Robe

Chapter 10

When something is seen that is beyond the range of all a person has experienced, the challenge it poses can be insurmountable at first, and then, as the observer becomes used to the phenomenon, gradually overcome, perhaps eventually accepted as a part of nature, as if such a thing always was. But this acquiescence takes time, and first encounters are always the greatest shocks. So, with this in mind, let us join Rusty in beholding the sight that entranced Sonic, when we first met her as she stood at the garden gate and gaped at the sky.

As Rusty stepped out of the doorway, Sonic's grip on his hand tightened, as though she too were steeling herself for the experience.

"What's the big deal?" Rusty asked, and looked up slowly. The sky was blue and cloudless from the horizon upward, but as his eyes followed the blue toward the zenith above them –

He fell to his knees.

The light coming from the sky was not from the Sun. Instead, a brilliantly white beam stretched from one horizon to the other, a river of pure light that cut the sky in two. This line sat in a gaping inverted chasm, the edges of which swirled possibly millions – no, billions – of multi-colored, sparkling orbs that slowly ascended toward the center, toward the whiteness. The sheer magnitude of the phenomenon above Rusty – this was the sky! – took all the air out of his lungs, and he felt like he was falling, falling upward toward that brilliant whiteness, that line of fire, into the chasm, following those stars that swirled and fell (fell?), drawn to the center that was... that was...

He passed out.

Dresden was also looking up at what was called, in the language of the Hep, the Line. He didn't see anything out of the ordinary.

"Is he well?" he asked Sonic, who was kneeling next to the unconscious outsider. "He was like this earlier, when I found him. By the Highest, it is as if neither of you have ever seen the Line before."

Sonic looked up at him. She had the other boy's wrist in her hand, pressing it. "He is well," she said, but thought: Kind of. "And neither of... the boy and I have ever seen the Line before, Dresden. My land... my land have no Line."

"But how is that possible? What about the Dark, do you have the Dark?"

Sonic nodded. "My land have the Dark," she said. Maybe.

"So, without the Line, how do you see?" Dresden asked, genuinely puzzled. "What lights the sky during the daytime?"

"My land have... lights the sky during the daytime," Sonic replied. It was as good an answer as she could manage.

"And how do you travel?" Dresden asked. He glanced up at the Line before continuing. "Here, you can always know where you are by the Line, it's just common sense."

"How do you know where you are by the Line, Dresden?" Sonic asked. She had one hand over the boy's face, and was checking his eyes.

Dresden was well and truly perplexed. Where are these outsiders from? "The Line moves as the day passes," he said, not quite believing that he needed to explain. To him, what he was describing was beyond merely fundamental; it was as if he had to describe breathing, or seeing, or being alive. "We call the direction it moves 'Lineward'. The opposite direction is where the Dark comes from, so that is 'Darkward'. So, if you face 'Lineward' and follow the line left, that is 'left of the Line', and if you go right, 'right of the Line'. Every... every child knows this. It is simple."