Carina Rozenfeld
Les portes de Doregon
Doregon
Commander

 The Gates to Doregon 

Mia, a particularly gifted young art student, is painting a world called Doregon that she has been imagining for years.

When she receives the Secret, a special power that enables her to go into her paintings so that she can enter Doregon in person and be a Look-out there, Mia discovers that Doregon is the intersection of portals opening onto hundreds of other universes created in the minds of people possessing the power of Creation. These worlds may present a danger for planet Earth and it is the role of the Lookouts to detect the newly created universes and make sure that the portals to the bad worlds cannot open.

But danger does not always come from where you think and Mia has to confront an unexpected enemy to save Doregon and by consequence, planet Earth...

Carina Rozenfeld likes grand scale stories and brave heroes, but she never misses a detail - a slight breeze, the soft feel of a jersey, the sensitive feelings of the "Chosen One"... She has managed to establish an intimate yet powerful contact with her public through her weekly discussions at secondary schools from January to June 2010. They all dream of following Mia and her telepathic lymbiote to the world of the intersection points...

La Quête des Livres-Monde (The World-Books Quest), published by Intervista, was awarded the Prix des Incorruptibles 2010.

Benjamin Carré
Illustrator

Translation Sample

 

 DOREGON

The Gates of Doregon

 

by

Carina Rozenfeld

 

BOOK ONE

What happened

 Meanwhile, in a bookstore...

 

Someone had betrayed me. I knew it had to happen. Moone was all too predictable for me not to know his intentions. Life is never mapped out ahead of time, but some paths do seem more inevitable than others.

I lay in bed staring into the darkness, my body stiff with anxiety, my mind jumping from one idea to the next at full speed, searching for the best way to protect the secret. My Secret, the one I was guarding, the one I was responsible for.

The silver light of the moon barely diminished the darkness of my room, but I could distinguish the shadowy forms of my familiar belongings: the creaky wood furniture, the carpet woven with interlaced and intricate designs, the billows of curtains that obscured the monumental window and created odd shapes in the night and my painting on the wall, of a river's scintillating ribbons -- it felt like I had painted it in some other life.

And his picture on my nightstand, comforting me in the illusion that he was still fondly looking at me.

Everything was perfectly in order, and yet I knew intuitively that it would be the last time I saw my world as it was at that moment. Moone was coming to crush it under foot, to destroy it, to shape it in his own image: brutal, hateful, enslaved to his huge ego. I held my breath an instant, listening to the still-distant sounds echoing in the hallway. Moone was on his way to steal the Secret, to drag it from me. I had been so sure of his coming that for several nights I'd slept fully clothed in order to be ready to flee ... It was urgent that I find a place to hide it. To hide myself would serve no purpose. Moone knew ways to find me easily. And he would have no qualms about taking it; he would even kill me for it. A shiver went up my spine. How did we get to this point?
Instinctively, I reached my arm out to my side, in a familiar gesture. I knew I would only find the empty and cold sheets of the big bed, but my heart sank as I rediscovered his absence. He was no longer there to comfort and counsel me. And I would need those things more than ever, in this dark hour.

Only he could have helped me. He alone... He would have been able to find the words to instill in me the courage and the strength to face Moone. He would have raised an army of lymbiotes or whatnot still in his power. But he would never return. I squeezed my eyes shut, until the black under my lids pulsed with red spots. My tears were about to brim over, but I held them back. This was not the time for sadness or for memories. I had to act, and quickly. Even while hearing the footsteps come nearer and nearer, I explored the Timelines looking for the fracture that had caused his disappearance.

Life is never mapped out ahead of time. The future may change according to our decisions. But the past is just as malleable, if you know how to find the branching point preceding the present - that person or event at the origin of the series of events leading to today. And I found without a problem the path that had led me to this day.

The solution imposed itself on me like a punch to the solar plexus. I had to catch my breath and when I did it was with gasping breaths. No...I could not! I did not have the right. Playing with Time was forbidden, punishable! But if I were to let my enemy take the Secret from me, this rule would no longer exist, just like everything else...

Preventing him from getting it was the most important thing. As for the rest...I would just have to suffer the consequences later. The sound of my heavy wooden door pummelled by Moone's violent assault only confirmed my certainty. I no longer needed to reflect. I knew that my decision would change the present and the future. I didn't yet know exactly how I was going to rewrite history, but if it was the only way to save the Secret, to save Doregon and him at the same time -- yes, save him - well, then I would hesitate no longer...

My decision taken, I immediately sat up, jumped out of bed, grabbed my cape from the back of a chair, and wrapped myself in it. I disappeared from the room at the same instant that Moone, with a dreadful noise, broke through the wooden door. From far off, I heard him shouting, and as I left the present, where he was discovering my empty room and unmade bed, I let the Time corridor behind me fill with my mocking laughter. I heard him scream my name, his rage reverberating right down to me, even where I was, back in the past...

"MIA!"

 

He guessed that I had gone into the past and would change the course of events. Garmon would certainly not like what I was about to trigger, but he was not there to know. It was dangerous, certainly, but Moone was even more dangerous.

 

I had a few minutes to act. And hope that everything would unwind and reform differently...

 

*

 

Josh ran a hand through his thick brown hair and sighed. One more day was over. Identical to the previous one and certainly identical to the next. He was happy to have landed this job at the bookstore outside of his college class hours, but the daily routine weighed on him some days more than on others. And that was the case tonight. On the program for the next few hours: close the store, reheat pizza in the microwave, do his homework... In short, nothing too exciting.

The cold winter evening was darkening into night. Snow had even threatened, but the delicate flakes melted on the asphalt, leaving only a damp iciness that seeped into every space, even the tiniest. Outside the window, the street looked like a long corridor, dark and deserted - all the people must have burrowed into their warm, dry homes. Perfunctorily, Josh lowered the blinds and turned the small sign on the door to "Closed." At this point he would usually lock the door, but the phone rang, so he rushed to the counter.

 "Hello?"

No one responded.

"Hello?"

Silence at the end of the line.

Josh shrugged and hung up. Forgetting that he had not finished his closing routine, he took up the chore he hated most about his job - balancing the cash register. Handling books, advising customers and sharing his passion with them was what he liked. Counting money in a cold, silent shop was certainly a lot less exalting.

At that moment the door of the bookshop opened with a tinkling sound from the bells hung on it. Josh raised his head, ready to take on any intruding client.

"The shop is closed..." he began.

 

The young woman who had come in was nothing like his regular customers. Only a glimpse of pale skin stood out against the heavy black cloak that enveloped her slender figure. With both hands she slowly pushed back the deep hood that hid her face, letting fall a sheet of glossy auburn- burnished hair. It made her large emerald-green eyes stand out spectacularly -- they seemed as deep as an entire unexplored universe. She looked like a character from a Manga book. Superb, and unreal.

The bookseller could not move. He stood petrified in front of his cash register by this apparition, this woman, and she was smiling at him! In her face shone a particular glow, like relief, even like love. She seemed happy to see him. Josh did not think anyone could express such joy at meeting him. In a few silent steps, she stood before him and he saw that her eyes glistened with tears.

"Josh," she murmured in a barely audible whisper.

Before he had time to ask her who she was and how she knew his name, she stood on tiptoe, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him.

Josh tasted honey on her lips and tongue, mixed with her salty tears. Her firm, slim body pressed against his. Incapable of the least coherent thought, he let her do it, without moving. But inside, his sensations exploded like fireworks. Their kiss was a discovery to him, but somehow familiar too.

The exchange lasted a long time, intense, passionate, desperate and full of unimaginable love. A throbbing, almost painful, arose within him, like waves of concentrated heat invading his body.

When she separated from him, Josh felt an intolerable pain, a lack, an emptiness inside that would never be possible to fill.

He wanted to hold her again, to ask her a thousand questions, but she raised her tear-filled eyes and pierced him with her gaze. So much pain was there that his fervour died away.

 "Josh," she whispered. "Now you possess the Secret. Take very good care of it. You're going to meet me for the first time, in a little while, but I will not know you. Just go through with it. You will know when it's time to give back what I've confided to you."

Josh opened his mouth to speak, but she laid a finger on his lips

"Shhh."

"Listen to me. Soon, your whole life is going to change. You will no longer belong to this world, but you will not be completely in mine. Be careful ... History is already shifting and I don't know how the future, my past and my present will change. I love you ... Here, everywhere and for always ..."

Then she disappeared ...

                                                                      translated by Galatea Maman

 

 

 

Serie
Doregon
Book
1
Parution
November 18, 2010
Collection
Pages
256
Type
Grand format
Price
14,12 €
Isbn13
9782841725250
Size
14,5 x 20 cm

Digital reading copy