“Where will the water come from?” Kestrel asked.
“That will come later,” his divine companion replied.
“Now, observe,” the many-legged god told Kestrel. The god pointed a leg at the ground beside himself, and released a stream of energy. There was a slight trembling of the earth, and then the ground began to furrow upward where he pointed, as the soil and stone on either side of his chosen spot began to push itself towards the center, creating a mound in the center with two depressions on either side. Tullamore kept his focus concentrated on the single spot, making the mound continue to grow higher and wider, and the crowd watched it continue to grow. The pile of earth rose above Kestrel’s head, and continued to grow more. The earth on either side continued to churn, throwing up a cloud of dust, while the mound grew to twice Kestrel’s height, then four times, and it also widened.
Tullamore, Kestrel, and the crowd of Skyes backed away, and continued to back away, as the ditch between them and the mound grew wider, threatening to engulf them all. After a minute’s work, with a massive pile of rubble thrown together, Tullamore changed his focus slightly, moving it towards the far river bank, and his massive mound of dirt finally began to lengthen.
“I will work my way all the way to the far side of the valley, while you match my efforts going in the opposite direction, to the opposite side of the valley,” Tullamore shouted to Kestrel in order to be heard over the roar of churning dirt. “We’ll meet back here in the center when our work is done.”
“And then you’ll fill all this valley with water somehow?” Kestrel asked wonderingly. He looked at the wide and long valley, and tried to comprehend the vast volume of water it would take to create such a lake. Even a mighty river or two would take weeks to accomplish such a thing, he told himself. But with a shrug, he pointed his finger at the ground next to the side of Tullamore’s mound, and he compelled the earth to begin to rise and mix and move.
After several long seconds of work, he began to move his working spot, and began to step away from Tullamore. The two of them began to drift apart, as each focused their energies and their efforts on their diverging tasks.
Kestrel let his mind go blank as he slowly stepped along, a stately pace that provided time for the long mound construction to progress away from the center. He felt the hot blue sun in the sky overhead, and he slowly began to find his mind wandering as the process of pointing his finger, releasing his power, and walking forward became a mechanical activity.
Why, he asked himself, was the ridiculous god of the bugs telling him what to do? The idea of a dam, built for non-existent water, was a waste of time, and he wondered if it was meant to be an effort to drain his own powers away, so that he could be overcome and defeated by Tullamore.
“Kestrel with two legs,” a Skye suddenly spoke from behind him, having approached him unheard, “I bring you this, which Lord Tullamore asks you to drink from.”
It was the water skin once again. Kestrel looked back over his shoulder, and realized that he and Tullamore had separated so far apart that they were no longer within sight of each other. With his free hand he took the water skin and swallowed a mouthful of the liquid, appreciating the relief it provided from the heat of the blue sun.
His day continued over a long course of building the mound, while being periodically reminded by his Skye companion to drink water. He finished his construction in the midafternoon, when he reached and climbed over a few foothills before ending the dam and anchoring it in the rising cliff face that defined the valley’s boundary.
As they finished, Kestrel and his Skye companion each turned and started to walk back along the dam. As they did, they each heard Tullamore speak to them from a distance.
Head up the valley, to the hill that separates the two valleys from each other. I will meet you there, Tullamore told them.
The pair reached the foot of the hill under the green sky of the sunset, a complete day devoted to their labors. Upon arrival they found Tullamore and the crowd of the other Skyes already climbing the hill, and they joined the party when they reached the top.
“What happens now?” Kestrel asked.
“You and I must work together to create the flow of water that will fill this new lake,” Tullamore explained. “We will go up towards the headwaters of that river, and start its flow. We’ll need to travel for the next two days to reach our goal.”
“And then what?” Kestrel asked.
“Let us wait for that,” Tullamore answered, and said no more on the subject. He summoned a group of Skyes, who came bearing the same leaf and root foodstuffs that Kestrel had eaten the day before with his friends. He sat and ate sparingly, as he thought about the fact that all those he had journeyed with were on another world, had spent an entire day in the land of the Inner Seas once again. He hoped they were safe, and close to reaching their respective homes. He hoped that Wren would somehow manage to send a message to Putienne, through Stillwater perhaps, to let the girl know that he was still safe, and still thinking of her.
The next two days were grueling ones for Kestrel as the group of travelers trudged up the edge of the dusty, hot valley. Though Kestrel drank from the water skin constantly, he felt his soul grow weary and tense from the constant besiegement by the fragment of the Kovell that had taken up residence within him.
They stopped their advance on the morning of the third day of the trip. They had climbed up a steep trail to reach the top of a tall, empty waterfall. The empty riverway had grown narrow and deep.
“The river here was once a beautiful, fast stream. There were glaciers in the mountains above us,” Tullamore gestured further up the river valley.
“This is where we will restore water to our land,” Tullamore said. “Take a deep drink of the water skin,” he directed Kestrel.
Once Kestrel drank his fill, Tullamore spoke again. “Now, you and I must merge our powers together, to create a field that will create infinity within a limited space.” The god held out one of his legs for Kestrel to hold.
The circumstances seemed odd. The god had grown suspiciously non-specific in his comments and explanations during the trip, and Kestrel felt uncomfortable. Yet he knew that his suspicions could be the product of the manipulative parasite inside him, and he continued to hesitate.
“We can bring a world back to life!” Tullamore urged, and he waved his clawed leg gently in invitation. “Just hold on and trust me.”
Kestrel closed his eyes. The journey through the strange land had accomplished everything he had set out to do, and more, yet now it seemed to be going off towards something that he could not comprehend. He had somehow achieved godhead, yet he had also compromised it through falling prey to the Kovell, and he had never sought the divine power in the first place.
He wanted the confusion of the strange blue-sunned world to end. He wanted to go home.
With resignation he reached out blindly; he felt the mist within him protest, and then he felt his hand make contact with the claw of Tullamore.
There was a jolt of power, and his eyes flew open.
He felt connected to the Skye god, aware of the perception the Skyes had of the world – an awareness of the soil, a closeness to the earth, a need to look upward at everything. The world was a place that was low, and wide. Mountains were of little note, debris on the ground was significant.
The memories, the racial memories were abundant, making Kestrel gasp as he experienced them, sorted through them, and patched them together. He saw the city he and the others had first walked through after leaving the portal; he saw it as it had once been, teeming with Skyes, green with growing plants – a vibrant city of life.
That was what Tullamore remembered, and what the god dreamed of seeing again. Kestrel realized it was the motivation that Tullamore had, the vision of restoring prosperity and comfort to the dwindling race of Skyes who were left in the desiccated lands that had been liberated from the ravenous Viathins. The god dreamt of giving a better life to his followers.
Kestrel released his power. He opened his reservoir of energy, and let it flow outward, into Tullamore, giving it freely to the god to be used in the pursuit of the vision of restoration and renewal. He felt the god take it, and he felt the god’s gratitude, as his energy and Tullamore’s were brought together, not mixing, but co-locating in the same metaphysical space. He felt and observed what the god was doing.
The two powers were united, and formed a perfect sphere, one that had distinct but indistinguishable stripes of the energies. As Kestrel observed, the sphere somehow seemed to turn inside-out, so that all the world was within it, though it still remained the same.
Then Kestrel observed the water skin rising and slipping into the interior of the sphere, in the space that was not within the world that was within the sphere. The paradox of the juxtaposition seemed to infuse the water skin with powers that were even more unusual than its eternal abundance.
A Skye took the water skin and lodged it firmly between two rocks, the spout poised to release its flow of water downward into the empty stream channel that disappeared over the falls. It reminded Kestrel of the water skin he had used at the lake in the mountains of the Inner Seas, a source of healing and life.
“Now Kestrel, I need even more – release every bit of power that you can. Force the energy out, join me in forcing the power into the water skin,” Tullamore urged, as the Skye that was handling the water skin began working the plug in the spout to release the liquid within.
Kestrel focused. He looked within himself and pulled the power out. He yearned for it to release faster, with greater volume, in a way that would feed more and more into the water skin, to do whatever Tullamore intended. His energy reacted. He could tell it was a strain, and that there was no way he could deliver anymore, but still he willed it to happen, and it did.
He was buckling from the release of energy, but he could sense that Tullamore was consuming it all, receiving the energy and then compounding it with his own energy, before building it up into a vast reservoir of energy poised around the water skin.
The Skye finally released the plug in the spout. As the first drop of water began to fall out, Tullamore drove all the gathered power into the skin in a single blast of energy. The water skin that was in the physically paradoxical state of being both within and outside of the world suddenly began to expel a torrent of water. Gushing waves of water, more than the skin could possibly hold or release, flew out of the spout in a vast stream that seemed to be the equivalent of the capacity of the entire river bed they stood next to. The water reached the edge of the precipice, and it thundered over it. The waterfall that had once been was suddenly back in existence, and the stones that had been dry for so long suddenly began to feel the moisture of a misty cloud once again.
“A job well done,” Tullamore said. He released his contact with Kestrel, and without the benefit of the contact, Kestrel collapsed to the ground. The deified elfling felt completely exhausted and drained. Tullamore had driven him to release more energy than he had thought possible, had provided a more alluring vision than Kestrel had been able to resist. Now, Kestrel felt so emptied of power he wondered if he would ever be able to generate his energy again.
“You gave everything possible,” Tullamore seemed to read Kestrel’s thoughts as he spoke. “And the result is well worth it. This flow of water is not only strong now, but it will grow even greater, so that the lake will fill completely in just a matter of days – all from the use of our powers.
“I can give you a way to strengthen your own powers now, so that you will be able to do great things like this, yet not feel as drained as you feel,” Tullamore continued. The god gestured in the air, and a tiny golden cube appeared.in the air between them.
“Find your power, all that is left, even the very center that it springs from, and feed it all into this cube,” Tullamore directed. “This cube will keep it, protect it, and strengthen it, so that your power never collapses or diminishes. It is a perfect way to increase your strength, and all of your power will be here, in this one safe place. You will be more godlike forever if you possess this cube.”
Kestrel looked at the glittering cube. He was still weary from the extraordinary creation of the new fount of water, but he felt the spark within him react positively to the notion of a protected, permanent home.
“How do I do it?” he asked.
“Simply press the cube against your forehead, and send everything into it, all the power you feel,” Tullamore answered. “It will feel and find and connect with your power, and then finish the process for you.”
The glittering object floated through the air towards Kestrel. He reached up and grabbed it. He took a deep breath and steeled himself for the task, then firmly pressed the gold against his forehead.
For the first two seconds, he simply felt the cool chill of the heavy metal. He felt the small reservoir of energy he still possessed, and he directed a trickle of that power outward, into the cube. The moment the power found the cube, the cube changed from passive to dynamic. The energy Kestrel fed it activated it to begin to pull the energy into itself, and it seemed to send tentacles of its hunger upstream to the source of Kestrel’s divine energy. It felt to Kestrel as though there were a ravenous plant that had suddenly established roots within his soul, as the tentacles multiplied and grew and pursued his energy, pulling away everything they could find within him. He screamed once in pain and fear, then fell silent as the cube controlled and overwhelmed him.
Kestrel felt the center of his energy being pulled away. It tumbled roughly through his soul, dislodging and upheaving his core as it went, leaving him with a bewildering mass of revived emotions, relived memories, and forgotten experiences. He could not tell the difference between what was happening and what he was remembering – what he lived and what he relived seemed to be the same as his soul was torn asunder by the destructive removal of the energy that was buried within him.
And then the trauma ended. He felt the mass of power flow out of him and into the cube.
Kestrel felt momentary comfort and relief, before a sudden new eruption of chaos occurred. “I shall go and control it!” the vaporous remnant of the Kovell shrieked. The unwelcome terror within him suddenly began to move as well. He felt it unwrap its hold from around his soul, and then it plummeted recklessly and painfully through him as it heedlessly tore its way into the cube, suddenly the undisputed possessor of his energy.
Kestrel lay, paralyzed and stunned, horrified and stricken by all that had happened. The cube lifted away from him, and he found that he was actually laying on his back on the ground. He saw the cube spinning and glittering directly above his face, and he thought it looked malicious now, a new home and a new weapon for the Kovell to use to begin to pursue death and destruction and control once more.
And then he heard Tullamore gently laugh.
“This is good,” the god said. He reached out and grabbed the cube as it floated in the air, then he examined it closely, as Kestrel had an impression that the Kovell was screaming in confusion and frustration.
“This is not really a container for power,” Tullamore said to Kestrel. “It’s really a prison cell, a place that is an absolute trap. Anything that enters it can never escape.
“I knew that the Kovell within you would never be dislodged unless it wanted to be; it had seized upon your heart and held you as a hostage, so I needed to trick it into leaving you voluntarily,” the god explained. “When it saw your energy leave, and it thought it could seize control of the power, it deserted you, expecting to become the commander of your energy.
“Instead, as you see, it is forever removed from the world now, and we all are safer.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Kestrel asked in astonishment.
“How could I tell you without telling the Kovell?” Tullamore asked. “I had to keep this all a secret from you in order to keep the monster in the dark.
“And now, you are free of the Kovell. You have lost your
godlike powers, but the abilities that were your own are still yours, and we can plan to move on to find a way to take you back to your own home, after you have a day to rest,” the god told Kestrel.
Kestrel took a deep breath, and considered the outcome of the god’s trickery. It was probably the best result he could ask for; he was rid of the Kovell, and the cost had only been the divine power that he was going to lose in any event when he left the land of the Skyes.
“I’ll be able to go home now?” he asked. He suddenly felt very tired.
“As soon as you’re ready, we’ll try to find a way to send you back to your own land,” Tullamore agreed.
“What do you mean, ‘try to find’?” Kestrel asked, as he yawned. “We’ll just go to the portal.”
“There are no portals left that go directly to your world,” Tullamore answered in a sad voice. “You’ve closed off both of those. “We’ll have to go to the one remaining portal that may take you to another world that will then have its own portal to your world.”
That was the last that Kestrel heard, before he fell asleep.
Chapter 20
Kestrel awoke to find that he was sleeping on a bed that rose and fell, giving a slight vibration that spread evenly across his body. He was looking up at the sparkling night sky.
“Is it an earthquake?” he asked as he sat up.
It was not an earthquake he saw. It was a moving bed of sorts. He was lying on the backs of several Skyes who were walking slowly, pressed together to make a continuous surface for him to sleep on. They were walking along a trail that bordered a wide body of water, and he heard the gentle sound of small waves lapping up against the shoreline next to them.
“There is no earthquake,” Tullamore responded. He was walking ahead of Kestrel’s carriage. “We simply wanted to allow you to reach your next destination more quickly, so we have carried you this far along the way. We’re beside the lake that you and I created with our earthen berm,” he explained. “My people are very excited to see a body of water; it gives them hope of better days ahead.”
An Unexpected Deity (Book 7) Page 28