There was a
window in the air. No one knew how it got there. No one. Ever. In the whole
wide world. The sun glimmered down upon it, but even it did not know why the
window was there, and why it remained there, and why it did not fall. There was
no thing that needed to look through the window, in fact no thing that wanted
to. No one knew it was there.
How could they? It was in the air, in a forest,
in a valley, in a mountain range, in a thousand-foot fissure, in a craggy
desolate desert with no life but cactus and snakes and gila monsters for miles
around, in a continent where no one had yet settled.
The window's name was
Eleanor, and she did not appreciate the fact that there was no company for her,
save the dark forest around her. No one, to be honest, could look through her
and see what was beyond. If they could, they might choose to open her shutters
and climb through the window, or they might choose to cringe and run away.
There was no telling what might happen if they saw her. Eleanor had only ever
had one person look through her, and he had gone through to the Other Place.
He
had worn a green cloak, and had blond hair, and brown eyes. She distinctly
remembered that he smelled of deerhide and leather, and that he had been very
kind towards her. If only the Age of Heroes still could be! If only that, and
maybe more would come to her. But alas! For the Age of Heroes had ended upon
the green-cloaked hero opening her shutters and climbing into the darkness,
never to return again. For he had been the Last Hero, the Guildarok, the Bladed
One.
If Eleanor could have heaved a sigh, then she would have. She wanted to
have someone else journey Beyond, but it would never happen, or so she thought.
And she thought well, in most cases, and in this case she thought well too, for
how could she have known that the Last Hero would return? Little did she know
what troubles he had faced, what monsters he had slain, what failures he had
endured, what victories he had claimed. For the Last Hero still lived, nearly
an age having passed in this world, the one Eleanor inhabited, but only three
years in the Other Place.
Eleanor did not know this, though, for she was, to
tell the truth, only half the window, for the other side of the window had not
endured so much time and was younger and more content. His name was Aaron. And
he was looking at the Last Hero's final strides, as he came over the hill
towards the window, coming back from the Other Place to his love in the First
Place. But he would be sorely disappointed, for little did he know that ages,
millennia, had passed, and his love was long dead, of heartbreak and despair.
For though he had only been gone three years by his count, it was three
thousand by hers, and for every second he spent, it was more than a minute in
the other world to which he returned. And it would be nearly a day until his
return, to Eleanor's perspective. And Eleanor waited eagerly, enduring though
all else had not. And this was true, that the forest surrounding Eleanor had
once been a neat and tidy garden, when the Last Hero had first come, but now
was a wild and overgrown place.
