Silver Cathedral Saga (14 page)

“Thank you,
Ruby.”

His father,
king Almare of Astora, gave a sudden worrying look to his son; the
prince’s eyes were now closed. His father’s look changed in mere
seconds into a gaze that was not so much shock, but more in line
with disbelief.

“No, that
is not possible,” said the king. He walked away repeating “not
possible” countless times, until the words lost its meaning and he
didn’t even know he was whispering it.

Part
Of

The two
children made their way to their rooms from the training room.

As they
passed a room hidden from sight, as the entrance was on the other
side, they heard a single voice talk about Ematay from behind a
wall.

“Ematay was
just sent to Swansie with another three Spell-casters yesterday. He
should be there by now, locating the Stone Swan.” Eleanor and
Christian only listened out of curiosity at first.

“Drat, that
means they will find it…”

“No they
won’t,” said another voice inside the room that was female. “The
Dark Queen has put it some place nobody would ever want to go.”

Eleanor
mouthed a ‘wow’ as she put her hand out to stop Christian moving
away, to stop any noise that could come from themselves; there was
nobody else around at this time.

She and her
friend ran away to her room as quick as these voices stopped, and
moved as quiet as they could.

“Can you
believe this. We have to tell the king?”

“How can
we,” replied Christian. “We can’t go pointing fingers. We didn’t
even see what they looked like.”

“You’re
right,” said Eleanor, baffled at what to do now.

Christian
scratched his cheek until it turned a deep, dark red.

“Take it
easy,” said Eleanor. “You’ll end up clawing your face off at this
rate.”

“Sorry, bad
habit. But we can’t just do nothing.”

“No, you’re
right.” Eleanor thought for some time as she and her friend
continued to walk back to her room.

The little
girl smiled at Christian before opening her door.

He could
tell she just thought of something.

“Do you
remember the giant swans in the stable below.”

“No—no way
am I riding one of them out of here.”

“Then
Ematay is as good as dead. Along with the rest of us. We can’t let
them win, Christian.”

Eleanor
knew from his deep sigh that she was right; this risk had to be
taken. “Adults have a history of never taking children seriously.
And we can’t let them sit by and ignore this.”

“This is
Ematay we are talking about,” said the child with long black hair.
The guy who gave us our new home. It goes without saying I
should—will—help anyway I can.”

“Then we
better get a move on. I heard from one of the guards the Shadows
are on their way to the Cathedral as we speak.”

“But won’t
the shield protect us from them?” asked Christian.

“Yes, it
should. But from the way the guard was talking he was scared out of
his mind. So it doesn’t make sense. Unless they use that portal
thing they done in Sunndira. I guess there can never be an ultimate
protection from anything.”

“There’s
always some way around. Also—” Eleanor stopped him there.

“Shhh,
enough chit chat, we have to get on to save Ematay and the others.”
Only Eleanor went into her room to get something and came straight
back out.

They ran to
the ready room at the very bottom of the rock compartment, where
Ematay flew his War Swan from not two days ago.

“Dammit.
There is a guard patrolling,” said Eleanor.

“Leave him
to me,” he replied confidently.

“Her.”

“What?”

“It’s a
her. What is it with people always assuming gender roles these
days. Get over them, because they don’t exist on Astora anymore.
They haven’t done since before we were born.”

“Alright,
let’s not make a big deal out of it again,” replied Christian. “But
I can still handle him,” he shook his head then corrected himself
frantically, “I mean her.”

Eleanor
replied with scratching her head and gesturing for him to do so.
They were both hiding behind the corner corridor that was before
the entrance.

The guard
just walked by, and the two children pushed themselves back out of
sight. The guard stopped and gave a curious ‘hmm’. “Another dull
day.” She sighed before continuing on; they now saw her back,
walking away.

The entire
scale of the stable was round. It only housed five swans on each
level. Though it looked as if there was many levels that ran up. If
you were to draw your eyes upon them you would get lost and feel
small. The two children remember feeling this way when they toured
this place the other day.

Christian
tried to be quite, tip toeing towards the female guard. Eleanor
watched from around the corner, afraid any second the guard would
turn and see him.

He suddenly
stopped when he was near her, fearing the worst to come.

Eleanor
gasped. The guard flung herself around because of the noise and
found the boy there, with his eyes closed.

“What are
you doing here, Christian?” It was the Spell-caster that led them
to their rooms on the first day they arrived. “What makes you think
I won’t last a week here?”

“I never
even said that,” said the Swan knight also known as a
Battle-caster.

The Swan
Knight took his arm to drag him out.

However, as
she reached for him—a wave of concussive forced darted forth from
where she touched him. She flew violently through the air. Her
armour clanked—hard, as it shot into the wall behind. Christian
nodded, knowing she would have only been knocked out, not hurt.

“I don’t
think they’re gonna be happy when they figure out we’ve done this,”
said Eleanor, appearing at his side, her friend jumping as his
response. “We’ll have to climb the stairs to the next level.”

They both
hurried along and were about to just run up the stairs. Then, a
noise of moaning erupted in the tall stable. It filled the air.
Eleanor kept running up the stairs, but Christian turned to see
what it was.

“I should
have known better,” said the boy to himself quietly. He started
running up the stairs, to his friend. He caught up. “We have a
problem.” Only Christian didn’t say it. The sound of it clanked up
the steps after them and revealed itself. It was the Swan Knight
again.

“That was
really uncalled for,” said the Battle-caster. “I know what’s going
on, and if you asked me I would have gladly helped. I am a
Battle-caster too, Christian. I absorb kinetic energy. Pitting us
against each other results in extremely long battles; the force
just gets absorbed and thrown back between us.”

“You would
really help us?” said Eleanor, walking closer to the tied up swan
in the large pen and farther away from this woman. “And how do you
know what’s going on?”

“I would.
Though we need to tell the king. And I am a magick wielder,
remember. Reading minds is as common as star bracelets with us Swan
Knights. I picked it up before your friend here,” she gestured her
head, “tried to knock me out.”

Eleanor
pulled Christian back as he was starting to slowly move towards the
guard.

“We can’t
tell the king. Adults don’t understand us. We are not like other
children, we don’t lie like them. We don’t think like them. He
would never believe us.”

“But he
would believe me,” said the fully fledged Spell-caster.

“Maybe,”
replied Eleanor. “But with every minute we stay Ematay could
die.”

Christian
managed to catch some strong thoughts surge through his friend next
to her. They spoke about not being able to trust anybody. She
couldn’t—none of them could. Because she didn’t know who was the
traitors among them, and if there was even more in on it.

“Hey, don’t
run away now. We can sort this out.”

“Stay
back,” replied Eleanor. Press the stone button on the side of the
pen Christian. I’m hoping it will open the sky doors. As soon as he
pressed it a loud sound of crawling stone emerged from beneath. A
large circle in the middle of the room was opening. It was so big
there could easily be seven, possibly more, of the giant swans to
fit through the hole at once.

“Stop,”
replied the Spell-caster. As the female propelled forward, Eleanor
forced out fire from her body, hands. It twirled itself around her,
and formed its cagelike bars of fire, criss-crossing. She used the
shield to stop the female from moving forward towards them.

“Don’t do
this,” said the Spell-caster.

“Get on the
swan,” said Eleanor to Christian, trying to drown the last sentence
out. “And get ready to take off.”

Christian
was a little more than frightened to go near the large creature,
but as he got near it it seemed to be used to people; it acted
calmly and didn’t move much. Only tilting its head to see the
person go to it. He climbed on as several of the War Swans on this
level already had saddles on. Most of the birds on the first couple
of levels usually did.

The fire
swirled around Eleanor consistently, slowly. To make sure nothing
would be able to get through without getting burned; It made noises
of crackling. Every now and then a spit would erupt from the dome
from different locations. She looked back to the pen the creature
was inside and saw Christian on the swan ready.

Eleanor
stepped back, taking her time not to trip, looking back. For a
brief second the shield went down, but went up quick enough when
she turned her head back to facing straight ahead, towards this
female Battle-caster. She worked on shrinking the shield, so it was
just around her and not blocking the path behind so much. Though it
didn’t matter now as she was right near the entrance to the pen,
within a few steps. She powered down the shield and ran to the
swan. The sky door beneath, on the floor, was already fully
open.

This female
Battle-caster shouted words at them just before the swan flapped
for the first time:

“The
Shadows are close. You could get killed on your way to Swansie.
What you are about to do is too dangerous. Please, just be a little
more patient.”

The sound
of the Swan Knight sounded sincere, and heart felt. Like most of
Astorians that cared about one another.

“Go,” said
Eleanor, knowing the risks they couldn’t take.

As soon as
she spoke her action it was taken. Christian kicked his heels
gently into the swan; it jumped onto the platform in front,
quickly, before diving head first off it without any warning.

Eleanor and
Christian managed to strap themselves in just before it took off
into the air.

 They
were now in the sky. Christian tried pulling the swan up to steady
itself in the air. But it’s wings stayed tucked in and by its side,
still plunging.

“Pull
up—pull up,” said Eleanor trying to scream the words. Christian
couldn’t hear all too well because of the air dragging away their
voices, making less of their loudness.

“It wont
pull up. I can’t stop it,” said Christian, guessing at what she
just said.

They were
now near the sea. Close, they could see it too close. The deep dark
blue was only about ten feet away and they never wanted to see the
Shade Sea to begin with. There was too much bad said about it. Yet
here they were.

Christian
closed his eyes and stretched his legs in the stirrups, as he was
the one controlling it.

However, as
if by reading their plee for help, the swan spread its wings out
open, fully, and the air’s current helped push them all higher into
the air, but not quite as fast as going down.

Both the
Hiva Aura children breathed heavily after the danger was over.
Eleanor rested her head on Christian’s back, thankful they didn’t
plunge into the sea.

The swan
kept climbing, like it was taking them to where they wanted to go.
They flew through some thick clouds, knowing they were getting
closer to their own, more familiar past world. As soon as they
passed the thick cloud even more lay in front, but there was a
space that was left empty, of which they saw a hole in the land the
swans must have used to travel to and from the cathedral from the
cities, as it knew where it was all too easy. They flew through it,
and instantly appeared to be above land. In a world they were used
to. But also, at the same time, a land that was growing more
different with each passing day.

“Did you
bring the map?” said Christian.

“I wouldn’t
have left if I forgot the map. We would have no idea how to get to
Swansie then. The problem is finding where we are now, and then
deciphering our path to get to the city from there. There has to be
some landmarks near that are recognisable.”

“Well it
might take some time.”

“But
nowhere near as much time if we were to go by horseback, or to
walk.”

“Too true,”
replied the boy. “I guess it’s just a matter of time till you
recognise something.”

“It won’t
be long. I’ve been making myself familiar with it every night as
much as possible. I don’t find things by sitting around doing
nothing.”

“Nope,
doing nothing is not in either of our gene pools.” The phrase made
the two children remember their families on the last day they were
alive together.

Eleanor
flashed to seeing Christian’s family and him: Mia and Miyah. Her
heart felt a little warmer thinking about it, but when she forced
herself to focus on the sights beneath her, everything felt cold
once more inside.

“We may
have lost a lot in the last week,” replied Eleanor. “But I am
grateful we have each other still.”

“Yes,”
replied Christian. “I feel the same. That is life for anybody
really. You make what you can out of what you have.”