by Bolz, Stefan
They all looked at him. “What will you do?” Wind asked again.
Joshua realized that he hadn’t thought of it. He had also completely forgotten all about the feathers.
“I’m not sure. But first things first,” he answered and flew up onto the stone pillar. When he landed, he was very surprised to see that there were only two feathers. He was certain in his dream he had seen three.
“There are only two. I don’t understand. Why are there only two feathers? Where is the third?” He must have looked very confused at that moment.
The dragon stepped forward slightly, lowering his head to Joshua’s level.
“They awaken usually either toward the end or at the beginning of each age. For on either of the two outermost points on the pendulum there is a searcher and one that will most likely swing it back in the other direction and toward the balance point. There have been two before you, Joshua. Two searchers. Two feathers. Two civilizations. The first came at the outset of one. He set things in motion. The second came at the end when the path became so clouded, so split up, divided and split up again that the right way was no longer easily distinguishable from the rest. She was the second searcher reversing the direction completely and by doing so ending what had been.”
“The sky people. Was she one of them?” Joshua had trouble following the dragon’s thoughts. The ideas were too vast for him to let them in completely.
“We do not know. I was very young when it happened and I have no recollection of what had occurred,” the dragon answered. “But I do know that you are the third. The searcher who stands at the dawn of a third civilization.”
Joshua was stunned. He had so many questions.
“How?” Was all he could ask.
“It is very simple, really. The dream is the beginning. Many have had it, Joshua. Few have answered it. But in the last thousand years you were the only one who came this far, who actually followed it through and all the way to the end.”
“But I didn’t do it myself,” Joshua thought. “I had… help.”
“Yes, you did and mighty it was. The companions the dreamer chooses says much about who he is. Think of the wolf and the war horse. Better friends no one can have.”
“Yes.” Joshua thought, looking at Krieg. “What about the lioness?”
“What about her?” The dragon answered.
“Who was she?”
All was quiet. Joshua saw his reflection in the green irises of the large dragon. Could it be? Was this even possible? No, probably not. But after he had thought it out, Joshua couldn’t help but realize the truth in what he had thought impossible at first.
“She was the second searcher.”
“In a way,” the dragon answered.
“The second searcher was a lioness?” Joshua asked.
“Yes and no. She spoke to you through her. That was the only way you could accept her help.”
Joshua thought about this for a moment.
“What happens now?” He asked.
“That is completely up to you. You decide where you wish to go from here,” the dragon answered.
“Can I meet her?” He asked.
“You have met her, Joshua. You have accepted her power and her strength within you. What else is there to meet?”
Joshua thought for a second that the wolf had spoken. The logic of it was so like him. He looked around the cave. He saw the sculpture of the lioness and from her he looked up at the ceiling. There was an opening right above where he stood on the stone pillar. The light was too bright and he couldn’t see where it was going.
“What’s up there?” He asked.
“Why don’t you find out,” the dragon answered. And with that, he stepped back again. Joshua looked at Wind and from her to Krieg and from him to Alda.
“Am I going to die?” He wasn’t really sure where this question came from.
For a moment all was quiet.
“You can’t,” Wind answered. “Not anymore.
“And what about my limitations?” He asked.
Wind smiled in her thoughts. “You left them behind when you flew out of the pen. And from then on you have gone far beyond them.”
Joshua looked at her, feeling her embrace and her warmth spilling out toward him and enveloping him completely. He felt the love he had felt when he first saw the feathers in his dream. Love for the Pegasus, Krieg, the turtle and the dragon. And for Grey who had not left his heart since he had gone to be with his companion. And he felt it for the vulture and the spiders and all the beasts of Hollow’s Gate and beyond it far up to the surface. He felt it for his hens and their chicks and even for the farmer. Hadn’t he given him the place from where he could begin his journey?
“I will never forget any of you,” he thought. “I wish everyone could experience, at least once in their lifetime, what it means to have friends like you.”
“The honor is all ours,” Krieg answered.
Joshua looked from one to the other, then up again toward the ceiling. For a moment he thought about what would come next. But as he didn’t know it, it didn’t make much sense to think about it further. He felt lighter suddenly. The pain that he’d had since the vulture dropped him was gone. But he also felt lighter in his heart. As if a burden was lifted from him. He felt suddenly that he could breathe deeply.
And with that thought he nodded slightly to the others and he opened his wings and flew up toward the light in the ceiling. And for a while the others still saw him, flying upward until he became just a silhouette that eventually disappeared into the light.
They stood in silence for a while. Then they saw a single feather float down from the ceiling and land on the stone pillar next to the other two. It was red.
The End
May your heart sing with Alda
May it soar with the eagles high above
Take flight with Wind and Krieg
With the strength of the lioness
And may it be true like the wolfs’
May you dream deep and wide and vast like
Dragon-On-The-Stone
And may your dreams reach the stars and beyond
And may you have friends such as Joshua had
Always
25. EPILOGUE
Dear friend,
As it is with many stories, the end of one is but the beginning of another. Just like the pendulum that stops at its tipping point only to swing in the other direction once more. There was one moment in my story in particular that has significance for what is to come. It was the moment during the ordeal inside the Labyrinth of Mirrors when I realized the depth of the love I shared with my beloved wolf. That moment has, like a pebble starting a landslide, set in motion a series of events culminating in the re-activation of the beacon—the ancient means of transportation between the worlds. And that, in turn, has re-awakened a whole civilization on the other end of the galaxy. I did not know this at the time. But I do know it now. As it turns out, this—all of this—is much bigger than I had ever thought it would be. And what will happen next, I believe, will surprise you, will astound you, will make you realize that to leave one world and to enter another does not mean you lose the one you left. It will stay with you. And just as the lioness stayed with me, the friends you made on this journey will always be with you if you so wish. That much I know.
We have not reached the end of our journey together yet. Keep your eyes and ears open. And watch your dreams. Always watch your dreams.
For now and until we meet again I remain very truly yours,
–Joshua
THANK YOU
Thank you, Layla Mosbacher, for being my first beta reader for a lot of the scenes. Thank you for your encouragement and your enthusiasm for the story. Now I know why your middle name is Hope. Thank you, Chloe Mosbacher, for filling the writing space with the smell of brownies, fudge, and almond extract. Because of you I might have a permanent association between cookies and the story. Thank you, Amy Mosbacher, for listening to countless hours of m
e talking about the story and you telling me each time—and however strange an idea was—that it was great.
Many thanks to Mrs. Kievit and her 4th grade class at Lenape Elementary School in New Paltz, NY, for having one of the manuscript copies read aloud in class. That was amazing. Thanks to Elke Kaeppner, Diane Silverberg (“I’m the rooster! I’m the rooster!”), Mercedes Calderon, Julie Rose, Gerald Sorin, Jed Sherman, Maxine & Marielle Rosola, Julie Nichols, Carla Aiston (a.k.a. frog princess), Lynn Masanotti (Lynn, I completely understand that you had to finish 50 Shades of Gray first. No hard feelings), Jackie Dooley and Laura Putnam, for reading the first draft and giving invaluable feedback. Thank you, Maxi Spanheimer, for being who you are, always. Thank you (again) Jackie Dooley for editing the manuscript in your ‘free time’. Thanks, Matt Maley at Visualstuff in New Paltz, for an amazing and inspired cover. Thanks to Donnie Light from eBook76.com for making the pages look beautiful.
Thanks to all my early Facebook page likers. Your out-pour of support was touching and bridged the gap over some chasms I had to cross in order to get to the other side. Thank you, Julie Lion Rose, for letting me play in the sand box at your therapy practice and thereby—and because of it—conceive Joshua’s story and everything that followed. Thank you Joyce Urritia for your understated brilliance in Astrology and your side statement of: “Oh, and, by the way, you should go back to therapy and please for God’s sake STOP EDITING YOURSELF!” Wow, that was a good one.
Thanks to my family and friends in Germany. You are with me far across the ocean. I am forgetting people to thank, I’m sure. Just know that you are not forgotten.
Finally, thank you so much, Joshua, for letting me be your scribe; for choosing me to write it all down. Thank you, Grey and Krieg, for your undying friendship. I feel honored for the privilege of being part of your journey. Thank you Alda, for your music; Wind for your wisdom and warmth; Dragon-of-the-Stone for sharing your magnificent dreams; Broga for your might & confidence; and you, lioness, for your stunning beauty and grace. I dare sometimes to summon you and you are there each time I do.
New York in August 2012,
Stefan Bolz
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www.thethreefeathers.com
Some of the locations in the story were inspired by the paintings of
Hans-Werner Sahm.
The head of the lioness was inspired by a painting by Sheila Wright.
The cover was created by Matt Maley.
www.mattmaley.com
The Fourth Sage
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Fifteen-year-old Aries Egan lives in one of five super high rises in a nameless city. There is no government. There are no schools. People are controlled by a ruthless Corporation. Any deviation from the Moral Code, the code of living set forth by the Corporation, is punished - sometimes with prison, sometimes with torture, sometimes with death.
Aries hacks into the main frame computer, creating a loop with the camera feed to her room and so stealing one hour per night for herself. Sometimes she reads a book. That alone could send her to prison for three months. At other times, she roams the massive building via the air ducts. During one of her nightly excursions, she finds something that has the power to change her life and that of everyone around her. But in order for her to follow it, she has to become an outlaw, a criminal, an enemy of the Corporation.
As the hunt for her unravels, she flees ever deeper into the belly of her building. What awaits her there, she could not possibly have foreseen. And the fate of her people now rests on her ability to survive.
Praise for The Fourth Sage:
"Unique in a sea of generic books." [Will Swardstrom, Author of Dead Sight and Dead Sleep]
"One of the most endearing things about this author's works is his passion and true belief in his stories and characters. His obvious love for them literally drips from the page; a trait sometimes missing in indie fiction." [Kimberly Llewellyn]
"I freaking loved it! This has to be a movie. There was far too much detail and visual stunningness (don't know if that's a word but it is now) that just leapt off the pages. This book was a spectacular adventure and an epic love story among human beings. Not the kind of love story between 2 people, but the kind between humanity. It was beautiful, beautiful!" [Ali Hammond]
"I found that once I began reading, I could not put the story down so make sure you plan accordingly!" [Jennifer Husta]
"A fabulous fast paced story that really strikes a chord at this day and age. Highly, highly, recommended!" [Lina Gingold]
"The philosophies and creativity this e-book was filled with were absolutely amazing, and the situations were intense. There wasn't a single break for Aries, who was met with adversity at every turn." [Undiscovered Tomes]
Dark World
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There is a world within our own—beneath, below, not visible to our eyes but never far away. We can neither touch nor feel nor smell it. We do not even think it real. Still, it is there. It is the world of the angels. Their world is our world but void of ugliness and fear and death and pain. Its buildings are pristine, its cities glorious, its lawns are still and deep, and its winged inhabitants the most beautiful creatures you can imagine.
From this world of beauty and peace, two angels—Amber and her daughter Pearl—do what is forbidden and cross into our world, landing in a dark back alley somewhere in a seedy part of Detroit. They should not be here. They should not have come. For once here, they are bound by the same laws we are. And now the unthinkable happens: before they can return home, Pearl is murdered by a street gang. Amber, for the first time experiencing human emotions, is soon consumed by powerful thoughts of revenge. From that moment on, she begins to slip ever deeper into the darkness of her own hatred until almost nothing of her is left.
On the other side of town, John Engels, a research scientist, realizes to his own surprise and terror, that he might be the only one who can possibly stop her before she follows through with her plan of killing all those responsible for her daughter's death. For if he cannot stop her, if she falls, the world—our world—will fall with her.
"A thrilling, visual, rollercoaster ride of revenge." Nick Cole, author of The Old Man and the Wasteland
"Stefan Bolz has his own brand of positive fiction. You see it seeping through every pore of The Three Feathers. In his book The Fourth Sage, the characters work together to achieve a goal they never could have even dreamed about. In Dark World, I was afraid I wasn't going to get a Bolz-style of story, but the opposite is true. There is a darkness and violence to it, but in the end it just reaffirms the good Stefan Bolz believes in." Will Swardstrom, author of Dead Sleep.
The Dawning of the True Self
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"The Dawning of the True Self" compares the spiritual journey hidden in the fable "The Three Feathers" to our own search for who and what we are in truth. As such it is a guide to our own journey, from the small self—the self we experience now—to our true self—the magnificent self that awaits us at the journey’s end. At the beginning of it all stands one question, asked in many forms, in different ways and in countless languages. It is this question that signifies the beginning of our search. The question is: Who am I? In order to find the answer, we must leave the confines of our small self and go on a journey of discovery, across the treacherous terrain of our unconscious mind and to our destination—the dawning of our true Self within us.
Table of Contents
1. Dreams
2. Death
3. Departure
4. Wolf
* * *
5. Krieg
* * *
&nb
sp; 6. Water
* * *
7. Wind
8. Jump
* * *
* * *
9. Eagles
* * *
10. Mirrors
* * *
* * *
11. Ruins
* * *
12. Refuge
13. Lioness
* * *
* * *
14. Darkness
15. Alda
16. Capture
* * *
17. Broga
18. Submerged
* * *
* * *
19. Ambushed
* * *
* * *
20. Awakening
21. The Long Dark
* * *
22. Battle
23. Dragon’s Flight
* * *
* * *
24. Home
* * *
25. Epilogue
Thank You