The Tessellation Saga. Book Two. 'The One' (51 page)

Before the open
Journey Gates and standing beside the huge golden bull that guarded
them, she had judged and blamed herself for not being the mother he
had needed, she had died, leaving him to mercy before even giving
him life. She had sworn on the very gates before her that she would
not begin her journey until he was safe, his soul safe, and safe
from his natural father who would destroy him if he could, just as
he had destroyed her mother and tried to destroy her.

If the Lady had
been able to breathe, she would have held her breath now, as the
energy bolt collided with the insubstantial tubeworm. It surrounded
its delicate framework with its power and light forcing life back
into almost dead lines and the gossamer tendrils of magic that held
it together. Like the umbilical cord that attached a new babe to
its mother, it began to pulse strongly once more, its glowing
bubble shaped end that surrounded the sleeping figures held in
abeyance inside, glowed with energy. The returning bolt swept on
leaving a glowing trail, a beacon for the damaged wormlike tube to
follow slowly, finally completing the pathway Thaddrick had
hurriedly set up ten long years ago. The Lady looked once more at
the figure of her son sleeping peacefully inside and wiped away an
invisible tear, the force needed to return the energy bolt had been
great and she did not know if she had the strength to make it to
the Journey Gates alone. Still though, she stayed, she prayed to
the Gods to give her the time needed to aid her son in his quest to
save two worlds and rid the cosmos of the evil that was MeGath.
MeGath will judge himself and find himself wanting
, she
thought as the now glowing tubeworm slowly followed the trail of
energy, finding its way through the darkening stain of evil that
was surrounding the world like a cloud in front of the sun.

Far away, amid
one of Arotia’s vast mountain ranges and deep inside a large
extinct volcano, the change in the magic’s roots sparked a small
fire, as it flashed into life; tiny yellow and orange flames cast
long dancing shadows around the walls of a hall that had seen no
light or life for centuries. The ice walls slowly turned from their
natural blue and green in the reflection of the flames. Drip-drip,
drip-drip... the age-old ice slowly began to thaw, the leisurely
and steady drip of melting water strangely echoed the beating of an
equally old heart as it too began to stir from its enforced slumber
within the dead volcanic tomb.