by Holly Martin
‘A prophecy?’ I whispered.
Sebastian nodded his head the tiniest of fractions, as he pushed open the great oak doors.
‘Oh,’ I said, quietly. ‘Thanks.’
As we stepped through into the dark corridor, my eyes adjusted. I was standing on a marble floor that stretched, dark and gleaming down a long corridor, to a set of great, gold patterned doors. The corridor was lined with burning torches, set in gold brackets.
I followed Sebastian down the corridor, his fists clenched angrily at his side. I looked at him warily. Everything about him was screaming a furious rage and I was right, he suddenly whirled round to face me, his eyes livid in the light of the torches.
‘Don’t misunderstand me,’ he growled in my head. ‘If it comes down to a fight for your life, if it comes to a choice between you living and dying, I will fight to the death for you. But I will not turn against the Oraculum so easily, and I hope, with every fibre of my soul, that the day I pledge to you never comes. I will do everything in my power to serve the Oraculum, to keep it together, united. A world without the Oraculum doesn’t bear thinking about. As far as I am concerned, we have let you have your way for far too long and it is time we reined you in. You belong to us, we created you and we will control you,’ he seethed.
He turned and stormed down the corridor ahead of me, leaving me feeling confused and cold. He pushed open the gold patterned doors, and they echoed loudly down the corridor as they slammed open.
I walked slowly into a great room and the door slammed behind me. The room had great ceilings, adorned with gold leaves, twisting and climbing over every surface. The black marble floor continued in here as well, as did the burning torches. There were several doors leading off the chamber, each protected with two huge Guardians. But the thing that held my attention was the nine towering plinths in an arc around the room in front of me. The plinths seemed to be made of a dark, shiny mahogany, and towered at least ten feet above me. At each plinth sat a man, each of them dressed in a blue cloak, each of them sharing the same look of distaste that Sebastian had reserved for me. Sebastian went up some steps on my left which led to a higher balcony that wound round behind the plinths. He followed the balcony round to the empty plinth near to the end, swept his blue cloak round his shoulders, and then sat down on his plinth, joining in with the staring and looks of distaste. I looked up at all the men, wondering if they all hated me as much as Sebastian did.
Cain had said that Nereus and Helez were loyal to me, but loyal in the same way that Sebastian was? That was the kind of loyalty I could do without. I wondered which ones were Nereus and Helez. My eyes scanned the men closely, looking for any glimmer of friendliness, a glimmer of hope. Samuel I had seen briefly at the church when I had just started my training a few months before. Matthias had come to me after I’d saved the plane crash and Jonah and Nathaniel I recognised as the ones I had inadvertently spied on. Cain was sitting on the central plinth and I wondered if there was a reason why he occupied that plinth. There wasn’t a glimmer of warmth from him either. I looked at the three I had not yet met. Leon, Nereus and Helez, all of which were supposedly loyal to me though I didn’t know which was which.
The moment of silence lasted what seemed like an eternity.
Was I supposed to say something? Because if I was, no one had handed me my cue. I continued to stare up at them, my neck beginning to ache with the height that they sat above me.
Samuel suddenly stood up in annoyance. ‘Enough of this,’ he roared, and sweeping his blue cloak round his shoulders he left the plinth and disappeared out the doors directly behind him. They slammed shut, the loud boom echoing round the great chamber.
Matthias stood with a heavy sigh. ‘Jonah, why don’t you show Eve to her room.’ He swept his cloak round his shoulders and he too disappeared out the double doors, but with less theatrics than Samuel.
Cain stood too. ‘I suggest we reconvene at two.’
The other remaining men nodded once and swept out of the room too. Cain hovered for a fraction of a second but left with them, leaving Jonah staring down at me thoughtfully. He gathered his cloak around him and swept gracefully down the stairs towards me.
‘I am Jonah of the Oraculum,’ he said, his voice deep and gravelly. The look of distaste was gone, but it had not been replaced by a look of warmth, more a look you would give a strange creature you had never seen before, a look of mild curiosity. ‘Follow me please.’ He swept towards the nearest set of double doors, which the Guardians moved to open. I quickly followed.
This corridor was dark and barely lit and immediately Jonah went down some stone steps that curved down and round, going so deep that I was sure that we were going into the depths of the mountain. As we followed the steps down, it got colder and colder, and my heart started beating faster.
‘How do you like your new personal guard, Caleb’s replacement?’
My step faltered, knowing instantly who he meant. I hadn’t made the connection before with his continued presence. ‘Isaac?’
‘Yes.’
I sighed. ‘He doesn’t like me.’
‘He doesn’t need to like you; in fact it’s better if he doesn’t. We don’t need any more Guardians indulging you.’ He paused. ‘He is pledged to you though.’ But I couldn’t tell whether Jonah thought this was a good thing or not.
Eventually we reached the bottom of the stairs and a Guardian opened up a big, thick set metal gate that led to a long stone corridor, only lit by the occasional torch. I followed Jonah and the Guardian followed me. My heart roared in my ears. At the very end, in the dim darkness, was another metal gate which the Guardian opened. I couldn’t see what was past the gate, there was just darkness.
‘Eve, please,’ Jonah motioned me to go in. I hesitated, swallowing nervously at what I couldn’t see. But the Guardian stood threateningly close behind me and I knew I would be made to go in, if I didn’t go through willingly. Checking my pocket for Quinn’s presence, I stepped into the darkness and the iron gate closed behind me, with an ominous clang.
I turned back to face Jonah as the Guardian locked the gate.
‘I’ll collect you in a few hours Eve, I suggest you use the time to think.’ Jonah turned and walked back up the corridor with the Guardian, disappearing into the gloom. A few seconds later, I heard the clang of the metal gate at the other end of the corridor. I was alone.
Chapter 9
I turned back to my cell, trying to adjust my eyes to the darkness from the limited light that came from the corridor. But it was so dark down here I couldn’t even make out the walls. They could have been just in front of me or twenty metres away. I looked over my shoulder back up the corridor to check I wasn’t being watched, but there was no one out there and the silence from the cell suggested I was alone in here too.
I closed my eyes and reached for my powers, hoping that I still had them and created a tiny flame in my hand. I was surprised how quickly and easily my powers came. Maybe the force field didn’t stretch this far down the mountain. I held the flame out and the flickering light caught the four walls. The cell was no more than a small bed, and a short metre of space between the bed and the other wall. I lay down on the bed and let my light wink out as I closed my eyes.
Despite the fact that I wasn’t trying to use my powers, I could still feel them tearing through my veins, pounding through my heart. It was only now as I lay in my cell that I realised that it wasn’t fear that had caused my heart to pound furiously as we descended the stairs, it was my power. I could only normally feel my powers when I reached out for them, ready to use them; at all other times I didn’t even know they were there. And the power that I could feel through me now was an inordinate amount of power. The kind I had only ever experienced once when I had fought the Reapers, and I wasn’t even trying to use them now. My heart raced, my head pounded with the power that was consuming me. I tried taking deep breaths but it didn’t relent. A huge part of me wanted to see what I could achieve with this powe
r, it would be immense. I could literally turn this great castle to dust, and probably the mountain too. I grinned in the darkness, that would show the Oraculum who was in charge. Their precious castle turned to ash and me standing amongst the ruins. So powerful they couldn’t even touch me. But I had promised I would be good and not act like an idiot. I didn’t really want an execution on my hands.
I fished in my pocket and pulled Quinn out, sitting him carefully on my stomach. He eyed me angrily. It was surprising that even as a mouse I could still pick up on his moods.
‘It’s ok Quinn,’ I said quietly. ‘So they’ve locked me in a cell, they’re just trying to make me sweat; they’re coming back for me in a few hours.’
His whiskers twitched, and he hopped down from the bed, and scurried off into the darkness, presumably to explore the cell.
I rolled on my side, trying to ignore the power surging through me. No sooner had I got comfortable than I heard the sound of the metal gate clanging at the end of the corridor and the sound of footsteps on the stone floor getting louder as my visitor came towards me. I climbed off the bed and went to stand at the entrance to my cell.
The man who came to stand before me was one of the ones I hadn’t met. He was the youngest of the Oraculum, he looked to be about Quinn’s age. Though his hair, short at the back with a fashionably long fringe, swept over his eyes, was silvery white, indicating he was perhaps a lot older than he looked. His eyes too were of a silver colour. He stared at me through the bars, and the more he stared the more he smiled.
‘I’m Leon,’ he finally said.
‘Hi Leon,’ I said, quietly.
‘They can hear us, it’s best to speak like this,’ he said in my head, as he leaned back against the wall, looking at the floor.
‘Ok.’ I had to be careful what I said to them. There was so much double crossing going on, I wasn’t sure who I could trust anymore.
‘So what’s your take on the Oraculum then? Pompous, arrogant, back stabbers?’
I looked down at my red converse trainers; he wasn’t going to get me to admit to any of that.
‘They are though aren’t they?’ he pressed on. ‘Sitting around on those great plinths, looking down on you, sitting in judgement, it makes me cringe. We’re not normally like that you know. We normally meet in much less formal situations. We sit, eat, share our prophecies, talk about what we intend to do about them. But you…..’ he shook his head with amusement. ‘You have grabbed hold of the Oraculum and shook them up. Ripped out the foundations from underneath us. Now we meet in secret and only then with those we think that we can trust the most, and even then we are careful what we say. The prophecies are not shared anymore; we keep them to ourselves in case we are sharing them with someone who doesn’t feel the same as us. It’s sad really, we’ve sat on the council for close to four hundred years, watched many kings and queens come and go. Watched rulers try to destroy their own countries and then invade other countries. We’ve bore witness to so many changes, technological, territorial, philosophical and we’ve always shared what we see about the future. We have always agreed on the best course of action, even when that course of action meant we did nothing. There has never been a time to distrust each other, to doubt each other and now that has all changed.’ Leon slid down the wall and sat on the floor with his legs crossed, leaning his head back and closing his eyes, looking like he was deep in meditation or prayer.
I bit my lip and sat down as well. Quinn scurried to my side and I smiled to myself as I saw him watching Leon, beadily. I surreptitiously tapped my head to indicate that me and Leon were talking telepathically.
Leon looked at me. ‘You hungry? Here.’ He passed me a chocolate bar.
‘No I’m fine,’ I said, just as my stomach gurgled loudly to prove me a liar. Eli would probably slide right into this cell and slap me round the face, if I took something to eat from a stranger again.
Leon smiled. ‘Oh yes, I forgot, no food unless it’s checked by your Guardians first, here.’ He unwrapped it, broke a chunk off and swallowed it. ‘See.’ He passed it to me and after a moment’s hesitation I bit into it.
‘Thanks.’ I broke a small chunk off and let it drop on the floor near to Quinn.
Leon leaned back against the wall again. ‘Eight years ago I had a prophecy that Nereus was going to kill Samuel. The prophecy was based at an assembly like we had this morning. You were in attendance, surrounded by your Guardians and Nereus suddenly stood up and burned Samuel to dust. I don’t know what was said before to provoke the attack, whether it was just or not, but it definitely had something to do with you. Normally we share all our prophecies together over dinner. But this was clearly not the kind of prophecy that could be shared, it would break the Oraculum. And both Nereus and Samuel are, were good friends of mine, we were all good friends, brothers almost. If I told Samuel of his impending demise, that would implicate Nereus and turn Samuel against him. If I told Nereus of his murderous deeds he would always be looking at Samuel wondering why he would ultimately end up murdering him. So I told no one. But the prophecies are always correct and there is nothing we can do to change them.’
I shook my head. ‘But that’s not true, you had a prophecy of the end of the world and you created me to stop it, that’s you trying to change your prophecies.’
Leon looked at me. ‘The prophecy was of you saving the world. We have all had prophecies of the end of the world, but in every single one of them, you were there fighting to save it.’
‘Oh.’
He resumed his position with his head against the wall again, eyes closed. ‘Anyway, we are given these prophecies so we can prepare for them. It didn’t feel right that I had seen this future and I was the only one that knew. The Oraculum do not have secrets from one another. So I told my most trusted friend, Sebastian. Sebastian told Samuel and Nathaniel of my prophecy and they both confronted Nereus about it. Of course Nereus knew nothing of this and knew no reason why he would ever turn against his friend, his brother in that way. Nereus believed that I had made up this prophecy to turn Samuel against him and he confronted me about why I had done this. The others were angry that I had kept a prophecy to myself. It was demanded that I shared all the details with the rest of the council, which I duly did. They were not best pleased that the source of the betrayal and murder was you. Cain then spoke up and said he too had had a prophecy that Nathaniel murdered Nereus whilst you were there. This resulted in a massive argument. There are those that believe that Cain and I have made these prophecies up, there are those that refuse to believe them, and those that do. But since that day we haven’t met as a council and no one knows who to trust. One thing we do know is that the breaking of the Oraculum, whenever that day will come, will be down to you.’
I exhaled deeply, trying to take it all in. ‘This stems back to when I was nine years old, when I had no clue about my future, about my destiny. This animosity towards me isn’t about me going to the Reapers at all, it’s about me, somehow ripping the Oraculum apart.’
‘Well for the first time in eight years, we are now united in one opinion. That what you did when you went to the Reapers can never happen again, but we cannot decide on how to proceed, on how to stop it from happening. Some feel that the best course of action would be to keep you here until the end of the world comes. Some feel that it’s your compassion and knowledge of the world that will make you save it, that will make you fight for it so fiercely. Some believe that taking you away from your friends, family and Seth now would make you so angry and bitter and when the end of the world comes, there won’t be enough love in your heart to want to save it.’
‘Have you ever tried to change the prophecies?’ I asked.
Leon smiled again. ‘In the beginning, yes, but we soon learned we couldn’t do anything about them.’
I shook my head angrily. ‘But these prophecies, sharing these prophecies will be the thing that ultimately brings them about. If Nereus has an argument with Samuel whilst I’m there, he wil
l think about killing him only because it has been seen in a prophecy, if he didn’t know about the prophecy then he probably wouldn’t even think about killing him.’
‘It messes with your head doesn’t it? Is it knowing about the prophecy that makes you do it, or would you have done it anyway? Since I saw the prophecy of Nereus killing Samuel, it’s made me think, made us all think, which side we would be on when the fight breaks out. Nathaniel would obviously be on the side of Samuel, if he kills Nereus to avenge Samuel’s death so Nathaniel and Samuel are now very close because of this prophecy.’
I looked up at Leon. ‘Which side would you be on then?’
He looked at me incredulously. ‘I’m on your side Eve, I don’t know what Nereus or Samuel will stand for or against, but I do know this, I know that I am on the side that fights for you.’
I smiled, sadly, as I reached through the bars to take his hand. Before the end, there would be so much death. Leon took my hand and squeezed it.
‘And where do you stand on today’s issue?’ I smiled, hopefully.
Leon smiled as he pushed my hand back through the bars and stood up. ‘You’ll need these in a few days’ time.’
I felt something cold in my hand and I opened them to see two gold wedding rings. I looked back up at Leon but he was already halfway back up the corridor and disappearing into the gloom. I stared back at the rings in my hand. One was bigger than the other, but apart from that they were identical. The rings were twisted to look like braided gold rope. There was writing on the inside, but it didn’t make sense, like some of the words were missing. I held my palm up to the light to try to make sense of it, and as I did the rings clanked together to make one thick ring, as if they were magnetically attracted. The words now made sense as they were written across both rings, and only made sense when the rings were together. In the finest writing were the words ‘A tangible representation of our bond’ and my heart leapt with recognition.
