The Mystical Knights: The Sword of Dreams

by K. A. Robertson

  "I got off work early!" Sam said, enveloping Nia into a hug which she returned half-heartedly. "Wanted to get down here before the place got too crazy. Nia, there's someone I want you to meet-" he began to gesture to the slender woman at his side. She grinned at Nia with an excited smile as she stepped forward, holding out her hand. "I'm DG! I've heard so much about you!"

  "Hi," Nia said quickly, ignoring the woman's hand. She gave her a smile, not wanting to be rude. Shaking hands was something Nia didn't like to do often, especially with strangers. The woman was opening her mouth to speak, but Nia continued, "Dad, I've got to get to my booth-er-find my partner for the booth."

  "Of course!" Sam patted her shoulder, beaming proudly. "Where can we find your booth? DG and I," he gestured to the woman, "will have to swing by."

  "Uh." Nia had to think fast; she was running out of time and she didn't want to give her father and the woman named DG to follow her to her assigned booth. "It's that way," she pointed in the opposite direction, and instantly felt bad for fibbing. "Just past the popcorn stand. You can't miss it."

  "We'll see you!" Sam winked at her and took DG by the arm before walking away into a small crowd. Nia watched them disappear behind a food stand and breathed a sigh. She wanted to know more about the lady Sam had brought with him, but she didn't have time to stand and wonder. Instead, she turned on her heel and started running again, weaving between and around other students and teachers.

  Rounding the corner, where her assigned booth should have been, Nia stopped in her tracks and frowned. The booth was still in pieces; CA was nowhere in sight. "Figures," Nia muttered, looking around for any sign of CA's flaming red hair. Where is she?

  As she took a step forward, her vision narrowed as her mind spiraled away. The ground beneath her feet was gone and she was left spinning away into nothing. She didn't feel dizzy or lightheaded. Disoriented, but otherwise alright. Nia gasped sharply as her hand reached for a world that was no longer in front of her eyes. The students, the carnival smells and the sounds melted away from in front of her. Something new materialized in its place. A place that was dark and cold, never been touched by the light of day.

  Making sure there was ground beneath her, Nia took a hesitant step forward. She was in a square room; it had high vast stone walls with no windows. There was a small grate up above her head that must have been used as a sort of ventilation system. Nia exhaled softly and wasn't surprised to see her breathe vapor in front of her. It was as cold as winter in this room. In the middle of the room, sat a long gray table with a boy laying on it as though he were sleeping.

  "Lance," Nia whispered, rushing towards him. She stopped as she reached the table and stared down in horror. He was stripped down to his underwear; his body was ice white and his lips were tinged blue. His eyelids were an unearthly dusky purple color, making his eye sockets appear deep and almost skeleton like. The soft brown hair was now drenched in a cold sweat. Intravenous needles had been poked just under the heels of his palms and a machine was pumping silvery liquid into his veins. Upon his head were these strange metal probes, at least a hundred of them. These peculiar metal probes were placed all over his head, and they were all attached to this large screen that sat just behind him. Nia walked around to the head of the bed and stared at the screen. Numbers upon numbers filtered through in green, beeping quietly as they were being computed.

  Nia crinkled her brow as she stared, trying to make sense of this strange technology, but found herself once again staring at Lance's nearly lifeless body. Lance's chest was rising and falling in shallow breaths. Carefully, Nia brought her hand to Lance's face and gently brushed his cheek with her finger tips. As she was thinking how cold he was, Lance's eyes snapped open, and Nia shrank back, stifling a scream. His pale eyes followed her with a silent plea.

  Close your eyes. I can show you, they whispered.

  Nia obeyed without hesitation. She saw her own hands in her mind's Eye, reaching out to pull a flat piece of granite stone away from the ground, revealing a long and dark tunnel that seemed to carry on for miles into the earth. A loud crack that sounded like a shot gun blasted off from within the small room, and she felt ripple of an explosion blast wave over her body and throw her to the ground. Her ears were ringing, but she could hear loud screams...she could feel the heat of flames scalding her skin...

  Everything will burn.

  "Did you know that for centuries, people have told tales of caves and tunnels deep inside the Earth," Lance's soft voice murmured through her memories.

  You know where to find me.

  Nia's eyelashes fluttered as she landed back into reality. The sights and sounds of the carnival echoed loudly from all around her, as though someone had just turned a television on full blast after being in a room of silence for quite a while. Realization, heavy and stunning, slammed headlong into her like into her like a runaway freight train. Her knees buckled beneath her and she began to go down, but there were arms wrapping around her shoulders, keeping her upright.

  "Nia. Nia, what is it?" It was Rowan; the smell of limes and spices washed over her as she gripped his shoulders for dear life. His soft face wavered in and out of focus as she clung to him, breathing in his familiar scent.

  "Why is it always you?" Nia murmured into his shirt. "You're just always there whenever I'm coming back from where my mind has been. It scares me."

  "It shouldn't." Rowan held her at arm's length to get a good look at her. His eyes took in her face with careful observation. "Would you like me to let you fall next time?"

  "Never." Nia held her breath and released Rowan from her clutches, but he still kept his hands tight at her shoulders. This was nearly perfect. She wanted to lean in and kiss him, but her vision still rattled in her memory. "We need to go," she said hurriedly, looking up at Rowan as cold, prickling fear settled in the pit of her stomach. "Lance doesn't have much time."

  "Do you know where he is?" Rowan asked as she grabbed his hand and pulled him back the way she came.

  "Yes," she said with certainty. They ran past Mrs. Curtis, who was busy chatting with one of her senior students. Guilt panged in Nia's chest, but there was no time. "We have to get up to the gazebo."

  They ran up the stone steps and out of the stadium, nearly colliding into the rest of the Knights at the entrance. Nia gestured to them as she ran, but she could find her voice to instruct them where to go. Her legs were on autopilot as she rounded the Junior High and slipped through the trees that led into Hollow Hills Park. She ran down one hill and up another until the balls of her feet were pounding up the granite steps to the gazebo.

  She released Rowan's hand, puffing for breath, and her knees hit the ground. The ache of the impact was sharp, coursing up and down her shins like needles. Her fingers began picking and prying at the stone slates that were the gazebo floor. She continued pulling at them until her fingertips were sore and almost bleeding.

  "What are you doing?" Rowan asked from above her, breaking the silence between her deep breaths. To her left, she saw Quinn bound up the steps, his face just as ashen as his hair.

  "What's going on?" he asked, looking over at Rowan, who shrugged. The rest of the Knights filed up the steps, staring at Nia, who continued attempting to pry up the granite slates.

  "There's a stone somewhere," Nia explained, letting out a hiss of pain as one of her fingernails bent backward.

  "There's stones everywhere up here," Fiona said, idly leaning against a granite pillar.

  "No, it moves-" Nia hastily crawled over to another stone and pulled at it with all of her might. She could hear her nails scraping against the granite and although it sent a chill down her spine, she continued to scrape and wiggle each stone her hands could reach.

  Dissatisfied, Fiona stepped up into the gazebo, pushing past a bewildered Kenzie and a stunned Thor, and marched towards Nia, her heavy black boots clicking curtly against the hard ground. "You have completely lost-" As the ball of her foot rolled along the stones, one of them made a grind
ing noise, shifting slightly underneath her weight. Fiona looked down, bemusedly stunned, before exchanging a look with Nia, who's jaw fell open wide.

  Many things happened at once; Kenzie gasped, her hand flying up to her mouth. Quinn let out a whoop of excitement. Rowan blinked wordlessly, unsure of what to say. Thor grinned at Nia like a maniac. At first unable to move, Nia stiffly moved her arms forward and scuffled across the ground like a crab. She grabbed the stone from underneath Fiona's foot and hoisted it in the air with a loud grunt. Fiona stumbled backwards in surprise, caught off guard by Nia's sudden dash across the stone floor. They all made a mad rush to join Nia, elbowing and buckling one another to get a closer look.

  It was certainly a tunnel of some sort; it travelled deep into the ground, so far down, Nia couldn't even begin to guess where it ended. Nia could just barely see the most of the roots and eroded rocks had been cut and removed from the earth. The opening to the tunnel was just big enough for an average sized man to squeeze through, but there was no way to tell if the gaping hole narrowed any as it disappeared into the dark underground.

  The Knights peered down into the darkness in awed silence, all unsure of what to say. There were plenty of things that could have been said. Who made this? How did this get here? Have we actually stumbled upon a manmade tunnel to China?

  "A couple of weeks ago, Lance said something to me," Nia said, drumming her fingertips against the hard ground. "At your slumber party, Kenzie, he said...something about ancient civilizations having told tales of caves and tunnels underneath the Earth." She glanced up at Fiona. "Is there any truth to that or was that just something he said?"

  "There are many places around the world with actual underground cities," Fiona said. "Derinkuyu, Jicarilla, the Andes Mountain Range, Yucatan Peninsula...probably many more places that I can't think of right now. They're all alien made; I mean, look at the precision, how clean this cut is against the earth. This was obviously here a long time before the gazebo was."

  "Whomever named this park 'Hollow Hills' had some sense of humor," Thor muttered.

  "Or knew too much," Nia said darkly.

  "Anyway," Fiona said, giving Thor a stern look. "There was once a religion known as Zoroastrianism; it's one of the world's oldest monotheistic religions. They say Ahura Mazda-one of the original leaders of the Ramayana-actually led the prophet who founded Zoroastrianism through dreams. Ahura Mazda was declared their chief God and he helped the prophet create an underground kingdom to protect a select group of peoples from the Druj."

  "What's the Druj?"

  "It doesn't matter. That faction has been extinct since the sixth century B.C." Fiona twirled a curl with her finger, looking puzzled. "These underground kingdoms are generally kept very secret. Not many know of the legends, and you'd really have to do some digging around in the right places to get any information..." She met Nia's gaze and frowned curiously. "I can't believe there is actually one in Willow Creek, of all places. How would Lance have even known about something like this?"

  "I think he's more aware than we give him credit for," Nia said. "His mind exists on a different plane most of the time. He may have autism, but that gives him a bit of leverage. It allows him to see the world a bit differently than us."

  "You mean to say he's psychic?" Kenzie asked, her voice awed.

  "I mean to say he is very gifted," Nia replied earnestly. "And from what Zephyrlis told me yesterday, the Greys like gifted minds."

  "Of course they would," Fiona said suddenly, snapping her fingers. "The Greys are a telepathic race. They communicate through the mind."

  "And Axel would benefit from this because?" Quinn asked, raising his eyebrows, looking between Fiona and Nia. "He for sure isn't psychic."

  "But he's a manipulator," Nia interjected. "He is very good with his words and he wants power. The Greys must have promised him something in return for helping them."

  "And what's that, do you reckon?"

  Nia frowned. Hesitantly, she outstretched her right hand over the entrance to the tunnel. Closing her eyes, she cautiously began to circle her hand over the tunnel like a scavenging hawk...

  There was a blinding flash behind Nia's eyelids and her eyes snapped open forcefully, her expression grim. "I don't know what they've promised him, but I do know he feels very safe where he is."

  "And where is he?" Quinn asked. "Can you see him?"

  Nia looked down the tunnel. "I can't see him, but I'm pretty sure you can guess where he is right now. With Zephyrlis, Lance and whoever else."

  "He's down there?" Rowan peeked over Nia's shoulder, stunned with disbelief. "How? How is anyone down there and still alive?"

  "Ventilation system. I saw them," Nia said, tapping her temple with two fingers. "These tunnels were made to hide an entire civilization of people, Rowan. They'd want to keep them alive."

  "I'm usually good with weird," Rowan shook his head and looked out towards the many hills that were settled within Hollow Hills Park, "but this is a bit much."

  "So they have Lance," Nia whispered, the cogs of her well whittled mind spinning as she thought. "They have Lance to hold as leverage. They have him strung up to these strange machines, like he's an experiment or something..." she heard Kenzie gasp from beside her, but didn't look at her. She didn't want to lose her train of thought. "We know that they know about the Sword of Dreams. We know that Axel wants this particular weapon...but is it for them? Or for himself?"

  "The real question is, can you get the Sword without them knowing?" Fiona asked. There was an underlying tone of urgency to her voice that made Nia nervous. So much seemed to be resting on her shoulders; finding Lance alive, getting the Sword...

  "Yes, I believe so. I don't think they're tracking my dreams or anything."

  "Have you attempted daydreaming in order to obtain the Sword?"

  "Yes," Nia lied. She hated lying, but she was finding that since becoming a Mystical Knight, the ability to do so was becoming readily easier. She was pretty sure Fiona didn't believe her either, judging by the way her eyes flashed.

  "How much time do we have?" Fiona asked, and she began to pace the stone floor. The sounds of the carnival were echoing through the trees; children laughing and screaming with glee on the rides, the cheerful music. That world felt so far away now, and Nia ached for it.

  "Not long," Nia admitted, exhaling sharply. "An hour and a half at most. But that's not the worst part. The fire and ash I was supposed to dream about? I saw that in my vision with Lance. I don't know what it means, but we have to be prepared for the worst and we have to go now."

  An edgy silence fell between them. Throats were being cleared, and Quinn gave each of them a rough clasp on the shoulder or a pat on the back as he walked towards Fiona. They each knew that death was a possible outcome. They had known since they had accepted their amulet as a token of their allegiance, and they had known since the first ascension to their individual guardian. But there were some things that were impossible to prepare for; Nia knew this all too well.

  "Nia." It was Kenzie. Her voice was soft and her hands were clasped in front of her. She looked very young, standing in front of Nia the way she did, with wide ocean colored eyes and her sweetheart face. "I wanted to thank you. Thank you so much for finding Lance-"

  "We haven't found him yet, but we will."

  "I know, I-" Kenzie paused and swallowed. She looked down at her hands and shifted her weight where she stood, biting her lip. "I also wanted to warn you..."

  "Warn me?" Nia asked sharply. "About what?"

  "About...about Rowan," Kenzie whispered insistently, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear as she peered at Nia over her glasses. Nia stared at Kenzie, unsure of what to do. What about Rowan? He certainly wasn't dangerous. She could see him out of the corner of her vision, chatting softly with Quinn.

  "What's it with Rowan? What's going on between you both? We're not dating or anything, so no need to be jealous-"

  "But you like him. More than a friend?"

&nbs
p; Rowan glanced up to look at Nia, and he instantly frowned. Nia looked back at Kenzie. "I think so-yes. Yes, I do."

  "You can't," Kenzie said tensely.

  "I'm sorry if you're jealous," Nia said, feeling a rush of heat hit her cheeks.

  "I'm not-I mean, I was. At first. But you don't know, Nia." Kenzie screwed her eyes shut, agitated, and reached up to touch Nia's shoulders. "I'm telling you as a friend, Nia. Not as some crazy ex girlfriend. He's not what he seems, please believe me."

  "'He's not what he seems?'" Nia whispered harshly, stepping back from Kenzie, trying to be subtle. "What does that even mean? He's a guy, Kenzie. Not some monster."

  Kenzie's bottom lip trembled and she bit it again to keep it in place. "I-I can't tell you," she said, so quietly that Nia had to strain to hear her. She looked down at her feet, defeated. "It's not my place. I'm sorry I said anything. Thank you for helping find Lance."

  Nia made to say something else, but Kenzie zipped away, quickly stepping past where Rowan stood, still gazing in their direction. Nia frowned at him uncertainly, and watched as Kenzie came to stand next to Fiona, and rest her head on the other girl's shoulder. What was that about? He's not what he seems?

  Rowan didn't move closer. Instead, his shoulders sagged and he then turned to Thor, and began to listen to something Thor was telling Quinn. Puzzled, Nia glanced down at her hands. She had always felt that Rowan had something to hide. But what? He obviously cared for her. That much she knew for certain. They were connected somehow, and when she was with him, she felt safe and put together. Her fears simply vanished and she felt at home. But then...

  What wouldn't Kenzie tell her?

  Quinn was shuffling through his back pack. The same back pack that went with them to every battle. He pulled out two Mag-Lites and clicked them on, handing them to Fiona. She flashed them down into the tunnel, squinting as she peered downwards. She cursed under her breath, reaching her arm down into the darkness as far as it would go. "I was hoping that we'd at least be able to see the floor."

  "We can always throw Thor down it first," Quinn humbly suggested; he had a knack for using humor in place of nervousness.