Season 4: Episode 6 – Where I Stand
© 2026 Heather L. McMillan / Anturia LLC. All rights reserved. This episode is provided for personal reading only. Reproduction, redistribution, republication, or commercial use without permission is prohibited.
This dark fantasy series contains mature themes that may be triggering and is intended for adult listeners.
Imprint of Karrah MacMillan
Hello? This is a little strange.
I never thought about writing down my thoughts, much less recording them in my head.
I remember how fast the sandstorm came upon us. Grandfather and Grandmother were ahead of us, with guides, as we traveled the desert.
One minute, I heard Grandfather yell for us to take cover. The next, I watched helplessly as he and those ahead of us vanished in a wall of darkness.
Yedder, our Tuareg guide, already pulled Kerrih, Keelia, Kimbal, Cecilia, and me behind several large rocks for shelter. On an impulse, my cousin Cecilia stepped out, calling “auld-mither!” and in an instant she disappeared into the dense mass of sand.
I felt sand start to whip around the rock and come around the backside, and then the roar of the noise bore down on me. I felt a strange sense of being pulled, as though a thick thread was yanked through the eye of a needle too small to hold it.
Then I stood on the platform of what I know now is the Porta Segreta.
I feel silly telling you all this, but I guess I want to start somewhere.
The strange sensation of being in one place one moment and somewhere else entirely different the next still echoes in my mind.
I cried in a medic’s observation room for two days for Grandfather, Grandmother, and Cecilia when I realized they were not with us.
The medic I see every day tells me I am still in shock from being taken from Earth in a traumatic event.
Kerrih wandered in and out of the room to check on me and to hold me those first two days.
Even though I’m only fifteen minutes younger than she is, she has always comforted me.
Baliya Island is foreign, and unlike anything I have ever seen in my life. The air here feels heavy, like I’m trying to breathe in a hot bowl of soup. All the plants that grow here are so bright and green; I don’t think I have ever seen so much green in one place.
The birds on the island are varied, and I recognize some. Others contain more colors than a rainbow and do strange things like mimic you or eat from your plate if you’re not watching. The noise of nature that comes from the island never seems to end, day or night.
Kerrih loves this island; she calls it beautiful and peaceful. Honestly, I am mostly terrified of it, and I often stay indoors to avoid the sounds unless I have to go out for training with the others.
I enjoy some of the training, but I dislike the physical parts. I like learning about things like how to use creation machines and our culture classes. I love Anturian painting the most. A strange green man with orange hair and glasses named Oswalt teaches us to paint as Anturians do.
He told me yesterday that one of my paintings was so good that he wanted my permission to hang it at the entrance to Facility Two. I said yes, and I beam every time I walk by it now. When I attempted to paint at home, I hung my work in my room. Here it is on display for everyone to see, with my name on it.
Kerrih tells me she cannot get enough of learning all these new things. She seems to adjust here better than anyone else I’ve seen around us in Facility Two. Interestingly, Bryn and Dahlfia told me that Kerrih and I have magic. We knew on Earth we had something like that, but we couldn’t talk about it without being branded a witch. So, neither one of us used magic on purpose there.
Here, I discovered that I am better at using magic than she is; at least she cannot seem to use her magic consciously unless I start mine first. We are the only two humans able to use magic that they have discovered, so we are only allowed to use it in front of Bryn, Dahlfia, and Kylah.
We are not permitted to go near Facility One where the Ninth Legion is housed. Apparently, the Legate doesn’t want his soldiers to become undisciplined or comfortable around outsiders, especially females.
Meanwhile, I have made friends outside of my family here. While Kerrih is off exploring the outdoors, I have become friends with a girl about sixteen named Abigail from the year 2024, who programs things called computers. She also doesn’t like the noise outside, so she doesn’t go out unless she has headphones on.
Right now, I sit in her room with her, and we play a game to see who can sit still without talking the longest. Sometimes I win. Sometimes she wins. Sometimes we are both interrupted when someone comes to the door.
I met a man named Flandan Reynolds in our training, and he’s also here in Facility Two. He left Earth in the same year as Abigail. He told me he was an Olympic runner traveling to the Summer Olympics in Paris when he got separated from his team and had to take a later flight. He had to explain what a flight was, since I had no idea. Anyway, the Porta Segreta pulled him to Anturia just before his plane crashed, killing everyone else on board.
Flandan has an excellent sense of humor, and he always makes me laugh. He spends a lot of his free time with me, and since I don’t like to go outside much, he spends much of it reading with me in the library or painting with me in the art room.
Because he was a runner, he still loves to run. Therefore, he goes in the morning for a couple of hours to run along the paths on the island.
We held hands yesterday as we walked through the hallway. It felt nice to have someone pay attention to me like that. Most of the suitors back in Lochinver were interested in Kerrih.
I love Kerrih. I would never wish her anything less than what she is. But sometimes it is nice when someone enters a room and sees me first.
I have no idea how long his attention toward me will last, but I will enjoy every moment that Flandan spends with me because it makes me feel special. Flandan says that if the Council of the Wise gives him a home here on Anturia, he will be lonely without company after living here for so long. Maybe he will ask me to live with him, especially after Dahlfia told Kerrih and me that we may not always be put together in the future.
I’ve never been apart from her. It’s exciting to think of a life without her always there. But it’s also terrifying. What would I be if I were not Kerrih’s twin sister?
Flandan is coming here to take me for a short walk through the garden in a few minutes. They say I need a little sun and fresh air each day.
Abigail giggles at me now. I giggle back. I have no idea why we are giggling, but the spell is now broken. We stand up and stretch. “I must go to computer class now,” she tells me. “Shall we meet at the same time tomorrow for another round?”
“Yes, please!”
As we leave her room and she heads off to class, Flandan walks up to me with a bright smile. I find him very handsome, as he is tall with dark skin, dark hair, and beautiful brown eyes. He does not look like anyone from 1371 Scotland. He offers his arm out to me, and I drape my arm through his.
“My fair maiden,” he teases. “Are you ready for your walk through the garden with the most noble of knights? I have asked the birds to be quiet,” he teases me playfully.
I blush. “I am ready. I have the most noble knight at my side to protect me.”
Together, we step outside in the late morning sunshine.
A gentle breeze blows my hair, and I step on the stone path that leads to the garden. I have a new pair of shoes to match my new dress. They are pretty and red with a small bow on the outside to match the simple red summer dress that I wear.
Kerrih runs around without shoes all the time. She always has, but I cannot stand the strange sensations of the ground outside on my feet. I prefer shoes.
As we pass under an archway of big palm leaves, a couple of butterflies dance in and out of each other. “Oh, they’re so pretty,” I say. They are purple and small.
“I had training with your cousins yesterday,” Flandan tells me.
“I’m sorry,” I say with a laugh.
“No, they’re fine. They are very loud, to be sure, but they are funny. They have taken to this new place quite well, it seems. They do get rather physical with each other and everyone. Have they always been so competitive and combative?”
“Yes, they are 19 and 20 years old, just a little older than Kerrih and me. We grew up living on the same family property, so we were always together. As long as I can remember, Keelia and Kimbal have always been that way. I don’t believe Anturia will make them change at all.”
“You said they had a sister who didn’t make it?” he asks. “I don’t mean to bring up anything painful,” he adds quickly.
“No, it’s okay. My medic thinks I’m okay to start talking about it. She says it may help me. Cecilia was her name. She was 17, and she and I were the closest. Kerrih, Keelia, and Kimbal were always off being wild and crazy outside. Kerrih would make up games, tournaments, and competitions for them. And I would play under a tree somewhere with Cecilia and our dolls. I miss her very much. This one time, Kerrih played cards with the others at our house, but they were so noisy that I didn’t want to play. The next day, Cecilia offered to play with just me, and I liked it much more.
This time, a yellow butterfly floats around me and lands on my free arm.
“I think she likes you,” he tells me as we stop to admire it.
“It tickles,” I say.
“Do you need me to remove her from your arm?” he offers.
“No, it’s okay.” A moment later, the butterfly leaves me and flies ahead of us down the path.
We start to walk again. We turn a corner, and in an alcove in the middle of several yellow rose bushes, I see Kerrih with the Legate sitting on a bench.
Kerrih reads from a book as he leans in close. For a second, she looks up at me and offers me a smile, but she does not stop reading. I smile back before even thinking about it.
The Legate puts his arm around her shoulder while she points out a section in the book. I know she leaves Facility Two at night to meet with him.
I look at Flandan, who has been watching them for a moment, but we keep going and leave their alcove behind.
“I thought the Ninth wasn’t supposed to interact with those from Facility Two,” he says.
“I think since he’s in charge of the Ninth, he can probably do as he pleases.” I shrug, not really knowing how it works.
“I suppose you’re right. Your sister makes friends easily,” he says.
“Yes, people are always drawn to Kerrih. I think that’s just how she is.” For once, I don’t care that someone is looking at Kerrih, because Flandan is walking beside me.
I pull him over to an arbor covered in vines where tiny birds hover around flowers. Their wings are moving so fast that I cannot see anything but a blur. They drink from these red, trumpet-shaped flowers.
“Look at these strange birds with long beaks drinking from the flowers. Do you know what they are?”
“These are hummingbirds,” he says.
“We did not have hummingbirds in Scotland.”
We remain watching them for a moment or two more before we continue our walk.
We pass an empty bench on the path. “Do you need to sit and rest?” he asks me.
“No, I can go on,” I tell him. It’s mostly shaded along the path, so the sun doesn’t exhaust me as much here.
A little later, we approach Facility Two again, and he walks me to the door of my room. Kylah sits in a chair in the hallway between Kerrih’s room and mine.
She is always there, or someone who reports to her sits in her place when she is training. We are the only ones with someone sitting outside our rooms.
She intimidates me. Keelia and Kimbal like her and love training with her. Kylah seems to watch every little thing, Kerrih, and I do.
Flandan takes his arm from mine and then gives me a slight bow. “Thank you for the honor of the walk, my lady. I will come again tomorrow for your next one?”
I smile and curtsey. “Oh yes, please. I would love that.”
I step inside my room and close the door behind me. I lean back against the door and feel my heart race with a twinge of excitement.
He wants to see me again. Not because I am Kerrih’s sister or because we arrived here together, but because he wants to spend time with me.
For the first time since we arrived on Anturia, I wonder if being separated from Kerrih might not only be something I can survive. Maybe it is how I find out where I stand.
>End Porta Cor imprint.<
