The Magic Meadow (14 page)

“
Enough!
” Sender said abruptly, as the vision of the city was followed by one of Belleview and its miserable inmates. “
No wonder you wanted to leave! Now let me show you where you have arrived.
”

The quick pictures that came to Brick left him gasping.

“
Do you begin to understand what you have done?
” Sender went on.

“Yes,” Brick said weakly.

“
you have made an incalculable journey. It has never been done before. Everyone here will want to meet you. You will understand better when you know that our last city fell to dust more than a thousand years ago.
”

Brick could only gasp.

“
We do not miss it,
” Sender added. “
Our planet is a garden again. Today all men help their neighbors, and no one profits from another. But more of that later. Our task now is to find you. Can you tell me where you are?
”

Brick immediately ran into difficulties. Though it was soon established, by the fact of darkness, the moon's height and certain star patterns, that they were on the same continent, it was evident that a great distance separated them. Nor did it help much to give a careful description of the bunkhouse and their present surroundings.

“
The land is broad,
” Sender reminded him, “
and there are countless trails and shelters for hikers. What we need is a distinguishing landmark. Do you remember seeing a line of mountains, or a tall hill?
”

“No,” said Brick. “Nothing like that.” Then he thought of the beautifully drawn map in the blanket chest that had been the cause of their leaving the bunkhouse. He tried to visualize it for Sender, but it was impossible to remember the ornate wording, done with strange characters in an unknown language. Without names, the map was useless.

“
Keep trying,
” Sender urged. “
All we need is a clue. If you can think of one before midnight, I will tell the dawn singers and they will surely find you in the morning.
”

“Dawn singers?” Brick was instantly curious. “Who are they?”

Sender seemed surprised. “
You have never sung to the dawn?
”

“What for? Why, I—I never saw a sunrise till I came here!”

Now Sender was shocked again. “
This is incredible! But I forget where you are from. And perhaps in the city no dawn was worth rising to, so they went unsung. Here it is a magical time. The world is reborn and song pours from every throat. But the most magical time of all is when the moon is fulling. Then the dawn singers gather in their craft and float singing through the sky.…
”

Sender was silent a moment, then he said, “
I will alert the singers anyway, so they will be on the watch for you. But if we only had some idea of the area you are in … Perhaps, if you could tell me of the kinds of trees growing around you
…”

Save for pines, Brick hardly knew one tree from another. But Nurse Jackson knew. “Wait till I wake the others,” he said. “Maybe I can find out something.”

He quietly awoke Nurse Jackson, but he had hardly begun to explain about Sender when the others awoke also. They crowded about, listening with growing excitement.

Nurse Jackson could think of nothing that would help. “All I can say is that it still looks like part of Alabama—though it could just as easily be the Carolinas or Virginia. But that wouldn't mean anything to him. I know now we're on another planet. Look at that big pink moon!”

“It's just impossibly gorgeous!” Lily Rose said softly, moving to the edge of the shelter for a better view of it. “It makes you want to go drifting away under it, singing and singing—”

Her voice died abruptly. She went rigid, and Brick saw that she was staring, not at the moon, but at the gate.

The gate was slowly, quietly, being opened by something huge on the outside.

The moment, and the sudden shattering fear that went with it, was something that Brick knew would be forever engraved on his memory. In the bright moonlight his unbelieving eyes could make out the monstrous shape on the other side of the palings. It was the great spotted dog, and the creature had lifted the latch with its mouth and stepped back to open the gate. Now, as Brick stood frozen, staring at it, the monster gave a little jerk of its mighty head that sent the heavy gate flying wide. Then it entered.

In the back of his mind Brick was only partially aware of Sender calling urgently, “
What is it? What is wrong?
” But there was no time to pull his wits together and answer. He sprang for his crossbow, but even as he snatched it up he realized it was empty, nor could he see the arrows anywhere within reach. He dropped the useless thing and grabbed the adze by the fireplace.

“
What is the trouble?
” Sender called sharply. “
Is anyone in danger?
”

“Yes!” he said, hardly realizing he was speaking as he whirled to face the intruder. “It's that—that monster! That spotted dog! He followed us here—he's just now opened the gate and come in. I—I've got to stop him somehow.”

He sprang forward, adze raised. But Princess was quicker. She sped past him, past the motionless Lily Rose who seemed powerless to move, then slowed and began speaking softly as she approached the spotted beast with her small white arms outstretched.

Sender was calling, “
No! Do not hurt the great dog! He is your friend! That is Janico. He is the warden of the South Preserve.
”

Brick dropped the adze, which he knew would have been all but useless against such an adversary. The sudden relief that flooded over him left him weak and trembling. He saw Princess with her arms around the great dog's neck, and he said thankfully to Sender, “I wouldn't have believed it! But it's okay now. He's found a friend.”

“
Good!
” Sender replied. “
He's highly intelligent, but very shy. Janico is known everywhere. His strain was developed to guard the deer and the other rare animals from extinction by the big cats. He is the only one of his kind left on the continent, so now we know you are somewhere in the South Preserve. But it is a very large area
—”

“Are there horses in the preserve?” Brick asked abruptly, and sent a mental picture of the horses he had seen.

“
Just those two!
” came the surprised reply. “
You saw them?
”

“Yes. In the meadow near the bunkhouse.”

“
That is where they are usually seen. Then you must be in the first shelter west of there! I will tell the singers immediately. If some are close, they may find you before dawn
…”

They were much too excited to sleep after that. They built up the fire in the fireplace, then sat watching the sky and listening, their excitement mounting as the fulling moon swung westward.

Nurse Jackson whispered, “Brick, you know something I don't. It has to do with time. My watch—”

“It'll always be fast,” he said. “The days are longer than they used to be. And the moon is closer.”

“Brick, what are you trying to tell me? Why—why is this so much like Alabama?”

Even though he had guessed the truth, the fact of it still boggled him. “It's because this—used to
be
Alabama. But that was ages ago. Ages and ages ago. I—I don't know how it happened, but when we came here, we—we came into the future.”

The huge Janico, lying beside Princess, suddenly raised his great head. Lily Rose said breathlessly, “I hear them!”

Now Brick could hear them, faintly in the distance. He sprang up with the rest as the first boat drifted across the moon. Others followed, circling downward. The voices that came from them were the happy voices of the young, and they sang in welcome.

Janico thrust open the gate. Brick and the rest moved through it, slowly, wonderingly, yesterday's children going to meet the children of tomorrow.

About the Author

Alexander Key (1904–1979) started out as an illustrator before he began writing science fiction novels for young readers. He has published many titles, including
Sprockets
:
A Little Robot, Mystery of the Sassafras Chair
, and
The Forgotten Door
, winner of the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award. Key's novel
Escape to Witch Mountain
was adapted for film in 1975, 1995, and 2009.

All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 1975 by Alexander Key

Cover design by Jesse Hayes

ISBN: 978-1-4976-5261-3

This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.

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New York, NY 10014

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EBOOKS BY ALEXANDER KEY

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