivating twinkles emanating from within hourglass for a couple of seconds before setting the device on the ground upside down. As her hand released its handle the sands began to fall at the same speed as the rain around them.

"Thank god." Andrew exclaimed.

"Wait, there is little comfort to find from any of this. How is it that you and Sara do not age within this place? At every turn we are presented with more troubling questions!" Karen's frustrations finally got the better of her as she burst with a loud grumble.

"You have to admit, Andrew. This is kind of crazy." Sara added in support of her friend.

"Ohh, totally. This is nucking futs, but it is also amazing and wonderful. In a perverse way, it all makes so much sense. Without the elimination of aging, this place would be a curse. With aging being removed, this is probably the most profoundly useful tool that has ever been created." He was again bubbling over with excitement as the two women watched him with growing frustration at not fully understanding what he was seeing.

"OK, let me try and put this all together for you. When I was out there, I counted two seconds before I closed my hand. Since you counted sixty two, that means that time within this place is travelling almost thirty times faster than the outside world." He paused to look between them as they began to understand the implications of what he was saying.

"For every two seconds that pass in the outside world, a minute passes within here. Every hour in the outside world is a day and six hours here. Every day out there, is almost a month in this place. Do you understand now? If we continued to age while we were here, this place would be a curse, because you would be wasting your life by being here. But with aging taken off the table, so to speak, we can use this place to study, train, or hell, even build things in what would seem the blink of an eye to the outside world."

Their eyes widened as the true impact of this revelation settled upon them.

"Andrew, you realize the dangers presented by a place like this, don't you? If it's existence becomes known there are many beings who would be inexorably drawn to its gifts. I will lend my talent to help keep it from being discovered, and my suspicion is that it has many protections of its own. Regardless of all that, with time, it will be found. That can't be helped or avoided forever." Karen thought for a couple more seconds before she concluded her statement, "If it hasn't been discovered already."

Andrew looked worried as he asked, "What can I do? I know so little about the magical community. Hell, I don't even know if there is a magical community."

"You're talking about 'The Council,' those arrogant pricks. I should be grateful, we all should be, really, but they make it so difficult." Karen's voice was bordering on malicious as she spoke of them. "They discovered me early on, and helped me remain hidden. Their agents helped when I outlived my first identity. People in my village were beginning to talk, those familiar rumors surfaced. Witch, heretic, apostate. All those familiar names, spoken by unexpected voices."

"It sounds like they helped you, just like you helped me. What kinda douchebaggery could make you hate them so much?" Sara was eager to understand more of this unknown world that just opened up to her.

"The crimes they have committed in their quest to keep the world of magic from being discovered is a blemish on us all. The stain on my soul weighs heavy upon my heart. For all their benevolent intent, their acquiescence to atrocity will not be forgotten." Karen looked between the young faces around her, and choked back her anger as she smiled and concluded. "Let us not dwell on the sins of the past. While they will eventually find you, for now you remain in secret. The ward you have placed has likely shielded this place from discovery. Otherwise a traveler would have already arrived to investigate."

"Thank you for sharing, Karen. I apologize for touching on a part of your history which seems so sensitive." They shared a familiar smile before Andrew asked, " What is a traveler?"

Karen gave a grateful smile as she considered how to respond, "As I described earlier tonight, gifts manifest in many ways. In every generation there are several wizards and witches born with overlapping abilities. Healers — those who share my gift — are rare. There are many of us since we are naturally peaceful and useful to all who need us. Our long lives guarantee that we remain as stewards as each generation passes to the next. Travelers are those who are gifted with an understanding of gates and doorways.

"It sounds trivial, I know, but they can create and sustain portals between two distant places. I have met but one in all my years, and he was gifted beyond measure. He could write symbols around a doorway, and create a portal across the world. He would imagine a place and vanish before your eyes, appearing there instantly. It was a spectacle to behold." She looked around as she laughed. "Of course, it seems that my standards for spectacular may need to be adjusted now."

Andrew and Sara shared her heartfelt laugh. Andrew then asked, "So if they had sensed the creation of this place, you think they would have sent a traveler to investigate?"

"They would have. They may have. Not all of their agents are overt. Most of the ones I have dealt with were very discreet. But you should have no reason to worry for your safety. 'The Council' will only attack someone with magical gifts if that person refuses to stop activities which could expose the existence of magic. The ward should prevent all but the most powerful or determined from finding it."

Andrew puzzled over this description of what sounded like the governing body of magical practitioners. Karen had seemed so upset about something 'The Council' had done in the past. He was forced to conclude that something must have changed as a result of those events, and whatever they were doing had ceased in its aftermath.

"Thank you again, Karen. So I heard you and Sara talking about the ward. Did you figure something out?"

Karen grumbled as she surveyed the patterns which extended out beneath Andrew. Their beauty added to her desire to understand their purpose. "This damnable thing vexes me." She ran her hand over its surface as she shook her head. "In my long life, nothing has ever been so maddeningly elusive. As I was telling Sara; when I try and study the symbols their shapes become lost within my thoughts. It feels as though I could study this thing for eternity, and at the end of all that time, when again I looked upon it, it would seem as though I was looking at it for the first time."

"That would be frustrating. I had hoped that you would be able to explain something about it. Glean some insight into its purpose."

Andrew stood and studied the complex shapes that surrounded him, and found that he had no trouble comprehending them. He could sense that every shape held purpose, and that the order and overlapping nature of the design held great significance. As he tried to speculate upon the nature of the shapes, he knew that his thoughts were pure conjecture. Not driven by his gift or granted insight by his powers.

"Well, we were able to figure out some of its more obvious purposes." His voice held the tone of a happy chuckle as he swatted a slow moving drop of water out of the air.

Karen pulled a notepad and pen out of her bag and for an hour she stenciled a few wards onto several pieces of paper for Andrew. She first drew the shape for a defensive ward, explaining that it would reinforce any structure or man made object it was placed on. Next, she drew a healing ward, stating that when drawn on a living being and activated it would draw power and cure injuries and ailments. The worse the injury or ailment the more energy it would drain. She expressed concern and warned Andrew to be careful when using this ward. Finally she drew a cleansing ward, explaining that it was a more silly ward a friend had given her a long time ago. When drawn on a piece of paper it would clear all writing, itself included.