Nethermost Realm: Prisoner of Arlunn

Chapter 28

Please note: I am updating this draft of The Prisoner of Arlunn. The most important change is that the main character's name has been changed from Philip to Rian.

28

There was something wrong with the null plane, or the Interstitium, as the others called it.

Rian trudged through the semi-dark twilight. First of all, he'd walked for an hour but the day grew neither lighter nor darker. Also, the sky was uniformly light. This wasn't the hour before sunrise. He had a feeling that there was no sun here, as in Arlunn; there was no sun there. But at least it was misty or cloudy there most of the time, and there was a night time and a day time. So, there was the illusion of a sun or daytime.

But it was more than that. The ground was wrong. It wasn't real. The rocks weren't really rocks. There was no soil or dirt. At first, the ground had felt a bit as if he walking on styrofoam or rubber. It felt unnatural. But as Rian walked towards an area with more landscape formations, here there appeared to be rocks, but these felt more like plastic or, again, styrofoam.

Nothing was real.

He sat down on the top of a small hill, overlooking the gray, bleak landscape below. No plants grew here, that he could see. Nor was there any water—no streams or lakes. The whole place was dry, that he could see. He had hoped to find food or water but now he began to despair.

Arryk had doomed him to death, then, out here alone in the wilderness. Also, he'd seen no other entry-points such as Arryk had in his fortress. So the only way in or out of the Interstitium had to be to teleport via an entry-point. Again, the only one he'd seen was back in Arryk's fortress.

So, he would have to turn around and go back—eventually. He could survive for days without food, but already he grew weak from the lack of water. He knew the body couldn't survive for too many days without water. Three at the most. And it had been almost a day since he'd had water.

The idea of crawling back to Arryk and giving in to his command really repelled Rian. He should do it, but he just couldn't bring himself to. Yet. Even though his hunger pangs were persistent.

Maybe, just maybe, Rian would find a source of food or another way out. He wouldn't know if he didn't try. And returning to Arryk's fortress had little appeal other than sheer survival.

A noise made Rian jump. He heard a chittering sort of sound and a scraping sound. Like some large crab moving about. He got up, warily, and looked around but could see nothing.

So, there was something alive in this place. He'd have to be careful. He had no weapons at all. Now, he wished he'd kept his own sword. But Arryk would have taken it from him, so that didn't really matter. Arryk could have at least given him a dagger, then Rian would have some chance of survival, but Arryk didn't even have the decency to do that, or to give Rian at least a water bottle.

That angered him enough, but what really angered Rian, was Arryk's attitude towards Kyran. Arryk hoped that the Arlunni would destroy his brother, whom Arryk called "the magic-spawn." Not that Arryk's opinion was that much different than any of the others on Arlunn, but no one else had said it to Rian's face. Rian wasn't sure if that meant Arryk was worse than all of them, or just more honest. Anyway, he couldn't forgive this. Keeping Kyran alive was Rian's primary goal right now. Nothing else mattered.

Except survival, of course. And out in the Interstitium, that would be very difficult.

Vaguely, Rian wondered if he could eat whatever creature was lurking out there in the semi-darkness. More likely than not, it could eat Rian. And Rian would need to sleep, eventually. Was there a safe place to rest here? He doubted it. He'd have to search for high ground or somewhere that a creature couldn't climb to. And he'd seen no trees, shrubs or bushes of any kind, so he'd have to find a peak or cliff.