Rob Scott - The Hickory Staff

Steven’s heart raced. This really was it. He struggled to open his mind as he examined the box from every angle. While he paced, the old sorcerer tried using his own magic, but it too had no effect. He scratched at the stubble on his chin and announced, ‘I don’t think it’s magic.’

‘What?’ Steven had not been paying attention. ‘Say that again.’

‘The door, this room, that book there on the table, even the table itself: I can feel the magic in the fundamental fabric of each. Although there’s a spell protecting this box from being destroyed or blown apart by our power, I don’t believe it’s a spell keeping it locked – I would be able to detect it. It’s just a confounding, tricky box.’

Suddenly Steven’s thoughts shifted. This wasn’t a problem he had to address with his limited understanding of the staff or its magic. This was far simpler, like a problem he might have tackled in school, or while working out a loan at the bank, or even- Steven paused. ‘Jeffrey Simmons.’

‘Who?’

‘Jeffrey Simmons,’ Steven grinned. ‘He’s a doctoral student in mathematics at the University of Denver in Colorado.’ His face had changed. This was what he was good at: the abstractions that made sense in layers of cognitive twists and turns; it frustrated and confused most students, but not him. Steven worked the problem.

‘How can Jeffrey Simmons help us? I remind you, our time is alarmingly short.’

‘Two, four, two, one, two, one on four sides and a top,’ Steven muttered to himself, and began pacing more quickly.

‘Steven?’

‘Two, four, two, one, two, one on four sides and a top. Think it through: what makes sense?’

‘To me or to Nerak?’

‘Neither. What makes sense mathematically?’ Steven smiled and continued, ‘You said yourself there was magic protecting the box, but no magic keeping it locked. So it has to be a mathematical riddle. Watch-’ He began moving the silver ornaments. ‘If two from the right and two from the left slide to match the four in the middle-’ He slid the ornaments simultaneously and for the first time both double cones remained in place. Steven repeated the process on each side. ‘And one cone from the left and one cone from the right slide to match two cones in the middle- ’ He slid the single cones towards their matching twins on the top.

‘Now we should be able to open the box.’ He released the cones. Both slid back into place.

‘Bloody demonpiss,’ the old man grumbled. ‘I thought you had it.’

‘Don’t get discouraged. That was only the first side.’ Steven repeated the process with one of the remaining four sides, but the cones slid back to their original position. ‘Shit.’

‘This isn’t working,’ the fisherman entreated. ‘Steven, we’re almost out of time. We have to think of something else.’

‘No,’ Steven said brusquely, ‘there are three more sides. Maths makes sense.’

‘It never did for me.’

‘It does. Trust me. This will work.’ He tried sliding the single cones to match the double cones on each of the final three sides, but each time the raised silver knobs slid silently back home. Steven’s resolve began to flag, but he gritted his teeth and muttered, ‘No, this has to be the answer.’ He ran through the entire process a second time – but still again the uncooperative cones failed to align with Steven’s geometric logic.

His mind raced. This was not right. Curse this miserable land. Nothing made sense here, not even maths. And yet mathematics went unperturbed by the soft philosophies and gummy epistemologies that trapped so many thinkers by the ankles: it was almost truculent in its determination to make sense. That’s why he adored it, because with enough time and intellectual determination, it all added up.

But not in Eldarn. Not in this inane land of horse-lion creatures, subterranean demons, dictators evil beyond the ken of mortal man, Cthulhoid cavern-dwellers with a penchant for bone-collecting, murderous spirit wraiths and long-dead sorcerers giving orders on barren mountaintops. What kind of place was this? Damn, damn and curse this hellish land.

Why was he here – and who or what had gifted him the hickory staff? More importantly yet, why couldn’t he stomach the thought of just going home and leaving Eldarn to the natives? Let Gilmour and Kantu – or even Lessek – sort out the problems.

Sweat poured off him as Steven struggled to understand. What am I doing here? Nerak is coming to kill me and I don’t know what I’m doing here. What do I care if Sandcliff Palace crumbles, if the spell table is opened again, if Lessek’s Key is ever found?

Steven stopped abruptly. Lessek’s Key. Lessek. ‘Holy shit,’ he shouted, ‘ Lessek! ’

‘What of Lessek?’

‘My dream – that night on Seer’s Peak, I had a dream. I remember it as if it were last night; you made us go over it, again and again.’

The old man was looking over his shoulder now, as if he expected Nerak to stride into the room at any moment. ‘Yes, yes, your dream. Lessek. Please Steven, focus! What of your dream?’

‘I was at the bank with Howard and Myrna, the day I met Hannah. I thought it was supposed to show me that Nerak was telling the truth, that Hannah was here in Eldarn – but that wasn’t it.’

‘So what was it?’

‘It was the maths.’

‘Yes, yes, I remember, the maths. You said something about pyramids, or Egyptians. I never saw the pyramids, myself – well, once, in a book-’

‘No, it’s not the pyramids, nor the Egyptians – I thought that too, because when I came out of my office to leave for Denver, I caught Myrna Kessler working on a problem, a circle drawn on a notepad, but that wasn’t it.’

‘I don’t want to rush you, my boy, but if you would get to the point, I would appreciate it.’

‘Telephones and calculators.’

‘Now you’ve lost me. And if you don’t get a move on, you’ll have lost us all.’

‘They’re simple electronic devices, each with a series of numbers, zero to nine. The telephone is organised top-to-bottom, one through nine with a zero at the bottom; the calculator is organised from bottom-to-top, zero through nine.’ He laughed.

‘I don’t understand. What is funny? We’re about to lose everything!’

‘It’s a trick question: why are the numbers on a telephone and a calculator organised that way?’

‘Steven, just open the box.’

‘When we use a telephone, we dial a telephone number, but it’s not a number at all: it’s a series of digits.’ Steven did a little jig. ‘On a calculator we use actual numbers, quantities that compare to one another against a common standard… the number one.’

‘So the telething and the calculus machine-’

‘Calculator.’

‘They both contain the same series of numbers. They look similar, but they mean different things.’

‘Exactly. A similar design – with a few key differences – but an entirely different purpose.’

The old man studied the box. ‘So with this box, the two double cones slid to match the four cones together.’

‘Right. Two and two equals four. Couldn’t be simpler.’

‘However, the single cones do not slide to match the twins-’

‘Because they’re not numbers, they’re digits denoting something else.’

‘What?’

Steven’s heart sank. ‘I don’t know. My guess is they denote a progression of sides.’

‘One, two, one. Same on every side.’

Steven was already at work: ‘If we start here on the front side and we call that side number one, then any of the adjacent sides might be side number two.’

‘Don’t wait for me. Just figure it out.’

Steven carried on thinking aloud, in case the Larion Senator picked up something he’d overlooked in the process. ‘If this is side one and either of these are side two, we can depress the first cone on side one.’ He did so and the cone remained in place. ‘Now the twin cones on side two.’ The conical carving remained flush against the smooth metal long enough for Steven to draw half an excited breath, then it popped back to its original position.