“Ah, yes! Them’s the ones, my friend.” The giant smiled, but his eyes narrowed, glowing green with malice.
Let there be light.
As that booming, thunderous voice filled the forest, the night sky filled with bright, golden, light, the black heavens becoming blue, the grey of the grass and the trees becoming bright green. No facsimile was this. No faux light.
But real, warming sunshine.
The demon’s last words were an inaudible screech as it caught light and burnt to a crisp, before blasting into a cloud of ash to be whipped away on the breeze.
***
Gwenna blinked in the bright sunlight, gasping in astonishment as she felt the warmth of the rays on her skin. The mill was now just a burnt out and blackened shell, as though it had been burning all night. Then her astonishment turned to joy as she heard a voice behind her.
“Gwenna?”
She turned. Virginie was there, too, standing, blinking in the sunlight in disbelief. Relief exploded within the shaman leader’s chest and she ran forwards to embrace the girl. All about them, the sounds of laughter, of relief. Here and there, shamans sat, tears trickling down their cheeks. James and Felice hugged each other, relived to be in each other’s arms, yet confused and bewildered as they looked about. To the shamans’ senses, the whole clearing thronged with the activity of the spirits, as the sprites of air, earth, water and fire all flitted hither and thither to catch a glimpse of these unprecedented happenings.
And in the midst of it all, looming like some gleaming demi-god from tales of old, Stone stood and smiled.
After long moments, Virginie broke free from Gwenna’s embrace, her eyes caught by the sheer stature of the man, stumbling backwards a couple of steps as she took in his scale.
“Virginie,” smiled Gwenna, as she gestured with one hand to the giant man. “This is Lord Stone.”
At once, the girl fell to her knees, head bowed, but she looked up once more, eyes filled with wonder at the perfection of his face, the green glow in his eyes that so echoed Gwenna’s own.
“Stand girl,” he laughed. “There’ll be no ceremony here.” He frowned for a second as he studied her. “You have the gift, I see. That’s unusual. Yet it is not entirely your own. There’s an imprint there.” His eyes flickered back and forth between the two young women, before he nodded, apparently satisfied, saying no more on the matter.
Arris, now, came to Stone’s side, falling to one knee, yet his face was alight with joy rather than serious.
“My lord,” he began. “It… it felt like a lifetime since we stepped through the portal.”
“Aye lad,” nodded the titan. “But you survived. You all did well. I knew you would.”
“If I may be so bold as to ask a question?”
“Fire away…”
Arris pointed up to the sky.
“What the fuck is that?”
The dragon still loomed above the scene, its scale rendered even more impossible, now, in the bright sunlight and blue sky of day. Its skin was grey and solid, as though hewn from granite. From its head and back, vast horns and spikes erupted in great, swooping arcs, each hundreds of yards long. Its head was long, snouted, reptilian, yet possessed glowing blue eyes of fearsome intelligence. All about it, the green of the forest spread out like a rug beneath a hunting hound.
Stone laughed.
“He’s a friend, Arris. An ally. Have no fear. It’s thanks to him that I could find you.”
The monstrous dragon inclined its head as if to say ‘no problem.’ Feeling almost foolish, the young shaman bowed his head in reply.
Gwenna drew near, now.
“And now you have found us,” she began. “What are we going to do?”
The titan smiled warmly.
“I have plans, my dear. But to begin them, we must return to our proper time.”
She nodded in understanding, but her face went pale, and she turned to Virginie, eyes alight with apprehension. The French girl frowned in confusion for a moment, then comprehension dawned and fear widened her eyes, too.
“But… this is my proper time…”
A rumbling noise from above that shook the heavens, as the dragon spoke in some ancient, incomprehensible tongue. Stone nodded as he listened then grinned, turning to the pair that stood, holding each other’s hands, eyes filled with worry.
“If you wish to come with us, he says that’ll be no problem.”
Gwenna frowned in confusion, despite the smile that threatened to break out on her face at the news.
“What do you mean? How so?”
He drew near.
“You have a… how shall we say? Bond.” he whispered. “As such, you’ve left an imprint on each other. Once that imprint is left, it can never be removed. Let’s just say that, as such, Virginie is now, ahem, ‘dual-nationality’ as far as her passport is concerned.” Seeing the blank expressions on both their faces, he laughed and continued. “You belong to both times at once. So if you choose to come with us, then you’re more than welcome.”
The joy that lit the face of the pair caused the titan to look away in embarrassment. But then Virginie grew serious once more, her eyes darting over to her cousin and her husband that stood some way off, still looking bewildered, even frightened by the events that had come to pass, so far beyond their experience and understanding.
“What about Felice? And James?”
He shook his head.
“No. They must remain here.” His green eyes were soft as he spoke to the French girl. “I can arrange for them to forget everything that ever happened. I can return them home and they can live their lives as if none of this came to pass.”
Virginie thought on this for a few moments, then slowly nodded.
“Oui. I think that would be for the best.”
Stone nodded.
“As do I. It shall be done.”
With that, he nodded to the dragon above. Its blue eyes flashed and, with a crack of white and the taste of tin, Felice and James were gone, home and safe, to live their lives in peace. With a nod of satisfaction, Stone turned, facing his troupe of brave shamans and calling out that all may hear.
“My friends,” he spoke. “My brothers, my sisters.” He turned to Virginie. “Our newest sister,” he added, with a smile. “The time has come, as I promised you it would. I have found you. And now begins our work.” He gazed out upon them all, the pride on his face clear for all to see, a pride infectious, a pride of triumph over adversity. “We return to our own time. But I warn you, this world – the Earth – is a different world to the one you left. And if you think it was strange here, in this time, you just wait till you see our own time. There will be wonders. There will also be dangers. And above all,” he added with a solemn nod, “there will be much work to be done.”
With that, he raised a hand as a signal for the six-winged beast. With a flash of blue power from its eyes, a gateway appeared, a rippling portal through time that glowed, not the ominous green of the last such passage they had seen, but a pure and brilliant white.
“Through this portal,” he told them, “destiny awaits. Are you ready for it?”
The air reverberated to their reply and, even as the cheers died down, Stone stepped aside, gesturing with a sweep of his mighty arm for the troupe to make their way through. And that they did, with no hesitation; heads held high and chests puffed out with pride, they formed a line and marched towards, in a very real sense, their future.
Gwenna and Virginie, hand in hand, strode towards the portal, smiling up at the titan as they passed. Before they reached the gateway, another figure almost bumped into them, before stopping. Black hair gently tousled in the breeze, a smile on his face, Pol swept his arm before the pair.
“Ladies first,” he told them, with a bow and a grin, his eyes fixed keenly on Virginie’s own.
Chapter Fifteen:
The wind whistled as it lashed at the concrete in its path. The night sky overhead was dark, brimming with clouds that it
ched to unleash their watery payload. Spread out before them atop their vantage point, the city, bisected by a great river that snaked, winding this way and that, its surface teeming with barges.
Yet this was no Merethia. This was no Yow.
Buildings rose, precipitously, from the ground; reaching up towards the sky. So many, so different. A city of a hundred generations, each building upon, improving upon, refining the work of those gone before them. Some of those that stood and looked out had seen taller, bigger, more impressive feats of architecture. But those had been no more than decrepit shells, remnants of a lost and defeated race.
This city that sprawled before them now was alive.
It was the middle of the night, yet the city blazed with light and life. Shops, restaurants, cars, buses; the streets thronged with the evidence of a culture long adapted to conducting its business at all hours. In the distance, by the banks of the great river, a wheel, like that of a wagon, that loomed many hundreds of feet into the air, its circumference marked with great, blazing lights so that all for miles around might see it and be astonished as it turned under its own power.
Opposite it, across the river, a great building that sprawled, regal, majestic. Imposing. Its gilded sides gleamed in the orange and yellow lights of night. At one end, a soaring clock tower. Even as they watched, wide eyes taking in the scene before them, the great tower tolled two in the morning, its haunting notes ringing out across the city.
As the sonorous call faded into the night, Stone turned to them, a smile on his face, yet his eyes were serious. He surveyed the crowd before him, stood atop their vantage point on the roof of a hotel, high above the city. With his white robes gleaming and his crystal glaives sheathed at his back, he loomed over those before him. Even the largest of the warriors, a foot shorter than his own, augmented form. Yet in character, each in his own way was a giant.
The Foresters, fewer in number than he remembered. They had fought long and hard for the safety of strangers. The Shamans, weary, tired-looking, having endured persecution and trials. The Tuladors, wearing the haunted look of those that had seen sights no man should have to see. As he looked out upon them, his green eyes glistened with pride, yet also sadness for those no longer here. But within his chest, determination. For these few before him, so brave yet so weary, were no longer to be the victims of fate.
Rather, its architects.
“This is where we begin, my friends,” he told them. “This is where our journey has led us. And this is where our work will start. Welcome to London.”
It was long moments of gazing out at the scene, still soaking in the sights, the sounds of distant traffic, the roars of the planes overhead muted by unfathomable distance, before anyone answered him.
It was Iain that ventured first, breaking the stillness of the night air.
“My lord,” he enquired. “This is a world of miracles. A race that can build such a city, that can build birds of steel that soar through the sky; how can any such civilisation fall, even against the foe we know is coming? Surely they have weapons of unimaginable power?”
Before Stone could even reply, Arbistrath took a step forwards, resting one plated foot on an air-conditioning duct. He took a long, lingering drag on his cigar, before exhaling and turning to the Forester.
“It truly is a world of wonders, you’re right in that respect, my friend. But it’s also a world divided. Nations at each other’s throats. Mistrust and fear abound. And you can rest assured that Those Beyond the Veil will try their damndest to stir that paranoia up before they invade.”
“Then we must try to unite this world,” came the soft tones of Gwenna as she strode forth, brushing red ringlets from her pale face as the breeze played with her hair. “Only by standing together can mankind win the war to come. The only question is, how do we unite such disparate countries? We cannot impose our will on them with force. That would go against everything we stand for.”
“No.” It was the Woodsman that answered her. He stood slightly apart from the rest, looking out to the city beyond as he thought, before nodding. “We do it by winning the hearts of the people. We do it,” he turned to the crowd and to Stone, “by becoming an example to others. We do it by becoming a shining beacon of humanity’s potential. If we do that, then we won’t need to force anything on anyone; they will come to us.”
A chorus of nods and murmurs of approval, the conversation continuing as the groups merged and mingled, each beginning to feel a mounting excitement as they elaborated on what had been aired already.
All of this, Stone watched, a smile on his face and arms crossed as he leant against a gently humming air-conditioning unit. A shape appeared by his side, a young man, clad in silver plate. One arm was missing from the elbow down, bandaged up tightly. His face, though youthful, bore the lines of endured agony. From his back, his cannon hung on its leather harness.
The titan looked down at the newcomer and smiled. Yet the smile didn’t seem to reach his eyes; there, instead, a sadness, as he took in the extent of the boy’s injuries.
The Baron’s axe had taken a piece of Marlyn that even Stone’s power could never restore.
“My Lord,” the Tulador voiced, as the hubbub continued in the background. “Where is the dragon?”
Green eyes glanced upwards to heaven, piercing the clouds with ease and raking the sky. After a second, Stone smiled.
“He’s up there, nine miles above us at the moment. Cloaked against any attempts at detection. Quite content to wait for us.”
“I’d quite like to see it up close, if I could,” the Guard told him. “I… I can’t quite work out whether he’s a creature or a construct. Is he made of stone? Metal? Flesh?”
The titan laughed.
“You’ve got an inquisitive mind, lad. You always did. Perhaps he’s one, perhaps he’s the other. Maybe his kind transcend easy definition.” He gave a shrug of his massive shoulders. “Who knows? As for getting a closer look at him. Well… I’m sure that can be arranged.”
Marlyn smiled, then paused for a moment, as if he had something on his mind but hesitated to voice it.
“Speak, lad. You’ve earned the right.”
The youth nodded, then, with his one good arm, unslung the intricate Tulador Cannon from his back, hefting it before him. His eyes roamed the sleek, polished metal that seemed to glow and hum with barely contained power, knowing every detail, every lever, every control as though it were part of his very own body.
He looked up at his lord, eyes serious.
“I have a favour to ask…”
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Stone Rising Page 26