Dark Moon Rising (The Prophecies of Zanufey)

by A. Evermore

  ‘I have come for the lost children,’ Zanufey’s voice was gentle but low and resolute. It vibrated through Issa’s whole being. ‘Now is the time, after so long, to bring their souls home. For everything there is a season, and our season has come.’

  ‘I will release them, beloved Eternal Mother,’ Issa said, feeling love flow through and around her, ‘I will free the White Beast.’

  Issa’s mind contracted and the universe collapsed into a single focus. She lay on the cold stone floor locked in Rance’s embrace. The scratching on the wall outside was louder, urgent, raking into her mind. I remember who I was, her thoughts were very clear now and her mind unclouded, but it is I no longer for I have outgrown it. Now I choose to be something else, I choose to be her, I embrace the Night Goddess. We are One.

  Issa felt pure ancient magic blossom within her and she reached for it lovingly and with all of her will, drawing it up from the depths of her being. It surged upwards and out through her body in rays of brilliant indigo magic. The walls of her prison shuddered once, bulged outwards, and then imploded. The walls cracked inwards with a noise like thunder, rocks flew and splintered as they smashed into each other.

  Through the debris flew the raven. In a moment Issa realised it was he that had been scratching on the walls outside, sent by Zanufey and desperately trying to get to her. More power flooded into Issa as her prison shattered, filling her with lost strength, breaking Keteth’s hold upon her. The dark moon had finally found her.

  She spoke a word and Rance was thrown to the floor. His face contorted into a howl and his eyes turned black as the White Beast formed before her once more, his true massive form revealed by her magic.

  Issa reached for more of The Flow, amassing it around her in great swirls of shimmering blue light. She reached down and, with a grasp strengthened by magic, gripped a long tentacle and pulled him screaming into her magical maelstrom. At her command they moved upwards, the raven flying by her side, out of the shattering prison and into darkness.

  Water engulfed her tunnel of spinning light and white bubbles frothed and spun around them. Upwards they moved, Keteth writhed in her grip but he could not break free of her grasp or her magical vortex. The water gradually became lighter and less dense until they burst into air.

  With a great gulp of pure air Issa slowed the upward movement until she stood lightly on the surface of the ocean. She still gripped Keteth firmly and his great bulk rolled upon the water as if the sea had become solid land. His tentacles thrashed down, trying to pull himself underwater but they could not even break the surface. He was a beached whale and the sea would not let him back in.

  The raven hovered above her, and the indigo light of the dark moon shone down upon them. Keteth moaned and writhed as if in agony of its light but she held him fast, the blue rays strengthening her even as they weakened Keteth. There came a hushed sound and Issa realised it came from the knife now at her side once more. Karshur was whispering to her.

  ‘The time has come… kill the White Beast… set us free… give us our vengeance!’

  Issa tilted her back and howled its commands in the tongue of the Ancients, her voice a wild sound in the still night. The ivory knife gleamed in the moonlight as she held it high and within it she felt the yearning of eons as it called for the heart of the White Beast.

  ‘I know who I am and I have always known,’ Issa cried, ‘I am a child of Zanufey. I cannot be beaten, Keteth, not on this night. I defeat you for my will is greater!’ The dagger burned in her grasp, ‘Behold Karshur, Keteth! Hear the thousands within it clamouring for vengeance. Your time is over, be now forever free from your prison!’

  Keteth snarled and writhed, trying to release himself from her grasp by turning into many awful forms. The tentacle she held became the leg of a giant centipede. Its massive segmented body rose high up into the air and arched backwards towards her. Its black mandibles snapped viciously.

  She dodged and struck back with Karshur, her attacking arm controlled partly by her own will and partly by the dagger’s own vengeance. Blade struck exoskeleton, slicing off a mandible and sending it flying high into the air. The centipede fell back screaming, spraying poisoned blackish-red blood all over her. But the light of the dark moon fell upon the blood and it dissipated harmlessly under the blue rays.

  Keteth was not done and the centipede’s leg she held swiftly became a scorpion’s claw as thick as her thigh. A stinging tail lashed towards her. She ducked to the right. The stinger narrowly missed her body and tore instead through the rags of her robe. As she dodged the tail its pincer snapped over her arm with a sickening crunch. A wave of nausea swept over her and her fractured arm went numb.

  She slashed at the pincer and half fell away in a spray of more blackish-blood as it released her arm. Even with a fractured arm she still held firm. The magic of the blue moon dulled the pain and would not let her release him. With a focused will and a word to release the magic a blast of indigo fire scorched the stinger as it tried to strike her again.

  Keteth changed again and the scorpion’s claw became smooth and scaled. Instead she held in her grip a great cobra. A black tongue as thick as her arm flicked out and its hood flared wide. Coal-black eyes locked onto hers and white coils curled around her. She slashed ceaselessly with Karshur to drive it back. She pulled on The Flow and released flames as blue as the dark moon, forcing back its venomous fangs before it struck.

  The snake coiled back from the flames with a whimper that sounded so human it made her hesitate. A sudden overwhelming feeling of compassion rolled over her. The emotion took her by complete surprise being, as she was, in the midst of fighting for her life. Through the compassion a wave of calm and clarity spread over her.

  Each blow and strike that came from Keteth, in his seemingly exhaustive number of forms, she countered with increasing ease. Karshur struck with a will of its own as the magic of the dark moon flowed effortlessly through her.

  The compassion brought calm and the ensuing clarity gave her strength and speed beyond that which she thought she possessed. She knew then that whatever Keteth became she would not, could not, let go. She remembered the man he had been who had sought to do nothing but good, even though Keteth himself could no longer remember.

  ‘I remember the good you once were,’ she spoke softly and yet her voice echoed around them. Keteth ceased his struggles.

  ‘Now is the time,’ Karshur whispered and she knew it to be so.

  She held Karshur high in the air and spoke, ‘Be released from your nightmare, Lost One!’

  She let go of the dagger. It flew from her hand, moving with a will of its own, flying straight as an arrow into Keteth’s chest. There came an explosion of blinding white light as it penetrated and disappeared into his flesh.

  Keteth made no noise but shook, his white flesh shuddering violently. His eyes filled with terror as his flesh trembled and then began to crack and peel. Layer after layer of his skin peeled off, slowly at first and then with increasing speed, turning into to dust to be blown away by the wind. Soon all the white bulbous flesh was gone and a young slender man with mousy-coloured hair stood before her in the place of the beast.

  Keteth stared at her in shock but he did not scream or cry out. He was looking at something deep within her being, eyes wide in awe. She glanced behind. The moon was gone and instead brilliant blue light radiated out from a robed and hooded figure walking towards them upon the still waters.

  All the stars that should have been in the sky were contained within her cloak and they glimmered and sparkled as she walked. Slender hands reached up and pulled the hood back. Issa stared up and saw her own face reflected there. The figure took Issa’s hand and stepped into her form as though she were a ghost, and they became one.

  Zanufey smiled benevolently at Keteth and took his hands in her own. She pulled him to her and embraced him. Her blue light glowed strong and pure and flowed right through his skin, cleansing the corruption, healing the madness, breaking the lie
of separation as she made whole his tortured and fragmented spirit.

  Keteth smiled up at her, the hatred and pain of centuries gone from his face. Then fine lines formed on his brow and began to crisscross over his flesh. The lines grew and turned into white light, becoming brighter and brighter until his whole body became a ball of brilliant light as bright as a star. The white light spoke to the consciousness that was Issa.

  ‘I pass on to you my gift, the ability to traverse the dimensions between the living and the dead and the knowledge of where those pathways are. You will only have to look within to find them.’ Joyful laughter suddenly burst out from that ball of light. Then there was a flash and the light was gone, along with the presence of Zanufey.

  Issa and the raven were alone upon the ocean with the dark moon shining before them once more. A faint whisper echoed on the wind, ‘I am free.’

  Nothing remained of Keteth’s existence except, in the place where he had been, there floated a beautiful turquoise orb that flared light from the palest aqua to the deepest azure. Issa smiled and reached down to pick up the Orb of Water.

  ‘I forgive… I will remember who you were in the beginning, Keteth,’ she whispered as tears blurred her vision.

  All around her there came the sound of joyous laughter and then, from the void deep within the ocean, the Ancients and all those imprisoned by Keteth came to her in their thousands. They rose up through the dark water as little bubbles of lights shining all colours of the rainbow. As they emerged from the water they gathered around her, dancing and swirling with joy.

  Issa stared at the lights as they passed and gasped for she could see within them the faces of the people they had been: Dwarves, Elves, Humans, Karalanths, Ancients and even races she did not recognise. All of them smiled at her and began to sing in voices so beautiful that tears began to fall down her cheeks.

  ‘Go in peace, go with love,’ Issa whispered, and at her word they sparked once and merged together. As one long ribbon of light they moved through Issa’s body, through her soul, and onwards towards the blue moon of Zanufey, on their journey to the light.

  Issa felt every one of the lost souls as they passed through her and each one she blessed and each in turn thanked her. Tears of joy and sadness fell down her cheeks as the souls enslaved by Keteth for millennia were set free. They departed from Maioria forever as the dark moon sunk gracefully back into the ocean. As the last blue rays caressed her cheek another whisper floated on the wind.

  ‘Maion'artheria,’ it said and then a final flash of indigo light engulfed her.

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  Ancient Mother

  The brilliant light slowly dimmed. Issa found herself standing in a glade surrounded by giant trees. Mist covered the ground and clung to the thick trunks as the dawn crept slowly through the forest.

  The dew upon the soft grass wetted her bare feet. She was dressed in the rags of her priestess’s robes and though her wounds had healed to nothing but scratches the rags were stained with dried blood. Not that it mattered much what she wore in this sacred place. Keteth was dead and the souls of the Lost Ones were free, how many thousands she could not know. Their knowledge, their power, their very being, for a moment, had become hers, she had been all of them. Her thoughts slowly turned to those she knew and loved.

  ‘Asaph,’ Issa whispered, but as a frown of worry creased her brow she knew he was going to be all right. She had given him the sword he called for so he could free his mind and soul. Now the White Beast was fully gone from the physical world he could torment Asaph no longer. But still she longed to see him, to tell him of all the things that had happened.

  If only Ma could meet him, she would have certainly approved, Issa thought with a smile.

  ‘Oh Ma, if only you were with me now. I won, Ma, we won. The Goddess is with me, you did not die for nothing,’ the sadness welled up within. ‘I am a woman now; your old Issa has not gone only grown, as she must if she is to walk the path of the Night Goddess. I think you knew this all along. You can rest in peace knowing we won.’

  In setting Keteth free he had given her his gift, had shown her how to walk the path of Zanufey, between the dead and the living, and for that reason she respected him deeply. He had given her back to herself, so that the love of the Goddess could flow through her. In a way, she thought, he, too, had set her free.

  Issa marvelled at the wondrous simplicity and complexity of the universe, indeed it seemed nothing was chaos, nothing was chance, all things were carefully, lovingly, arranged, though it might not seem like that to a limited incarnate consciousness.

  Eventually all paths led back to the loving Source of All Creation, but some paths were longer, some were harder and more treacherous, some very painful, but eventually they all led back home. She came to the wide path lined with old oaks, leaves rich and green and full of life.

  ‘Maion'artheria,’ a faint whisper called to her, followed by ‘My sacred daughter’.

  Yes, the call of the Great Mother to all of her daughters, Issa thought.

  Between the ancient trees stood the huge monoliths proud and tall. They were no longer old and crumbling but new and covered with freshly chiselled writings, pictures and constellations that seemed to be telling a story, and she fancied they were the stories of stars.

  The path she walked showed no erosion and looked as if newly laid. The mound before her was larger than before and no longer covered in grass but in gleaming white marble stone. The blue stones that surrounded it were luminous in the light. She stood once more in the place that was a gateway to other worlds and dimensions.

  The door frame was decorated in the same signs and symbols that covered the monoliths and this time the door was open, there was no mirror. Issa stepped through into a brightly lit room filled with white candles. Fresh flowers of all colours and sizes adorned the walls and the stone floor gleamed like new. It was as if spring blossomed here.

  Issa breathed in the sweet smell of the flowers and stepped through into the next room. She came to a stop before the stone bowl and drank again from the sacred water. The water flowed through her being like cool energy filling her from within. She closed her eyes in peaceful ecstasy. Her breathing slowed and her heart beat in time to the pulse of life in the earth beneath her feet.

  She let her mind expand outwards, it was easy in this place, like the wide undisturbed surface of a pond stretching out around her. She knew herself not as Issa but as all of the things her mind touched, the stones, the grass, and the trees. Her boundary of self no longer existed and she was a part of everything around her. She wanted to expand forever, reaching up into the stars.

  How lovely would it be to drift in the Divine All and be everything? She thought. Were there limits? No, there cannot be, for who would place them there? And so her mind reached where the stars shone and the space around her hyper-awareness pulsed, breathing like a living thing. Time melted away so all past and present and future became indivisible, a single moment, a single awareness.

  After a time, or perhaps it was no time at all, she drew her consciousness back and directed her thoughts to a specific place and person whom she longed to see.

  Though she held Asaph’s face firmly in her mind she struggled to reach him. She found his body but his mind and spirit walked the Dreamlands. Finally she sensed his familiar presence and moved towards it. A vivid landscape formed around her. He was stood a little way ahead with his back to her on a wide-open plane of green grass billowing under two suns that shone brightly in a clear blue sky.

  ‘Asaph!’ she called and ran towards him laughing.

  ‘Issa,’ he turned and caught her in his arms, ‘is it really you? How are you here?’

  ‘Of course it’s me, do not worry. Keteth is gone, you are free from him, we are free,’ she grinned up at him.

  He looked away into the distance with a thoughtful frown.

  ‘Yes, you are right,’ he breathed, ‘it’s as if a dark cloud has lifted and unseen chains fallen a
way. I feel exhausted but free. I think I have a lot of healing to do,’ he said with a raised eyebrow.

  ‘Come to me, Asaph, come to Celene where you will heal fast, come soon,’ she hugged him and suddenly realised how bold the action was, but he didn’t seem to notice and hugged her back.

  ‘I will, right away,’ he kissed her forehead.

  Thoughts of another she had to see formed in her mind. As soon as she thought about Edarna, Asaph and the blue skies began to fade and she reluctantly let go of him.

  She felt herself being sucked backwards and a universe of stars flowed past.

  In a blink she was sat at Edarna’s kitchen table, the warmth of the fire a warm blanket on her rag-covered shoulders. The witch squealed in surprise, splattering the soup she was stirring all over her apron.

  ‘Oh lordy lord! Good Mother, it’s true what they say, hay? Speak their name and they shall appear!’ she said and wiped at her apron with a cloth.

  ‘I had not expected it to be so abrupt,’ Issa grinned in surprise. Was that how the gateway worked? She was going to need a lot more experience.

  Edarna smiled, set the cloth aside and sat down next to Issa.

  ‘Well, well, well. So you chose to walk the path of the Night Goddess, as surely you should for there is no other who can. Hmm,’ she frowned, her eyes flashing momentarily blue with insight as she stared hard at Issa.

  ‘I see in your eyes the Sacred Grove from which you have come. I too have been to the Sacred Grove, where all our possible futures converge; but that is a story of my life, and not yours. It is an eternal place beyond all worlds and yet connecting them all. You know in all Maioria the veil is thinnest upon Celene? That is why it is known as the Goddess’s Sacred Isle,’ the old woman explained, ‘I knew the Wykiry would take you there,’ Edarna winked. Issa looked at her, eyes wide in surprise at her knowing.

  ‘Keteth is gone, Edarna, he is at peace now and the Shadowlands will recede,’ Issa smiled.