The First Stone

by Mark Anthony

  “Beltan,” Travis said, his voice thick with wonder. He touched the blond man’s cheek.

  “What’s happening, Travis?” Beltan said, confusion in his green eyes.

  Before Travis could answer, Nim rushed toward them. “Father!” she called out. “And Father!”

  Again the air wavered, blurred, resolved, and they were back in the throne room of Morindu. Then Deirdre blinked, and it was Earth again. The change kept recurring every few seconds. Morindu. London. Eldh. Earth. A sharp scent, like lightning, permeated the air.

  “It’s perihelion,” Travis said, turning around in a slow circle. “It’s here. . . .”

  As he spoke, waves of distortion rippled through the air— suddenly they were in Morindu again—and this time Deirdre saw from where the ripples radiated. It was Nim. The girl had stopped, still clutching the Stone, and was staring all around, mouth open. She was the center of the effect.

  She was the nexus.

  Something shimmered in Deirdre’s subconscious, some understanding that had lain too deep for her to reach. Only now her mind was so clear she could almost see it. . . .

  “Great Hermes!” a man’s voice shouted.

  Deirdre shook her head, clearing her vision. Not far from her, Grace gasped. In each of the sarcophagi, a gold-skinned figure sat upright. Their eyes were open, and they were not gold, but rather black as onyx. In slow, perfect unison, the Seven climbed from their sarcophagi.

  Nim let out a soft cry, and the air rippled again. The domed building on Earth now. The girl reached up, but her fingers could not grasp the Stone of Twilight. It had plucked itself from her hands, and it hovered in midair above her.

  The iron box in Larad’s hands gave a jerk. He fumbled with the lid and opened it. The other two Stones shot out, white-blue and crimson, rising into the air, and drifting toward Sinfathisar.

  The knowledge that Grace had imparted to Deirdre melded with her own experiences, and the result was a new amalgam of understanding. Yes—that was why the two worlds had been drawing closer and closer over the centuries; that was why perihelion was destined to come.

  It was the Imsari and the Sleeping Ones. Their purpose was to be joined together, to heal the imbalance in the universes, and for eons they had pulled at one another, bringing the two worlds they resided on closer and closer together.

  Now, at last, perihelion was upon them. The Seven approached the center of the chamber, where the three Stones bobbed. Their golden faces were ageless and serene as death masks from the tomb of an Egyptian pharaoh.

  “Stop them!” Phoebe called, voice rising into a shriek. “Their blood is ours!”

  But the other Philosophers retreated, letting the Seven pass by. The air rippled, and they were on Morindu. More ripples, and it was London again. Still the effect was centered on Nim. The Stones hovered just above her. The girl was gazing all around. Travis started toward her, but Phoebe sprang in front of him, brandishing her knife.

  “It’s the child, isn’t it? She’s doing this. She’s making everything . . . change.”

  Travis tried to pass her, but she thrust with the dagger, and he was forced to leap back. As he did, the talisman he wore around his neck slipped from his serafi. The piece of white bone caught Deirdre’s eye. It was marked with three parallel lines.

  Three lines . . .

  A humming tone sounded in Deirdre’s mind, like the vibration of a quartz crystal. She knew. She knew what the catalyst was.

  I understand, Marius. I understand the song. It’s about endings, and beginnings, too, and how sometimes they can be the same thing. It’s about how, no matter what happens, when all is said and done, there’s always still possibility. After fire and wonder, we end where we began. . . .

  Again Deirdre glanced at the talisman Travis wore. The lines were etched in parallel onto the piece of bone. However, they could just have easily been connected end to end, in the shape of a triangle, like the symbol Grace and Travis had seen on the wall of the throne room. Years ago, Travis had told Deirdre the name of the rune carved on the talisman.

  It was Nim.

  Hope.

  The Seven golden figures closed in on the girl. The three Stones still hovered above her.

  “It’s Nim!” Deirdre called out. “She’s the catalyst.”

  She felt Beltan’s and Travis’s startled gazes on her. Beltan tried to swipe the dagger from Phoebe’s hand, but he still moved stiffly, and she was nimbler than the other Philosophers. She darted past him, then grabbed Nim, holding the dagger above the girl.

  “Stop!”

  The Sleeping Ones seemed to understand her. They ceased moving a few steps from Nim, their faces still serene, expressionless. Travis and Beltan lunged forward, but Phoebe glared at them.

  She did not have the power to cast her spell, not fully, but there was still some malice in her gaze. Both Travis and Beltan staggered back, and Deirdre knew a chill like that in her own arm had touched them. However, in the time it took Phoebe to work her magic, Grace had closed the distance. She reached for the dagger.

  Deirdre didn’t will herself to run forward. Instead, she seemed to float over the floor. She was so light, so empty, like a bauble of spun glass. The air continued to ripple, so quickly now that with each blink of the eye the world seemed to change. London. Morindu. Again, and again, until the two blurred together, becoming one. . . .

  Phoebe slashed with the dagger. A line of red appeared on Grace’s arm. Grace staggered back, outside the circle of the Seven. Phoebe’s lips curled in a smile. Nim gazed up, her face a white oval. The dagger flashed, then sank deep into flesh.

  “Oh,” Deirdre said softly.

  Phoebe stepped back, a look of annoyance on her face. Nim’s cheeks were streaked with tears, but she made no sound. Deirdre smiled down at the girl, to tell her not to cry. Then she saw it: The hilt of the dagger jutted from Deirdre’s stomach. Nim hesitated, then reached out and touched Deirdre’s hand.

  Deirdre saw it at once: the shimmering web of the Weirding. She could see—no, could feel—Travis and Beltan staring, shock on their faces. Not far away, Larad was regaining his feet. And Hadrian and Vani, though still in stasis, were unhurt.

  I wish I could talk to you Hadrian. You finally did it—you had a Class Zero Encounter.

  But so had she, Deirdre supposed. The room around them was still a blur, changing so quickly that it was both London and Morindu, both Earth and Eldh, at once.

  Oh, Deirdre, Grace’s voice sounded in her mind, trembling with sorrow.

  I see, Grace. A feeling of exhilaration filled Deirdre. The Stones hovered before her. The Seven golden figures stepped forward. I see everything.

  Grace’s voice hummed over the shimmering threads. You would have made a good witch, Deirdre.

  Thank you, Deirdre wanted to say.

  Only then the Seven took another step, closing the circle. She was aware of Phoebe trying to push them back, to break the circle, but Grace stuck out a foot, tripping her, and Phoebe went down, her black veil tangling around her.

  Nim tried to pull her hand free, but Deirdre held her tight. Don’t be afraid, she tried to murmur. The catalyst doesn’t change. That’s what Sister Mirrim told Hadrian.

  She didn’t know if she spoke, or if she sent the words along the Weirding, but either way Nim stopped struggling and stood still. The Seven reached out gold hands, laying them against the girl. The three Stones descended, alighting on Nim’s outstretched hands.

  The melded vision of Earth and Eldh vanished, replaced by darkness—pure, flawless darkness, stretching into eternity. It was like the primordial vacuum, the empty space that constantly spawned pairs of virtual particles. It was the nothingness in whose very emptiness lay coiled the potential for everything. It was the silence before the word, the slumber before the dream.

  It was hope.

  With her last thought, Deirdre Falling Hawk sent everything she saw, everything she sensed and understood, in a pulse along the Weirding, toward the green-gold
strand she knew belonged to Grace.

  It’s so beautiful!

  Then she gazed into ancient black eyes, and the nothingness that had brought her into being claimed her once again.

  48.

  Travis was cold. So terribly cold.

  He was a planet, spinning alone out in space. The sun he had been bound to had vanished. Its light and life-giving warmth were gone, and there was nothing to hold him down, nothing to keep him from spinning off into the dark, endless Void alone. . . .

  “Travis?” a voice murmured. “Travis, can you hear me?”

  The voice was warm and familiar, like the memory of the sun. In the darkness, two lights appeared. They were stars, each as green as a summer forest. He let the stars pull him in with their gravity.

  “Please, Travis. I know you’re still in there. Talk to me.”

  The stars grew brighter, closer. Only they weren’t stars, he realized. They were eyes.

  Grace Beckett’s eyes.

  A shuddering breath rushed into him, and Travis sat up.

  “Grace?”

  She was kneeling beside him, along with Beltan. Vani, Nim, Larad, and Hadrian Farr stood close by. Beyond them, the dim air flickered, as if lit by a lamp swinging on a chain.

  Grace smiled, a look of relief on her face. “There you are, my friend.”

  Beltan gripped his hand. “You scared me. I thought after all this that . . . I thought you weren’t going to . . .” The blond man pressed his lips together and shook his head.

  Sorrow pierced Travis’s heart. Why was Beltan so sad? Travis tried to think back, to remember what had happened. It was hard. He felt thin and hollow, like a candy wrapper with nothing good left inside. Only that wasn’t completely true. He still felt good when he looked at Beltan, and Grace, and Nim. They all looked well and whole, though Grace did have a small cut on her arm.

  “What happened?” he said. For some reason, he couldn’t stop shivering.

  “There’s no magic,” Farr said. His face was haggard, haunted, but there was a note of wonder in his voice. “It’s gone. The Imsari and the morndari were what brought it into being in the first place. When the Stones and the Seven came in contact, when they eliminated one another, magic ceased to be. We feared you would share their fate.”

  Travis frowned at him. “Share whose fate?”

  Farr stepped aside and gestured to something on the floor. It was a heap of black cloth—a robe. Shriveled hands jutted from the sleeves of the robe, skeletal fingers curving like claws. A black veil half concealed a skull stretched with withered skin.

  It was Phoebe.

  Travis started to stand. He was still shaking, and would have fallen, but Grace and Beltan helped him. Beyond Phoebe, he saw the other five on the floor. All of them were dried mummies.

  “The Philosophers,” Travis said, the words a croak.

  Farr stood above the mummy that had been Phoebe. “It was magic that sustained their lives all these centuries. Drinking the blood of the Seven gave them the gift of immortality. Once the Seven were no more, that gift was taken away.”

  Travis swallowed hard. “And you thought . . . you thought the same had happened to me.”

  “We didn’t know,” Grace said. “Orú’s blood hadn’t extended your life, at least not yet, but it had changed you. You collapsed at the same moment the Philosophers did, and we feared the worst.”

  Beltan touched his cheek. “Only you’re all right, aren’t you?”

  Again, Travis shivered. It felt as if there was a hole in him where something had been excised, something rich and warm and golden. And something else was missing as well—a familiar presence.

  Jack? he spoke in his mind. Jack are you there?

  There was no answer. And there never would be again. Travis touched his right hand, but for the first time in five years he didn’t feel the familiar itch beneath the skin of his palm, the faint tingle of the hidden rune.

  “Travis?” Beltan’s green eyes were worried.

  Travis breathed. “Yes. I’m fine.” He smiled, laying his hand over Beltan’s, pressing it against his cheek. “I’m more than fine.”

  Already a new warmth was filling the hole inside Travis. And while it was not so golden and fiery as Orú’s blood, or as shimmering as rune magic, it was every bit as powerful in its own way. And as long as Beltan was at his side, it would never fade.

  “Now that he is awake, we must make our decisions,” Vani said, hands on her hips. “Time grows short.”

  Travis shook his head. What was she talking about? A note of alarm cut through his confusion.

  “Where’s Deirdre?”

  “She’s gone,” Farr said simply.

  Travis staggered, leaning against Beltan. For a moment he felt disbelief. Then memory returned. Phoebe had chilled him with a glance, as well as Beltan. Travis had watched, unable to move, as the circle of the Seven closed in around Nim and the Imsari.

  And Deirdre.

  The last thing he remembered was an orb of brilliant silver-gold light encapsulating both Nim and Deirdre. The final image he could recall was of the light beginning to dim, and of a single, tiny figure standing in its midst, like a chick inside an egg lit from behind. There had been no taller figure standing beside the little one.

  “Gone,” Travis repeated the word, as if it was unfamiliar to him.

  Grace gripped his hand. “She was happy, Travis.” A tear slid down her cheek. “I felt her, right before . . . right before she was gone. She was so happy. She understood everything. She knew that—”

  “Forgive me, Your Majesty,” Larad said with an uncomfortable look. “But I don’t think we have time for that now.” He gestured behind them.

  Travis turned around, and he tried to understand what he was seeing. “Where are we? On Earth or Eldh?

  “Both, for the moment,” Farr said. “But perihelion is drawing to a close. The worlds are beginning to drift apart.”

  Travis understood. It had seemed the shadows in the room were shifting. But that wasn’t it at all. It was the room itself that was shifting. The chamber in London and the throne room on Eldh were no longer blurred as one. Instead they were discrete, separate. First one flickered into view, then the other.

  However, even as Travis watched, the area affected in this way shrank inward. It was limited to the center of the chamber, to the area around the dais. The rest of the chamber was solidly, unwaveringly the room in London. Again the air flickered, and the area around the dais became part of the throne room in Morindu. Orú’s mummy still sat shackled to his throne. A few moments later the air seemed to wrinkle, and the throne was gone, replaced by the jumbled heap of stones that had been the gate.

  Farr took a step toward the dais, his black serafi swishing. “I don’t think we have much longer. We have to decide which side to remain on before perihelion ends.”

  His words stunned Travis. Decide? How could he possibly decide between two worlds? Before, when he had returned to Earth, there had always been the possibility that he would return to Eldh. Only this time there would be no chance of that.

  “Perihelion won’t come again, will it?”

  Farr shook his head. “It was the pull of the Imsari and the Seven that brought the worlds close together. They will never draw near again. And nor will gates function, now that magic is no more.”

  “I suppose these aren’t worth anything anymore,” Travis said, pulling the silver coin from his serafi.

  Grace smiled. “It’s still worth something, Travis.”

  True. But it couldn’t take them between worlds, could it? Travis’s heart ached. He didn’t want to say good-bye. Not so suddenly. Not forever.

  The air in the center of the room rippled. The nexus between the two worlds shuddered, then shrank until it was no larger than the dais. One moment it was Morindu, the next London.

  “I’ve made my choice,” Farr said, moving onto the dais. “I intend to stay in Morindu.”

  “But sorcery doesn’t work anymore,
” Travis said.

  A smile flickered across Farr’s handsome face. “It was never about magic, Travis Wilder. That’s not why I searched for other worlds. It was for knowledge. For wonder. All of Morindu the Dark remains to be explored. Who knows what secrets remain to be discovered? I cannot throw away the chance to learn things no other living person knows. Deirdre would have understood.”

  Travis sighed. Yes, she would have. But Deirdre knew more than any of them now.

  Master Larad moved to the dais, standing next to Farr. “As interested as I am in learning about another world—this Earth on which you spent so much of your life, Your Majesty—Eldh is my home, and I cannot imagine not spending the rest of my years there.” He gave a sardonic smile. “Though the problem of getting out of the desert and returning to Malachor may require all of those years to solve.”

  Farr grinned. “I imagine we’ll be able to solve that one, Master Larad. Camels aren’t the only way through the desert.”

  Like the iris of an eye contracting, the circle above the dais shrank inward another fraction. The nexus was already not much larger than a door. They were almost out of time.

  “What do you think, Beltan?” Travis said. “Which world do you want to be on?” Travis tried to sound noncommittal, even though he knew, without doubt, that he wanted to stay on Earth. Eldh was a world of beauty and wonder. But it wasn’t his home. It never had been.

  “I want to be on planet Travis,” Beltan said solemnly. “My world is wherever you are.”

  “Are you sure?” Travis said, wanting to laugh and cry at the same time. Could he really expect Beltan to spend the rest of his life on another world?

  “I’m sure,” Beltan said, taking Travis’s hand.

  Doubt vanished, and Travis grinned. “I guess we’ve done pretty well here on Earth. I think we’ll stay, if that’s all right.”

  Beltan kissed him. It was.

  Reluctantly, Travis pulled away. Now came two farewells he didn’t think he could bear. Only, somehow, he had to. He knelt before Nim. The girl had not said anything since he had awakened. Did she understand what was happening?