The Last Summoning---Andrew and the Quest of Orion's Belt (Book Four)

by Ivory Autumn

  Andrew’s lips were blue. His face was ghost white. His body throbbed and ached as feeling slowly came back into his frozen limbs. His hand went to his sword. It felt hollow, empty, like a soulless body. In an instant he knew. His stomach lurched. He staggered forward. “Th…the…battle?” Andrew chattered, his whole body trembling. He stared at Freddie, frightened by what he might hear. They had been trapped under the ice longer than he had first supposed. What he had thought a few moment’s had been hours. The night had gone, and with it all sign of fighting. Freddie’s face was spattered in blood. His clothes were torn. He had a nasty gash in his shoulder. His eyes looked different, like he had seen something terrible, and could not speak it. “Andrew…” Freddie’s voice cracked, his eyes filled with tears. He buried his face in his knees, and wept. “We tried…but…”

  Andrew quickly stood, and stared across the ice, his blue lips trembling with cold. The sun was just coming up, gleaming across the frosted surface of the ice, lighting up the place where the great battle had taken place. Heaps of bodies dotted the ice, like dead fish out of water, frozen forever in place. Beyond the ice, he could see host of men marching away into the Fractured Mountains.

  Andrew pulled Freddie’s cape around his shoulders, and took a step towards the awful scene. Something hard crunched beneath his feet. Horrified he looked down. He had stepped on an outstretched wing. “Flicker?” he breathed, panic lacing his voice. He bent down and dug through a heap of snow, revealing Flicker’s frozen body.

  He cried out, and stumbled back. He opened his mouth to speak, but the words caught in his throat, frozen by grief.

  Men and beast from both sides littered the ice, frozen in death, on the battlefield of black ice. It was a haunting scene, forever imprinted on Andrew’s mind. Andrew felt like he was looking at a scene out of a nightmare he hoped he would wake up from. He covered his face in his hands, overwhelmed. Oh, he wished that this scene might dissolve---that he had never lived to see it. Andrew’s eyes glistened. His head reeled. He wished that he had been swallowed up by the water. The coldness he felt from being in the icy water was nothing to the ice he felt now. It crept over him, stabbing at his mind, accusing him, stabbing where it hurt the most. He felt as if someone had grabbed his whole body and was squeezing it. His stomach churned as if he had swallowed a load of bricks.

  “Andrew,” Freddie said, placing a hand on his shoulder to steady Andrew’s faltering form. “Don’t.”

  Andrew shook Freddie away from him and walked over the ice, from person to person, looking for any sign of life. He suddenly stopped and fell to his knees at the foot of one of his faithful captains, crying out in great angry cries. The man lay dead, with his eyes turned up as if looking at some celestial object.

  “I should have been there with them,” Andrew sobbed, his voice ridden with anguish.

  “You were, Andrew,” Freddie consoled.

  “No! I wasn’t!” Andrew dropped to his knees, overcome with grief. His eyes were glazed. He stared blankly ahead, his face drained of all color. “Are they all dead?” Andrew gasped, looking at Freddie for some sign of hope. “All 7,000?”

  “I don’t know…” Freddie’s voice was soft. “After you fell through the ice, and Ivory went in after you, I got so angry I just threw myself at Vargas. He sliced my shoulder, and something hit me in the head. The next thing I knew, I was waking up to this,” He motioned to the bodies littering the ice.”

  “What about Talic, and Croffin, and the others…are they dead as well?”

  Freddie shook his head. “I…I don’t know...Andrew…I…I…” He too began to cry, looking very boyish and not like the strong soul he usually tried to be.

  Andrew grasped his friend by the arms. “Freddie, you’re a good man. The best kind of friend I could ever ask for. If I had a brother, he would be just like you.”

  “I tried,” Freddie stuttered, his voice rising. “I really tried. But after you went down, everything went very bad, very, very bad. After I woke, I grabbed an ax and started chopping holes in the water. Chopping, chopping, chopping…I knew you had to be down there.”

  “Freddie!” Andrew cried, shaking his friend. “I know you tried. And you saved Ivory and me. You saved us, Freddie!”

  Freddie’s lips curved into a faint smile. He stopped ranting, and wiped his bloodshot eyes. “Yes…I did, didn’t I?”

  “You did,” Andrew breathed, hugging his friend tightly.

  “Andrew…” Ivory ventured, tapping Andrew from behind. Her face was serious. Her red hair hugged her face in frosted locks. “Andrew…” her voice was barley above a whisper. “There’s something you need to see.”

  Andrew stepped away from Freddie. He stared at Ivory. Her face was tight, and her eyes were wide like she’d seen a ghost. “Oragino,” was all she could say. She pointed to a body draped across the ice a few feet away from where they were standing.

  Andrew stepped over a mass of frozen bodies, pausing before the broken body of his horse Oragino. The horse’s beautiful body was covered in blood. A sharp metal prong had been thrust through its torso, pinning the horse to the ice.

  Andrew fell to his knees, instantly engulfed by a new wave of sorrow. “Oragino…Oh, Oragino, my horse. What has happened to you?” He stroked the horse with tender hands, burying his head in the horse’s mane.

  “Don’t be sad,” the horse murmured, trying to lift its head and comfort Andrew.

  Andrew sat up, his eyes wide, his face streaked with tears. “You’re alive?”

  The horse heaved a weary sigh. “No, Andrew, I am not what you humans call alive, nor will I ever be again, in this life. What I am is in between. I am leaving very soon.”

  “No,” Andrew wept. “Don’t go. So many have gone already. You can’t leave me, too.”

  “Be still, master,” the horse wheezed. “It is a terrible thing to witness so much death and destruction. But do not blame yourself. We all chose to come onto this battlefield of ice. And in doing so we chose to die, if that was what fate had in store for us. It is fate’s will I go now. Just as you must live.”

  Andrew ran his fingers over Oragino’s soft, velvet fur, brushing away the frost. “Then fate is unkind and cruel. If fate is what it should be, it would have let me die along with you, here with all these good souls, these voices who are silenced forever.”

  “Oh,” Oragino groaned, “their voices are not silenced. They live on through you.”

  “They cannot live through me!” Andrew cried. “I am dead, just as they are, though my body goes on living. All is lost. If fate had been kind, it would have led us on to victory. No. Fate is nothing to me. I will never trust my life into its hands again.”

  “No,” The horse gasped. “Do not lose your faith in a higher power. For that is what Fate is. Do not question it. If you were a horse you would know that fate is something quite different than luck, chance or happenstance. It is much more precise and careful. With her, there is always a reason, a why, and a perfect ending. Whether good or bad, only she knows. Just as she has chosen my ending. And the ending of many other’s lives, there is soon to be a new beginning for me, one that will never end, but go on.”

  “There is no such place!” Andrew shouted, feeling an oppressive weight of sorrow press on him from all sides.

  “Do not be angry,” the horse murmured. Its voice was soft, and fading, as if its lungs were filling with water. “I and those of your men go to a far better place than we are now. Do not be angry that you live, Andrew. It seems your work is not yet over. You still have a job to accomplish, else you would be coming with me.”

  “Job?” Andrew murmured. “There is nothing left for me to do. The Fallen has won.”

  “Oh, Andrew,” the horse moaned. “As long as you are alive, you are still in the race. If there is one thing I’ve learned in this life, it’s that every horse must finish his race, even if he is the last one on the track and he has no hope of winning. You keep going. Trust that fate has something in store for you.
Fate works like the webs of a spider. She first spins a thread in the air that catches a random passerby. Each thread seems only to be one long, silvery string that dances in the air, pulling you towards something you don’t quite understand. Fate spins her web, catching those it desires, pulling one this way, and another that, entombing one, freeing others, while letting others wait. Fate does no one thing without pulling on the strings of others, winding all in its coils. One man she blesses with riches, while making another poor. Another man’s item of torment may be another man’s treasured idol. A man’s misfortune might mean another’s gain. The wind, a blessing to a bird, may be a curse to those aground. The web she weaves is as complex and as spontaneous as a laugh or a cry. She embroiders our lives together, making no one thing alone out of our actions, no matter how disconnected it seems from another being. She brings the hero forth, and he is hailed, because others wavered---thus the glory of the hero is made more perfect by those quavering souls. In her, nothing is without significance, no darkness without purpose. Though those she uses may be small, unlearned, or dull, she moulds a character of one born into mean circumstances. She fashions him for greatness in poverty, so that when riches strike him, he is unwounded, unaffected, and triumphant. She throws humanity together in the melting pot of earth, using the heat of trouble and woe to melt away the dross, to refine the gold and make up her jewels. She uses all ill to her gain, every misfortune to some better end. She lets the sun go down. She lets rulers rise, lets some fall. All this she does with the web she weaves, leaving no soul unconnected from her web. Her work is without flaw, though to some, it seems so. Time is always on her side, and she uses it with precision, down to seconds. For in time, she has learned that with it, she can wield a more powerful punch. She delights in randomness, yet nothing she ever does is random or without meaning. Those touched by her hand never come to the same place as the same person again. Fate never rests, nor ceases from her work. Sewing the patterns that make up our lives, she lets one fall, so that others may rise. To her, the fools have purpose, the darkness more depth, the light more shine, the water more glitter, the senses of life heightened by her breath. In death she delights in making others look at the preciousness of life. In life she breaths a new dawn. She takes the hand of those who she wills, and meshes them, fits, molds and sharpens those into a plan with more dimension than the human mind can comprehend. In her, worlds, fates, stories, histories, kingdoms, good and evil all play a part. In her, life has more meaning, and the heartbeat more ring. Heroes are made greater, and triumph more meaning, and joy more full. Fate is what brought me to you. What brought us all here together, here on this battlefield of ice. And it is what has split us apart, and eventually takes us back home---a home that our characters have fashioned for us. And it is only at rare moments when the privileged few get to see small glimpses of the amazing patterned, interconnected life that we call our own. Fate, yes fate will take us all back home. And that is where I am…going.”

  The horse’s sides heaved with pain, “Goodbye my friend…I would have given anything to carry you to victory, and then take you back home. Oh, home sounds so nice. Doesn’t it?”

  Andrew wiped his tears and nodded. “Yes, it does.”

  “Promise, me Andrew, that when all is over, you will make sure the horse you ride home is decent. I don’t want you sitting on just any ole pony. You need to find a horse who has pride, humility and dignity, a horse who knows who and what kind of person he carries on his back.”

  “Oragino, no one can replace you.”

  “As much as I like to think that…” the horse murmured, “All horses are replaceable. Just like a shoe, we horses wear out and grow old, and are quickly replaced.”

  “No.” Andrew wept. “There has never been, or ever will be a horse like you, Oragino, and you know that. Just as a star shines in the sky, when its light goes out, nothing can fill that void.”

  “Just as old stars die,” the horses murmured, breathing heavily and straining at every word. “New stars come to fill that void…” Oragino’s voice faded. He lay down his head, and breathed no more.

  Andrew stared at Oragino’s motionless body. A coldness gripped his heart. He wanted to scream out, wanted to escape this sorrow that enveloped him. A biting chill blew. Clouds covered the sun, and thick, fluffy snow began to fall over them, like frozen tears falling over a world that had grown too cold and harsh to mourn any other way.

  Ivory knelt down and pulled Andrew’s shaking form to hers in a tender hug. Her body was warm. It caused Andrew’s frosted heart to melt. Tears flowed freely down his face, as he wept like a child.

  Chapter Thirty

  Apples

  Andrew awoke where he, Ivory, and Freddie had fallen into a bitter sleep next to Oragino’s frozen body. Andrew stretched his legs and groaned. He was stiff and sore. His whole body ached, and throbbed. The air was icy, and his breath hung in the air like the spirit of a bodiless soul. How long he had been sleeping, he could not tell. The sun was rising above the mountains, looking dismal and subdued behind thick sheets of clouds. He shivered, dusting a layer of snow off Oragino’s stiff body. His hand stopped at the saddle. He quickly took the saddle bag and slung it around his shoulders. “Goodbye my friend,” he whispered, stepping away from the horse.

  The wide expanse of black ice had been covered in a blanket of snow, burying the bodies of the dead, in a white mantle. The land looked hushed in quietude as if it knew that many brave souls had just passed over to the other side. The scene was eerie, haunting, powerful, provoking Andrew to deep reflection.

  Then, without uttering a word, he moved over the ice, scouring the battlefield for survivors. Ivory, and Freddie soon joined him in the search for life. But the task was long, cold, horrible, and without success. There was no life to be found anywhere, on land, or the ice. All that was left of the powerful, army full of life, and hope, were soulless bodies, with white, frozen eyes, and frosted faces, all empty of life. They could not find Talic’s body, nor could they find Croffin. All were assumed dead. Every horse, and every man. All had perished. All had died. And for what? He was responsible for this. He alone. The weight of those now lost were now upon his shoulders. Nothing stirred over the entire battlefield of ice. All was now covered in snow, buried together in their frosty grave. Andrew’s heart ached like a soulless room, once filled with people, now empty and hollow. It made Andrew want to curl up in the snow, and fall asleep forever.

  He groaned, and knelt before the body of a fallen boy no older than himself. The face looked almost identical to Talic’s. But he couldn’t be sure. He couldn’t bring himself to uncover the rest of the body. No. It couldn’t be Talic. It WASN’T! Unable to control his emotions, he pushed himself up, and began walking towards the others, trying to shut out the empty void that ate away at his troubled soul. But the pain would not be requited. It would always haunt him. Would always follow him. The voices of those who followed him seemed to swell and pulse in his head, exploding against his skull, bidding him to do what they could not, bidding him to stand before The Fallen, to not let their voices dissolve with them.

  He closed his eyes, trying to shut them out, trying to ignore the pain. But it was there, throbbing, hammering inside him. The battle was over, but the fight was not. His only path before him was a bleak one. But it was the only path he could take now. He would do what he had promised. He would do all that was in his power to stand before The Fallen. He would seek him out, and if he could not destroy him, he would, like his fallen army, die making his voice heard. He had to finish his race. Not for him but for them, for those who lay cold, and buried under the snow. Since their voices had not carried, he would carry them farther. He would find The Fallen, and face him, even if he had to do it alone.

  He trudged through the snow, feeling his resolve building with every step. The memory of his friends who had fought by his side, echoed vividly in his mind urging him onward.

  He suddenly paused, hearing a muffled screech. He peer
ed down beneath the snow, and gasped. There, underneath his foot was Croffin’s skunk’s tail.

  “Croffin?” Andrew cried. “Croffin!” He bent down and yanked at the tail.

  A loud, angry screech yowled out. “OUCH! That’s my tail. Let go!”

  Startled, Andrew let go, and fell back into the snow, watching as Croffin’s head peered up through the snow, his one eye glaring out at him.

  “You’re live?” Andrew gasped, hardly able to contain himself.

  The coon pulled himself up and out of the snow, scowling. “Dead? Do I look dead?”

  “You did, for a moment.”

  Croffin let out a loud yawn. “Well, so sorry to disappoint you.”

  “No. I’m glad you’re alive. I thought…”

  “Well you thought wrong. My tail got caught underneath a Sontars body, and it nearly took me all day to get unstuck. I just got free when you happened to so rudely step upon my tail. Luckily, my trusty book saved me, kept me warm, and propped up enough space for me to get out.” He pointed to his dirty skunk’s tail, then held up his book triumphantly. “And you thought my reading and writing was a waste of time.”

  Andrew narrowed his eyes, confused.

  Croffin grinned, as if genuinely pleased. “Don’t look so confused, Andrew. It’s really me. And I’m alive, that’s all that matters.”

  “Yes,” Andrew agreed. “It is!” Then turning he called out to his friends. “FREDDIE, IVORY! Come and see what I’ve found!”

  Freddie and Ivory soon came, and crowed in around Andrew, looking at Croffin in surprise. They had all supposed him dead.

  “Don’t look at me so!” Croffin huffed. “I’m not a ghost. I’m very much alive. See.” He whirled around, and stopped. “I look alive, do I not?”

  “Yes, Croffin,” Freddie laughed. “You do!” He patted the coon on the side of the head. “I never thought I’d say this, but I’m very glad to see your sour face.”