Brave Story - Miyuki Miyabe [56]
“Th…thank you,” Wataru said again. His throat felt suddenly dry, and his voice sounded hoarse. It’s a bird! A talking bird!
“Ah, it was nothing. But, do answer me one thing. This area belongs to us—the karulah. We don’t take kindly to other tribes in our…” Suddenly the bird started in delayed surprise. “Why, you’re a man-child!”
“Yes…yes I am,” Wataru responded, raising an eyebrow. Were humans a rare thing in this strange place?
“And just what is a man-child doing here? How did you get here?” the bird asked excitedly, beating its wings against the rock, forcing Wataru to hold up his hands to shield his eyes against the whipping sand.
“W-wait! Hold on and I’ll tell you! Stop flapping!”
“Oh, right,” the bird muttered and folded its wings up again. Wataru took a deep breath, and somehow managed to regain his composure. He could feel his heart pounding in his chest. “I came through a gate high up in the sky and fell down here,” he said. “That’s really all I know.”
Slowly the bird turned its large eyes up to the blue sky. “I see,” it said at last. “So the Porta Nectere is open…”
“The Porta…Nectere?”
The creature nodded. “Aye. ’Tis the doorway between the Over Here and the Over There—a huge gate, so high its top is hidden in the clouds. None in my tribe has ever seen the top, and because no one in either the Over Here or the Over There has wings stronger than the karulah, that means no one has seen it.” The bird thrust out its breast as it spoke. Its long feathers fluttered in the wind. “The Porta Nectere opens only for ninety days every ten years, as such things are counted Over There. I suppose this means that the ninety days have started. I had completely forgotten about it.”
Wataru could only gape.
“And so you came through the doorway, stumbling from the Over There into the Over Here, and fell smack down into a pack of gimblewolves,” the creature concluded thoughtfully. “I see, I see.”
What the creature referred to as the “Over Here” must be where he was now, Wataru figured, while the “Over There” was where Wataru normally lived, the real world. But something didn’t fit. The gate that Wataru had come through was certainly impressively large, but nothing like what the bird had just described. Wataru wondered out loud about this, and the bird haughtily replied, “Well, of course. The true scale of the Porta Nectere is visible only from this side.”
“I see,” Wataru lied. At least his heart wasn’t racing quite so furiously anymore. He plopped down on the rock and took a closer look at his sur-roundings. He could see clearly in all directions, which wasn’t saying much. No matter which way he turned, all he could see was desert. Here and there, vague lines interrupted the sand dunes—likely other rocky outcroppings like the one where they sat. One horizon was a dim yellow line that shimmered like a mirage. A sandstorm, maybe?
“Well, you look a bit flustered,” the scarlet bird said, ruffling its wings in what was apparently a laugh, “but that’s to be expected, I suppose. You didn’t have any idea all of this was here, did you? First time I’ve ever picked up a stray. I have heard of other young man-children mistakenly falling through the door, though, so take comfort! You’re not the first. Aye, you may be a bit on the dull side, but at least you’re in good company.”
Wataru decided to take that as a compliment. The creature had saved his life, after all, and he did seem to be a generally decent person—or rather, bird.
“So, um…where is this place?” Wataru asked. “Doesn’t Over Here have a name?”
“Vision,” the scarlet bird replied.
“Vision?”
Wataru remembered a spell in Saga II called “Vision Strike.” It was a spell usable only by powerful wizards that confused their enemies with magical visions that led them to attack each other.
A vision. An illusion.
“So this whole place is just make-believe?”
“I suppose it must seem that way to a man-child.”
“So right