by C B Samet
Joshua looked doubtful. “Are you sure, Abbey?”
I thought about this man’s age and how the author of the book would be a hundred years old by now. I hesitated in confusion, but I was certain he matched the picture of Baird Potts that I remembered. It was an oil painting at the university library that hung by the section of books he had authored.
Joshua continued, “Because I keep thinking, if you trim the beard very short, braid his hair, and put him in a white gown, he looks like an older Sebastian Slade.”
“Mythology!” I exclaimed, shaking my head. “That is an insult to this man who is a true historian and cultural anthropologist.”
Joshua replied calmly, “I think we have already well established that mythology and history are one in the same.”
The man seemed to enjoy watching us dispute his identity and remained silent until we finished bickering and turned to him expectantly for an answer.
“I am who you say I am,” he said.
Joshua and I looked at each other then back at him.
I looked at him sideways, “Who I say you are or who he says you are?”
“Both.”
“What?” I asked incredulously.
“Brilliant,” Joshua replied. He sipped his drink.
“I am Baird Potts—world traveler and professor of humanities. I am Sebastian Slade—mythologist and symbologist.” He drank from his cup of cider. “I have traveled the world and seen the existence of all of these things. I chose to write about them separately so those who believed or fantasized in the supernatural could appreciate its existence and those skeptical of such things would not refute my cultural knowledge.”
I realized I was the very critic of which he was speaking.
“And,” he continued, “to those young or just young at heart, I am known as Bernard Blackfoot.”
“The children’s book author?” I knew the books well because Paul had read so many to me as a child.
Andonius of the sea
A serpent known to me
In warm waters of his home
He sings a melody
In the mist he makes his home
Beneath the ash he’s free to roam
Shrouded in darkness
Confined to this bleak zone
When shipwrecked sailors are in fright
Andonius does alight
And save their lives
With all his might.
“But you didn’t come here to discuss my children’s stories,” he added, taking another sip from his steaming cup of cider.
I shook my head. “We are looking for the Che stone of strength, and we were told that you are its last known possessor.”
“The Warrior Stone. Well, that would be quite a prize,” he began. “If I did have it, what use are you intending for it?”
We had come this far. I decided to tell him everything.
He listened patiently, his face a mask of calmness. “So you intend to conjure the Avant Guard.” He rubbed at his beard.
“This is the last piece,” I urged, probably sounding more desperate than was decorous.
He arched an eyebrow. “I suppose I could part with it for a good cause.”
My heart leaped, and I gripped the table to force myself to remain calmly seated.
He stood and dug around in a cabinet. Withdrawing a small, dark ruby stone, he approached the table again. He reached out his hand, and I extended mine, palm upward.
He looked startled at my blue star and hesitated.
Then he set the Che stone down. It was a deep, dark, crystal- line burgundy. Joshua’s stone was smooth, flat, and pebble-like, while Inok’s was more lucent and quartz-like. The Warrior Stone, in contrast, was geometrically more distinct, with seven smooth surfaces that met at sharp angles. One end was flat and smooth and the other came to a point. It wasn’t particularly sharp, but could have been strapped to a spear as an effective weapon. Baird closed my hand around it.
I tucked the stone into my pocket. “Thank you,” I said, relieved.
“May I see your hand?” I extended my empty hand out to him, and he traced the blue star with his finger. “I haven’t seen anyone else with such a mark,” he said softly.
Anyone else? “You know what this means?”
“More than what it means. I know what it does.” He turned his hand over, palm up, and I saw the exact same star. His hand was larger, older, with more wrinkles and scars, but the star was just as vibrantly blue as mine.
I gasped.
“This is the Traveler’s Star. With it, you and anything you touch can be transported instantly to anywhere you want.”
I traced the star and its seven spikes with my own finger in awe. I thought of how far we’d come by foot, by animal and by water. All this time, I could have instantly gone anywhere. I looked again at Baird’s star.
Then I thought about what Allis said about the significance of the journey, not just the destination. If I had bypassed the journey, then the Queen and I would still be alone together, running instead of taking a stand. I would not have made new friends and allies. I would not have fallen in love with Joshua.
I looked up at Baird’s sparkling blue eyes, and thought about how this old man was still too young to be who he said he was. The scent of cider from my cup drifted through me. Then I realized.
“You’re a monk!” I declared.
Smiling, he confessed with a shrug, reclaimed his hand and leaned back in his chair.
I looked over at Joshua with delight. There was a wolfish grin on his lips and a twinkle in his eye.
I frowned. “You already came to that conclusion.” He mimicked Baird’s shrug and leaned back. I rolled my eyes, but my mood could not be dampened by trivialities.
When the cider was finished, the decision was made to return to the Queen’s camp. Baird packed a bag, intending to join us for the journey. I was excited to have the additional member, especially one who could defeat a Mug in one-on-one combat. Eagerly, I put on my heavy coat. I rubbed my internal pocket just to confirm the presence of the ruby Che stone—the Warrior Stone, which would be activated by the Avant Champion. We were so near our goal.
Baird had given me the Che stone, but he also gave Joshua a gift, one of his mythology books—A Tale of Champions. It was thick, worn and somehow managed to look sturdy and fragile at the same time.
With gloves and hats donned, we held hands, and Baird instructed me to think of the exact location of the house at the base of the cliff where the Queen, Allis and Inok were staying. He explained how the star could only take you to a place you had physically been to before, or a place you could see directly ahead, or a place someone with you knew well. It was as though it had to access an existing map within a mind in order to take its owner there.
I closed my eyes, pictured the spot, and felt an ever so slight sensation of movement, as though standing on a boat in a gentle wake. There was a tug at my core as though the effort was consuming some measure of energy.
When I opened my eyes, we were standing outside of the Vonik family house.
I turned to Baird. “Amazing,” I reveled.
He smiled and squeezed my shoulder.
Smelling the scent of sausage escaping from the house, I knew we had arrived in time for dinner. I knocked at the door, and we were greeted warmly by a surprised Alencia.
“You’re back already!” she declared, hugging each of us.
Vonik appeared. “Did you succeed?”
I nodded, and he embraced me enthusiastically. As we separated, he looked at his newest guest. “This is Baird Potts, who has been gracious enough to let us use the Warrior Stone,” I introduced him.
The two men embraced. When they had finished, we all moved inside where the Queen was sitting with her head bowed, as if she were meditating.
Baird bowed slightly to her. “Thank you for joining our cause,” she said graciously, lifting her head. “It is good to see you again.”
“You are welcome, my Queen,”
he replied. “I have vowed to protect mankind; therefore, I will fight the Malanook.”
I looked at Joshua, who was grinning as widely as I was. Allis and Inok arrived with unmistakable relief in their eyes, and I was touched by their concern.
A few minutes later, with heavy coats aside, we were all crowded around the dining table. Joshua was telling Allis about scaling the mountain and the Muglik warrior encounter; Baird was describing past battles to the Queen, pieces of knowledge he had gathered and assembled from all of his travels; and I was reassuring Alencia and Vonik their son was well.
“How did the town meeting go?” I asked the table.
Vonik answered, “It went well. News had already reached the leaders of an evil spreading across the land, so it did not take much convincing. The Ballik have pledged their support and willing fighters are to depart for Marrin Beach by midday tomorrow. They agreed to bring the town’s supply of Ballik blades with them.”
I was awed by how readily we were assisted at every crossing—the Caballus, the Gunthi monks, the Dubik gypsies, and the Ballik. If we had not been so well received at even one of these crucial places, our mission would have crumbled.
Vonik continued, “Inok did well to present in earnest the upcoming battle and need for help.”
Inok accepted the compliment with a slight dip of his head.
When we were done eating our sausage and boiled cabbage, I excused myself to go and get cleaned up. I washed vigorously and though I had intended to rejoin the group, a wave of exhaustion swept over me. As though it had invisible tentacles, my mattress on the floor pulled me to it. As soon as I lay down, I fell asleep.
The next morning I awoke before the house was stirring and confiscated Joshua’s mythology book. It smelled like aged oak with a worn leather cover and yellow pages adorned with faded blue ink. The pictures of war and devastation were overly vivid and the text was mildly captivating. It read more like a history book, but Baird had inserted quotations from the Ecclesiastic Elements—an eclectic scripture book of the Gunthi monks that had a multitude of translations, each with a different meaning. It was said to require its own manual just to de- cipher the cryptic text. As it was not of a scientific nature, I had never read it.
Although it encompassed several hundred years before peace (the start of our current calendar year, seven thousand years ago), I chose to focus on the last world war—The Hundred-Year War.
Behold a gold robe of redemption masking a poisonous cloud of oppression descended upon the unsuspecting land.
The Hundred-Year War spawned from a cesspool of anarchy and chaos. Milos Bornak—the Golden Emperor across the Viger Sea—rose to power under the promise of order and prosperity. Subsequently, he launched a brutal campaign to stretch his empire to the farthest reaches of the planet. He conquered four of the ten continents—Bellos (his own), Pathos, Sallos and Crithos (my continent). He was credited with laying down the roads and town infrastructure that exist to this day, but it was not done for the greater good.
A foreign concept engulfed villages like a plague—slavery. Every land where the White Robe’s fleet touched shore was robbed of its wealth and resources.
The roads were used to transport stolen goods and slaves back to Waterton (the fishing port south of Marrin Beach). Bornak exported silver from Taxco and clear-cut all of the forests of Marrington to build his mighty fleet. From the untouched springs of Ntajid, he created a bustling resort for the wealthy. Generals and diplomats were catered to by slaves and concubines. The Golden Emperor reigned for twenty- two years.
A new evil crept into the house of gold and it was forever stained red.
On a dark and frosty Winter Solstice night, the emperor’s lead general—Adamantius Pillar—launched a successful coup. He raped and slaughtered the emperor while his soldiers did the same to six of Bornak’s ten wives and two of his four husbands. Ten of his twenty-one offspring were killed. The emperor’s remaining family scattered to the ten continents and hid in exile.
The weeping of ten thousand wives and mothers could be heard across the seas.
In military fashion, General Adamantius Pillar showed no mercy to any opposition. He conquered the territories, stripped them of their natural resources and left them a barren waste. Taxes were levied against his lands by foreign governors loyal to Pillar. They were mostly greedy squatters who enforced oppressive rule and demanded unlimited access to the women of the villages. The death tolls from his transcontinental conquests were estimated to be several hundred thousand men, women and children.
The Crimson Army’s thirst for wealth and power knows no bounds.
On a balmy summer, twelve years into his tyranny, General Pillar mobilized his army to capture the castle of the lead priest, Luke Ellipsos, of the Universal Religion, who believed in the existence of multiple worlds, multiple ecclesiastical beings and one ruling deity—Unideit.
The priests of the Universal Religion were precursors to modern-day Gunthi monks, who shun the violence done in the name of the Universal Religion and practice their faith in peaceful seclusion. They no longer refer to the Unideit as their deity; instead, they believe in an intangible source of love and peace that connects us all through invisible flowing threads (or a gnarled ball of twine).
Remember what fate awaits those who seek distant treasures.
General Pillar’s ambition was not religious in nature; he was seeking the wealth of jewels said to reside in Ellipsos’ castle. On the first attempt, they were unable to breach the castle walls. They camped in the surrounding land and cut off all supply routes, intending to starve the holy congregation into submission. Ellipsos appeared on his high tower and denounced the surrounding army. As an abomination to humanity, they would be struck down by the Universal Deity (Unideit).
From the swamps of Sardis rose divine intervention and the Crimson Army was reduced to ash by the Unideit.
Over the next thirty days, General Pillar’s army dwindled by 90 percent, as bodies of his dead soldiers filled the swamp. History would later reveal that this “miracle” of “divine intervention” was actually the result of swamp fever—a deadly disease transmitted by water flukes. Death came mercilessly from agonizing organ failure due to the flukes eating their way through livers and lungs.
Ignorant of the true cause of the general’s demise, the four continents heralded Luke Ellipsos as the right hand of Unideit. The religion and the priests gained world recognition for the “Ellipsos Miracle.” He removed the foreign governors and replaced them with newly ordained local priests, forming the Universal Brotherhood. What was believed to promise freedom brought only a new type of oppression. Ellipsos laid claim to all of the general’s conquered territory and declared them united under the Universal Religion. No longer persecuted for race, provinces were now persecuted for religion.
Deity and ruler of man, worlds and universe, have You abandoned this world to its own undoing or are You so cruel that You would take part in the bloodshed abound?
People could perceive no less oppression or fewer taxes under Ellipsos’ rule. His lack of experience led to poor oversight, and provinces were left to the brutality of local ruling priests. (Today, being called “elliptical” could have many meanings depending on the context and intonation. It might mean ecclesiastical in a complimentary fashion, simpleminded or deserving of pity with a disapproving tone, or incompetent if the person was disliked.) The continents fractured into quarrelling, chaotic battlegrounds.
While Ellipsos’ Universal Religion spilled over the four continents, by the end of his nineteen years of blundering rule, he could only truly claim to still control Bellos.
What fair maiden speaks of hope but lashes out with a serpent’s tail dripping with venom?
Out of the ashes of warring provinces rose Ophelia Bornak, daughter of the slain Golden Emperor. Despite her father’s bloody reign, this generation romanticized it as a time of unity and prosperity. She gained power, reduced the priests to figureheads, and reunited the conti
nents under taxation, slavery and foreign governors.
She retained a fondness for the Universal Religion and kept a set of advisors within the Universal Brotherhood. Religious persecution was no longer government sanctioned, and it was also not condoned. Empress Ophelia rebuilt the fleets of ships her father once commanded.
Oh, the familiar Golden shroud—masking death on a bed of knives. Lie down on the bed of knives, soldiers of fortune, and acquaint with your destiny.
Fearful of being overthrown by the military as her father once was, she purged her army of any internal opposition yearly. (Today, the Purging Holiday was in the spring and recognized as a day to forgive enemies and reconcile with family—a pleasant twist on a recurring historical nightmare.)
Do you dare bring a child into this world who will never know freedom?
With such firm control, Ophelia maintained her rule for an unprecedented forty years. Bitter and brutal to the end, she died of old age. She was succeeded by Samtarnik Zallik, one of her younger lovers and soldiers of fortune. He was from Karnelik, but not of royal blood and held disdain for the succession of kings and queens in his homeland. Fulfilling his own personal agenda, he invited the king of Karnelik to his castle on Bellos, only to murder him in his sleep.
After he killed the king, Isabel Dallik, the king’s widow, began the conspiracy to unite powerful Che stones and bind the overflowing evil of the world into a single entity that would only pose a threat every one thousand years.
There was so much bloodshed and death. I felt nauseated. I didn’t want to know that world—a world where man’s evil ruled and people lived brief, grief-stricken lives followed by brutal deaths.
I reflected on a discussion Joshua and I had a few years ago. I was famished one day and went to Paul’s dormitory to loot his kitchen. Paul turned out to be studying in the library, but Joshua was home.
