Crystal Warrior: Through All Eternity (Atlantean Crystal Saga Book 1) (60 page)

‘I can help you.’

For the briefest of moments she’d forgotten where she was—and why. But the words from the Crystal brought all the terror rushing back into her heart.

‘How? Can you help me return to Qrazil to avert this disaster?’ she whispered.

‘The place you call Qrazil is no more. Already is the city of Fyr Poseidyr and much of the south country lost. Nothing can avert this disaster. The land known as Atlantis has come to the end of its existence. Henceforth it will only be spoken of in legend, myth, suspicion or dreams. This day Atlantis is lost to mankind and few will survive to nurture her memory. There is no time to tarry. Surrender yourself to the energy. The child has a journey to make but he cannot begin it alone. You must assist him to transmute into pure energy and rise up onto the astral plane. The crystal he holds will protect him. But your paths of destiny diverge here.’

Fyr Poseidyr gone! It was too late to return to Qurazil; too late to avert the disaster; too late to save the people of Atlantis. She had failed! And how could she leave her son to travel alone? Convulsively she clasped him against her breast.

‘Will the God’s forgive me? I should have been strong enough to go while there was still time!’

‘T’was never your burden to bear, Daughter of the Blood. The prophecy but spake the time of its occurring. The evil that has befallen Atlantis is of the making of those with greed and lust in their hearts. Bow not your head to guilt.’

It was even as Dogon and Taur had tried so often to convince her! Her presence in Qurazil to follow Ianthe as Archinus would have made no difference to that which had long been ordained. The ambivalence of her feelings troubled her. There was a lightness to be sure, as she felt the burden of responsibility lifted from her. But it was leavened with sorrow by the realization there was no hope for Atlantis, no hope for her people.

Copying his baby sister, Ugo was now sucking his thumb and had snuggled close beneath her chin. Tenderly she brushed the dripping hair from his brow. There was no time to tarry, the Spirit of the Crystal had said. She must assist Ugo to start his miraculous journey, a journey he must travel alone. He was not yet three summers old!

‘May Electra and I not go with him? He is too young to make such a journey alone!’

‘Calm yourself, Daughter of the Blood. T’is the child’s destiny. He will travel far from the time and place of his birth but he will not travel alone. One comes, one who requires a miracle that he may become King in a land that has great need of his strength and power. The child is that miracle. Surrender yourself to Destiny, for if you do not allow him to follow this path, he will die.’

This then was to be the ultimate test of her trust in the Gods; the ultimate sacrifice for herself; the ultimate gift for her son. Sacred Mother, fill me with your power, she silently prayed.

A great rolling rumble began under the ground and Ugo, with both hands clasped around Merwin’s Crystal, buried his face against her neck and began crying once more. Electra’s tiny body arched and kicked and she screamed with fright.

Where is Taur? Why is he not here to help me make this decision? Though the words were not voiced aloud they vibrated through her being with the power of despair.

He is not, murmured the voice of reason within her heart and if he were, he would choose life for his son. This you must be strong enough to do also. And you must do it now.

‘Let it be so,’ she murmured tremulously.

She had to gain some semblance of calm or she’d never be able to raise the energy to save her son. The Earth settled again. But for how long? Ibn Ist, lend me strength.

Qerlim huddling against her knee, nudged Gynevra’s elbow with her head. Feeling a great rending around her heart she reached down to clench her fingers in the sodden fur. The wolf never left her side but she couldn’t take the animal with her. Yet how could she leave her? What if—? No! She must not think that. Qerlim dead meant Taur dead. She could only commend them to the Goddess.

Focusing her mind on the wolf, she projected,
‘I must go, Qerlim. I must take Ugo into the Light. You understand that, don’t you? I can’t take you. I beg Sacred Mother Ist to take care of you—but I can’t take you. If it be the Will of the Gods I’ll come back for you. Thank you for your love and loyalty. Taur needs you. Go find Taur. Go find him, Qerlim, please!’

Sitting back on her haunches, Qerlim regarded her mistress from sad, loving eyes and it was then Gynevra noticed the broken crystal point she held in her mouth. With another gentle nudge of her nose Qerlim dropped it into Gynevra’s hands.

‘Oh Qerlim,’ Gynevra whispered on a sob, as she felt the soothing energy flowing from the truncated crystal point and she clutched it convulsively in her fingers. She thought she’d lost the ability to breathe at all when the animal rose and slunk from the pyramid with her head turned over her shoulder watching her mistress to the very last.

Like a child’s top spinning out of control Taur dashed in and out of any building that still stood, searching, calling, at a complete loss as to where they might be. He would not even let himself think they might have fallen with the royal apartments. He would know if his Golden One’s energy had ceased to pulse. He would know!

Something wet and soggy brushed against his leg as he backed out of Janod the Silversmith’s house. Qerlim! The animal was never far from his mistress. He dropped to his haunches and hugged the animal in desperation.

‘Where’s Gynevra?’ he whispered hoarsely against the wet fur. ‘Take me to Gynevra.’

As he came upright, the wolf wagged her tail and turned to trot down the hill.

In a blinding flash he knew. The Powerhouse was destroyed so it would no longer be creating the Energy Web. Racing after Qerlim, he caught up to her on the other side of a chasm that had opened right across the Street of Smiths, scarcely aware of leaping it. Gynevra was in the Star Path. She could not leave him now! Not now!

Gynevra closed her eyes tightly and fought to stem the agonizing tears and then gave up and let them flow. She could wait no longer and doubted now she’d ever get her emotions under control. She’d have to work through them. Somehow she had to get up onto the astral plane and beyond.

With Qerlim’s crystal clutched tightly in her left hand she lifted Ugo’s chubby fist, still tightly clasped about Merlin’s Crystal and held it to her third eye. With a sense of wonder she opened to the power of it, felt that power building the energy field about them. Combined with the power of the Star Path it was everything Taur had claimed for it. Even in her agitated state Gynevra could feel their physical forms dissolving into pure energy, floating and becoming one with the ether. Over and over in her mind she repeated the invocation to Ist to protect them—to protect her son.

In the Light far beyond them appeared a Being. As his presence strengthened she noted he wore a strange-white-gold crown and flowing robes of pure white such as Ugo had worn in her dream. Surrounded with an aura of golden light he glowed more brightly than any star. As he drew near she became aware of several greater, even more luminous beings beyond him. These stayed well back for their light would have been overpowering, while the robed one came right to where Gynevra waited. His light, compounded of violet and gold, told her his Being was highly spiritually evolved. This Being would be a worthy guardian and sage for her son.

‘Who are you?’
Gynevra projected.

‘Pandumon, King of Lanax in the land of Khemu. I seek a miracle. The Gods have directed me here. Who are you and what would you ask of me?’

‘I’m Gynevra, Queen of Nyalda in Atlantis. Our world is being destroyed and all will die. Yet the Goddess has promised a future for this child, my son. His name is Ugo. If you were to return with him from your spiritual journeying, would that not be a miracle?’

‘It would, Lady of Light. But not only is my country far removed from yours but so is my time. Atlantis exists only as the subject of mythical stories in ancient writings known
to a few very learned scholars. In every one of those tales, Atlantis was a great and beautiful country destroyed completely by greed and lust for power and carnal living. If indeed the Gods have brought me to that time of destruction then you will die if you do not also remove yourself to a different time or place. Khemu would welcome you. Such golden beauty is rare in my land.’

The longing to acquiesce, to go where she could protect her child, watch him grow to manhood, was intense. Waves of soft rainbow colors radiated outward from the King and immediately the hovering Light beings moved forward, intensifying the light glowing around him to an almost unbearable brilliance. The light expanded to surround Gynevra also and suddenly King Pandumon was right before her, holding out his arms for her son. She could see the pearlescent sheen of his pure white robes, the copper-dark hue of his skin and the brilliant gleam of his ebony eyes.

She could not release her hold on her son. Clutching him to her breast, pressing him to his baby sister, she backed away, immediately compromising the energy. Where was Taur to help her in this instant of desperate decision? How could she pass her child to a complete stranger, no matter how brightly he glowed? How could she not go with him? Yet how could she leave Taur?

Ibn Ist, help me! From the brilliance beyond King Pandumon stepped One Gynevra recognized from Her many manifestations during Temple Ritual. Praise be to the Goddess who answered all prayers! Praise be to Ist.

Clutching the children to her breast, Gynevra dropped to her knees before the Goddess, knowing now beyond all doubt that Ugo at least would be safe. With a loving hand the Great One reached out to gently untie the banners binding Ugo to his mother. Wrapping them about the child so his arms were swaddled against his body with Merwin’s Crystal held safely in his hands, She lifted him and placed him in the arms of King Pandumon.

Turning back to Gynevra, she took her hand and raised her to her feet.

‘Be healed in your heart, Daughter of the Light. In the Book of Journeys his life-path is written. Each must follow his own destiny. From here your paths separate but fear not for this little one. His destiny is foretold. I, Ist, Goddess of All Life, shall be his Guardian.’

The light of the Goddess suffused her whole being and Gynevra slowly and reverently withdrew her clutching hands from Ugo.

Eyes wide open to etch every last memory of him on her consciousness, and every word on his heart, she said,
‘Ugo, my beloved son. Never forget us but grieve not for us. Live your life with love and integrity. Know that we, Taur and Gynevra of Nyalda, who gave you life, love you—always.’

He would travel his life in the Light of the Goddess. She could ask no more for him than that. Clasping her Goddess-blessed hands around her daughter, she bowed her head in veneration. When she lifted it again the energy of the King with her son secure in his arms was fading into the light beyond.

What had she done?

Ugo-o-o! Even now she could follow him, watch over her baby.

Ugo-o-o! Her scream was silent in the ether and yet it reverberated all around her. Or was it the terrified scream of her child, shredding the very core of her soul? What had she done? What would become of her son? Had she saved him? Or not? Desperately she tried to re-conjure the picture she’d seen in her dream but it wouldn’t form. Cronos, Ra, Asar, Ist and every other God in the Universe, she pleaded in her heart, keep Ugo safe!

Reactively she clutched her arms tightly about Electra and the crystal point in her hand dug into her palm, its energy sharply balancing, clearly focusing. Now she must concentrate on finding safety for her daughter. Suddenly Taur was in her heart and all concentration fled.

Just for a second she let all her energy flow towards him.

‘Taur, I love you!’

As if called by her projected thought, he burst through the triangular entrance to the Star Path chamber, Qerlim a grubby white blur at his heels. Hair in sodden ropes about his shoulders, water streaming from the once soft white leather of his gold-braided sheepskin jerkin, his chest heaved as if he’d run all the way from the city to be with her. Staring down at him through the dim light from the astral plane where she still hovered, she had a terrible longing to feel his arms round her one more time yet knew with an equally terrible certainty it was already too late. Even as she began the descent, drawn irrevocably to him, his beloved face distorted with pain and grief.

Staring at the faint vision of Gynevra fading into the intense energy at the apex of the pyramid, Taur knew he would never see her again, never hold her or love her again.

Never. Never. Never.

She had Electra in her arms. Where was Ugo? Pain and devastation were complete. His woman, his love, his son, his daughter, all gone! Nyalda a drowning, muddy rock-pile about him. Devastation erupted from his inner being in a great roar of rage and grief and as if this triggered the final act of destruction, the Star Path split asunder and the sea engulfed all—

Chapter 34

Auckland, NZ. Monday 16th November 1998 AD.

The blackness was suffocating her. The earth pressed down with a crushing weight. All was sinking, sinking beneath the sea. She'd failed! Holy Mother Ist, save my baby!

Taur! Taur! Terror and wrenching despair welled up from within her. As it reached her throat she opened her mouth to scream and the suffocating weight and blackness lifted abruptly from her. In the same instant she felt the emptiness of her arms. Grief ripped through her body with the savagery of an up-thrusting dagger. With a great wail of despair she began railing at the bitter fate that mocked her reluctant and belated effort to avert disaster and demanded the ultimate price in retribution.

Gone! All gone! Taur, their children, Qerlim, all, everyone she'd known and loved; gone, because she, selfishly and indulgently, had wanted to be with one man. Regardless of the assurance of the Goddess, the guilt would torment her through all eternity.

‘I don't believe it. That dog wouldn't give the crystal to anyone else and now it's in her hand she's come round! She's very distressed. Hold her. Talk to her.’

Hands gentled her. Voices, familiar and yet not, called to her, soothing and calming—in a foreign language which oddly she understood. Yet she only knew her grief.

‘Electra! Ugo! Taur! Qerlim!’ she cried, beginning to struggle and fight against the restraining hands.

‘Georgina! Stop it! You're all right! Just relax. You've been having a nightmare!’

Her mother! Ianthe was dead. But the childhood habit of obeying her mother’s voice was ingrained—even though somehow the words could not have been spoken by Ianthe. She dropped back against the pillows and with eyes tightly closed dragged great sobbing gulps of air into her lungs. The pain round her heart had crushed it all out.

‘Perhaps we should give her a shot to settle her down.’

That voice, the one that had spoken of the dog, she didn't know, but it made her open her eyes.

The woman clutching her left hand was her mother—her mother but not Ianthe. The one on the right was her sister, Merryn, but the woman in a white uniform standing at the foot of the bed she'd never seen before.

Mum!

Merryn with Case beside her.

Oh God! How could it be that where she'd just been, a place most people deemed no more than a myth, seemed more real than they, than this hospital bed she was lying in? How could the grief she'd obviously only experienced in a dream feel as if it would tear her asunder?

A grief ancient beyond recognition.

‘No. No shot,’ she managed and the words felt strange on her tongue. ‘I'll be all right.’

If only I can manage to believe it was merely a dream.

Tears continued to roll down her cheeks and occasional gasping sobs wracked her body. Ellen caressed her hand, in which she clutched something hard and familiar, and wiped the tears as they fell.

‘Georgina darling, what's wrong? Do you hurt?’ she asked.

Like you can’t imagine! Squeezing her eyes shut and clenching her teeth against the pain, she ground out, ‘No. Not physically.’

She still held the crystal Qerlim had picked up from the floor of the Star Chamber. How—?

‘What do you mean? You're in agony!’

A great sobbing breath shuddered in her chest and Georgina raised her hand to look at what she held. A crystal. She gazed at it through her tears, memory tormenting the edge of her consciousness. The same—yet not. A crystal nevertheless. A soft growl drew her attention to the big white dog sitting beside Ellen, her strange light eyes watchful and knowing.

A wave of joy washed over Georgina.

‘Qerlim!’ she whispered and almost fell out of bed in her eagerness to wrap her arms round the animal. The moment the name formed on her lips she understood her mistake and grief welled through her again. Katja licked at her tears and Georgina clung to her, sobbing.

Ellen tried to gentle her, asking again what hurt so.

‘It's grief.—I'll tell you—shortly. How come—they let Katja in?’

Georgina settled back on the pillows, one hand nestling in the dog's fur and the other wielding the tissues Merryn pressed into it.

Ellen laid a hand on the dog's back and shook her head in wonder.

‘She's a very special dog. Aren't you, Katja?—I went home this morning for a rest when Merryn and Case came to sit with you. Katja met me at the door with the crystal in her mouth. She wouldn't give it to me and she wouldn't budge from the door. I didn't know what to do so I rang Merryn. She suggested I speak your name and see what she did. Well, she got very excited and tried to growl but mainly woofed with the crystal in her mouth so Merryn said I should bring her up here and see what happened.

‘She warned the staff we were coming and since they hadn't been able to find anything wrong with you nor any way of bringing you back to consciousness they were willing to try anything. We didn't tell them about the crystal. Katja wouldn't give it to anyone but you, so I held your hand and she dropped it in, slobber and all. I was able to get it to wash it then!’ Ellen laughed a little shakily. ‘But it worked. A few minutes after you held the crystal you started to come round. Oh George, we were so worried! You've been unconscious for four days!’

Georgina lay with her eyes closed, still too choked to speak. Only four days? She'd lived ten years of an ancient lifetime, in only four days? Lived and lost an entire lifetime. How could she ever explain it?

‘Have you any idea what happened?’ Ellen went on. ‘When I got to your house on Friday morning I could see you slumped in the pyramid pit. I let myself in but I couldn't wake you. We've not been able to find a mark on you. The doctors did a brain scan and everything seemed to be perfectly normal but you simply—weren't at home.’

Ellen's voice had become wavery and Merryn came to sit with an arm round her shoulder. Georgina looked from her mother to her sister noting the lines of worry and tiredness on both faces. Slowly she raised the crystal and stared at it for a long time, trying to sort her thoughts, calm her emotions.

‘Perhaps if Case gave me some healing I'd be able to tell you what I think—and where I've been.’

A slow smile softened Case's hawkish features and he moved close to sit with his hands on her shoulders. Merryn stared at her sister as if she'd asked for a triple whisky with a Black Russian chaser.

Georgina gave her a weak, watery smile between shuddery sobs.

‘I—uh—’ At last she simply shrugged. The changes within herself were too vast to be encompassed in a few words, the emotions too raw to allow them to form. ‘I'll explain—soon.’

A doctor bustled in, checked her blood pressure and heart, looked in her eyes and declared in a baffled voice that he could find nothing amiss apart from her obvious emotional state and he could give her medication for that.

Georgina shook her head.

‘I'll be all right,’ she insisted. ‘What I need most is a cup of tea and a meal. I feel as if I haven't eaten for days. And then I'd like to go home.’

When the doctor left them alone again, Georgina forced herself to speak between deep, wracking breaths. ‘The last thing I remember—is picking up the crystal and wishing it could bring me—comfort like you said it would, Merryn, but not believing it could. I went to sit in the—conservatory because I felt closer to Gould there—Oh! Oh—’ Georgina stopped and stared first at Ellen and then at Merryn, her eyes wide with sudden total consciousness. ‘Gould—Fran—have they—found the yacht yet?’

Neither Ellen nor Merryn spoke, but their eyes answered and Georgina felt the familiar wave of panic wash through her body. She'd been the cause of their deaths in Atlantis but she now held the knowledge that could save them in this world—just as her mother had seen in the crystal ball.

A terrified kind of excitement began to overlay the hopelessness of grief.

‘Get me out of here. Take me home. Now. Please!’

‘Georgina, we haven't given up hope!’ Merryn said quickly, leaning forward and taking Georgina's hands in hers.

Georgina shook her head and sucked in a shuddering breath.

‘Me neither, Merryn,’ she said, ‘but Mum said that morning that I had the knowledge to—to save them and I didn't know what she was talking about. Now—I think I do. I have a huge story to tell you guys—but not here. Take me home. Please.’

Within the hour they were settled in Case and Merryn's back garden looking onto the lower grassy slopes of Mt Eden, one of several small extinct volcanic cones on the isthmus of Auckland City. The rustic table was laden with crusty bread buns, salad, ham, fruit and a pitcher of chilled fruit juice.

Case crouched before Georgina with his hands on her feet.

‘You've been a long way out of your body, George,’ he said solemnly. ‘Your energy's very scattered and you feel quite jumpy. I want you to take some deep breaths and when you breathe out, imagine you're breathing through your feet. It'll make you feel more centered, more settled in yourself.’

As Georgina followed Case's instructions, Katja stood at her side, solemnly watching all proceedings. Georgina still held the crystal in one hand while the other was buried in Katja's coat. The dog was of a similar size to the wolf and when Qerlim had been in her winter coat she'd been as snowy white as Katja. Only the eyes were different. Was it fanciful to imagine Katja could be a reincarnation of Qerlim? Was it any more fanciful to see herself a reincarnation of Gynevra, or Fran of Phryne? Or Gould of Gotham and Torr of Taur?

Georgina leant her head back against the chair and closed her eyes. She'd recognized Taur in Torr the first time she'd set eyes on him. Reincarnation was a fact and no one now could ever convince her otherwise. She imagined Case and Merryn just smiling wisely at her when she told them, for of course they already knew. What would Torr think? Where was he? Her heart lurched just thinking of him. Would she ever see him again? Could two days out of this lifetime be all they were destined to share? Her heart couldn't believe that.

But there was Fran and Gould to think of before she would allow herself to consider finding Torr. She'd once put him first in her life, many millennia past, and she still carried the scars. This time, if there was to be any chance of happiness for them it would only be when all other debts were paid. This lifetime was about ‘karmic payback’. She could imagine Merryn and Case smiling when she mentioned that, too.

It was evening and they'd long since moved into the warmth of the house before Georgina completed relating the epic of her out-of-body experience. They were gathered round the oval oak table in Case and Merryn's dining room. Ellen, with dark rings of exhaustion round her eyes, gently rocked the drowsy baby, Case cleared away the remains of a pizza dinner they'd had delivered, and Merryn was making tea for everyone.

Georgina, alternating between bouts of jagged crying and stoic wonder, was still remembering things to talk and exclaim about, like the identical birthmarks she and Fran had above their right breasts which, with a little imagination could be said to resemble a dragon.

The family had let her talk with little interruption but now as her thoughts and memories became more spasmodic and the incredible purpose behind making such a journey more apparent, they'd gone quiet. Merryn put the tray containing mugs of tea on the table and lifted the sleeping baby from her mother and took him to his bed.

When she came back Ellen had her arms around Georgina who was talking again between weary sobs.

‘In that lifetime it seemed I had everything Phree wanted but denied herself in the name of duty—Gotham, freedom to marry. It even seemed to her that I stole Taur's God-essence in that most sacred and important moment of ritual initiation. I guess one can understand why in this lifetime she's never let me, or anything else, stand in the way of what she's wanted. It makes such utter sense.’

Ellen leant back and surveyed her daughter, her tired eyes anxious.

‘I know my saying you had the knowledge to bring them back threw you for a loop but—what do you think now?’

Brushing the tears from her cheeks yet again, Georgina let her body relax and centered herself. Everything Gynevra had known was with her still. It seemed now she wasn't only Georgina Hackville but in the same body, in the same skin, she was also Gynevra of Poseidonia. The memories, the knowledge, the ‘knowing’, were now in her conscious mind. Her eyes glazed over and her vision turned inward and before her amazed family, she went into semi-trance. When she began speaking Case grabbed a sheet of paper to write down what she said.

‘The crystals the Atlanteans created were four-sided and when they exploded they split cleanly down the axes, the four triangular sections impacting downward into the earth with immense force, a force great enough to create volcanoes and destroy vast tracts of land. Each segment has the ability to generate the same energy as the original but, because the original was never programmed, it has no focus or direction. In effect, each segment becomes a rogue force, its energy never diminishing, and being amplified with further erratic outcome, whenever charges from two segments coincide. The result is a critically unstable field of energy that swirls, soars and fades, entraps and distorts, transmutes and transposes through dimensions. It's an energy field with capacity for immense positivity or negativity and there's no way of knowing at any given moment of time which polarity will be in the ascendant.’