The Great Darkening (Epic of Haven Trilogy) (26 page)

Cal was amazed at the labyrinth of passageways that ran deep under the mountain, here beneath the ancient fortress of Petros. Hope sprung up again in his heart that there might yet be a way back to his friends and to Moa. As he considered which path to take, he peered into the entrance on the left, listening hard for any sign of friend or danger, but he heard nothing except the steady trickle of water. He poked his head into the entrance of the right chamber and strained his ears once again. What he heard made his heart leap. It was faint, but it was there; the worried voice of Elder John spoke from somewhere off in the distance.

That settled it for Cal, so he made up his mind to continue on through the corridor to the right.

The whispering voice startled him once again. “Calarmindon, you must seek the light.”

“But I hear my friends!” he yelled out in reply. “I have to go to them!” He started again through the entrance on the right.

In an instant all the torches went cold and the chamber blinked into blackness. The corridor was completely dark, save a small pinprick of purple light through the wall of the center archway. It looked as if the light was escaping through a tiny crack in the crudely constructed brick facade. Cal thought long and hard for a moment. He could hear his friends through the tunnel on the right, and maybe, just maybe, it would lead him back to Kalein. Then again, it could be nothing more than their voices bouncing and echoing through the rocky caverns.

He knew that there was light coming from the center, and he knew that the voice had told him to seek the light. “What do you want me to do?” he yelled into the dark. “This way is impassible, the archway is walled shut!”

His frustration got the best of him, and he gave the wall a solid kick. It stood, immovable, against the small force he applied. Shrugging to the darkness, he rested his case. He paced a while, waiting for her eerie response, willing the right answer to come to the surface of his mind. When nothing happened, he pulled back his foot and let it fly once more with all the force he could muster, but before his foot met the wall he intended to strike, he tripped over something very hard.

“Ouch!” he yelped out loud, catching himself before he fell to his knees. “What in the damnable dark?” he cursed out of pain and frustration. Reaching down, his hands found a good-sized chunk of stone, so he picked it up and held its heavy form in his hands.

“Follow the light,” he heard again. The repetitive voice would have been irritating were it not so compelling, and beautiful, and somehow trustworthy. Cal examined the solid piece of fallen stone that he held in his hands, and suddenly an idea occurred to him. He nodded to the darkness and approached the wall.

The tiny shaft of purple light peeked out defiantly from behind the brick, beckoning Cal to set it free. With the large piece of rock in his hand, Cal raised the stone high above his head, ready to strike. With two hands, he put the full force of his might behind the rock, sending it crashing into the bricked wall. In an instant the shaft of light grew bigger, and the chamber glowed brighter as the purple light flooded in from the opening. Understanding now what he was going to have to do, Cal repeated the action again and again until he had cleared a place large enough for him to climb through.

The light was bright on the other side of the wall, and it took a moment for his eyes to adjust, but what he saw when things finally came into focus baffled him for a moment. The walled-in corridor dead-ended into solid rock, but at the center of that mountain impasse sat an unadorned, iron door that had been braced and latched shut.

Through the cracks of the door and its surrounding enclosure, the brightest violet light Cal had ever witnessed glowed strong and bold there in the dark chamber under the mountains. He climbed through the ruined brick wall and hopped down onto the chamber floor. Slowly Cal made his way over to the heavy, iron door and raised the cross brace, unlatching its exterior fastening.

The whispering woman’s voice came again. “Enter Calarmindon … and see the beauty that has been calling you.”

His hand reached out to the door latch, and with some effort he was able to turn its handle to the right and break the seal of dust and time that had encrusted this forgotten gateway.

Chapter Thirty

I
t
was with great effort that Cal was able to awaken the rusted, stiff hinges of the door. He pulled with his good arm, putting the full force of his weight against the resistant metal. Angry sounds of grating iron defiantly raged against the countless years of hibernation. The half-walled chamber exploded with a violet light as the door budged open just a crack. Cal had to quickly cover his eyes with his other hand to shield himself from the sheer immensity of its brilliance.

He continued to pull against the rusted hinges, putting the full weight of his stunned strength behind his efforts until the door finally swung free. He fell backwards, tumbling to the floor of the light-filled room, sprawled and half-blinded on the ancient dirt and stone. The door slammed against the mountain wall, shaking both brick and bone with its jarring reverberation. Its echoes rang loud, announcing to all of its long-awaited unsealing. After creak and crash settled at last, only silence remained in the deep mountain chamber. No sound could be heard, save Cal’s heavy breathing and his pounding heart. He listened intently, waiting for the voice of his invisible companion to speak once again, still unable to see anything but a bright blur of color.

Then, without warning or expectation, the deafening silence was interrupted by the blasting resonance of an army of trumpets. Their collective brass voices rang bright and true, heralding a joyful music with their grand and triumphant notes.

Cal rubbed his eyes, willing them to adjust to the intensity of light here in this unimaginable place under the mountain. Slowly and gingerly he rose to his feet, brushing the dust off of his tunic and pants, his sight still blurred in the brilliance of the violet light. Flashes of silver and purple danced in his vision, and he couldn’t be sure if they were shadows or if his eyes were now playing tricks on him. The trumpets rang out again with another announcement, and the faint movement of a sweet, fragrant wind blew over his face and through his hair. He stepped through the opening of the door, still unable to make out much of anything.

“Hello?” Cal nervously asked. “Is somebody there? Are you the woman who was calling for me by name?”

“Hail, Calarmindon Bright Fame!” called a voice, though it was not the same voice that had beckoned him to follow the light. This voice sounded confidently masculine, and extremely near.

Cal took a step back, his vision still a bit out of focus. “Who … who are you? What do you want with me, and why can’t I see you clearly?”

“Peace, Bright Fame,” the voice told him tenderly. “Be not afraid. I am Ardghal, herald of the High Queen, and I have come to welcome you.”

“High Queen?” Cal said, puzzled. “High Queen of what?”

“Come, and I will show you,” Ardghal said, unwavered by the questions.

“But how can I follow you any place when I cannot see?” Cal countered.

“Oh, but you shall,” the herald replied. He began to sing in a whispered language more lovely than Cal could have imagined.
“Ní bheidh aon níos mó tú faelter, le haghaidh bhfuil solas teacht a dhéanamh soiléir do radharc.”

As Ardghal sung his words, Cal inexplicably understood their meaning inside his mind, much the way he heard the Oweles when they spoke in their screeches and stares.

No longer shall you falter, for light has come to make clear your sight.

As the last of his beautiful words were whispered, the fog that had clouded Cal’s vision lifted. With wide-eyed amazement, he took in the full scale of magic and beauty that waited for him in the bowels of the Hilgari.

Hovering just an arm’s reach in front of his face was a tiny, winged warrior that could not have been more than two hands in height. Beautiful and terrible, he was dressed in a full regalia of armor that appeared to be made up of something that resembled fish bones and bright crystals, seeming both fragile and unbreakable all at the same time. His silver hair hung long and luminescent against his nearly imperceptible silver wings, and his eyes shone with a proud, brave fire in them. Cal was so enraptured that he nearly overlooked the fact that Ardghal stood not alone, but at the vanguard of a host of these creatures, whose banners were unfurled and alive in the wind of their silver wings.

“Come, Calarmindon, the Queen awaits,” Ardghal politely insisted.

Overcome by the immensity of the moment, Cal followed the host of tiny, winged warriors. Without so much as a question or hint of resistance, he walked away from the old iron door and into the brightness beyond. What he saw there on the other side of the mountain’s wall stole the very breath from his lungs and squeezed the happiest of tears from his eyes. Cal walked into what looked like a masterfully tended forest of the most beautiful trees he had ever seen. They were, in fact, the very same trees that had been carved on the walls of the passageway that led him to this incredible place. Their wide, smooth trunks were shockingly white, and their branches fingered broad and high into elaborate purple plumage. A violet glow emanated from their leaves, and the sweetest of fragrances scented the wind that played in their majesty.

Cal walked along the carved stone footpaths, following Ardghal and his host down an ornate, slow-spiraling staircase until he arrived on the ground floor of this magical place. Off in the distance, the roar of water falling and crashing upon stone filled the silence with a tranquil constancy, but it was the voice of the woman that cut through all the wonder with an almost effortless intoxication. Her song lifted high above the waterfall and danced among the purple-flowered trees. It tiptoed delicately along the silver pools of the cold river, and skipped playfully along the walk, finding its way to the heart of the company that escorted Cal.

The winged warriors sung forth in echoing harmony to her haunting tune. They sang in formation as they led Cal along the pathways and up over a delicate white wooden bridge. Its scrolled railings took wild artistic turns, embellished with the still blooming purple flower.

“Such green and such life, here of all places,” Cal mused as he followed the company of Ardghal. “We must be at least three hundred paces under the mountain!”

“You are mistaken, Calarmindon Bright Fame,” Ardghal corrected. “We are four hundred and ninety in the paces of men.”

“Four hundred and ninety paces,” Cal mouthed in disbelief. “These trees … what are they? Granted, I have not seen many trees in my days, for there are not many that remain in the world, but I have never seen a tree like this before.”

The herald smiled a knowing and approving smile as he led Cal down the pathway through the thick of the trees, his ranks of winged warriors turned choir still in tow.

The company halted, kneeling before a clearing at what must have been the very heart of the forest. At the center of this clearing stood three of the largest trees, whose roots did not begin beneath the mountain ground, but rather pushed the base of the great white trunks high above the rock from which they grew. The massive trees rose up out of the mountain, their roots creating an enormous chamber within their spindling and spiraling fingers before plunging below the stone surface.

The trunks of these great trees began to form nearly thirty hands above the ground, and their roots and bases mingled into one, yet three separate trees. Behind the clearing, the raging movement of falling water sparkled and glittered in the illumination of the trees, causing this magical light to dance upon the hallowed clearing.

Beneath their magnificently elaborate hold, a silver throne was set, and upon it rested the singer of the song, the whispering voice in the dark.

The warriors ceased their singing, still kneeling before the throne of their High Queen. She rose to her feet, dressed in a flowing raiment of what looked like molten silver. She stood nearly a whole hand taller than all of her warriors; her wings had an azure hue to them and her long hair shone like polished bronze.

“Welcome, Calarmindon Bright Fame.” Her words sounded as thick and rich as satin and yet as sweet as honey. “I am Iolanthe, keeper of the secret grove and Queen of the Sprites.
”

Cal, not knowing what to do or how one should properly address royalty, let alone a person of magical royalty, bent to one knee. “Thank you, Your Majesty. I am not sure why you have called me here, and I know that there are those who are looking for me … but however I may serve you … I, well, I am yours to command.”

His clumsy words moved Iolanthe to smile with an intoxicating tenderness, and her compelling beauty pulled the strings of Cal’s heart towards her.

“I am not looking to command you,” she said kindly. “For how could I presume to indenture the very savior of my people?”

“Savior?” Cal didn’t understand.

At that the herald Ardghal flew high on his silver wings, with trumpet in hand. He played a long, bright note in joyful celebration, the horns of his fellow Sprites joining in harmony and filling the grove with song.

“Here stands Calarmindon Bright Fame, breaker of brick and liberator of our people!” he shouted for all to hear. “For he has unlocked the cell of our imprisonment, and has so loosed a violet hope for all the world!”

The throng of Sprites let out a roar of celebration, sending cheers and trumpets resounding off of the mountain walls. Even the trees joined in the fanfare as they sent a purple shower of their hallowed flowers raining down from their great heights.

“But you must be mistaken,” Cal said quietly to Queen Iolanthe. “I am no savior … I merely fell through a bookshelf, and nearly broke my arm for the second time stumbling down the dark stairs. If it were not for your voice I would still be lost somewhere in the labyrinths of the mountain.”

“And what makes those deeds any less heroic to we who were once imprisoned and who are now set free?” the Queen kindly replied.

“But you don’t understand, I was … I was merely lost, it was you who found me!” Cal argued, blushing at her breathtaking gaze that had not broken with his. “I do not deserve all of this … especially not from you, Your Majesty.”

“But it was you who struck brick with stone, it was you who did not choose to save himself by following other paths, and it was you who followed the light,” she said, recounting the facts. “Perhaps you misunderstand our joy? For we were not praying for a mighty warrior, nor for the strongest of men; and I have no concern for the context of circumstance. No, Calarmindon Bright Fame, we were praying for one who would seek the light, and seek it relentlessly.”

Iolanthe flew up to meet his eyes with her own as her bronzed hair gleamed and played in the wake of her beating wings. She took his face in her small hands to emphasize her next words.

“It is not of consequence to me how fierce or how feeble your resolve has been. For you sought, and you have found, and the result is freedom.”

A humble smile lit her face, and Cal was undone by it. “It is I, no … it is all of us that are at
your
service, Calarmindon Bright Fame.” She kissed him on his forehead, and the crowd of Sprites erupted in joyful celebration.

“I don’t understand,” Cal managed as he shook his head in amazed disbelief.

“You will, soon enough,” the Queen said. “Now come, we have much to discuss.” She led him by the hand into her inner chambers beneath the canopy of the tallest of the purple trees.

“What is this place, and what are these trees?” Cal asked, taking in the beauty and serenity of such an unexpected oasis.

“This, Calarmindon Bright Fame,” she said as she gestured with her hands, “is Islwyn … the grove below. Here lives the remnant of the Sprites who are left in this world, under my stewardship and my protection. We have been forgotten, sealed away for many generations, since the days of Šárka’s great evil. For this is a garden of refuge, a secret grove … and these are the last of the mighty Jacaranda trees, to whom we Sprites owe our very lives.”

Cal’s eyes traveled up the mighty white trunks of these mythical trees, feeling their enormity in the depths of his soul. “I do not understand? How is it that you owe the trees your lives?” His curiosity was beginning to overtake his sense of prudence. “And what great evil do you speak of?”

“Sprites are but the ripened fruits of the Jacaranda,” she told him. “The offspring of His great beauty here on this earth. For once all the world shone with traces of His violet playfulness. Many generations ago it was my people that tended to and cared deeply for the trees, the very origin of our existence, so as to color the whole of the world in His lavish beauty.”

“You come from the trees?” Cal asked, still not quite understanding.

“We are born as a result of His beauty manifested in the form of the Jacaranda,” she kindly corrected him, bemused at his genuine curiosity. “For thousands of years the whole of the world was free to rest in the shade of our protection … for beauty is a fierce warrior, Calarmindon Bright Fame. The trees were a gift of the THREE who is SEVEN, and His wide-reaching illumination held the world safe.”

“But I have never seen or even heard of such a tree existing in the world … are there more of these trees elsewhere?” Cal asked.