The Watchers (18 page)

Mia watched him click awa
y
on his camera like a rampant turkey. As far as she was concerned he was taking advantage of the Watcher’s hospitality, their trust in him and their sacred right to anonymity. She couldn’t understand Uriel allowing him to photograph their world. It shouldn’t be for the human race to see. She was worried about how the Watchers could be compromised if their world was made public.

From the beach, they were all taken back to the room in the palace where the round table of life welcomed them. The leader, Varquis, was there, taking his place on the chair opposite the altar where the seven crystal skulls were displayed like prizes. “You are rested,” he said. We will begin.”

Keri was sitting right next to Mia, so she reached out and squeezed her hand. Her skin felt clammy. Jesus was on her other side and then Tom, who had his camera thrown over his shoulder protected by his hand as if it was as precious as the prizes on the altar.

“Keri Rains, we need your help.”

Each of them turned to look at Keri. Her expression was blank as if she had prepared herself for the moment when their plans for her would be revealed.

Mia remembered the words of Uriel the night she met the Watchers at Stonehenge. She’d said that she couldn’t imagine why they’d chosen her. ‘Not you’ he’d replied, ‘one other…a woman. She can help us.’

“Early tomorrow morning, on the solstice, a new dawn will begin. In all its glory, the earth’s sun will appear through the structure of Stonehenge, as it has for many suns before. It will shine as a beacon of hope for your people and for us, the children of God. But unlike the suns before it, it will shine brighter and further than it ever has. It will cast its light upon many places, not just the stones your people worship each year with hope in their hearts. Tomorrow, the earth’s sun will be at one with our mother, as it was over one-hundred years ago in 1915.”

Varquis’ voice charged around the room. His bellow moved the hairs on the back of Mia’s neck with the drone of his words, as surely as it must have affected the others in the same way. “The alignment of the sun with the mother will once again be a time for unity. It is the new dawn of peace and prosperity. It is the calming of the seas and the wind and our mother will once again breathe new life upon us. The fish in the sea will be plentiful. The harvest in the fields and the fruits on the trees will be abundant, and the cattle, which sustain you, will be free of disease. The icecaps will cease to thaw and the forests will grow. But most importantly, the ground beneath your feet will begin to repair. The waters will flow freely and the soil will prosper…As long as man stops raping the land, allowing it once more to shift and settle so that it may regenerate its strength and power.”

"You were warned in the year of 1915. You were told by the mother to connect with the dawn, feed on its offer of life, and prosper with sincerity in your hearts and minds. But you did not. Instead, you once again plagued God with war and famine. Disease had once more cast its fingers over the land and the air. Wealth was your motivation and as you surely fought in two great wars and more battles of destruction, you killed and spread your hatred around the globe so that darkness fell once more. This is your last chance, but even now it could be too late. We are giving you this final message as an offering of peace. We are giving unto you and you must listen."

“Wait.” Keri rose to her feet. “Why are you telling us this? We can’t do anything. We are ordinary people. We have no power over the decisions of our…” She was speaking for all of them, but mostly, she was referring to herself.

Varquis silenced her with the strength of his message. “You have the confidence of your Prime Minister, Keri Rains.”

Keri looked as if her spine had all but given way. She sat down. “But, you can’t honestly expect me to stop what is happening to the planet…”

“It will take just an ordinary man. Just as ordinary men have gone before you.”

“Me!” She placed the flat of her palm on her chest. “Me? Saving the world.” She was becoming shrill as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

Mia placed her hand on Keri’s shoulder. Her body was trembling. “May I speak on her behalf?” Mia said gently.

“You may.”

“Even I am having difficulty believing this woman could save our planet from total destruction…”

“No offence,” Tom quipped.

Then Jesus rose to his feet. “No!” All heads turned towards him. “She can do it. Varquis is saying that no one ‘important’ needs to do this. This is not a task that needs title or power, this is not something for our leaders to deal with. They are too corrupt and they have no goodness in their hearts. They aren’t Kudos.”

"Neither am I," Keri shouted. It was as if she'd found a lifeline, a way out of the challenge they were setting her.

Varquis’s voice was serene now. “You are Kudos. You connected with us once at the stones. You touched an Angel. It was I.”

Mia turned to look at Keri’s face. “What does he mean?”

Keri was staring at her hand resting on the table. “Last year, when I came to Stonehenge, I thought I saw…it was the stone…for a moment I thought I saw it move.” She looked at Varquis with disbelief in her eyes. “That was you?”

“Yes. We came for you then, but you were not ready.”

Jesus spoke. “Don’t you see? He is speaking of ordinary men before us…” His voiced trailed away as he turned his gaze from Keri to the leader, Varquis. “Am I right?” He was urging Varquis to read his mind.

“You are. Your namesake walked upon this earth to deliver the message, but he was destroyed. He was a man of great wisdom, and he was pure of heart. He was Kudos.”

Tom was shaking his head. “You mean the man himself…JC?”

"There were others after him; men of peace; the man Gandhi, Mother Teresa and many others with less celebrity. They have all walked the earth wanting change, wanting food for all men, health and harmony. If they failed, it was because they were prevented by the people whom they tried to help, as Jesus was prevented and destroyed."

“Hey, Keri,” Tom said. “You’re in good company.”

“No, this woman is not like them.” Varquis said. “We would simply ask her to deliver a message to her leader. She has the advantage of her trust. The message is of great importance. It must be delivered before our earth is threatened once more by man and his greed.”

Keri brushed away her tears. “What sort of message?”

“We want to meet with them.”

“Meet?”

“It is time. We want to meet with the Prime Minister on the morning of the solstice and you must make her agree.”

“But that’s tomorrow. There’s not enough time. Besides, she would never listen to me…not in that respect. She is…she’s not the woman I thought she was.”

“You will persuade her. We will show you how.”

“I don’t see…”

Varquis stood and the others followed without being instructed. "Uriel will show you to the other side now. We will meet again later before you leave."

“But…I have more questions. There is so much more I want to know.” Mia felt panic rise up from her stomach. She couldn’t leave now. Not now!

“All your questions will be answered, Lakey.”

“When?”

“Soon.”

Jay stepped out of the showe
r
and wrapped a warm white towel around his hips. He had returned to his hotel room to freshen up while Maggie delved into his laptop in the lobby downstairs. She said she wanted to be able to print out stuff, so no doubt she was bugging the front desk at that very moment. The whole thing was crazy. Maggie was crazy, and he was crazy for allowing her to talk him into the whole crazy scheme.

He dressed in jeans and a white cotton shirt, which he left hanging out. He was tempted to tuck it in, but Fran always called him a nerd when he did that. He sat down next to the table where a cup of black coffee was going cold. He sipped it as he glanced at an article in a magazine, left over from the now discarded Sunday newspapers.

Afghanistan and gemstones have been synonymous since the Neolithic Period, 6,500 years ago. Though millennia have come and gone, not much has changed. Afghanistan is still rich in precious and semi-precious gemstones, and mining is still an industry steeped in risks.

Afghanistan is in desperate need of legitimate, lucrative industries to bolster its dire and turbulent economy.

What we are finding is that Afghanistan is a country rich in gemstones, but they are at the bottom of the chain.

They are not capitalising on their valuable natural resources. Increased security, recent changes to the legal framework for mining and the Afghan government’s strategy for legitimising the mining sector will improve the prospects for investment and the consequent increase in yields.

Jay threw the magazine on the bed and checked his watch. Time to go, he thought, as he wondered what the hell that crazy broad, Maggie, was going to get him into now. He stuffed his wallet into his back pocket and picked up his key card. Then checking his cell one more time for any messages from Fran, or the kid, he kept it in his hand and pulled the door closed behind him.

After walking along the pat
h
from the spiral palace, Mia, Tom, Keri and Jesus arrived at the bottom as Uriel led the way with his six Angel brothers.

When Mia glanced at the other Angels mulling about, she pondered how serene they looked, how very…
together
they were. She admired them in so many ways. Some of them were working on crafts on a wall made of blue stones and some were fishing, hovering above the water with their wings extended. She could see them laughing as they caught a fish intent on escape. They were pulling up oyster shells and on the beach some sat and prised them open, taking the pearls from inside and placing them in a basket. Over the water, they teased each other with crayfish as the black shelled creatures snapped their pincers at them.

In the distance she could see some working the land, carrying nets laden with fruit taken from the vines. And far away some stood amid the yellow corn fields picking the golden crops as if they were choosing each one. Mia looked up at the ledge where she and the others had emerged the day before. Seven Angels were exiting the cave, soaring from its landing with their wings outstretched, gliding through the air until they landed on the beach. As a group they walked across the sand towards the castle of Caer Sidi, perhaps to report to their leader, news from the human’s world.

Uriel told her the Angels each had markings on the palm of their hands, all of them diverse and special. Their legend spoke of each mark being duplicated by mother earth somewhere on the planet; anything from the outline of a mountain peak to the shape of a pebble on a beach; some had been replicated in crop circles, fashioned on the land for everyone to see. The marking on Varquis' hand was two circles intertwined. It was the ultimate symbol of life, where they lived, somewhere between the living and the dying. He'd been made leader since the sacred mark was the highest accolade from his maker.

As they made their way along paths of shells and pearls, Mia wondered, and not for the first time, about the lack of females in their world. They were all male adults as vibrant and desirable as any real man, more so…What woman wouldn’t want them, and if they were so desirable, how had they escaped the chance for reproduction? They had the ‘equipment’, she pondered privately.

In front of them, about twenty meters away, they approached the rock face over the waterfall, which Jesus called the green man. Its face became bigger as they got closer, more omnipotent and real, the features distorting close up, becoming simply a cliff side of crevices and gulley's covered in oak leaves, holly and mistletoe. His beard was trailing ivy, his hair bushes of green and his eyes were placed naturally within two rounded holes where inside each, a magnificent emerald reflected the light. To his left, a waterfall crashed to a small pool where fresh-water fishes of gold and rainbow colours swam beneath its surface among reeds and rocks, and coral as fine as porcelain.

Uriel spoke as they all gathered around the pool watching the life under the water. “Take the entrance at the side of the rock.”

Jesus turned about and asked, ‘The fabled green man…who is he?”

“His image represents our father.”

“Your father?” muttered Jesus. “You mean God?”

“Yes, of course. It’s no different to man having a cross to use as a symbol of worship. We worship this image because it is formed of the earth, by the mother’s own hands. His face is a good representation of how our father looks.”

They all regarded the cliff face as if they were looking at it in a new light. The Angels had a mother and a father, supernatural in man’s perception, but very real to them.

Uriel spoke, bringing their attention back to the matter in hand. "Go behind the fall of water. It will take you to the other side, if you are wise."

Mia stepped forward. “You’re not coming!?” They couldn’t go alone. Not without the Angels to guide them.

“We will wait for you here. You may return by the same route when you are ready. But you must return. You cannot stay.”

Stay?
Why would they stay? And what was on the other side? They were acting as if it was a secret vault containing something too precious to expose. "What is on the other side?"

“You will see,” he said. “Go now.”

Guided by Tom, the fou
r
stumbled over rocks next to the pool and walked through a darkened crevice at the side of the green man’s face. The path took them to a ledge behind the trailing ivy, hidden like a secret passage behind a hanging tapestry made of living green silk.

Tom’s stomach churned so bad he blamed it on the lack of meat in his diet. Fruit was okay, but man, it couldn’t beat a prime American steak. They were about to enter a world never before seen by any human. The prospect of exploring new territory in a world that was already a wondrous find was almost too much to for his stomach to bear. He wondered if he should vomit. Spill his guts behind a rock somewhere, but for now, he placed his hand inside the ivy that hung like beaded drapes and pulled it to one side. When he stepped through, Mia and the others followed.

Behind was a deep crevice in the rock, chiselled out by the fall of water which had eroded it over centuries. The path extended behind the waterfall like a curved walkway and as Tom sidled along with the water crashing down in front of him, the rest followed suit so that all four of them were hidden from view by the veil of water. Halfway along the walkway, they took a new direction to a short tunnel, and as they traipsed with anxious footsteps they came to an enormous low-ceiling cavern.

The cave was about half the size of a football pitch, but it was raised only a meter above their heads, making Tom hang his neck even though there was enough room to stand upright. The ceiling was covered with thin spiked anthodites resembling white crystallised flowers. And around the walls, rock formations appeared to resemble clusters of pearls, glistening, as if they had been sprinkled with fairy dust. From the ceiling, and spiralling throughout the cave, ancient stalactites fell, joining with stalagmites rising from the rock floor. To Tom and the others grouped together at its entrance, it looked like a princely ballroom filled with marble-like pillars to waltz around.

“It’s beautiful.” Keri’s voice echoed around the room.
It’s beautiful, it’s beauty…

Tom walked around the edges trying to find an entrance. The low ceiling was making him feel claustrophobic. “There’s no way out.” He stood against the pearl covered rocks and turned his head to detect an illusion, something for them to walk through, but again there was nothing.

“There must be a way through,” Jesus said as he walked around the pillars. He smoothed his hands over the magnificent structures, so naturally formed and preserved for millennia.

Mia’s called out. “Uriel said something about finding our way through ‘if we are wise’.” Her voice reverberated against the walls.

Jesus smiled at the echo of her voice, if we are wise, if we are… “I might have an idea, but I’m not sure…” He wandered about in a circle. “I could be wrong, but it looks like the Cretan maze. It’s hard to distinguish from here, but I’m trying to picture it from above and it does seem to follow the ‘labyrinth’ principle. Like Woodhenge”

“So?” Tom asked.

“We could try and follow the path through the pillars. If their spiral castle is based on the Cretan maze, it would seem reasonable to assume that this is the same sort of principle.”

Tom rubbed his bare arms. It was cold down there. “Except this cave is naturally formed, not manmade.”

Mia paced forward as if she was going to embrace Tom. But of course, she didn't. "Don't try and analyse this, Stoney. It is beyond our comprehension just like everything in the Watcher's world."

“Yeah, got that. Okay, let’s try it. It’s cold in here.”

Jesus began at the point nearest to them and walked to the left until he reached the far pillar. He knew the way of the labyrinth since he'd drawn the image often enough. There was only one route and that was the way he would go. He encouraged the others to follow him in case a portal -or something-opened suddenly. He changed direction and walked right back to the point he started from, except he was on the next pillar along. He turned back and then moved left again, and then right until they finally reached the centre.

The group stood still and silent, waiting for something –anything-to happen.

“Look.” Keri was glancing back to where they had just walked, and through the pillars, there formed a walkway leading to a gate set into the wall. It was clearly visible from where they were all standing and yet if they hadn’t have followed the maze, they would not have seen it.

Tom stared at the gate. “Whatever is behind that entrance must be extremely important to the Watchers,” he said. “To have such a complex route…they must be guarding something very precious to them.”

“Well,” Mia announced as she went towards the gate, “Now’s the time to find out.”