Legend of the Timekeepers (7 page)

A rancorous scream permeated through the forest. She-Aba froze in her tracks, the vine she cut hanging lifeless in her hand. “W-What was that?”

Lilith’s whole body prickled.
No, it can’t be, can it? That would be impossible.

She turned to scan the area. Tau wouldn’t quit wiggling. She reached for his arm and squeezed. “Stop that, I’m trying to—”

Another scream, this time closer, rolled out through the leaves.

“Oh, Poseidon, it is,” Lilith said, feeling her heart start to race. “Quick, She-Aba, throw up the vine and go hide! Now!”

“What’s going on, Lilith?” Tau asked. “Why do you sound so frightened?”

Lilith looked around again. “Because a wyvern is hunting us.”

“A…what?” She-Aba asked.

“A wyvern. It looks like a huge snake with wings, feet like a hawk’s, and a tail like a white crawler.”

She-Aba huffed. “Excuse, me, Miss Bossy, but I think I proved that I can handle a snake just fine.”

“For once would you just do as you’re told, fire-head,” Tau said. “Throw up the vine!”

“You mean this vine, Tau?” She-Aba swung it in her hand.

“She-Aba, you don’t understand, wyverns aren’t like cobras,” Lilith explained. “You’ve never seen one before, so you have no idea what they’re capable of.”

“So enlighten me, then. How do you know so much about these snake-like creatures?”

Lilith scanned the area one more time before she said, “They’re native to only one place on earth.”

“And where’s that?” Tau asked, grunting as he gripped the tree branch.

Lilith licked her dry lips and said, “Atlantis.”

6

The First Timekeepers

“D
id…did you just say Atlantis? Atlantis, as in your home country?” She-Aba asked.

“Atlantis as in your now sunken country?” Tau asked.

Lilith nodded. “I know it makes no sense, but wyverns were only bred on Atlantis to protect our coastline.”

Another shriek permeated Lilith’s ears. She balked. “She-Aba—the vine!”

She-Aba pitched the vine, not realizing that its end was tangled around her feet. As Lilith and Tau yanked up on the vine, She-Aba fell backwards. “Stop pulling, I’m caught!”

“Well, get uncaught, fire-head, we need the vine!” Tau shouted down.

Hearing branches snap and crack, Lilith and Tau turned their heads. They dropped their jaws, and the vine, at the same time. A wyvern broke into the clearing—a young one—Lilith guessed, judging by its size, as it was no bigger than a full-grown horse. Its translucent wings flapped, its green, leathery skin rippled, and it opened its reptilian jaws. A long, forked tongue slithered out, as if tasting their smell, drinking in the perfume of their sweat. Strutting like a cock ready to do battle, it whipped its long tail side to side, showing off its poisonous barb as if it were an ornament to be revered. The wyvern’s nostrils flared once, twice, three times before it let out another shriek from his monstrous mouth and charged them.

“Oh-my-Poseidon! Run, She-Aba!” Lilith screamed, trying to break a branch off the tree.

“I-I-I’m trying!” She-Aba yelled, still struggling with the vine.

A roar sounded from behind the advancing wyvern. Lilith had managed to snap off a branch and pitched it at the winged serpent. Her aim was dead on, whacking it on the head. It stopped, shook its head and neck, making the wormy beard on its chin wiggle, and glared at Lilith. It let out a shriek that made her insides shrink. The wyvern flapped its wings, preparing for attack, but was clawed in the face by what appeared to be a human-animal hybrid half its size.

The hybrid stood upright, roared, grabbed one of the wyvern’s wings, and tugged it toward its back. Losing its footing, the wyvern shrieked, gnashed its jaws from side-to-side, and flailed its barbed tail around the air in an attempt to swat the hybrid. The wyvern’s attacker pulled the wing harder until it was dragged down to the ground.

“Watch the tail!” Lilith yelled.

The hybrid looked up in time to avoid the tail. Although he looked and dressed like a man, he possessed the claws and tail of a lion. He glanced at Lilith for a moment. Olive eyes bored into her. His nose was long, his cheekbones high. He had a shaggy black mane for hair and a long, braided goatee. He was wearing a burgundy tunic with the insignia of a golden serpent wrapped around his left arm. This marked him a guardian of the Temple of the Sun—a common purpose for human-lion hybrids.

“Etan!” a voice yelled from the forest.

“Who said that?” Tau asked, still struggling between the branches.

“There—” Lilith pointed. “—running out from behind those sprawling shrubs. A boy about your age.”

“Not a boy, a…a
man
.” She-Aba finally freed herself. She ran her fingers through her hair. “And he’s a fine-looking specimen from what I see.”

“Stay where you are! I swore to your father to keep you safe!” the human-lion hybrid named Etan growled as he pinned the wyvern down harder.

“For Ra’s sake, throw up the vine, fire-head, my legs are cramping!” Tau yelled.

Lilith caught the vine, wrapped it around the branches Tau was pinned between, then reached over, grabbed one of his feet, and guided Tau’s foot toward a notch in the tree. “Push hard, Tau, set yourself free!”

Tau grunted as if he were giving birth and pushed himself up and out. He grasped the vine and climbed down with ease, mimicking a monkey. Then Lilith reached for the vine, swung off the rough tree trunk, and started to slide down just as the wyvern let out an angry, piercing shriek. Startled, Lilith jerked and the vine snapped. She-Aba broke her fall.

“Ohhh!” She-Aba screamed, almost matching the wyvern’s horrible wail. “My foot!”

“Ohhh, my ears,” Tau muttered, covering his ears.

Lilith heard the sound of hurried footsteps crunch through the spongy ground to beat a path toward them.

“Are you hurt?” someone with a distinct Atlantean accent asked.

Lilith looked up. The young man who ran out of the forest hovered above her and She-Aba. He had curly, sandy hair which stuck out every which way, and soft brown eyes. He was dressed in a linen tunic and pants, with a purple sash and palm leaf sandals. Despite his plain clothing, everything about his manner and stance told Lilith that he came from a house of privilege. He leaned against his staff, as if he had nothing better to do.

Lilith cleared her throat. “Um, I wouldn’t worry too much about us, seeing as your—”

“It’s…it’s broken!” She-Aba cut her off.

“Your foot is broken?” Tau asked in a concerned tone.

She-Aba sniffed. “No, my heel! Now my shoe is ruined!”

Lilith rolled her eyes. She got up, brushed herself off, looked at the young man hovering over her friend, and said, “She’s all yours.”

Etan ripped out a painful roar. Lilith whirled around. The wyvern had managed to dig one of its sharp talons into his leg. His grip was starting to weaken. The wyvern’s tail swung around enough for Lilith to see a small tattoo above the barbed tail. Her eyes widened. Uncle Kukulkan had once told her that to ensure their safety wyvern breeders implanted a small poisonous sac inside the tails of young wyverns, and marked the area with a tattoo. If a wyvern suddenly became unruly, then the breeder smashed a rod against the tattoo to release the poison into the wyvern’s body, killing it instantly. Panicking, Lilith looked around for a makeshift weapon. The only possible weapon was being used as a post. She didn’t hesitate and grabbed the staff the stranger was leaning on.

“Tau, pick up the vine and follow me!” Lilith yelled.

“Huh? Why?” Tau asked.

“You’re a farmer’s son. Surely you know how to rope a goat,” Lilith answered.

“Goats, yes. That—” Tau pointed, while gathering the vine “—not so much.”

“All you need to do is rope its tail. I’ll do the rest with this staff.”

Tau groaned as he made a loop with the vine. “Atchas make no sense.”

Lilith frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You’re afraid of cobras, but not afraid of those things?”

The wyvern shrieked as it thrashed its head and long neck.

“Come on, Tau, the hybrid is losing his grip!”

Lilith sprinted and circled the wyvern on one side, while Tau ran toward the opposite side and waved the noose over his head. With his tongue sticking out the side of his mouth, Tau threw the vine and caught the tip of its barbed tail. Threading the vine around his torso, Tau yanked on the tail. The wyvern screeched, swung its head in Tau’s direction, and snapped its jaws, just missing his foot.

“Hurry, Lilith, before this oversized lizard reaches me!”

Lilith targeted the dark tattoo shaped like two connected circles above the barb, raised the staff and swung it with enough force to hit the tattoo dead-on. The wyvern jumped at the blow. Hissing and wailing, the wyvern started to convulse and drool as the poison from the implanted sac swiftly shot through its body. Etan released his hold, flicked his tail, and motioned for Lilith and Tau to move away. The wyvern, now free, thrashed and railed for three more breaths before it fell deadly still.

“Quick thinking, Lilith,” Tau said as he joined her. “How did you know what to do?”

“Simple. We needed to fight fire with fire, like Istulo did with my father,” she replied. “I knew that under the tattoo above the wyvern’s barbed tail was a poisonous sac placed there by its breeder, so I thought if we could get close enough to break the sac then—”

“—it would poison itself,” Tau cut in, finishing for Lilith. “Good call, Atcha-girl.”

“Thank you,” the human-lion hybrid said, bowing. His voice sounded beastly, deep.

Lilith squeezed the staff. “We should be the ones thanking you. If it wasn’t for you, my friends and I would be wyvern fodder by now.”

“Unless it got to She-Aba first,” Tau added with a grin. “She would have left a bad taste in its mouth, and it would have left us alone.”

Lilith burst out laughing.

“Did I miss a joke?” She-Aba asked, hobbling on one foot while the young man had his arm wrapped around her waist.

“Oh, there’s always something to laugh about when you’re around, fire-head.”

She-Aba huffed. “If you don’t show some proper manners, I won’t introduce you to my new friend.”

“Poor friend,” Tau muttered.

Etan hid a smile. Lilith did too, then said, “I’m Lilith, and this is Tau. I see She-Aba has already presented herself.”

The young man bowed. “My name is Ajax-ol. And this—” he waved a hand toward the hybrid “—is Etan, my guardian.”

“Your guardian? I thought Etan was a guardian of the Temple of the Sun?” Lilith looked at him. “He wears the insignia on his left arm.”

Suddenly, a tremor rose up through the ground. She-Aba almost fell again, but Ajax-ol held her tight. She made a cooing sound and snuggled to him.

“I am,” Etan answered, as the tremor passed. “I also serve the House of Ajxor.”

“The House of Ajxor? Admiral Ajxor?” Lilith asked.

“My father is not an admiral,” Ajax-ol replied, tipping his head slightly. “At least not yet. Unless—” he looked at her squarely “—you know something I don’t?”

Lilith frowned. “No. I thought the history scrolls state—” She stopped herself. Her skin prickled.
This must be Atlantis as it was one hundred years ago, before the first major earthquake. This is what Father was scribing about in his record keeper when Mica interrupted him.
Lilith’s eyes widened.
Mica must be here too!
The ground rumbled and shook again.

Lilith fell forward and Etan grabbed her arms. Lilith winced, feeling the power of Etan’s grip.

“My apologies,” he said. “Did I hurt you?”

She shook her head. “I’m fine, just a little confused. Can you tell me who is in power?”

“Some say King Elem is, but I say Belial holds the real power,” Etan growled as he released Lilith.

“Who is Belial?” Tau asked.

Etan’s whole face drew in, as a wary, low growl developed in the back of his throat, and he swished his tail. “Where are you from? You talk with a strange dialect.”

“Both She-Aba and Tau are from the Black Land,” Lilith replied quickly before Tau answered. “I used to, um, I mean I dwell in the City of the Golden Gates, in the advisor’s section.”

Ajax-ol jerked. He slipped his arm away from She-Aba, who stumbled back. “These two are from the Black Land? I’ve heard only savages dwell there.”

“Savages?” Tau said indignantly. “You have some nerve, Atcha—”

Lilith didn’t give Tau a chance to finish. She clipped him across the back of the head. “Silence! You must never address anyone from the House of Ajxor in that manner. You’re here to serve my family, and you need to learn respect for our people!”

Tau’s eyes bugged. He rubbed the back of his head. Then Lilith looked at She-Aba, who was having difficulty balancing on one shoe. “And you—” she pointed at She-Aba “—take that shoe off and walk with dignity. You’ll never be groomed as an Atlantean’s servant if you are not appropriately dressed.”

“S-S-Servant?” She-Aba stammered.

Lilith clapped her hands three times. “Are you both forgetting how much trouble it was for my family to have you shipped here? The travel costs alone made us…
spiral
.”

She-Aba’s eyes widened. So did Tau’s. They glanced at each other and nodded.

Lilith inhaled sharply.
Good. We’re all on the same scroll
. She handed Ajax-ol his staff back and said, “Thank you for the use of your staff, Ajax-ol.”

He grabbed her left hand in mid-air and inspected the orichalcum snake bracelet her Uncle Kukulkan gave her before they left Atlantis. “Etan, look, she wears the talisman from the House of Seers.”

Lilith thought she heard Etan purr. “Yes, it appears so, Ajax-ol. Lilith must be in exile as well,” he said.

“House of Seers? Exile? What does that mean?” She-Aba asked.

“In my house, a servant does not speak until spoken to,” Ajax-ol said sternly.

“It’s all right, Ajax-ol,” Lilith said, patting his hand. “In our house, we teach our servants to ask questions if they don’t understand. My father says it breaks down barriers and builds better relations.”

Ajax-ol laughed. “Belial would do well to listen to your father.”

“Belial listens to no one, Ajax-ol, that is why your father had me take you here,” Etan added.

“Yes, Lilith’s father had me take Lilith and her woman servant here too.” Tau puffed out his chest. “I even had to face a cobra to carry out my duty.”

“Excuse me, bug-boy?” She-Aba blurted. “Who faced the cobra?”

Lilith waved them off. “Why were you exiled, Ajax-ol?”

Ajax-ol looked at Lilith warily. “Why were
you
exiled?”

Lilith felt her heart skip a beat. “Oh, well, you see, it’s complicated really—”

“She trusted the wrong person,” Tau replied, cutting in.

Ajax-ol laughed. “You too?”

Lilith’s shoulders sagged. “Yes. His name is Mica.”

“Her name is Zurumu,” he said, shrugging. “I should have known better. She has bright red hair like your woman servant.”

Tau guffawed.

She-Aba’s face turned as red the setting sun.

“Most of the high priestesses have red hair, Ajax-ol,” Etan added. “You happened to pick the wrong one to put your trust in.”

“Really? Your high priestesses have red hair?” She-Aba asked, beaming.

“He said most, not all, fire-head,” Tau said, smirking.

She-Aba opened her mouth to say something, then stopped. She pointed at Etan’s leg. “Your injured leg needs attention.” Then she snapped her fingers and fished around in her satchel.

Lilith glanced at Etan’s leg. The bloody, torn flesh was seeping yellow liquid. She-Aba was right. The wound was starting to fester already.

“I got this at the market today. Normally, I make it into a salve to spread over my face to draw out the impurities—”

“You wasted your coins. It’s not working,” Tau cut in, slapping his thigh.

She-Aba rolled her eyes. “But it can also be used to heal and clean wounds if you’ll allow me.”

Etan’s wide nostrils flared, as if testing its fragrance. “Very well, but hurry, we need to seek shelter soon. The razor-tooth cats will be on the prowl by dusk.”

She-Aba shuddered. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but you don’t have to tell me twice.”

Another tremor rumbled through Lilith, this time throwing her to the ground. Tau was knocked over too. Lilith sighed. She’d forgotten how unstable her homeland had been. Feeling Etan’s claws wrap around her small wrists, he gently pulled her up. “The quakes are getting frequent,” he said. “I fear it will get worse, before it gets better.”

Lilith stared at her feet. “Trust me, it won’t get any better.”

“Nonsense,” Ajax-ol said as he leaned on his staff and waved a hand frivolously. “Atlantis will always conquer whatever the gods will deliver. We are invincible.”

Like the tremor that had just erupted through her, Lilith balled her fists, sidestepped Etan, and kicked Ajax-ol’s staff out from under him.
Whump!
He fell flat on his back. She placed a foot on his chest and glared at him. “How arrogant are you to think that way! Don’t you see what’s happening to our land? What Belial is doing to us by abusing the power of the crystals? We’re killing ourselves by killing this place!”