Beyond the Rainbow

Ronnie pulled herself from the water and lay on the bank of the river, miles from the Gateway. She needed time to catch her breath. “I’ll just rest her a while and then I can follow the river back to the village.” Ronnie spoke to herself – no one else was anywhere in sight. “They must need my help, but I’ll be no use to them if I don’t close my eyes for just a few minutes. That was quite the ride. They should put something like that in the water park, but without all the rocks. I’m sure I’m going to have bruises everywhere.” She raised her head a little and looked out at her surroundings. “I must have been carried down a side arm of the river. The forest is quite close here. If I just walk back the way I came, I should get back to where I started.” Ronnie yawned deeply. “Yeah, I’ll just rest here a few minutes I’ll take a 15 minute power nap and then I’ll head back. If they really need me, Morpheus will call me in a dream.” She closed her eyes and started to drift into a deep sleep when a shadow fell across her. Thinking it was Black Cloud, she opened her eyes and leaped to her feet.

The creature whose shadow had covered her was not a Harpy. Ronnie was sure of that, but had no clue otherwise as to its identity. Unlike the Iridalites, this being was tall and lithe with an auburn mane that flowed to its waist. Its head was shaped somewhat like a triangle – an upside down triangle. Its body and its voice told Ronnie it was probably a female. Of course it was hard to be sure in this strange land.

“Greetingss,” the creature’s esses came out as soft hisses, with a hint of a whistle. “My name is Seripha and I live nearby. I’ve never sseen you here before. You musst be a guesst of the Iridalitess but you certainly are far from their village and you are wet. Have you been swimming in the river?”

“Hi, yeah I guess I am wet.”, Ronnie replied with a sigh. She was more than a little relieved and happy to meet another friendly being. “I haven’t exactly been swimming, more like trying not to drown. I was swept downstream in a flood. My name is Ronnie. I came to Iridal with Wollomombi. We’re trying to figure out a way to rid the land of the Harpies. Have you seen their storms raging?”

“Oh yess, I have sseen storms in the disstancse. I wondered what wass causing them. Why would the Harpiess be causing trouble in this land? Did they grow bored of wreaking havoc on the Earth Mortals? That’ss what you are issn’t it? I knew there was something familiar about you. I’ve not sseen one of your kind for quite some time. I did not know Wollomombi had cultivated friendships amongst your people. – especially not a friendsship closse enough to causse him to bring one to this land. The Iridalitess must have been surprised to meet you. I wish I had been there to ssee their reaction.”

“It was pretty weird. They all wanted to touch me and I had to shake hands with every one of them. Believe me, that was way too much hand shaking. So, I guess you must be a friend of the Iridalites.” When Seripha said that she considered those creatures to be very good friends and asked again why the Harpies brought their storms to Iridal, Ronnie told her tale. After she’d brought Seripha up to date on all that was going on in Iridal, she asked the creature to return with her and aid her in the quest for a solution to the problem of the Harpies.

Seripha agreed readily to help but suggested Ronnie had been right to rest first and persuaded her to continue her nap. “I will watch over you and sssee that no trouble befallssss you asss you resst.” Ronnie was happy to do just that and curled up on the ground. She immediately fell into a deep sleep. When she reached the Dreamtime World, Morpheus was there.

“Sleep, Ronnie. We have it all under control for now and we need you rested. Come back to us as soon as you feel up to it, but do rest. I would wish you pleasant dreams but will just send one instead.” Ronnie murmured her thanks and drifted deeper into sleep.

In her dream, Ronnie flew up to the clouds and leaped from billow to feathery billow. She’d always wanted to dance on a cloud and now she could! As she whirled and twirled, the Iris Stone pendant swung with her every movement. Suddenly, it tightened on her neck, startling her and rousing her from sleep. What Ronnie felt and saw when she opened her eyes awakened her fully.

Seripha was leaning over her, pulling at the Iris Stone as if attempting to get it off of her neck. Ronnie grabbed the pendant away and leaped to her feet.

“What are you doing? Were you trying to take my Iris Stone?” Ronnie demanded.

“Oh, no Ronnie, I only wanted a closser look at it. I know the magic is yourss. It would be of no usse to anyone elsse. You are the Key Keeper and the wielder of itssss magic.”

“Well, okay. I’m happy to give you a closer look but I won’t take it off. You can see it well enough if I hold it out toward you.” Ronnie was beginning to wonder if she had trusted this creature too quickly, but was still willing to give her the benefit of doubt.

Seripha had not yet risen from her kneeling position and when Ronnie held the Iris Stone out to show it, she could see the creature through the stone. What she saw was a very different Seripha from the one that had presented itself to her.

Seripha’s body, which had seemed to be covered in a tight-fitting one-piece outfit, was actually covered in scales – not luminous ones like Wollomombi – but dark, dank scales. Three long fingers extended from each hand. Her auburn mane was a tangle of snakes and worms and her tongue was forked, as a serpent’s might be (or a liar’s), which Ronnie now suspected she was. She had no idea that she was in the presence of Echidna, the creature of whom Iris had spoken.

She held the pendant fast, clutching it to her body. “Who are you and don’t tell me you’re a friend. I saw you as you really are. You lied to me!”

“Yesss,” the creature’s hiss was more pronounced. “I am Echidna. With the aid of the Harpiesss, I have brought forth ssstormsss beyond your limited imaginingsss. When I take possession of your Irisss Ssstone, you will be powerless to ssstop uss.” She sprang up reaching out for the pendant but Ronnie had already turned to run and run she did – faster than she’d ever run before. When she dared look back, Echidna was far behind. The creature had reverted to her serpent shape and her bulk was rather unwieldy. Ronnie kept running.

Finally, just as she felt she could run no more, the forest around her thickened and provided cover. She sought out a place to hide amongst the underbrush, crawled into it, and waited there for the beast to pass. She turned onto her stomach and peered out at the path, confidant that she could not be seen. The bright pink ferns that surrounded her were the same shade as her T-shirt. She was, for the first time, happy to be wearing such a colour. She could neither see nor hear anything. She lowered her head onto her arms and tried to catch her breath, her mind worked furiously to sort out all that had just happened.

Ronnie reasoned that since Echidna was a lowly beast and friend to the Harpies, she had probably been sent to waylay Ronnie and was not working alone in her attempt to get the Iris Stone. But why the name Seripha; what could it mean? As she wondered and thought, Ronnie sketched the name into the dirt with a twig she had picked up in her nervousness. Once she saw it printed, she realized what it meant. It contained all the letters to spell ‘Harpies’. She silently thanked her mother for all those games of Scrabble they’d played. The pastime had heightened her ability to see words within a jumble of letters.

The thought of her mother caused her eyes to tear as a lump found its way to her throat. She’d not felt so alone, so frightened, so in need of her mother’s embrace since the day she had lost her dad. At the thought of him as well, the tears flowed freely down her cheeks. She wished, for just a minute that she’d never found Wollomombi’s cave, never heard of Iridal. Then she thought of the suffering of the Iridalites and realized that her pity party had better be short lived. She needed to find her way back to the river and then to the Gateway. It was up to her to find a way to keep Iridal and its marvelous creatures safe from the likes of the Harpies and their minions.

A rustling in the bushes caught her attention and Ronnie stilled even her breath. She dared not release the air in her lungs till Echidna had long passed and, even then, she did so as quietly as she could. After a long wait she was confident that the creature was not coming back. She crept out from her hiding place and hurried off in the opposite direction to the one the creature had selected.

Some time and many bramble scratches later, Ronnie peered out at a small meadow. She feared stepping into it. Echidna could be watching from behind any number of big trees or maybe the creature was hunkered down amongst the underbrush that spilled out from the forest. As she stood there perfectly still, wondering what to do and in which direction she should go, music filled her senses. It came from a break in the trees across the meadow. She had heard that music before. She just needed to stop and breath, listen and think. “I know!” Ronnie whispered. Her hand flew to her mouth and she silently cautioned herself to stop thinking aloud. It was Pan’s mournful tune she heard and, remembering what Wollomombi had said about his appearance in her dream, she decided to trust that sound. She bolted across the meadow toward it.