“Little one,” Nekar soothed, “I have never abandoned the Musterlings. I have protected you all these years. I left the Book in the square for you to read. You had to decide if you believed it or not. Those children lost their speech because they saw the terrible evil I’ve been protecting you from. The Kalat child did not belong here. A Raphad has taken her from Musterion to Soterion. She is now the daughter of a king.” Nekar stood a little straighter and met Chara's eyes. “Most of all, I don’t speak on my authority, but on the authority of the Master, the true and living God of the Book that I gave you.”
Chara blinked in shock but managed to regain her composure. “I’ve never heard of a Raphad here in Musterion.”
“He came from Soterion at the Master's command. The Master told me to give him the child.”
Omar cut in. “Who is this Master? You’ve seen him?”
Nekar pierced Omar's soul with his gaze. “Your questions are spoken from a hard heart. I will not answer them. You have years of struggle, until your hard heart is crushed and tender enough to hear the truth.”
Omar blinked as he tried to recover from this accusation. His anger boiled. This mad man doesn’t even know me!
Ischus winged his way above the crowd, taking control of the gathering. “Nekar, do you say that you speak for the Master?”
“I do,” Nekar replied.
“Do you believe that the Master wants us to stay here in the Core and not enter the maze?”
“Yes. That’s the truth!”
Ischus raised his hands. “Very well, then. None who follow the Council of Seven are to leave the Core without asking my leave. If Nekar says that there is danger, we will accept his word. It is better to err on the side of caution.”
Guards began to disperse the crowd. “Nekar,” Ischus asked, “will you come back with us to city hall so we can discuss this more privately?”
Nekar seemed to be listening to a voice no one else could hear. The Master's, no doubt, Omar mentally sneered.
Ischus invited Omar, Sebastian, Chara, and the other members of the Council of Seven to the meeting. When they arrived at city hall, Ischus set some Am ‘Mayim to stand guard. He led the way into his secret chamber where they found King Thalassa of the ’Am Mayim waiting for them. Nekar walked over and embraced him as an old friend. After each of the others paid their respects to King Thalassa, they all sat down and began their discussion.
“What does this all mean?" Ischus asked Nekar. "Can you tell us anything? I know that the Master can be…well ... cryptic ... and he reveals things in his own time. But I need you to tell me whatever you can so that we can protect our people and act wisely. Wait…! Where’s Myles? Hasn’t he returned yet?”
Omar shook his head. “He left while we were sleeping last night. We haven’t seen him since then, and I’m beginning to worry.”
Nekar cleared his throat. “Myles is in the space between places in a time between times. You won’t see him again soon, probably not for weeks. Gabriyel is protecting him for now.”
Ischus asked, “And who is Gabriyel?”
“Gabriyel is a large dragon who serves as the messenger of the Master.”
Chara couldn’t contain herself any longer. “It’s a trick! Dragons can’t be trusted. The Great Red Dragon is a shape shifter and a deceiver!” She flew into Nekar’s face shouting, “What have you brought on us?”
“Silence, child." Nekar slapped his hand on the table, but his voice was gentle. "Chara, you must decide once and for all. Trust me or discard me. Make your choice. Stay and listen to what I have to say, or leave.”
Chara backed up, wings drooping. “I’m sorry. I’ll trust you, and I’ll listen.”
The whole mood in the room grew calmer with Chara’s apology. Nekar looked around the table. “Ragal is dead.” Chara muffled a gasp. He quickly continued. “She has become Kasey Phoenix. The curse of the Kalat has been lifted from her, and she’s now a Miyka.” Ischus, since he was also a Miyka, seemed to be more interested now.
“Kasey has passed through a portal made by Gabriyel. She has trials ahead of her in a world beyond what any of you have seen, but I’m sure she will learn much. I’m confident enough in the ways of the Master to promise you that she will return when Myles returns.”
Omar bit his lip. All of this talk about the Master annoyed him. He wouldn’t be surprised if the Council of Thirteen had never made it out of the maze, and they were now posing as the Master, with Nekar as their front man. Omar didn't trust Nekar. It's not right to deceive people and use them through religion.
Ischus sighed. “Nekar, what is this evil you’ve talked about? How do we fight it?”
“You cannot fight this evil alone. You will need both Myles and Kasey to return first. You can’t kill it. It must be expelled. I’ll tell you more when the time grows near. But be on your guard; those who disobey you and leave the Core will be infected and become its slaves. It might enter the Core, but it can’t harm you here. It will bring strife and division, tearing apart the peace that you’ve tried to keep. It will go first for the Council of Six because they don’t believe. Don’t communicate with them anymore. There’s no use in trying. I’m telling you from the Master, there will be war in Musterion. That’s all I can tell say.”
Omar's doubts swelled as he forced himself to sit through this meeting. Nekar might be able to answer so many of my questions about Musterion. Still, how could anyone get reliable information out of someone like this? Should we pay any attention to his ranting? Ischus just wants to fall in line with whatever he says. You just can’t be rational with religious people. Science, you can trust. Logical, scientific people you can trust, but religious people can’t be trusted. The religious ones are likely to do anything just because they say some deity told them to. Is Nekar just cloaking his own ambitions and desires in the guise of an all-knowing God?
Omar decided that he would leave as soon as possible for the open area that Sebastian had told him about. He needed to recharge his laptop. Will Sebastian tell Ischus? Will he refuse to go with me? Omar knew he would need Sebastian’s guidance to get there.
Ischus bowed to Nekar. “Thank you for your guidance and insight. I believe it will help in the days to come.”
“I only do as my Master pleases.” Nekar's eyes swept around the room, and he left.
Ischus dismissed everyone, saying, “I need time to think, pray, and decide what to do about this news.”
Soon after the meeting with Nekar, Ischus called all the citizens of Pneuma Karpos together. No citizen who followed the Council of Seven was to leave the city without permission and none were ever to leave the Core. Ischus summoned Omar and together they devised a plan for how they would respond when war broke out. In return for Omar’s help and that of the ever-growing Order of the Magi, Ischus agreed to allow the Magi to travel out of the Core if they wished. He trusted that the Magi would be more likely to be able to deal with whatever evil lurked in the tunnels.
Ischus asked if Omar could help him give the citizens something to keep them busy. He believed this would keep them from being overcome with fear about whatever evil lurked in the tunnels. Omar asked the citizens of Pneuma Karpos to build a tower for the Magi. The plan was well-received and almost everyone pitched in to help make it a wondrous tower.
As the construction progressed and two months slipped by, Omar worried about Myles but busied himself with the training of the Order and with the Tower. Without Myles, the Magi couldn’t learn to create the illusions that were such an important part of their secrets. But for now they could learn the science that Omar taught them and hopefully Myles would soon make it back through “the space between spaces”. Every time he thought about that statement, Omar wondered who the real con man in Musterion was.
15
Entering the Darkness
Myles stepped through the portal into the fountain square, startled when a cheering crowd surrounded him. He couldn’t understand why everyone seemed so delighted to see him. He
caught a glimpse of a towering spire in the middle of the city, made from the same kind of brick as the walls of the maze. Moss still covered the bricks, and the tower seemed to subtly illuminate the buildings around it.
Myles was bombarded with questions as he tried to make his way through the crowd and head toward the tower, everyone seemed anxious to hear what he knew about the tunnels.
“Where have you been?” “Did you accomplish your mission?” “What’s out there?” Myles was pretty sure these people knew better than he did what was 'out there', so that question really made him wonder what was going on.
“What was that creature we saw? Was that a dragon?”
Myles wondered about that himself, even though he had just been there talking with Gabriyel. It looked like a dragon, but it certainly wasn’t violent and destructive like a dragon was supposed to be.
“It looked like a hole was ripped in the air! Where did you come from?” Myles wished that he knew the answer to that. If he was ever going to find Kasey again, he’d need to know where to start.
Myles didn’t try to answer any questions as he walked through the crowd, since he didn’t have any good answers. He really needed to find Omar and Sebastian and talk over what he had experienced. He had left yesterday on a mission to save Ragal and he was sure they would want to know why he didn't bring her back. But Ragal was gone. She was no more. Now he was trying to figure out how he’d explain that. Omar would never understand the redemption and transformation he’d witnessed. Especially when Myles couldn't honestly say he understood it himself.
Myles looked up again at the tower and thought it was more than a little strange that it could have been built in one day. Omar had to be involved somehow. He imagined some handheld device from Omar's bag of tricks that accelerated the assembly of bricks, sending them all rushing to stack themselves on top of each other. If anybody can do it, Omar is the man.
Myles broke away from most the crowd, increasing his speed as best as he could while pushing the motorcycle along. He was anxious to see his friends. The tower had a statue on either side of a grand, arched entryway. Who are those statues of? Omar? And the other one is -- Someone made a statue of me?
Several Akana in distinctive robes approached. Their leader stepped forward and bowed. “Master Callaghan, we have awaited your return a long time.”
“I’ve been gone for a day. Are you that impatient? By the way, I don’t even know you, so don’t be calling me Master. My name is Myles.”
Myles hated people who seemed to know things he didn't. This Akana gave him a knowing smile. “Yes, Mas….uh, Myles. Master Metzger told us that you might not have noted the passage of time. It has been two months since you left. The prophet foretold that it would be some time before you would return from the space between spaces and the time between times. Is Kasey Phoenix with you?”
Myles thought that this man seemed to be in another world and didn’t even know what day it was. “No, Kasey is not with me. She passed to a world beyond Musterion.”
All of the Akana looked at each other in shock. “What could this mean?”
The leader turned back to Myles. “You must come with us immediately. We must take you directly to Master Metzger.”
Myles shook his head. This was getting more ridiculous by the minute. He wanted some solid answers. Hopefully Omar still spoke in logical, understandable ways and could make some sense of all this. “Yes, please take me to Master Metzger.” He couldn't say that without a hint of sarcasm. It was too much to ask.
As the Akana led him into the building, Myles considered what he’d just been told. Could I really have been gone for two months? Was Gabriyel not only able to send someone from one place to another, but also send someone from one time to another? Could that be our way out of the Maze of Musterion, if we play their cards right? One more thing I have to tell Omar.
The trip up to the top of the tower seemed to take forever as they climbed the spiral staircase. Myles caught glimpses into rooms where he could see dissected animals, racks of test tubes, shelves and shelves of handwritten books, and various bottled liquids laid out on metal tables. People who seemed to be Magi worked and studied on every level. “How many Magi are there?”
“There are precisely eighty-five Magi,” the Akana leader told him, “from every race on Musterion except the Kalat and the Drakoni. They are considered hostile races now.”
That's pretty funny. I've always considered Kalat hostile, and I've got the limp to prove it. The Akana leader continued. “We also have 2,000 associates who, though they are designated, ‘common folk,’ represent every possible skill, from blacksmiths to tailors to bakers!”
Wow, that is a lot of people. I really hope Omar knows what he's doing. Oh, wait, Omar always knows what he's doing.
At the top of the tower stood a metal door. Sebastian stood on the landing outside it, dressed in a long white robe with black trim. Myles noted a scar on the left side of his face that went from the top of his forehead all the way to the bottom of his cheek. It looked like he’d been clawed by some giant animal.
Sebastian didn’t move to greet him. “Myles, for security reasons I must check to be sure that it’s really you. Omar acquired some of your hair from the old hideaway, so we have you on record. Please stand still while your DNA is scanned."
Myles blinked. “What do you know about DNA?”
Without responding, Sebastian took a pencil-shaped metal device with a red light at the end from the bag at his side. The device projected a red light that went up and down Myles’ body. Sebastian looked at the readout and smiled. “Where have you been, my friend?”
Myles was taken aback by all the security. “What in the world is going on here? I leave for one day and the whole place changes! People are calling me Master, and there’s a statue… a statue, Sebastian! There’s a statue of me in front of a tower that wasn’t here yesterday!” He grabbed Sebastian by the shoulders. “I’ll tell you what. You answer a few questions that I have, and I’ll answer all the questions you want.”
Sebastian’s smile grew. “Oh, I’ve missed your humor around here. Come, my friend. Omar will answer all your questions. I’m sure he has many to ask you as well.”
Sebastian led him up one more flight of spiraling steps. They entered a large open room where the ceiling rested on pillars. No walls hindered the marvelous view. Myles could see all of Pneuma Karpos from this room. On the outer edges of the room were several telescopes positioned for viewing the entire city.
Myles saw several lab tables scattered around the room. On one of the tables was a docking station with a laptop in it and moss sitting in front of it. Across the room stood a diverse group of Magi. Standing in the middle of the group was Omar. Omar wore a pair of goggles that seemed to have an iridescent coating on the lenses. He also wore a robe of red leather with a belt that equipped with numerous pouches. In his right hand he held a long staff that looked almost like a cattle prod. And when he crossed the room, a light seemed to follow him.
Myles was afraid to ask if things could get any weirder around there. But that was only because he already knew the answer.
When Omar reached Myles, he embraced him with a broad smile. Patting him on the shoulder, Omar said with a laugh, “I’m sure you want some explanations for what’s happened since you left, and why it seems like only a day to you.”
“You got that right!”
“Let’s try starting from the beginning. The day you left, Nekar came into the fountain square and, among other things, informed us that you would not be returning for a while. I postulate from his description that a dragon made a portal for you that reached across space and time. That’s why it’s only been one day for you. Nekar also warned us that no one should leave the Core because of an evil darkness that was gathering there. So I began recruiting Musterlings into the Magi and we began building the Tower of the Magi.
“Ischus later gave the Magi permission to leave the Core after we took down several members of
the Council of Six who were hiding in the city. Yes, they’re criminals now, but I’ll explain that later. He felt that we would be able to deal with the darkness because of our superior technology. But we should have followed Nekar’s advice not to leave the Core until you and Kasey had returned.
“Upon stepping into the tunnels, we were attacked by an overwhelming darkness. While we were caught in the darkness, something got hold of Sebastian. We couldn’t see what it was, but we escaped back into the Core, dragging Sebastian with us. Sebastian was losing 'way too much blood, and I didn’t have any medical equipment that could save him. But I’d been told about the healing power of the moss on the tunnel walls so I grabbed some and put it on his wounds. Fortunately it healed him, but not without leaving some scarring, as you can see.
“As we assembled the Order of the Magi and built the tower, I began to turn my attention to this moss. It’s amazing, Myles. The clothes that I’m wearing and even this tower are infused with it. It’s a poison to the Kalat but a healing plant to the Gabad and the Miyka. I think we can use it like a weapon to fight the darkness. That’s what I’m meeting with the Council of the Magi about today. The members of this Council are the only Musterlings who know all our secrets.”
Omar finally ran out of breath and paused for a minute. “My question to you is this: Where’s Kasey?”
Myles shrugged. “I really don’t know, Doc. I found Nekar first, and he sent me to find Ragal. He told me how to get her to The Master, who saved her life, changed her into a Miyka, and renamed her Kasey Phoenix. Then we found the dragon, who’s named Gabriyel, and he sent her to another world. And you were right. He opened a hole in time and space and sent me back to the fountain plaza.”
“The Master…you actually met him?” Then he shook his head. “And you think that Kasey’s gone? That’s not good. We need her here.”
Myles nodded and told him what had happened. Omar listened to his story and was wrapped in thought as he finished. “Hmm…I think all of this is for a later discussion between you and me. Right now, Myles, I need you to teach the Council of Magi your skills with sleight of hand. I’ve already taught them much about science so if you’ll teach them what you know of illusion, they can go out and teach the rest of the Magi.”
Bridgeworlds: Rise of the Magi Page 16
