Circles of Seven (33 page)

The beam expanded into a huge dome of swirling luminescence, like an inverted funnel of pure light. From all around the cone, tiny rays shot out toward Bonnie’s body, striking something sparkling on her chest. The rays bounced back in dozens of colors, filling the dome with a kaleidoscope of reds, yellows, and blues.

Shiloh leaped to the edge of the cliff, shouting excitedly at Billy. “It’s my necklace! That’s what’s making all the colors!”

Tears rolled down Billy’s cheeks. He tried to call back, but he could only whisper. “It’s a regeneracy dome. The light’s creating a regeneracy dome.” He sighed, then laughed, more tears slipping down his cheeks.

The colorful streams multiplied and wrapped around the skeletons. Moisture oozed from the bones, and their ashen shade turned gleaming white—fresh, clean, and new. Jumping off the ground, the bones seemed to dance, rattling against each other and piecing together, joint to joint. Soon, a menagerie of skeletal dragons stood motionless on the valley floor, like statues in a science museum.

In a flurry of bubbles and ripples, the red liquid from the riverbed began crawling up the beasts’ leg bones, coating them in scarlet as it ascended and tying the skeletons together with ligaments, tendons, and muscles. The reddish coat thickened into leathery skin and scales, turning beige as it dried and hardened.

The process stopped abruptly. The red river dried up, and the regeneracy dome shrank, enveloping only Bonnie’s motionless body in the midst of its swirling colors.

Billy lowered Excalibur and glanced at his rubellite ring. The color was static. No pulsing. He scanned the valley again. Now, instead of a bunch of bones, the riverbed was full of lifeless bodies—fully formed, but still lifeless.

Joseph scooped up a handful of dust and scattered it into the breeze. “Speak to the prophetic rock, son of man. Say, ‘Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.’”

Billy slid Excalibur back into its scabbard and turned toward the boulder, now alabaster white instead of red. He took a deep breath and repeated Joseph’s words, his voice shaking like an earthquake. “Co . . . come from the four . . . four winds, O breath, and . . . and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.”

A song rose from the valley floor. This time, instead of the professor’s solo, a choir of angelic voices sang an ecstatic chorus.

Whither shall I go from thy spirit?

Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?

If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there:

If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.

If I take the wings of the morning,

and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea;

Even there shall thy hand lead me,

and thy right hand shall hold me.

Billy gave a short laugh, mixing it with a stifled sob. “It’s . . . it’s Bonnie’s song. They’re singing Bonnie’s song.”

Long tails began swishing. Wings stretched out like taut parachutes. Great mouths opened in yawns and roars, fire spitting out in weak streams. Eight dragons lifted and dropped their legs as they lumbered around on the dusty valley floor.

Billy clenched his fist and shifted his gaze from his rubellite to Bonnie’s motionless body. The song continued, bursting out in rapturous crescendo.

If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me;

even the night shall be light about me.

Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee;

but the night shineth as the day:

The rubellite’s red eye never blinked. All the bones were gone, and eight dragons stood here and there, still stretching and testing their newly restored bodies, but Bonnie lay deathly still in her dome, hundreds of sparkling hues bouncing off her body.

Joseph laid a strong hand on Billy’s shoulder. “I don’t know why she was excluded from the regeneration, Son. My understanding was that the plan called for her to be revived with the rest of them.”

Billy shivered, nausea boiling in his stomach. He could barely speak. “Did . . . did I mess up something?”

“Mess up?” Joseph tilted his head. “Perhaps you could use that idiom. I would say you just didn’t recognize the light at the bridge, so God gave you another one to follow. It proved to be a longer path, one that I am not familiar with, so I have no idea how it will end.”

“Isn’t there anything I can do to make it right?”

“I know of nothing,” Joseph replied, handing Apollo to him. “Do you have an idea?”

Billy took Apollo and hugged it with both arms. “Well . . . I read a prophecy about a dragon chained in darkest pits. Maybe it means I should go back to the pit and try to find my dad. But I don’t know how that will help Bonnie.”

“You crossed the bridge,” Joseph said. “You cannot return to the other side, not without a new portal.”

Billy jerked his head up. “What’s that noise?” A buzzing racket seemed to rise from the direction of the valley’s boulder dam. He rotated on his heels. A mass of fluttering wings swarmed at the base of the white stone.

Joseph shouted over the din. “Passage beetles!”

Billy pulled out Excalibur and waved it back and forth, creating the dome of light. “Will they attack?”

“So far, it seems not, but if they do, not even the dragons are safe. Their bite can pierce armor . . . and your photo-umbrella. Neither blade nor beam will hinder such an army.”

Billy allowed the beam to diminish and sheathed Excalibur. “Is the bite fatal?”

“Not to souls already dead. All victims pass to a deeper circle where they face greater torment, but a bite to a living human is likely to be a fatal wound.”

Billy rubbed the welt on his neck. “Would someone who’s already been bitten be immune?”

“I cannot say. I don’t know if it’s ever hap—.”

The buzz suddenly grew louder. “They’re coming this way!” Billy shouted.

Joseph clutched Billy’s shirt collar. “You must mount a dragon and fly! I will send the other dragons to collect your friends and follow.”

Billy jerked away. “I can’t. There’s something I have to do.” He marched toward the bridge, Apollo dangling from his hand. The fluttering beetles charged toward him in a thin stream and encircled him, like vibrating yarn spinning around a spool. In seconds they knitted a shroud of tiny armored bodies, wrapping his legs and torso. As they crawled on his skin he waved his arms at Joseph. “Get everyone out! Now!”

A sharp sting on his hand jolted his brain. Another shot across his neck. More bites dug into his arms, sending a tidal wave of ripping agony along his spine. Through the mass of buzzing antennae and wings, he could still see Bonnie’s body lying in the dome . . . motionless. He blew two beetles from his lips with a fiery spurt. “Good-bye, Bonnie. I’ll see you again . . . someday.”

The entire scene began to dissolve before his eyes—Joseph, Bonnie, the dragons, the valley—all melting to the ground. The sky swirled like a black tornado, and the ground collapsed beneath his feet. He plummeted down a slippery tube at breathtaking speed.

The beetles peeled off his body, stripping upwards like flakes of dead skin. His shirt flopped up into his face, and his sleeves tried to ride up his arms. Seconds later he slowed to a stop, landing gently on his feet. He straightened his shirt and patted his hands on his chest. The beetles were gone, but his skin felt like fire.

The ground radiated intense heat, rising into his face like steam in a sauna, and his toes chafed in his shoes. Lifting his feet one at a time, he tested the ground. Although it gave a little bit, it seemed solid enough. He looked up. High in the dark sky a tiny circle of brightness peered down. He set Apollo near his shoes and drew out Excalibur, creating an ambient glow that illuminated his immediate surroundings in the oven-like chamber.

A stony ceiling capped the room just out of arm’s reach. Directly over Billy’s head, a six-foot-wide tunnel with sheer, vertical walls exited the chamber. Far above, a ray of light shone down like a distant full moon, the same circle of brightness he had noticed before.

Billy moved Excalibur toward his feet. “Auggh!” He jerked his knees up and down, dancing in place. The floor was crawling with worms, long, orange and black striped worms slithering in a knotted mass, thousands, maybe millions. His feet squashed a dozen or more, sending streams of worm juice spraying all around. A ripple of fire passed across the surface, igniting the injured worms, but they kept right on squirming, apparently unable to die.

Billy settled his feet in the writhing quagmire, his skin tingling as hot worms oozed between his socks and pant cuffs. He summoned Excalibur’s beam and stirred it into the wormy soup, but it had no effect. The blade’s glow was enough, however, to illuminate the chamber. A column of fire shot up, spewing a geyser of flame that splattered the arching roof with a sparkling coat of orange luminescence.

Far away to his left, two walls came together to form a dark corner. Lifting his feet high, he strode to the nearer wall, squishing more worms and dodging another fountain of fire. He ran his hand along the wall’s surface and poked his finger into one of its many deep divots. Did candlestones once occupy these little holes?

As he approached the corner, he found a sneaker with a PF logo on the side. Worms slithered across the outer lining and crawled through the eyelets, chewing on the frayed laces and canvas. A sparkle of light caught his eye. He stooped, finding a spot on the floor clear of worms. A glow pulsed on the clean stone tile, strobing between two distinct shades of crimson. He picked up a chain next to the glow, lifting a gold ornament with a pulsing red light in the center.
Shiloh’s pendant!

Walter gulped, backing away from the edge of the cliff. “Billy disappeared!”

Shiloh grabbed his elbow. “I think those bugs ate him!”

“They couldn’t have! They disappeared, too!”

“Walter!” Joseph shouted from the valley. “Come down here!”

Walter leaped toward the cliff and zipped along the path, Palin’s sword in hand, skipping most of the hairpin turns and sliding down the slope. He sprinted up to Joseph’s side, breathless. “What happened? . . . Is Billy okay?”

Joseph laid his hands over Bonnie’s regeneracy dome as if warming his fingers. “I do not know. This development was not in Merlin’s plan. Only the Almighty can guide Young Arthur now.”

Walter gazed inside the kaleidoscopic aura. “But what about Bonnie? Wasn’t bringing her back to life part of the plan?”

One of the dragons stretched out its neck, hovering its head over Bonnie. Joseph reached over and stroked its tawny scales. “It was part of the plan,” he replied, “but events arose that I did not expect. I honestly don’t know what will happen next. But for now, you must do your part.”

Walter pointed at himself. “My part in the plan? I’m just here to help Billy and Bonnie!”

Joseph knelt and scooped up a stray passage beetle, gripping it by the outer shell to avoid its blue spittle. “That is the way of prophecy,” he said, rising again. “Purposes are always fulfilled, though individual participation and outcomes vary.”

The dragon draped the end of its tail over Walter’s shoulder. Walter eased his hand over it, pressing his fingers in between the spikes. “Okay,” he said slowly. “Confusing, but okay.” He gazed at Joseph’s dark eyes. “What do I do?”

“First, help me with Bonnie. Dead or not, her body doesn’t belong in the circles. We must get everyone back to the world of the living as soon as possible.”

“Suits me,” Walter said, hoisting the sword over his shoulder. “Show me the door, and we’re outta here.”

Joseph lifted his eyes toward the sky. “The gate is up there.”

Walter squinted at the shining fence Billy had drawn with Excalibur. “I love a challenge!” He thrust the sword between his belt and waistband. “Well, we have a bunch of winged dragons here. What are we waiting for? Let’s launch them!”

Joseph patted the dragon on the flank. “This is Thigocia. She is a war dragon and a healer. If anyone can still help Bonnie, she can, and she is delighted to have a chance to go to war against the Watchers.” He stood on tiptoes to speak into the dragon’s ear. “Round up your troops. You must collect Bonnie and the living humans and fly through the gate.” He cupped his hands around his mouth and called up to the ledge. “Patrick! Shiloh! Come down here!”

Thigocia lowered her head, making a stairway with her spiny neck. “Young man, climb on my back and hang on tight. I am accustomed to carrying a warrior, but I assume that you are not experienced yet.”

“Nah. I’m a rookie, but I’m ready to ride.” Walter climbed up the scales and grabbed hold of a spine near the dragon’s neck. “My name’s Walter. I guess you don’t have any—”

“Reins to hang on to?” Thigocia finished. “No. I need no guidance. I will lead the way, and I will appoint two others to carry your friends.”

Walter half closed one eye. “Did you just read my mind?”

“I do not read minds. I make calculated assumptions.”

Walter pushed his seat up higher on Thigocia’s back. “That sounds way too familiar.”

Patrick and Shiloh ran onto the valley floor hand in hand. Joseph directed each of them to a dragon, helping them climb aboard.

Thigocia unfurled her wings, stretching them out into a mammoth pair of leather-like sails. “We must keep Bonnie’s regeneracy dome intact.” She flicked out her long, forked tongue and banged her tail on the ground. “Ladies! Form the hammock pyramid! Firedda! Yellinia! We three will take the lower position.”

“The hammock pyramid?” Walter repeated.

Thigocia turned her body, pointing her tail toward the regeneracy dome. “Yes. It is the way we transported a wounded dragon through the air in order to prevent further injury.”

The dragons carrying Patrick and Shiloh stationed themselves on each side of the dome, completing the triangle with Thigocia. Three other dragons took to the air and flew in a tight circle right over the triangle, beating their wings furiously.

“That’s it!” Thigocia shouted over the flapping racket. “Now alternate your downbeats, and we’ll be off.”

A strong updraft nearly pulled Walter off Thigocia’s back. With dust flying everywhere, he clutched her spine with both hands, squinting through the debris. Bonnie and the entire sparkling dome lifted slowly off the ground.