Atlantis: City of Mages

by M. Arcturus

  Seth looked at Pandora. More than anything, he wanted to say something witty in defiance to Anthony’s words, to find something to justify his rage, but he couldn’t. Looking at her now and reflecting on Anthony’s last few words, he couldn’t picture his life without her. The thought of her dying pained him so much that he almost let a tear fall. Anthony was right. His irritation over the garden incident paled in comparison to losing her. He had hurt her by his words, but he didn’t know how he could mend the tension.

  The whispered conversation between the men had dwindled. Pandora’s ear was pressed up against the wall. “Help me!” The voice was not much louder than what it was before, but this time Pandora heard it.

  “What was that?” She asked as she looked at Anthony. “Seth, I think he’s onto something. I heard it, too.” Though her voice was compassionate, the look in her eyes told Seth that something in her had died. His words had done more damage than what he thought they had. Seth finally realized that there was a good chance redemption with Pandora may not be possible.

  Putting aside his concern for Pandora, he stated dryly, “Then we have two options. Find the girl or find the eggs. What do you think we should do?”

  The question came to her as a shock. He had taken charge of the group this whole time only to turn around and give the reigns to her. She looked at him as if it was a trick question. He gave no indication of trickery. What he had said was true. The humbled expression on his face only hinted that there was more to be said. “I think we need to save her. She’s too young to die. Atlantis is dying. Even if we find the eggs, the war may still persist. I—”

  Seth cut her off. “I understand. No need for explanation. Anthony, Pandora, you lead the way.”

  “What am I, scrap?” His voice was shrill and sharp to their ears.

  Seth glared at Icarus. “I have yet to hear something come out of your mouth that shows some sign of intelligence. Better yet, something that doesn’t benefit you.”

  Pandora walked past them and started to lead the way. “Aren’t you going to say something to her?” Anthony’s question didn’t surprise Seth in the least.

  “Honestly, I don’t know what to say.”

  “I’ll see if I can convince her to stay behind to talk to you in private. That’s the best I can do.”

  “I’m surprised you’re willing to help me. Why are you doing this?”

  “If I goofed like you just did, I would want some help. Guys, in general, have a hard time expressing feelings using words. Might as well try to chip in and help.”

  “Thanks!”

  Anthony jogged up to the front beside Pandora. “You know he’s not a bad guy.”

  “I’m not so sure of that anymore.”

  “He knows now how he hurt you. He’s hoping that you’ll let him apologize.” He looked at her facial expression. “What’s on your mind?”

  “He loses his temper an awful lot and allows it to influence his thoughts and feelings. I know he’s trying to overcome his war-inspired instincts, but I’m not sure if I’m patient enough. How long will it take to erase years of conditioning?”

  “You’ll need to go to counseling for that. It just depends on how much you want to make it work.”

  “In the meantime, say he gets angry enough, what if he tries to hurt me?”

  “He’s not going to hurt you. He loves you too much. Why would you think he would hurt you?”

  Anthony’s words reminded her of what Selené once said. It pained her with a chilling memory. “He’s already pulled a knife on Selené.”

  “What!?!” Anthony stopped dead in his tracks then took off toward Seth.

  “Hold on Anthony! Everything is okay.” Pandora tried to pull at his shirt, but he was too strong.

  Anthony walked up to Seth, and out of nowhere balled up his fist and swung, knocking Seth onto the floor. Seth was too distraught over the situation with Pandora to get angry with Anthony. He just sat there rubbing his jaw. “Stand up!” Anthony shouted. Seth just looked at him stunned.

  “I don’t understand?”

  “You held a knife to Selené?”

  Seth’s pleading eyes landed on Pandora. “I’m sorry,” she muttered through a whisper.

  Seth closed his eyes and lowered his head to the floor. Anthony continued to shout, “Here I am trying to help you, and then I find this out.” Anthony didn’t know how to take Seth’s demeanor, which angered him even more. “I said, stand up!”

  “I’m not going to fight you.” He lifted his eyes to stare at Anthony. “I have wronged you both. Pandora’s right, I did hold a knife to Selené. She spoke badly about my people, and out of my own pride, I almost struck back. My anger ruins everything that I touch. I’m sorry.” Anthony took a breath and tried to calm down.

  “Guys, we don’t have time for this, and neither does the little girl we need to save.” Anthony just brushed past her and walked off down the hall taking the lead.

  “Pandora, why did you tell him? How did that even come up?” He asked sadly, yet the fire started to rekindle in his eyes. The look in her eye told him that the seed of mistrust had begun to germinate within her. It fueled his anger even more. How could she feel mistrust when it was she who had betrayed him? She told Anthony things that he had no right to know.

  Pandora looked back at Seth, who didn’t even try to get up. “He wanted me to make amends with you, but your anger scares me.” Pandora started to grow stronger from the truth of her words, letting the fear within her extinguish. “Anthony didn’t believe me when I told him that around you, I feared for my safety. So, the incident with Selené came up.”

  “I would never hurt you. Why would you even think that?”

  “I have seen your anger, Seth. If we got into it and you no longer loved me, what would keep me safe?” Her eyes zeroed in on him scrutinizing every facial expression and every muscle twitch. He didn’t move a hair. “I was hoping that through love, and given enough time, that I would overcome my fear or that you would be able to show me that you wouldn’t hurt me.”

  Trying to follow Anthony’s advice, Seth struggled with his natural instinct to fight back. She was more important to him than that, but the venomous words he wanted to say hung on the tip of his tongue. “I could never hurt you, and to keep my promise, I’ll do whatever it takes to regain your trust and do whatever you want me to do.”

  Pandora swallowed hard, knowing that this was going to be one of the hardest things she would ever have to say, “I can’t be with you until you get help. Once this all blows over, there’s a well-known sage on Avalon I want you to see. He will be able to help you. I’ll wait for you while you learn how to manage your anger. Until then, I can’t deal with this.” She left, following Anthony’s lead. Seth got up on his own feet, shaking off Anthony’s punch. He tried to drown out his newfound anger toward Pandora. He had no intention of ever speaking to this sage, and knew, whether he wanted to admit it or not, they were through. Keeping his anger to himself until the war was over was going to be tough.

  The group suffered in silence for quite some time. As they walked along the hallway, Anthony tapped on the wall with his knuckle, trying to see if the girl would respond.

  “Hello? Hello? Is someone there? Please help me.” Her voice still traveled down the pipes to get to them, but she sounded much closer.

  “Yes, we’re coming to get you. Please keep talking,” encouraged Anthony.

  The girl giggled in response, but it became apparent that it wasn’t because of Anthony’s statement. “Hey, cut that out! That tickles!”

  “Who’s there with you?”

  “My pet, Sparkles.”

  Anthony looked at Pandora, “Sparkles?”

  Pandora shrugged. Talking into the wall, she asked, “Who’s Sparkles?”

  “My pet dinosaur,” she answered with delight.

  “Dinosaur?
” Pandora asked under her breath as she pulled away from the wall. “It has got to be a dragon.”

  At that moment, they heard a loud banging sound. The girl shrieked in terror. They took off sprinting down the hall. Following the blaring noise, they turned left down an intersecting hallway and took the next right turn. Stopping dead in their tracks surprised at what they saw, they pulled back to the intersecting hall. Icarus stood in the middle of the other hallway too shocked to move. Anthony ran out and grabbed Icarus by the collar and pulled him back.

  “Well, at least we know where the girl is,” Anthony said, trying to stay positive.

  “Yeah, too bad that dragon found her first,” Seth replied.

  “That’s one long, sturdy dragon! It’s almost like watching a pile of boulders walking around.” Pandora’s eyes were wide in disbelief. “I wonder if he saw us.”

  “I’m pretty sure he did.”

  “Why’s that, Seth?” asked Anthony.

  “The banging has stopped.”

  Icarus piped up, “Uh, guys?”

  A deafening stillness settled over the conversation. Hearing the soft, slow grinding of rock on rock, they turned to face the hall they were about to enter and were confronted by the dragon’s large stone face. They looked upward to meet his eyes. They saw pain and resentment, but most of all, exhaustion. Baby dragons and Bennu had gathered around the stone dragon’s feet, all puffed up with energy and ready to attack. There were so many little ones that it was apparent that they could stop searching for the eggs. Juron’s cargo had hatched.

  However, there was no sign of the little girl or her pet Sparkles. They both must have been stuck in the pipes behind the wall, right next to the stone dragon. There was a tremendous dent in the wall from where the dragon had been banging his head trying to get to them. With an outstretched hand, Pandora cautiously stepped forth. The baby Bennu started to squawk. The elder dragon remained calm and focused despite the little ones around his feet.

  Pandora approached him slowly. Ignoring her drive to run, she outstretched her hand and lightly touched his nose, “I’m sorry.” A tear left her eye. “Is there anything that we can do?”

  The dragon let out a sigh-filled growl in dismay and shook her hand off of his face. “There is nothing for you to do other than pay for this monstrous act with your lives,” the dragon said. His voice was deep, and he started scraping the floor with his claw as if ready to charge.

  “Are all of the little ones accounted for?”

  He paused for a moment. “Why do you care? Shouldn’t you be running?”

  “No, even if I run, there will be others along the way that will kill me. Making it off of this isle is not likely without cooperation. We did not imprison your children. We are but a few who understand what has happened and have come to find the hatchlings to set them free.”

  Anthony and Seth had slowly moved from their spot and were working their way down the hall to help the girl. Catching sight of the movement, the dragon shifted his attention from Pandora to the guys and slammed his tail down in their path. Turning back to Pandora, “You are very tricky. I almost believed you.”

  “I didn’t know they were on the move, but all they’re trying to do is help the girl you were trying to get to.”

  “Why should I allow you to help her?” Icarus had started running down the hall in the other direction. Using transportation, the stone dragon appeared before Icarus and roared. “And where did you think you were going?” Icarus whimpered before him.

  “Whoa, I didn’t know you guys could do that!” Pandora’s voice quivered.

  The dragon looked on his back where wings would have been. “Earth dragons rarely have wings, but some can still fly using levitation. Others use earthquakes or landslides. I can transport to any location by using my mind.” The dragon took a breath and stared Icarus down. “Once again, where do you think you are going?” Icarus was too afraid to speak, so Pandora spoke for him, which irritated the dragon.

  “He’s just trying to save his own hide. Can’t you tell that he’s a coward? What is he to you?”

  The dragon snorted in protest. “There’s too much fear in his eyes. He must be guilty!”

  “Guilty of what, you honestly believe he has enough spine to hurt your young?”

  “Hey!” retorted Icarus.

  “Well, Icarus it’s true. Retrieving dragon eggs, and keeping them, would probably be more trouble than what you could handle.”

  “That’s not true, take that back!”

  “No!” Pandora stared Icarus down, “That little girl down the hall has more bravery than you! She’s trapped because she was chasing after a baby dragon, which is more adventurous than anything you could ever achieve.”

  “Take that back!” shouted Icarus even louder.

  Anthony and Seth used the distraction to their advantage. While the conversation distracted the dragon, they slipped down the hall to where the little girl was trapped. The stone dragon had done a good job busting through the wall. As they approached, they heard her whimper.

  “Psst! Can you hear me? What’s your name?” Anthony was afraid that the girl would not hear his soft whisper. He didn’t know if her hearing was intact due to the loud banging caused by the dragon head-butting the wall. To his surprise, she responded.

  “My name is Rowyn.”

  “Okay, Rowyn, we’re going to get you out of there.”

  They started folding back the metal lining the hole in the wall. To their astonishment, the stone dragon had approached them, bit down on a corner of metal and pulled it back, nearly doubling the size of the hole. It was apparent that Pandora had convinced him that they were there to help. The enormous hole exposed a large pipe that ran the length of the wall.

  “Rowyn, are you in the pipe?”

  “Yes. Can you get me out?”

  “Of course, sweetie, but we’ll need you to back up.” Anthony could hear the pipe creak as she backed.

  Seth tapped Anthony on the shoulder. “Okay genius, what’s your plan?”

  “I’m thinking about it.” Anthony turned back to the pipe. “Rowyn, is Sparkles with you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does Sparkles spit fire?”

  “No, silly! Dinosaurs don’t spit fire; they spit flesh-eating ooze!”

  Seth covered his mouth with his hand and chuckled. Anthony glared at him half-jokingly. Then, Seth whispered to Anthony, “Sparkles must be a water dragon. It’s the only type of dragon that I can think of that would spit a form of acid.”

  Anthony nodded and then responded to Rowyn. “Then I’m going to need Sparkles to move back up to where you were originally and focus a stream of ooze on the side of the pipe. Preferably toward us, which is to your right.”

  They could hear the girl whisper something to Sparkles, which was followed by a sizzling sound. In a matter of seconds, they could see the pipe bubbling in response to Sparkles’s acidic spit. The hallway started to moan and creak as if buckling under a lot of pressure. They could feel the ship shaking like there had been an eruption of some kind. The pipe started tapping as if water started dripping from somewhere down the line.

  Anthony turned toward Seth. “Do you think that noise is from the pipe being eaten away?”

  “No,” Seth said a little shaken in dismay. “I think we’re in for a flood.” They looked up as they heard water racing along the ceiling.

  Pandora spoke up. “They must have started the process. The isle is sinking. We need to get out of here.”

  Seth looked at her. “I don’t think we’re sinking yet, but I agree with getting the hell out of here.”

  Rowyn shrieked in terror! “There’s water filling up the pipe!”

  Pandora thought out loud, “Sparkles can’t burn through that by himself, at least not in time.” There sounded a peaking noise from inside the pipe. “Rowyn what’s
that?”

  “Oh, that’s Scribble.”

  “Is Scribble another dinosaur?”

  “No, Scribble’s a Bennu bird,” she said in a matter of fact tone.

  “Bennu bird, I got it!” Pandora squealed. She redirected her attention to the stone dragon. “Do you spit acid?” He shook his head in dread. Pandora addressed the baby dragons. “Step up if you spit acid.” One-fourth of them stepped forward. There were at least fifty of them. “Can you fly and spit at the same time?” Some tried to take off but couldn’t. Others looked for wings, which were not there. “Bennu, pick up a dragon and fly it up to the pipe so the dragons can centralize their spit to burn through the pipe!” The Bennu were not that experienced with flying, but they each chose a dragon and did their best to suspend the dragons around the pipe.

  “Help!” they heard Rowyn gurgle as water entered her mouth.

  A Rowyn-sized opening was burned through the pipe just in the nick of time. As the hole was complete, a large wave of water surged through the pipe, carelessly shooting Rowyn out like a cannonball. Seth sprang into action. He slid on the floor using his body as a cushion for Rowyn’s tiny body. For being so small, she weighed a ton! The wind was knocked out of him, but Rowyn was safe. It took a few seconds for air to refill his lungs, but he was able to shake it off.

  Rowyn giggled as Sparkles and Scribble nuzzled her. Bitter apprehension made the edgy stone dragon stare at her like a hawk. He was not accustomed to seeing their offspring nuzzle a human. He didn’t want to admit it, but maybe he was wrong about this group. Then again, the fat rollie-pollie of a man who had been in the hallway quite some time ago reminded him of why he hated the Atlanteans.

  As Seth got up, they all watched the water spew profusely out of the pipe. Down at the far end of the hall, they heard what sounded like a tidal wave crashing up against the sides of the walls. The ceiling started to bow as the hall moaned under the stress of added pressure.