Everflame (31 page)

“We can cut it in halves, right?” asked Ben.

“I don’t know,” said Whiteclaw. “We can touch it, so I assume that it is only the juice that is deadly, but I wouldn’t dare have that juice touch my flesh. Cutting that apple could put us in severe danger.”

Evercloud and Riverpaw had never considered tha
t possibility while in the bog.

“I suppose it would have been smart to take two apples,” said Evercloud.

“No,” disagreed Riverpaw. “The parchment said ‘two items,’ the apple and the hammer. For all we know, the tree may not have let us take two apples. It may have been a mistake to deviate from what the parchment said.”

“You should probably talk to the statue again,” said Tomas to Evercloud.

“Oh,” said Evercloud. “Yeah. Of course.”

He got up from the table and picked up the apple and the hammer and walked over to stand in front of the statue. Its eyes no longer glowed as they had before Evercloud and Riverpaw had left for the bog, but the small compartment door in the statue’s torso was still open. Evercloud looked the statue over to see if it made any reaction as
he approached, but it did not. He held the two items out in front of him and spoke to the statue.

“Uh, hello.” Evercloud cleared his throat. “It is I, um, the one who had passed the test. I have returned with the items. The two…items.” He paused and waited for some sort of reaction from the statue, but again, there was no response. Evercloud looked back into the compartment and found that it was still empty. The others now joined Evercloud around the statue, too eager and curious to stay back.

“Maybe something will happen if you put the items into the compartment,” suggested Tomas.

“I don’t think the hammer will fit, but maybe…” Evercloud put the apple into the compartment and it fit just fine. He closed the c
ompartment door and stood back.

Without delay, the eyes of the statue began to glow. Riverpaw and Evercloud shivered as the eyes turned a sickly
, green color that reminded them, far too much, of the moss in Oldham’s Bog. Something inside the statue began to whir, and this noise continued for a few minutes. The group waited patiently, never taking their eyes off of the statue. Then, without any warning, a second compartment door popped open at the back of the statue. Evercloud opened it and reached inside. When he pulled his hand back out, it came with two glass vials of a yellowish liquid.

“The juice?” guessed Ben.

“It must be,” said Riverpaw. “I suppose all that whirring was the statue juicing the apple. We can’t touch the juice, but it can.”

Evercloud pocketed the vials and turned back to the statue.

“That still doesn’t help us find the guardians. There must be someplace to fit the hammer.”

“Why not the hands?” asked Whiteclaw.

The hands of the statue were closed, but not all the way. There were gaps, possibly large enough to rest the hammer in. Evercloud tried to fit the handle of the hammer into the left hand of the statue but the hole was too small. So Evercloud tried the right hand. At first, it also seemed too small, but Evercloud was persistent and eventually, the hammer fit.

Once again, the eyes of the statue glowed and everyone knew that the hands had been the right place. Violet was the color of the light on this occasion, and again
, the statue began to produce whirring sounds. This time, the statue was also beginning to move. It started with just the arms, bending forward and back, in jerking motions. Soon, the jerking motions spread to the rest of the statue’s body. The travelers stepped back a few paces, just to be safe. They continued their watch as the statue gained full animation. The movements were becoming less jerky and more fluid with each second, looking like a man stretching his muscles loose. Suddenly, all the movement stopped and the statue addressed them.

“Hello,” it said without moving its mouth. “My name is Tomaton. Thank you for waking me.”

“Hello, Tomaton,” began Whiteclaw. “I am Whi–”

Tomaton was not listening. He turned himself around, toward the back wall
, and began walking toward it. Once he had reached the wall, he cocked his arm back and raised the hammer. Then, in one swift motion, he swung the hammer at the wall with great force. A loud boom echoed through the room and a large slab of the wall crumbled to the ground. When the dust settled, the travelers could see that a passageway had been opened, revealing a staircase that led up, further into the mountain.

“Of course, more stairs,” grumbled Riverpaw. “Why not a nice slide
going down?”

Tomaton turned back to the travelers and stood, motionless. “Please, let me know when you are ready to continue,” he said.

The travelers all looked at each other.

“I think that we’ve come to the point where we need to be ready for anything,” said Ben.

Everyone nodded in agreement and then turned to where they had their things, lying in wait. Riverpaw and Whiteclaw had no packs, and hadn’t needed to carry water since the desert. Being bears, they also carried no weapons. In all respects, they were ready. The three men filled their packs and secured them tightly to their backs, taking care that they were neither bulky nor restricting of movement. Ben grabbed his blades and swung them through the air, stretching his arms and making sure he was comfortable with the weight of the blades. Tomas strung his bow and knocked an arrow, pointing it out the open end of the room, and checking his sights. Evercloud strapped his claw on, making sure that it was tight but comfortable. He walked over to Ben and handed him one of the vials.

“Here,” he said. “One person shouldn’t carry both of them.”

Ben nodded and placed the vial into his pocket. The men returned to the two bears and they all nodded that they were ready. Whiteclaw began to speak.

“We don’t know that the guardians will be waiting for us up those stairs, but now is not the time to hope for the best. We must prepare for the worst. Do not throw those vials for any reason. For all we know, they are the only weapons that will kill the guardians. Losing those vials could
, very well, mean our death. Most importantly, stay together. These guardians have the power to keep the Ancients at bay. To think that one of us could harm them on our own is ludicrous. Be smart first and brave second.” Whiteclaw looked all of them in the eye to make sure that they understood what he was saying. “Do any of you have any questions or confusions?” No one spoke. Whiteclaw nodded. “All right,” he continued, raising himself up to his full height. “Now you must remember what it is that we fight for. We fight to bring peace to this world, to free the Ancients, to stop the Great Tyrant. Remember your mothers, your fathers, your sisters, and your brothers. Remember all those who have loved you, and remained close to your heart. For it is that love that has seen us through the darkness of this world. It is that love that has been a light. See that light. Feel its heat. Now become that light. For it is now we who must banish the darkness for those who have done the same for us, and by everything that I am, every thread of my being, I swear that I will not fail! By the Everflame!” he roared.

“By the Everflame!” the others shouted in unison.

Whiteclaw turned to the statue, poised in the doorway.

“We are ready to continue.”

Chapter 29: Into the Blinding White Light

Tomaton led the way up the staircase at a constant pace, never slowing, never stopping for a break, his violet eyes floating through the darkness. Hammer in hand, he moved forward, metal feet clinking against the rock. No one spoke; speech was unnecessary and only distracting from the objective. Tomaton’s violet eyes lit the way, giving them a vague idea of what was in front of them. His clunking feet urged them on like the beat of a battle drum. They had been travelers, hunters, adventurers, and searchers, and now they prepared themselves to be warriors, unrelenting, efficient, hardened and invincible.

Whiteclaw had stirred something in them. Possibly something they didn’t know existed, something instinctual, primal, animal. Philosophers of the day might find it curious to see such anger born from a speech concerning love. Strange are the ways of the mind, and stranger is the fuel of emotion. Each one of them had found that ‘one thing’ during Whiteclaw’s speech, during that sobering moment that only times of true passion can evoke. That moment when a being reveals to itself the things that it already knows. That moment that we see, within the mirror of our souls, the reason that we choose to live each day. And we do, though we may f
orget, choose to live each day.

For Ben, that one thing was truth. He anguished in a world full of gray muddiness and confusion. He yearned for life to be black and white, once and for all, right and wrong. No more masks, no more compro
mising, simplicity and purity.

For Tomas it was peace. Not in the sense of a world without violence, but in the sense of personal serenity, stability, tranquility. No man can be a pacifist in a world that no longer affords him the
quiet moments of his own mind.

For Whiteclaw, it was his son, his student, and the legacy he would leave to him. He could not leave this world knowing that he had allowed what is wrong to live on without fighting for what was right. He fought for change. He fought for the future.

Riverpaw was driven on by his desire to win the hearts of his Kingdom. Every bone in his body ached to show that he could be great. Showing them that he could protect them from danger. He would be a rock by which they could shelter themselves from any storm. He would be their champion.

Evercloud wanted the world. Most men did. But most wanted it for greed or power, reasons that were evil and base, reasons that were for the benefit of the individual and the detriment of all else. Not Evercloud. Evercloud wanted the world because he saw within in it light and beauty, and he wanted every other creature on this planet to see what he saw, feel what he felt. He wanted to show everyone that life and living were
a gift and not a cruel tragedy, and he knew that he could be the one to show them the way.

It was these things that drove them up the staircase. It was these things that were moving them, so resolutely, onward. These things that were all that they were. These things that were their own definitions, the reason that they fought for every single life-giving breath they took. Their hearts. Their souls. Their Everflame.

They could see the end of the passageway, a flat circle of white light that grew larger and larger with each step forward. It was a light at the end of the tunnel, as if they were making their way into the arms of salvation. The hot stagnant air of being enclosed in rock was now being replaced by crisp, fresh air. They moved ever closer to the light and the air became colder, slightly chilling. The silent passageway, once filled with only the sound of Tomaton’s plodding steps, now howled as the wind blew against the exit, like breath over a bottle top. They were only feet away from the exit now and could see that the last stairs were covered with snow. They were now being hit in the face with flakes, gone maverick from the storm outside.

They emerged from the passageway into blinding whiteness, biting winds and a flurry of snow. They were upon the peak of the mountain
, or at least very close to it. Tomaton continued to trudge on, leading the party down a path that cut between two sheer, rock walls, creating an alley. The alley was easily one hundred feet wide and the path was flat, as if some ancient architect had made it that way. Down the alley they walked, heads turned from the wind, doing all they could to shield themselves from the relentless elements. Suddenly, Tomaton stopped walking and turned to face the travelers.

“Destroy the guardians,” he said.

Tomaton turned back along his path, and they watched him move forward, now noticing the gigantic statue before them. Easily thirty feet tall, if not more, stood a statue of Tenturo the griffin. The statue looked over them with a noble, yet menacing, stare. His wings were folded against his body his and ears were pointed back, he seemed as if he were about to pounce on them. The toes of his massive paws were as high as Evercloud’s waist. They stood in awe, wondering if the real Tenturo were just as big. He must be close now, and if Tomaton’s words had been any indication, so were the guardians.

The group felt invincible at the feet of the statue. They would soon be in the presence of an ancient being, fighting alongside a mythical power, bent on defeating the darkness. They readied themselves to attack, adrenaline warming their bodies and spirits. They remained attentive and searched for Tomaton so they could follow his lead.

As they looked back upon him, however, they noticed that he had stopped at the foot of the great statue. Tomaton climbed up on one of the mammoth paws and cocked his arm back, raising the hammer just as he had done to uncover the passageway. He struck the statue and a gonging sound echoed over the mountain. A crack appeared upon the leg of the statue and Tomaton raised the hammer to deal another blow.

T
hen, they heard it, high in the sky, a sound to dominate all sounds, the cries of a beast. But no ordinary beast could make this sound, only a terrible beast, a tortured beast. The cry came again, chilling their blood, locking their joints like a nightmare. Their eyes searched the sky and finally, they found them. Two black shapes glided through the blizzard above the travelers. They flew closer and closer, the party now able to see their gigantic, black wings. Tomaton continued to pound at the statue, sending cracks all along the body, but the group could no longer watch Tomaton and his hammer, for behind them had landed the guardians.