Dylan Chan
For the past 46 minutes Dylan Chan had been listening to his mothers argue. He wasn’t trying to listen. At ten years old he knew listening to other people’s conversations was rude. It wasn’t his fault his mothers were yelling. He was trying to focus on building the Lego Deathstar in front of him, and every so often a word from their argument upstairs would trickle down.
“Moore is...dangerous....sell it...under...for Dylan...lost.” More of what is dangerous? Dylan wondered. He had heard his own name too, and wondered if they were fighting about him. The thought made his tummy twist uncomfortably, like it was trying to sit criss-cross inside him. He added another piece to the Deathstar, but he wasn’t very focused on it. If they were talking about him...then it would be ok to listen right? It was rude to talk about other people so if they were being rude first then he could listen to what they were saying. It was only fair.
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Somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that two wrongs didn’t make a right, but they were his moms. He had a right to know! He crept to the staircase and walked carefully on the edges where the wood wasn’t as worn down. His Mom was a writer and in one of her books that she read to him she had written about a thief who had broken into a family’s house and snuck around this way. His Ma was an archaeologist, which should have meant she went on great adventures like Indiana Jones, but actually meant she spent a lot of time in a lab “dating” pieces. He had asked Mom once when he was little how she felt about Ma dating pieces while they were married and Mom had laughed till he cried.
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Dylan smiled at the memory and hesitated at the top of the stairs. He was right next to his moms’ room here and could hear them better.
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“--on the cusp of the greatest discovery in millenium!”
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“Do you even care about what that could mean for the world? What if there are people there Xiao?”
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“Exactly! What if there are? What kind of culture would have developed? What kind of stories–”
“Don’t tempt me with stories. I know stories. And I know that if they’re still down there they have their reasons. Do you think they’ll thank you–”
Dylan could hear footsteps from inside the bedroom approaching the door. He looked around wildly still hovering on the stairs. He could start running down them but he would be caught in the open. He darted down the hall and through the first open door. He just barely stopped himself from slamming it closed instead swinging it so that it remained open just a crack. It turned out he hadn’t needed to run. Ma must have been pacing, which she did when she was thinking hard. The door to the bedroom never opened, and Dylan could hear footsteps still thumping behind the bedroom door if he listened hard.
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Stupid moms. Yelling and keeping secrets from him. They were the ones who always told him secrets were bad! Dylan could still hear the occasional word from where he was, but they seemed to have stopped the shouting. It also hadn’t seemed like they were talking about him after all. It was just about Ma’s boring lab work. Dylan glanced around the room he was hiding in. He was in his Moms’ office. He glanced out the large windows bored. It was a beautiful afternoon, and everyone who visited their house always said he was so lucky to live next to such a view, but he would have rather lived in a big city. Somewhere exciting with lots of people, and where stuff was always happening. Nothing ever happened to them out on the edge of the world.
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Dylan began to explore the office. He wasn’t technically allowed to be in here, and usually one of his moms was always in here working, while the other was with him. He realized that this was a rare chance to look around. He wandered over to the bookshelf recognizing some of the books in a stack as one’s written by his Mom. They were the adult books she had written before he was born, and he wasn’t allowed to read them yet, although he knew they were very popular and a lot of other people got to read them and had made Mom famous.
Leaning up on his tiptoes he began to pull these books from the shelves. He pulled the first two off ok and set them on the floor, but he became unbalanced when pulling the third and the black book it was sitting on top off came flying off the shelf. Dylan fell to his knees and threw his arms out catching the black book before it could hit the ground. He froze for a few breaths straining carefully to see if his moms had heard anything. Their harmony remained consistent with the steady pattern of Ma’s footsteps, and the murmur of their voices. Releasing his breath he looked down at what he had caught and realized it wasn’t a book. Actually he recognized the object. It was the box he had painted for his Ma for her birthday last year.
Dylan was overcome with curiosity. He wondered what she kept in the box he had made for her. Glancing at the door, still open a crack he decided that as he had made the box he had a right to open it whenever he wanted.
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He gaped at what was inside and felt his heartbeat speed up. Inside the box was a silver chain with a white rock or crystal on it. Treasure! Had it come from Ma’s job? Was she like Indiana Jones? As he looked at the necklace Dylan felt a strong and sudden desire to keep it. He didn’t care that it was a necklace and those were for girls. It was a cool rock and he wanted it. He wanted it so bad for a moment he was almost dizzy with the wanting. Before he was even aware he was doing it he was putting the necklace in the pocket of his shorts and putting the box and the books back on the shelf. If you had asked him, he would have told you that stealing was wrong, and that he would never steal, but despite knowing this none of it seemed to occur to him as he acted almost on autopilot to hide his crime.
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He made his way out of his moms office seeing no point in exploring more now that he had found treasure and walked toward the stairs. He was right in front of his moms bedroom so deep in thought that he missed when the voices stopped, and didn’t expect it when the door swung open.
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For a moment the three of them just stood on the landing of the stairs staring at each other in dull surprise. Then his moms looked at each other with concern.
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“Dylan,” Mom started.
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“Can I go outside?” He asked.
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“What?” Mom responded startled. Either at his interrupting her, or more likely in surprise at the question.
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“I came up to ask if I can go outside. I got stuck on the Death Star.”
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“Do you want help, honey?” Ma asked.
“No. I want to go outside.” He insisted, then realizing he was being rude he added, “if that’s ok.”
His moms glanced at each other for just a moment before looking away quickly, as if now that the shock of seeing him had worn off they remembered they were fighting.
“That’s a good idea,” Mom said, “we should start on dinner while you play.”
Dylan nodded, already turning and running down the steps.
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“Be careful!” Ma called as she always did.
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After finding his shoes and stuffing them on without undoing the laces he raced out. It was Summer and the sun was still pretty high in the sky. He made his way to the edge of the cliffs where the house was built. His whole life his moms had told him never to play too close to the cliffs, and they had been talking about hiring someone to put in a railing for years. It had only been in the past year or so that Dylan had even been allowed to be out here on his own. Since he had broken so many rules already today he didn’t think much of it and walked right to the edge of the cliff.
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He pulled out the treasure he had stolen. He didn’t know why, but he wanted to look at it out here. He held the crystal up to the sun and looked at the light shining through. The rock wasn’t clear all the way through, and the sun didn’t make the fogginess inside the crystal go away.
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He frowned. He had been so sure, so certain there was something special about the crystal… so sure something like out of his Mom’s stories would happen if he just brought the treasure outside.
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He ran his fingers over the chain. It was still cool, he decided, but he wished something had happened.
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“Dylan!” One of his mothers was yelling at him. He startled at the sound of her voice and to his horror he dropped the necklace. He scrambled closer to the edge of the cliff watching as it fell into the sea.
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“Dylan!” He turned, ready to call something back, an apology, or an acknowledgement or anything, but moved too fast. He was crouched too close to the edge and realized with a swoop in his tummy that he had moved his back foot too far when he turned. He pinwield his arms staring in one long frozen moment at his Ma running towards him from the house.
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Then he went over the edge of the cliff.
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Dylan was sure he screamed. He must have, but he couldn’t remember doing it. Maybe he had been too afraid to. Dylan could swim but his Ma had warned him that from this high up it didn’t really matter.
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Dylan fell toward the waves. And then the waves leaped up and met him. Dylan didn’t feel like he had crashed through the ocean. Instead he felt like he was being tumbled over and over in the washing machine. Finally out of confusion he opened his eyes but could only see things in flashes: a wall of water which he was being bounced off of, massive shadows on the other side--whales? Sharks?-- and for a moment something that seemed even bigger. He continued being spun and thrown until he was sure he was going to throw up, sure his head was going fall off his body and keep spinning like a top even after he was dead, and just when he was sure he couldn’t take it anymore the vortex of water he was in spat him out in front of a metal door.
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Dylan took a few minutes to lay on his back, and then a few minutes more when he realized he had stopped spinning and that it was the water above him that was still moving. Finally he got up onto his knees and looked around. He saw very close to the wall of water was the necklace he had stolen from his mother. It had been carried here too. He grabbed it and put it in his pocket.
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He stood in front of the metal door for a moment. There didn’t seem to be a handle. Shrugging Dylan knocked. Nothing happened. Using his fists Dylan knocked louder. After a moment there was a loud click like a lock turning over and the door creaked open.
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On the other side was an older woman with grey hair and a white dress. No not a dress exactly, Dylan thought. It was more like a cape. Robes maybe, like the wizard in Mom’s book.
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“Yes?” The maybe-a-wizard asked. She was tall and was looking past his head. Dylan cleared his throat.
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The maybe-a-wizard looked down at him with surprise and then seemed to do a double take. “What? How did you--” then she paused and shook her head, “Can you understand me?”
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Dylan thought that was a dumb question, but if he wanted to get home he might need this maybe-wizard’s help so he just nodded instead.
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“You can?”
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“Yes,” Dylan clarified, hoping he didn’t sound too like Ma when she had been working late.
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“Oh,” Despite asking the maybe-wizard didn’t seem to know what to do with this information.
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“Are you going to let me in?” Dylan asked, figuring one of them had to get to the point. He had done his part and knocked, and it was her job to make the next move. That was manners.
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“Oh,” she said, “Yes. I suppose I should. I can’t leave you in the portal can I?” Some part of Dylan registered the word portal with excitement. The other part was just happy to get away from the water that had tossed him around like a ride at the fair.
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The maybe-wizard stepped aside and let him through the metal door. He heard her laugh as his jaw hit the floor. Above him was a city of massive black stone. The city was lit by glowing and floating balls of lights in all the colours of the rainbow. Flying among the lights Dylan thought he saw a group of kids his age floating on boards or hovering by themselves as they played some sort of game. Above the city and above the kids were silver beams of light that formed a dome, and above that dome was water. Dylan saw the shadows of a whole school of sea turtles pass over their heads.
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“Magic,” he breathed. It had to be.
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“Welcome, young traveler to the Last City of Magic.”
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The maybe-wizard was smiling at him. “Now lets see if we can’t sort this out, ok?’
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“Can I fly?’ Dylan asked.
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The woman’s smile slipped for a moment. “Maybe,” she decided after a moment and began to lead him down a path made of stones that lead up to the city. It was lit by those floating balls of glowing green light and lined with strange pink and silver flowers. Dylan wondered if they were magic too, if the maybe-wizard could make potions out of them.
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“Is this your garden?” He asked, trotting to keep up with the maybe-wizard's steps.
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“Hmm?” she said, making the same sound Mom did if you interrupted her while she was writing, “No. No. The City would have planted that. Someone on the Coven would be in charge of maintaining this public space.”
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“How did you hear me then?”
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“Hmmm?”
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“Well if you don’t own the garden how did you hear me all the way from the city when I knocked?”
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“Oh well I was in my office and one of my artifacts started going crazy, lighting up and shaking you know? It was the Old Bell. It used to do that when the portal was open and Travelers came.”
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“And it made you go and check the door.”
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“Yes,” the almost-definitely-a-wizard looked at him out of the corner of her eyes, “I was almost certain it was some kind of mistake. The Bell hasn’t rung in centuries.”
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“You haven’t had visitors in that long?” Dylan asked as they walked through the twisting stone paths of the city and up to a massive building with columns holding up the ceiling. She spoke some words and the doors creaked open.
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“Out of curiosity did you understand that?”
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“No,” Dylan said staring up at the wizard, whom he had just seen do magic.
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“Hmmm,” she motioned for him to enter the building. “this is the Library. It's where the coven will be at this time. Oh, and to answer your question Dylan Chan, we haven’t had visitors here in a very, very, long time.”
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She knows my name! Dylan thought, then wondered if she could read minds or if it was just names she could tell. He soon became distracted from these thoughts when he entered the Library. The lights in here were purple and blue and pink floating between the stone shelves and reflecting off the black stone in a way that was both beautiful and intimidating.
His wizard guide led him through the stacks to the reading area at the back of the Library. “These are our leaders so try to be polite. Just be honest, and we’ll try to help you Ok?” She whispered to him.
Dylan nodded, rubbing his sweaty hands on his t-shirt. When she had said he was meeting leaders Dylan had expected thrones on a raised dais. Instead at the back of the library was a reading area with three chairs equidistant from a fire. The fire was a blazing white but as they approached Dylan didn’t feel himself get any warmer even though he knew from science class that white flame was the hottest.
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There were three women in the three chairs. To his left sat an old woman in an armchair reading with a blue light hovering over her shoulder. In the middle sat a woman about his Mom’s age with only some grey in her hair and a few lines around her eyes. She sat in a rocking chair and had two books balanced on her lap. She was writing or copying something from one book into another with a purple light hovering just above the pages. In the chair on the left sat a much younger woman, Dylan thought she might have been a teenager. She sat with her legs thrown over the one arm of her chair and her back pressed against the other. She had a pink light in her hand and it was the book that was hovering in front of her face.
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“Coven,” the wizard spoke. Dylan studied the other women as they turned to him with surprise, interest, and curiosity. He decided they weren’t wizards like his guide. They were witches. Dylan couldn’t say how he knew this and if pressed for the difference the best he answer he would have been able to give would have been “she studied magic and practiced a little. They did magic, and never had to practice at all.”
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“What are you doing here, traveler?” The oldest witch asked him.
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“I’m lost,” he said, remembering the wizard’s advice and being as honest as possible.
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“How did you get here?” The middlest witch asked.
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“I fell off a cliff.” he answered as true as he knew how to be.
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“Why?” The youngest witch asked him.
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“Huh?” He asked.
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“Why did you fall?”
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That’s a dumb question Dylan thought. Nobody falls on purpose. Then he realized that maybe it wasn’t a dumb question after all. It had a smart answer. He didn’t want to give it, but he didn’t want to get on the bad side of these witches more. “I dropped the necklace. I looked over to see it go over the cliff and I lost my balance. That’s why I fell.”
“The necklace?” The middlest asked.
“If he found an artifact it would explain how he fell into a portal,” the oldest explained.
“How did he find an artifact, Artificer?” The youngest asked while the white fire reflected dangerously in her eyes.
Dylan’s wizard straightened. “We never got them all back. In our history there have been a few Adventurers who never made it back from their exploring of the surface.”
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“So, you have something for us then?” The oldest witch asked peering down at Dylan. He nodded and reached into his pocket producing the necklace.
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The oldest witch leaned forward to take it but Dylan clutched it to his chest. “I don’t want to get in trouble.” He said.
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“You won't,” the middlest assured, “you’ve done us a great service returning what is magical back to the City. We’ll even give you a reward.”
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“But I…”Dylan knew he had to be honest but he suddenly realized that he had stolen the necklace. Before the desire to take it had been so strong he hadn’t really thought about what he was doing but the realization hit him now. “It’s my mother’s. I don’t know if I should give it to you.”
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“It's not hers. It belongs to our people,” the youngest said. “It doesn’t belong in your world.”
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Something about the way she said that reminded Dylan of his parents' argument earlier. Something being dangerous...being more dangerous.
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“Is it dangerous?” He asked looking up at the wizard.
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She tilted her head and studied him. “Yes. And no. In the wrong hands yes.”
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“And in yours?” He asked not thinking if it was rude or brave just wanting to know.
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A raspy laugh drew him from his staring contest to the oldest witch. “In our hands it will be studied and most likely sit on a shelf of the Artificer here. I doubt we’ll have much use for it these days.”
“Why?”
“Because it opens a door to the surface,” the middlest one said patiently.
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“And we don’t go there anymore, so we won't use it.” The youngest finished bluntly.
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Dylan thought about that. “With great power comes great responsibility,” he said seriously.
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The witches and wizard glanced at each other.
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“Yes,” the wizard said, “you are very wise for your age.”
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Dylan decided that the rule to be honest didn’t have to apply to explaining Spider-Man to them and nodded. After a moment of hesitation he handed the necklace to the oldest witch. The white fire seemed to blaze even brighter as she held it and Dylan had to look away to blink spots out of his eyes.
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“Thank you,” the middlest said.
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“Artificer, why don’t you help him get home? I’m sure people are worried about him,” the youngest suggested or ordered it was hard to tell.
The wizard inclined her head in a bow and after a moment Dylan did the same though it only seemed to amuse the witches when he did it. The oldest witch handed the necklace to the wizard who tucked it into her robe. He followed her out of the library. He wondered about his reward but didn’t say anything remembering the rule about being polite.
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For a moment he and the wizard stood blinking at the towering stone city and the swirling magical lights overhead. Then she smiled down at him. She took off the hood of her robe and tossed it in front of her. It hovered above the steps of the library.
“Well,” she said, “you wanted to fly. Climb on.” Dylan grinned, and they rode her robe like a magic carpet back to the stone path. The wizard stooped down and picked one of the strange flowers from the path. Then after a moment's hesitation she grabbed one of glowing balls of light.
They reached the metal door. “I have a couple things for you, alright?”
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Dylan nodded slowly to show he was listening. As excited as he was from the flying he felt how serious she was being.
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“First take this,” she handed him a flower. It was pretty, but Dylan didn’t know how to make potions, which would have been cooler.
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The wizard brushed one of the pink and silver petals. “When you reach the end of the tunnel before you go back to your world eat three petals from this flower. If you fell into deep water the portal will take you back to where you fell. These petals will allow you to survive in the water for two hours each. Six should be more than enough for someone to rescue you, but keep the rest of the flower with you in case. Dylan nodded. He didn’t want to go back through the vortex that tossed him around, but he understood it was his only way home.
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“I also want you to have this.” She handed him the small glowing ball of green light.
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He reached for it with a shaking hand. “Can I do magic?” He asked.
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She shook her head. “On the surface it will change and just be a pretty rock. But it will be a pretty rock from the Last City of Magic.”
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That was cool. Dylan saw this orb was a bit smaller than the other floating orbs. It was about half the size of his fist as opposed to the whole fist. He tucked it into his pocket.
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“Thank you,” he said, not just for the reward.
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“You’re welcome. It was my honour” she said, not just for giving it to him.
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The wizard said a few words with the crystal clenched in her fist. Dylan approached the open door. He saw the vortex in front of him. He looked back, at the wizard, at the city of flying, and light, and so much magic. He thought about his Ma’s face as she watched him fall.
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He pulled off a petal and began to chew. “Good-Bye!” He yelled over his shoulder as he headed into the vortex. Since he walked in he wasn’t immediately tossed around like he had been before. Instead he followed the path of the tunnel watching all the incredible shadows of sea creatures and making faces at the fish that passed around and above him. Eventually he made his way to the other side. He thought he recognized the smell of the sea here. It was different from the smell of the Last City of Magic, or the smell of the tunnel which was almost electric. This sea smelt like home. He chewed on another petal for luck and closed his eyes. He jumped.
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When Dylan woke up he was at the base of the cliffs. He was in his Mom’s arms as she sobbed over him in relief. His Ma was holding them both, her short hair not hiding the tear tracks on her face either.
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“I’m sorry,” Dylan croaked to them. The petals had worked keeping him alive as the ocean tossed him around a second time. Eventually he must have fallen asleep or passed out. His mothers must have seen him from the cliff because they ran down and plunged into the sea to get him. He wondered how much time had passed since when he fell to when they saw him again. If it had been hours or if the wizard had created a tunnel in time as well as in the sea.
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In his mothers’ arms it didn’t seem to matter.
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“Don’t be sorry,” his Ma said. “Just don’t ever do that again.”
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“Alright,” he said and then fell asleep or passed out again.
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Eventually he told his Mom all about what he had seen in the Last City. Even though she wrote about magic all the time she told him he must have been dreaming as he was in the ocean. Strangely it was Ma, who was usually the more practical one, who seemed to believe him. She never asked him about the necklace missing from his box and he could never bring himself to tell her about taking it. Sometimes though he caught her looking at the waves by their house with a calculated look in her eyes and he thought that she knew it had gone over the cliff, and that he had briefly gone with it to its new home.
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Neither of his mothers ever liked to talk about that afternoon. There were two changes to their house that revealed the incident had happened at all. Firstly, that weekend a railing had been put in all round the cliff surrounding their property, a reminder of Dylan’s fall. Secondly, on Dylan’s bedside table sat a beautiful piece of perfectly round and perfectly smooth beach glass in shape of an orb. A reward and a reminder of his stay at the Last City of Magic.
