by Bryan Davis
A whistle sounded again from a forest to the right. Albatross beat his wings and hopped that way. Lauren hugged Apollo and clutched the spine tightly, bouncing with him. The dragon was now like a puppy responding to his master’s call, no longer conscious of anything else in the world. Every thump on the ground slammed Lauren’s bottom on his scales and shook the backpack. She cringed, hoping the mixture wasn’t volatile.
A black teenager dressed in calf-length pants and short sleeves appeared at the edge of the forest. Still bouncing, Lauren tried to look him over. No taller than herself, he stood with his arms crossed, accentuating toned muscles. A flashlight and two daggers hung on his belt, and a companion floated above his ear, drawing attention to his closely cropped hair. With his shirt partially open, a half-dollar-sized medallion glimmered at his chest.
As Albatross bounded toward him, he smiled and clapped his hands, shouting, “Albatross! I was hoping you would come!”
When Albatross arrived, he snaked his neck around the teen and nuzzled his cheek with his own. As he patted the dragon’s head, he looked at Lauren. “Who is this young lady you brought to the valley, you silly dragon?”
Lauren set a hand against her chest, trying to catch her breath. With the river’s din still high, she raised her voice. “My name is Lauren. I’m from Earth.”
“I am Eagle.” His smile seemed to light up the valley. “I heard your name from your brother when he came to this world. He seemed concerned about you, so I hope you were able to reunite.”
She nodded. “We saw each other for a short time.”
“That’s good.” He angled his head, squinting. “You say you are from Earth, but I see a companion’s light in your hair.”
Lauren brushed her hair back, revealing Joan. “It’s a long story.”
“I see.” Eagle unraveled Albatross’s neck and extended a hand toward her. “I have a long story as well, but it might be best if I learn why Albatross has brought you to this place. This is a time of crisis, not an opportunity to explore.”
She took his hand and slid off the dragon’s side. “I have to find a cave with a portal leading to Earth. Do you know where it is?”
“I do. In fact, I was there quite recently in the company of a sorceress.”
“A sorceress?”
Waving a hand, Eagle laughed. “Don’t worry. Semiramis is not a friend.”
“You mean Semiramis is here?” Lauren pointed at the ground. “Right here in this valley?”
“She was here but not any longer.” Eagle gave her a puzzled look. “Do you know her?”
“All too well.” Lauren tried to calm down. Getting all worked up over Semiramis’s survival wouldn’t do any good. “Let’s just say she’s not my friend.”
“As I said, nor is she mine. Our alliance was pragmatic and temporary. We have no allegiances with each other.”
Lauren lifted her brow. Pragmatic? Allegiances? This guy had some intellectual depth. “Is the portal open?”
“I don’t know. While I was there, the cave had a fiery exit at the back. I hoped that it would provide an escape from the volcano’s poisonous fumes, but when I went through it, it burned like fire, and my companion fell to the ground. I decided that following a sorceress into a domain that deactivates my companion would be a very bad idea. I’m glad I left Cheer in the cave so she didn’t have to suffer the burn or risk seeing her companion fall.”
“Cheer?”
“Cheer is a girl, and I am her protector.” He nodded toward the forest. “She’s asleep over there.”
Lauren looked into his eyes, dark brown, bright and alive. He was so different from most Earth teenagers. “If you don’t mind me asking, how old are you? I mean, you look young to be sent here by yourself on a dangerous mission.”
He smiled. “I know I look younger than I am. By Earth years, I am sixteen. I am not tall, but my father has trained me well.”
Lauren gave his muscular arms a furtive glance. “I’m sure he has.”
“I assume that your desire to find the Earth portal is part of your long story.”
“It is.”
“Then I will lead you to the portal, but I want to avoid exposing Cheer to the danger, so I will ask Albatross to take her to safety.”
Lauren nodded toward the hospital. “I just came from your hospital. It’s sitting near the garden where the plants give birth to babies. The doctor said he’s not going anywhere unless there’s an emergency.”
“The perfect place.” Eagle patted Albatross’s neck. “Will you take Cheer to the hospital and return to let me know she is safe? If I am not here, then you are free to patrol.”
Albatross bobbed his head with vigor.
“Come.” Eagle gestured toward the forest and walked that way. As Lauren followed, the river’s noise faded into the background. “When I left the cave with Cheer,” he said, “the smoke was quite dense, but since I could provide her with a certain leaf that filters the poison, I thought it better to protect her here than to follow Semiramis.”
“What was the pragmatic reason you were with her?” Heat rushed through Lauren’s cheeks. “I mean, I know you had no allegiances with her, but … what I’m trying to say …”
“Fear no offense, my new friend.” Eagle took her hand in his and continued walking. “She told me a convincing story that gave me reason to go along with her for a time, but I soon discerned her wiles. That was another reason not to go to your world with her. She cannot be trusted.”
Lauren glanced at their clasped hands. Eagle was so gentle and kind, free with his feelings. Being his “new friend” felt good … and unnerving. “It sounds like you made the right call.”
After stepping through dense underbrush, they arrived at a small clearing where a little girl slept in a nest of ferns, the edge of an elephant-ear-sized leaf in her hand. At least ten brightly burning torches had been embedded in the ground around her, making a circle of fire that cast rippling light over her body.
“No shadow people would dare draw near with this fence of protection.” Eagle plucked one of the torches and walked through the gap. After tamping out the flame, he dropped the torch, took Cheer’s leaf, and folded it into his pants pocket. He then scooped her up and walked out of the circle. “If you don’t mind, would you please smother the other torches? There is no need to save any. I have a flashlight.”
While Lauren grabbed torches and rolled them over the ground, Eagle spoke to Cheer in a singsong voice. “Wake up, little one. It’s time to go dragon riding. You like that, don’t you?”
Cheer blinked her bleary eyes and nodded. “Grackle or Albatross?”
Eagle lowered her to the ground and slid his hand into hers. “Albatross.”
“Oh, good! He’s bouncier than Grackle. I like to bounce.”
Smiling, Lauren smothered the final torch. Obviously Cheer was an experienced dragon rider. She would be safe.
After they walked back to the river and sent Cheer and Albatross away, Eagle stood at the river’s edge and watched the dragon-and-rider silhouette as it shrank in the moon’s light. Tears sparkled in his brilliant eyes. “These are dangerous days,” he said, his voice barely audible over the river’s rush. “Sometimes I wonder if Second Eden has seen such darkness before, perhaps when I was young, but since King Elam has kept the evils of your world away, I had not experienced such darkness until Mount Elijah exploded and killed my best friend.”
His companion zipped down to his nose and began flashing red.
Lauren’s cheeks warmed. “Killed your best friend! I’m so sorry!”
“Oh, I am the one who should apologize. My words were not meant to cause sorrow in you.” He touched his companion with a fingertip. “He just reminded me that I too often express my thoughts verbally when I ought to keep them to myself.”
Joan floated near Lauren’s eyes, glowing blue. Verbalizing the moods of the mind can be helpful. While you search for the cave, lift his guilt by asking him why he won
ders about the darkness. It must be something that weighs heavily on his mind.
Lauren nodded. “Shall we find the cave?”
“If you trust me to hold my tongue.” He gave her a sheepish smile. “Stay close.”
“Wait a minute.” Lauren slid out her phone and pointed the lens at Eagle. “Do you mind if I take a picture?”
“A photograph?” Eagle straightened and smiled. “I am honored.”
After taking a picture of Eagle and another of Joan, she put the phone away. They headed downstream at the river’s edge, marching side by side. Lauren watched his purposeful strides. With squared shoulders and disciplined gait, if not for his darker skin and shorter stature, he could have been Matt’s double.
A hum drifted from his lips, a familiar tune—“Amazing Grace.” Lauren smiled. Since he liked that song, it might mean that he had spiritual light within in spite of his dismal words earlier. “Why do you wonder about darkness in your younger days?”
“I have memories.” He kept his focus straight ahead. “Dreams, really, so they’re vague and fleeting. I see a dark place with jagged streaks of light, much like the lightning you have in your world.”
“You don’t have lightning here?”
“My father mentioned a time when we had some, before I was taken from the birthing garden, so my dreams must be from the photos I have seen in books brought here from your world. I have not seen any lightning myself.”
“Only photos? No videos?”
Eagle shook his head. “We have no video devices, and King Elam prefers it that way.”
“I see.” Lauren hid a smile. Her friends on Earth would think Elam’s policy oppressive and narrow, but if they could see the quality of people here, maybe they would change their minds.
She sighed. No. Even then, they wouldn’t change their minds. Most would call the Second Edeners ignorant hicks who needed enlightenment.
“Why the sigh?” Eagle asked.
Looking at him out of the corner of her eye, she smiled. “I’d rather not say.”
He turned his head toward her, returning the smile. “I could learn a lot from you, Lauren. Your private manner is wise. You are very much like my father. I am like my mother in that I would ask questions until … What is your idiom? Until your ears fall off?”
She laughed. “Yes, we do say that.”
“I will ask another question, and perhaps you will answer when the time is right.” He nodded at Apollo. “What is that device you are carrying?”
She lifted it by one of its dowels. “I think it would be better to wait, like you said. It’s really hard to explain.”
“As you wish.”
The glimmer from his medallion caught her attention. “Do you mind if I ask you a question?”
“Please do.”
“That medallion you’re wearing. Does it have some kind of significance?”
He stopped, lifted a thin chain, and set the medallion on his palm. “This is something my father gave me. He wore it for many years and gave it to my mother on their wedding day.” He lifted the edge with a fingertip. “See the engraving?”
She read the etched letters—My gift to you. My life. It is all I have to give. “So why do you have it now?”
His features sagged. “My mother died about a year ago, so my father gave it to me. I hope to give it to my bride when we wed, to a young lady I would give my life for. As it says, giving my life for the one I love is the only real gift, is it not?”
“It’s true. I know I would love to get a gift like that from someone who loved me so much.”
And I am sorry to hear about your mother, Joan said without flashing.
“And I’m sorry to hear about your mother.”
“I appreciate your kindness.” He slid the medallion behind his shirt and continued walking. “Now is it my turn to ask a question?”
“Sure.” She shrugged. “I guess so.”
“I noticed that your skin glows. Why is that?”
She looked at her hand. No sign of a glow. “It’s a genetic thing. It’s really hard to explain.”
“Well, it suits you. It makes me think of faith and virtue. Those qualities must emanate from within your soul.”
Lauren’s cheeks flushed hot. “Thank you.”
“And if I may trouble you for yet another question.”
She gave him a sideways glance. With his expression stoic, he didn’t give away any hidden agenda. “Go for it.”
“What are you carrying in the backpack?”
“It’s a mixture of dirt and enzymes and genetic material and parasites, also a hand shovel and a helmet. I hope to throw the mixture into the volcano to create a new parasite that will battle the one infecting the sick anthrozils. I assume you know about them.”
“Oh, yes. I have suggested many herbal remedies, but all have failed.” He touched the backpack’s outer lining. “I think if you throw it into Mount Elijah, you will not create a new parasite. It will just burn. Nothing can survive that heat.”
Lauren quickly explained Dr. Conner’s theory, finishing with a sigh. “The mutated parasite can survive for seven minutes, so after the backpack gets thrown in, the volcano needs to erupt to eject it into cooler air.”
“I hope you will pardon me, but that sounds like one of the fairy tales my mother used to tell me. A volcano can never create life. It only destroys. You might as well hope to spin straw into gold.”
“It does sound crazy, I admit, but that’s the theory.”
“The theory has another serious flaw. How will you make Mount Elijah erupt within seven minutes?”
“Well …” She looked at the ground. “I was thinking …”
Joan nudged Lauren’s ear. Do not be ashamed. Tell him. He will understand.
Lauren looked Eagle in the eye. “How about if I pray for it?”
“Pray?” Eagle clapped his hands. “Excellent. I pray for wisdom all the time.”
“Wisdom? Yes, I pray for it, too, but I meant—”
“If you seek wisdom about Mount Elijah, then you asked the right person, because I know why it erupts.”
“You do?”
He nodded. “It erupts whenever someone dies by falling into its crater. I heard that this recent eruption was so terrible because many Earth soldiers fell in.”
“That’s true. They did.”
“And have you met Listener?”
“I have.”
“She has a spyglass.” Eagle positioned his hands as if peering through a handheld telescope. “There was an eruption a dozen years or more ago, and right before it happened, Listener was looking through the spyglass and saw someone fall into Mount Elijah. And my father told me about a boy who fell in long before that, an accident when his father took him to the summit. When Elijah erupted, the father barely escaped with his life. After that accident, our prophet Abraham plugged the hole to discourage visitors from coming to see the fire inside.”
“That must have been awful!” Lauren lowered her gaze and watched her bare feet keep pace with his. Eagle’s words seemed like confirmation from above. Although the theory sounded like a fairy tale, how else could anyone explain the cry for help from the ghostly voice? And the deep scratches in the shelf at the top of the ladder proved that a struggle had occurred—real physical evidence, not just whispers riding on a breeze.
Joan brushed against Lauren’s ear. Abaddon said to let wisdom guide you.
I remember.
And did you and Eagle agree that you both prayed for wisdom?
Yes. We did.
It seems that the answer to your dilemma was delivered to you as if presented on a velvet pillow.
Lauren nodded. So you know what I’ve been considering.
Of course. Your prominent thoughts are easy to hear.
Abaddon’s words flowed into Lauren’s mind, burning like acidic bile. She must sacrifice for the sake of others, a supremely selfless act that will sear her s
oul. And facing fear of death will defeat all fears forevermore.
Lauren swallowed hard. This idea was just a theory. I’m still not sure I can go through with it. Maybe I haven’t interpreted everything the right way.
I see no other way of interpreting it. You knew about this likely result when you chose to come here instead of staying with Abaddon.
I know, but …
But you hoped to escape the fire. Joan’s blue light flashed, then dimmed, as if letting out a sigh. I cannot count the number of times I hoped for escape from my persecutors. Even at the last hour I begged God to bring my compatriots to my rescue, but when the executioner touched the flaming torch to my pyre, and I saw no familiar faces in the panting throng, I realized that my prayers had gone unanswered; at least they were not answered in the way I had hoped. No rescue came. The fire crawled over my body. I burned. I died in torment.
Lauren nodded. And because of your death, all of France rallied in your name.
And they broke their bonds. My sacrifice meant freedom for many.
As tears welled in her eyes, Lauren pushed Joan away. I need to stop talking about this.
Very well. Joan settled on Lauren’s shoulder and darkened.
From that point on, Lauren and Eagle marched in silence. When they entered a thin cloud of smoke, light from the moon dimmed. Eagle withdrew the leaf from his pocket, tore it in half, and gave her a section. He covered his mouth and nose with his and gestured for her to do the same.
She held her section tightly over her face, trying to close the gaps, and breathed through it. A sweet smell entered her nostrils, similar to the aroma of the liquid she had poured over the mask at the top of the museum room ladder. Although pungent, breathing it was a lot better than choking on poison.
Soon, Eagle guided the way to the left and into the forest. He pulled the flashlight from his belt and shone the beam into the darkness. Never slowing his stride, he marched on.
Lauren slid the goggles up to her eyes. With Eagle watching for anything that his beam touched, she could watch for everything else.
After about a minute, they arrived at an entrance to a cave. He focused the beam on a heaping line of blackness that looked like someone had dumped a wheelbarrow of tar. “Avoid stepping in it,” he whispered. “This is the remains of the shadow people who accosted us earlier. Semiramis concocted a potion that burned them.”