Shadow Mage (Blacklight Chronicles) (27 page)

Nikulo broke the silence with a loud belch, and thumped his chest as a way of making an apology. “Wait…let me get this straight. Each of you open a portal, and each of you will be drawing power from the crystal at the same time, correct?”

Palarian nodded somberly. “One crystal and one power source.”

“And the balancing part?”

“World portals require a tremendous amount of energy…when they are forming, they draw impossible spikes of energy that often crack or shatter the crystals trying to channel the power. Two portals at once…to different worlds…spikes in energy may occur at different times. It could lead to disaster. We’d have to balance, try to balance, anyways.”

“And if we just opened one portal to our world, and you could open another one to yours?” Mara looked hopefully at the old sorcerer.

“The crystal may very well crack, and I’d be stuck here without another crystal of sufficient strength.” Palarian motioned to Talis. “Your idea is valid, and it’s been done before…by other sorcerers of legend, older than my time.”

Talis coughed at the idea, unable to fathom a history that went back that long. “So we have no choice but to try it?”

“When you’re faced with the impossible, face it, conquer it, don’t give up until you’ve dreamed your world and made it into what you’ve always desired it to be. That’s what a thousand years of solitude and tinkering with the dark arts has gained me: wisdom. Whatever you struggle for is always worth it in the end.”

“We have a world we want to create.” Talis gazed warmly at Mara, and she blushed in response. “We just need to return home.”

Palarian cast his eyes towards the palm forest. “Shall we then?”

Talis unrolled the Surineda Map and frowned. “The crystal is moving farther inland…this way.” He gathered his backpack and led the way up the beach towards the palms, their branches dancing under a stiff breeze that had started from the north. Charna dashed ahead through grassy undergrowth filled with fallen coconuts and shrubs and the occasional snake slithering out of sight.

They found a clearing with a stream and a wide path that had been trampled by something incredibly large. The stream was laced with flowers, bottle brush and orchids and gingers. Many trees along the way up the mountainside had been knocked aside. Talis discovered a massive clawed print twice the size of person.

“I’d hate to be stepped on by whatever beast made that print,” Nikulo said, peering down into the hole left by the print.

“It’s moving up in those mountains faster than we’re walking.” Talis pointed at the map.

Palarian cleared his throat and snapped a finger at Talis, and he experienced the weightless sensation of flying. He whistled to Charna, who bounded back towards him, and hissed in reaction to seeing them floating again.

“Come on, girl, I know you don’t like flying, but I’ll hold you and won’t let go.”

The lynx hesitated, her gold eyes staring at Talis, and finally she leapt into his arms, her paws wrapped around his neck. Soon they were up flying above the landscape, following the trodden path of the enormous creature. They kept lower to the ground, tracing the line of the stream as it jutted up over a hill that led to a broad pool and a waterfall. There were many massive prints along the pool’s edge.

“The creature must have stopped to take a drink here…he was probably sick of drinking salt water.”

Talis followed the trampled path around and up the next hill, through another forest until it reached a rocky cliff where the water came out of a bubbling spring. The cliff was several hundred feet high, and the creature’s path led to the left where the way turned into grassland and eventually went down the hillside, back to another beach with clumps of sea grass scattered here and there. An enormous curved boulder sat in the middle of the beach.

“What’s that? Is that a rock?” Mara said.

“That’s no rock…look it’s moving. I think we’ve found our sea creature.” Talis dove towards the beast, and as he got closer, recognized the bumpy grey and brown shell, sharp ridged beak, and giant claws as belonging to a massive sea turtle. The turtle’s claws dug into the sandy soil as if it was searching or preparing the ground for something.

Then the turtle turned to face them and Talis nearly fell from the sky.

“Its eyes!” Mara shouted. “They’re black crystals….”

A deep rumbling came from the beast and smoke flared from its nostrils. The black faceted crystal eyes glowed with a piercing silver light. The turtle took slow thundering steps that caused the ground to shake. Talis flew over and peered into the hole that the creature was digging, and noticed a pile of dull white eggs.

As if reacting to a threat against its eggs, the turtle sent sparks of lightning from its eyes, igniting a surge of heat and pain throughout Talis’s body. The force was so strong it slapped him from the sky and sent him and Charna tumbling over the sand and into a mass of seagrass. Charna hissed and scampered away, her hair standing up. Talis grasped his left shoulder as a dullness spreading down his arm, his heart pounding, and his chest felt like someone was pressing hard against it.

Out of the corner of his eye Talis could see Nikulo trying to control the beast, but the turtle just bellowed madly, swung its head around and gazed at his friend. Beams of dark light sliced through the air and struck Nikulo, causing him to stumble about as if drunk and dizzy, and he fell backwards onto the sand.

When Palarian clapped his hands, black strings snaked out and wrapped around the turtle, enveloping the beast in their entangling snare. Mara used the opportunity to race across the beach towards Talis.

“Are you alright?” she said, and helped him to his feet. His chest still felt numb and his legs were wobbly and weak.

“It was just trying to protect its eggs…over there in the hole…so many turtle eggs.”

A smile spread over Mara’s face. “Mama turtle…looks like Palarian has her settled down…she’s sleepy now.”

Talis sauntered over to where Palarian was tying the shadow cords to an iron rod lodged deep in the sandy soil. The sorcerer held an amused look on his face.

“Such an amazing mystical beast…imagine, crystals of such quality lodged in its eyes!” Palarian wagged his head from side to side.

“Will it hurt her if we cast the World’s Portal spell?” Mara said, her eyes staring sadly at the turtle.

“I don’t believe it will…painless, I would think…take a bit of her bite away from her, but that might not be a bad thing. But why are her eyes crystals…living crystals? Who formed her, or should I say which god made her?”

“Does it make it easier casting twin portals with two crystals?” Talis said.

Palarian frowned as if lost in thought. “Twin crystals…twin portals. I don’t like the smell of it. Reminds me of a story I once heard in my youth, many thousands of years ago. But that couldn’t happen, could it?”

What was he talking about? Talis thought. The old sorcerer started muttering to himself again, staring off at the black and grey fog wall far in the distance.

“But that would mean… no, not that. Not again…the ancients prevented that from ever happening again. Or are we at the beginning of another Kyrian Cycle?” The sorcerer’s eyes were suddenly bloodshot and his face looked grey and deathly, as if mortally ill. He continued muttering in an unknown language, spittle flying from his mouth.

“He’s gone mad,” Mara whispered to Talis, and gripped his arm. “What do we do?”

Talis grimaced, watching the old man getting angrier and more disoriented and confused after each word he spat from his mouth. Nikulo stumbled over, rubbing his head vigorously, casting wary glances at Palarian.

“What’s wrong with him? Did the turtle drive him insane?” Nikulo stretched his face wide and blinked several times like he was trying to clear something from his eyes.

“Give him some time,” Talis said, and drew characters in the sand with a stick. “See…he’s slowly coming out of it, maybe an idea came to him. Whatever happens, we have to make sure he gives us the rune for our world… Let him go home if he wants, he’s waited so long.”

Palarian stepped somberly towards them, his hands clasped behind his back. When he reached them, he looked up, his eyes black pools of terror.
 

“I know we must do this thing…but I warn you, there could be dire consequences, to your world and mine. Are you certain you’re willing to take the risk?”

“What do you mean…consequences?” Talis wrinkled up his forehead, wondering why the sorcerer was being so cryptic.

“I’m forbidden to tell the story, my father made me swear a sacred vow before the gods. But I can tell you that if we continue on our path and cast the twin portals, there is a chance we’ll bring cataclysmic forces to bear on both our worlds. Would you risk it?”

Did they have any other choice? If they didn’t cast the portal they’d be stuck here on this world, and Naru would continue to be ruled by Viceroy Lei and the Jiserians. He glanced at Mara for guidance, but she just shrugged her shoulders and looked at him like it was his decision. And Talis knew that the only way of ensuring he got both runes to both worlds was to cast twin portals.

“We take the risk.” Talis exhaled, hoping he had made the right choice. “You open a portal to your world and I’ll open a portal to ours…we’ll do it at the same time. Agreed?”

Palarian chewed on his fingernail, thinking, and finally nodded hesitantly. “Agreed.”

Talis pulled off his backpack, and withdrew the blank rune tablets and inscribing tools. He started to hand the runes and tools to Palarian, but the sorcerer raised a finger to stop him.

“You must inscribe your own rune…to your world, and I must create mine with my own tools.” The old man snapped his fingers and a blank rune appeared in his left hand and a silver and black inscribing tool in his right. He etched a complicated swirling character onto the rune, sighed as he inspected his work, and displayed it to them. Talis memorized the rune characters, confident he could cast them again in the future…if he ever needed to.

“Vellia…my ancient home…so hard to believe I’ll be returning at long last. Now it is your turn, I’ll draw the characters for your planet, known to us as Yorek, the world tempted by darkness. Then once completed, we’ll simultaneously siphon power from the twin crystals and cast the binding over the runes.”

“What if we fail?”

Palarian chuckled brightly. “Then the next moment we’ll be standing face to face with the guardians of the Underworld…a quick and painless death. Not even the gift of immortality from the Zacrane Dagger could stop such a death….”

Talis twisted up his face at the idea, but gazed at the sand where the old sorcerer was drawing runes both harsh and simple at the same time.

“Yorek…farewell, world of my banishment, world of my regrets. Though the Isles of Tarasen, cold as they made be, ever warmed my heart. Fondness lingers among those fragrant pines….”

Talis memorized the runes, ever mindful of trickery on the part of the old sorcerer, and inscribed the characters onto the blank tablet. He stared at Palarian until the sorcerer nodded and held the rune ceremoniously towards the north.

“Twin forces, light and darkness, life and death, guide our minds as we bind these twin runes to open portals to twin worlds separated by time and space. We stand here on Chandrix, the stepping stone to many worlds, and give praises to all gods, asking blessings in exchange for our eternal devotion.”

Palarian bowed to Talis and closed his eyes. “If the wind stirs from the north, this means the gods are willing, and we each picture our world and cast the binding.”

Talis held the tablet tightly and gazed at the empty blackness behind his closed eyes, waiting for a sign from the gods. He felt a fever flush along his back, drops of sweat running down his spine. What if this was a mistake? Was returning home all that important, especially if doing so could risk everything he loved?

But the gods answered with a gust of wind blasting from the north, and the wind felt more like laughter from the gods, a divine trick, laughing at the stupidity of mortals. Talis shrugged off his thoughts and focused on casting the binding spell, picturing the sun-baked streets of Naru, his mother’s smile, the hearth-fire at his house, out at the hunt in the swamplands holding Mara’s hand.

He was going home.

When he opened his eyes it was as if from a dream, a light-filled one, and the island scene around him had dimmed, a pervasive grey mist suddenly hissing through the air. Charna padded up to him, her tail twitching, golden eyes fearful.

“Now we place the runes and cast the final bindings…” Palarian set the runes on the sand in front of him and mumbled words of prayer.

Talis matched his movements and cast the closing binding spell, his hands trembling like an old man. As the World Portal exploded open in front of him, he glanced desperately at Mara and seized her hand, pulling her close. Nikulo huddled close as well, eyes afraid of the second World Portal churning and scintillating only steps away to their right.

Palarian’s eyes were warm and tearful as he stared inside. “We’ve done it…at long last…Vellia awaits my return….”

A deep rumbling and thundering suddenly sounded in the sky directly above them. The mist had coalesced into thick black and silver clouds crackling with lightning. A huge
pop
sounded above and a third shadow portal formed in the sky, ejecting five flying figures, then it evaporated into nothing.
 

Aurellia and Rikar descended from the sky, flanked by the three Elder sorcerers Talis had seen at the old Temple of the Sun. Their proud and mocking faces reflected the shivering light of the twin World Portals.
 

“What have we here?” Aurellia said, studying the portals. “Twin portals? Could it be? And a turtle with twin crystal eyes? Ah…the ancient story is true… And let me guess, one portal leads to Yorek and the other to Vellia.

“A new cycle has begun!” Aurellia shouted, and released twin arcs of electricity from each palm, one aiming at the left portal and the other aiming at the right. He drew his palms together and joined the lightning into one massive arc, clapped his hands together, and the arc remained fixed between the two portals, causing a lightning bridge to form.