This is a forest, she thought. There’s got to be water around here somewhere. But she couldn’t bring herself to move yet…she was shaking with fatigue and hunger. How many days had passed since she’d run away? Surely they would have found her by now, if they’d been sent to find her…
A pattern of silvery blots began to interfere with Lilian’s vision. She felt very sick. Water, she thought vaguely. I really really need water…
But she couldn’t move. Am I dying of thirst? She wondered, strangely detached.
Then she found herself pointlessly saying “help. Please, help, something help. HELP.” There really was no use in it whatsoever, because there was nothing and nobody to hear her apart from a bunch of trees and horrible bugs that wanted to bite her.
She took deep breaths, and the nausea and her vision cleared slightly. It did nothing for the sense of fear and failure however. Reality had become a questionable numbness yet still wouldn’t leave her alone; and she gasped as her heart thumped out of pace, stopped, and jumped back to normal again. Panicked, she sat very still for a moment. Then she said to herself,
“I hate it. I don’t know what it is, but I hate it.”
“You don’t hate it. You don’t hate anything, you are just afraid.”
Then she noticed a strange glow of blue-golden light hanging in the air, so brilliant it was almost blinding.
***
Quinn spent several hours of darkness trying to get some sense out of the butterflies. He was more alert after sleeping all day, and had better capability of understanding the rather far out concepts they liked to discuss.
That didn’t mean he was any more capable of continuing on his quest however. Oddly enough that had taken something of a backseat, and he was more interested in how to get out of this place. He also kept wondering if maybe he’d died or gone into a coma and was in some kind of strange limbo, in which case he wanted to know because then he would feel less anxious as everything would be completely beyond his control.
On the other hand, it might be a dream, just a very long one, and if so he wanted to wake up as quickly as possible because this was getting boring now.
Of course, none of this seemed at all important to the butterflies, as they were on another plane altogether where apparently things like the difference between life and death or reality and insanity were irrelevant. In the end Quinn gave up and tried to persuade them to talk about mad stuff like the “undesirable things” dwelling in the forest.
“So what defines a creature as “undesirable”?” asked Quinn.
The butterflies twitched subtly.
“A creature that is not of the light, that feeds off darkness,” said one.
Quinn frowned.
“But, nothing can eat darkness. That doesn’t work.”
“To feed, is not necessarily to eat. It is to acquire energy from a substance or state…many creatures do that.”
Quinn digested this for a moment, then tried again.
“So – these are bad creatures? What the hell are they? Or d’you mean mosquitoes, because they’re already very much –“ he swatted at the air, “ – awake.”
The green and purple butterfly cut across Quinn to answer him, so adamant of what it had to say.
“No, no, not bad, just different. Humans are deeply confused about these matters…they think that what they do not like, must be bad. As though their miniscule opinions count for anything at all. As though there is judgement, and as though that judgement was influenced by them.”
Quinn’s expression froze, as he tried to wrap his brain around these words.
“But, how can they not be bad, if they are undesirable? How can something that feeds off darkness not be bad?”
The butterfly huffed.
“You weren’t listening, were you?”
“Oh, don’t you start,” said Quinn. “You’re the second – person? – to have told me off for not paying attention to a speech made of garbage.”
“Well, you obviously understood it, because as you see, garbage is not necessarily a bad thing. You have just recycled the garbage I spoke into a sentence that proved my point. Well done.”
Quinn, now seriously bemused, could no longer stand this situation. He sprang from the forest floor, away from the fire’s embers and the butterflies and everything else. He heard their fluttery voices for a moment, calling warnings, but he had already bounced off over the moss and into the darkness. The glowing creepers had faded and he realized why, because it was not altogether dark anymore. The first blue light of dawn was cast over the sky.
While he was looking up at it, he carried on hurrying away from the strangeness, delighted that he was actually at least slightly in control of the situation. And then he slipped straight into the river. Look where you’re going! He reminded himself, but too late. The icy cold snatched the air from his lungs for a second and then he was dragged into the current.
***
Lilian woke up through a very bright cloud of delirium.
Then she heard a sound.
Water! She thought. Where there was the sound of water, there must be water, surely.
She struggled from what she presumed was the forest floor, but before she could stand up and run to the water, wherever it was, a voice said sharply,
“Don’t move.”
Lilian stopped. Then she realized she couldn’t see anything, because there was so much bright light it was quite impossible to see. Only then it began to slowly dim back to normal, and the forest canopy popped into focus as though from underwater through a fisheye lens.
Lilian tried to make sense of it all. Only, nothing seemed to make sense anymore.
The light dimmed further and suddenly she realized it was still night. There was the moon. She shivered slightly and hauled herself up to sit against a tree.
And then there was a unicorn, right in front of her.
She blinked. It was still there. There was no denying it. It was unmistakeably, a unicorn. It was made of the same brilliant light Lilian had just woken from, and it was so dazzlingly alive that Lilian wondered if she’d ever seen anything truly living before.
“Why did it take you so long, to ask for help?”
Lilian gawped.
“Why are you talking?” she replied.
The unicorn laughed.
“Next, you will want to know where you are, and whether this is real.”
“I wouldn’t mind knowing those things actually,” Lilian said.
“Humans always want to know about the minor, irrelevant things. Never understanding that – they don’t really know, anything.”
“I know that you’re a unicorn.” Lilian tried hesitantly.
The unicorn shuffled a hoof. “That is just a word. It is not what I am.”
Lilian closed her eyes briefly.
“Ok –“ she said. “Look, can we just – talk practically for a minute? I haven’t eaten for about three days and last time I looked I was dying of thirst. I’m kind of struggling with these epic concepts right now?”
The unicorn stepped towards Lilian, lay down on the forest floor and put it’s head on her knee. She couldn’t help but marvel at it’s glittering mane and strange colourful yet colourless brightness.
“You could have asked for help much sooner,” said the Unicorn.
“But there wasn’t any help,” Lilian said.
“Oh, but there was,” the unicorn corrected. “There is always help, you only have to ask.”
Suddenly Lilian became aware of what was happening.
“Wait!” she exclaimed. “You’re a unicorn. Quinn was sent to kill you! Lucerna said you were evil, which is crazy, and sent… sent…how come I found you then? What –“
The unicorn hushed Lilian.
“Calm down, child,” it said kindly. “You require water. I have kept you alive for this time, but nothing can really substitute for water itself. I will guide you to the river. It is not far.”
It’s like??
?a horse made of light, Lilian thought, noticing the silver horn between its ears, glowing softly with iridescent gold; like a seashell worked into a wand of spirals.
The creature paced away through the trees and Lilian followed, the sound of the water becoming clearer; until she could see it: the moon reflected in the hurrying ripples, turning the river into a wave of fluid platinum.
***
Quinn had to simultaneously figure out what had just happened, swim, and cough up the water he’d already choked on. He had a momentary understanding of what multitasking was like.
Swimming took precedence then, and Quinn struggled to anchor to something while staying afloat. The riverbed shelved away so he could not tell how deep it was. The river also widened at this point; he snatched to get to the muddy bank but the swift current hauled him away every time. The cold burned inward, and embodied the fear that overwhelmed him as the ruthless roaring of the river numbed his senses.
How long passed as he was funnelled along the racing water he didn’t know. He noticed when a clearing opened up overhead and the blank greyish light of dawn lit up the rushing blackness around him; he had time to worry about the very real possibility of meeting a dam, a log, a waterfall, rapids, rocks or some kind of hideous prehistoric animal that would devour him in small pieces. The clearing swept by and the river bulged downwards into the densest green forest he had ever seen.
He had never before appreciated how impossible clothes made swimming. They ballooned irritatingly, sponged up incredible amounts of water, and snagged as dead weights on every limb.
Then quite unexpectedly the river narrowed; a sharp bend threw Quinn into a calm patch and without a moment’s hesitation he grabbed on to the first available object that didn’t move and tried to pull himself out of the water.
Except the embankment was high and steep, and very very slippery. His boots were gone, he realized. He slithered back into the river several times and, exhausted, found himself being pulled inexorably back to the main stream…
Desperately he fought to cling to a tussock of mossy mud, held on for all he was worth, and summoned the energy to scramble on to the bank. If it didn’t work this time, he was going to freeze to death, he was sure. Or drown in this murky side curve of the river –
“Hey! Here!” A voice called out above him.
He looked up and a hand reached out. He had no choice but to grab it, though he had no idea who it might be. A powerful strength eased him over the edge of the riverbank and he collapsed on the ground, coughing.
When he could see straight, he was sure he was dreaming.
A girl with an anxious but curiously radiant face was in front of him, and standing a few paces behind her was what could only be a unicorn.
Chapter 5
Lucerna was praying.
She was really praying. Because she was afraid.
“Great Deus, fear not…I have sent the boy to slay the evil unicorn. He will bring us it’s horn and I shall offer it to you, with him, to show you how devoted I am…Please spare me great Deus, for I have done only what had to be done…forgive me for my actions, if they were wrongful…”
The eye stared at her, empty and painterly. But it seemed slightly mocking, or slightly…ominous. The Hall was occupied by Lucerna alone, and the stone walls crowded in with a suffocating watchfulness. The blood was still on the floor where the woman had been killed. The rusty smears seemed to draw Lucerna’s gaze, and she couldn’t face the decision of whether to have them cleaned off or not.
To be true she was frightened to order anything anymore, in case it was wrong.
The miraculous thing was she had kept up her appearance of powerful self-confidence in spite of her terror; the weekly gatherings in the Hall and the meetings with people for advice had continued as though she was entirely untroubled. The acting came effortlessly. She supposed she was pleased that her latest plan had worked: they all seemed to have got over the initial shock of seeing someone get killed for lack of devotion, right in front of them, and apparently considered it entirely reasonable in this particular context.
Now that she was by herself though – whenever she was by herself, in fact – the malevolence sank into her again, like a toxic chemical absorbed by her skin. She felt as though she was being sickened from the inside. And so earnest she was to reassure herself that everything was okay, she had turned to the only thing that could justify it – the system of belief that she had invented and which had decreed all of this in the first place.
Lucerna was now so deep in denial that she couldn’t let herself betray the belief for a moment, in case she might suspect for a moment that she had made a huge, horrible, irreversible mistake. She got to her feet and left the Hall, the stony silence a massively loud whisper in her ears.
***
Lilian thought she knew who she had just pulled out of the river, but she couldn’t be sure because he was covered in some rather reprehensible mud.
The unicorn didn’t seem to have any trouble recognizing him though.
“Hello, Quinn,” it said, as though they were old friends.
Quinn froze, or as much as you can freeze while shivering uncontrollably.
“E-excuse me?” he stuttered.
The unicorn stepped forward, and placed its horn on Quinn’s shoulder. The mud and water melted away, slid off on to the ground. The unicorn stepped back, leaving Quinn warm, dry, and thoroughly perplexed.
“What the heck is going on?” he asked bluntly.
There was a pause, and Lilian figured it was her turn to say something awkward.
“Um, this is the unicorn, Quinn. How did you wind up in the river?”
Quinn felt extremely stupid. He wondered whether to make up some dramatic story to cover his idiocy, and decided that would make him seem even stupider. After all, for all he knew, this unicorn he was in denial about had known where he was and what he was doing all along.
“I – I accidentally fell in the river when it was dark, because there were all these – all these…butterflies. And they were driving me to distraction. By all means laugh. I’m sure I’ve got concussion and I’m seeing things, I can’t help it okay?”
Lilian didn’t laugh.
“Butterflies?” she said.
“Well – yes,” Quinn replied defensively.
The unicorn apparently decided this pathetically human conversation was going nowhere and interrupted.
“Lilian tells me of a woman called Lucerna. Do you know this person?”
Quinn looked suspicious.
“Yes,” he said hesitantly. “Why?”
The unicorn tossed its head.
“She is attempting to kill you.”
“Me?” Quinn frowned. “No, no, you have got it all wrong mate. I’m supposed to kill you. That’s what she told me. Obviously I’m not going to because she is a raving lunatic and I –“
“Quinn, Quinn,” the unicorn snorted, like a horse-laugh. “Trying to kill a unicorn would be similar to trying to kill light itself. I would not rule it out – anything is possible – but I would consider it a highly unlikely possibility. If that is what you are here for, I wish you luck in your endeavour, but must warn you to prepare for utter dismal failure.”
Quinn looked rather abashed.
“Don’t blame me. Blame that crazy priestess woman. She sent me out here to find a unicorn, kill it, and bring back it’s horn to give to her bank accou – I mean, to this deity thing she –“
“- made up,” Lilian finished.
“Yes,” Quinn concluded with mild exasperation. “It was all going swimmingly until I was robbed of my horse and taken prisoner by a bunch of wretched butterflies. Now what am I supposed to do? Where am I? Is this real, even?”
Lilian laughed then. Quinn scowled at her.
“What are you doing here anyway?” he asked.
“I ran away because Lucerna threatened to kill me, too. She offered up somebody as some kind of weird sacrifice before I left, just
because they couldn’t afford to pay anymore. She’s gone mad, if she wasn’t already. And I escaped and sort of thought if I saw you then I would warn you that she intends to kill you whatever the outcome of this quest thing she sent you on. I read the paper on her desk and that’s what it said. She found out I’d read it and that’s why she said she’d kill me.”
“Oh,” said Quinn. “Right. So what happens next?”
“Humans forget,” said the unicorn, “that there is no one way. There are ten thousand ways to the one way, and none of them have anything to do with books or rewards or punishments. There is no wrong and right. There are only balances that must be maintained. I myself am simply a balance of real and imaginary. What happens next is decided by you, and whatever balance you wish to maintain.”
Quinn looked uncertain.
“Why ten thousand? What do you mean?”
The unicorn looked at Quinn sideways for a few moments, then answered, “ten thousand is a big number. Like most things, it is a metaphor. You will understand the rest later.”
“I hate it when people say that kind of thing,” Quinn said to himself.
Lilian laughed again. “A unicorn said it, not a person,” she corrected.
The unicorn cut in sharply.
“Humans are not the only people in the world, Lilian.”
Lilian’s smile faded. “Oh,” she said thoughtfully. “You mean, animals can be called people as well? I suppose, if they can talk…” She thought of all the possible reasons why she had been given the impression that the word ‘people’ only applied to humans. Had anybody actually defined it? Perhaps they hadn’t.
Quinn objected.
“People are people, humans are people. How can a bunch of, I dunno, rats – count as people? Is that what you’re saying?”
The unicorn refrained from a sigh that might have been almost disparaging.
“You are both being somewhat close minded. The natural way of things is a sort of well-balanced mess, if you hadn’t noticed. Neat, organized, categorized and unvaried things nearly always go against what is natural. Thankfully, such things rarely last long. It is worth stopping them before they turn into wildfire, however.”
Lilian had always thought she was reasonably open minded, and felt a little disappointed in herself.