The Amazing Tales of Princess Amelia
Chapter 7:-
Characters may be based on imaginary real people, perhaps.
Grandpa Ant was beaming ear to ear with joy at the safe arrival of his grandson Sebastian, best friend Merklin the wizard, and his faithful messenger Rook. In the beautiful sandstone and emerald granite-paved entrance courtyard to the castle, he spun around and said to them “Now could I ask you all to sit here by the fountain for just five minutes, whilst I go inside and ensure that no one spoils the surprise. I promise that you will be truly astounded! Amelia, please make sure they behave themselves” he joked with a wink. He rushed inside before they could answer, and called for the guards to ensure that no one approached the courtyard until further instructed, and to not spoil the surprise under any circumstances.
He quickly explained to Queens Emma, Stephania and the others there, to spread the word that no one was to say anything to Merklin, Sebastian or Rook about the events of the last few weeks, while they were given a chance to bath, change and eat. He would personally take them to meet the ‘Red Witch’ Tallia immediately after. He also asked the whereabouts of the Master of Arms, Roger, and was told that he was inspecting his soldiers in the north court. He asked the head butler to please bring the guests in and see to their needs, while he rushed out to discuss with Roger the report of this new Terraloon that had attempted to abduct Merklin, and so badly scared Sebastian and Rook.
“Oh no, not again!” groaned Roger, smacking the palm of his hand against his forehead, and leaving a bright red mark “This must be the one that Tallia couldn’t contact. We must warn those in the cavern too and just hope we’re not too late”. Just at that moment a royal Jewel castle horseman, resplendent in his white and blue light armour, galloped in through the court gates, dismounted painfully from his stunningly beautiful glistening black steed, which had a contrasting long white mane and hooves, and rushed over limping and wide eyed, to inform them that a really gigantic Terraloon had crashed it’s way past them, toward the cavern but amazingly had not seriously injured any of them. Grandpa Ant felt his blood run cold and his spine tingle at this dreadful news.
Grandpa Ant and Roger then decided that the guards remain vigilant and set the traps to the Keep, but for now avoid the full castle shutdown, unless he hadn’t returned in the next half hour. Roger and the guards looked on in amazement as Grandpa Ant activated his anti gravity device and flew off into the distance and over the crater ridge. Five minutes later sergeant Toodles rode up to Roger and proudly informed him of the latest news at the cavern, and that the very last Terraloon was safely aboard the Red Witch Tallia’s craft. Roger felt immense relief sweep over him. With a mischievous glint in his eye he knocked sergeant Toodles hat off and the men roared with laughter. Then Roger put his arm around the sergeant’s shoulders and said “You’re one of my finest men Toodles, let’s go for a drink. C’mon all you men! It’s time to finally relax and celebrate the sergeant’s great news. Let’s spread the news”
There had never been such a big joyous party in the kingdom before. A large fairground was set up in the castle grounds and visitors from the villages in the kingdom, from Castle Jewel and the village of Apple and from Marshall Mathew’s Star Lake, all came to celebrate and marvel at the many new wonders shown them. Fireworks were exploded at dusk, musicians filled the air with sound, colourful dancers pranced around large crackling bonfires and children ran about shouting and laughing until their bedtimes. The grounds were filled with tall circular tents and other forms of accommodation, for the three-week stay, although many slept out under the stars.
Sebastian, Reese, Harry, Amelia and their youngest visiting cousin Archer were lying on raked-out straw, looking up at the stars, waiting to see who would see the next shooting star first. They made a game out of everything and now argued about who was quickest to shout out and point. There was no moon and it was a clear night, so the stars were really bright. “What’s that?” asked Amelia, pointing at a very large dark object moving across the stars. It was strange and they decided it wasn’t a bird, and seemed too large and far away for a cloud. “It’s creepy the way it moves!” said Sebastian, and Amelia felt a chill run up her spine. Reese could feel goose-bumps rise on her arms, and hugged against Harry. Harry stared with eyes wide and said in a low voice “It’s stopped!” He was right, the object had moved across a cluster of stars and then just stopped in one place. Archer just pointed at it wide eyed. They waited for what seemed like ages for it to move on but it didn’t. “It’s watching us!” whispered Reese. Now they were all starting to feel a bit scared to move, even with the sounds of the music and crackling fires just over the rise behind them. “No one will believe us!” said Sebastian “Now that it’s not moving, it just looks like a dark part of the sky”.
“What’s up children? You all look a bit serious” said Merklin from behind them, giving them all a bit of a fright. “Quickly lie down and look up there Merklin” said Amelia. “We’ve all seen a big black oval shape move across the stars and now it’s stopped in one spot over there. See there, just to the right of the three bright stars in a row?” Merklin lay down next to Amelia and looked hard at the night sky. It took his eyes a while to adjust and then he saw it! He knew the sky well and whatever was blocking the Angel Speckles and Syrus Cluster was large indeed. He would have presumed it was a dense cloud of sorts but from the kids’ description of its movement and the lack of any light edge, common to clouds at night, he realized that it must be sitting in space, and as large as a kingdom. “Wait here kids, I must chat with Grandpa Ant and Tallia about it and will be right back”
Soon Tallia, Grandpa Ant, Merklin and King Jay were lying down with the children examining the dark shape. Tallia spoke softly “I have ordered Mog to shut off all power to my craft and reinstate the inert black wall. The ship type is unknown to our data but is an ovaloid just over two hundred miles long, fifty miles diameter and very close. It may be hostile and is very likely scanning this world, but in search of what I don’t know”. Tallia continued in a low voice “While it is here it is important that we do not use the levitation devices nor any special power items such as the ExCaleebra swords. Urgently place such items under the black cloaks” she said, meaning the folded pile of black material now in the armoury “and Amelia please place your pendant and ring in this bag and pull closed the drawstrings”. Amelia exclaimed that the bag felt strangely heavy but did as she was told and hung it back around her neck.
King Jay rose and ordered Roger to urgently take his and the other Azlan powered weapons to the armoury, and place them all under the black cloaks, and report back with the Marshall, Luke and King El. Also to ensure that no one be alarmed, but continue with the celebrations. The Queens were to be told that the men were teaching the children about the stars, if they inquired. Normally they would be informed immediately of all urgent matters, but until they had a better idea of the risks it seemed awful to spoil their joyful evening at this time.
As soon as Matt, Luke and El arrived with Roger, they too lay down and were informed of the large spaceship. Tallia continued quietly, turning over onto her stomach “It is highly likely that they can see in great detail and possibly even hear our voices if they zoom in close enough so please all turn onto your stomachs as I have and try not to stare in their direction, which might draw their attention”.
“I told you it was watching us” whispered Reese to Sebastian.
“They will consider us primitive I imagine” continued Tallia “but they may take an interest in the large airship in the crater. We will just have to wait and see. Reese, lay on your back again and without staring too obviously at it, tell me if you see any movement. We should all take turns doing the same, to avoid arousing suspicion. Keep your voices low and aimed at the ground if talking about the ship”.
“There are some tiny light circles coming out of it!” Amelia whispered loudly after flipping on to her stomach. Everyone immediately turned to look before remembering not to stare. Tallia turned onto her side and watched the three approaching craft out the corner of her eye. Two were heading for the crater and the other remained high above the celebrating crowd. She warned Mog to cease communication with her unless they breached the black wall. She hoped that these new-comers would presume an ancient civilization had come and gone, and not attempt to penetrate the black wall. Her spacecraft was the only hope she had of ever seeing her planet again. Amelia touched her arm and whispered “So sorry Tallia!” Tallia embraced her in a hug. “Thank you little one. I think it will be allright. Don’t fear ok?”
King Jay and his brothers were stunned by the enormity of this event in their lives. It was hard enough to cope with the discoveries in the caves, never mind the giant airship and then coming face to face with the beautiful alien ‘Red Witch’ Tallia and all she revealed. And now there was an unbelievably large alien vessel, that if hostile could destroy them all. “What on earth do we do guys? Any ideas because I’m getting mighty restless right now?” said King El. King Jay got up and stated loudly “Well not much we can do but enjoy the party. I’m going to dance with my beautiful wife. Do you kids want to have a bit of fun? Say nothing about this but let’s go and dance hey?” The children immediately got up and ran to the dance floor laughing again, relieved that their dads weren’t acting fretful. Tallia also decided to rejoin the celebrations and accompanied Grandpa Ant and Merklin to the dance floor. What will be will, she decided, wrapping the large silk robe and hood around her body and head to hide her glowing red hair and green skin from the skies above.
The queens were gently advised of the situation by their husbands during the dance, but before they had time to react or resolve a course of action, one of the villagers shouted out loudly “What the blazes is that?” pointing up at the sky. There was loud murmuring and yelling, mostly in fear, as the crowds stopped dancing and even the musicians stopped playing one by one, as they noticed the crowd’s strange behaviour and excitedly pointing fingers. Initially everyone stood in awe and stunned silence as they witnessed a strange glowing yellow egg- shaped craft silently dropping down toward them from an impossibly large black halo-edged circle in the sky. It stopped about 100 feet above the ground. There was no sound for a few seconds and then from its base and intensely bright white light-beam shone straight down, fixed on a point on the ground, in the middle of the field of celebration.
Pandemonium rapidly then followed. King Elton yelled out for the soldiers to stand down until further orders, and for the crowd to move back from the circle of bright light. The soldiers, led by Roger, Paul and Luke, were rapidly ordered into a large circle around this point and to keep their weapons lowered. Many in the crowd screamed and ran away in fear, dragging their loved ones with them, but bravely, or in stunned curiosity, most villagers remained rooted to the spot or moved in around and behind the soldiers, muttering quietly in anticipation of the totally unknown. A low hum could now be heard as the beam of light began to glow red.
Tallia was more aware of the dangers of part or total extinction that such an advanced civilization was capable of, if hostile. Some could destroy an entire planet with a single device, or start a rapid decay of a star like the sun, which she had witnessed in her learning tube as a child. Her people were peace-loving seekers of truth, but would defend themselves and others against such aggressive culture, as in that case. Her people had then destroyed the attacking craft and forced total surrender from the attacker’s home world, placing the armed-monitors in orbit around their world. The small percentage of survivors from the attacked world were relocated.
Now in this present situation, she realized that she actually felt a great deal for these local people, who had changed her heart from hostility toward the human race, to a loving understanding. She thought of all the possible moves she could make to defend them if these aliens attacked. She had her very powerful weapons at hand, but her science, so beyond the knowledge and capability of the humans, was ancient and in all probability unlikely to match the technology of the present-day science and weapons of these new visitors. On her command Mog would have her craft fully armed and in orbit within just five seconds, ready to fire simultaneously at all enemy craft on her next command. Talia held her breath.
The royal family and Talia had moved to the raised dias and the circle of soldiers, guards and knights moved into a horseshoe shape to allow them full view of the yellow craft and its focal point of light changing to red on the ground. Apart from the almost inaudible low humming sound the silence was deafening as Jay felt his heartbeat thumping in his ears. Amelia was clinging to his leg and his queen squeezing his left hand. He regretted not having their ExCaleebra swords at hand and felt far less capable of defending his family. Tallia had her arms folded, hands up her wide sleeves of her dark robe, her right hand wrapped around her wand, within the concealing heavy black cloth. She knew she was high-trained and extremely fast if needs be. Within half a second she would have blasted the yellow egg-shaped craft on full power, enough to remove the side of a mountain.
The bright beam sparkled gold within the red and a metallic humanoid-looking creature suddenly appeared as though rising from the ground. The light beam disappeared but the yellow craft remained hanging silently in the air above them, as did the giant black circle above it. The silvery material on the creature seemed to shimmer and move like mercury, until a harder shell formed like a knight’s armour, in patterned silver and deep blue. The head was helmeted in silvery segments like an orange from the shoulders to the tip and the front face was a curved smooth reflective gold crystal, a little like the spheres in the caves Grandpa Ant thought, which Tallia had called power-glass. The creature slowly turned until facing the raised dias and stood quietly. Then it spoke, seemingly from the air above, in a calming voice.
“I be” pause “I am Kyra!