The escape from Bruglia: part 3

Lola gets her hands dirty (literally)

The Triverse is
Mid-Earth, an alternate 1980s 1970s London
Max-Earth, a vision of the 26th century
Palinor, where magic is real

Previously: An arrest warrant has been issued for Detective Lola Styles. She’s on the run, accompanied by her partner, Princess Daryla. They are travelling across the Bruglian Wastes, where they have found passage working for a merchant caravan…

The Bruglian Wastes.
3202. Frostfall.

Journeying by caravan was altogether more comfortable than on foot. Jacinda worked them hard, but they had blankets for the night and got to ride during the day. Cleaning and feeding the various creatures that hauled the carts was unglamorous but kept Lola’s mind occupied.

The moon hung above the canyon’s cliffs, perfectly positioned in the gap of sky and casting a blue light across the camp. They’d been travelling for two days, making considerably faster progress than they had prior to joining Jacinda’s crew. Lola wiped her hands on a bundle of straw, fighting the urge to sniff her fingers. Water was too scarce to use for washing, which meant putting up with an endless stink until they reached the next trickle of a river or route well.

She collapsed onto the cushions that Daryla had arranged. Everyone slept in close proximity when on the path, the caravans forming a protective ring of sorts. The animals too, tied down next to where the crew rested. Lola hadn’t wanted to ask about the risks, but there were lookouts every night: often aen’fa, with their excellent night sight that was as clear as a human’s by day.

“Hi.” Daryla was already there, on her back, arms behind her head. It was a warm evening, despite the time of year. “You smell like shit.”

“Thank you, Princess. You also smell very, very bad.” Lola sighed and stared up at the stars, always so much brighter on Palinor. “When I used to go camping as a kid, the campsite always had showers. Kinda grim showers, but it was something.”

“We’re not on holiday.”

Lola shifted closer to her. “We’re exploring and discovering new places and taking time off from the day job. What’s the difference?”

“After a holiday, you get to go home.”

One of the animals whinnied. Someone nearby was snoring.

“Do you miss it?” Lola turned on her side to face Daryla. “The palace? All the pageantry. Playing the diplomat and doing big, important things.”

“I wasn’t ‘playing’ at anything. In the moment I miss it, the comfort and luxury. It made living easy.” She smiled, stroked Lola’s face. “But there are worse things than being on the road with you. This feels more real.”

“Smells more real, too,” Lola said, gently pushing Daryla’s hand away.

“Sorry.” She sat up and crossed her legs. “It’s good for me to get away from it all. I know it’s not what you wanted, though.”

Lola’s thoughts were always with Clarke and the others, all of them probably stuck in prison awaiting trial. It made no sense, and she couldn’t see how the situation had gone from A to B. The collapse of law and order had been slow, ever so slow to the point of being imperceptible, and then it had been rapid and in a flood. They’d seen it coming, but still hadn’t time to react.

“I just wish I could have done something for the others,” Lola said. “Or could do something.”

“We’re in this for a long time, Lola. Neither of us are going back any time soon.”

“You could, though, right?” Lola was afraid to even make the suggestion, but it seemed wrong to tie Daryla’s fate to her own. “Your father has influence. If you wanted to go back, you could.”

“My father,” Daryla said, almost spitting the words, “is not a good or kind man. He runs the city and the university for his own gain. He’s a narcissist. I’ve been trying to get out from under his shadow my whole life.”

That made more sense of her recent ill-advised activities in Bruglia. Chancellor Baltine had been on the list of people Bakker had assigned Lola to keep an eye on, not that she’d been able to get close to him. It was the other way around: he’d kept her on a leash, positioning her office in the grounds of his estate. Baltine was tangled up in everything happening back home, and Lola wondered how much Daryla really knew.

Might as well find out. They were both in it together, whether they liked it or not. The SDC was toast, and Lola needed to figure out what to do next. “You know,” she said, “my appointment as a liaison officer was just one part of my role in Bruglia. I was also there to keep an eye on your dad. On Chancellor Baltine.”

Daryla frowned. “Keep an eye on him?”

“Something’s been going on back home.”

“I’d noticed,” Daryla said, gesturing at their surroundings. “We didn’t join a caravan in the Bruglian Wastes by accident.”

“Fair point. The arrest warrant, the evidence they cooked up for me and the other SDC officers, it’s all tied to a bigger picture. Earth First, the election back home, the referendum and the portals being shut down. Everything they’ve been sneaking through the back doors. Callihan’s death. It’s all connected.”

“Who is Callihan?”

Lola smiled. “It’s a long story. I never knew him.” She took a breath. “It’s complicated. Anyway, what I’m saying is that there’s a cabal of people involved in this, all the way up the Joint Council. We’ve got some leads, at least one person on the force, plus politicians on Max-Earth and in the British government.”

Daryla put a hand on Lola’s arm. “And my father.”

“And your father.”

Even after weeks on the road, after days of mucking out horses and camels and whatever the other things were called, Daryla still was able to carry herself like a princess. There was always a grandeur to her. Perhaps it was a spell. “This explains a lot,” she said, after a lengthy silence. “I’ve always thought he was involved in something untoward. I’d assumed it was university politics, or a desire to secure more power in Bruglia. This is bigger than I imagined.”

One thing was certain, Lola realised. “Seems like we were on the right track. Otherwise they wouldn’t have moved on all of us like they did. We must have been getting too close.”

Lying back down next to her, Daryla kissed her cheek. “Thank you for telling me. I wish you’d brought me in earlier. We could have helped each other.”

“I didn’t want you to get involved.” Lola looked over at the sleeping crew and animals. “So much for that.”

“I’m glad to be involved,” Daryla said, smiling. “Truth be told, I’ve been preparing for this, one way or another, for years. I always suspected there might be a time when I’d have to leave one life behind and find another. In that regard, I’m better positioned than you. I’ve always wanted a way out.”

“That’s the thing,” Lola said, sighing deeply. “Palinor was my way out. Coming to Bruglia. I thought that was it.”

There was a shout from the perimeter of the camp, then a torch flared brightly against the night. A ring of torch flame spread around the edges, as was the protocol. The wielders in the party would need the light.

Lola sat upright, feeling suddenly very vulnerable on the ground with no more protection than a couple of blankets. “What is it?”

“Stay here,” Daryla said, getting to her feet. Lola could see her making small gestures with her hands, perhaps the beginning of a spell. The animals were waking and starting to fidget nervously.

Another shout, followed by a scream and a burst of blue plasma from beyond the ring of carts. In the momentary illumination, Lola caught a glimpse through the wheels of something large and prowling.

“There’s more of them!” came another shout.

Emerging from the darkness towards the firelight were three enormous beasts, sabre-toothed and ferocious, looking to Lola every bit like Chinese ink drawings she’d once seen at the British and Empire Museum of mythical creatures.

Lola understood for the first time the appeal of working a normal police job in London.

They were surrounded.

Photo by Leo_Visions on Unsplash

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Thanks for reading.

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MEANWHILE

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Read the whole thing in the bottom half of the newsletter here.

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Author notes

This is very much an internalised chapter. In terms of action, this is what happens:

1. Lola walks across the camp and lies down

2. That’s it.

Sure, there’s an Exciting Attack by a Cliffhanger Monster at the end, but otherwise this is a quiet chapter with lots of internal thoughts from Lola and dialogue between her and Daryla. These chapters always feel like a risk, but I think the contrast with the more bombastic stuff helps. Something I’ve learned with Triverse specifically is that it can accommodate the quieter stuff, perhaps more so than my previous projects which were more YA-infused.

There’ll be some action next time to make up for it, anyway.

The dialogue here is about showing where Lola and Daryla are, in terms of their journey, and there’ll be more of that to come. Lola has very much been yanked from her comfort zone. Daryla, on the other hand, might be a princess but she’s also very capable and anything but helpless.

I was primarily a scriptwriter for about ten years, in my 20s. Not professional, but I spent a lot of time tinkering with various projects. I sometimes have to resist the urge to slip into dialogue sequences that are essentially scripts. I love writing dialogue, and could happily do an entire chapter of people just nattering at each other.

We’re into the third chapter of the Lola flashback. There’s more to come. This would have made me very nervous not too long ago. I think I used to regard flashbacks as a rather cheap storytelling crutch: a lazy way to explain things, or a way to use non-linearity to make an otherwise dull story seem more interesting.

Reading some manga and watching anime has forced me to shift my thinking. In particular, making my way through Naruto with my son has required getting over myself and my disdain for flashbacks. A stylistic quirk of manga storytelling appears to be the Recontextualising Flashback, where it does a lot more than explain a mystery. In Naruto, a flashback will often turn the entire story on its head, but without being contradictory or relying on ‘gotcha!’ twists. The intricate planning resonates up and down the timeline.

All of which is to say: the Lola sequence is likely to be longer than you might expect. But, hey, that’s OK. Clarke had his own storyline. We haven’t gone back to Lola specifically for months. It’ll all come together in the end.