Chapter 185: Book Three Chapter Forty Four: TT_Stage Two

There exist no words to describe the array of emotions that Qube experienced as she watched the kingdom’s Saviour toss the realm’s princess over the wall into the alleyway behind the manors.

 

There were too many to experience one at a time, so instead her brain decided to experience them all at once, nearly causing her to have a total meltdown at the sight, and freezing her for long enough that she missed her window of opportunity to cast [Lesser Shield] on the child before she disappeared out of view behind the stonework.

 

“Why would you throw the princess?” she nearly yelled at the Chosen One as the last pink bow vanished out of sight.

 

“That was some impressive airtime,” he happily replied.

 

“My palatial petal! Wait for me!” Sencha Bard cried, shoving past the Hero and racing out of the current garden and into the next door’s backyard.

 

“Oh, of course!” Qube forced herself to reprioritise. She took off running after the Bard. The Exiled Princess might be hurt! Or worse, have landed badly and died! Hoping against hope that the protective poofiness of her dress had saved her from serious injury, Qube scarcely noticed whether or not the rest of the party followed her as she chased both the older and the younger Bards through the next door neighbour’s house, past the Royal Guards (who were now, for some reason, facing the front door and holding out their spears) and round towards the alley where they’d first spoken to memory-Sencha.

 

The princess’s dress had held. She was standing in the alleyway, staring straight ahead. Qube gave a sigh of relief. They hadn’t accidentally committed time-treason. Not seeing any obvious signs of injury, Qube held back on casting any spells on the little woman-child, afraid  of doing mental damage to her.

 

“She’s so pwetty!” the mini-Bard said in awe-struck tones as he beheld the Exiled Princess.

 

“There’s traps!” she exclaimed. The mini Bard timidly crept closer to her. As soon as he was within touching distance of her she seemed to snap her out of whatever fugue state she’d been in. 

 

“Greetings,” she said regally, before bestowing her hand on the urchin. “You helped save a princess today. Thank you, kind sir. Your loyalty to the crown will not go unrewarded.”

 

The little boy clutched at the delicately-gloved hand, and executed an awkward but earnest bow over the back of her hand.

 

“As thanks, you will be given a place in the Bard Academy,” the princess continued, despite the fact that she was supposedly being held prisoner and thus should have even less ability to grant access to places than her future self. “I hope one day you will prove yourself worthy of serving the realm.”

 

The manner in which the Exiled Princess spoke was grand enough to suit any Royal enthusiast but, Qube had to admit, the content of the speech didn’t seem very gracious. For starters, the rest of the party had just appeared and she didn’t seem interested in thanking any of them, or Sencha Bard, who‘d been standing there the entire time.

 

On the other hand she was probably still somewhat annoyed by being thrown over the garden wall, and didn’t seem to be holding it against the Chosen One. Perhaps if she hadn’t been catapulted around she would have given a better thank you. At least they now knew how the Bard had gotten his education, for all the mystery of how she was able to grant such favour was still unsolved.

 

“Make sure to thank her,” Sencha Bard coached himself.

 

“Fank you,” he replied cutely. The princess inclined her head, and withdrew her hand.

 

“Here, you should give this to her,” Sencha Bard said, producing the lute. Qube had thought the Chosen One had claimed it and, from the look of surprise on his face, the Chosen One hadn’t noticed the Bard taking it off him. Mini-Sencha clutched the lute, which looked ridiculously oversized compared to the version his adult self used, and offered it to the princess. She casually waved it away.

 

“Keep it, kind stranger,” the Exiled Princess intoned. “As a memory of the time you helped save the kingdom, and upheld the virtues of order.”

 

It didn’t quite line up with adult Sencha Bard’s description of being given the lute by a mysterious kind stranger, but then memories were a funny thing, especially when the Chosen One or the Golden Prophecy were involved.

 

The tiny Sencha clutched at the lute, his face lit up brilliantly, and he looked between the princess and the Bard.

 

“Fank you,” he said, before his gaze slid over the rest of the party and returned to Sencha Bard, a slight frown between his eyes. Sencha Bard gave him a small but eloquent shrug.

 

“We do what we must,” he told the child who, still looking somewhat uncertain, nodded, and dissolved into a small hourglass. Before anyone else could react the Chosen One bent down and picked it up.

 

The alleyway dissolved, and they were back in the mausoleum.

 

“Not gonna lie, that was a weird one, even by the normal standard,” the Chosen One said thoughtfully as the gem flipped from red to green. “The child models in that one were not good.”

 

“Chosen One, don’t be rude,” Qube said, but she knew the Hero well enough that she wasn’t surprised by his lack of tact.

 

“I don’t believe that was a true memory,” Sencha Bard said reassuringly. “More that the Temple has, once again, violated our secret thoughts, read our minds and attempted to recreate our memories using its own magic. Naturally, it has yet to perfect its memory-recreation spell, especially if, as the Chosen One said, the Devs ran out of time in creating it.”

 

“But if that were the case then why did it show us Otto’s memory?” Qube asked.

 

The Bard paused. He looked at Definitely Bad Guy, who was looking thoughtful.

 

“Mascot,” he said to Squiggles, who beamed at him, displaying her glittery gold teeth. He pulled out a tome and skimmed through it, not actually reading it, but more out of habit. “Do you have any idea why we would be receiving Otto’s memories, rather than yours?”

 

Squiggles happily danced. It was hard to tell if the head nodding was her agreeing, or just part of the choreography. 

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“You are clearly intelligent enough to understand direction,” the Mage informed the pet sternly. “You should be capable of communicating with us in some fashion. Why would the Temple show us Otto’s memories rather than your own? What theories do you have?”

 

While she was pleased with the compliment to her pet’s smarts, Qube wasn’t sure if Squiggles was yet at the point she was capable of forming complex theories. However, Squiggles, pleased with everyone looking at her, flopped onto her side and drummed her tentacles against her side, clearly inviting tummy rubs.

 

Never able to deny belly rubs, Qube knelt and obliged.

 

“Please focus,” the Mage said in strained tones as Qube cooed at the sharktopus and vigorously rubbed her belly, ignoring how the rough skin hurt her hand.

 

Squiggles, perhaps not satisfied with only having one member of the party petting her, slapped her tentacles against her side harder. It was vaguely familiar, but Qube couldn’t place where she’d seen that behaviour before.

 

The Mage stroked his chin as Sexy Screamy Spider Briar and Sencha Bard succumbed to the pressure of sharktopus puppy-dog eyes. Only the Chosen One stood strong, and that’s because he was watching Definitely Bad Guy with the same sharp precision with which he used to regard Qube. And sometimes still did.

 

“We shall work on your communication skills,” the Mage told Squiggles, before turning away. He gave a small start of surprise as he looked past the Chosen One and towards the next few rows of drawers. His eyes rapidly widened and then narrowed as he stepped past the Hero and examined a red-gemmed drawer.

 

His long, pale fingers brushed over the name affixed to the drawer as he read it out loud: “The Creature.”

 

The Chosen One stared at the drawer, and then swung around and looked back at where the entrance to the mausoleum had been behind them. The rest of the party abandoned their cooing over Squiggles and sprang up, alert and ready to fight.

 

Nothing in the mausoleum had changed. The exit was directly next to them and the creature drawer, just as it had always been. For a second, it seemed like only the gem colour had changed. 

Except they hadn’t been standing directly next to the entrance when they’d come back. And, spinning around to check back where the Bard’s drawer had just been, they were still standing at the foot of the coffin, as if they’d just entered the mausoleum. All evidence that they had travelled the entire length of the vault was erased.

 

Looking further down the walls, Qube could see hints of red near where the prior drawers had been.

 

“Did you use a save scum attack?” Qube asked the Chosen One, uncaring about how personal a question that was.

 

“No, I didn’t do this,” the Hero said, all traces of earlier unease wiped away as he relaxed at the confirmation that something extremely strange had just happened. “This is probably just the ‘time’ part of the Time Temple. Finally; I was wondering when it was going to kick into gear.”

 

Qube found she was worrying at her bottom lip, biting it slightly as she tried to unravel what had just happened.

 

“There must have been something we missed,” she said.

 

“Ah well, you know what they say,” the Chosen One said, tapping the panel and watching it slide back to reveal a small stone otter. “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again!”

 

“That’s a terrible saying! You can’t just keep trying Temples!” Qube said, before the Hero touched the statue, the walls and floor fell away, and everything dissolved.

 

---

 

They were back in the room in the Water Temple where young Otto had been bullied by those other otters. Only this time, there were no otters to be seen. In fact, much of the floor was missing too. 

 

Qube (keeping a cautious eye on the Chosen One in case he decided to “think fast” her) sidled up to the edge of one of the pits, and peered down into the seemingly bottomless abyss. Fortunately, despite popular belief, it didn’t peer back.

 

Looking around, she saw the only way through to the edge of the pond where the memory of Otto had been bullied was a narrow stone pathway. It was a bit maze-like, with several branching single-tile offshoots that abruptly stopped, the lack of railing meaning an incautious traveller would have nothing to stop them from plunging into the darkness.

 

Another difference was that this room wasn’t grey. It was hard to tell at first, given the gloomy lighting, but it was much closer to its original appearance, aside from the missing chunks of floor.

 

“Interesting,” the Chosen One said, approaching Qube to join her in looking into the pit. She hastily backed away from the edge. He grinned at her. “What, you don’t want to see what’s down there?” he asked her innocently.

 

“No,” she replied bluntly. The look of amusement in his eyes deepened, but he focused on tracing the path to the pool of water.

 

“Hang on a minute,” he said, shrugging off his backpack and rummaging around in it. ”What would they put it under? It was a unique, hmm, Otto, hourglass… oh! Creature!”

 

With a flourish he pulled out a small hourglass.

 

“Check it out,” he said, handing it to Qube. The others clustered around her, trying to examine the object. In small writing the word “CREATURE” was branded into one of the thin wooden pillars holding together the two glass globes of the hourglass. The bottom was full of grey sand, and on the empty top half the word “FORESIGHT” was scratched into the glass.

 

The Chosen One reached over and tapped the top of the mini-Otto’s inner loot. He nodded sagely. “I think I know how this Temple works now,” he said, and took the hourglass off Qube. With a flick of his wrist he turned it, and suddenly they were back in the grey version of the Water Temple, the sounds of baby Otto cries echoing around the room.

 

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