Crystal Warrior: Through All Eternity (Atlantean Crystal Saga Book 1) (59 page)

Ugo and Nudon were badly shaken but fortunately had only suffered minor cuts and bruising. With her daughter in her arms Gynevra worked at Taur’s side trying to bring calm and order to a chaos more daunting than anything they’d ever faced. The anger and frustration with which they’d fought each other moments before was forgotten in the face of this new terror.

It was Taur, passing a window now open to the elements, who chanced to look across to the city. A great string of profanities left his lips and all nearby turned to see what new disaster had befallen. Everyone stared in horror at where once the city had draped down the cliff-sides like a colorful veil. Built mostly from blocks of stone, nearly every building had tumbled towards the harbor as if a child had swiped his hand over a stack of toy blocks.

As they stared in trance-like dismay, the first drops of rain fell, the first rain since the thaw of the winter snows. Everywhere groups of people clung to each other crying and talking, sobbing and pointing. Taur clutched Gynevra and his children against his heart then urged everyone back from the gaping windows as the rain quickly built to a steady, pounding deluge.

Staring through the sheets of water falling from the sky Taur knew terror like he’d never known, and knew he couldn’t show it. This was what had been building in him all day and had culminated in his total loss of control with Gynevra before the quake hit. It had been a dread sitting in the base of his stomach and he’d not known how to dislodge it. Now he must transcend it. Now he knew the face of the enemy he could transcend it. For this woman who held his heart, for their children, for all their people who looked to him as King and leader he would—somehow— project calmness and control.

‘I must go down there,’ he said.

Gynevra couldn’t prevent the clutch of her hands at his person. It was convulsive and reactive. Dragging in a slow sobbing breath, she uncurled her fingers from his clothing and nodded her head.

‘Ta’a. You must,’ she agreed. ‘I’ll assess the damage here and start putting things to rights.’

His Queen. She too would do what she must. Bending his head, he kissed her fiercely then said, ‘I love you, Golden One. Remember only this.’

Turning on his heel he left her, the words echoing between them with the finality of a farewell.

Running through the Castle, he rallied people from their shock and confusion, setting them to clearing the debris and tending to the wounded. When he reached the guard room he found as much confusion there as anywhere but was able to muster a small troop of men to go down into the city. Ordering them to make their way to the city center with every speed they could manage, he said simply, ‘I have to get down there now.’

In his mind’s eye he could see the raw, gaping cliff-side where the Temples and Halls of Justice had once stood. His heart felt as if it was torn and bleeding in his chest but he managed to calm himself, close his eyes and concentrate on that part of the city that seemed to have suffered the most.

As quick as the thought he was there with unbelievable devastation all around and rain falling from the skies with the power of the Mt Alti Cascade. It was as if what hadn’t been tumbled by the quake was to be washed into the harbor by the force of the deluge. Taur found himself standing on a pile of rubble of the crushed blue, black and grey stones of the Halls of Justice.

Looking down he saw a hand wedged between two huge slabs of rock, its owner buried somewhere beneath. From the great seal ring on the middle finger Taur knew it belonged to Judge Albyon. Above the roaring torrent of the rain he could hear screams, moans amid terrible groans of agony from all about him. Where to start? What to do?

A poor wretch wedged between two great blocks of stone, screamed in agony, begging, ‘Kill me ‘Kill me!’

For a moment Taur thought of trying to focus the energy to move the stones but it was obvious the man was gravely injured, being almost crushed in half at the waist.

Never had he thought to use the priestly energy that could create fire for anything as destructive as death. But it was the only merciful answer.

Working in a trance-like haze of horror, Taur administered a similar compassionate end to many more of his people as he stumbled from rock pile to rock pile, tears streaming down his face in the rain and great tearing sobs choking his throat. It seemed no one had escaped. Any who still lived were cruelly trapped and dreadfully crushed.

As his own body temperature lowered and the despair in his heart grew, his ability to garner and focus the energy diminished. He must be able to return to Gynevra the moment he felt she had need of him.

Despair was beginning to overtake him when the ground began to shake again. With a terrible sense of futility he knew then all the cili’s dreams and premonitions had been true. Cronos knew where the warriors were he’d ordered to the city; probably still struggling through the debris at the edge of the harbor. As he cast about in an agony of hopelessness a great jolt shook the blocks beneath his feet and he knew he was in danger of being crushed as so many others had been. He needed to get back to Gynevra and his children at the Castle.

He could just see the outlines of its rocky battlements through the driving rain and as he fixed his mind on it a great chunk of the cliff-side fell away taking with it the part of the Castle that housed the royal apartments.

In shock he couldn’t raise the power to apportate. Dragging deep sobbing breaths into his lungs and calling on all the powers he’d learned as a priest, he forced limbs to stop trembling and heart to stop quaking long enough to concentrate on the thought of where he needed to be. It was the hardest thing he’d ever had to do, to be absolutely still in body and mind when every nerve and spark of energy in his being yearned to run and stumble and cry towards Gynevra and his children—and it seemed to take forever but at last he stood in the devastation of the King’s Presence Chamber.

Wounded people sat about or lay on the floor among the debris moaning and crying in pain and fear over other bodies which lay ominously still. Where was Gynevra? Ugo? Baby Electra? Frantically he cast about and asked any who might be able to answer but no one knew where she was. There was little left of the royal apartments, just a great gaping hole where the rain poured in on the devastation and destruction. Had his Golden One and Ugo and Electra fallen to their deaths with the terrible crushing cascade of rock? No-o-o! his heart screamed. It could not be so. He’d not allow it to be so. He was the King, dammit! He rushed through the chaos of the Queen’s Court and on to the outer courtyard.

Pog, his tiny friend and torment, lay still and white against the outer rock wall. Seeing the small body with no aura of life smote Taur deeply. They had shared so much.

His tears flowed unashamedly and tenderly he bent and laid a hand on the still brow. Brokenly he murmured, ‘Farewell, midget. I have had no more faithful servant. I commend you to the Presence of the Gods.’

Turning to the great gaping hole in the side of the Castle, he stared wildly about. Where was everyone? How many had fallen to their death? It was hundreds of gladvenon down to where the hog pens had once been. He began moaning, ‘Gyn’a, Gyn’a!’ over and over and the pain where his heart should be almost felled him. He could not give in to it. He had to find Gyn’a and his children. Stumbling over the piles of debris he stepped out into the pouring rain.

Where would she have gone? He couldn’t accept that she might be dead among the debris that littered the first plateau hundreds of gladvenon below. He asked where the Queen was of anyone he passed. Most just stared at him in shock or whimpered in pain. He was beyond helping or even showing concern. He was driven by a terrible single-minded purpose.

Gynevra. Ugo. Electra.

One minute she’d been standing shouting to Difleer and Foab across the room as the Earth writhed and screeched beneath their feet as if in the throes of a terrible agony and the next they and a huge section of the Castle and cliff-side had fallen far down to the hog pens below. Their screams echoing horribly in her ears, Gynevra snatched up her children and began to run, Qerlim close at her heels, blindly following the instinct to get down off the cliff-side. As she ran she shouted to all she passed to go to their families. It was all any of them could do now.

Out on the stepped roadway all was a chaos of crying and screaming people running in all directions, animals bleating and cackling, charging and flapping, and water running in great sheets down the roadway and into gaping fissures in the ground. How long before the rest of the Castle fell away into the valley below just as the city had fallen from the cliff-sides and into the harbor?

Taur! Where are you? The devastating thought drew her eyes towards the city where even now he could be crushed by tumbling buildings and rock. With the dense curtain of rain she could no longer see the cliffs over which the beautiful city had draped like a colorful quilt. As pain sliced though her midriff she noted she could only see as far as the Crystal Powerhouse Island and that seemed to have sunk or moved for the Powerhouse lurched at a drunken angle and half the structure was broken away with the sea washing into it.

Stopping only long enough to bind the children to her body with a long head scarf and several lengths of cloth that had once been brave black and gold Nyaldan banners, she ran on down the roadway, a sodden, bedraggled Qerlim loping at her heels. If the Powerhouse was damaged the Energy Web would be deactivated. She couldn’t stay to help anyone. The only thing she could do now was what she should have had the strength to do long since.

She must return to Qurazil.

The ground rumbled and trembled beneath her feet. People called to her and rocks and debris fell around her but she kept running. Her breath came in great searing gasps through her lungs, the children cried and the rain poured down on them as if it would drown them if they stood still. Out on the peninsula leading to the Star Path great waves washed up against the breakwater tearing at her sodden gown and dragging at the children tied against her.

Sobbing and gasping, she came at last to the forbidden place, the place of power, her last chance to redeem herself and save Atlantis. The guards had deserted their posts. There was not a soul to deny her entrance.

It would make no difference if there had been. She’d immobilize them with energy if they tried to stop her now. Entering the corridor lit with muted ilmenite lamps she tried to hush the children but knew it was hopeless. How could she ease their terror when she was so filled with terror herself?

Shards of precious stone, which had once been a full sized statue of Poseidon, littered the portico. The ascending clear quartz staircase was strewn with shattered ilmenite from the lamp niches. Each fragment gave off a tiny glow to cast a dim, eerie light up towards the Star Chamber. Aware of the need to hurry yet also to take care, Gynevra began climbing as fast as she dared, scraping debris aside with her feet to clear a safe place to tread on each step. Sobbing for breath, she came at last into the central holy sanctuary. Among the remains of crystal spheres, ilmenite lamps lay shattered on the red quartz floor. Though the light was dim the power of the place still impelled.

She could only pray that Merwin’s Crystal was intact.

From the moment she stepped through the triangular doorway she lost all sense of pain or fear. Even the children hushed their terrible crying.

Taur had been right to ban her from this place. Just as Cielcif had described for her, in the center of the symbol of life, an aquamarine statue of a mermaid held Merwin’s Crystal aloft. The mermaid and her priceless treasure were intact! The base of the sculpture was carefully fitted into a block of lapis lazuli carved to resemble an ocean wave. The lapis was deeply embedded in the mosaic of the floor.

Merwin’s Crystal was completely enclosed by the delicate fingers of the mermaid’s hands. The power of it emanated in strong undulating waves that enfolded her, uplifted her—and calmed. Despite the chill of the water streaming from her, a sense of warmth pervaded all her limbs and she knew it was transferred to the small, shivering bodies of the children also.

‘You have come,’
it seemed to be saying,
‘and not before time. Take me into your hands. Lift me out from the top.’

‘Can I—have it, Mobuon?’ Ugo asked, between gulping sobs.

Startled by the intrusion of the baby voice into the powerful moment of connection with the Crystal, Gynevra stared down at her son. Golden hair plastered to his scalp and tear-filled eyes large and luminous green, Ugo gazed wide-eyed at the tiny luminescent fire that danced in the crystal heart then reached out a hand.

Gynevra looked back at the crystal. Aware she was already in semi-trance she adjusted the children in their makeshift slings and approached the mermaid. Reaching into the cradling hands she took the crystal octahedron carefully into her own.

‘Give me unto the child. He will have need of my power on his journey.’

Startled by the clarity of the communication she did as bid and immediately Ugo calmed completely. Scarce aware of her actions, she settled into one of the hematite chairs and snuggled the children against her breast. Electra’s tiny thumb found its way into her mouth. Qerlim stood, as if guarding the entrance.

Ugo touched a chubby finger to the crystal point then snatched it back with a small gasp. Wondering what he’d felt Gynevra also tested the point with her finger and a sudden smile touched her lips at the prickle of energy.