Alex

'I stepped through the portal clutching the Travel Rod, and then, just as suddenly as Travelling on our world, I was somewhere else. But it did differ from normal Travelling – my sense were reeling, I felt completely confused, befuddled even, and I could not see clearly, everything was blurred.

'Slowly I realised that I was on all fours, the ground rough and stony under my fingers, and hot to the touch.

'As my wits returned and my sight began to clear, I tried to push myself up to stand.It was then that the fear took me.

"Never before had I felt terror so great, not even in my darkest nightmare. Things happened in my body then that I am ashamed to talk of, especially to you Alex. So please forgive me if I leave those details out.

'He spoke to me then, and the fear increased a hundred fold. I wanted to run, I wanted to bury myself like those ostrich birds you have here. I would have done anything to get away from that voice and the terror it brought. Gone, you see, were the kind words and caring tones. His voice then, I believe, was from his true self. How he would always be if he did not need to bend others to his will.

'Even today, all these years later, I remember clearly his words to me, and his mocking tone.

‘“Rise,” he said. “Look around. See my world. Look and enjoy as the last of my amusements pass into the great beyond. Stand witness to the fate soon to be that of your own world. Know that it is you, Jalholm, the Greatest of Scholars, that brings this, the greatest of my gifts, to your world.”

'And then he laughed, a terrible mocking laugh, filled with malevolence and hatred, hatred of all things.

'As I looked around at his world, I cried and vomited in equal measure at the horror I saw.

'I was stood on a hill. In front of me, as far as the eye could see in all directions, was a flat, barren plain. Barren that is except for the corpses. Thousands… hundreds of thousands of them, all twisted into unbelievable shapes by the forces that had killed them. The faces of those closest were contorted in agony, with screams of their death throes still frozen in place.

'On some, limbs had been torn away as if by a child plucking wings off insects, whilst with others, heads were twisted and hanging at ridiculous angles, almost as if boneless. Hundreds lay with their innards piled high on their chests.

'It was horrific beyond imagining. He made me traverse the whole hill. In all directions the view was the same… millions must have died there.

'His voice changed again then, becoming the voice of gentle kindness, the voice I had so long listened to through my Looking Eye. As I looked upon him, he was perfection itself, an Adonis, the Supreme Being… I worshipped him. It was brief, ever so brief, the illusion vanishing as he again spoke.

“These were my armies, those I would bring to conquer your world. But I grew bored. The game tired me. With such an army how would I amuse myself? Where would I find my enjoyment and what would be the challenge? No, it is better that I begin anew with your world. Better to take my time and savour my conquest. And I am strengthened by my armies’ sacrifices… their fear, and pain has fed me. I am sated now, and ready to begin afresh. The challenge will be good for me.”

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'He laughed again then, though there was no joy in his voice or his eyes as he continued.

‘“Come. I will show you my mercy,” he commanded, as he walked down the hill and into the dead. We walked for what seemed an eternity, the bodies somehow moving aside where we walked, and then closing behind us, as if the clear path I stood on was but an illusion. I wanted to close my eyes, to look away, to look anywhere but at what surrounded me. But I could not, no matter how hard I tried, I could not pull my eyes away, and all the time he laughed, an evil, inhuman laugh.

'The bodies were in various states of decay, some still twitching and groaning, alive despite horrific injuries. All, the living and the dead, somehow bowed their heads as he passed, and then their eyes fell on me, their stare willing me to see what it was I unleashed upon my world. But still I could not turn away.

‘An age later, he stopped and beckoned me forward. “Behold, see my mercy,” he said.

‘Before us were about a hundred men and women, all naked, all chained to stakes, all prostrated on the hard rocky ground. None moved, none looked up, but I knew their terror. I heard it in their low moans and sobs. I saw it in the trembling of their limbs. I felt it in my bowels.

‘“These I allow to live. They will be free. This world will belong to them alone when I leave. Am I not truly merciful?”

'The laugh that followed was as terrifying as it was inhuman. I prostrated myself, and became one with those that he would free.

‘“I am akin to the class you term Farmers,” he said. “I, too, grow my own sustenance. What good would it do to kill them all now? What would I feed on in the millennium to come? No, these are the seed that will repopulate this world, ready for the time when I return. These few will provide a fine harvest given time.”

'And then I was stood before him again, my eyes wide and adoring, as the kindly god before me spoke.

“Come. Your world awaits my coming.”

‘As I turned to follow, the shackles crumbled from those before me, almost as if they had never existed. But not a one of them moved. Their fear kept them pressed hard to the ground, as it would have me had he not commanded me to follow.

‘I brought him back then to Ellas. Despite all I had seen, all the death. I could do nothing else, I had to obey him.’

Jalholm had tears in his eyes, all sarcasm or mocking had long since left his voice. But as I started to speak he cut me off.

‘Wait, there is one other thing, something that has troubled me since I first came to your world… something that I do not understand, but believe to be of great importance.

'As I stepped through the portal to bring him to Ellas, low on the horizon, I saw a moon. It was not a full moon, but more a three quarter moon, that which you call a Gibbous moon. It was very distinctive but as you can imagine, I was not sightseeing, and the image of that moon did not register at all with me then.

'My eyes saw it, and my mind stored away the image, but my conscious mind did not see it at all… not until I came here to your world… I am certain that the moon I saw that day was your moon.

'I have no doubt at all of that, and so the world I left behind, the one he had devastated, must therefore have been this one, your Earth.’

‘That’s ridiculous!’ I blurted. ‘How could it have been Earth? You said that the world was destroyed, that nothing lived there. The moon you saw just looked like our moon, that’s all. You said yourself that it was not even a full moon… and it was a long time ago. Your memory is just playing tricks with you.’

‘It was your moon, Alex, and the world was your planet. I do not understand how, but it was your world, I promise you. The only explanation or theory that I have been able to reason out, is that it was Earth, but thousands or even hundreds of thousands of years ago in the past, and that the barrier, the grey mist, was time itself.

'When I breached the barrier, I opened a portal, not just across the vastness of space but across time itself, to bring him to Ellas from your distant past.

'It would explain why his Rod alone was not sufficiently powerful to bring him to Ellas, and yet that very same rod allowed David to travel here.

'This is all a theory of course, no more than a guess, perhaps. But of this much I am certain – the moon I saw was the one that orbits this very world.’