The Secret of Namana (The Arnaka Saga Book 2)

by Lucia Ashta

  The fairies took the places Leva assigned them based on their ability to hold the energy field they would establish. In this arrangement, neighboring strength compensated for any weakness. Then the fairies commenced without warning.

  As the world around Ashta began to blur, and the trees and bushes became an unintelligible streak of green, Ashta felt a pang in her heart. She had learned to love these fairies in the short time they had known them. She would miss the little heroes.

  Any further thought was shaken from Ashta’s mind. Suddenly, her brain was consumed by the struggle to hold onto those notions of being that she identified with herself. As she tumbled, the ruby throbbing at her chest, she lost her connection with this world and any other. She was suspended in a place that lacked any defining element. There was only an intense sense of nothingness as Ashta hurtled through the void between space and time.

  35 Ripples in Space

  Space spat Ashta out. She landed on her hands and knees. The world around her swirled so that she could not make out anything at all. She did not know if she was right side up or upside down. She vomited once, and then a second time.

  All she managed to do was lie on her back. Spread flat against the earth, she did not move. She felt like she would never want to move again. She yearned for stillness, for her vision to steady.

  She closed her eyes, willing them to shut out the spinning of everything around her. She breathed deeply, trying to overcome the panic that threatened to seize her over-stimulated mind. She breathed. It was all she could do. She breathed until there was nothing but her breath. And when her breath was all there was, she focused only on it for what seemed like a very long time.

  She lay motionless on the ground, drifting in and out of the breath, until her mind registered a sound. At first, she could not make out what it was; she only knew there was a sound. Eventually, her bewildered mind understood that someone near her was vomiting too.

  The retching soon subsided, and then there was just her breath again. There was no talking. There was no movement. There was just the quiet intake of breath that tried to still a panicked mind.

  The sun traveled across the sky and found its peak overhead before Ashta was able to focus on anything else. Then she recognized the earth beneath her as familiar; she remembered its energy intimately. It was a part of her, and yet her scattered mind could not identify it.

  The sun continued with its travels until Ashta could move her hands. Her fingers swam in an ocean of grass, and her mind finally stilled. Ashta thought she would cry with relief. But she did not. She did not move more than her fingers.

  The sun had to advance across the sky more before Ashta could realize that the earth beneath her was familiar because it was Arnaka. And with the thought of arriving in Arnaka, she fell asleep. The peace of sleep claimed her and removed all muddled thought from her awareness. She did not realize then that the fairies’ attempt had been successful, but she would when she awakened.

  Ashta stirred. Somewhere next to her, a man was groaning. He sounded like he was in pain, and Ashta struggled to pull herself out of the dream world. It was difficult, but she managed, and soon she was on the path back to consciousness.

  When she became aware of her bodily sensations, she also whimpered. She had not meant to, but she hurt so much that she moaned without thinking. Another man joined them in vocalizing his discomfort, and, finally, the last of them did too. It was a chorus of aches and pains they would have laughed at had they possessed the ability to observe.

  It took longer than any one of them could have imagined, but eventually, they all sat up. They crawled to whichever tree was nearest them and leaned on its trunk, feeling deep gratitude to have the support of Mother Earth at their backs.

  When they were able to keep their eyes open, they stared at each other. There they were, the light warriors, even if they could not even stand just then. They looked like they had fought and barely won an arduous and drawn-out battle. In many ways, they had.

  They swiveled their eyes to encompass the full range of their peripheral vision, not wanting to move their heads any more than necessary. They were all accounted for; Kaanra, Thom, Anak, and Ashta looked dazed, but they were all there. Although the ride was significantly more tumultuous than the fairies had anticipated—they had no way of accounting for the difference the humans’ greater mass would have on space-bending travel—it had been a successful, albeit painful, journey.

  Even with the significant amount of rest the light warriors were allotting to their readjustment, they were still several days ahead of the time it would have taken them to walk to their destination. The doman was unharmed, and the ruby was intact. Their guardians knew it even without touching them for reassurance. Thom and Ashta perceived the rhythmic connection the objects of power held with their own beating hearts. The ruby was warm from its glow against Ashta’s chest.

  What the light warriors could not predict while they sat, waiting to settle within themselves, was something the fairies did know, but tried very hard not to fret about, focusing instead on a positive outcome to their mission. When the fairies propelled the humans through the fabric of space, a wave of energy so large was created that there was no avoiding its detection. Ripples swept in all directions to compensate for the hole the fairies created in the space-time continuum. The ripples traveled swiftly, spreading like flooding waters across the forest floor, stopping only once the energy fully dissipated.

  Waves of displaced energy rose into the sky as if they were themselves on wings. Focused on guiding the light warriors to their destination, the fairies squelched their growing concern that Brazzon would notice the disturbance. The fairies held their concentration formidably, but that did not diminish the disruption they caused.

  Space folded in on itself for only a few moments, but the effects of this manipulation lasted much longer. Even so, the light warriors almost escaped without detection. The dark raven had been flying, searching for them, but he faced the opposite direction. He did not see the undulating energy rush across the forest, with the force of an explosion.

  Nevertheless, fate intervened for its mysterious reasons. Just before the waves that burst forth with such power were to pull back in on themselves—the hole in space sucking them into it as it collapsed—one oscillating, undulating gasp stretched upward. In the aftermath, silence and absence would be heavy, and so the ripple strove to reach higher and higher still. And as the ripple could not fight its nature any longer, and it responded to the pull to return to its origins, the disruption echoed and rose to caress the dark raven’s feather tips, to touch life.

  The raven turned desperately, feverishly, in mid-flight, searching for any sign of his prey. What caused the change in air currents? The agility of his flight belied the darkness of his heart with its beauty and elegance. His quick move allowed him to catch sight of the tail end of the ripple as it faded into oblivion. The light warriors had almost escaped under his watch without notice. But in the end, they did not.

  The dark raven adjusted his course. He imbued his flight with renewed purpose and enthusiasm. He pointed his beak forward. He pumped his wings once, and then pulled them back tightly against his body. He was an example of aerodynamic perfection as he made his way toward Arnaka as quickly as the body of a bird with an uncommon reserve of strength and resolve could. After all, despite his darkness, Brazzon was extraordinary. He was capable of acts few others alive could perform.

  He followed the trail of the ripples toward Arnaka. There was still a chance he could recover the doman before the light warriors had the chance to accomplish what they intended with it.

  There were no obstacles in his way. The sky was clear. He pumped his wings again, and he soared.

  -----

  Elena willed herself to control the nausea. She had tumbled and fallen so far that she couldn’t tell which was top and which was bottom. Her body was ready to burst from the dizziness swirling inside her head.

  She could tell she
was in an enclosed space; the air was stuffy and dense. Even though she couldn’t make out anything around her, Elena knew there must be walls enclosing them.

  It was so dark, even more so than the darkest dark she could remember experiencing. Her eyes, used to the bright sun just moments before, were unprepared to deal with this stark contrast. Elena lay flat on a smooth surface, until she rocketed up to seating, fearing she would vomit. She gagged.

  “Amore?” Marco’s voice came out of the surrounding darkness, startling her. He sounded like he was right next to her, yet she hadn’t noticed.

  Marco’s voice was weak. It was barely more than a choked whisper. He tried to speak again, but he, too, retched. Silence reigned while Elena and Marco struggled to return stability to their bodies. It took time, longer than they wanted, but eventually their breathing normalized, the dizziness subsided, and their eyes adjusted to the pitch-black.

  Finally, Elena was able to make out the outlines of shapes, and she looked around. She still had no idea where they were. One minute they were reaching out to touch the pyramid capstone, and the next they were hurtling down into a deep and dark unknown. What happened? Where were they? She wanted to ask Marco, but when she tried to speak, she realized she wasn’t in full control of her body yet. She quieted. She had no choice but to wait.

  It was Marco who eventually broke the silence for good. “Dove siamo?” he asked. Where are we? Marco’s reversion to his native tongue was a telltale sign to Elena that he was still unsettled.

  “I don’t know,” Elena answered. She was surprised to hear her voice steadier than she thought it would be. She realized she could continue.

  “The last thing I remember was all of us reaching out to touch the top of the pyramid. One minute we were in the bright sunshine of the desert, and the next we were tumbling into nothingness, plunging into darkness.”

  “Yes, that is all I remember also,” Marco said. “I do not understand it. What did we do? What happened?”

  Elena was shaking her head in the dark, affirming her own lack of understanding, when she gasped.

  “Where is Sitting Bear?”

  “Mio Dio,” Marco said in an expression that survived from the Catholic influences of his youth. My God.

  Elena and Marco called out to Sitting Bear. They called for him softly at first, but then they got loud. They yelled. They called out for Sitting Bear until their weak voices grew tired and hoarse, and then, finally, they quieted.

  They did so just in time. If not, they would have missed it. It was a faint sound, but they were certain it was he. That low, gravelly voice was unmistakable.

  Sitting Bear had been yelling his responses back to them. But Elena and Marco could not hear him. They were too committed to their continued shouting to remember to pause and listen. They would only make that mistake once this day.

  “I am here!” Sitting Bear called, his voice also strained from effort. “I am on top of the pyramid. Where are you?”

  “We do not know where we are!” Marco called back. “But it is very dark in here.”

  Sitting Bear’s jaw fell open. Could it be? Could it possibly be? Sitting Bear stared off, looking at nothing in particular, while he contemplated the incredible, the astonishing, and the unbelievable.

  “Sitting Bear?” Marco said.

  “Yes! I am here!

  “I think you may be inside the pyramid!” Sitting Bear said.

  Now it was Marco’s turn to be silent.

  Elena looked toward the faint outline of Marco’s body. “Could it be? Could we be within the pyramid?” she asked, awe in her voice. “Is that possible?”

  It was Elena’s final question that led them to their answer. They had redefined their notions of possibility and impossibility lately. It was an adjustment born from necessity. Elena didn’t know if anything was impossible anymore. Perhaps some things still were, but she didn’t know which those might be.

  Elena called out, “What are we supposed to do?”

  Even as the words took flight from her lips, she knew what a ridiculous question it was. Sitting Bear couldn’t tell them what to do. No one could tell them what to do. They would know when the time was right. It was their destiny. Of course they would know.

  Sitting Bear seemed to sense the emptiness of Elena’s question, and he saved his breath. Elena crawled over to the shadowy outline of Marco’s body. Her eyes trailed over him, yearning for definition her eyes did not find. But her eyes did find his. In the dimness, their eyes were barely visible. However, once their eyes met, once the visual connection between eternal beloveds was forged again, Elena swore that Marco’s eyes began to glow on their own, as if they themselves were a source of light.

  Mesmerized, Marco could not look away. He too looked into an amber fire. He looked into passion that reflected his, and it was this passion that would carry them, blazing, through the windows of the soul and of destiny.

  36 The Clash of Light and Dark

  Outside the pyramid, still resting his hand against the capstone, Sitting Bear turned his eyes to the heavens. Something was brewing.

  The wind whipped around him. Sitting Bear turned his collar up against the otherworldly wind that had appeared out of the stillness of moments before. Clouds came rushing in where there had been none, blotting out the normalcy of the sunny day.

  The clouds came together, forming a swirling vortex above the tip of the pyramid, building in intensity. The torrential sky combined light and dark; it was a symbolic forecasting of the battle that would define the prominence of only one.

  This was now a matter for the heavens. Sitting Bear prepared to make his descent. He would not abandon Elena and Marco, but with a storm like this, he had to get down from there. If he stayed, nature would force him down, and he doubted the result would be gentle.

  Sitting Bear bellowed down to the twins that he had to climb down the pyramid. He shouted against the howling wind, while his wary eyes watched thick, pregnant rain clouds skirting in. He didn’t know if Elena and Marco could hear him over the growing roar of the skies, but he turned and started his careful trek down the pyramid anyway. He had no choice but to leave right away.

  The fast-moving storm was localized, and, to anyone who knew what to look for, it was obvious the tempest was of an otherworldly nature. Coyote noticed the changes first. His animal body was designed to sense acute shifts in atmospheric pressure. Willem, attuned to the presence of darkness—both his blessing and his curse—felt the shift next. Willem stopped what he was doing immediately, and he turned directions. He was close. He hurried to the pyramid.

  The inhabitants of the neighboring towns attributed the unusually fast-building storm to the whims of nature, and they headed inside to the shelter of their vinyl-sided homes. But the animals, even domesticated pets, were ill at ease. A cacophony of howls and animal warnings rang out in the quickly darkening midday sky.

  There was another who was also paying rapt attention. When the light changed, announcing that these were times of other worlds, one with a heart long ago given over to darkness looked to the skies. The skies threatened chaos and destruction, and this menace gave him joy. However, there was no real mirth in the smile that split his swarthy face. It was an expression of pure darkness that enjoyed the torment of others.

  The man righted his shirt, pulling down on crisp edges, and turned toward the pyramid. He would be there soon and, if he got his way, he would interfere with the light in every way he could. Nothing would make him happier.

  -----

  The ruby glowed insistently, urging the light warriors to their feet long before they felt ready to move. They had to advance. Enough time had passed while they waited for their physical bodies to adjust to the unexpected harshness of space travel.

  The ruby at Ashta’s chest was warm, and, just as before, it pushed down on her heart. It wanted her to do something. Ashta moved into action before the ruby’s indicators became any more insistent. Her body was still too fragile to deal with any
thing the ruby might do to motivate her.

  She looked toward the sea to get her bearings. The ruby was clearly pulling her toward the water, but where exactly was the pyramid under the water’s concealing surface? When Vilu, the dolphin, led her to the pyramid years before, they had come upon it while underwater. The landmarks Ashta used as reference to find her way did not help her now.

  Soon, however, it became apparent that she would not need landmarks. The ruby propelled her into motion. The ruby seemed to come alive, as if it had a mind of its own and the will to see its goal realized. In response to the power the ruby emitted, Ashta’s feet moved forward as if of their own volition. They moved in the direction of the water, and Ashta trusted the ruby would lead her right to the underwater pyramid. She did not need to do anything to find the way.

  Ashta relinquished control, and the ruby led her toward the water even faster than it had moments before. Anak walked immediately behind Ashta, and Thom and Kaanra were only paces behind him. The light warriors understood what was happening without Ashta telling them, and they banded together.

  When they were near enough to the water to hear its hypnotic sounds, something unusual happened. It had been a normal day. The skies had been blue and clear. Then the sky collected those fluffy white clouds that floated off in the distance and transformed them. Abruptly, the skies became torrential. Dark clouds clashed with each other in rumbles that shook the earth, and the disruption was increasingly intensifying.

  Ashta and Anak looked at each other and then to Thom and Kaanra. Was one of them doing this? But no, it was not their doing. Mother Nature, or something else that conspired with her, was at work. Ashta picked up the pace. The water was already beginning to churn in response to what was happening directly overhead—as above, so below. The rate at which the waters were reflecting the changes in the skies was alarming.