The Last Summoning---Andrew and the Quest of Orion's Belt (Book Four) (68 page)

“Angry?” The Fallen bellowed. “Yes. I can see
it in your eyes. You didn’t want your little coon friend to die.
How sad. Well, what about these others? You don’t want them to die
either, do you? He motioned to Ivory and Freddie, who stood behind
Andrew. “It seems you want a great many things from me; the belt of
Orion included. How about we make a deal, and all will be
forgiven.”

“Deal?” Andrew questioned, anger simmering
inside his chest. “I don’t make deals in the dark.”

“Dark?” The Fallen questioned expelling
rivulets of light from his shimmering being. “I see no darkness?
Only light.” He pushed aside the shrouded mantel he wore, showing
off the brilliant light of Orion’s belt. The three stars embedded
in it sparkled and gleamed, blinding Andrew by their
brilliance.

“You see. I am light!” he roared, beaming
before Andrew in all his stolen glory. “I am great, and glorious
light. Cower before my splendor!” the being thundered, spitting out
sparks from his mouth and unfolding all his magnitude before
Andrew, like an endless scroll. “I am greater than any one being in
the entire universe. All cower before me. Darkness has been subject
to light for far too long. Now it is light that is subject to me,
to my will. And it obeys me, as you soon will. Nothing, not even
you and your army can take back the light and break the great power
I hold. Worship me, and I will let you live in the pavilion of my
shadow! Both you and that sword shall drink of my eternal wrath.
You cannot change what has been written in the stars, their wisdom
and knowledge absorbed into myself. Believe me. I know what the end
will be!” The Fallen opened himself wide, revealing his full power
and glory for all to see. Light and shadow surged through the air,
hot and icy, burning and cold. The Fallen stretched himself out
like a dark, vast, webbed map, revealing thousands upon thousands
of brilliant orbs of light snuggled into his black core that were
wrapped in a dark shell-like encasing, as if he had hid them there
for later digestion.

“Behold my glory!” The Fallen thundered,
spitting out oceans of dazzling sparks, still unfolding himself
like an endless scroll. Light, and radiance swirled around him.

“Behold my power, my light, and my might! Bow
before me! Bow!” His face gleamed with moonbeams. His skin vibrated
with the heat of the sun. But behind all the light and glory, there
lurked a repressed darkness that itched to consume and devour. His
frame was huge, stretching out in every direction. The stolen light
of sun, moon, stars, life, and light that he bore, shone in every
direction in a blinding wave of light, heat, and ice, but dimmed,
and diluted by his own person.

“I will never bow to a shadow, for that is
all you are,” Andrew answered, shielding his eyes. “I will never
cower before a void which robs others of light in order to gratify
its own emptiness. You are a being which will never be filled. A
being who will never allow others to be full. It is you who will be
made to bow!” Andrew could feel his entire body tingle with the
power granted to him from the sword. It filled him up, nearly
consuming his flesh by its energy, as if eager to do what it had
been made for. The time was now. Andrew raised his sword and ran
into the open folds of the void’s chest, splashing through the
great curtain of darkness.

The Fallen roared, and cried out in anger.
Still Andrew cut through the dark folds, diving deeper into The
Fallen’s depths, pushing against the swirling masses of darkness,
in bursts of light and shadow, as if he had been plunged into a
current of black water. Heat, fire, and ice surged around him,
trying to hinder his way. Still he pushed onward, disappearing
completely into the void, where he was transported into a colorless
wasteland of fear and shadow, of muted and mingled sounds and
stolen light. He felt shrouded in mist, confused, and lost in this
endless void. Then, his eyes burned green, showing him a path
through the darkness, to The Fallen’s weakest spot. There, just
beyond him, was The Fallen’s core and heart, set in a colorless
sheet of blackness. Its heart was blacker than any pit, deeper than
time itself, endless as eternity, hungry and empty as a soul that
once was, but now would never be. It pulsed and throbbed like a
nightmarish sea creature, sucking in the accumulating sparks it
held within its being, lighting is black core for a small second
before sucking in more, in an never-ending hungry and desperate
quest for more. Just barely alive to be existing in a desperate,
clinging, clutching state of something, nothing, and never enough.
In this dark heart existed every shadow, every gray thought, every
dark deed, every lie, every vanished hope, every lost chance, and
every dimmed soul.

Andrew could feel a terrible, crushing,
rushing sensation on all sides of him, as if he was being sucked
further in. Heat and ice flooded in around him so intense that he
could hardly think. It felt as if it was melting away everything
except the light that he held inside himself, burning away all that
was nonessential. The heart was hungry for more, and Andrew seemed
the perfect candidate. It sucked him towards it, like a shark with
its mouth open wide. Andrew let the current take him towards it,
his soul, his sword, his mind unified in the purpose he had been
commissioned to fulfill.

Just inches before he reached his goal, he
felt something within the sword, falter, and give way. It was as if
a great surge of fear had cut through of the ranks of hope’s army,
like black veins of infection, consuming the light, and weakening
the strength of the sword.

In an instant he felt himself being pulled
back out of the blackness and out into the open, black air.

“No!” The being screamed, ripping Andrew from
his chest in a flurry of inky, black mist, blotched with red. “You
will die, just as all who bear hope within their hearts soon
will!”

Andrew fell at the foot of The Fallen, sword
still clutched in hand, hope still glinting off his skin.

The Fallen rose above him, growing taller,
and wider, and larger with each breath he took in. “You will watch
as I snuff out the light you have ignited, one by one. He let out a
great surge of shadows and darkness through his nostrils, then
pointed to the flickering army battling below them. In an instant,
it seemed as if a thousand flickering lights, were snuffed out.

The Fallen howled, and roared, grasping
Freddie, and Ivory in his clutches. “Just watch! Watch as I consume
your companions.”

“I will not let you!” Andrew cried, slamming
the sword against The Fallen, fracturing shadows, and light in one
tremulous blow.

The Fallen reeled back, dropping Freddie and
Ivory at Andrew’s feet. Andrew stood protectively in front of his
friends, holding his sword aloft as The Fallen, hammered him with a
discharge of darkness. “If you will not be made to bend!” The
Fallen’s all-encompassing voice coursed in around him, “then I will
break you to pieces!”

The Fallen coiled every shadow within his
grasp into a powerful lash, barbed with fractured bits of ice,
heat, shadow and light, Andrew stood strong, shielding his friends
with sword as The Fallen twisted the lash back, then brought it
down upon them with such force, and pressure that Andrew thought
the world had split in two.

SWISH, THWACK!

Andrew’s ears throbbed from the sound as
shattered pieces of light and shadow coursed around him. For a
moment he was blinded, he could not tell where The Fallen was. He
thought he could see Talic’s outline through the darkness, howling
and screaming, as shadows tormented him.

SWISH, THWACK!

The air was knocked from Andrew’s lungs. He
gasped, struggling to hold the sword as The Fallen came at him,
again and again.

SWISH, THWACK!

As the battle waged below him, and hope
faltered under the onslaught of darkness, Andrew began to feel the
strength within the sword begin to wane. Andrew struggled to stand,
struggled to shield his friends as The Fallen beat down on him with
his merciless whip, gathering more length, and strength to him as
darkness and shadow, laced themselves to his whip’s long
lashes.

SWISH, THWACK! SWISH, THWACK! SWISH, THWACK!
CRACK!

Andrew knees gave out and he fell back,
breathless. He was covered in ice and sweat. The sword hummed, and
vibrated from the blast, like a crystal wineglass, ready to burst
and fracture under pressure. Andrew’s hand shook, and trembled with
the sword. Hope was beginning to wane, and the sword was beginning
to crack. The darkness that was beginning to subdue the armies
below him, was slowly taking the strength he needed to crack the
darkness. Suddenly the protective beam of light emanating from the
sword cracked and gave way under the intense pressure, exploding in
a momentous flare of light, sending sputtering tails of fractured
light, shooting into the dark atmosphere like falling stars.

The Fallen’s darkness coursed in around him,
loud, and violent, tearing at him in discordant, clashing tones.
The Fallen drew back his whip one last time. Andrew’s eyes filled
with fear, not for himself, but for Freddie and Ivory. In a moment
of desperation, he pulled himself back up, putting himself directly
into harm's way.

The whip cracked over Andrew, in a blinding
flash of light, knocking the faltering sword from Andrew’s hands.
The air whooshed from Andrew’s lungs. His breath was sucked from
his nostrils. The sword’s light was suddenly consumed by the shroud
of darkness, lost somewhere in the shadows. Andrew cried in pain as
the strength of the sword left him. It was as if The Fallen had
ripped away one of his limbs---something that had bonded completely
to his own body. He instantly felt his strength ebb out of him. He
was limp, and lifeless, weak, drained. The fatal wound The Fallen
had given him only days before, rushed to greet him, like a deadly
disease no longer in remission. The ice, heat, and pressure of The
Fallen had ground him down and made all his muscles and bones feel
like jelly. He groped in the darkness, reaching for his sword. He
thought he could see its dim outline through the mist, just inches
from his fingers, beckoning him to just grab hold.

Andrew cried out, reaching for the sword,
just barely touching the hilt as The Fallen caught hold of him and
lifted him high into the air, taking him far away from it. He
called out in desperation, struggling against The Fallen’s grasp,
craning his neck, struggling to see his friends were safe.

“Did you think that it would be that easy?”
The Fallen bellowed, sending a blast of ice and heat pressing down
on Andrew. “That I’d let you destroy me? I who have brought the
nations of the world to their knees. You are nothing. Nothing
compared to my brilliance, nothing!”

The Fallen’s darkness swirled around him in
blinding clouds of extreme heat, cold, darkness, and light, mixing
together like toxic rings of smoke and ash from some distant
planet. Andrew could feel his senses dull and his strength wane.
The pressure from The Fallen’s breath slammed him like the fiercest
wind, like the hottest flame, like the coldest ice, like the
bitterest blackness. He cried out, feeling as though his flesh was
being melted from his bones. The light from his skin dimmed and
flickered, as The Fallen breathed in, sucking his life from
him.

“Stop!” Freddie’s voice cried below them.
“STOP!”

The Fallen paused and glanced down, his face
contracting with rage.

“Stop?” The Fallen repeated. “You really
think you can stop me?”

“Yes,” Freddie shouted. “I do!”

The Fallen looked amused. “You lowly human!
What can you do to stop me? What is one insignificant soul compared
to my eternal power?”

“He’s more than you’ll ever be,” Andrew
cried, feeling his bones break and crack as The Fallen squeezed
him, blasting him with tidal waves of darkness that crashed around
him unmercifully.

“You really should have never returned,” The
Fallen thundered, “This time I won’t make it as painless as
before.”

Andrew could feel the darkness crushing him,
pulling away at him, trying to grind him into powder. His eyes
filled with pain, and agony, but he did not cry out. He struggled
against The Fallen, using every ounce of his strength to free
himself. Through the darkness, through the pain, he thought he saw
a small shaft of light flit and twist through the shadows, like a
white feather blown by the wind. It settled on his shoulder, and
whispered in his ear. The voice he heard was soft, powerful, and
piercing. Was it a beam of light, of hope, an unheard, unsaid word
that had found its way to him? He did not know. But what it spoke
and what he felt, filled his soul with brilliant light for one
moment, and a powerful peace that gave him greater hope than he had
ever known. His eyes glistened with the hope and truth spoken to
him. He now knew what he must do in order to complete his quest. He
must give his life. The Fallen mustn’t take it. He would let go,
and give it freely. Then when light was given, could it only
expand. This was the last thing he must give. He instantly stopped
struggling. A great peace settled over him, as a new, and renewed
hope burned inside his heart, a hope, stronger, brighter, softer,
and far more beautiful than ever before. It lit his skin with one
last brilliant surge, contrasting Andrew to The Fallen in stark
difference.

“Take it, Freddie,” Andrew’s fading voice
cried, as The Fallen held him in his clutches. “Take the sword. I
will not be the one to take it to its mark. Take it. I see clearer
now. There can never just be one. And if there is one, that one can
never be
the
one unless he gives up everything he has. That
light, if it is real light, must give, and expand, and live on, and
never die. As one candle fades, it passes its light to another so
that the world will never grow dark. You bear in your hands my same
mark. You must take the sword and finish what I have started. You
have always had the same purpose as I…and I pass the flame to you.
Take the sword and finish the quest,” Andrew cried, his voice
bright, and clear. “FINISH IT!” Andrew’s voice cracked, then faded
as The Fallen breathed in a last vacuuming breath over Andrew,
sucking the life out of him completely.