The Fall of Vaasar

Chapter 13

Tamza danced for Edgar the following night, in their chambers. He'd eaten dinner with her and then had a long bath. He was in a pleasurable mood and she took advantage, wanting to strengthen her enchantment long enough to find a way to end his life. She had just finished her dance and was sat in his lap as Ursah-bear's voice soared through the little square window of the second floor room. The thunderous roar came again.

Tamza jumped off the King, pulling at his tunic. "Ursah is in danger, I must go to her!"

Edgar frowned. "My order is for no one to go near the bears. It's nothing."

She took his face in his hands, grateful she had strengthened her spell moments before and said, "I know my bears, and I know Ursah-bear is in danger. I must go to her, now!"

Edgar's eyes rolled. "Stay here, I'll go."

"Edgar! Ursah needs me."

His eye twitched, his temper was fraying. "Do as I say, woman." He stood, tapped on the door and the soldier posted there let him through. As the door locked behind him, Tamza heard Edgar's order, "Don't let her out."

Ursah-bear's roar sounded a third time, shaking Tamza into action. She pulled on her cloak and headscarf, took a deep breath and clapped. A blue doorway appeared between her palms and grew to the size of a turnip.

"This has to work." She pulled the chair that Edgar had just been sat on, to under the little window, climbed on it and could just reach the ledge. The doorway rested in one hand, the smoky blue swirling into the jagged edge and the purest black she had ever seen in the centre. She held it in her mind's eye for a moment and dropped it out the window.

Usually, the doorway had to be placed exactly where she wanted it. Tamza had never attempted to drop it into place. Concentrating to will the circle down, down, to the dirt ground, she prayed that there was nobody around to see it. She made it bigger, so she could step through it. If this didn't work and she ended up falling from height, it could be the end. Or if the doorway hadn't expanded, she would be speared on the sharp, serrated edge. I have to try, even if I die trying. I cannot sit here and not help my bears.

She clapped her hand a second time and the adjoining doorway opened in the room, she widened it, took a deep breath, and stepped into the portal. This was the second time she had transported herself and the feeling was still strange. A sudden nausea, an intense pulling on her insides and a fast wind against her face.

In an instant, she was through the other doorway, her foot landing on ground. She ducked low, but there was no one to be seen. She looked back at the portal. It was glowing bright blue, like a beacon. She clapped her hands a third time and it disappeared. Knowing from experience, that the doorway left in the room would dissolve at the same time into nothing.

She edged her way along the outermost part of the garden, now overgrown and straggly after weeks of not being tended. It was dark and deserted. She crept through the bushes and out onto the Killing Fields, trying hard not to look at the piles of bones that lay there, stripped bare by the vultures. She stumbled in the dark over ribcages and skulls, repulsed, but her desire to help Ursah forced her on.

Tamza reached the bushes that marked the end of the Killing Fields, the enclosure fence a few paces away. Men laughed and cheered. Peeking from the bush she saw Burrington, Orpey and a few other men on Edgar's council, inside the fence, on the sandy training ground.

Soldiers surrounded Ursah-bear, prodding her with sharp spears. The brown bear was reared up and roaring, trying to lurch forward to get to her cub, Fir, who was tangled up in a net hanging from a tree, just skimming the grass. A huge slab of meat on the floor under him. A trap, they sprung a trap to catch him.