Image borrowed from Yahoo"This way is the right way, the other way is the wrong way."
I could hear the voice echoing around me, I could suddenly see a smooth path before my feet. I even seemed to see an arrow in the sky, pointing to the right. But the road was open in front of me, while, on the right, was a hill whose top disappeared into the clouds.
"This way is the right way, the other way is the wrong way," the voice insisted.
But I was tired, and the hill was I-knew-not-how-high. Surely, if there were a town nearby, it would be somewhere along the road ahead of me, possibly behind those trees at the end of the lake, I reasoned, so I hesitated.
"He who hesitates is lost," said another voice, probably the one in my own head.
The smooth path in front of my feet shimmered for a moment, then disappeared. The arrow, which couldn't possibly have been real, disappeared also.
I continued along the road in the direction I'd been traveling all day. Exhausted, I slipped. Unable to regain my balance, I fell, and tumbled downhill toward the lake. As I felt the ice break under my weight, I heard the voice again.
"This way was the right way, your way was the wrong way."
As I felt the cold water closing around me, I looked up, and saw a castle appear as the clouds rose away from the top of the hill. Castles are built on hills to discourage newcomers.
Kay L. Davies
aka: Kay in Canada
Posted over on her site An Unfitties Guide to Adventurous Travel
Listed as #13 over on Magpie Tales 50
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