(This is only the second draft of the book Worthless. Expect typos, plot holes, odd subplots and the occassionally wrongly named character, especially minor characters. It is made public only to give people a rough idea of how the final story will look)

Chapter 52

It was not the same.
Any time machine can be different. Any method of time travel can feel like nothing else. The pain, the disorientation, the problems on arrival, all can vary from  device to device. But this felt unique. This felt like nothing that anyone at The Embassy had ever described.
The Devil fingers were not like the ones at The Embassy. They looked the part, as long as the machine, or whatever it should be called, was dormant. It likely had been for centuries. But when it activated, rather than disassembled pieces spinning out to form a sphere that kept the tremendous energies inside, these fingers turned to a mist. The inside was like a thunderstorm, everything pulling in every direction, all at once. Lightning flying in small bursts, setting errant fabric ablaze. Everything about the device screamed experimental, a rushed construction by some desperate faction long ago. And yet, for all its flaws, it worked.
For a brief moment, the round room disappeared, subplanted by blackened earth and a grey sky. Black dust covered every bit of land as far as could be seen, and small towers, most still only the hasty constructions erected by someone in a rush to claim land, dotted the land. Heavy beasts pulled unusual plows through the black dust, swirling it up and into collecting bags. Men, skin and clothes blackened dirty by the dust, swung whips above the heads of the beasts.
But as quickly as it came, the sight vanished. Back was the throne room, Kehu still standing by the distant wall, collecting bits of the dust that was now left.
"Did it..."
The device left no more time for talk than that. Everything dissolved again, and the floating feeling returned. A boom signaled the arrival to another place, this one nothing like the lands inside the wall. In fact, in the distance, a large wall could be seen, looking new, stone still shiny and smooth, as far as one could tell. But as before, the view was snatched away abruptly. The throne room was back, but only briefly. There was no time to even call out.
The third arrival felt... real. The pain was familiar, everything came in topsy turvy. Then, like a skipping vinyl record, it stopped, and happened again. Again and again, the same arrival, everything flickering as the time travel failed to hold. Until finally, it did.
The forest floor was a rough landing, but it was a clearing, free of too much undergrowth. A few prickly thorns from tiny vines and the painful bumps on dry branches hurt, but nothing entangled any body part. And most of all, it was still. The quiet of a thriving forest, only birds and animal chatter to be heard. No beasts of burden, no sound of people. Forest life, and nothing else. It made it feel far more warranted to lie flat, waiting for more than a minute to see if the time travel would falter again, if the pull back to the cavern throne room was too strong. It held.
The land did, in its own weird way, seem familiar. The lay of it, the way it curved and bent, the way hills rolled. The babbling of a brook nearby was a new experience, but much of it seemed oddly familiar.
Turning around to spot the cave not far away sealed the deal. This was the same place, the land of black dust. Only the dust was not there, yet. The past. The past of a distant past, to be precise. There was no way to know the year, but if Hathark had been speaking the truth and Kehu's version of their history was to be believed, that would mean about seven hundred years back, perhaps even more.
With that in mind, it all seemed remarkably modern. A forest, its trees, plants and animals. The sky, a brilliant blue. From immediate looks, it could be simply off the beaten path anywhere back home.
The brook that made its natural sound actually did run into the cave, as the dried out riverbed had, in the future of the place. A small stream, its water no doubt absorbed by layers of earthen soil on its way down the cave. It beckoned, the cave. Beckoned to be explored, to see if the time machine was still there. Or perhaps better put, if it was already there. It would be new, perhaps in a much better condition. It might even be manned.
Without torches, though, it would be suicide, and in any case, there was no time for minor exploits and side-quests. The sun was at late morning, if the bearings from back in the land of black dust was still anything to go by. And considering there were likely no walls yet, it would be a game of chance to even find signs of civilization. Centuries in the future, this forest would be cleared and the biggest wild animal would be closer to a rabbit than a wolf, but this was wild forest. Even in the day, there could be risks. At night, all bets would be off.
The clearing was larger than it first had seemed. The wild grass did cover it well, but crossing it away from the cave was a fair walk, perhaps half an hour's worth. It eventually opened onto a meadow, nothing but grass and flowers to be seen. The open space showed how much the hills did indeed roll, and that in turn gave a good look of the land.
Farther away from the clearing, the grass became abruptly low. Broken strands and trampled patches, grazing grounds for animals. Settlements. People. Civilization. But nothing immediately to be seen. No farmhouse, no town, no fields. It brought forth images of nomadic peoples, grazing their livestock through an area and moving on before depleting the land entirely. Others could be waiting to come in and continue, making use of the grass that grew from there and all the way to the forest clearing. This was a common practice in older cultures, the use of a place with respect for others who might use the same. In old times, it had helped different tribes coexist, even mingle and share their cultures, their resources, and their bloodlines.
It was a nice thought. But it clearly was not the case.
At first, they seemed like patches of bad grass. The dull brown mixed in seamlessly with the green, and with the sand and gravel that lay strewn in places. The hills did theirs to trick the eyes, the angle of the patches atop other hills making it hard to see them clearly. Between the hills, there were none of them. It made sense, in retrospect. After all, who would build a home between the hills, rather than atop them?
Up closer, standing only a hill away, it became all too clear what they were. Small stumps stood up, broken and charred, slanting as if hit by something massive. Smoldering debris and ashes still hot were scattered by winds, carrying some of the heat to patches of grass dry enough to have since flared up. They now looked like dark spots on a landscape painting.
Standing in the rubble, with the sun crossing midday, the carnage became all too clearly written in the scorched remains of the small hamlet. Eight houses, only two of any real size, had stood there. Now, there was next to nothing left. Even the dirt beneath where wooden floors had been was scorched black, looking almost like the black dust back in Hathark's caverns. The destruction was, in its own terrible way, impressive. Stumps. People had lived here, grazed animals and raised children, likely. They could have inhabited the hamlet for years, decades or more. And now, there were only stumps. Stumps and ash.
But among the ash, there were footprints. Heavy marks, people carrying heavy loads. Hard shoes, though, not the average boot that a farmer would wear. Military, perhaps. They formed a labyrinthian chaos, going in and out of buildings that no longer stood there, chasing things around open grounds as ash still fell.
They also left in the same direction that they came, all of them together.

It only took perhaps an hour or so to begin to catch up with the owners of said footprints. The first sights were not soldiers, or even distant screams or crumbling houses, though. It was smoke. Thick pillars of smoke on the horizon, long before anything else was truly visible. Another hamlet, already up in flames.
The screams did come, closer up. From a few hills away, the chaos of people chasing people, people desperately fighting people, and an all around mess, was horrifically visible! Houses were ablaze, straw roof engulfed in flames while fire took a slow hold of wooden beams and planks. Black figures on the ground where they had fallen as fire caught their simple clothes. There was no way to intervene, nothing to be done to save anyone. The distance alone would make any attempt redundant. Several minutes later, standing on another, closer, hilltop, there was nothing to do but witness the fires begin to die out as houses collapsed entirely. Men, not in military uniforms but definitely wearing something that signified who they were, moved on with people walking with them, tied to long wooden poles that were dragged behind horses. Prisoners. Perhaps hostages.
They were all gone by the time it was possible to reach the area. It was a slightly bigger hamlet than the other, only a few houses more, but bigger ones. Piles of broken wood still burned, the hot air making one's eyes water, and the smell more than enough to upset a weaker stomach. There were no weapons in the ashes, nothing metal even dragged out of a house. Perhaps there were farming tools inside the burning piles, but from outside, there was no way to tell. There were no tears, nobody crying, nobody screaming. No one was mourning the dead. Because the dead were all that was left.
Which made it that much more of a surprise to feel a hard hit in the back of the head!

Movies love the idea of being knocked out. A quick dunk in the braincase, and someone goes limp for minutes at a time. The real world works differently. Between the hit from behind and the hands grabbing and tying up every limb, there were only seconds. It was a blur, though, the hit making any reaction impossible, any defense impossible. A flash ambush, over before it was even fully understood.
On the positive side, it made it impossible for them to use the poles. It still hurt, being thrown heavy-handedly into a rolling cage about the size of a large suitcase. But even then, it allowed for a moment to rest, a moment to gather thoughts and regain all mental faculties.
Someone in a cage nearby said something, perhaps trying to start a conversation. One of the men in matching clothes put a stop to it, slamming a wooden club against the other person's cage, but it would have mattered very little either way. The language, like so often, was nonsensical, something local, something not taught at The Embassy, not even for basic recognition.
And even if that hadn't been the case, the pain was back. It had been there, dull and dormant, ever since arriving, but the added ache of the hit made it flare up again. Time was breaking, stretched across perhaps ten millenia now. It tucked at every atom, wanted to snap back. But it never did. Not yet.
The sun was low by the time the small caravan came to the encampment. The materials were local, mainly wood and stone, but the design had a strange feel to it. Careful slants made the walls look more robust than a castle or fort built with the same materials, walls curving outward in precisely spaced waves of stone, an increased defensive strength that an attacker would be wholy unable to spot at a distance. Metal fixtures that looked taken out of some dark fantasy artist's mind lined the walls, like teeth that had already dug into the stone. And still, the inside looked like any busy castle courtyard, people walking and pulling horses or other animals around, the ground covered in mud and hay.
One of the men in the matching clothes began talking. At first, he seemed just desperate to strike up a conversation, but as he continued, he was clearly cycling through multiple languages, trying to find one that hit the spot. None did. They were all gibberish, native to times and places that could only be guessed at. But then, something got through. Latin. The man instantly noted the recognition, repeating the phrase several times. A few thoughts passed by inside his head, judging from his eyes, and the next thing he said was in clumsy French. Who are you? Who sent you? But before there was a chance to answer, another voice cut in.
"No, not French," said the voice in a flowing English. "Twentieth century, right? Perhaps twenty-first?"
A woman stepped out from amongst the men, holding a clipboard that, although clearly homemade and rather primitive, looked completely beyond this age.
"Asian features, but you don't seem Asian to me," she added, leaning in ever so slightly. "Immigrant. Western. I would guess American, but that almost seems too easy. Right, little girl?"
Everyone was oddly quiet around her. She had power. They feared her. And as the final pieces fell into place, that made far too much sense!
"You...."
There was a shift in her eyes as she reacted to the hissed word. It had been hard to tell at first, with her leather and string outfit. Mostly because it wasn't white.
"See, Valinse, she knows the language," she chirped, clearly proud of herself. "And from that seething anger, I think she knows me, as well!"
It was her. It had to be. The woman in white. But something was not matching up.
"so tell us, little girl, where are you from?" she asked, still smiling, knowing that the cage protected her. The man said something to her, making her briefly turn her head, and when she turned it back, she was clearly thinking behind the smug grin on her face. Turning slightly, yet not looking away, she called out loudly to someone, and somewhere, a voice called back.
"Because, Valinse," she said, sounding as arrogant as always, "she has never seen one of these."
Even before the last word had left her lips, a shadow passed overhead, and a roar of unbelievably power shook the air! With a crushing sound, heavy feet landed on a raised perch in the open courtyard, talons gripping the stone so hard it cracked beneath them. Scales slid between one another as the serpentine body came to a rest, folding massive wings tightly onto its body. Then, it roared again.
"A dragon?"
"Yes, little girl, a dragon. And if you do not give us some useful answers, you will be seeing it up close. Very close."
Even the people in the courtyard, both the men with matching clothes and the rest, were moving slower, avoiding the perched dragon to the best of their abilities. As if to emphasize what it was, the dragon blew small puffs of flame from between long, sharp teeth. Never enough to do much damage, but enough to intimidate.
"I will feed you to it," she explained, giving the beast a quick glance.
"Oh, I got the clever hint."
She frowned, just for a moment, at the remark. Then she stood straight again.
"Who are you, little girl?" she asked, completely casually. Her face left no doubt, this was the woman in white. Except not in white. And apparently, with a few bits of memory missing. "You clearly don't belong with this ragtag bunch."
She nodded at the jumpsuit, which was showing beneath the more locally appropriate clothes from back in Kehu's time. And she had a point. The rest of the rounded up looked like peasant folk, simple clothes and skin rough from physical work. And yet, they did not look like the historical peasants from any age that came to mind. There was a crude ingenuity to their clothes, clever little details like crafty pockets and practical patches and string. It was the peasant look, but updated by a far more modern mindset.
"California, 2005. Your people destroyed my colony."
She made no sign of doubting any of the lie. It fit her expectations. That, or she let none of her doubt show.
"You're a long way from 2005, little one," she said in what could best be described as a grimly concerned voice. She had to be a great deal younger than any other version of her. The woman in white before she became the woman in white. She looked pretty much the same, her face and figure, but only physically. There was something missing, something in her eyes and in the way she moved. She seemed as disciplined as ever, but in a practical way, not the strict, rigid way she was known for. Brutality. For all the carnage and destruction she had evidently caused here, perhaps having her pet dragon burn down entire villages, she lacked the aura of brutality.
"I thought it was safe here. I have nothing else left."
With a satisfied smile forming on her lips, she gave a gentle nod of approval, then took a step back. She seemed about to leave, but her eyes stayed fixed.
"None of you have anything left," she said in a voice far too soft to match her words. "It's over, I hope you understand that. Your rebellion is done. A  century from now, and there will be nothing left to show that you were even here. History will be locked down."
The men around her moved aside respectfully, or perhaps just fearfully, as she turned and started to walk away. She said something in the gibberish language to the men, loudly, as if giving a collective order, and several of the other captives began to struggle against their ropes and chains. Something bad seemed about to happen, but it was impossible to tell exactly what. As the men began to pull them into a building one by one, many began to struggle, while others fell to their knees, begging for mercy in their foreign languages. They were ignored.
Even without restraints, the wooden cage was limiting. It was too low to stand up in, and barely large enough to sit in right. On the trip to the encampment, one of the men had reached in, at first looking like he just wanted to grope or maybe do something hurtful for his own entertainment. He had been going for the hands, however, which were now tied with rope. It was a good, strong knot on rope that was a little too wellmade to match most of the surroundings, adding to the feel of some updated medieval theme. What he had not done was tie either hand in place. Through some hidden fumbling and wringing, the horseman's trinket dropped out of the jumpsuit pocket, and plonked onto the dirty cage floor.
Even just holding the trinket was painful, once the thick leather wrapping came off. It felt as if it had a glow around it, a scorching sphere that dug into the skin like long surgical needles. A penetrating pain, like as an atom here and an atom there was forced out of this time and back, back through Kehu's age, back through the Wenwey hubs, back through the pirate fort by the coast and the Prussian town built as an Embassy office. Back to Nakskov. But only individual atoms. If the trinket and its strings of black dust were surrunded by atoms from another time, it would trigger a chain reaction, one atom blowing the next back to its own time. The stick that held the strings was long enough to not make that happen. A single stick, no longer than a hand from wrist to fingertip, was all that stood between anyone holding it and the forces of time.
And then, the men came. A handful of others had been taken into the nondescript building, crying, kicking, screaming. There were still plenty left, but somehow, someone had decided to now empty the cages. There were five in total, five cages with a captive in each. They came for all five at the same time, two men for each. They were rough. It felt like being handled like cattle, or even worse. Dragged out by the feet, thrown on the ground. The leather wrapping held over the trinket kept it from pressing against the jumpsuit, but it had to be held tight, even if it hurt. It had to be held tight, or they would find it.
The first man screamed when the trinket touched his bare skin. It was a simple sleight of hand, slipping the thing up his loose sleeve. He screamed instantly, a jolt going through his hand, powerful enough to feel outside the sleeve. And then, the chain reaction took hold. He squirmed, at first, then flailed his arm, as if to shake off the pain. By then, it was too late. As he stumbled backward, his comrades realized what was happening to him. Not one of them came to his aid.
The second man was more of a challenge. Like his companions, he stepped back to stare at the flailing man, stepping out of reach. A bit of acting did the trick, pretending to be terrified, stepping over to the big man for protection. And then, the trinket up the back of his leather tunic. He roared, his back tensing like a bow. Half of it was drowned out by his buddy being engulfed in colored dots and exploding, however. The burst took every part of him not of this time, ripped it from time itself and pulled it back to wherever and whenever he had come from. But he had been in this time for far too long. His body had absorbed utrients and built blood and cells with it. Those parts of him, a vapor of bodily fluids and matter torn apart, stayed behind, the energy from the sudden time jump overcharging it all and making it burst into flames, falling to the ground, drenched in unchecked energies. Black ash. A single spot of it.
His clothes burst into flames, as well. The fabrics caught fire, the leather charred and deformed. His tools, however, survived. They were thrown by the blast, though, and while a small hammer hurled itself at the shin of one of the other men, the knife impaled one of the wooden cages. And while everyone fled as the second man began to burst, there was no one to keep that knife from cutting the ropes. The blast of the second man bursting back in time felt like a warm wind, and a perfect cover to escape!
The captured people screamed. Some in cheer, some in fear for their lives. A few others tried to make a run for it, as well, but without the cover of bursting time travel minions, they quickly failed. It felt wrong, watching them, knowing their fate. The urge to help, to create more chaos for them to escape in, was strong. But it would not work. Even if it would have no effect on history to free them, the alarm had sounded. It felt wrong. It felt cold, looking them in the eyes and turning, but there was no other way.
It quickly became clear that nobody understood what had happened. The troops, the henchman of the woman that was not yet the woman in white, attacked one after the other, thinking it was just a case of an escaping captive. They were clumsy, brutish, hurling themselves into what they thought was a fistfight against a small, unarmed woman. One by one, they were caught in their own swarm of colored dots. They were the perfect foil, rushing in and providing more cover as their burst. The gate was within reach before anyone thought to order arrow fire.
Large arrows, looking more like spears, ripped through the air. They struck everything, be it captives, troops, or random workers. Seeing one guard struck off his horse, it was pure instinct to grab the rein. The gate was still open, captives still being brought in from who knew where. Caught off guard by the chaos, terrified by the rain of oversized arrows, nobody got in the way.
In a frenzied gallop, no doubt wanting to get away from the chaos, as well, the horse ran! Holding on was a challenge, even with the trinket wrapped and secure back in its pocket in the jumpsuit. The road was open, but uneven enough to make the ride bumpy, and night was creeping in. There was no other life in sight but the encampment, nothing to ride to.
And then, the roar sounded! Heavy wings cut through the air in the twilight dusk, swooping in. The dragon was nothing but a large shadow in the air, the only color being a faintly purple outline around it, the last light of the sun hitting it in flight. Like a bird of prey, it rose up, its eyes clearly already on its target. And like that bird, it hung motionless for a split second, and then dropped in for the kill!
No fire. No scorched earth. The horse reacted instinctively to the reins being pulled, skidding to a halt. The leap of its back, even before the animal stood entirely still, felt like hitting a brick wall, rather than the actual dry grass. And with a powerful crunch of talons and terrifying weight, the horse was gone. Warm blood scattered in the air like a thick mist. Causing a powerful wind, the massive wings landed, the purple now fully visible in the dying light of the sun. The huge beast stared silently at its bloody prey, stomping to loosen bits of dripping flesh from its feet. It seemed to try and smell for something, but gave up when, from the looks of it, the smell of horse entrails overpowered its nostrils. As the wings raised the beast into the air, the wind beneath them felt like a flood of water, the weight of it crushing down.
Silence. The beast was gone. The air was thick with the smell of blood, but the threat was over. And as the first of the lesser beasts started to prowl for the dead horse, it seemed only smart to leave, as well.

The wood was surprisingly warm, even throughout the night. It had seemed a bit risky to pick the same hamlet, but it seemed equally risky to venture even farther out into the hills at night. Moreover, the last hamlet to be burned down, it seemed only logical that it would still have the most heat left to fight the cold of night, too. It was hard to say what time of year it was, but there was an unnatural cold in the air, a chill that seemed not to fit in. Most straw had long since burned out, but wooden beams splintered on the ground and no doubt wooden furniture inside still had strong embers, a few of them even some flames in them.
By morning, though, all of it was cold. The jumpsuit did a bit to ward off the freezing morning air, but survival meant crawling inside the collapsed homes of likely dead or gone people to seek shelter. Deep inside, there were even a few pieces of wood still warmly smoldering.
At the first sound of footsteps, all thoughts immediately ran to the henchmen coming back! With only a few hours of sleep, it was hard to keep the mind from panicking, but the first sound of life, and of footsteps, came from far away. There was time to get that mind under control. When they finally came close, the panic was gone.
Voices spoke a foreign language. It could be any of the foreign languages that the henchmen had spoken, but there was a difference in its tone. One voice quivered, another gritted its teeth so hard it muffled sounds. When the first foot came into view, it was as it kicked a piece of scorched wood, clearly in a fit of impotent anger. They were emotional, a sense of pain running through everything they said, even if the words were incomprehensible.
There were three, at the least. Two sets of feet looked large, heavy, the feet of fully grown men of some size. The third could be either a small or young man, or a grown woman. One voice had feminine qualities to it. They seemed aimless, not knowing what to do or where to go. One of the male sets was getting increasingly restless, walking from ashpile to ashpile, calling out words that could easily be names. Then, the other set of men's feet kicked again. This time, they kicked the remains of the house that had provided shelter for the night! The smoldering wood cracked in many places, ash falling like black snow. It got into everything, the eyes, the ears. The nose.
It was just one cough.
The men immediately raced around the blackened remnants of the house, looking in, their torsos becoming visible through gaps in the wood. The woman called out, yelling words that sounded like nothing but gibberish. There was no way out, no way to slip by them and play it safe by running again. There was no way in, either, no gaps big enough to slip through to dig deeper into the ashpile and hide better from these prying eyes. It did not take long before two green eyes peered through between two smoldering beams of burned wood.
"Kidaome?" asked a voice, likely the one that belonged with the two green eyes. "Kidaome sandeh?"
All three began grabbing things, pieces of wood still strong enough to use as tools, large beams loose and balanced enough to move safely. Before long, others joined in, feet, hands and voices that had never drawn attention to themselves, perhaps looking in the other ruins of the destroyed hamlet. Four, five, six, they continued to appear out of nothing, hidden from view by the blackened remains of the house. Hands grabbed the black wood, pulling and lifting beams apart from one another. Like the mouth of a giant beast, the ruins opened.
There were over a dozen of them. People of very different ages, men and women alike. They had the same simple fashion as the captives at the encampment, but they moved differently, even what little they showed while staring inside the gaping maw of the ruin they had pried open. There was a strange sense of organization to their movement, stepping out of the way of one another quickly and with ease. They stood up straight, almost rigid, at every turn, and the work with the ruin was instinctively coordinated. They were trained, disciplined. And yet, nothing about them screamed military.
"I don't... I don't understand you," was the only response that seemed to make any sense, knowing full well they would likely not even understand the language. As predicted, none of them answered back. One, however, said something briefly, then ran off.
Chatter broke out as hands reached in, wanting to help with getting out of the ruin maw. They really didn't need to, there were no broken limbs or the like. The house had been a hiding place, long after it collapsed. But there was no real way to tell them that, no way to say thanks but no thanks. And with the intensity they showed for helping, it would have seemed a heartless thing to do, anyway.
While both eyes and hands checked for any injuries, dusting off the jumpsuit without ever asking permission, the one who had run off returned. She had a woman with her, one that looked slightly old and, at a closer glance, partially blind. Her eyes seemed to move, under her control, but they focused on nothing for more than a fraction of a second, as if she could see something, but saw nothing clearly.
"Ileba," she said, not knowing quite where to turn to.
"Sorry, I... #*@! it, you don't understand me, either."
The words honestly just flew out, never intended to be said out loud. That made the sudden smile on the woman's face even more creepy.
"You jump to conclusions, my friend," the woman said in a hoarse voice.
"You understa... Wait, are you using a spell?"
"Oh, no," she laughed, holding onto the young girl who had brought her, as if she was scared that she would be lost if she moved away for even a second. "I understand quite naturally. I was taught your language long ago, among many others."
The entire crowd was hushed as the woman spoke. Glances were exchanged, faint shrugs and whispers, perhaps from people guessing at what the old woman was talking about. Obviously, none of them understood any of it, which likely turned their world a bit on its head.
"Do you know what happened here?" the old woman asked, letting go a bit of the girl's arm as she tried to look around. She squinted, perhaps trying to see something other than black blurs in the backdrop of green hills and blue morning skies.
"A dragon."
As a complete surprise, someone in the crowd said a few words and everyone gasped. There was one word, at least, that they could translate into their own tongue.
"A woman uses it to burn places to the ground, killing all or having her henchmen take them as captives."
With a slow nod, the old woman listened. Then she turned her head slightly to translate to the girl, who spoke the translation out loud. Cries of panic and pain broke out in the crowd, men shouting enraged words while others held their mouths in their hands, some trying not to cry or gasp out loud, some clearly trying not to throw up for sheer fear, pain or anger.
"She's... The woman, she is... unusual. I work with some people that..."
"She is a time traveler," said the old woman, speaking as calmly as if she had been talking about the weather. "And so are you."
"How did..."
She said nothing just lifting a hand to point at where the jumpsuit stuck out of the more time appropriate clothes.
"We are all time travelers, or the offspring of them," she added, turning to whisper something to the girl. The girl instantly let go of her and ran off to something down the hill.
"You're a colony? Or, I mean, you were a colony?"
The old woman's hand felt like treebark. She mainly held onto the sleeve of the ragged clothes that covered the jumpsuit, clothes that now were nearly black from sod and ash. But the small, comforting pat that she gave made the brush against the back of the hand feel like gently scraping an old elm.
"Stop thinking in thise lines, my sweet. We are people." She smiled, a tired smile, hiding sorrow. She tried not to look around at the smoldering rubble. "Come, help an old woman to her cart."
On the way down the hill, towards a pack of horses and, tied to many of them, carts to carry people, there was a lot of angry grumbling, restrained sobbing, and other expressions of sorrow. Nobody said anything outright, but watching grown men and women struggle not to break down crying told its own story. This was not just some isolated hamlet, people had lost friends, perhaps family, here.
"What's your name? Mine is Marie."
"Gertrude," the old woman answered, sounding like a sigh. "Gertrude Hedester."
"Why is she taking them to that horrible place, Gertrude? What does she want with them?"
The girl that Gertrude had sent away came running, having prepared the old woman's seat in a cart and ready to help her into it. Others made brief moves as if to help, but held back when the girl seemed to have it under control. There was a strange love and respect for the woman, moreso than simply for a town elder or the like.
"They say to keep history on its tracks," she sighed, her weak eyes making a few quick moves to suggest that she struggled to believe that answer herself, "but it always ends with power. The power to know the future by knowing the past."
"Sounds very wise."
The old woman chuckled, loudly, sounding as if she kindly mocked the idea of wisdom, or at least that she sounded wise in any way.
"I escaped her once," she said, now suddenly speaking with a deeper, stronger voice, as if the memory of her past made her young again. "She makes a great speech of the past, of how it is set and cannot be changed. And yet, she fights to keep evreything and everyone in line." At the last few words, the old woman's voice became her age again. "Such is power."
"Power..."
Mumling the word got a quick glance from the woman, even though she might only see a blur with the old eyes. There were pieces missing, some bit of a puzzle that stuck out like a gaping hole in a complex tapestry. Something that nobody said. Something nobody knew. Something they could not...
"You will survive this."
In an unprecedented move, the woman waved her hand quickly in the air, hushing everyone around her. It was as if a light inside her old eyes had been turned on, a vigor suddenly returned to her body.
"What, my dear?"
The crowd understood nothing of the conversation. They had their own language, that much had been clear from the start. And yet, they now suddenly look on, perhaps detecting the slight burst of life in their elder, looking as if they were trying their hardest to follow along.
"Sorry, I didn't mean to say that out loud."
"But you did. You said it. You said that we survive." Her eyes squinted, her bushy brow seeming to want to reach out from her head and demand answers all on its own. "What do you know?"
Even though they only looked and could not truly listen, the crowd seemed to suddenly force themselves into the matter. Gertrude told them nothing, spoke no words in their language. But it felt like they understood, perhaps from sheer willpower alone!
"You were not meant to be here. Your presence threatens history, so she will fight to the bitter end to wipe you all out, or take you back, or whatever it is that she does. But she is going to miss some. They will hide, but they will..."
It started as just a few calls from the back of the small caravan. Then, far too quickly, it became panicked screams! Men from the back came running to the old woman, telling her things quickly in their language, and she raised her eyes to the sky, again squinting in the hopes that it would make her youthful eyesight return, even if just for a moment. Judging from her frown, it did not.
From afar, it looked mostly like a bit of missing sky. A dark, nearly black patch against the morning blue. And then, it moved around, swaying from side to side as it bent and stretched. As it flapped... wings.
"Dragon..."
"Indeed," the old woman growled under her breath.
"There is a clearing not far from here, Gertrude. Send everyone there."
"It's a dragon, dear, it burns those for..."
"There's a cave there, a deep system of caverns. Many tunnels, many exits. Even a dragon can guard only one."
Gertrude instantly shouted commands to the people within earshot, and everyone reacted like veteran soldiers! Whips cracked as horses were pressed to their utmost, the hard wooden wheels rattling dangerously against the gravel road, and people grabbed one another to keep anyone from falling behind. The fear was still there, strong and commanding, but the panic that would see them fall over one another under pressure was gone. All would reach the cave together, or nobody would!
As the clearing surrounded them all, the dark spot had gained enough distance for its mighty wings to clearly show. Across the massive distance, its shriek could still be heard, a low, piercing sound so far away, like feedback from a dying speaker system. It flew at a breakneck speed, gaining and gaining, but the forest was now showing its trees. Sure, they would easily burn, but there were many of them, dense enough to obscure anything below their branches. The dragon would be burning the entire forest to find its prey!
And then, the group stopped.
Carts slowed to a halt, people dug their heels in to cut their haste to nothing. Whispers ran at first, but then, nervous chatter set in.
"Gertrude, why did they stop? Tell them to..."
"The forest," she said, her voice oddly calm. "This is sylphin land."
"What? Sylphs? Air spirits? Those are from fairy tales!"
"Call them what you will. There are spirits here that guard their land viciously, we just gave them a name we knew. They will let a few pass, maybe, but not this many!"
"They let me pass, easily. What do I have that... Oh..."
"What? What is it, child?"
Spirits. Magic. It was all Fifth Force stuff. The memory of the mansion and its magics just breaking down from contact with time travel energies came rushing back.
"Magic... magic doesn't like me much. Tell your people to stay as close to me as they can!"
One step forward, one step to go have spirits chased away. The old woman's fingers were strong on the sleeve. And she held fast, held firm, as her old, strained eyes gazed through skin and soul.
"Child... how long have you been here When did your trip through time arrive in ours?"
"Yesterday."
Something shifted in her old eyes at hearing that.It was impossible to truly tell what it was, except that it was emotional. Tears threatened to roll down her face, but never did, as she hardened her own soul, gritting what was left of her old teeth to be able to talk instead of crying.
"We will survive?" she asked, voice nearly breaking.
"Yes. I don't know how many, but some of you will live on after this."
She let go. Then, bringing back the strong voice of her youth, she shouted words to the rest, words that only they understood. And everyone looked over, hesitant, staring worriedly at the strange woman in their midst that they had likely been told to trust with their lives against magical beings. The youngest gathered around, urged on by the older, while the older themselves took the horses and carts to the edge of the clearing, spread out so as to not make the dragon's work too easy.
"You will take them in, Marie," said Gertrude, a steely gaze in the old, faltering eyes. "If you can, come back for us, but they are young, they matter most."
"But if we..."
"No," she interrupted, her voice suddenly soft as velvet. As if to make her words carry more weight, her leathery hands wrapped softly around the wrist of the frayed jumpsuit, holding gently but with a strength that had nothing to do with her physical muscles. "The spirits will be threatened less by fewer. It is a risk either way." The gentle carous became a respectful but firm hold on the wrist. "Trust an old woman in this."

The younger in the group followed obediently into the forest, but it was a struggle to not look back. Branches and leaves soon closed around everyone, the forest now being all there was to see. It had been like this, looked like this, after the arrival to this place. But as everyone moved deeper into it, the trees themselves seemed to change. Colors seemed to fade and shift, brights becoming dull, colors becoming grey. In other spots, colors flared up, as if someone had tampered with the saturation settings of the world. Things, intangible but there to feel, moved through the crowd. But they only picked at the edges of the group, never daring to meet the one in the middle. They feared the energy that still dragged behind like a slipstream, a slipstream of broken time.
A scream rang out, a young man suddenly dangling in the air! Whatever tried to carry him off was stopped as others grabbed his legs, others yet grabbing them to hold them back! The entire group, as if in one thought, locked hands, grabbing anyone near them and holding on for dear life, in the most literal way possible! With a shriek, the man plummetted to the ground, where likely someone picked him up and pull him tight into the group again. From the center of them all, it was hard to see precisely.
While the forest filled with unnatural sounds, someone at the head of the group began calling out. The words still meant nothing to anyone but them, but it sounded joyous. At the first sound of the bubbling brook that likely ran into the caverns, it felt like a weight was lifted, like light was brighter and the air fresher. And then, someone got impatient.
As before, the actual events at the edge of the group were hard to see from its center, but three people, at least one of them a young man, were suddenly too far away to have patiently stayed with the rest. They had rushed to the cave, either to enthusiastic or too desperate for something they could see and touch to protect them against the forest. They screamed as they were picked off the ground and hurled into the woods. One came back, struggling against unseen hands clawing at her legs and body, leaving bloody gashes where swirls of dry leaves and dirt seemed to take on life and lunge at her. She was at last pulled back in. The two others were not. Their screams rang through the forest, but even without understanding the foreign language, it was clear what everyone whispered, tears in their eyes. Bait. The spirits wanted to lure others away, tempt them into a daring rescue. They failed.
When at last at the mouth of the caverns, the ones left rushed in. It would have been easy to escape with them, but once they were gone, there was only the forest left. Following them into the caverns was not an option. Gertrude and her old guard were still out there.
Unlike the first time, the forest now looked vile, threatening,perhaps even evil. Things lurked out there, things that were angry with humans, perhaps angry with everything that was not them. It felt like the mind refused to wrap itself around the notion of intangible forest spirits, wanting to constantly see figures, humanoid forms, in the green and brown that was everywhere. But whatever watched, it had no human form. Pure spirits, the free kind, prowling their territory. Not the tamed kind that Happy Marla spoke to, not the trained energies that Copper Claw used. Wild, savage, merciless spirits. And if there was any doubt, they themselves disspelled it when the mangle corpse of the young man taken was suddenly hurled through the air, already dead bones breaking against a large tree with a crushing sound. A show of power. Frustration. It was almost as if their voiceless screams filled the air with a disembodied anger.
But they were impotent, unable to get close. Held back by other unseen forces, likely causing them as much fear and frustration as their intangible bodies caused physical beings in their woods. And in the end, the clearing came into view. Branches and leaves parted, and sunlight made its way in, warm and plentiful!
The other warmth was less of a blessing. Fire crackled, several of the carts set ablaze. Two horses lay dead, and by closer examination, so did about half a dozen of the people. There were no loud screams, nothing but a few that could be heard in pain somewhere. Of those still on their feet, most were in the open, far too easy targets for the beast whose shadow slipped over the tall grass as it prowled for new victims, safe high up in the sky.
Gertrude was seated on the ground, breathing heavily, by some freestanding trees. No one dared go near the forest, and it was now painfully clear why, but she looked like someone who had run out of strength.
"Gertrude, are you..."
She nodded, waving a hand to gesture not to make too much of a deal out of it. She tried to talk, but she needed deep breaths to even focus.
"Child... are they safe?"
"They are at the caverns. Now we need to get the rest of you there."
She raised a weak arm to point to the sky.
"I believe someone above us disagrees," she said, chuckling a weird, raspy chuckle. Then she looked down, her hand reaching out and touching the grass. "It's okay. My time here is at an end."
The massive shadow went over the tree behind her, covering everything in darkness for a brief moment. Then it passed, and light came back. The shadow was large. It was low in the sky. It was chosing its prey.
"Gertrude, I think I may have been wrong."
A bit of life cameback into her eyes as she looked up, uneasy frown on her face.
"What, child?"
"I think... I think that you were all meant to die here. I think I changed your history."
She looked up towards the circling dragon, bewildered, not sure if she should be afraid.
"You need to tell your people to stay out of the way of the world. You need to tell them not to meddle in the affairs of history. To live and eventually die out in peace. Can you do that?"
Her voice cracking, her eyes finally beginning to fill with tears, she kept looking for the dragon that was hidden behind the bright sunlight, a shape she would barely be able to see with good eyes.
"How can I? I have no more voice to shout with, and they are far away."
The shadow passed again. As it did, it shrank. The dragon was rising up, getting ready to strike.
"When I'm gone, you will tell them."
"When you are gone?"
It was painful meeting her eyes, but in that moment, it almost felt as if she saw everything clearly.
"Your time here is not at an end."
She said nothing, but her eyes asked a million questions.
"But mine is."
With a slight touch of the old woman's wrinkled forehead, there seemed to be nothing more left to say. Deep breaths drew warm air into the lungs, filling the body with new energy. A paralyzing fear tried to make its way from gently shivering fingers up through the spine and into the brain, but it was blocked, forced to writhe as an impotent emotion deep inside a dark corner of the subconscious. Reaching into the jumpsuit, the antimagical trinket felt like an old friend, the thousand needles on the skin like a warm carous.
"You there, #*@!er?! Come and have a bite, you flying #*@!ing rodent!"
As if commanded by a higher power, the tall grass moved out of the way, making running through it feel like nothing more than a track race back home. Home. Glimpses of it flashed by, of The Embassy, of everyone there. To them, no time had passed. The time machine had flared up and made a loud noise.
"Remember me, skyturd?! I'm the one who royally butt#*@!ed your master!"
The shadow suddenly passed over, tiny, the dragon so high above. There was nothing but open space around, now. There were no obstructions, no distractions. Turning around and looking up,the shape of the beast blocked the sun, creating a dragon-shaped halo in the sky. The leather wrapping came off the trinket with nothing but a flick of the wrist and fell to the ground silently.
"Come on! I'm right here! Move that slow ass! Was your mother a #*@!ing blimp?!"
It dropped like a rock! The shadow grhew in every direction, the sun disappeared, and the early noon light only fully illuminated the glistening white teeth and talons as they hurtled towards the earth.
The trinket dug into flesh, through to bone. It would do nothing to a dragon. The dragon belonged here. But it was not the target.
All it took was wrapping naked fingers around the black dust on the strings. The pain shot through everything, feeling like fire in the eyes and thorns through every drop of blood. It was impossible not to scream. So why bother resist? As the mighty beast threw itself towards the ground, its trajectory stopping only when its claws dug into its prey, colored dots filled the air, and pain filled everything else. Four... Three... Two...
"Come and #*@!ing get me!!!!!"