by R. E. Carr
“Winowa, Jenn—get behind that outcropping. Eon, can you see that light?” Kei asked.
“Yeah, I see it. If she tries to freeze us, I’ll drop both of you,” Eon said.
“Understood.”
The two men crouched, waiting for an attack. Moments later, a sheet of ice came barreling through the center of the cave, covering the river, and causing the temperature of the room to plummet.
A slender figure carrying a lantern slid into view. She stopped only a few feet in front of Kei and dropped to her knees.
“Blood . . .” Kei whispered as he sniffed the air.
“Licia?” Eon asked, bending over to help her.
“The Oracle of Earth is dead. The Machidonians killed her, and Dailyn is gone . . . They killed Rhea, and Lady Aubergine is missing. I don’t know what happened to the others.”
Eon picked her up and began suppressing her ice field. “It will be all right,” he whispered. “Kei, let’s get her over to Winowa.”
They eased the wounded Oracle behind the rocks. She coughed and marveled at the red stains that appeared on her hands. Winowa wasted no time in patching her up. Jenn was forced to sit on the sidelines.
“She’s badly wounded. If she doesn’t rest . . . ,” Winowa said gravely.
“We do not have time to rest,” Kei snapped.
“We can’t just leave her to die, Lord Kei—”
“What needs to be done to treat her?” Eon interrupted.
“I can sew up her cuts, but the bruises within—Nothing but time will cure those. She’s of the Spirit Tribe. If she had been a Commoner, she wouldn’t have survived the trip here.”
“Stitch her up, Winowa. I’ll stay here with her while you go check out the temple,” Eon said.
“We need you—” Jenn started.
“I owe it to him, to Dailyn, to stay here with her.”
“Then we all stay—” Jenn started.
This time Kei spoke up. “We should press on to the next seal.”
“Kei!” Jenn cried.
“If Farris follows us, I have a chance of stopping him, Ji-ann,” Eon said. “I can at least disable him. You and Kei hurry on to the complex. Take Winowa too. Don’t leave any more stragglers than necessary.”
“Eon, are you—” Jenn was cut off by Kei grabbing her roughly by the arm and pulling her to her feet. “Kei! What are you doing?”
“We get ready and we leave. Every moment we waste is another moment that the Machidonians have to attack Gracow City.”
“Kei!”
“Do not argue, Ji-ann. Please, for once, do not argue.”
“But Kei—”
“Would both of you go argue someplace else? I’m trying to stitch her arm with an improvised sewing kit,” Winowa said.
Kei stormed off beyond the circle of light. Jenn stumbled after him. Finally, she collapsed against a stalagmite and waited for Kei to come huffing back to her. She was rewarded a few minutes later by a tail twitching just in the corner of her vision. A minute after that, Kei plopped beside her and pulled her shoulders against his chest. Without saying a word, they rested together and waited for Winowa to finish treating the Oracle.
“Do you really think the Machidonians killed Dailyn?” Jenn asked.
“No.”
“But who? Kei—”
“It must have been Farris. A man who would kill so many could certainly kill his own brother.”
She found his glowing eyes easily in the darkness. “Kei, what if this Farris truly is unbeatable? Even Eon might not be able to stop him.”
“We cannot worry about that now,” he said, but his voice trembled slightly. “Every man has a weakness, even Farris.”
“But, Kei, I don’t get it. Why do you think Farris made it look like the Machidonians killed Dailyn?”
Kei stared off into the darkness. “And why did the Oracle of Water help us so freely?” he asked. “I get the distinct feeling—”
“That we have no idea what is really going on here?” Jenn offered. “Yeah, I’m right with you, sheep-boy. Let’s just hope that we aren’t walking right into a trap.”
As if on cue, the water in the cave began to churn. Both Kei and Jenn watched in horror as lightning rose from the water—just as it had under the Temple Tree.
“Not again . . . ,” Jenn moaned as she heard the cables.
Illumination
“The balance must be restored,” Jenn heard as her eyelids fluttered open. “Equilibrium is threatened.”
“Not you again,” Jenn sighed. A gray woman with long, white hair floated over the underground river. Her luminous black eyes stared right through Jenn and her unconscious companions. She now wore silver armor and carried a force pike in her three-fingered hand.
“I could say the same thing about you, Serif-fan of Beasts. Or are you Ann, Champion of the Machidonians? Or are you someone else entirely?”
“Who are you?”
“I am everything and I am nothing.”
“You’re annoying . . . Iaxani, is it?”
“Iaxani is my form, Hykeria is my function. I am part of all of you. I am the land itself.”
As she spoke, her arms rippled and split into a million pieces before coalescing once more. A pearlescent gem suddenly appeared on her forehead. Her dress and hair morphed into a braided pattern. More cables slithered out of the water, but, for the time being, they seemed content to dance along the shore.
“You’re the cables?”
“I am this world.”
Jenn watched as a pair of the virtual snakes coiled around Licia’s leg. Jenn ran to her side just in time to see a shimmering, silvery slime bubble up out of the Oracle’s wound. It stopped the bleeding by freezing solid. She grabbed her own scar.
“Yes, I saved you too, Serif-fan.”
“What do you want?” Jenn cried as she approached the water. The surface had taken on the same sheen as Iaxani’s dress.
“Hold still.”
Jenn gasped as the water itself crept out of its bed in a single, terrifying, physics-defying motion. It rolled over her burns and cuts and dragged her down into the deep.
“Backup protocols initiated.”
“Jenn, please respond.”
“CALA?”
“I am detecting a deep-level genetic scan as well as auxiliary storage . . .”
Jenn snapped her eyes open and coughed up a lungful of water. As she pushed her arms into the crumbly dirt beside her, she marveled at how smooth her skin looked—of what she could see peeking between soaked bandages.
“Time is running short. The others I have contacted are willing to destroy everything. This will achieve nothing. I must adapt my protocol.”
“You’re still here,” Jenn said as she waved dismissively to the woman floating over the water.
“You are here, and you are somewhere else. I am attempting to warn you. Transmissions shall be sent. I see all, tell all . . .”
“What the hell are you talking about? What transmissions?”
“I will warn you, will help you. The serpent’s games have gone on too long. Must move faster, but must get more information. High-level observations are out of date.”
“What is going on?” Eon said as he too pushed to his feet. He ran to Jenn’s side when he saw the wave of cables snaking around the water. “Ji-ann!”
A pair of cables wrapped around each of his limbs, yanking the Maya back before he could touch Jenn. She threw herself between the Iaxani and Eon.
“Leave him alone!” she cried.
The floating creature hung her head. With a flick of her wrist, Eon went crashing into a rock.
“Perhaps it is too late for you.”
“Ji-ann, run!” Eon cried as he ripped an arm free. The creature in the lake cocked her head and stared at him. “Run, and save yourself!”
“You are not a man,�
�� the Iaxani said, floating to Eon’s side. “Yet you pretend otherwise. Curious.”
“What?” Eon spat.
“No more time. You have opened all the seals save one, you who are here but who is also not here. You must move backward to move forward. You must face the serpent now, before it is too late—”
“But there were still two seals—” Jenn started.
The lake transformed into an image of three mighty pyramids. A jackal-headed sphynx kept watch over them. Jenn watched, wide-eyed, as a sleek silver craft drifted toward the shadow of the sphynx.
“You were there, yet you were not there.”
“That looks just like Egypt,” she muttered as she leaned closer. “I’m so gonna have to go there one day.”
“Your purposes may be crossed, but your methods are the same. Two sides of the same coin—”
“What do you mean, ‘face the serpent’?” Eon asked.
“You must face the serpent now. The other you will strike soon. She takes a new Oracle as we speak—”
“Oh God,” Jenn whispered. “They will power the Quetzalcoatl again—”
“By the spirits of nature!” Licia gasped as she too awakened. She immediately genuflected and pressed her gem fully into the sand.
“Help them find the serpent, Oracle. Restore the balance and my power shall be yours.”
“As you command,” Licia said.
“That’s your—” Jenn started. As she stared at the Iaxani, her gray-skinned countenance faded into a vision of Hellenic beauty, drifting in glowing white robes and a crown of prismatic jewels.
“We all see what we need to see. We all hear what we want to hear.”
“Ji-ann . . . ,” Eon said as he finally broke free and stumbled to her side. “Why is a Machidonian—”
“You can see me, yet you still don’t understand me. You know where you must take them, Eon. You must go now to the land where stories end.”
“You’re making no sense!” Jenn cried. She whirled around to see wires wrapping around both Kei and Winowa. “Leave them alone! Just leave us alone!”
“Great Mother of Nature, please don’t be enraged by her,” Licia begged. “We are your servants, your humble servants.”
Jenn held fast to Kei as the water lapped as his feet. As she focused on him, she saw the water engulf Winowa and drag her under. Kei came to just in time to see his friend being dragged into the darkness.
“No!” he yowled before both he and Jenn were engulfed by the silvery water again themselves.
“Backup protocols resumed.”
“Jenn, please respond.”
“CALA?”
“I am detecting a deep-level genetic scan as well as auxiliary storage . . .”
“We’ve done this before, CALA. Tell me something I don’t know.”
“I am sorry, but I don’t know what you are referring to. However, I believe that the AI contained within Delphi may have interfered with our mission progress. I am currently reading that six of the—”
“Yeah, all but one of the seals is open now. I get the feeling that the other me is—”
“Jenn, I am afraid that I did not anticipate this outcome, and for that I must apologize. I should have mentioned the potential for duplicate signals.”
“Right now, I don’t care. I just want to know if that crazy Iaxani is out there still—and what she did to Kei.”
“It appears that Kei’s technorganic infestation is operating at peak efficiency, both inside our body and in his—”
“English, please?”
“Your bodies are both healing at an accelerated rate. This Iaxani seems to be able to enhance the parasites native to all the local flora and fauna—”
“CALA, I’m pretty sure she is the parasite.”
“Ji-ann, help me. Please . . . ,” she heard. She scrambled over to a trembling Kei, who waited by the water’s edge. “She’s gone . . .”
“The Great Mother needed a new servant,” Licia said as she kneeled beside a metallic cocoon. “The Machidonians thought they could destroy us—”
Eon dropped to his knees between Jenn and Licia. “Please, tell me what you mean, Ancient One,” he begged.
“What did I miss?” Jenn asked.
“That thing . . . took Winowa,” Kei growled. “That monster with my mother’s face. It took her—”
“Winowa?”
“She shall awaken when the time is right. The land needs a new champion. Now you must go, or all will be lost, Serif-fan.”
“Winowa!” Kei yowled. “What have you done, monster?”
The gem on Licia’s forehead began to glow and her eyes rolled back. Eon and Kei stumbled and fell. Only the defiant Serif-fan was left standing to face the monster in the lake.
“What are you doing?” Jenn asked.
“Giving you one shred of hope. Now go.”
The creature stretched her arms wide, allowing the lightning from the lake to arc through her. For one moment, Jenn could see an array of cables pulsing behind the Iaxani. They formed themselves into virtual wings. The lights flickered, and then the creature dissolved into a pile of silvery dust. As the dust spread across the water, it formed the faint image of a man and woman embracing that caught her eye. She couldn’t make out faces, but she could see horns and wings.
“Tell Lord Kei that I will return,” Jenn heard as a whisper coming from the cocoon.
“Good-bye, Winowa,” Jenn whispered. “We’ll find you again.”
“Go backward to go forward. You must face the serpent at last.”
“I hate disembodied voices,” Jenn muttered as she shook Eon and Kei awake.
“Other than you, CALA,” she added quickly.
Revelation
Jenn took a deep breath as she curled against a furry arm. Kei stared at her.
“What?” she asked with a sigh.
“Everything is so strange, so different,” Kei said. Jenn slumped against him even more heavily.
“It seems so long ago, doesn’t it?” she asked.
“Everything seems so long ago,” he whispered. “I did not even get to say good-bye . . .”
She squeezed his arm. “So many are dead—or, I don’t even know what.”
“I am certain that we will find Winowa again, but somehow, I also know that she will never be the same,” Kei said as he leaned his head on Jenn’s shoulder. “I hope we are not too late getting back to Delphi.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Machidonians will return to reclaim their dead. Those who died in battle are repurposed to rebuild the living. Those who were contaminated are burned to prevent them from infecting others.”
“Repurposed . . . I really don’t want to think about that,” Jenn said with a shudder. Kei wrapped his arm around her. “Still, I can’t help thinking that I was just Sorakare . . . repurposed.”
He squeezed her tighter as they waited in the cave. Kei stared at the cysts that now crept up his furless arm.
“We are not so different, are we?” he whispered.
Jenn shook her head. “But we are different. I mean, not just the Beasts or the Machidonians. I mean us, Kei. Every time I stop to think about what we’ve done . . . what has happened . . . ? I dunno . . . I just . . .”
“Ji-ann, we are so close . . .” Kei whispered as he leaned his forehead against hers.
“So close to actually opening the seals,” she finished as she leaned against him. “But you know what that means, don’t you? If I succeed, then I go home.”
Kei continued to stare into the darkness. “My mother and father were from different worlds,” he said as he held her tight.
“Not literally, though,” Jenn muttered. “Back home, I was nobody, Kei. I was nothing—”
“Then stay here. Stay with me, Ji-ann,” he said.
“But the scrolls say—”
>
“If there is one thing I have learned about you, Ji-ann, it is that you take little notice of, nor care about, what you are ‘supposed’ to do,” he said, squeezing her again.
“That has to be the nicest way a guy has ever called me difficult in my entire life, sheep-boy,” she said. “Maybe . . . maybe there is a way. I could ask Rheak if I could just stay. You’re so right! I am not the same girl who just landed here with no clue who she was or what she wanted. I know what I want now.”
“Oh?” Kei asked.
“I want you,” she whispered.
He pulled away just a bit and stared into her eyes. Jenn gulped as her gem was reflected in his inhuman gaze. His lip quivered, but he remained silent. Jenn cringed.
“Yeah, I know that it’s terrible timing, you know, confessing your love when your childhood sweetheart was just stolen by some god and we’re waiting to face our probable deaths—”
He cut her off by sweeping her into a passionate kiss. Jenn stumbled as he finally let her go.
“Ji-ann, I am about to try to pilot a Machidonian air ship into a land full of assassins for you. We may never have another time to say how we feel, and I am terrible with words—”
“Me too,” she said before kissing him. “And maybe I should just stop thinking again. We seem to be at our best when we just charge in headfirst.”
“Like a ram?” he asked with a sad smile.
“Good thing I’ve got a sheep-boy at my side,” she said. “We will finish this, and when the seals are open, I’m going to ask Rheak if I can stay with you. I promise.”
“You are not a man,” Eon whispered as he led the Oracle out of the tunnel and into Delphi. “What does that mean?”
His eyes widened as he stepped foot outside. Howling winds swirled around the mountain, forming a wall of debris that nearly blocked out the sun. Eon wrapped the tatters of his shirt around his nose and mouth as the storm whipped around them.