The Tessellation Saga. Book Two. 'The One' (36 page)

‘
I love you
too Gid, but I’m still not goin’ ter kiss yer.’
Gideon grinned
slowly through his tears at his friend.

‘
I hope not,
I’d rather have Mayan kiss me, if there are any kisses going that
is,’
he said, his voice trembling with feeling. Jed held his
friend’s hand tightly.

‘
I am so, so
sorry Gideon, please, please fergive me,’
he sobbed as the
tears continued to fall.

‘
Brother,
there is nothing to forgive, my life is your life, my blood your
blood.’
Gideon said and swallowed, desperately trying to rid
himself of the hard lump in his throat, he had not realised how
hard his friend was punishing himself.

The figures
beside the tree and the people in the red water slowly began to
fade, finally they disappeared, the river of blood and tears
changed into a river of flowers, light and sweet smelling amongst
the green, green grasses.

‘
Sleep well
now my friend,’
said Gideon as he gently pushed his friend into
a more comfortable position amongst the flowers and watched as he
drifted off again, this time to a deep and healing sleep.

‘
Gideon,’
the lady called, Gideon smiled at the lady who was
once more beside him.
‘You truly are my son,’
she said.

‘
Am I the
one?’
Gideon asked quietly as she took his hand once more, the
movement causing her amulet to move and twinkle in the bright light
that seemed to surround them both.

‘
The way
will be hard for you Gideon, but Jed will be with you, I also will
be with you, for as long as I can be,’
she answered as she
kissed his brow and slowly began to fade, as she did so, Gideon too
fell into a dreamless sleep.

The sun had
begun to lower in the sky when Gideon opened his eyes again; Jed
was still beside him watching the silver water as it played and
ran.

‘Wherever you
go Gid, I will go,’ he said, without looking at his friend.

‘It would make
me proud to have yer beside me.’ Gideon replied with emotion, not
realising his speech was almost correct. In his mind, he could see
the lady, his mother, smiling. Understanding between the two men at
last complete, Gideon stood and offered his hand to his friend.

‘C’mon Jed,
let’s get back, the others will be worrying,’ he said. Jed placed
his hand in Gideon’s as he allowed himself to be pulled to his feet
and together they walked back toward the low white halls in the
distance.

They had gone
to swim as children and they returned as men.

‘There yer
are,’ called Mayan smiling as she ran out to greet the returning
swimmers, she had been watching by the window for hours worrying
about them both. As the men approached, she realised that something
about them had changed but as she could not put a finger on it and
she made a mental note to discuss it with Lemba just as soon as she
could.

‘Is everyone in
the hall?’ Gideon asked Mayan, squeezing her hand gently.

‘Yer, we waited
fer yer coz we knew you’d be hungry. Lunch was hours ago and dinner
is on the table,’ she answered as the three walked into the open
door and on into the large room. Thaddrick was sitting alone at the
head of the table almost where they had left him.

‘Thaddrick,’
said Gideon as he took his chair casually, ‘I…, we,’ he corrected
himself as he looked at his friend who smiled in return, holding
tightly to Lemba’s hand. ‘We need for yer…, for you, to tell us
about the Bleak, about the gateway and just how we are to fix it,’
he said. Varan turned white and began to cough as he choked on a
succulent piece of chicken, Sonal, pale but able to pull himself
together more quickly handed his brother a jug of sweet small
beer.

‘What?’ Said
Gideon’s father standing quickly, ‘yer no a soldier boy,’ he began
angrily, ‘I’ll no allow yer ter go ter fight, I’ll no lose yer
now,’ he said, clearly upset. Rhoàld sat quietly saying nothing,
knowing his fate was to accompany Gideon and now, it seemed, young
Jed too, wherever they went. Thaddrick smiled.

‘Da, I was born
to do this…, you know I was.’ Gideon said as Thaddrick who had been
about to speak closed his mouth and listened. Jed looked at his son
as if for the first time, suddenly seeing the man he had become and
for a long while, no one spoke.

‘Yeah lad, I
suppose I do,’ Gideon’s father answered as he shook his head sadly
in resignation, ‘an’ yer’d be no son o’ mine iffen yer shirked yer
responsibilities,’ he said, adding, ‘I be mighty proud o’ yer Gid,
always ‘ave been,’ he sat down once more and stared hard at the
food before him.

‘I couldn’t
‘ave ‘ad a better Da…’ Gideon said warmly and deliberately, as he
smiled at his father and his father smiled slowly in return, for
once Thaddrick did not correct his speech.

‘Blue, can yer
tell the lad about the Bleak,’ Jed said, still smiling sadly at his
son.

‘Well,’
Thaddrick began. ‘To understand the Bleak, you must know how it was
created,’ he said as the two young men began to help themselves
from the food piled on the table. Varan and Sonal sat silently,
knowing only legends from their childhood, they were eager to
understand the truth.

‘Long after our
arrival…,’ Thaddrick continued and as before the hall began to fill
with people, all as enthusiastic to listen to Thaddrick’s stories
as the group around the table. ‘It was noticed that the site of the
gateway was becoming barren and the lake seemed to be changing too.
We had already moved our little camp away from the lake and the
site of our arrival to the high flat ground under the lee of the
mountain range that surrounded the valley. It offered more shelter
from the winter storms, the lake did tend to thrash around when the
wind caught it as I recall,’ he paused, remembering the tall waves
and the soaking tents on the occasion of the colonies first winter.
‘We had found a large cave in the side of the mountain that served
as a council chamber and our best stone masons spent months carving
it into a replica of a similar chamber at home so it seemed
sensible to move closer to it.’

Varan paled as
Thaddrick spoke but remained quiet as the older man continued.

‘Anyway, the
site of the gateway was becoming barren and everything seemed to be
dying slowly, even the grass seemed to turn brown and wither and
the trees seemed to just, give up. It was as if something had
sucked all the life from the area.’ Rhoàld shot a look to Varan who
remained rigidly composed and avoided looking at anyone.

‘The child with
dead eyes,’ he said looking at Varan, ‘the child with dead eyes
sucking the life out of the land, killing everything, like a
disease…’ Rhoàld added, as Varan turned at last to Rhoàld and on to
Gideon.

‘It was a
message my friend, for the one, a message to bring help and hope,’
he finished, his eyes remaining on Gideon’s face as he spoke.

‘What message?’
Lemba asked, feeling somewhat bewildered.

‘Show them
Varan…,’ demanded Rhoàld, ‘they need to see it too,’ he said, as
Thaddrick interrupted.

‘I can show
them Rhoàld,’ he said, it was my message originally. Puzzled
expressions passed around the small band at the table but the words
and questions remained unasked once more as suddenly in their minds
they could see a small child sitting on lush green grass against
the bole of a large tree. It was summer and the full dance of
nature, glorified in the sunlight was evident. The wind blew
ensuring the weaving of the branches making the leaves twist and
turn to the harmonious music of the physical world. A deep wide
silver river flowed fast and furiously beside the child and fish
swam and played, darting around the water as they leapt to catch
the flies that stopped by to lay eggs under the surface. The child
lifted a hand to caress the tree and where the child’s hand touched
the bark it began to darken and shrink, it was dying. The patch of
now lifeless bark began to spread like a disease. The tree’s very
branches rustled and shook, screaming in protest as the life was
drawn away from it and sucked into the child, slowly, so slowly the
tree stopped fighting for its life and began to succumb. The full
green leaves began to turn yellow and then brown finally dropping
off the branches and falling all around the small child still
touching the trees wide bole. The child looked up toward the silent
watchers, the deep dead eyes holding no life; he just continued to
stare as if nothing was happening. The tree dried up and finally
died leaving withered lifeless branches reaching into the sky like
pleading hands asking for help that never came. The ground around
the trees roots slowly began to change colour, from the lush green
grass it had been it turned slowly to yellow then brown, as it too
seemed to be drying up, dying. Still the wind blew only now, it
pushed dead brown leaves and tumbleweeds of dried grasses. The
river slowly turned brown then grey, the once silver fish floated
belly up their scales dry and peeling…

Rhoàld held his
head in his hands as once more he saw the vision Varan had sent
him, very slightly changed but essentially the same one. ‘Yes,
that’s it,’ he sobbed.

‘That’s
horrible,’ cried Lemba as she held her hand to her throat, as if
forcing the lump that had been growing there to empty of tears.

‘Yes my dear,
it is, and it is exactly what happened, is still happening inside
the barrier that holds the Bleak, the child you saw represents the
void that holds no life.

‘We discovered
by some quirk of fate that the gateway from home had been left
partially open, just a tiny bit but enough to cause the life of
this planet to be slowly sucked out and into the void, life, a
grain of sand at a time just leaking away. I, along with our
greatest mages got to work at once trying to complete the closing
spell but whatever we tried was ineffective, the gateway remained
open and piece by tiny piece our beautiful valley was dying. We
could not stop the death and some of our younger people even began
to fall ill as the air grew thin and the waters turned foul. A few
families chose to leave the protection of the valley; these
families expanded over the years and grew, mingling with the
planets original inhabitants. Which we believe, is why some of the
peoples of the planet became, em…, special and others did not.’
Thaddrick smiled at Mayan, ‘no offense meant my dear,’ he said.

‘None taken,’
mumbled Mayan quietly in return and Thaddrick continued.

‘As the valley
continued to die, we decided to split up once more. I did mention
this earlier,’ he said looking at Jed who nodded his agreement. ‘A
valley, similar in every way to our original home was located, this
valley in fact.’ Thaddrick stopped and gestured around him before
reaching forward and taking the jug of small beer that sat in front
of Varan, poured himself a drink. ‘All the families were
volunteers, the spell we created contained an element of time which
meant that the people sent here would not age as normal people do,
this would mean they would stay as true to Arotian values and
traditions as possible and remain free from the threat of any
hostile indigenous peoples. Remember, this was a very long time
ago,’ he said sagely, as Gideon’s father snorted loudly at the
mention of hostile peoples. ‘We spent a long time in the
preparation of the spell and imbued the very soil with magic and
health to ensure both our own and the lands survival.’

‘So that’s why
our forest is so diff’rent then...!’ Young Jed exclaimed; he had
followed a recruiter’s wagon across the whole of Derova, since his
eighteenth birthday and he had seen forests and woods in plenty but
never in all his time travelling had he come across a forest that
had had the same feel as the forest of his home. He smiled,
thinking that he had always believed that was the reason it felt
special, because the Green Home Forest, was home.

‘Shhhh!,’
smiled Lemba, encouraging Jed to remain silent whilst Thaddrick
continued as if uninterrupted, Mayan also nudged her brother,
irritated by the interruption in the story.

‘The spell was
to last only until the gateway was closed and we could call the
people home, my nephew, Dèvin, Théoden’s son and
your
ancestor,’ he added, looking directly at the elder twins and Gideon
pointedly before continuing again. ‘Dèvin, now a man took his
family and a few of his friends and made a camp outside the
boundaries we had set for our colony within the mountain range.
There they stayed whist we worked together to create a spell that
would build a wall of protection around the valley, the wall would
hold the life outside of the valley safe and protected from the
void. The spell was very complicated and intricate for it had to
last and be strong enough to hold back the void should we fail to
close the gateway and it took weeks to prepare. I argued with my
nephew who felt that he, as the son of Théoden, First Mage of
Schools, should be the one to be the sacrifice, the balance. We
knew the spell would need a sacrifice to the void as the magic was
to be so strong and we could not allow any more life to be taken
from the planet itself, the spell needed balance and I intended to
be that balance. So, to give my headstrong nephew something to do
and to get him out of harm’s way more than anything else really, I
sent him to take a last check on the site of the gateway.’
Thaddrick halted in his story; he picked up his glass once more and
stared for a moment deep into the depths.

Roidan, as ever
at difficult moments for Thaddrick, moved to stand behind her
husband lending him her love and support, she gently squeezed his
shoulders as Gideon spoke.

‘What is it
Thaddrick, what ‘ap… happened?’ He asked, unconsciously correcting
his speech and suddenly feeling dread.
Sacrifice,
he
thought,
am I to die then, is this how I close these doorways
into the void?
Thaddrick began again, his eyes staying for the
moment deep in the now empty glass.