The King?

Chapter 1

Malcolm squeezed my hand. We were standing in front of the bathtub, feeling a bit foolish. Well, I was at least. I knew this was all a joke, but for some reason my heart was was hammering like a drum. "Close your eyes babe," he said.
"Why?" I asked. "I don't want to miss anything. This whole dimension jumping is not exactly something one does every day, after all." I could see a spider crawling it's way across the bottom of the tub, a dark speck in a sea of cream, zig-zagging its way towards the drain.
"Do you trust me?"
I looked at my husband. "Would I be standing in a bathroom like this if I didn't?"
"You're humoring me. I get it. But I'm not lying." One lock of my hair fell out of my tight bun of hair and hung loosely in front of my face. Malcolm reached out and brushed it out of the way so that he could stare me in the face. "Hey, I love you. Now close your eyes."
I took a deep breath. "Okay."
He clasped my hand again, and I squeezed it until the knuckles turned white. I felt him slip a small piece of paper into my palm. I looked up at him quizzically, but he was already facing forward at the wall. "On the count of three, then we'll do it."
"Do what?"
He ignored me. "One. Two. Three!"
I shut my eyes and felt a sharp jerk on my hand, and then my navel, and then suddenly the floor was gone  and I was flying. I could feel wind and particles whipping by my face. I wanted to scream, but was afraid if I opened my mouth then something might fly in it.
There was a second sharp pull at my arm wrenching my sharply in a new angle, and I was thrust away from my husband. I lost all reservations and opened my mouth to scream his name, but nothing came out, the sound of my voice consumed by the void of another dimension.
Then I was alone.
My body connected with something hard, and I lost consciousness.
Seagulls.
I could hear them calling to each other.
It had been ages since Malcolm and I had taken a proper vacation to the ocean. It was good to finally be back, except why was l at the ocean again?
"You alright, miss?"
I opened my eyes, and only saw blurry shapes. The world was fuzzy as if I needed a pair of glasses, but I could make out three distinct colors: the dark navy water of the ocean, the bright cerulean of the sky and the beige expanse of sand stretching for miles in two directions before me. The sun was hot on my skin and sand was sticking in bunches to my elbows. I waited patiently for my mind to unscramble and my bearings return to me. It came in pieces:
Followed Malcolm into bathroom.
Different dimension.
New life.
Flying.
Got separated.
Hit a thing.
Here now.

"Hello? Miss? You a mute or somethin'?"
I looked up. A girl no older then twelve or thirteen was looking down at me. She had tanned skin and short sandy hair fashioned in a pixie cut. She was offering a hand to me, and it was at that moment that I realized that I was sprawled out on my back.
"I'm okay...l think. Thanks." | accepted her hand and let her pull me to my feet. My entire body ached, as if I had done a work out at the gym for the first time in months.
The girl was strong for her size, and did all the work to get me standing again.
I began to dust sand out of my plaid pajama bottoms. I noticed the girl was staring at me with a funny look.
"What?" | asked, still groggy.
"That's a funny thing you wearin. You're from the Outside, yeah?"
If the Outside is a different dimension, then yeah, I thought.
"Something like that." | looked around. Out past a horizon of dunes, I could see a row of thatched, red roofs, a patchwork plain of mismatched and uneven tiles. It appeared to be some type of shanty fishing town. There were fishing lines dotting the shoreline, propped up in the sand, all facing the sea.

"You must have come for the funeral then. Lot's of Outsiders will be sailing in the next few days. Guess you must have shipwrecked huh?"
My head was still pounding and I only understood half of what the girl was saying. "Funeral? No. I'm looking for a man. Name is Malcolm Reynolds. Apparently he's lived...uh... here for about 1000 years. You heard of him?"
The girl shook her head and kicked at the sand. "Don't know anyone by that name. It's a big world miss." She took a step closer and peered a bit closer in to my hears. "We should get you to a doctor. We only got herbalists in the fishing village, so if you want a real one you have to head into the city."
I shook my head. "I can do that later, after I find my husband."
She shrugged. "Suit yourself. You said he lived here a thousand years, yeah? Well anyone that lives that long would have to have a record in the city library." She began to walk over to the fishing lines by the sea to check them. "I'm heading up that way for the funeral, you can join me if you like."
It wasn't like I had any better ideas. I looked in both directions as far as I could, craning my neck as I did on.
No sign of Malcolm anywhere. "Okay," I said. I held my hand again. "I'm Jill, by the way."
She clasped in with bony fingers. "Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Jill the Outsider. I'm Ko'sa." She pointed back towards the village. "Let's head back to my cottage. We can stop and get provisions before we head into the capital. If we leave now we can get in before the lines at the city gates get too long."
I nodded. "Must be quite a funeral."
"You could say that." Ko'sa grinned. "It's a funeral for the queen, after all."
The queen? Guess even alternate dimensions are ruled by royalty, I thought.
"She was a good queen then?"
Ko'sa bowed her head. "Yeah. She'll be missed, at least by most of us. Some of us... wonder about her death.
Whether it was really natural or not. The Queen and the King were an arranged marriage you see, didn't exactly fancy each other. Some say he had it in for her, loved another."
As Ko'sa prattled on about the royal family, I realized there was something pressed against my left palm, now slick with sweat. I opened my hand to reveal a note. The same note that Malcolm had thrust into my hand back in the bathroom.

It was tiny and rolled up neatly, like a scroll. With fingers that were slightly trembling, I unrolled the tiny piece parchment and read the words in my husband's hanu writing.

"If you need me, just ask for the King"