Chapter 41-Xenophon’s Abode
That night, when the twins met again at dinner, Idus asked expectantly:
“Well???” Irgen grinned happily back at him before explaining what Nigellus had made out of the poem. Idus was delighted at the news. It was truly good news to hear that they had finally figured out why Xenophon had written that bit of nonsense. And they both decided that they already knew where Xenophon’s last home was.
They decided it was in the very last tower. The only remaining one that had not yet been explored, but they did not yet know how to enter the tower, so that night they decided it was time to find a way into the tower.
When nightfall came, they once again snuck out of the castle, but this time they met no one as they left the main turret. Emboldened by the lack of activity in the citadel, they took their time in getting to the Tower of Earth. Outside, the clear crisp air of spring going into summer gave them an elated feeling as they strolled along the soft grass. After a while, they stood before the tower of earth. Its mighty stone walls stood defiantly before them in the air. They wandered around the structure, wondering how they were going to enter this building.
They had decided earlier, that this was probably going to be the most difficult tower to enter, seeing as how it was Xenophon who had sealed it up, and they had also decided that this was also going to be the most arduous journey inside any of the towers. They figured that if Xenophon had gone to that much trouble to make the ridiculous poem he gave them, he would most certainly have guarded his secret well inside of the tower. They decided it was probably a good thing that they had not figured out where the clue pointed to until this far into their training, because they were not expecting Xenophon to go easy on them.
After circling the grounds a few times, the twins gave up on trying to find something on the ground. After all, they hadn’t really expected it to be that easy, but they weren’t completely sure just what to expect from the seemingly odd mind of Xenophon.
They stood together silently for a minute, before Idus looked at Irgen and shrugged his shoulders.
“Well it’s a good thing that our specialty is to do earthen magic otherwise this would be really difficult.” Irgen half-heartedly smiled back at Idus, but he wasn’t in much of a mood for joking right now. He knew that it would be up to him to enter the earthen stronghold, for he was the only one who had managed to do any earthen magic so far.
He looked around uncertainly; this was truly a much tougher tower to break into than the others had been. There was nothing on the ground which might help them in their quest to enter the doors. He remembered that Idus had said that he entered his tower with a thunderbolt, so what had to do with earth that would allow them to enter the tower?
As he was thus pondering, his hands slipped to his sides and he felt at his side the hilt of his sword. As he did so, he had the thought to look again at Xenophon’s poem. He did and once again the words rang through his head:
Do ye indeed break the walls of my home?
Hast thou not seen the riches away from thee?
Where is thy sting oh kindred tongue?
For I am gone far from thee.
Into the night of blackness wilt thou go.
To find what you seek from me.
Seek to find wondrous power.
And let the black darkness flee from thee.
Thou are far from me yet.
With the strength of my mouth will I smite thee.
Wealth untold will not save thee.
For walls crumble beneath the power of my will.
This time, he felt something urge him to focus on the last line. He looked at it again and read the words: “For walls crumble beneath the power of my will.” Irgen thought for a moment as he remembered that Xenophon had been so powerful that he had caused the walls of the great city Menoeceus to crumble, a feat which rivaled what all of the other brothers did, but surely that wasn’t the only reason to put that in the poem.
Xenophon was already immortal, what did he care for popularity? But if he didn’t add that to glorify himself, what did it mean? Surely he didn’t expect Irgen to demolish the walls of the tower…Did he?
The two brothers stood silently staring at the piece of paper, or at least Irgen did, Idus seemed to lose interest in the paper after looking at its worthless words for about the thousandth time. He turned away and once again began walking around the tower, this time examining almost every piece of the ground, unwilling to give in to the fact that perhaps the accursed poem did contain how to enter the tower.
Irgen, on the other hand, continued to stare at the slip of paper which he held in his hands, as he did, a queer idea popped into his head. He slipped the paper away and ran forward to the wall, and began examining it to find anything which seemed to be out of the ordinary. It did not take him long to find what he was looking for. He found a small insignia about the size of a small coin.
It was of a fire burning, and it was cut into a block of stone. Irgen felt the anticipation build in him as he lit a small fire near the stonework. As he did so, the insignia changed to represent a large wave. Once again, Irgen created what the insignia pointed to make, this time dousing the flame, and it changed again. This time, it changed to a large thunderbolt.
By this time, Idus had come to look at what his brother was doing. As he did so, Irgen pointed out the lightning bolt to Idus and he smiled in anticipation. Suddenly a crack of thunder split the atmosphere and a lightning bolt crashed into the side of the wall where the insignia lay, as it did so, a large chip of mortar came out. The chip that had been created was where the insignia had been. It was small, but it was large enough that now Irgen understood the poem.
It was talking about him breaking the walls. It was he who was to smite the mighty tower. He built up his energy and focused on that tiny chip in the wall. As he did so he felt a powerful thrust flow out of his body. The ground rumbled beneath of them, and a violent crack rent the atmosphere. A cloud of dust flew into the air. When it cleared the stone which had held the small insignia was no more, in its place was a small opening which allowed the brothers entrance into Xenophon’s tower. The small weakness in the tower had allowed the brothers’ entrance.
They walked forward, awestruck at the simplicity of the poem. Irgen grabbed a hold of the hole and pulled himself upwards and through. Once through he reached his hand back out and helped Idus through the gaping hole.
Here they found what the poem had meant when it talked about darkness. Indeed no light at all penetrated the tower. The innards of the tower were completely hidden from view in the tangible darkness. Idus tried to conjure a light above their heads, but to no avail, the light could not penetrate the darkness.
The darkness acted like a leach grabbing a hold of any light which tried to enter and blocking it out just as quickly. The two brothers decided their best bet was to link arms and go forward into the unknown abyss before them. They decided that they would start by heading towards what had to be the center of the tower. In every tower so far, that was where something important always seemed to lie, so they took a few steps and slowly made their trek forward.
They found their progress easy and unhindered which only heightened their alertness. In the darkness they felt that they would rather face the enemy now, than go on forever always living in fear of what was to come next.
As they continued, they began to feel as if a presence was nearby; it was as though they were being stalked as they wandered through the tower. They walked like this for a while but the tower before them did not seem to end. It continued forward, and the brothers decided that the tower must have been magically enlarged; otherwise they would have met the other wall by now.
They continued to walk forward, trying as hard as they could to keep going in a straight line, although in the darkness, it seemed almost impossible. A few months earlier, and they would have been terrified of the prospect of traveling through a dark tow
er not knowing what was before them, but now they found that they were no longer afraid of the bleak outlook before them. They had resigned themselves to knowing that it was what they had to do, and it was up to them to do it. It wasn’t going to get any easier, so they just continued on.
After some time of walking, they finally reached the other wall. The feel of its cold stone warmed their hearts at feeling something they knew. This time, they decided to follow the contours of the wall around and see if there were any pathways that were cut into the wall. They began to walk around, with Idus steadily feeling the wall, and Irgen hanging onto his arm.
This time, as they walked around the wall, their progress yielded something. Idus almost fell down as the wall suddenly left his grasp and a wide opening was revealed. Excited at this new discovery, the twins headed heedlessly into its depths, as they did so, they felt the ground beneath them begin to steadily rise, and they slowly walked up its gradually sloping plain.
As they reached the top, something happened which they did not expect, the darkness ended abruptly behind them, and light flooded their vision. They both almost fell down from the spectacular contrast between light and darkness, only a step before, it had been pitch-black, and now the light seemed to penetrate every fiber of their body. It filled them with light and more than that, it seemed to fill every corner, there was no corner that the light did not touch.
When they finally got used to the newfound brightness, they could peer into the distance and see what was ahead of them. A long tunnel stretched out into the distance before them. It seemed like it was to go on forever, but the twins had found light, so they didn’t care how far it went on for. They started walking down the long tunnel.
After a while it dove sharply downward and soon they found a large chamber open up in front of them. The chamber was huge, but there was one problem with it; it was no longer bereft of activity. In the middle of the room roamed a large animal of some kind. One which the brothers did not like the look of, it was larger than life once again, and it had the look of what a liger and an eagle might look like.
Irgen felt sick to his stomach when he realized what it was. It was a dreadful creature that existed in many of the old mythological chains. It was a Sphinx, and yet it did not appear like the sphinx Irgen had heard tell of, it did not have a head like a maiden. Instead it was replaced with a large tiger’s head which was covered by a grizzly mane of hair. Large wings jutted out behind the front two legs of this enormous creature. And what should have been large padded feet, were replaced, by large savage looking talons.
The two brothers looked at each other, and Irgen knew Idus knew what it was as well. He shrugged with indifference and began walking boldly forward, over the course of their training he had become more and more like Irgen, and he had grown to scorn prudence. Irgen watched his first few steps with trepidation before coming to his senses and jumping after his brother.
As they approached the mighty beast, it turned and sat on its hind legs, folding its arms impressively with its wings stretching out behind its back. It created a mesmerizingly terrifying sight, but neither of the twins felt the fear that should have entered their body; instead they walked undeterred, up to face the creature before them.
Finally they stopped and the three of them surveyed each other, like two rivals man and beast, preparing for battle. After a moment, the Sphinx spoke, and a rich baritone voice sounded forth:
“Sons of Perseus, here we meet at last, and now I perform the duty to which I was trusted. In me is the secret to where your staffs may be found. In this tower, you have passed through the veil of darkness that you might find the light of truth. For light cannot be brilliant if there is no darkness to compare it to. You have done well and gone forward with no fear, but now you have reached your last obstacle…Me!” Silence followed his last words, and it seemed the Sphinx was done speaking. A little aggravated at so little being said, Idus asked:
“Well how are you the last obstacle?” The animal stirred again at his words.
“I am the last because in me is the secret you seek. I am a Sphinx it is true, and therefore you may get the secret by answering a riddle, or we may fight, but beware! I am not as weak as the Sphinx that Oedipus killed, Xenophon endowed me with magic. It will not be easy to fight me, and remember if you do fight me, you mustn’t kill me, because if I die, the secret goes with me, and your journey through the darkness will have been in vain.” Idus looked at Irgen questioningly, but as he did so, Irgen’s voice rang in his head:
“Well I guess that simplifies matters. We take the riddle and if we get it wrong then we fight him and somehow capture him. Sounds simple enough, right?” Idus turned back to face his brother and this time Irgen’s voice sounded aloud.
“Well then what’s the riddle that you’ve been waiting these many long years to give?” The Sphinx unfolded its arms and its wings relaxed to the side.
“Answer correctly and you will have your secret, answer incorrectly and I strike!” The beast cleared his throat before beginning his riddle:
What weeps with the basest of animals and trees?
Kills the strongest of men?
And is the giver of life?
The brothers looked at each other with raised eyebrows before saying, “Oh…Is that all?”
The sphinx nodded its head in silence. The brothers turned back to look at each other. Idus spoke first,
“What a bit of nonsense, I should have known better with good old Xenophon running the show.” This time Irgen did not smile, he was too deep in thought.
“What gives and takes life, and yet weeps with everyone?” Irgen asked sadly, knowing that this riddle was out of his league.
“Hmm, well I guess we can think about it for a little bit eh?” Idus said with a sigh. The two of them sat down next to the Sphinx and started talking it over. At first they did not think that anything could really fit those requirements, but after a while they started to make a little bit of progress.
They took it bit by bit and tried to think up different things that fit a category, before they narrowed it down. They started with what was something that could kill and they worked their way down until they finally reached something that gave life to everything and weeping. By this time, they had it narrowed down to things like the gods, or just a singular God, or maybe random molecules, but just as they reached this point, the Sphinx’s eyes flew open and it jumped upright, and screamed:
“You have taken too long! Prepare to fight!” And with that its enormous wings beat the air creating a wind tunnel in the chamber, and it lifted itself up above their heads. The brothers scrambled upright and looked up just in the nick of time to see the Sphinx come spiraling downward at the two of them. Its talons hit the solid rock and left four mighty imprints where its claws had hewn the solid rock in two. The twins just managed to jump to the side to avoid its mighty onslaught, but now they were ready. They both had their weapons out, and they felt the mighty power flying through them.
Idus did not wait to attack, he created an enormous cage of electricity around the monster, a cage which Irgen promptly filled with fire, but a moment later the mighty Sphinx let out an earth shattering roar and the cage broke apart, and once again the mighty behemoth took flight into the air above them. This time, it did not drop from the sky, but with a wave of its hand cast a mighty mound of earth towards the twins. Irgen and Idus just avoided it as it collided with the cold stone.
As they jumped out of the way, Irgen felt his foot catch a piece of broken stone, he tripped and fell towards the hard ground, and just as he did so, the mighty Sphinx struck. He just managed to roll out of the way as its talons collided heavily with the stone next to him, but before he could stand up, one of its large talons flew towards him; Irgen pulled out his sword and thrust it as hard as he could into the creature’s talon. It screamed in agony and yanked its foot back, wrenching Irgen’s sword from his hands. As its foot came back;
however, Idus leapt forward holding his battle axe high over his head. It swung downward on the other leg of the terrifying creature.
Another screech filled the air as Idus ripped his axe free. The crazed Sphinx took flight again, this time dripping great drops of a white pus-like substance. It ripped the sword out of its foot and hurled it downward with fearful forcefulness. It struck the earth and buried itself in the stone, slicing through it like butter until it stopped with a shudder as the hilt collided with the stone. Seconds later, the great beast once again dropped from the sky, missing Idus by inches, but this time it acted quickly and with superhuman strength carelessly flicked Idus’ axe away. It grabbed Idus in one of its talons and raised him up to his mouth.
Idus’ frantic voice penetrated Irgen’s mind, “Do something!!!” Suddenly Irgen thought of something, and without even thinking, he ran with it.
“The answer to the riddle is water!!!” Irgen shouted out at the top of his lungs. The Sphinx stopped with Idus’ hanging in between the wide open sharp teeth. A large hot piece of saliva dripped on Idus’s face. The monster slowly lowered Idus to the ground and turned and blinked at Irgen before saying with a great amount of pain in its voice:
“You are correct, water can kill the greatest, it is essential for life, and it is said to weeps with all when it rains. I’m impressed, you have both fought well. I don’t know if I will ever regain full use of my feet because of the two of you.” He looked sadly at the two of them, but Irgen brightened up and responded:
“Don’t worry we’ve found the way to heal wounds such as those, although we can’t because we don’t yet have a staff. Speaking of that what is the secret, you have had to keep?”
“The secret is a place far away, to which only I can take the two of you to. You have won; gather your sword Irgen, your blade bears your name well. You are a great fighter, as are you Idus. You truly are the chosen ones. Let’s make our way out to the castle; I haven’t seen it for many years…I wonder if it has changed much.” He beckoned the two of them to climb onto his back. They scrambled for their weapons, Irgen’s taking a little longer to get than Idus’ before climbing aboard the beast’s back and feeling the powerful wings beat underneath of them.
They felt themselves being pushed backward as the great beast lifted off the ground and shot like a rocket down the narrow tunnel, after a few minutes of flying they were back into the darkness, but the darkness did not seem to bother the Sphinx instead he just flew right through it, until they reached the point in the wall where they had broken through earlier. Here they found the hole they had made earlier had disappeared, and in its place stood an enormous opening that allowed the large Sphinx’s body to fly gracefully out into the open.
As they broke out of the tower the brothers found themselves blinded by the dazzling light of the Sun’s rays. They hadn’t realized how long it had taken them to get through the tower, and they wondered how late they were for their training.
On the lawn was their answer, there all bunched up, were their trainers standing in their glittering white armor and two new strangers, one dressed in navy blue armor, and another, a woman, with bright vibrant blonde hair, was there with bright silver armor. The Sphinx flew high into the air. “Thank you my boys, I have been waiting for ages for this.” As he flew high into the air he surveyed the castle and surroundings. Satisfied he turned and descended to the bystanders who were watching them silently from the lawn, the brothers wondered what awaited on the lawn before them, what could have caused the Knights to put on their armor? The answers they knew, were about to be given to them.
The Brothers Tuerl & The Staffs of Zeus Page 42
