Billy: Messenger of Powers (12 page)

He started to scream, but the scream was left behind as the ship banked sharply upward, impossibly fast, and now they were traveling parallel to the line of the tower, at a ninety degree angle to the earth below, vertical as a rocket escaping the planet’s atmosphere.

Billy kept screaming. It seemed the only really appropriate thing to do. He screamed as long as he could, then when he ran out of breath, he inhaled and screamed some more.

He ran out of breath again, and inhaled to scream still more, but at that moment Tempus appeared to finally awake. “That’s enough of
that
,” he murmured, and waved a hand.

Billy screamed. But this time, no sound came out. He knew he was hollering and shrieking—he could even feel himself grow hoarse with the effort. But no sound whatever escaped his lips. He stopped screaming his silent scream a moment later, and chanced a glance below them.

The ground was thousands of feet away.
Miles
below them. It receded farther and farther, faster and faster. Powers Island itself shrank to half its size, then a fourth, then an eighth. Then it contracted still further until it was a mere pinprick in the ocean, and then finally disappeared altogether. At that very instant, Billy felt something wet and cloying all around him. A bright flash illuminated everything, and he realized that they were flying through the roiling storm he had earlier seen ringing the tower, keeping it from being viewed above a certain height.

Electricity crackled in the air, lightning crashing within what seemed like inches of the ship. Still completely silenced by Tempus’s spell, Billy couldn’t give voice to his fright, but continued to look around in terror.

Vester reached out and tapped him on the shoulder. “Watch this,” the fireman grinned. He reached out a hand, and lightning arced out of the sky, lancing down until it hit Vester. Vester clenched his fist at the same time, as though catching a fast fly ball. The lightning dissipated, and Billy couldn’t help but crane his neck to see as Vester opened his fist, revealing a small ball of electricity. The ball sparkled and crackled with contained energy, then shrank down for a moment before expanding again. Just as the match flame on the beach had done, the energy formed itself into the shape of a horse, which galloped up Vester’s shoulder to join the other horse. The two equines—one made of fire, one of lightning—pranced across Vester’s shoulders and arms, and Billy couldn’t help but laugh a silent laugh.

Vester smiled. “We’re safe as houses,” he said. Then, pointing up, he added, “And we’re almost to the top.”

Billy looked skyward.

It was true. They were, at last, almost to the top of the tower. The top, like the rest of it, was twined in the think branches of the Earthtree, which joined together at the top of the building to form a bower of sorts. A waterfall flowed from the top of the tower, flowing off the side of the stone tower, its spray gradually dissipating and losing itself in the force of the ever-present storm below it.

The craft finally slowed as it flew over the lip of the tower, touching down gently on a soft mat of greenest grass that sprang up impossibly from the bare stone of the tower. Once more, Billy felt himself gripped—gently, but firmly—by the wind and lifted out of the craft. The others, too, were lifted up and set softly on the stone ground that constituted the top of the tower. Then Mrs. Russet clapped her hands, and the glass craft suddenly lost cohesion, falling instantly into a large pile of sand again, the sand then flowing over the side of the tower and disappearing into the vast emptiness below.

Billy looked around. The top of the tower was enormous, hundreds of feet in diameter, so he felt no sensation of being particularly high up, even though he knew he was many thousands of feet above the earth. The wood of the Earthtree cradled the tower in branches that moved of their own accord, not twisting with the wind but constantly shifting and joining to create beautiful shapes, a living work of art. Nearby, a straight river flowed, the one that fed into the waterfall that Billy had seen earlier. As far as he could see, the river bisected the tower perfectly, and he suspected that it somehow ended in another waterfall on the
other
side of the tower, though that would mean the river was moving in two directions at the same time. That would have been impossible anywhere else, but here….

Strange, beautiful flowers grew at the edges of the water, and Billy had the feeling that if he were to lay down among them, he might never wake up, but would sleep forever and dream only of beauty and light.

“Come on then,” said Mrs. Russet, walking toward the center of the tower. Billy could see something in the distance, which gradually resolved so that he could make it out. It was a crystal dais, a raised platform of that appeared to be made of purest diamond, glimmering and glinting as the sun’s rays kissed it before shattering into a million shards of rainbow and light.

The dais was perfectly round, and around its circumference sat seven chairs. Actually, they were thrones, more ornate and beautiful than any furniture Billy could imagine gracing a head of state in the “normal” world.

One of the thrones was dark red, and appeared to be carved out of a single enormous ruby. On it was a pillow, maroon and gold of deepest velvet that made Billy sure that sitting in it would be nothing but bliss.

Another of the thrones was blue, and it moved like the waves of the sea, slowly ululating and pulsing while still somehow managing to hold the general shape of a chair. Lovely many-colored shells and coral coated it, and Billy even thought he could see tiny sea creatures—shrimps and damselfish and wrasses—floating within the chair.

The next throne was carved of brown marble and dark granite, exquisitely inlaid with fine etchings of gold and silver, and sporting carvings that looked to Billy like some kind of writing, though in a language that appeared both ancient and alien.

Following that was a green throne, one that grew from the branches that wound around the dais. Its living frame writhed ever so slightly, as though the chair was waiting impatiently for its master or mistress to come and sit on it.

And the last two chairs were the most beautiful of all, though completely opposite in many ways. One was black as deep space, absorbing the light so completely that Billy almost couldn’t make out the details of its structure. It looked as though it were formed of a million tiny black pearls, all held together through some dark force. Billy shivered as he looked at it. This chair, alone among them all, seemed like one he would not care to sit in. Beautiful, but a throne of fear.

But as frightful as the black seat was, the throne to its left was just as beautiful and more. It was purest white, gleaming with a brilliance that outshone even the diamond platform on which it sat. Billy couldn’t tell what it was made of, but every so often the chair would flash, exploding in a rainbow of colors that reminded Billy of mother-of-pearl, only a million times brighter.

“What is this place?” he asked, surprised to find that he could speak again. He glanced at Tempus.

The old man shrugged. “I figured that you weren’t screaming any more, so you could have your voice back.”

“This is the Council Seat, atop the Diamond Dais,” answered Mrs. Russet, disregarding Tempus’s aside. Billy looked at her when she said this. Her voice had changed somehow. It was deeper, more resonant. As he watched, she walked toward the dais. Before her, the stone floor of the tower shifted like liquid, forming stairs that allowed her to step gracefully onto the top of the diamond platform before they sank back into the stone as though they had never been.

Mrs. Russet walked to the center of the dais. She withdrew a stone from her pocket. Once more, the stone changed in her hands, becoming the same crystalline staff she had used before to summon Vester, Tempus, Wade, and Eva Black at the time of Billy’s Gleaning.

She touched the staff to the exact center of the dais. No sound came forth this time. Instead, a dazzling rainbow of colors emerged. The display was so bright, it should have blinded Billy, but it didn’t. Rather, it seemed to heighten his sense of sight: everything suddenly appeared clearer to him, the colors more vivid, like he had been seeing in pastel his whole life and now at last could see the bold colors of an oil painting.

Mrs. Russet closed her eyes. “I summon the Council,” she intoned.

Almost immediately, a voice responded. The voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once, as loud as a wave crashing down, yet silent and piercing as the whisper of a friend. “Who summons us?”

Mrs. Russet stood tall, gripping the crystal staff with a confidence and strength that belied her years. “It is I,” she said, “Lumilla the Brown, Power of Earth and Councilor of the Powers.”

The light from her staff flared even brighter with this, as the disembodied voice came again: “And why are we summoned?”

“Because I believe that the White King, long prophesied, has at last begun his return,” answered Mrs. Russet. She paused a moment, as though weighing her next words carefully. Finally, she said, “And I believe I have found his forerunner: the Messenger who will go before the White King and prepare us for the final battle.”

Mrs. Russet took in a great breath, apparently steeling herself to say what followed. She looked right at Billy, her dark eyes piercing him to the soul. “I believe I may have found the boy who will destroy us.”

CHAPTER THE FIFTH

Destroy? thought Billy. She’s not talking about
me
, is she?

He looked over at Vester, and saw that the youthful fireman looked just as surprised as Billy did. So did Tempus, for that matter. Ivy was the only one who seemed as though she knew that pronouncement had been coming. Billy remembered that she and Mrs. Russet had been engaged in deep conversation on the ride from the Lagoon to the top of the Tower. Was this what they were talking about? he wondered.

Apparently Tempus also had questions of his own, for he looked at the green-garbed woman and asked, “Ivy? What is this that Lumilla is saying?”

Ivy looked almost helpless, shrugging her shoulders as she said, “It’s not for me to say, Tempus.” She nodded toward the diamond podium where Mrs. Russet still stood. “The Council is convening.”

Billy followed her gaze and saw that, over each of the colored thrones, a light of the same color as that throne was beginning to appear. Soon, there were six glowing orbs: green, blue, gray, red, brown, and black. All but the black one cast a beautiful glow, leading to a many-colored rainbow dance that played across the diamond podium like a symphony of tone and hue. As for the black orb, it seemed to grab whatever light passed near it and pull it in, as though seeking to extinguish the very existence of all around it.

Billy looked at Vester. “What’s going on?” he whispered. “What’s the Council?”

“The six strongest Powers, the governing Masters and Mistresses of each of the Elements,” replied Vester.

Billy looked at the thrones. “Six Elements?” he asked. Vester nodded. “Then,” asked Billy, “why are there
seven
chairs?”

Vester pointed at the one chair that did not have a light-orb glowing over it. “That one is the White Throne. Only the White King may sit upon it.”

“The White King?” asked Billy. “What’s—”

“Shush,” whispered Ivy. “They’re here.”

Billy looked up, and saw that the orbs were slowly shifting, changing from circles into glowing shapes that gradually resolved themselves into human figures.

Only the brown globe maintained its shape, but it moved toward Mrs. Russet, who had remained standing where she was during the dance of the lights. The brown globe overtook her, seeming to merge with her, then obscuring her figure for a moment before re-coalescing into what was recognizable as Billy’s teacher. Only where before she had been wearing a pale blue blouse and no-nonsense ankle-length skirt, she was now clothed in an outfit that was brown from top to bottom, a beautiful cloth with what appeared at first to be intricate stitching. But when Billy squinted, looking closer at the cloak, he saw that the stitching was really something else, something far more marvelous and breathtaking.

“What is that?” he couldn’t help but whisper, tugging on Vester’s shirt and pointing at what he saw.

“The Outlines of History,” whispered Vester in return. His voice had taken on a hushed, almost awed tone. “Lumilla the Brown is the greatest Power of the Earth—perhaps the greatest Power alive today. And the earth is the repository—the resting place—of most of the past. So when she is in her fullest power, here on the Diamond Dais, Lumilla is cloaked with the knowledge of that past. She—” he continued, then interrupted himself. “Look there!” he half-whispered, half-shouted, pointing at Mrs. Russet’s cloak. “I think it’s—yes, yes it is! It’s the Battle of Gettysburg!”

Billy looked where Vester was pointing, and, sure enough, could just barely make out the shapes of two great armies clashing in a field, their dark outlines barely visible against the brown background of Mrs. Russet’s velvet cloak. The two armies of the Civil War came together in a fury of fire and smoke, then were swallowed up in the ever-changing pattern of the cloak.