For a moment Leoni wasn’t sure what he was talking about and must have looked puzzled. Bannerman jogged her memory: ‘Remember you told me you were out of your body inside the hospital – just before we revived you in the ER?’
‘Yes …’
‘You saw a receptionist. You said she seemed very prim and proper but that she was wearing orange sneakers with striped purple and green laces?’
‘Exactly! Above her desk all you could see was this stiff charcoal business suit. Made her look like a headmistress or something. But under the desk she had on this crazy footwear.’
‘Which was definitely orange sneakers with purple and green laces?’
‘For sure. I was looking right at those shoes when you zapped me back into my body.’
‘Well, here’s the thing. That receptionist exists. She told me she was on duty the afternoon you were admitted and she was wearing a pair of sneakers exactly like the ones you described – right down to the purple and green striped laces.’
Leoni objected: ‘The scientists you want to convince aren’t going to accept that as evidence of anything, are they? They’ll just say I must have seen her when I was being brought into the hospital.’
‘Well, obviously I’ve checked. Turns out you were brought directly into the ER from the helipad on the roof of the Med Centre – straight down in an express elevator. You didn’t go anywhere near the reception area. So there’s no way you could have seen that receptionist’s shoes while you were in your body …’
‘Unless I’d been to the Med Centre before and seen her then …’
‘Obviously I’ve checked that, too’ – Bannerman was looking vexed. ‘Have you been to the Med Centre before, by the way?’
‘No. Never.’
‘Well, it wouldn’t matter if you had because this receptionist was new there. The day you were admitted was her first day on the job and the sneakers weren’t even hers. She’d had to borrow them from a colleague who goes running because she broke a heel on her own shoes that morning.’
‘It’s a cut-and-dried case,’ David chipped in from the back. ‘You saw something real that you couldn’t possibly have seen if your consciousness was confined to your body.’
‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ said Leoni. ‘Some of the places I saw, and some of the things I heard … It’s going to be pretty scary in lots of ways if it’s all real.’
‘But you agree it’s worth trying to find out?’ Bannerman asked.
Leoni bit her lower lip and thought about everything that had happened. ‘Yes,’ she said at last. ‘Let’s find out. I’m going to help you every way I can.’
Chapter Twenty-Five
‘Father also spoke of you,’ Brindle said. ‘Told me you been chosen to fight Sulpa. That why you in valley yesterday to save me from Grigo, Duma and Vik. Not accident.’
Ria frowned at more of Brindle’s mystical talk. ‘What do you mean, I’ve been chosen to fight Sulpa? Who chose me?’
‘There is good and evil in spirit world. Good interested in proper order of things. Balance. Harmony. Love. Life. Sulpa part of evil. Interested in confusion, chaos, hate, death. Our Lady of the Forest kept him chained up long time. Stopped his wickedness. But he got away, turned proper order upside down, took human body, came into our world. Now good spirits need you to fight him.’
‘But that’s ridiculous. If he’s a demon they should fight him themselves.’
‘In spirit world they can fight him. In our world they cannot. Not allowed for them to take human bodies. That why they need you. Me as well. Uglies and Clan must make strong rope together to fight Sulpa.’
‘A rope? You’re talking about friendship between the Uglies and the Clan? Not a chance, Brindle. Our leaders would shit mammoths at the idea.’
‘OK. Let them shit mammoths. Doesn’t change anything. We the ones who have to fight Sulpa. Our responsibility. Our job. This our time.’
‘We will lose against Sulpa,’ Ria said, ‘if you go on trying to be merciful to the – what did you call them? The Illimani? The way you handled the ambush yesterday was really stupid.’
‘We trying to do right thing, Ria.’
‘I understand. And it’s noble. But it cost lives. Remember what your father told you. These Illimani do the bidding of a demon. The only right thing is to kill them.’
Last night the large expanse of flattened earth in front of the Cave of Visions had been lit with a score of lurid fires, and the wild uncouth looks of the Uglies had been terrifying. But now as those very same Uglies began to emerge from the cave in ones and twos, blinking at the sun, yawning, stretching, in several cases farting, Ria discovered that she shared a strong bond with them.
Indeed, in her head, faint as a whisper, she imagined she could now hear the thought-talk of the whole multitude.
‘Not imagining, Ria,’ Brindle interrupted. ‘When you ate the Little Teachers with us last night they made rope between you and all the Uglies …’
Ria was shaking her head from side to side, scratching her ears. ‘You mean everyone can speak to me now, not just you?’
‘Sure. Why not? Every Ugly is your friend.’ He stood up, rested his hand on her shoulder: ‘Soon time for you to go back to Clan. Before go, Merinabob-grundle-nupro-atrinkam has present for you.’ He stood and walked off, beckoning her to follow.
‘Who has a present for me?’
‘Merinabob-grundle-nupro-atrinkam. Our Sorcerer.’
‘You mean you’re taking me to see a magic man?’
‘Not man. Woman. Very old. Very powerful. She going to help us fight Sulpa.’
Ria had long ago checked out the Clan’s magic men and discovered they were all total fakes. ‘Powerful?’ she demanded. ‘How? In what ways? Give me examples.’
‘Can turn herself into wolf, find lost things, talk to animals, heal sick, make storms, fly like bird.’
‘Oh come off it, Brindle!’ Ria scoffed. ‘You don’t really believe that crap do you?’
‘You mean same way you believed Clan crap about the Little Teachers turning people into demons?’
Ria hesitated: ‘OK, you were right about that, I admit.’
‘Right about this, too. You will see. Sorcerer’s magic real.’
The slope behind the Cave of Visions was rocky and precipitous, rising up to an immense wall of sheer cliffs. But in front, where Ria had fled in terror the night before, the ground fell away in a series of wide terraces; birch and oak grew in scattered stands and numberless huge boulders lay about in tumbled disarray amongst tussocks of coarse grass. Below the last terrace the stony banks of a clear alpine stream marked out the bottom of the valley which rose steeply beyond into mixed forests of alder, willow and pine. Higher up these were succeeded by patches of open moorland and, in the distance, a daunting vista of jagged snow-clad peaks.
‘I can see why Clan scouts never found this valley,’ said Ria. ‘Cliffs that can’t be climbed on one side, mountains that can’t be crossed on the other. It’s the perfect hideout when you know the secret way in.’
A narrow but well-trodden path connected each terrace to the one below it. As Brindle led the way down, Ria saw that clusters of lean-tos made of branches roofed with skins nestled under almost every tree and up against the fallen rocks, and Uglies of all ages were going about their daily chores. With the morning sun warm on her back she realised this could be any camp, anywhere, a Clan camp just as much as an Ugly camp, united by multiple common bonds of humanity – females cooking, curing hides, and weaving grasses, males setting out on the hunt, knapping flints, building shelters, groups of children playing games.
The lowest and widest of the terraces, not far above the stream, was overgrown with a thick coppice of ancient oaks. Here there were no dwellings and small herds of red deer grazed amongst occasional clearings. It was amazing to Ria, who knew the skittish temperament of this species, that they did not run away when she and Brindle approached; one powerful buck even allowed her to stroke him and fondle h
is ears.
She laughed in delight: ‘I don’t get this, Brindle. What’s the matter with these animals? Why aren’t they afraid of us?’
‘Sorcerer has magicked them.’
‘But how is that possible? I’ve never heard of such a thing.’
‘Told you. Sorcerer very powerful.’
In the heart of the coppice, just where it seemed to be at its most tangled and overgrown, they came to a little dome-shaped tent made of skins stretched over a framework of curved branches. It stood in a circle of shelter beneath the outstretched boughs of three gigantic oaks. Beyond lay a broad open meadow where many different kinds of herbs, fruit bushes and brightly hued flowers had taken root in ordered and regular rows. Waist deep in all this abundance, with a cloud of butterflies fluttering around her, a very small, very old Ugly female dressed in a loose smock of woven hemp was working on a bush, removing its flowers and placing them in a bag slung from her shoulder. ‘She is Sorcerer,’ confided Brindle.
At this the woman turned and began to walk out of the meadow towards them. She was frail, tiny and wizened, her gait was painful and stooped and Ria recognised her as the player of the bone song in the Cave of Visions. Clumps of pinkish-grey hair protruded from her large head, giving her a disconcerting babylike appearance. But in the shadow of her prominent brow ridges, narrowly set above her broad nose, her grey eyes sparkled with wisdom and experience. Her breathing was shallow as she approached, with many wheezes and gurgles, her hollow chest rising and falling beneath her smock, and yet she radiated invincible inner strength.
Ria found that her heart was pounding, as though she faced some powerful animal, and fought off an impulse to back away. Then a warm and gentle thought-voice addressed her: ‘Greetings, Ria of the Clan. I am Merinabob-grundle-nupro-atrinkam.’
‘I shall call you Merina,’ Ria replied. ‘I loved the sound you made last night with the bone.’
Merina looked impressed: ‘You’ve learned how to thought-talk fast! Brindle told me you’re very special.’
For some reason the compliment made Ria feel uncomfortable: ‘I’m just a rabbit hunter,’ she objected. ‘There’s nothing special about me.’
‘But I’ve heard you have a special gift with stones,’ said Merina. Then, with surprising speed, she took hold of both Ria’s arms just below the elbows and began to knead and prod her flesh, working her way down to her hands, tugging at her fingers, and popping each of the joints in turn.
‘Ow!’ Ria protested. ‘What are you doing to me?’
‘Giving you magic,’ whispered Merina with a mischievous smile. She turned, leaving Ria’s arms tingling, and hobbled towards the little domeshaped tent. ‘Follow me, rabbit hunter,’ she said
Brindle pulled back the tent’s entrance flap to allow Merina to step inside. A beam of light falling through the opening illuminated the scene in the cramped dark space beyond as Ria followed, her heart still thudding. Hanging from the curved branches forming the tent’s framework, suspended on finely woven grass threads, hundreds of little quartz crystals danced, casting back a myriad of dazzling reflections like stars. Bundles of fragrant herbs and dried fungi were stored in wicker baskets on the floor.
Merina was feeling her way around the walls of the tent, setting the quartz crystals jingling above her head. She picked up and discarded various objects. Finally she announced ‘Here they are,’ and turned, holding out a deerskin pouch: ‘Five good throwing stones for Ria the rabbit hunter.’
Ria took the pouch from her.
It was heavy.
She put her hand inside and counted one … two … three … four … five stones, all of perfect throwing weight. She drew one of the missiles out and examined it in the beam of light at the entrance flap. It was, without a doubt, the most beautiful thing she had ever seen – a cold and deadly egg of milky quartz.
She took the other stones from the pouch and laid all five on the floor of the tent side by side so she could study them. All were exactly the same shape, size and weight. All shared the same outer shimmer and the same strange inner opacity, like swirling mist or clouds. All were flawless and smooth to the touch.
‘I’ve had them half my lifetime,’ said Merina. ‘I found them by the Snake river, lying in a circle on the bank, still wet as though someone had just fished them from the water. But no one else was there. Beautiful, mysterious stones. They have some power about them – any fool can see that. I picked them up and carried them away with me. All these years I’ve kept them safe …’
‘Then you mustn’t give them to me. They’re much too precious a gift …’
‘All these years I’ve kept them safe,’ Merina repeated, ‘without ever knowing why. But last night Our Lady of the Forest visited me and told me to give them to you.’
With the words came an image of the beautiful, exotic, thrilling woman whom Brindle had called by the same title and whom Ria had seen on her journey with the Little Teachers. The tall woman with long black hair and deep blue skin who had stood with her long-dead parents by a river in the spirit world.
Ria was dumbfounded: ‘Last night, after I ate the Little Teachers, I also saw this blue woman …’
‘She is not a woman, Ria! Do not be deceived, for she does not belong to humankind at all. She is one of the eternal spirits. One of those to whom all the worlds and every time and place are open. Past, present, future – nothing is hidden from her.’
‘But what does she want me to have the stones for?’
‘Why, my child! Is it not obvious? She wants you to throw them, of course.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
Thanks to a stopover at a Starbucks in Santa Monica, heavy morning traffic on the 405, and the beat-up engine in Bannerman’s decrepit Chevy, the fifty-mile journey from Los Angeles to UC Irvine was now well into its second hour. In such circumstances Leoni should have been fuming. She couldn’t bear to be delayed or frustrated – by anything. But having just escaped from Sansom’s creepy lunatic asylum she felt differently. Every mile that crawled by on the freeway was a mile further away from Mountain Ridge and a mile closer to Bannerman’s project – and maybe to some answers to the big questions now swarming all over her life.
‘It’s a residential programme,’ Bannerman was explaining as he drove. ‘Part of the deal is that all the volunteers – there are thirty of them – live in at our research facility on campus and don’t have contact with the outside world for the duration. The whole project runs for four weeks but the other volunteers have been there for nearly two weeks already, so you’ll be joining halfway through.’
‘And what is it? Like some sort of dorm or something? I’m not sure how good I’ll be at living with thirty other people.’
‘You’ll have a small private room. You can be left alone, or you can socialise. It’s up to you. The only commitment is that approximately once every two days you come down to our lab – it’s in the basement of the same building – and we give you a shot and you report the effects to us … Sometimes we’ll ask you to have two or three shots in the same day – which can be tough.’
‘These shots … they’re not ketamine, are they?’
‘Ketamine?’ Bannerman sounded surprised, even affronted. ‘Certainly not. Where did you get that idea from?’
‘At Mountain Ridge. Last night I tried to escape …’
‘That was gutsy of you,’ commented David from the back seat.
‘I just got so mad with the way they were treating me,’ said Leoni. ‘Anyway, it didn’t do any good. They caught me in a minute and sedated me with a huge hypodermic full of K. Then they strapped me back on my bed and that’s where I stayed until a certain knight named John Bannerman rode in on a white charger and rescued me this morning …’
Bannerman’s face had clouded with anger: ‘That’s so irresponsible of them,’ he exploded. ‘Sansom ought to be behind bars for using ketamine like that. It’s not a tranquilliser – unless you’re a horse.’
‘So what is it, then?’
>
‘Lots of things. It’s used as an anaesthetic for certain kinds of surgery. It’s also a powerful hallucinogen – that’s why it’s popular on the club and rave scene.’
Leoni nodded in agreement: ‘I snorted it in a club once. It’s a heavy trip. But what it did to me at Mountain Ridge was way beyond that.’
‘Any idea how much they gave you?’
‘The nurse said something about “four hundred milligrams intramuscular”?’
‘That would do it!’ Bannerman whistled: ‘You could have open-heart surgery on four hundred milligrams IM and you wouldn’t feel a thing.’
‘Yes, I was knocked out – or at least my body was. But my mind felt like it had been set free and I travelled to the same place I was in when I had my near-death experience. It was the land where everything is known again, and the Blue Angel was there. The green flowers were there. The monsters I saw before were there, too – they’re trees but they have these huge beaks like birds – and I met this girl who they were going to attack. I tried to warn her, then the next thing I knew I was yanked out of there and stuffed back inside my body in Mountain Ridge.’
‘You told me your near-death experience felt, what did you say, “more real than real”? Did all this feel that way too?’
‘A thousand per cent. But ketamine’s just a drug …’
‘Not necessarily. Remember we talked about how our brains might not be so much generators of consciousness as vehicles or receivers that mediate consciousness at the physical level?’
‘The idea of the brain being like a TV set?’
‘Exactly. And most human brains are tuned, by default, into Channel Normal – everyday reality, in other words.’
‘Makes sense,’ said Leoni. ‘We’d be pretty messed up if they weren’t.’
‘But that doesn’t mean that there aren’t other channels broadcasting at us all the time which are all also equally real but not normally accessible to our senses. Perhaps what happens in NDEs is that there’s a natural release of hormones into the brain that retune its wavelength setting and allow us to perceive those other realities.’