Chapter Twenty Three: Of stones and Messages

“Evany, I have to talk to you. Back at the fort... Kar—” The locks of the mysterious steel box clicked open, making him stop mid sentence. His nerves tensed. The secret of the box made the news of Kara silently slip from his mind. His breath quickened the longer it took, the box consumed his focus.

It was the only hint that he and Tyas had at the whereabouts of their parents, the only lead to solve a lot of the mysteries. The contents terrified him.

He almost shouted at Tyas to hurry, but the words didn’t make it out of his mouth before Tyas threw the lid open.

Inside there was a round item wrapped with paper. The letter on it was sealed with blue wax. Beneath it there seemed to be tiny gold coins and some silver, but the letter was where Calin’s attention really was. Tyas untied the letter to reveal a meticulously polished rock. The man placed the stone back in the box and held the letter up in the light of the fire.

Calin waited with great anticipation for Tyas to read the letter, but his eyes were drawn to the smooth rock. He drew his gaze back to the letter, but again his eyes flicked back to the stone. With a shake of his head he tried to regain his focus. The solid object shone in the firelight, something other than a shadow flickered in it all of a sudden.

What? He looked closer at the stone, not even hearing Tyas read the letter out loud.

Each time a glimpse of something presented itself on the stone, Calin’s eyes unfocused.

He forced himself to take his gaze from the odd stone, but it availed him nothing. Soon he was concentrating on the stone, the strain almost physical. He dropped from his crouch to his knees.

A weight pressed down hard on him. It was as if he was compelled to see something, though the longer he stared at it, the heavier the weight became on his shoulder.

What is that? Calin’s eyes were stinging, everything around him started to fade from sight. All he could see was the gleaming stone. And all he could hear was his heartbeat pounding in his chest.

Somehow it was like his eyes were forced not to see what was right in front of him, yet in complete contrast he was compelled to discover its secret. He gritted his teeth and pressed forward as he leaned in closer. Through it all his shoulder was throbbing, it almost became unbearable.

It was to his surprise when a bright light traced over unfamiliar markings, it flashed over them at an incredible speed. He couldn’t fathom what he had seen.

Finally he was forced to look away, his eyes shot away from the stone. The strain was too great.

He collapsed to the floor, drained of strength. Everything above him seemed blurry. The sound was muffled around him.

Faintly, he made out dark forms approaching him and tried to bat them away, but his hands were like lead. He dropped them heavily back to the ground. The closest form made a noise and he tried to comprehend what it was, but nothing.

He dragged his heavy hand over his chest. Each pull was a great effort, until he could rub at his burning eyes. It did nothing to soothe him.

Frustrated, he dropped his head to the side, and from the muffled sounds around him he swore he could hear a child laughing. It seemed so out of place.

Through the confusion there was a light from where the laughter was coming from. He blinked, desperate to find any picture that wasn’t blurred to his burning eyes. He struggled against the weight that was trying to claim his last strength, but there was nothing on him. He gave up finally and all the imagery melted around him.

***

Dreams, jumbled into fiery flashes of images, nothing made sense to Calin as it danced around him. Hundreds of ancient words formed in the air, and then disappeared in a flash. A girl laughed in the distance, the words formed again, his thoughts were too much of a jumbled mess to make anything of it. Calin tried to crawl towards the moving words but he couldn’t move fast enough. The more he tried the more he failed, until he roared and jumped at one of the words.

As his hand grabbed the light, a single word thundered into his head and he woke up screaming it. “TRUTH!”

A gasp for breath drew much needed oxygen into his lungs. Calin panted and tried to get up, but Jerry grabbed him and pushed him down, all the while saying, “Relax Calin you’re safe. Relax. What happened?”

“Truth,” Calin said, still panting for breath. A frown crossed Jerry’s face and the boy said, “Yes we want to know the truth.”

“Truth.” Calin chanted the word again and the others glanced at each other. Evany sat down next to him and took hold of his hand. The worry in her eyes was intense as she asked softly. “Calin, what happened, what’s going on?”

“Truth.”

The girl’s voice became more uncertain as she pleaded.

“Please tell us.”

Calin tried to get the words out, but all that left his mouth over and over was the word truth. A trapped feeling settled over him and he gently batted the others away and crawled towards the box with the stone. Almost immediately, Tyas grabbed his arm to draw him away, but Calin swung his weight towards the man and sent Tyas tumbling back.

He crawled closer to the box and Jerry was about to grab him when he jumped forward to finally lay his hand on the stone.

A jolt shot through his body and Calin almost screamed it as the words flowed through his mouth.

“TRUTH! Truth guide your arm when there are lies in your reach. For lies is a darkness that only brings despair. Truth be our armour against those who would steal it from our lips and may faith be our shield with light burning as our sword when peace is forced away from us—”

Panic settled on Calin. He gasped through the words for breath, almost like fire was eating into his lungs. But he couldn’t remove his hand from the stone. The burning settled deeper into his lungs and he grabbed his stuck arm with his free arm and with every ounce of strength he pulled away and fell away from the stone in a tumble, not able to complete the message.

He gasped for breath as the fire in his lungs started to dissipate. Evany was by his side in an instant and was checking him and feverously asking him if he was okay, but he placed a hand on her arm.

“I’m fine, I’m fine. Give me a second to breathe.” He drew slow deep breaths into his lungs glad for the oxygen as he sat up. Though deeply disturbed at what just happened, he looked to Tyas. His stare dug into the man with its intensity as he asked,

“It’s a secret message, isn’t it?”

The man stared wide eyed at him while nervously fingering the letter. Calin grunted and got to his knees and more forcibly asked again. “Isn’t it?!”

He couldn’t care less as the others stared in utter confusion at what had just occurred. He needed an answer from Tyas.

The man swallowed hard, his amber eyes flashing with uncertainty.

“That was the last thing my mother said to me before she died. How?...”

Calin’s breathing started to calm down, but still, nervousness settled over him before he said, “I don’t know, but something happened when I laid eyes on that stone.”

“Can somebody tell me what on earth is going on?” Jerry exclaimed from the side, but Calin had less a clue of what had happened than the boy had.

Then he spotted the letter again and asked, “What does it say?”

“I don’t care what the letter says at the moment,” Evany interrupted. “All I want to know is what happened to you. You scared the living daylights out of us!”

There wasn’t time to explain something he didn’t understand himself. So Calin looked at Jerry and said, “Jerry you remember the night of the lightning?” The boy nodded at him uncertainly, but he continued. “Well this was close to the story I told you of what happened, explain it to her.”

“What story? What is he talking about Jerry?” Evany asked, utterly confused, but to his relief Jerry grumbled but agreed, albeit with a raised eyebrow before he drew the girl to the side to explain. Calin didn’t waste time to ask Tyas the same question again about the letter.

Tyas opened the letter and gave it to him:

If you read this Tyas, or Calin, then something has gone terribly wrong. For fear of what might happen, it is of the utmost importance that you go to Moons’ Reach and speak to the owner of the guild: House of Es, his name is Seanmor. Give him the message contained in the box. He is the only one able to read it. Stay hidden, no matter what, and good luck.

The first part caught Calin truly off guard. By some disturbing circumstance his name was in the letter, but the moment Tyas read ‘Reach’ he remembered Kara and froze.

“Agh! I almost forgot about Kara!”

Evany spun on Calin, throwing Jerry off balance. She more demanded than asked, “Kara? Don’t you dare make this worse for me!”

Calin raised his hands to disarm the girl as he said, “Whoa there, yeah I get it, but Tyas and I found her—”

“What!!” Evany exclaimed as her eyes got wide. “And you were just going to leave that out?! What happened to her?”

With a shake of his head Calin crawled to the girl and took hold of her shoulders gently and said, “Don’t freak out, but she was in a prison in the fort we scouted out.”

He was thrown back by the girl as she jumped to her feet. She hit the ceiling of the cave hard before she collapsed again holding her hand to her head saying, “Ow! Ow...Ow that hurt.”

Calin crawled closer and tried to get her hand away to take a look, but she swatted his hand away all the while grimacing in pain. With a glare at her, he said, “Evany let me take a look will you?”

The girl reluctantly let go and Calin spotted a bit of blood, but when he touched close to the wound she hit him on the chest and said, “OW! Be careful.” He just swiped at her hand. “Yeah yeah, but hold still.”

To his surprise, Jerry brought him a small aid kit. He raised a questioning eyebrow at the boy and Jerry just said, “I, uh thought it would come in handy when we were in Tyas’ cabin. Here you go.”

Calin quickly got anti-inflammatory salve from the kit and gently applied it to the squirming girl. After finishing, he sat back and said, “There, good as new. Now be more careful.”

Evany shot him a glare but she finally blew at a lock of golden hair on the side of her face and said, “I know, but will you tell me about Kara now, please? We’re best friends.”

Calin smiled, but then got more serious. “We were going to try and help her escape, but we needed Jerry and your help.”

The girl looked like hope blossomed in her eyes and Calin was glad there was something in this dark day that could bring hope to her sad heart. He grabbed one of his axes and scooted closer to the fire and motioned for everybody to huddle up.

He started drawing an outline of the fort on the ground and Tyas helped as they started to formulate a plan to get Kara out of the camp