“They evacuated people of importance first, those who could carry with them the technological secrets of their civilization and continue on with the Golandon legacy in other worlds. Their best scientist was chosen to stay behind. Before leaving, the scientists cybernetically enhanced him to prolong his life indefinitely. They then placed him in stasis deep within the core. If the invasion damaged the Obiectis and it could not self-repair, he was programmed to wake and oversee the repairs himself.
“The last and most crucial part of their plan to save the Obiectis was the role of the High Priestess. Her knowledge of multidimensional magic exceeded even that of the Golandon scientists. She was a Sensitive, in tune with the astral forces and able to manipulate dark matter to do her bidding without the need for technology. In other worlds, some would call her a witch or sorceress.
“The High Priestess feared the chaos god. The entity was powerful beyond anything she had ever encountered. The only way to stop the behemoth was to contain it within something she could control. But no manmade structure would hold it. The container needed to be a living vessel with the strength of will to dominate the wild beast and ultimately tame it.
“As the last of the Golandon fled through portals to parts unknown, the High Priestess took her position and gazed at the churning mass of darkness swarming over the revolving hoops as it burst through the last remaining shreds of the force field. Black writhing clouds swamped the artificial atmosphere, filling the immense space with the terrifying howl of a thousand storms, questing for the life force energy it craved.
“The High Priestess closed her eyes and commanded the entity to enter her. Nothing could have prepared her for the massive onslaught of the being’s immense energy invading her. She knew her own smallness in that moment, like a ship swallowed by a tidal wave. Every horror and atrocity that had created the monster, consumed her whole and blazed into existence. All the old truths and ancient magic she’d clung to abandoned her.
“Dark wrappings of power seeped into her cells, down to the molecular level. As the last vestiges of her spirit struggled to hold on, she realized her own secret longing for power and surrendered to the darkness. In that instant, she willingly merged with the entity, a choice which transformed them both into the fearsome, black-eyed goddess, known in that moment of manifestation as Kaliena.
“Her changed form overflowed with rivers of darkness, which sought to spread across the universe. The black tendrils of smoke curling around her body lashed toward the portals, slipping through before fully closing behind the departing Golandan, flowing into hundreds upon hundreds of other worlds. Thus, spreading the seeds of her power throughout untold galaxies, where she has since become deified as a mighty goddess of both creation and destruction. She has been called by hundreds of names–the Cosmic Mother, the Devourer Of Him Who Devours, the Great Sorceress and Kali, to name but a few.
“Kaliena took full ownership of the Obiectis. For a time, she slept, dreaming of her omnipresent self and the power she wielded over the many worlds she now possessed. When she finally woke from her long sleep, the connection to her many selves became severed and she found her consciousness limited to her physical body. Unfortunately, this division left her trapped within the residual negative energies of the chaos being. Her wisdom and reverence for life had moved on with the other parts of herself now scattered throughout the universe.
“For hundreds of thousands of years, she used the portals in an attempt to reunite with the missing pieces of her greater soul. When this proved fruitless, she turned to seeking out powerful objects of magic in the hopes more power would offer a solution. She stole these instruments of magic from countless worlds, hoarding them like treasures within the Obiectis. When none of these objects gave her the power to do what she desperately craved, her thirst became insatiable.
“A time came when a powerful sorcerer named Wodrid discovered a gateway into the Obiectis through a mystical lock, a trespass which nearly ended his life. The wizard was no match for the sorceress, Kaliena. For some unknown reason, she allowed him to live and held him prisoner. When he regained his strength, she tortured him, partially for her own amusement, but mostly to discover how he’d found a way into her impenetrable fortress.
“Wodrid withstood this torment in a way that surprised her. She soon came to admire his strength and endurance. Having been alone with only her mechanical servants as company, she eventually softened and allowed him a modicum of freedom, though his life wholly belonged to her. She would never allow him to leave. But as decades passed, something changed between captor and captive. They fell in love and Wodrid had no other choice but to join in her quest to rebuild her original power.
“Unbeknownst to Wodrid, Kaliena was not the immortal she claimed to be. She’d been secretly relying on magical elixirs and amulets she’d stolen from other worlds to maintain her youthful life force. But she finally came to a point where she could no longer hold back her bodily decline. She needed stronger remedies, and her supply of ancient amulets had finally been drained of power.
“When at last, she confessed her weakness to Wodrid, he helped integrate her mortal form into the magically infused technology deep inside the heart of the Obiectis to keep her alive. He stayed by her side as she slipped into dreamless slumbers, each of which lasted a little longer with each passing day. Desperate to give her hope, Wodrid broke his oath to The Order of Druids by revealing a sacred secret. There were two objects which could restore her to godhood. He told her of the Orb and Rod of Aeternitis, two instruments of incredible magic, when combined, would give her the power to call anything into existence.
“Her last words to him as she fell into a permanent sleep were to find the Orb and Rod and deliver them back to her. Before Wodrid left, he brought the scientist out of stasis and instructed him to monitor Kaliena’s life force until he returned with the means to revive her.
“As of this last entry, I observed the passing of two centuries without any sign of Wodrid’s return. As my own life nears the end of this existence, my Sight dims and I do not See as much as I once did. What I can See, is that the revolving hoops of the Obiectis continue to turn. The portals still fill with magical wonders and Kaliena sleeps through it all. But of one thing I can be sure, the Golandon scientist will find a way to wake her. It’s in his blood to make broken things work. The problem is, he knows not of what he is waking and I fear for the future of the universe when his task is complete.”
As Vasha’s face vanished from the misty screen, Fate hastily shut the lid of the projector ring. Her mind was reeling. She could barely breathe, knowing she’d witnessed the moment the Golandon scientist achieved his goal of waking Kaliena. The frightening images of the black-eyed goddess, Kaliena, shrouded in writhing darkness and her ultimate, downward spiral into a greedy, power-hungry sorceress would haunt her. Yet for some reason, her fear had become hair-raising terror when Wodrid entered the picture with his beautiful elfin face, delicately pointed ears poking through his long silvery hair and eyes the color of ice.
By the time the recording played to the end, Fate’s terror had increased to an irrational level. She couldn’t shake the feeling she knew Wodrid. His face had been disturbingly familiar. She was certain their paths had somehow crossed, and not in a good way. Yet surely an unpleasant encounter with him would’ve scorched itself into her brain. Not to mention, given his mission to revive Kaliena, he would’ve used everything in his power to take the Rod from her if they had met.
She grabbed at the chain of her necklace to check if the Rod was still attached. Her panic eased when she felt the warmth of the thin gold bar between her fingers.
Her head was spinning. “Wodrid.” The name felt foreign on her tongue, yet familiar at the same time. “Wodrid. Why do I know that name…and that face?”
Squeezing her eyes shut, Fate reached back in her memory, recalling as much as she could from her time in the Book of Fables. But too much had happened. Pinpointing how she knew Wodrid proved to
be impossible. It was like looking for a polar bear in a snowstorm, and every bit as nerve wracking.
“Oh, screw it,” she muttered. Tomorrow, she’d ask Farouk what he knew about Wodrid. Or maybe she should hold off. Any conversations she had with Farouk needed to be about enlisting his help to locate the portal to Oldwilde so she could bring Finn back to the Keep.
Her heart raced at the thought of seeing Finn. It was almost too much to hope for. She shook her head. There was no room for doubt. She had to believe it was possible. For a split second, she allowed herself to imagine his face when they reunited–the passionate glitter in his green eyes, the irresistible curve of his lips and the dark golden strands of hair falling artfully across his forehead. She smiled in spite of the bittersweet ache spreading through her chest.
Fate scooted down into the bed and hugged a pillow. A good night’s sleep was in order. She would need her wits about her tomorrow.
“Lights out,” she said through a yawn, her eyelids already drooping as the light of the lanterns dimmed to blackest night.
21
His Mother’s Son
THE LHIANNAN SHEE GAVE the nearby tables in the tavern a sidelong glance. “You shouldn’t overstay your welcome,” she warned Finn.
Ignoring her, Finn sopped up the last of his mutton stew with a wedge of bread and stuffed it in his mouth. After a solid day spent in O’Deldar’s room without eating, he was weak with hunger. “We’ll leave as soon as I’m good and full.” He chewed his food slowly and swallowed. “You may not need to eat, but I can’t go any further without refueling.”
He looked up from his empty plate, wincing at the sight of the faery. To keep her from taking on Fate’s form, he’d made her wear a glamour of someone he detested. In this case a young gangly boy with a freckled nose and red hair, an evil kid who’d come frighteningly close to killing Fate by sacrificing her to a bloodthirsty oak.
Finn swigged back the last of his mead, barely able to stomach what he was looking at. “Other than men, what is it you actually eat?”
“Love is what feeds me.” A frown darkened the faery’s ruddy complexion. “A bite of which I’m desperately craving at the moment.”
Anxious knots twisted in Finn’s gut. He was playing a dangerous game allowing the Lhiannan Shee to join him on his quest to locate the fiery divide. But the loneliness he’d been plagued with had only gotten worse and his temptation to see Fate again was more than he could resist. He told himself he needed this reminder to keep him from giving up, but he knew he was fooling himself. His desperate desire to be with Fate had made him weak-willed.
He reached into his sealskin sporran for a few coins and laid them on the table. “Let’s be off then.” He stood to leave.
Finn’s movement turned heads in the room. He’d been careful to keep his face hidden beneath the hood of his cloak, but looking back, that in itself may have drawn suspicion. Tensing as he reached the door, he heard the faery scream his name.
There was no time to react. Something thick and hard smacked into the side of the head. The blow dropped him to the floor in a flat second. A blast of fractured light filled his vision and with the last shred of his dimming awareness, he caught sight of the Lhiannan Shee.
She’d morphed into Fate.
As Finn struggled to keep his eyes open, the faery with Fate’s face fell to her knees next to him. “Stay with me, Finn. Get up and fight. I know you can do it.”
The conviction in her voice filled him with renewed strength. Growling with effort, Finn pushed himself off the floor, only to be knocked back down as a cracking sound filled his skull and plunged him into darkness.
•
Finn woke to screams of misery. A pounding headache cut through his fogged brain. Groaning with pain, he opened his eyes to a dark cell. Beyond the bars imprisoning him, the light of a torch flickered over greasy stone walls stained black with years of filth and old blood.
Some sort of wooden knob had been jammed in his mouth to gag him. Someone must’ve guessed by the Elder race runes inked on his skin that he could invoke the elements and bring a hurricane down upon them. He tried to force it out with his tongue, but a strap held it firmly in place.
Finn moved to take it out with his hand, when he realized his wrists were shackled and solidly anchored to the wall. Panic flooded his veins as he jumped off the scummy floor. His ankles were bound as well, and he could go no further than a standing position. He strained against the iron grip of the manacles with every ounce of power he could muster. But there was no breaking them, regardless of his extraordinary strength.
Why had he gone into that tavern? Fate had given him the ability to fly with her Words of Making. His raging hunger really could’ve waited the extra hour or two it would’ve taken to get to a village well outside of Asgar. But no, he’d allowed himself to get careless. All because he’d been able to stroll in and out of the castle so easily.
A furious scream tore from his lungs, his cry muffled by the plug in his mouth. He went berserk, kicking and wrenching his arms against the restraints. The shackles bit deep into his wrists and ankles until his bones throbbed, but he couldn’t stop himself. His own stupidity infuriated him.
His raging ignited a series of howls and shrieks from other parts of the dungeon. Out of breath from the painful struggle, Finn dropped his fists and hung his head as he listened to the other prisoners. The loudest of them sounded insane, some like caged animals, while others cried out in horrible agony.
Finn gulped and glanced down. They’d stripped him of his Beldereth uniform and the sporran holding all his worldly goods, including his flute, of course. He was dressed in rags. This must be some kind of torture chamber. No doubt, it wouldn’t be long before it was his turn on the rack.
He no sooner came to his grim conclusion, when a guard appeared, unlocked the door and stepped aside, allowing a cloaked man to enter. His face was in shadow, but judging by the cut of his clothes and fine fabric, he was someone of nobility.
“Leave us,” the man said to the guard as he removed his hood.
As dim as the light was in Finn’s cell, he recognized Prince Tynan immediately, though he must have been crowned king after Moria’s death. The young man took after his mother. He had the same ivory complexion, dark hair and red glint of the dragon in his brown eyes.
“I knew it was only a matter of time before I would look into the eyes of my mother’s killer.” Tynan’s mouth twisted into a hateful line. He held Finn’s flute high for him to see. “I suppose you came back to finish what you started. Was it not enough for you to take my mother? What kind of animal are you that you need to end her bloodline?”
Finn’s throat tightened around the grief he felt for Tynan. This was a good man who believed he was facing the murderer of his innocent mother. The king would never know what a truly evil woman Moria had been, which left Finn with nothing he could say in his own defense, even if he could speak.
Tynan’s fist shook with anger as he tightened his grip on the flute Finn had used to enchant Moria into throwing herself into the flames. The muscles in his jaw tensed as he clenched his teeth. “What did my mother ever do to you?”
Looking the king in the eyes, Finn shook his head. He wanted to tell Tynan that he did it to end the suffering of his people, but the king obviously had no desire to hear what Finn had to say. Not that he’d allow him to speak. The king knew Finn could use his rune power to invoke the elements that could bring nature’s wrath down upon his kingdom.
“We were the most prosperous kingdom in all of Oldwilde,” Tynan seethed. “That is, until you killed our empress. It was she who blessed our people with endless wealth. Her death cast a shadow over the land, bringing death and decay down upon us all!”
Finn steadied his gaze on the king. It didn’t matter that he was gagged. There was nothing to be said. How could he ever prove that Moria had plotted revenge against Asgar by marrying Tynan’s father and giving him the perfect son and heir? Her patience had known n
o bounds. Over a span of seventeen years, she’d manipulated the king into relinquishing his rule to her authority and had allowed the kingdom of Asgar to fall into rot and ruin. The most cruel part of her plan was the web of illusion she’d woven over the people. She’d made them perceive only prosperity, where no one ever grew sick or died. In actuality, the castle had been crumbling down around them and their bountiful harvests were that of the dead.
Tynan would never know his mother had intended to use him against Asgar as her final act of vengeance. If Finn hadn’t stopped her when he did that night at the great bonfire, Moria would’ve awakened Tynan’s Serpen blood and turned him into a dragon that would finally raze the kingdom to the ground.
Finn understood Tynan’s blindness. No loving son could ever believe his mother was so evil and vengeful. Not unless he personally witnessed her despicable actions. All the sorrow Finn felt for the young king welled in his eyes.
A fleeting look of surprise passed over Tynan. “What’s this? Tears? From the Unholy Piper?” He stared at Finn, confused for a moment. Then rage returned, turning his pale face red as he held the flute in both hands, straining until the hollow reed snapped in half.
Finn winced. His grandfather had carved that flute for him. He’d lovingly scored it with Druidic inscriptions, and later, Tove had inscribed the Elder race runes into the wood, transforming the flute into a powerful weapon. Finn had used it as a wind sword to fight his greatest opponent, and of course, on Moria as a seductive instrument of death.
Fate's Keep (Fate's Journey Book 2) Page 15