The king laughed, his voice so loud it shook the walls and sent more debris plummeting down.
“NEED? I AM A DEMIGOD. I HAVE NO NEEDS, ONLY POWER!”
He raised the trident and a blast of blinding holy fire broke open the rest of the sky window.
Elara covered her head until the danger passed.
“Yes, you have power, Father. Power unrivaled, as one of your station should. But our city needs that power now. And you. Can’t you see how Atlantis fares?”
The king’s eyes glazed a moment. He looked around, as if trying to wake from a dream. Then he shook his head, those dark eyes falling to his daughter again.
“ATLANTIS IS A DYING SEED. A PRISON. I SEE IT CLEARLY NOW. WHY SHOULD I CARE FOR A CAGE WHEN THE WORLD ABOVE AWAITS MY RULE?”
King Atlas turned to leave when Elara shouted out.
“Father!” Elara stood, revealing herself. “You forget yourself.”
The demigod turned back with a willful sneer.
“DO I NOW?”
The king aimed the trident at Elara. She stood her ground. There was nothing to protect her now. But before King Atlas fired, a kinetic blast shot from the seats, striking the demigod in the back of the head. King Atlas turned to see Fanucio, wide-eyed, halfway up the auditorium, smiling meekly, a glowing sonstave in his hand.
“Apologies, your massiveness,” Fanucio stuttered. “Misfire. Totally my fault.”
The trident spun, and holy fire ripped through the seats. Fanucio dove out of the way as several rows were instantly destroyed.
“Do something!” Nyx shouted.
Columbus stepped from behind one of the columns. “Fire at his eyes! He can’t hit what he can’t see!”
A series of sonstave blasts struck the king in the face and head. He responded with a roar, sending more holy fire across the Nave, blasting through columns, and eviscerating more seats. Columbus dashed across the aisles, grabbing Elara as the throne was obliterated.
Smoke filled the room as the trident fell silent. King Atlas stalked to the side of the room, searching for the interlopers.
In one of the narrow alcoves, Columbus and Elara huddled together.
“What can we do?” Elara whispered. “His mind is gone.”
“Keep trying,” Columbus answered. “You can get through to him. I know it.”
“Look,” Elara said.
In the rafters, a large section of metal and glass hung perilously over the room. At the top of the seats, Monday and Tuesday took aim with their spears. They tossed them both, striking the target dead on. The metal cracked, and the entire section fell, striking King Atlas across the back and sending him tumbling to a knee. Monday and Tuesday let out a cheer and touched heads. Then, King Atlas’s eyes locked onto them and he snarled.
“Oh, shit,” Tuesday muttered in Spanish.
Holy fire ripped across the balcony, chasing the Pygmies as they ran for their lives. More columns fell, the walls of the great amphitheater threatening to come down around them.
King Atlas’s chest heaved as he stood, spinning around to look for more targets. Elara remained hidden but called out again.
“Even now your city crumbles around you. The city you gave an oath to protect.”
“OATH?” the demigod echoed as he searched for her.
“To save our people. They live still. And they need you more than ever.”
King Atlas bellowed. “NO. I COMMAND THE SKIES AND THE SEA. I RULE THE ANIMALS OF EVERY KINGDOM. I ALONE CAN RESHAPE THE VERY EARTH. BEHOLD!”
King Atlas slammed the pommel of the trident down into the cobbled floor. Instantly, a shimmering wave swelled out, turning everything within a ten-foot radius into solid gold.
Columbus’s eyes narrowed. Then he noticed the transmutation had stopped at the center of the Nave where that familiar pale rock with three holes still sat. It hit him at once. His trip to the Fates.
“Elara look at your father’s feet. The stone. The Fates revealed that stone to me. It’s the one from which the trident gave birth to Atlantis. We need to get him to strike it again before the floor collapses.”
King Atlas stormed around, peeling stones away with his hands, hunting for any sign of the humans.
Columbus looked for another route to the floor. Only then did he notice Elara had gone. He looked, horrified to see her stepping out on the floor, approaching the monster without a shred of cover. Her voice stopped everything.
“King Atlas, protector of Atlantis, thirty-second son of your line. Do you not know me?”
King Atlas turned. Elara was ten feet away, well within his reach. Despite this, he didn’t move, even as she tread closer.
“I am your daughter and your most devoted servant. Can you not hear my plea through this veil of madness?”
The king blinked, as if trying to see through a fog. “I KNOW YOU.”
Seeing the demigod was distracted, Columbus slipped from the alcove to the balcony and crept along the bannister behind him.
At the same time, Elara made her way to the center of the floor, stopping only when the three-holed rock was beneath her feet.
“Yes,” Elara said. “All my life I have watched you from the shadows, marveling at your strength and courage, wanting nothing more than to earn your respect and love as the people loved and respected you. Do you not know me?”
King Atlas grimaced, fighting against the storm that raged in his mind. Then it came to him. “ELARA?”
“Yes,” Elara cried. “It’s me. Put down the trident, Father. It was never meant for us. If you put it down, we can rebuild Atlantis together.”
Behind them, Columbus slipped over the bannister, tip-toeing his way toward the trident, still clenched tightly in the king’s hand.
“I CANNOT. THE DRAW IS TOO POWERFUL. EVEN NOW, I FEEL IT BENDING MY MIND TO ITS WILL. HELP ME.”
“Strike me down, then! Do it now, with all your strength. Strike me down and your torment will end!”
The demigod’s body shook, the struggle within him building with rage until it was too much.
“NO. I CANNOT—”
It was all Columbus needed to hear. He ran and latched onto the trident with both hands, ripping it from the king’s grasp before running off.
King Atlas’s head spun back to Elara, his eyes filling with rage. His mighty hand struck her, flinging her across the room as he yelled, “DECEIVER!”
Elara struck the wall and lay motionless.
King Atlas charged after Columbus, watching as he whirled the trident around and pointed it at him. He squeezed it, expecting to unleash holy fire. Nothing happened.
“What…?” he asked.
“FOOL!” King Atlas bellowed. “NONE BUT A GOD MAY WIELD IT!”
King Atlas stomped his foot down. The cobbles of the floor split. Columbus tumbled to the ground. As the glow of lava burned below, the trident shot from his hands and slid across the floor. The pommel struck the bannister, turning a long section of it to gold.
King Atlas lumbered for the trident, leaning to pick it up when Nyx fired a blast from her sonstave, striking him in the eyes. He reached out and grabbed her with his hand, ready to squeeze the life out of her when a streak of red whipped by overhead. It was the Pygmies, flying on the ends of two banners. When they wrapped around the king’s eyes, Fanucio fired his sonstave and hit the king’s forearm. Nyx fell to the floor.
“The trident,” Nyx screamed. “Put it in the rock!”
Columbus scampered across the stones and through the king’s legs. He scooped up the trident, twirling it in his hand as he closed in on the center rock. With careful aim he lined the tines with the three holes and heaved downward with all his might.
A blast shook the room and Columbus was sent sprawling. When he looked up, the trident lay broken in two pieces. The top half by the demigod, the bottom half by Elara, who looked up, woozy.
“WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?” King Atlas roared.
Elara whispered, “He is not the Anak-Ta Eleece.”
The walls shook again, this quake bigger than any other. The city was coming down around them.
“We’re out of time!” Fanucio shouted.
Elara watched as her father closed in on the top half of the trident, those tines glowing with power “Father!” she screamed as her hand wrapped around the bottom half of the trident. “Forgive me.”
She flung the broken trident as hard as she could. It skittered across the floor, spinning until it struck his foot. King Atlas looked down. The pommel was touching him. The golden wave already rising up his legs. He looked back at Elara and saw only sorrow in her eyes. In those final seconds, he looked like himself again.
“No,” he said. “The injury is mine. Forgive—”
As the transmutation concluded, Elara turned away.
Columbus rose to his feet as the floor shook. It felt like another quake, but Columbus knew differently. “He’s too heavy! Nyx!”
Nyx sprinted across the floor. Columbus grabbed the top half of the trident and threw it toward the center of the room. Nyx caught it and slid to a halt over the rock, hefting the trident up with both hands. She looked to Elara.
“Do it,” Elara said.
Nyx slammed the trident into the rock.
The voice spoke a final time.
It is done.
A wave of power radiated out from the rock, blowing past Columbus and the others. It passed through the remaining walls of the city, extending out over the water, healing the seabed as it continued to expand. As it bubbled outward, it reached the Void. A blinding light broke over the realm as the two barriers became one. Instantly the volcanic rifts disappeared, the sea grew calm. The trees and foliage grew more vibrant, and the animals came out of their dens.
Outside Gaia’s Craw, the sirens waited, watching as the light approached. They held their heads high, lilting a simple song as the energy washed over them. Instantly their sickly bodies shed away. Their stunted appendages grew longer, feathering with brilliant plumes as they took to flight, their song becoming clear and beautiful as if it had been born of the angels themselves.
On the Isle of Arcadia, the people of Atlantis cheered. Mothers and fathers cradled their children as they cried. Many ran into the water, singing their own prayers of hope in honor of Poseidon.
Back in the Nave, Elara cried. A weary Columbus nodded to her, and she nodded back. Then his gaze turned to Nyx. She shrugged as if embarrassed by what she’d done. He laughed softly, but inside he hurt for the pain he’d caused her. His daughter. He would need to make amends.
From high above, more cheers resounded. The Pygmies had found a bottle of Atlantean wine and were toasting with it. Even Fanucio laughed.
Then the remaining half of the cobbled floor began to shake. Nyx was still in the center.
“Nyx!” Columbus shouted. “Get out of there!”
Nyx tried to run just as the floor collapsed, toppling into the inferno below. She was hanging from a stone a foot beneath the surface. She tried to pull herself up but didn’t have the strength. That’s when she saw the bottom half of the trident on a small shelf to her right. It had already turned the rock to gold and was dangling over the abyss.
Elara screamed.
Columbus slid up to the edge and extended his hand. “Give me your hand!”
Nyx looked at him and back to the treasure. She watched his eyes turn toward it, saw him register what it was. It was so close.
“The treasure,” she groaned.
Columbus hesitated only a moment before he moved.
As he passed to her right, she felt something leave her, as if a knife had been lodged in her heart and now it had been pulled out, leaving a vacuum that hurt worse than the blade itself. She shouldn’t have been surprised. This is who he is. She had known that all along. Her only mistake was believing he could change.
Just as she began to accept her fate, Columbus leaped down on that rock, his boot kicking the trident, sending it plummeting over the edge. Nyx looked up, tears spilling over her cheeks as he latched onto her arm.
“The only treasure I need is right here.”
He lifted her up and pulled her into his arms. She sobbed in relief as she collapsed into him, hoping beyond anything he would never let her go.
Up above, Elara and Fanucio cried too.
At the top of the Nave, Tuesday sniffled. Monday stared at him.
“What?” Tuesday asked. “All this smoke is hell on my allergies.”
Monday wrapped his arm around his friend.
Chapter Twenty-Five
They gathered in the Garden of the Blest. The Void had been pushed back by several miles, leaving a meadow of such overwhelming beauty Columbus wanted to get lost in it. The citizens of Atlantis lingered there, unwilling to celebrate in the face of so many losses but relieved the worst was behind them. Though their kingdom lay in ruins, work had already begun on a new one on the Island of Arcadia. This city they would name after their king.
As Elara spoke, she told her people some of the ancient crafts might be necessary to rebuild their kingdom, but that they were only tools. The true worth of a kingdom came from its people and their character could only be forged by hard work. The people embraced the idea. Poseidon must have too. When she was done, the old bridge finally crumbled and fell. No longer would any be separated by difference or station. Each man, woman, and child would thrive on their own merits.
Finally, the moment everyone had been waiting for arrived. The honoring of champions. First, Elara bestowed gifts and praise upon her own people, including her father and those who had given their lives. An eternal flame would burn so all could come and honor the sacrifices of the dead.
Next, she honored those who had fought or served bravely. Some were Gadeir. Others were simple citizens. The healers that tended to wounds. The fishermen who swept people to safety. All were humbled in their queen’s presence.
At last, she turned to Columbus and his crew.
“And to our friends from the dark continent,” Elara said, handing two beautifully crafted spears to Monday and Tuesday. “These are given to replace the ones you lost. May they guide you in the light and dark and only serve your hand.”
Monday and Tuesday bowed before taking the spears and slipping them into sleeves that had been crafted from Gadeir fabric.
“And to the most loyal first mate of this realm or any other. I present you with this.” She held out a golden foot. “May it always keep you fleet of foot.”
“My golden foot!” Fanucio shouted as he replaced his peg leg with it. “And it fits! Thank you, Princess. I mean, my Queen. I’ll treasure it always.”
Elara smiled as she stepped forward and kissed him on the cheek, whispering into his ear, “Just don’t let your captain sell it.” Fanucio blushed and turned away.
Dion was next, looking as uncomfortable as a warrior standing in a field of flowers could.
“And to our kingdom’s most faithful son. Without your fealty and strength, all would be lost. This belongs to you.” She held out her father’s sword. Dion’s eyes grew wide, and his lip trembled. Then he shook his head.
“No gift could be greater, my lady, but I must refuse. All I have known is a life of bloodshed, though I see from these strangers there is far more to it. No longer will I take up weapons. From now on, I pledge to live a life of peace.”
Elara was moved. “If that is your wish.”
“If you would allow me one request? Allow me to accompany the mariner. A strange world awaits above. If there are more people like him, I would like to meet them before I return.”
“Atlantis has need of leaders.”
“I beg pardon, my Queen, but they have all they need in you.”
Elara took a heavy breath before nodding. Dion bowed, and she moved on.
Next, she came to Nyx. The girl stood straight and stiff, fighting with everything she had to keep the smile off her face. At this, she failed miraculously.
“Nyx, you hold a special place in my heart. Throug
hout your journey, you have maintained the light from which all good things flow. For that, I give you this.” A woman handed Elara a beautiful cape, which she gave to Nyx. “It belonged to my mother. It is called the Cape of Royals and allowed me to move freely about the city as a child. It will not make you invisible, but those not looking will be hard pressed to see you.”
“Thank you, Queen Elara,” Nyx said. “I already love it because it’s from you.”
Elara kissed her on the cheek and moved on to Columbus.
“Christopher Columbus. Walk with me.”
He nodded and held his arm out. She took it and together they headed deeper into the garden, passing over the brook that ran with fresh water again. They stopped where it forked and listened as it ran over the rocks. They stood there in silence for a time, both unsure what to say. Eventually, Elara spoke.
“The gift I chose for you, I know you will not take. But I offer it anyway. Stay. Share my kingdom with me.”
Columbus gazed into the eyes of this stunning, regal woman and knew any man in his right mind would be a fool to say no. But in his heart, he knew his destiny lay elsewhere.
“As much as I would love to, Princess, my place is on the sea. But you could always come with us.”
“See the sun rise every morning?”
“And the stars shine every night. No allegiances but to each other.”
“A tempting proposal. But you have your world to rule, and I have mine.”
“Since Dion will not take my father’s sword, I’d like you to have it. It will pair well with my brother’s shield. Neither will fail you.” Columbus bowed. “Oh. And I have something else. To start you on your new journey.”
She drew a rolled-up parchment from her pocket and handed it to him. He nodded again and slipped it away.
“May I ask one last thing before we part?” Elara said.
“Don’t worry, Princess. I will keep the location of Atlantis secret.”
“Thank you, but I actually had something different in mind.”
Columbus smiled. He took her in his arms and kissed her deeply.
Christopher Columbus and the Lost City of Atlantis Page 35
