Maylin's Gate (Book 3) (23 page)

The lifeboat stopped beside the pier. The impaled guardian shifted into a bird before landing beside the strangers on the pier.

The wounded guardian shifted.

The white souled woman, a healer, rushed to the injured guardian’s side.

The guardian fell forward and sucked in ragged breaths. An arrow sprouted from the woman’s thigh.

She squinted through the darkness and peered past their blinding soul auras.

The female guardian, the one who had pulled them from the sea, turned toward the lifeboat.

Blood drained from her face and she stifled a scream.

The male guardian knelt beside the prone woman on the pier. The man appeared every bit the king’s twin. “Well done Rika,” the man said resting a gloved hand on the king’s lady. “Well done.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

Stairway of the Gods

Dozens of waterfalls stretched in an arc across the crater’s rim. The last rim among seven they’d passed since leaving the Maltha River Basin.

Ronan glanced behind at the waterfalls stacked one on top of another like a staircase.

Beyond the waterfalls, the Adris Mountains appeared as a distant haze painted on a faint blue sky. Thoth called the cascading range of waterfalls the ‘Stairway of the Gods’.

Looking back on them now, he agreed.

Lush ferns and high grass spread like a green blanket across the lowlands ahead. Winding streams carved paths through high, saw-toothed grass. A never-ending series of lakes, ponds, and rivers stretched to the horizon. They’d reached the swamp.

He’d deemed the place the madman’s swamp although he kept that bit to himself.

Thoth’s wings beat faster and they climbed over the swampland. “Look to the swamp’s center where the horizon begins.”

“What are we looking for?” He said.

General Demos leaned over the saddle and studied the rivers draining into the swamp. The general’s tongue flickered as if tasting the humid lowland air. “This place,” General Demos hissed. “It tastes like home.”

He glanced behind and eyed the general. “Like Baerin?”

General Demos’s gaze lingered over the lush green horizon. “If I’d known of this place….”

“Do you see the tree at the swamp’s center?” Thoth said and rolled right.

A brown tree with a bare trunk and short sturdy limbs towered over miles of patchy green vegetation.

“I see it,” he said.

“The man Abzu spoke with lives beneath that tree,” Thoth said. “He called it the Tree of Life.”

“Who did? Abzu?”

“No Silver Soul, the madman did.”

“Why?”

“We can ask him ourselves,” General Demos said through the link.

“Another hour,” Thoth said. “Maybe two.”

“It doesn’t look that far away,” he said.

“The swamp is a deceiving place,” Thoth said. “Should you become separated from the pack, take care with your steps.”

“What sort of creatures live in the swamp?” General Demos said.

“Serpents large enough to swallow a man whole,” Thoth said. “A strange breed of monkey lives in the inner swamp, and I’ve seen spiders as big as dogs.”

He’d picked a fine time to lose hold of Elan’s magic.

“Tiamat has seen vast schools of red fish clean the flesh from a two-ton water bull in less than a minute.”

His gaze drifted over the placid scenery. Thoth might be stretching the truth just a bit. “How does the madman survive such dangerous creatures?”

“That is a mystery for which I have no answer,” Thoth said. “Perhaps he’ll tell you.”

The air above Thoth shimmered like heat waves reflecting from the desert sand.

“What’s that,” General Demos said pointing to the strange flows.

Like melted wax, the air swirled forming a circular current of glass-like energy.

Thoth roared and rolled away from the rotating flows.

The short hair on his neck prickled and he leaned forward gripping Thoth’s saddle with both hands.

The scent of ozone filled the air and the swirling current pulled on his body.

“It’s a portal,” Thoth said through the link. The dragon roared and blue flames leaped from Thoth’s gaping mouth.

A deep hum came from the forming portal and shot outward sending a wave of vibrations rippling across the sky.

His teeth rattled and his fingertips buzzed, but he couldn’t take his eyes from the portal.

Like a minnow struggling against a mighty river current, Thoth’s wings beat faster and the dragon struggled to keep them from the swirling vortex.

The energy swirled faster. Wisps of electricity crackled at the portal’s center. Currents of black spun while blue, white, and yellow light pulsed in a rhythm that felt ordered.

He stared at the blinking lights mesmerized. The lights beckoned him in a way nothing had before. Something locked away yet ready on the tip of his tongue.

Patterns emerged. A long blue light followed by two bursts of white then a long yellow.

Long blue—two whites—long yellow. Time slowed and the ever-changing pattern drew him in.

Thoth’s wings heaved against the gate’s pull. General Demos clung to the dragon’s saddle.

The blinking lights vanished and the doorway spread open.

He blinked and the spell snapped.

A window to another place appeared dangling a hundred feet above the swamp. A blood-orange sky and thin wispy clouds came into view.

With jaw agape, he stared through the portal into another world. Was it the Seeker’s world? If he ordered Thoth through, would he find the Tower of Souls?

The portal’s overwhelming tug vanished. Thoth broke free and flew in a slow arc above the window hanging over the swampland.

A toe-curling screech came through the portal. A beast unlike any he’d ever seen slid through the opening.

General Demos reached for a longbow dangling from Thoth’s saddle.

The winged beast appeared Thoth’s size and half again. The creature bore no skin or scale. Bone, muscle, and sinew covered organs visible to the naked eye. The beast’s heart pumped inside a muscled chest cavity. Blood pumped through exposed arteries. The creature’s eyeballs rotated in an open socket tracking Thoth’s path in the sky above.

A shiver pulled at the base of his skull. He recalled the visitor’s words. Agents were already among us. Was he witnessing an agent?

Seated atop the beast, a shrouded figure clad in black turned a shadowy gaze in his direction. Bony fingers clung to a linked silver chain strung through the beast’s nostrils.

His skin crawled, and he wanted nothing more than to be far away from the creature and its rider.

A fifty-foot spray of fire erupted from Thoth’s throat.

Blue flame rolled over the creature’s body.

Six-inches from the beast’s heart, transparent skin glowed cherry-red. The beast never flinched.

The creature’s black-clad rider snapped the silver reigns. The beast responded soaring higher and setting a path toward him and Thoth.

The beast stretched its jaw wide. A dozen rows of glassy teeth grew inward like those of a cobra.

Thoth’s tail rocked sideways and slammed into the beast.

Wings flapping, the creature careened downward. The beast loosed a high-pitched reedy gurgle that left his teeth chattering.

General Demos trained the longbow on the shrouded rider and loosed an arrow.

The arrow hissed and the beast rolled. The arrow missed and clattered off the creature’s invisible skin.

The beast darted upward at a speed faster than should be possible. The creature raised its tail overhead like a scorpion ready to strike.

Thoth roared and rolled sideways exposing black scales.

The beast’s tail flicked forward. Hard pellets skittered against the dragon’s protective scales.

Thoth loosed an agony filled roar and dove toward the high-grass and flowing rivers below.

He peered over Thoth’s side and scanned the dragon’s scales.

Blood streamed from the cracks between Thoth’s scales. Thoth rolled and bright sunshine gleamed off the blood.

His stomach sank.

Thousands of glassy quills impaled Thoth’s scales.

“Heal him,” General Demos screamed above the whipping wind and the dragon’s wail.

He reached for Elan’s magic and touched emptiness. “I can’t.”

Thoth glided a few feet above a stream flowing between high grass and ten-foot cattails. The dragon’s mind lurched outward. “Leave me.” Thoth yelled through the link.

His face flashed with heat. “What? I won’t leave you.”

General Demos gripped his collar and pulled.

His hands fell free of the saddle, and he flew backwards across the Thoth’s tail.

Thoth barrel rolled.

He fell. Cool water met his back and splashed around him. He sunk toward the river bottom and the sound of a second splash came a few feet to his right.

General Demos thrashed with arms and legs flailing. The general slipped beneath the river’s surface in a frothing soup of whitewater.

He kicked and shot free of the water’s surface and gasped.

Thoth roared and he turned his gaze skyward.

The dragon climbed fifty feet setting a collision course for the alien beast and its rider. With neck lowered, Thoth slammed into the creature’s belly.

The beast spiraled backward toward the open portal.

He reached for Elan’s magic, but it refused to serve him.

The creature rolled away from Thoth’s snapping jaws.

The water beside him splashed followed by a desperate gurgle. General Demos broke the surface with tongue flickering.

Without thinking, he took a deep breath and dove. He kicked lower and slid his arm around General Demos’s chest.

The baerinese general clutched at his arm pulling and grabbing trying to reach behind him.

Water shot up his nose and slid down his throat. He fought back his body’s instinct to cough and pushed away from the struggling general. If he didn’t reach the shore, General Demos would drown them both. He tightened his grip around the general’s chest and pushed off the river’s soft bottom.

General Demos thrashed and pulled before both their heads broke the surface.

The alien beast’s high-pitched shriek filled the air and he gasped.

General Demos coughed and spit pulling in short hard breaths.

The general stopped resisting.

He pulled them to the shoreline high with green river grass and swaying cattails and turned his gaze to the sky.

Thoth’s jaw circled the creature’s neck. Where the dragon’s teeth pierced, cracks appeared in the beast’s clear skin. The creatures wrestled before the portal locked in mortal combat.

The rider turned its gaze toward the riverbank and stared into his eyes.

His flesh crawled.

The rider had no face. The man from the next world gazed on him without eyes, nose, and mouth.

He turned away from the rider’s stare and shifted deeper into the grassy thicket.

Thoth kicked the creature’s belly and it slipped halfway through the portal.

The energy around the portal dimmed and drew inward shrinking the doorway.

The creature let loose a final cry and snapped down with its jaw grabbing hold of Thoth’s tail.

With a twist of its neck, the alien creature yanked and pulled Thoth through the opening.

Thoth bellowed spraying a torrent of fire from the next world. The dragon’s wings beat in short hard bursts before the portal slammed shut.

Blue skies and silence descended on the swampland. Thoth vanished.

CHAPTER THIRTY

Ritual

Beneath the horizon star, rainbow lights glowed above a crystal oasis. Zen. Trace’s home and Obsith’s capital.

Danielle shrieked a warning cry. She rolled right and descended toward the desert city. A city where she might find the last of the great heartwood trees.

Flying as a desert hawk, Arber loosed a high-pitched shrill and rolled right following in her path.

Atop her saddle, Jeremy leaned forward. “Be careful Danielle. I’m going to leave the shields off.”

She tipped right and drifted lower leveling off for a slow even descent.

Like a sea of glittering diamonds, white salt flats shone beneath a full moon. Zen’s jagged walls rose above the plane like a crown jewel. Thousands of lights twinkled behind Zen's quartz walls. A rainbow of colors danced for miles in every direction.

Her eyes feasted on Zen’s dazzling skyline. How had a man as despicable as Trace created such beauty?

“If I’d not seen the city with my own eyes, I wouldn’t believe,” Jeremy said. “I’m still not sure I do. Am I dreaming?”