Tales from Amaranth Ch 1

A Story by Joshua Clement

A small town girl and her best friend get thrown into another world with magic, technology, and creatures beyond their wildest imaginations...

Chapter 1

The sound of Rebekah Alexander’s locker door slamming reverberated down the empty school hall.

Late!

She was late!

It was no use rushing now. She glared down at the open combination lock with the utmost contempt. Not for the poor faded blue contraption that hung broken before her, but for those responsible. Her throat tightened. Her small frame shook and tears seemed to sear her eyes, but she would not cry. Never. Not for herself. Never for them. So what if she was tall and thin? Did her appearance break some unwritten law that she was to be so punished? Was she such an offense to society that the powers that be could target with extreme prejudice those who could not, cannot, and will never fit in?

Same story, everyday.

Rebekah steeled her resolve and calmed herself. She opened the locker again. Slowly, the door whined ashamedly open to reveal shredded books and papers. Names accordingly were scribbled here and there. Someone even showed a hint of imagination with a picture of a starved dog.

Anger? No. Anger seemed to ebb away from Rebekah the more she considered the matter. It was sad. Kids were actually so bored that they had nothing better or constructive to do than this.

“I pity you.” Rebekah said simply and sighed. It’s the same old story. It never really changes for anyone, does it? Not for kids. Not for adults either, Rebekah guessed. The battle was there for them too, just different. For a small moment Rebekah envied adults. They got to use tanks.

Same old story.

But it’s not her story! She would rise again, reborn from the ashes. She would rise and overcome. The wind will be sweet and the sunshine gold. Rebekah had faith in that. A life of love, hope, and wonder awaited her, and she eagerly awaited it, always waiting with open arms, ready to embrace destiny and all of his fancy vegetarian cooking. Such hopes were worthy of hoping.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a hall pass, would you now?” an accented voice snapped Rebekah out of her reverie. Principal Jinlad was a very tall man. Though he was nearly bald, he had a rich black beard that complemented his bronze complexion. Though Rebekah was tall for a fourteen year old girl, and even had great reach that would, as her mother so gracefully put it “aid her in fencing”, but she couldn’t even touch the shine of his head.

“I don’t need one, sir.” Rebekah said dismissively and began to walk away.

Principal Jinlad blinked, “You will be stopping right there!”

Rebekah stopped, but did not turn to face him. He eyed her. From her plain brown sweater that hung loosely on her, to her tan ankle long skirt and simple shoes. Her hair was long, black and neatly supported with a simple hairclip. She had a handsome face, sure to be beautiful when she aged, and beautiful blue eyes. To Jinlad, she looked the ideal student; modest and book-smart, and honor list for sure. She was hugging a textbook with a notebook shoved inside.

“What is this attitude I smell? Did I not require a hall pass from students since the beginning of time? You will be explaining this to me now!”

Rebekah sighed and answered in a calm voice. “I know you mean well, sir. But I have just suffered a severe trauma. All of my personal things have been vandalized and I am suffering life. If you could be so kind, I will excuse myself from school today. I wish to go home and contemplate the end.”

“What?” Principal Jinlad said after a few confused moments.

“I wish to go home and contemplate the end.” Rebekah repeated, “Civilization seems to have regressed beyond the reach of true humanity. It isn’t as though democracy failed within school rather it was an illusion to begin with. Am I wrong to say that the strong fall prey to the weak minded? Are we not to beware the power of idiots in large numbers politically as well as scholastically?”

“What are you talking about? What is this philosophical crap?” Principal Jinlad stepped in front of Rebekah, “If you do not produce a hall pass immediately, you will be suffering my foot! Where I come from, children eat through straws when they disrespect their elders.”

“Didn’t you understand me?” Rebekah said a little less patiently, “I’ve said I have just suffered a grave injustice. I am very disturbed by it and am relieving myself the rest of the school day. I’m sure you don’t wish the school board to know of your tolerance with vandalism, and I’m quite sure you’re not a man who tolerates it himself. Now, if you will excuse me…” Rebekah walked passed Principal Jinlad towards the school doors.

Adults; you just have to know how to talk to them.

***

The Principal’s office hadn’t changed much since the last time Rebekah had been there. There were a few new posters. A “Smoking is Slow Suicide” and a chimp teacher with chimp students poster, with a punch-line Rebekah never really cared to look at. She sat solemnly, looking but not really looking, her mind elsewhere. The office itself was entirely too neat. Pencils lined up, each sharpened in exact length as well as papers perfectly symmetrical in stacks. Rebekah could almost imagine the principal on all fours combing the grey carpet. The air was stained with the ritual of aftershave. It wasn’t intolerable, but how many brands of musk could there be in a world of over excess?

“No! That is not what I am saying!” Rebekah could hear principal Jinlad’s voice in the other room. He was on the phone with her mother, no doubt. And, no doubt he had no idea who he was dealing with.

“What?” he yelled again, “No, I use three eggs, not two! No! That is being beside the point! What are you talking about? What does this have to do with my being a competent principal? I don’t care what your talk show says! We are not tolerating smart mouthed brats at this school!”

Rebekah smiled; last nail in the coffin.

“I didn’t say she wasn’t smart! I wasn’t harassing… I never said… I said brats because… what? No I am not prejudice…what bribes? Where are you hearing this tabloid crap from?”

“I love you, Mom!” Rebekah said to herself.

“Fine! FINE! I wash my hands of it!” Principal Jinlad slammed the phone down onto the receiver and kicked open his office door, “You! Go home! Go home! I am finished with you! And do not be coming back! Go home and may your mother’s madness be your eternal supplement!” Rebekah had already got up and left the office with principal Jinlad yelling after her. It was a good day for walking. It wasn’t even noon. Perhaps she would stop by a place or two on the way home.

***

Amber Valley was a small, but lively town. It's people tended to be overbearingly conservative, but very open and friendly to visitors. It had a cheery, contemporary feel about the one and two story buildings, coffee shops, and restaurants. Fresh flowers hung outside various colorful stores, and delicious roasting spits from Rusty’s Bull Pit Roadhouse could be smelled from blocks away. Sidewalks throughout town were generous and many people preferred walking instead of cars.

Rebekah took her time walking home. It was only about a mile outside of town, two miles total from the school. She knew exactly where she wanted to go first. Toni’s Bookstore was only around the corner. It was a small two story bookstore squeezed between a clothing store and a boutique. Two great dull green bay windows were open with displays. In one window sat a globe, charter maps, and books on geography. In the other window was a faux Mona Lisa on canvas with various paints and brushes and books on art.

Toni’s was one of Rebekah’s favorite places to go. It had been almost two weeks since her birthday, and she still had a little money left over she was saving. Today was a good day to forget school and go shopping. A fresh scent of cherry and apple enveloped Rebekah as she entered Toni’s. Toni was always burning a scented candle or two to show off her display for bath and beauty products and meditation CD’s. That was another thing Rebekah loved about Toni, she didn’t just sell books… she sold interests. Do you love to draw? Toni has books on drawing techniques, and here are some pens, charcoal pencils, and plenty of different styles of parchments. Love agriculture? Toni has books on gardening and the care of all kinds of plants and herbs, and she even sells a variety of seeds and starting kits.

For Rebekah it was a rich and wondrous place. It was almost a second home. Crisp sunlight graced shelves upon shelves of books and varieties. A thin cast iron spiral stairwell ascended onto a partial second floor. Off limits to others, Toni allowed its access to Rebekah, where there was a coffee table, an old leather couch, and a few more select books, Toni’s personal library. A down waiter was on the wall to the stairwells left.

Rebekah walked into the sweet smelling store. Toni was absent, so Rebekah freely walked around. Candies and candy-kits were displayed on one side of the counter. On the other were cookbooks and pastry guides behind a great platter of fresh baked muffins. Rebekah wandered over to them, leaned over and inhaled the delicious aromas. Blueberry muffins, and cinnamon brands, banana nut muffins and chocolate chunky muffins. It was heavenly.

“Go ahead and steal one if you want!” Toni burst out from a door that lead from a small kitchen and storage area, carrying a box of books which she shoved roughly onto a nearby cart. Toni was a head taller than Rebekah, with pixie cut, fiery red hair. She wore a sleeveless green shirt with a forest green bib overalls. Over her overalls she wore a black, gold trim apron with various tools and pens and scissors sticking out. In bright gold, the word “Toni’s” was written across the apron in a strange italic.

“Hi Toni!” Rebekah said delighted.

“Rebekah, darling!” Toni wrapped her arms around Rebekah, careful not to squeeze too hard for fear of a nasty poke from her protruding box-cutter and scissors, “It’s been a week!”

“I know,” Rebekah said, “But I’ve been a bit busy with school work.”

“Speaking of which, shouldn’t you be in school?” Toni started rummaging absentmindedly through the large box.

“I suffered a trauma and I was graciously given the rest of my life off.”

“Terrific news!” Toni smirked, “I could always use an extra hand, especially in the mornings!”

“Think my mom would go for it?” Rebekah asked jokingly.

“Not this decade, darling.” Toni had shuffled a couple of books around and gave up with a huff, “Hey, you hungry? I’m fixing to close shop for lunch. You like Chinese?”

“I adore it!” Rebekah smiled.

“You’re still the veggie queen, right?” Toni took off her apron and threw it on the box.

“Always.”

“Great! More shrimp for me!”

***

With the bay windows shut and the closed sign in place on the door, Toni ran across the street to the Chinese restaurant. She came back with a bag under each arm, a tub of rice hanging from her mouth and another of noodles balanced on her head. While she had gone, Rebekah had gone into the small but tidy kitchenette to put on a pot of tea. The bronze teapot was already whistling on the old gas stove by the time Toni had come back. Rebekah put the pot on a tray along with two cups, two plates, and utensils.

As soon as Rebekah had raised the down waiter to the second floor and ascended the stairs, Toni, had already opened the food and had served portions out onto the low coffee table.

“You’re fast!” Rebekah giggled.

“Only when it comes to food, honey! And now…!” Toni had turned away and tied a white bandana on her head. The words in red on it were in Japanese, meaning ‘strength’ and ‘endurance’. Toni spun around with in a flare. A fire was in her eyes. From nowhere, came two pairs of chopsticks that spun with fury in Toni’s nimble hands. The spinning stopped abruptly, Toni pointing at the food, “Prepare to meet your doom, lo-mien!”

“Toni, you are crazy!” Rebekah giggled.

“I’m adorable!” Toni almost sounded offended.

“Crazy!” Rebekah repeated, “Your wearing a Japanese bandana and about to eat Chinese. If you’re trying to be politically correct, you’re failing.”

“Just trying to enjoy the best of both worlds, sister!” Toni sat with Rebekah and the both began to eat. Toni produced another pair of chopsticks and to Rebekah’s surprise used all three! In her left hand was gripped an eggroll in one pair, she was eating lo-mien with her right, and she was using the third pair with her right foot toes to dip shrimp into sweet and sour sauce.

“You eat with great skill and excellence!” Rebekah laughed as she poured tea.

“Mffg-luggn-ffrf-ggffn!” Toni said, she had stuffed an entire eggroll in her mouth. Despite being as nearly thin as Rebekah, Toni could generally out-eat a sumo wrestler. On they went, laughing and dining. Rebekah told Toni her the heart wrenching story of woe, her mother’s courageous rescue, and of her heroic escape from the Amber Valley institution of socialism and arithmetic.

Toni only listened and ate at first. There were many slurps, gulps, and grunts, but Rebekah took it as a sign that she was still listening and telling her to go on with the story. Soon the food was gone and the tea was empty. All that were left were the fortune cookies.

“Rebekah,” Toni wiped her mouth, “I have to continually remind myself you are still only fourteen. I mean, you are so many years ahead of yourself! You’re worrying about things that you shouldn’t have to worry about for years to come. Social and political decay, the prevarication of the American dream, and the asphyxiating power of an overfed central government are our generations’ problems to screw up, not yours.”

“I refuse to continue under the illusion of…” but Toni cut her off.

“I’m just saying... you only enjoy childhood once!”

Rebekah sighed.

“You are so strong and passionate. All I see from kids these days is nothing short of apathy. If one comes in and buys a book, it gives me that much more hope for the future.” Toni smiled, “Honey, if even that gives me hope, you make me believe that anything’s possible.

“It just scares me that you might burn yourself out. Much study brings much sorrow, my young tadpole. Learn to love and live in love for now. Societies problems will always be here, but the opportunity to learn love won’t always present itself. I think that’s one of society’s biggest problems anyway. So why not stop worrying about tomorrow, and lead by example today?”

Rebekah quietly got to her feet, brushing off her skirt.

“Thank you Toni. I’ll do my best!” Rebekah said solemnly.

“You’ll be amazing! One day,” Toni said matter-of-factly, “you are going to turn the world upside down!”

“I don’t know about all of that.”

“Have you met your mother?” Toni said flatly.

“I guess the house doesn’t fall far from the twister, does it?” said Rebekah.

“Never does.” Toni tossed Rebekah her fortune cookie. “On the count of three? One! Two! Three!”

They both karate chopped their fortune cookie into oblivion, leaving only crumbs and a loosely folded paper.

“You first,” Toni smiled wryly at Rebekah.

“Okay!” Rebekah opened her fortune and read:

-Flowers do not bloom when the sun is scarce!-

“I think there’s a bit of a theme here.” Toni smiled. “But, fortunes do have an uncanny ability to state the obvious for half the people who open them.”

“What about yours?”

“Mine?” Toni opened hers and glanced at it nonplussed, at least, only at first. A shadow seemed to flash across her eyes, though her face remained placid. Rebekah caught only a glimmer of it. What was it? Contempt? Shock? It seemed as if she had just read something offensive and immediately disregarded it.

Without another word, Toni balled up her fortune, popped it in her mouth and swallowed it with a great gulp.

“What did you do that for?” Rebekah looked at her incredulously.

“Then again,” Toni said passively, “they are absolute rubbish for everyone else.”

Toni stood up and walked over to her private bookshelf and studied a particular section. Clicking her tongue, she seemed to be trying to make a very difficult decision. Reluctantly, she reached for and pulled out a yellow book entitled “Pearl Harbor: The Night Before”.

“Be a sweet-cake and give this to your mom,” Toni said with a weak smile, “I just keep forgetting to give her what she asks when she asks.”

“Getting senile?” Rebekah asked playfully.

“Something like that.” Toni replied.

***

Fat bulging clouds began to fill the sky as Rebekah made her way over the market bridge, a stone walkway that crossed the Amber Valley River. Not too narrow, local seniors would often fish from various points, but not today as Rebekah noticed. A cool sweat breeze perked up as she made it to the halfway point, and she couldn’t help but smile as she looked out over the waters. Such a terrible morning blossoming into the most enchanting day, Rebekah complemented herself on her earlier steel reserve and constructiveness. It paid off more than tenfold!

Rebekah couldn’t wait to get home to tell her mother, but she also couldn’t rush such a wondrous day. Oh, to be able to fly and fan her fingers through the air and through river’s surface. Birds were so free and majestic that way. Not a care or a test in the world to worry about. Not even communism. The sky’s large enough for everyone and every tree is a welcome home.

Rebekah continued on her way across the bridge and turned up Mountain Berry road towards her home. As she made her way down, a black limousine bearing New York plates rolled to a stop at the mouth of the road. A tinted window rolled down and a leather gloved driver peered down after her through mirrored shades. His face, though roughly handsome, was cold and emotionless. The window rolled back up and he turned his heartless stare to the back seat where an older gentleman sat in a dark suite with black coat. The black cane in his hand had a silver viper’s head ornament.

“That’s her, sir!” said the limo driver.

“Yes, good!” The older man replied in a deep voice.

“Do we follow?”

“No!” said the older man, “We wait for the darkness!”

The old man’s gaze went to an immense figure sitting across from him. The man was so huge and hulking he seemed to fill the limo.

“Are you ready, my child?” the old man asked the giant man who shared a similar suite as the limo driver. At the old man’s voice, the giant man seemed to breathe like a heaving rhino, muscles upon muscles flexing and tensing in that small space. Saliva had been streaming from his mouth steadily, and veins pulsed in his neck and bald head.

“Good.” The old man said lazily, a smile appeared on his face, “Anxious we all are, but we must remain patient. Remember that she is to be taken alive with as little damage as possible.”

“What about the girl there, sir?” the limo driver asked.

“She is of no consequence.” said the old man, “If she interferes, kill her. Only the mother is important.”

© 2015 Joshua Clement

Author's Note

Been working on this story for a while... I'm not so much interested in grammar correction, but i will take structure advice... what concerns me most is that I would have this be enjoyable and coherent to the reader, so please, show me inconsistencies if there are any or redundancies... I am open to respectful correction and advice of all kind, and above all.... enjoy

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Featured Review

Rana

An entertaining chapter. My favorite character would be Toni and I loved her place as well, it sounded so much fun to be in there. Also, I got so curious about what it was that made her eat the fortune without revealing it. Other things, I felt eager to meet Rebekah's mom. She's quite a woman. But then, I felt Rebekah's character to be a tiny bit unconvincing, the way she reacts to the Principal. Maybe because I've not read about her previous encounters with him, but I still felt her behavior to be something quite unnatural and also the way she abruptly leaves the school for good. Also, you could add how long she'd been studying there to throw more light on it. The ending brings in suspense to the work and yes, I love your style of writing.