The Girl With Pink Hair: Pt. 05

***

After the food, Elena made herself comfortable on the sofa.

"I think I want you with me," she said to Jess. "As the Sword. I don't want you to intervene unless I ask you to. I just want to demonstrate to her ladyship that I'm the one who calls the shots in my own head."

"Of course, love," Jess smiled and with barely a shimmer, the Sword was holding her hand.

"I'll stand ready to parachute in if you need me," Alan said as he settled into the chair opposite.

Elena nodded and winked at him, enjoying the heat that rose in his aura. Then she closed her eyes, took Jess' hand and sank into the dreamscape.

Out of the blackness materialised a landscape. Elena remembered it, it was a remote location on the north Norfolk coast where her parents had taken her on holiday as a child. It was cold and grey.

They walked side by side on a flat beach. The wind whipped up the fine sand to sting her bare calves.

"I know this place. You're building it out of my memories."

"Well, it is your dream," the Queen said drily, looking about her.

They walked on.

The Queen was wearing a knee length dress and a leather jacket, both in the usual white but somehow less ethereal than before. Elena felt that she could put her hand out and pat the leather.

Her royal companion was barefoot as ever, her feet leaving tracks in the sand.

"You're becoming more real, aren't you?" Elena said.

"Whatever that means," the Queen replied. She looked behind her. "You can tell the Sword she can stand down. I'm not a threat to anyone."

Her fiancé was following them some twenty metres back, using Ascalon as a staff. The wind ruffled her pink shock and Elena felt a surge of warmth in her breast. Jess' eyes lifted to meet her, and her lips pursed in a knowing smile. Elena grinned and waved. Her lover waved back and put her clenched fist to her chest.

"Oh, I don't think so. I trust Jess to act in my best interests."

The Queen scowled. "She is the Sword."

"This is, however, my dream and I'll do as I please thank you very much," Elena said, firmly, "and I remember this place from the summer so let's have a bit of that."

She snapped her fingers but annoyingly nothing happened. The Queen looked at her in amusement and Elena's eyes narrowed. She stopped walking, and opened her senses fully to the environment, the chill of the breeze on her skin, the grit under her feet, the tang of salt in her nose and on her tongue, the silver grey vastness of the sky and, in the distance, the muted roar of the breakers. She encompassed it all and, seizing the gestalt, altered the base parameters.

Abruptly the sky was a cerulean bowl, and the sun beat down on the white sand.

The Queen startled and Elena felt a sense of satisfaction at her discomfort.

Elena shaded her eyes from the glare, and her lips quirked. From somewhere she summoned a wide brimmed hat. Behind her she heard Jess whoop and clap.

The Queen looked unhappy, and Elena realised that perhaps this was not the right approach. In some ways this was akin to therapy, she needed to make peace with this aspect of her personality.

"Can I touch you?" she asked.

The Queen stopped and turned to look at her, her pale eyes wide. "You're asking my permission? Do you know what that would mean? For you, for ... us?"

"But there is no us, is there? Not really."

Away to the side, Elena felt Jess tense and put out a hand to reassure her.

Slowly she extended her hand. The Queen stared at it and then looked up to where Elena had her head on one side with a slight smile. Her alter ego looked scared. The narrative required that she control proceedings, but this was a new story. Elena widened her eyes and nodded.

The Queen's hand came forward and Elena held her breath for the moment of contact. It was somewhat anti-climactic. She felt like a human being, and perhaps that was the point.

***

The safe house 11pm, 4 ^th June

Alone in the living room late at night, post the successful engagement with the avatar, the girls having gone to bed, Alan sat and brooded at the turn of events with the aid of glass of bourbon. He swirled the amber liquid in the glass and took a sip. Before the burn faded, he summoned the Shadow to the front of his consciousness.

"I think-" he started.

'I'm intrigued,' the internal voice said dryly.

Alan took a deep breath and tried again. "I've figured out you're diverging from the narrative. It started with naming Jess' spear."

'Ah, you finally noticed,' the Shadow chuckled in its papery way.

"What's going on?"

'Earlier, you claimed to think. What, exactly, do you think?'

"Like I said, you're moving away from the narrative. But if you succeed then you'll lose a lot of your power, maybe even lose your identity entirely."

'Agreed. I decided on this course of action after I realised the significance of your mobile phone.'

Alan decided to bite. "And?"

'The most remarkable thing in all of this world is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand. A tiny window into space and time and the sum of human knowledge. I nearly went into a fugue state when I realised what it was.' The Shadow changed tack. 'What do you know of the Arthurian myth, Alan?'

"I haven't read Geoffrey of Monmouth, if that's what you mean."

'No, that is not what I mean. Perhaps I should have asked what you understand of the Arthurian myth.'

"Oh, let's see, Arthur gets Excalibur from the Lady of the Lake. It makes him invincible in battle. Under Merlin's guidance he establishes the Round Table at Camelot and there's a whole sub-plot when his missus has a fling with Goody Two-shoes Launcelot. There are other side plots involving the Grail and Indiana Jones. Arthur has an illegitimate son with the Wicked Witch of the West ... yada, yada, yada."

The Shadow sighed, an odd whispery feeling in his head.

Alan chuckled. "Apart from the immense pleasure it gives me to wind you up, I know what you're driving at."

'Good. The salient point is, how many of the characters are involved? Can you name even ten of them? The narrative is fuelled by the majority consensus of the story. And every retelling adds another layer of complication. Outside of wargamers, not many progress to an appreciation of scale. Instead what they see is a courtly romance or a soap opera in fancy clothes. Conforming to such a notion will not enable the Folk to survive the surveillance state. I was also able to access some of the databases of the Folk.'

"You're a fast learner."

'I remind you I am the Shadow. There is nothing particularly difficult about learning to utilise a search engine. Especially when you can look over the shoulder of someone using it.'

"Remind me when you did this?"

'You have the phone in your hand a lot of the time, even when it's idle. It was simplicity to divert some resources to my enquiries.'

Alan did not care to have himself referred to as 'a resource'. "So, what were you searching for?"

'The Battle of Badon.'

"Enlighten me." Alan had the feeling he was not going to like the answer.

'The final battle between Arthur and Mordred outside Bath. Mordred was the leader of an early version of the Elect. Arthur was a Centrist by the standards of the day. No matter the detail lost to time's eraser, it remains that two opposing factions of the Folk used their power to bring a significant number of mundanes into a conflict that was not of their making. Many lives were lost, and the Folk worked hard to conceal the part they played in the slaughter. They only narrowly avoided being positively identified as the instigators and suffering the pogrom that would have followed. That event is why the Folk have remained hidden these fifteen hundred years.

Now the Elect want to resurrect it. They've partially succeeded too, except unforeseen events have disrupted their plans. Most notably the assumption of the Queen by Elena and their failure to realise the narrative is no longer about gathering and maintaining a following.

Still, we must keep the narrative off balance as much as possible to prevent events spiralling out of control. Any future conflict will not merely be for a hill near a provincial English city. I do not wish for my Queen to preside over a blasted heath.'

Alan frowned. "Does Elena know what you're up to?"

'Of course not. And, more importantly, the Queen has other matters to occupy her.'

The Shadow paused. 'And then there is the most pertinent question of all.'

Alan nodded; he'd been wondering this himself. "Why now?"

'Precisely. After one and one half thousand years, why now?'

***

To be continued