Eclipsis

Chapter 4

Hank flies out the door first, followed by Will carrying his doctor's case.  Franzi is right behind them, her book always close to her. The three storming like a stampeding herd out of the mansion gives Aalina a fright. She gasps and starts running towards the ruins, with our heroes in hot pursuit. Hank closes in on Aalina first, but when he reaches out to grab her, his fingers won't grasp her wet arm and his feet slip in the wet grass. As he falls he notices William trying to take the lead. Cursing, Hank catches William by the leg and causes him to tumble to the ground beside him. Meanwhile, a laughing Franzi makes her way past the both of them. She runs up the hill, her book still clutched to her chest.

          After two minutes of sprinting  half way up the hill, Franzi stops and concentrates on trying to spot Aalina. The rain makes for terrible visibility. The adjacent area is mostly grassland. Franzi wipes the raindrops off her eye lashes and sees St. Mary's Church a  few hundred yards to her left. On top of the hill ahead of her loom the ruins of Tutbury Castle. The north tower is only partially damaged, as well as some other parts of the building. Franzi wonders if that's where the girl is hiding. She has to find her fast, before Hank and William catch up again. She looks behind her and sees them struggling with each other. 'Cretins', she shakes her head. The ring of the St. Mary's church bell shocks Franzi back into action. She's not the only one who gets startled: Aalina stumbles and has a hard enough fall to make her scream. Franzi's eyes catch sight of Aalina just before she disappears through the gate house into the ruin, and Franzi continues her pursuit.

          So do William and Hank, and they are quite an amusing sight to behold. Like in a practiced choreography they run side by side, Hank throwing a vicious punch at William's arm with the first bell ring. William cries out and retaliates by swinging his heavy bag into Hank's side with the second ring of the bell. And so it goes back and fourth until with the tenth bell ring William's swing hits home and the impact knocks Hank a few feet back. With a war-cry accompanied by the eleventh and final ring of the bell a very agitated Hank starts sprinting forward again. He passes William and then Franzi, and arrives first at the castle gate.

          Once inside the bailey, Hank scans the castle's former courtyard. Parts of the inner walls are still intact, very like the north tower and the gate house. The wall-walk on the other hand seems extremely damaged. At 20 feet high it's anything but safe. Incessant rain limits Hank's vision, but there she is! Hank rushes after the girl. Franzi and William arrive just in time within the bailey to see Hank disappear into the north tower.

          The tower and stairs are completely made of stone. The spiral staircase is steep, narrow and dark. The steps radiate from a central column, a newel. Some steps are damaged and mossy. Hank grabs the newel to steady himself while he climbs two steps at once. He catches Aalina within a few strides. They are at a point where the stairs split: to the left they continue to spiral upwards. To the right they stop two yards ahead at an arch. The arch leads outside to the ruined wall-walk. Aalina is about to slip though the arch, but Hank pulls her back by her girdle.

          In Aalina's struggle to free herself from Hank's grip, Lady Amelia's locket slips from her fingers and lands on the wall-walk, right beside a peculiar golden device. Hank doesn't pay it any attention, but Aalina stares at it in recognition. A moment later Franzi and William arrive, and the narrow staircase becomes uncomfortably crowded. Hank's shouting startles Aalina out of her reverie. "Are you insane? There's nothing but ruins! Do you want to throw yourself off the tower for a piece of jewelry?" Yet the strange thing is that the wall-walk appears intact from the archway's position, not at all like the absolute ruin it was on the outside. It also looks definitely darker than it should be, and most bizarrely, there is no rain. Peaked by curiosity, Franzi attempts to peer beyond Hank's broad shoulders and the writhing Aalina. Finally she manages to squeeze past them and spots the locket, a single faint glimmer, caught by the smallest ray of sunlight. Caution aside and eyes on the prize, Franzi leaps toward the locket but gets instantly yanked back. Hank holds her by the top of her pants: "What are you doing? Don't you understand it's too dangerous?! It's like a nursery here!" He turns around and beckons William for support. Hank nods toward his struggling captives, one in each hand. "Take one of these kids, will ya?" To Hank's astonishment William doesn't obey, instead he brushes past Hank and moves through the arch. At that moment the air around William quivers, like a mirage.

          Only Hank notices the oddity while Franzi is busy with peeling his hands off her pants. As soon as she frees herself she bolts after William, and Hank watches her slide through the quivering air and instantly stop beside the young doctor. There they stand on the wall-walk, almost frozen in motion on the other side, a surreal picture in dark sepia. Enthralled, Hank lets go of Aalina. He nears the arch, moves his hand through the air and observes the ripples. Then he takes a step and walks through. Aalina follows him as the air in the arch way ripples once more time and the view beyond it changes: it is now as it should have been all along, an empty damaged wall-walk in the rain.