Desire (Legends of the Kilanor Book 3)

by Jared Stone

  Schuntz just let out a sigh. “I suppose anything is possible, Mr. Valenti,” he conceded. “But do not let your fear get the better of you. No matter what power this diminutive creature believes it possesses, I am certain it will not prevent us from continuing on in our journey.”

  Schuntz then turned to the mysterious being perched on the rock. “Be silent, you accursed beast, and let us pass,” he commanded with a wave of his hand.

  “Papé Satàn!” the hairy creature called out again in reply, narrowing its amber eyes. Without warning, it reached out its clawed hands at the three travelers. Lucian immediately felt an acute tingling sensation shoot throughout his body, as if all his limbs and torso fell asleep at the same time. He dropped to the ground and saw in his peripheral vision Blake and Schuntz do the same. Unable to move, Lucian stared down at his hands upon the cavern floor as they pulsated with a brilliant white light. He could feel the qi being sapped from him as he watched this light flow out from his skin and into the outstretched hands of the creature. Within seconds, the beast held in its grasp a twisting mass of white, black, and red energies, and the three men remained crouched over on the ground, seeming dim and almost lifeless.

  “What…?” Lucian mumbled.

  “Dude,” Blake said softly, “he…, like…, stole our energy or something….”

  “Do not let him escape,” Schuntz ordered to the two boys, sounding greatly weakened and encountering significant difficulty as he struggled to stand. “We cannot progress without….”

  Before he could finish, the professor collapsed back to the floor again, exhausted and completely sapped of the energy which had sustained him over so many years. But Lucian immediately understood what it was he had tried to say.

  “Get him!” Lucian cried out to Blake as he reached forward and lunged at the furry thief. But, much to the boys’ dismay, the creature was far too quick, and it effortlessly leapt away from their grasp. Flying through the air, it landed its padded feet on Lucian’s head before springing back off again, forcefully driving the boy back down, onto the ground. Before Lucian could even turn around to see where the creature had gone, it had scampered away, down into the great chasm of colliding boulders.

  Scrambling up with some difficulty, both Blake and Lucian rushed over to the edge of the downward slope into the ravine. From already quite a distance away, they could see the furry thief nimbly leaping from boulder to boulder, avoiding entirely the notice of the big, lumbering oafs who were too preoccupied with chasing their rolling gold to care about anything else. As the creature bounded from one golden orb to the next, it still hugged tight to its chest the pulsating mass of energy it had stolen from the three humans. Reaching the end of the very long chasm, the thief scurried up the side of the slope without difficulty, coming to stand in front of the exit at the far end. Holding the glowing energy sphere high into the air above its head, it waved it back and forth, clearly mocking the two boys while staring them down with its creepy yellow eyes.

  “Grrrrrrrrr,” Blake snarled, his fists clenched beside him. “That little freak totally took all our powers, man! We gotta get over there so I can take ‘em back and pound him into a pulp!”

  BAM!!

  Immediately following this, another pair of boulders loudly collided, causing the boys to both grimace in pain. Lucian feared for a moment that he was about to lose his balance and go toppling down over the edge of the cliff, but he caught himself just in time. Both he and Blake stood there with their fingers in their ears until the sound waves stopped vibrating off of every surface around them and the ringing in their heads faded.

  Lucian agreed wholeheartedly with most of what Blake had just said, but, as he glanced down into the chasm before them, he had serious reservations about trying to get across. Speeding boulders raced down either side of the halfpipe as fast as cars on a highway, and elephant-sized creatures with no eyes covetously zig-zagged in every direction after them. There were at least fifty ways Lucian could easily envision getting crushed to death, and not a single one of them seemed like a very comfortable way to go. It all reminded Lucian of a video game he had played as a kid, where an animal had to jump through a series of countless moving obstacles to reach the other side of the screen. A game he always lost.

  “Eh… I don’t know about this, Blake,” Lucian said hesitantly. “I mean, even WE would be lucky to get all the way across without being killed. Especially without our powers. But what about….”

  Lucian suddenly let out a gasp. He had entirely forgotten about Schuntz, who still lay on the ground behind them. Turning around, Lucian rushed over and knelt down beside him.

  “Professor? Professor?” Lucian called out, rolling the elderly man over onto his back and pushing gently against his shoulder to rock his body back and forth. His heart was racing nervously for the first few seconds as the professor showed no visible signs of life, but he was greatly relieved when he then heard Schuntz moan.

  “Mr. Aarden, I am incapacitated; not dead,” Schuntz scolded almost inaudibly amongst the din of their surroundings. He breathed heavily a few times as his chest trembled with the strain. “Unfortunately, at my age, I have precious little energy left to spare. I am experiencing some significant difficulties calling upon my typical motor functions.” The man took another second to breathe again. “I fear that I will be of little assistance to you in this challenge.”

  “It’s alright, Professor,” Lucian said. “Blake and I will go get our energy. Just stay here, and we’ll be back for you.” Looking at their surroundings for a second, the student then asked, “Can I help you sit up against that rock over there or anything?”

  Schuntz sighed. “No, I believe I am quite fine as is, Mr. Aarden,” he stated from his place on his back. “If you set me upright, I fear that I would only….”

  BAM!!

  Just then, another pair of boulders smashed against one another, blasting deafening sound waves out from the chasm beside them.

  “And do hurry, Mr. Aarden,” Schuntz urged as loudly as he was able. “For that is becoming quite bothersome.”

  Lucian nodded once in response, then stood up and walked back over to Blake’s side at the edge of the slope. Both boys looked down into the chaos below.

  “You ready?” Lucian asked his roommate.

  “I mean…, yeah…, I guess,” Blake responded with some apprehensive hesitation.

  Lucian took a deep breath in. “Do we have a strategy or anything?” he asked hopefully.

  Blake shrugged. “Try not to get hit?” he suggested.

  Lucian sighed. “Okay then…,” he said. “Here goes nothing.”

  With this, both boys walked up to the edge and crouched down. Lucian turned around so that he was facing away from the pit and slowly lowered his leg over the lip of the embankment, all the while keeping a firm grip on the flat ground above to stabilize himself. He felt his first foot make contact with the sloped earth below, and he brought his other leg down beside it. Once both of his feet were firmly in place, he loosened his grip on the rock and started to slowly slide down.

  Okay, steady… steady… Lucian thought to himself as he used all his limbs to gradually make his way down the rock’s sloped surface. Just take it slowly. This really isn’t that bad if I just take my time. It’s actually easier than –

  Suddenly, Lucian’s right foot slipped out from underneath him, and the boy’s chest collided with the wall in front of him. The force of the impact bounced him back off again, and, though he tried to grab onto something to catch himself, there was nothing but hardened rock all around him. Desperately grasping at empty air, Lucian felt himself toppling backwards with a sickening sensation rising in his stomach. After what seemed like an eternity of falling into nothingness, his butt hit the slope hard first, followed by his back, then head. He somersaulted backwards several times, straight into the ravine, before rolling to a stop. Lucian was now on his hands and knees on solid, flat ground, and his head was spinning around so wildly he thought
he was going to vomit.

  “Lucian, watch out!” Lucian heard Blake’s voice scream out in front of him. “Left!”

  Still attempting to recover from the sickening topple of just moments before, Lucian brought his head up and glanced to his left. Growing ever larger in his field of vision was a giant golden orb careening down toward him from the platform above. Lucian’s eyes grew wide as he instinctively twisted around and rolled out of the boulder’s way just seconds before it barreled over the place where he had just knelt. Lucian remained planted to the ground as the orb shot past him, inches away from his head. Following closely behind, the tree trunk leg of the big gray creature chasing after it stamped onto the earth with such force that Lucian felt his teeth jostle in his mouth. Several more lumbering steps sent a tremor through Lucian’s body that lasted until the beast had progressed several feet in the other direction. With his sense of balance once again stabilized, Lucian quickly scrambled up onto his feet.

  “That was a close one, dude!” Blake called out as he ran up to Lucian’s side. “You gotta watch out for –”

  Just as he said this, Lucian saw the boulder which had just whizzed past him flying up behind Blake as it tumbled down the other side of the halfpipe. Grabbing his roommate by the shoulders, Lucian tugged with all his might to leap out of the way and take Blake with him. As the boulder rolled past, Lucian could actually feel it brush against the jacket material covering his left arm. Coming to a stop beside its path with Blake still in his grasp, he once again felt vibrations shoot through his body as the blind beast similarly raced past the two boys.

  “Geez!” Blake exclaimed, looking back in shock. “Thanks, man.”

  Lucian let go of Blake’s shoulders and took a step back. “Yeah, well, don’t be too excited yet,” Lucian reminded his roommate. “We still have a long way to go.”

  Looking down the length of the chasm in which they now stood, Lucian gained an even greater sense of the complexity of the feat before them. Golden orbs flew back and forth in every direction, seemingly without any pause between them, and the spaces not within the boulders’ tracks were frequently taken up by stomping legs and flailing arms. It was nearly impossible to try and determine a pattern.

  “Just wait til the gray things run by, then move forward,” Blake instructed, seeming more at home in such a chaotic flurry of continuously changing variables than Lucian. “Go far enough so that you’re past the boulder that just went by, but not so much that you’re in the way of the next one.”

  Lucian understood the general principle, but he was fearful that it was much easier said than done. Still, there wasn’t really much else that could be done at this point. “Okay, I’m ready whenever you are,” he told Blake.

  Just as he said this, a boulder came rolling by in front of them, followed closely behind by a big gray creature. “Now!” Blake called out after it had passed.

  Lucian hurried forward alongside Blake, being sure to go far enough ahead that he was out of the way of the previous boulder, but not immediately in danger of getting run over by the next one. Before he could even pause to get his bearings again, he heard another “Now!” come from Blake. Somewhat blindly, he charged ahead again.

  “Now!”

  “Now!”

  “Now!”

  Lucian found himself hopping from lane to lane, barely able to even determine from which direction the boulder was coming before he had to run past it to the next one. It was all happening so quickly, in such a frenzy of activity, that Lucian was starting to get confused about where he had been stopped and when he should be going again.

  “Now!”

  Lucian moved forward.

  “Now!”

  Lucian moved forward.

  “Now!”

  Lucian moved forward.

  Lucian moved forward.

  “No! Lucian!”

  Lucian barely had enough time to turn around and look at what Blake was talking about before he was sideswiped by the thick gray arm flying toward him. The beast’s gargantuan, meaty limb struck the boy’s shoulder, sending him helplessly stumbling forward and directly into the next lane. It was as if Lucian was moving in slow motion as he spun around and saw out of the corners of his eyes the two golden orbs, one from the left and one from the right, rolling down directly at him.

  “Lucian!” he heard Blake’s voice cry out. Lucian saw the dark haired boy lunge forward and collide into him, shoving him out of the way. The last thing Lucian witnessed as he fell to the ground was Blake standing where he had just been as the two boulders smashed together.

  BAM!!

  And, just like that, it seemed that all the movement around Lucian immediately ceased. The gray beasts stopped their constant running and stood still, with mouths hanging open as if they sensed a change in the air itself. The golden orbs which had been barreling this way and that slowly rolled to a stop in the middle of the chasm. And, from the ledges above them, the tall, slender creatures gazed down with their huge, unblinking eyes at the spectacle.

  Lucian, however, sensed none of this as he pushed himself up and ran over to the two boulders which had just sandwiched his roommate. He threw his hands against one of them and pushed with all his might to try and roll it away, but the tremendous weight of the metal ball was too much for him.

  “Blake!” Lucian cried out desperately, still straining in vain against the obstacle. “Blake!”

  Seeing that his own effort alone was of no use, he turned to two of the nearby creatures. “Help him!” Lucian pleaded with them, tears welling up in his eyes. “Dammit, help him!”

  The big gray creatures just stood there, eyelessly staring into the void as if they understood nothing.

  “Help him!” Lucian screamed again.

  “Papé Satàn, papé Satàn aleppe,” Lucian suddenly heard from behind him. Turning, he beheld the furry thief sitting atop the pair of boulders. Lucian’s heart sank.

  “Please,” the boy begged, staring anxiously into the yellow eyes of his tormentor. “Please, you gotta help him. Somehow. He saved me. That should’ve been me…. I should be the one in there….”

  The brown creature tilted its head and stared at the boy in attempted comprehension, then opened its fanged mouth into what could only be described as a smile. “Papé Satàn aleppe,” it repeated again as it lifted its arms into the air.

  From the creature’s palms, orbs of energy shot out. A white orb flew directly at Lucian, striking his chest and instantly filling him with the warm tingling sensation characteristic of summoning his qi. A red orb shot up and over the ledge above them to where Schuntz still lay. And a third, black orb shot down in between the touching boulders.

  As the furry thief leapt off the top of its perch, there was an explosion of dark energy which sent both the boulders flying off in either direction. And there, in the middle, calmly stood Blake, seemingly unharmed and simply looking perplexed.

  “Blake!” Lucian exclaimed, running up and giving his roommate a giant hug.

  “Uh, hey…” the boy responded. He stood in the hug awkwardly, his arms hanging by his sides. Lucian let go of him and stepped back.

  “I thought you were dead,” he then admitted to Blake seriously.

  “Yeah, well,” Blake began. “I honestly have no idea what’s going on….”

  Lucian laughed. “Me neither,” he admitted.

  Suddenly, the ground beneath them began to shake violently. Lucian looked around anxiously, fearing an ambush of some sort, but instead he saw the earth on either side of the halfpipe chasm crumble away. Underneath, two sets of stairs led to the top in either direction.

  “Dude, what is going on?” Blake asked.

  Lucian shook his head. “I don’t know,” he replied.

  “It appears that you have somehow succeeded, Mr. Aarden,” Lucian heard Schuntz’s voice say as the professor descended the stairs behind them. “And I, for one, am quite grateful for that. Now, let us leave this cacophonous place at once.”

  �
�Yeah, let’s,” Lucian agreed. Once the professor had reached them, the three travelers made their way around numerous boulders to the stairs at the other end. As they passed by, all the creatures in the cavern stood off to boths sides in silence, staring down or sniffing at the air as if confused by what had just transpired. It was honestly quite an uncomfortable situation for Lucian.

  “Professor,” Lucian started as they began to climb the stairs at the end of the trench, “how did that have anything to do with greed? I mean, I get that that weird furry thing wanted to steal our energy. But then Blake had to almost die for us to succeed? I’m not getting it.”

  Schuntz considered for a moment. “I believe that these two types of creatures represent the craving and wastefulness of greed – one always hoarding and the other always casting away. Their entire existences are shaped solely by their interactions with material wealth. Perhaps Mr. Valenti’s sacrifice for another represents the surrender of that which should be most important to all beings: life itself. An act of supreme altruism with complete disregard for his own wants and needs.” The professor then paused for a moment. “That is, of course, only a theory,” he concluded.

  Lucian nodded silently. It seemed to make sense on the whole, though he still wasn’t totally certain of anything anymore. As he was thinking about this, the three of them reached the top of the stairs and headed into the narrow exit carved into the rock wall. And, at the end of the tunnel, a gate with a swirling vortex of red energy stood awaiting them.

  Looking up, Schuntz shook his head. “Just as I had suspected,” he said.

  “What is it?” Blake asked.

  “The word carved over this portal is ‘Míyerdín’: ‘defilement of violent turmoil of mind,’ or ‘Wrath,’” the professor explained. “This confirms the theory that I had mentioned to you earlier. These realms are all modeled after the traditional Seven Deadly Sins enumerated by Pope Gregory I in 590 CE. These seem to have been simultaneously combined with fantastical notions of the underworld taken from Dante Alighieri’s Inferno, from the 14th Century. It is probable that whoever created these challenges to protect the key was very familiar with these tenets of the Church. Or, conversely, those tenets were based off of experiences encountered in these realms….”