Divine Deception: The Will Traveller Chronicals (21 page)

Though it was
largely unexplored, those who managed to get back alive from
exploratory expeditions reported a variety of large carnivorous
animals. They also reported small some communities of primitive
peoples, who, according to that dubious history, ‘were savages who
seem to be the least developed on the planet and attacked on sight,
without any provocation’. Given the pathological dishonesty of the
Supreme House, I doubted that was what we would find. As soon as we
came across some open ground, after some twenty, uneventful
kilometres of flying due North from the safety band, I asked the
Captain to land. I wanted to feel this place out, one of those
things you can’t do from inside a hermetically sealed craft.

We came gently to
rest in a clearing that would comfortably house four football
fields. I took two rather nervous guardsmen with me and alighted
from the T.T.V. With my fearful guards, their weapons at the ready,
I walked towards the nearest edge of the clearing, perhaps two
hundred metres away. We heard a low growl, actually more like a
snort, and both young men went into instant combat mode, their
death-dealing weapons pointed at where the noise had come from. I
telepathically ‘heard’ a pre-teen girl’s voice.

“Mother, look,
they’re over here” Then, a two and a half, maybe three metre tall
grizzly bear came crashing out of the semi tropical forest and
reared up on its back legs.

“Hold your fire
lads” I told the two guardsmen.

“Junior, you just
wait for me you hear?” I ‘heard’ a typical concerned mother’s voice
urge, as the huge but, obviously young bear started towards us. I
focused on his plate sized brown eyes.

“Hadn’t you best
wait for your Mother young man?” I telepathed. The young bear
froze, ears back, eyes even wider.

“Who said that?”
He asked silently, too afraid even to look around.

“Me, standing over
here dressed in red” I replied telepathically.

“But you’re a
human aren’t you?” The huge young bear asked.

“Yes, I am” I
replied telepathically.

“But we can’t talk
to humans, we just scare them away” The huge creature looked at me
“Why aren’t you afraid?” He asked, the fearsome young giant was a
touch disappointed.

“Should I be?” I
asked “Are you going to eat us?’ I asked him.

“Oh, yuck, ugh”
The young bear was nauseated at the thought “You don’t know much
about bears do you?” He asked me, adding “All we eat is fresh
vegetables and fruit” The young giant corrected me. Just then mum
arrived and, faced with the largest living thing any of us had
seen, the guards took off for the T.T.V.

“Lord Robert!”
They yelled “We have to go, please come away”. They, of course,
knew nothing of my conversation with junior. However, even after
the giant beasts which I’d encountered in Carabindy, she was still
terrifyingly huge. At least as tall as those ten metre elephants
when she was still on all fours legs!

When the mother
bear stood human-like, she was absolutely the largest living thing
I could imagine, and the most terrifying. Her paws were the size of
a bulldozer’s scoop. She stared at me.

“Junior, stay
back, this one can hurt you real bad” She told him, ready to defend
him.

“How do you know
that Mother bear?” I asked telepathically, intrigued by the almost
human look of surprise on her face.

“Could that be you
speaking to me?” The fur covered giant queried, looking down at
me.

“Yes Mother, to me
too, he can speak to bears” Junior confirmed.

“How can this be?”
The massive but gentle mother bear asked me, drawing her son, who
was much younger than I’d first thought, to her. I was able to
explain with remarkable ease, especially as she knew nothing of the
Divine House or the New World.

Of course, that I
was able to tell part of my story standing right opposite her
gigantic and expressive face, ten metres off the ground! And that I
occasionally punctuated my words with explosive balls of energy,
which I drew from this powerful land itself, did provide some
additional credibility to my words. This was an articulate and
intelligent being, not a human perhaps, but not a carnivorous
animal, that’s for sure. She felt humans were ‘gross’ because we
eat me flesh!

“How did you know
that I could hurt junior?” I asked the enormous Mother bear.

“You do not know?
Truly?” She found that truth hard to believe.

“For decades,
ships like yours have come here, led by men in dress exactly like
you, to hunt us like wild animals” She told me.

“But surely not in
red like myself?” I protested, hoping not to hear what I did.

“Oh yes, more
often than not, in red. And only the ones like you can kill us” She
added. The jungle was, in fact, teaming with wild animals, but,
with the exception of ‘small dogs that eat rodents and the like’,
there were no carnivorous beasts among them.

“There used to be
humans living here abouts” The bear telepathed “In fact, this
clearing was one of theirs, but your ships came and cleared them
out years ago” She told me.

“They killed
them?” I asked, fully expecting the worst.

“No, only those
who resisted” She answered “They took all the girls and young
women, burned the place down and told the rest to go North or they
would be killed” She added.

“How far to their
nearest village now?” I asked the Mother bear.

“Not too sure
now-a-days” The gentle giant answered, adding “Small groups come to
dig and take away rocks, we usually scare them off, we know what
will happen if we don’t” She told me.

“How many of your
kind are there up here?” I asked the gigantic Mother bear.

“Some say two,
three hundred thousand, I don’t know really” She replied. Having
thanked her and her still awe-struck son, I floated from the two
giant grizzlies back over to our T.T.V. and the waiting equally
awe-struck crew and guardsmen.

Commanders
Richards and Davis, who had been strongly against us going out in
the first place, were in a total state of shock. They had more
shocks to come. Keeping below a hundred kilometres an hour, we
moved further inland and despite our infra red heat seekers
confirming the thick jungle below was teeming with sizable
wildlife, our searching eyes saw nothing. We did pass three very
large cleared areas, one even had obvious signs that it had once
been a human habitat, but not any longer. It wasn’t until just on
an hour, when the jungle had gradually given way to more
forest-like vegetation, that we finally saw small herds of deer,
though the animals themselves were extremely large.

Now able to see
what our heat seekers had seen, we saw family groups of very large
cats, huge bears and packs of dogs. Compared to my super large lady
bear, they may have seemed small, but in fact, they were the size
of a small horse! It seemed safe to assume that the occasional
hordes of monstrous rat-like creatures we passed over were the
‘rodents’ the bear had mentioned. As the ground started to rise and
the shrubbery beneath the trees became lush bright green grass, we
saw our first evidence of the proximity of human beings.

“That is not the
work of savages” Zoran stated matter-of-factly, as the crew,
Commanders Davis and Richards, Zoran and I looked down on a whole
hillside that was being systematically harvested.

There was still a
third of the hill covered with obviously planted rows of various
aged trees. This was a carefully managed, sustainable timber
plantation. Despite the sophistication of the harvesting, there
were only pathways around and through it, nothing wide enough for
any kind of large trunks. Commander Davis looked decidedly
uncomfortable.

“This has nothing
to do with the New World, Lord Robert, I think we should go back”
He told me anxiously.

“Aren’t you
interested in finding workers” I asked, surprised by his sudden
change of heart.

“These people are
obviously skilled to some degree” Zoran pointed out “That’s
unlikely to be fire wood they’re harvesting” He added chuckling,
enjoying the Sentorians’ discomfort I indicated to the Captain to
proceed.

“Take it really
slow and stay as low as you can safely fly o.k.?” I instructed. We
moved over the plantation and saw several more ahead and on both
sides, but still no roads, only dirt tracks, which gradually
converged on a larger hill across a deep valley. Now over two
hundred kilometres inland from Sentoria, we slowly rose up the side
of the steep, naturally vegetated largest hill. The tracks came
together halfway up and, for a hundred metres or so, there was a
three metre wide, flat surfaced roadway. Then it went into a huge
natural cave. With still no sign of life and unwilling to go into
the cave, which would have been a very close fit anyway, we moved
on up the much steeper hillside.

When we crested it
and saw what lay before us down below, we were all struck
absolutely dumb, no one said a word. Down in the well protected
valley, surrounded by cultivated fields, was a city! But not one
with tall buildings, streets and that sort of thing. This looked
more like an ancient Inca style civilisation, with a kilometre
square centre, built of huge sandstone blocks, with stepped sides
all the way to the top. Each farm in the valley had its own
house-sized sandstone block dwelling, and they were all laid out
symmetrically on a circular network of paved pathways that
connected all of them to the city centre. Still there was not a
soul in sight, so I instructed the Captain to land in a clearing,
high on the southern side of the crater-like valley.

Zoran, Commander
Richards, four of my guardsmen and I ventured out onto the grassy
hillside. I motioned to stay quiet as we moved toward the nearest
dwelling. The solid door was unlocked and, as no-one answered my
knock, I entered, motioning for two of the guardsmen to stay
outside and keep their eyes open. Though clean and tidy, the place
had definitely been lived in. Illuminated by cleverly designed
skylights, the large main room had animal skin covered chairs, a
large dining table and led to a small kitchen. All was as if one
minute they were there, then, suddenly, they weren’t. Just as I was
beginning to fear the worst, we all distinctly heard a child cough,
then again. It came from below us! The floor was carpeted with a
finely woven thatch.

I scanned it for
signs of a trap door, while Commander Richards grinned, as he
pulled his elaborate hand gun from its holster. He

switched on the
heat seeker sighting, pointing it around the floor. And there they
were! Four of them, huddled together in a cellar accessed from the
alcove, between the main room and the kitchen. Richards holstered
his gun and pulled open the hatch.

“You are honoured
to have Lord Robert of the Divine House of Red in your home”
Intoned Zoran, then added more warmly “We are not here to harm you,
please come out of there and be not fearful”. The Father, a well
built Indian around forty, led the way up, his wife, an attractive
woman around thirty, followed, then their teenage daughter and
small son. Despite Zoran’s words, they were all absolutely
terrified.

“You are safe
believe me” I assured the four, still silent, tightly grouped
family “We are here to explore your world, not harm it” I told them
gently. The man, dressed in a woven work shirt and pants, looked at
me defiantly.

“Why do you need
to do that?” His deep voice was sullen and resentful “Haven’t you
taken enough from us?”.

“I have never been
here before” I told him “Of whom do you speak?” I asked him

“Why do you lie?
To deceive your companions?” The man growled at me, then put his
arms around his family, as if to protect them from retaliation. I
sensed the truth of what he said.

“I do not doubt
your word good Sir” I told him sincerely.

“But I have no
recall of ever visiting this place before. Perhaps you can
enlighten me?” I asked him politely.

“I thought the old
man said you were Lord Robert?’ He queried, looking confused.

“I am Lord Robert”
I confirmed for him.

“The older brother
of Lord Elton and Lord Edmond?” He pressed.

“Yes, but I’ve no
memory of being here” I answered truthfully.

“Perhaps you’ve
raided so many of our cities you’ve just forgotten this one” His
scorn grew with his confidence. I held up my hand to silence
Zoran’s intended rebuke.

“It is easy to
feel your anger at my family” I told the man “I would know of what
harm we have done you, so that I can make restitutions” I said
solemnly.

“Restitution!” The
man exploded “They say you are a God, so can you give back the
lives of those you’ve killed, return the lives of those you’ve
enslaved?” He asked angrily. I shook my head sadly.

“Perhaps you had
better take me to your leaders” I suggested.

“That I will never
do” The man stood tall, eyes ablaze with defiance. “Kill me, and my
son, take them” He motioned to his wife and daughter “And do the
same to every home in Karak, but none of us will ever let you into
the city” He told me defiantly.

“Then perhaps one
of your leaders could come out of the city to speak with me” I
offered gently “For I have no desire to kill or capture any of you
good people” I assured him.

The big dark man
stared at me silently, clearly unbelieving.

“Though I will do
you no harm, perhaps if you realise I could enter your city at
will, you may more rationally consider my request” I suggested,
then ushered the four of them outside. As they stood surrounded by
Richards, Davis and the four guardsmen, I drew a ball of heat from
the energy rich ground and flung it across the top of the low lying
city into an open space, like the one we had just landed in. The
explosion shook the whole valley and, as the reverberation faded,
we saw two brilliantly polished mirrored discs rise up out of the
top of the main city structure.