"Well done," Master Jojonah congratulated, and Avelyn relaxed somewhat. "What do you know of the Ring Stones?"
"They are the source of all the magic in the world," Avelyn recited.
Jojonah nodded but said, "Not exactly true."
Avelyn stared at him hard.
"The Ring Stones are the source of all goodly magic," Master Jojonah explained.
"God-given magic," Avelyn dared to put in.
Jojonah hesitated - a pause not consciously caught by Avelyn, but one that he would recall in years to come - then nodded. "But there are, too, the Earth Stones, the source of evil magic, the power of the dactyls," said Jojonah. "They are not numerous, by God's grace, and can only be used by those demons - who, by God's grace, are even less numerous!" He ended with a chuckle, but Avelyn was hard-pressed to see any humor in a discussion of the demon dactyls.
Jojonah cleared his throat uncomfortably. "And there is magic in the Touel'alfar, as well," he said. "In their melodious singing, so it is said, and in the metal their gardens 'grow' from the soil."
"Grow?" Avelyn asked.
Master Jojonah shrugged; it was not important. "Tell me of the Ring Stones," he prompted. "Who gathers them?"
"The brothers of St.-Mere-Abelle," Avelyn answered immediately.
"From where?"
"They fall from the sky, from the Halo, into the waiting hands of-"
Jojonah's chuckle stopped him short. "They fall with a speed greater than that of an arrow in flight," the master explained. "And they are hot, my novice friend, so hot as to burn the flesh and the bone beneath it!" Jojonah chuckled again as he described to Avelyn an image of a young monk standing in a field, as holed as the cheese of Alpinador, an incredulous look on his face, a group of glowing rocks on the ground behind him.
Avelyn bit hard on his lip. He realized that Jojonah wasn't mocking him, but could not understand why he was being told these things.
"Where do we get them?" Jojonah asked suddenly.
Avelyn started to say, "The Halo," but stopped short, realizing that that ground had already been covered. His expression blank, he merely shrugged.
"Pimaninicuit," Jojonah said.
Avelyn's expression did not change.
"An island," the master explained. "Pimaninicuit. That is the only place where the sacred stones may be collected."
Avelyn had never heard such a thing.
"If you ever utter that name to any who do not know it, without the express permission - no, the express instruction - of the presiding father abbot of St.-Mere-Abelle, all of the powers of the abbey will be put into focus to bring about your execution."
Avelyn knew why he had never heard the name before.
"When do we get them?" Jojonah asked, changing the subject so abruptly that he had Avelyn thoroughly flustered. Again the young monk could only shrug helplessly, wanting to know but afraid to know. There was something most sacred, yet particularly unmysterious, and thus unholy, in all of this, a tingling of ecstasy combined with a slightly foul taste that Avelyn Desbris could not ignore.
"The stones do not come to ground often," Jojonah explained, sounding more like a scholar than a priest. "They do not fall frequently, but they do fall regularly." He led the way to the left-hand wall of the large chamber, and as they neared, Avelyn could see that the murals carved there were, in fact, charts, astronomical charts. Avelyn, who had often spent hours at a time gazing at the wondrous night sky, recognized some of the points. He noted the four-starred girdle of Progos-Behemoth the Warrior, the most prominent constellation in the northern sky, and the arcing stars that marked the handle of the Farmer's Bucket, the one he had to walk away from his parent's back door in order to see, for it always lingered right above their roof. Corona, with its Halo, was certainly evident, and prominent, being the center of it all, as Corona was the center of the universe.
Looking closer, Avelyn noted grooves in the wall. At first he thought them the borders of the known spheres, for he had heard theories of the universe as a series of overlapping, interlocking heavenly spheres, the invisible bubbles that held the layers of stars in place. When he realized that most of the grooves were near Corona, connecting the sun and the moon, and the five planets, he came to understand the truth. Those grooves were of a practical and not aesthetic nature, serving the mechanics of the chart so that the heavenly bodies could be kept in motion. Avelyn carefully noted the position of Sheila, the moon, and stared at it long enough to realize that it was indeed moving, ever so slightly, along its path about Corona.
"Six generations," Master Jojonah explained, after he had given Avelyn several quiet minutes in which to study the fabulous chart. "Or nearly," he added when Avelyn turned to him. "A hundred and seventy-three years will pass between each of the offerings."
"Offerings?"
"The stone showers," Jojonah explained. "Consider yourself blessed, my novice friend, for you live in a time of the showers."
Avelyn breathed hard and stared again at the chart, as if expecting little lines of falling stones to appear between the Halo and Corona.
"Have you ever witnessed one of the stones at work?" Jojonah asked suddenly, drawing Avelyn from his contemplations. The young man stared at him wide-eyed with hope and eagerness, his hands clenching and opening at his sides.
Jojonah pointed to a case near to the middle of the room, and motioned for Avelyn to approach it. As soon as his back was turned to the master, Avelyn heard a click from the wall and suspected that Jojonah had thrown some sort of lever, probably hidden within the tapestry of the star charts, to unlock the case. The master soon joined him at the case and slowly slid back the glass top.
There were several various stones within, all smooth and polished. Jojonah's hand reached for one of two of the shiny gray stones. "The soul stones," he explained. "Hematite, by name." He held the stone tightly in his right hand, then reached back in with his left and took out a different gem, mostly clear, but with a slight shading of yellow-green. "Chrysoberyl," he said. "A stone of protection, in this clear form. Always a wise choice when dealing with the dark hematite!"
Avelyn didn't really understand, but he was too overwhelmed by all of this to think of interrupting with a question.
Jojonah dropped the chrysoberyl into the pocket of his thick robe and moved far from Avelyn, facing the younger man directly. "Count to ten," he instructed, "that I might have time to cast the enchantment. Then place your hands behind your back and raise your fingers, however many you choose, in a slow and clear sequence of seven distinct numbers. Take care, to remember your sequence!"
The master closed his eyes and began to softly chant. Avelyn hesitated for a moment, trying to digest the newest information. He collected himself quickly and did as instructed, alternating the number of raised fingers behind his back. Through it all, Master Jojonah continued his soft chant, his eyes never fluttering, all of his body seeming locked in place.
A moment later, the master opened his eyes. "Seven, three, six, five, five, two, and eight," Jojonah said, seeming quite pleased with himself.
"You heard what was within my mind!" Avelyn gasped.
"No," Jojonah quickly corrected. "I left my physical body and ventured behind you. I merely watched as you raised your fingers."
Avelyn started to respond but held the thought private, though his labored breath and incredulous expression revealed volumes.
"Not so hard a task!" Master Jojonah said suddenly, exploding with delight. "The hematite is a powerful tool, among the most powerful stones of all. Using it to walk out of body barely touches at the edge of its true magic. Anyone trained in the stones could do it. Why even you . . ." Jojonah's voice trailed off, a tease that anxious Avelyn could not ignore.
"Brother Avelyn," the master said in all seriousness a moment later, "would you care to try?"
Before he could even begin to consider the offer, Avelyn nodded so forcefully that he was sure he must have looked incredibly simple. His feet, too, were moving before h
is conscious thought could stop them, as if he were being drawn to the stone.
Jojonah nearly laughed aloud at the spectacle, and held forth the hematite. Avelyn reached for it, but the master pulled it back.
"It is a powerful stone," the master said somberly, "one that could put you somewhere you do not belong. Take care in your travels, my young friend, for you may soon be lost!"
Avelyn retracted his hand a few inches, wondering if he was being a bit foolish here. The temptation was too strong, though, and he reached out again, and this time, Jojonah let him take the hematite.
Its feel was impossibly smooth, almost liquid. It was heavier than Avelyn had expected, quite solid and dense. He ran his fingers over it repeatedly, felt something deeper within it, a place of mystery, of magic. He looked to Jojonah and saw that the master was clutching the chrysoberyl close to his heart.
"It will prevent our spirits from crossing," Jojonah explained. "That would not be a wise choice."
Avelyn nodded and backed off a few steps. Jojonah put his free hand behind his back. "All in your due time," he said softly. "I will know when you are in the hold of the magic, and then I will begin."
Avelyn hardly heard him. Already the young monk was falling into the depths of the stone. To his rubbing fingers, the hematite felt truly liquid then, and inviting. Avelyn stared at it for a long while, then closed his eyes, but saw it still. It was expanding before him, engulfing his hands, then his arms. Then he was falling, falling.
He resisted, and the hematite receded dramatically, almost forcing him from the trance. But Avelyn caught his fears in time and started the journey once more.
His hands were gone, then his arms. Then all was gray, then black.
Avelyn stepped out of his body. He looked back and saw himself standing there, holding the stone. He turned back to Jojonah, saw most distinctly the chrysoberyl, fiercely glowing and encasing all of the master in a thin white bubble, a ward that Avelyn knew his spirit could not pass.
He started toward Jojonah, giving the man a wide berth. He felt incredibly light, felt as if by will alone he could rise from the ground and fly.
Behind the master, Avelyn watched the sequence of fingers: one, three, two, one, five.
"Go higher," he heard Master Jojonah prompt.
Avelyn was surprised that he could even hear the voice in this state. He understood the command and willed himself off the ground, drifting effortlessly toward the ceiling.
"There is no physical barrier that can stop you," Jojonah remarked. "No barriers at all. Have you seen the roof? There is something on the roof that you should know."
Despite the thrill, Avelyn flinched as he drifted through the room's ceiling. He marveled at the loose structure of the wood, at the density of the higher room's tile floor.
There were several monks, men a few years Avelyn's senior, in the chamber above. Avelyn felt himself grinning, felt his physical form in the lower room grinning, as he passed, the men totally oblivious of him.
Then the grin was gone. Something tugged hard at the young monk, some dark temptation that he should enter one of these men, that he could push out the host spirit and possess the body!
He was beyond them before that dangerous notion fully registered, drifting higher, through the next ceiling into an empty room, then through that ceiling and the next and the next and the next, this last one much thicker. Then he was outside, though he felt none of the physical sensations, the warmth of the sun or the chill of the ocean breeze. He saw that he was rising above one of the highest spots of St.-Mere-Abelle, coming right out of the roof. Still he went higher, and Avelyn feared that he would never stop the ascent, that he would drift through the clouds, out to the Halo, the stars. Perhaps he would shine in the heavens above, a fifth light on the girdle of Progos-Behemoth!
He dismissed that ridiculous notion and turned his spirit about, looking at the roof of the abbey. From up here, St.-Mere-Abelle appeared as a thick and stretched snake, winding its way along the top of the sea cliff. Avelyn saw a commotion in the courtyard, far to the side, as a group of young monks labored at the well and with the abbey's horses and mules.
"Come back," bade a distant voice, Master Jojonah's voice, reaching Avelyn through his physical form. The disconnection was not complete, the young monk realized, and he shuddered to think of what a complete break from his own physical form might mean.
Shocked back to his senses, Avelyn turned his attention to the high roof directly below him. He had seen this roof before, from one of the higher points of the abbey, but looking on it from this vantage point revealed a most clever design, an image that could not be seen from a lower angle. Carved into the roof were four arms, two sets, hands lifted high, palms open and holding stones.
The journey back was quicker, until Avelyn got into the room directly above the Ring Stone chamber. This time the temptation of the other bodies pulled at him even harder. He felt himself being drawn in. He pictured the hematite as another living being, commanding him, whispering promises of power into his spiritual ear.
Avelyn felt something touch his hand - not his spiritual hand, but the physical one, the one clutching the stone. He sensed the chrysoberyl again, that magical barrier, and then his spirit was pulled to the floor, through the floor, careening back to his waiting body.
Avelyn nearly jumped when he opened his physical eyes again, seeing Master Jojonah so very close.
"One, three, two, one, five," the young monk said abruptly, trying to satisfy whatever curiosity held the older man.
Jojonah waved his hand and shook his head, uninterested. "What did you see?" he asked.
Avelyn noted that Jojonah held both stones again, though he didn't remember giving the hematite back to the man.
"What did you see?" Jojonah pressed, moving even closer.
"Arms," Avelyn blurted. ""Two sets, palms open . . ." Before he could finish, Jojonah fell away, gasping, laughing, crying all at once. Avelyn had never seen such a display, couldn't begin to decipher it.
"How?" Avelyn asked with enough force to bring Jojonah back to his senses. "The stones," Avelyn clarified when he had the man's attention. "How could this be?"
Jojonah launched into a rushed explanation, more the regurgitation of a prepared speech than anything spontaneous. He talked of the humours of the body joining together with the alien humours of the stones to create the seemingly magical reaction. He even compared what had happened to Avelyn with the tablets given to a monk with a stomachache to induce a belch or a fart.
As he listened, Avelyn felt the mystery melting around him. For the first time since they had entered the room, there was no reverence in Master Jojonah's voice, just the dry lecturing tone of an instructor. Avelyn didn't buy into it, any of it. He could not explain what had just happened to him, but he knew instinctively that this talk of "alien humours" belittled the experience. There was indeed a mystery here that no tumble of fancy words could lay bare; there was something here of a higher order. Master Jojonah had called the stone showers "offerings," and to Avelyn, that description seemed exactly wrong. "Graces" was a more appropriate term, the young monk decided there and then. He glanced around the room again, from stone to stone, his reverence of these gifts from God tenfold what it had been when first he had entered the chamber.
"You should be among those select few who make the journey," Master Jojonah declared, and the weight of the statement drew Avelyn back to him.
"To Pimaninicuit," Jojonah explained, his grin widening as Avelyn's brown eyes widened. "You are young and strong and full of God's voice."
Tears collected in Avelyn's eyes and began to stream-down his face at the mere thought that he might be among the chosen few to get so very close to the greatest gift of God.
Jojonah dismissed him then and he left the room as if in a trance, overwhelmed indeed.
When he was gone, Master Jojonah replaced the stones, closed the case, then went to the wall and moved the hidden switch to lock it fast. All the while, t
he master considered the weight of what he had witnessed. A first-year novice should not have been able to activate the magic of the stone, despite what he had told Avelyn about hematite. Even if a novice had managed to fall into the magic, the control should have been above him, a quick and random out of body experience, culminating with a gasping, disbelieving, thoroughly overwhelmed young man.
For Avelyn to control the magic enough to get behind Jojonah's back and see the finger sequence was incredible. For the young man to use the stones and drift out of the room, out of the abbey, and see the design on the roof was truly amazing. Jojonah would not have believed it possible. The master paused and lamented his own weakness. He had been in St.-Mere-Abelle for more than three decades, and had only been able to use the hematite that way for the last three years!
Jojonah pushed his own self-pity away and smiled about Avelyn. The young monk was a good choice, a God-given choice indeed, to go to Pimaninicuit.
CHAPTER 6
Carrion Birds
She came back to consciousness never expecting to see the wide sky again. She opened her blue eyes even as she moved her hands in frantic waves, trying to rid the small hole of the thick odor of charred wood.
A slanting ray cut in through the smoke, a single shaft of light that beckoned the girl back to the land of the living. She followed it as if in a dream, gingerly reaching up to touch the piece of lumber that had fallen to partially block the hole.
The wood was warm. Jilseponie understood then that she had been unconscious for a long time. She found she could put her arm against the beam firmly as long as she kept her sleeve between tender flesh and the wood.
The girl pushed hard, but the beam would not give. Stubborn as ever, summoning her rage to bolster her muscles, Pony set her legs under her as firmly as she could and pushed again, with all her might, groaning with the strain.
The sound of her own voice stopped her cold. What if the goblins were still out there? She settled back and sat very still, listening intently, not even daring to breathe.
She heard the cawing of the birds - carrion birds, she knew. But nothing else came to her - not the whimper of a survivor, not the whining, grating voice of a goblin, not the guttural grunts of the fomorian giants.
Demon Wars 01 - The Demon Awakens Page 7