Into Darkness

72

Richard was shocked. “You mean to say you can’t see the glowing lines above the sand?”

Sang briefly looked again and then back at Richard. He shook his head.

“I see only sand and beyond it, the Glee who are growing angry.”

Richard hadn’t expected that the Glee couldn’t see the lines of light. He knew that everyone in his world had at least a spark of the gift within the Grace they were born with. That spark, even though it usually wasn’t powerful enough in most people to use it to do magic, still allowed them to see and interact with magic.

The only explanation was that the Glee had no such spark of the gift. They were completely devoid of even that infinitesimal spark. That was why the goddess had been so fearful of the magic of Richard’s world. She had never experienced it before and didn’t understand it. It was a fearsome unknown to her.

Sang drew back his lips, exposing his needle-sharp white teeth, as if in apology.

Richard gestured. “Can you see the symbols on the stone light up?”

Sang leaned past Richard to look at the stone. “Light? I see no light. Only the markings as they were always there.”

The sun had set, and it was rapidly getting darker. Sang should have had absolutely no difficulty seeing either the glowing lines of light above the sand or the glowing symbols on the stone gateway.

Richard looked over at Vika. “You see them both, right?”

She shrugged her confusion that Sang couldn’t see them. “Of course. I don’t know what the lines over the sand are, or what they mean, but I can see them.”

Richard was at least relieved by that much of it. “It’s the initial stages of a verification web. The lines mean that I was able to get the gateway to ignite its constructed spell. There’s no explanation I can see other than whatever this gateway is, it uses a constructed spell. It’s built right into it.”

“What is a constructed spell?” Sang asked.

“Magic,” Richard told him. “Dangerous magic.”

“Dangerous to you, or to us?”

“Extremely dangerous to the Glee,” Richard told him. “You already know that this device has the ability to send you into darkness. That should tell you something about how powerful it is. That power is dangerous.”

“But we have used it since long before any of us were alive,” Sang said. “It never harmed us.”

“It was never activated before, but now it is. Because it uses a very powerful form of magic, I need to use that power built into the device to destroy it. It’s the only way.”

Sang gestured back across the sand. “But the others are angry at not knowing what you are doing with their device, and they may soon decide they must stop you.”

“You need to go talk to them. Tell them how you have seen the power of magic in my world. This device uses that same magic. If you want to, tell them that the device is malfunctioning, and it is about to kill anyone up here. You need to get all of the Glee away from here or they might be killed. Get them all to go back down the mountain to safety.”

“I don’t think they will want to leave you alone with the device. It is too important to them.”

Richard growled his frustration. He gestured up at the darkening sky. “It’s getting dark. You need to go now while it is still light enough to see your way down the mountain or you will all be stuck up here in this dry place all night.” Richard leaned toward him. “All night. Without water.”

Sang touched a claw to his lip. That concerned him, but he was still hesitating. Because he couldn’t see the glowing bluish lines, Richard didn’t know if he understood and feared the magic of the gateway, but like a boulder falling off a cliff from above, you didn’t need to see it to be killed. He knew, though, that fear of being stuck in this dry place overnight was probably more alarming to him than anything else. He looked across the sand to the others. Some of them were clacking their claws in a threatening manner.

“Sang,” Richard said, drawing his attention back to him, “something is about to happen that will likely kill all of you up here. You need to convince them they must leave, right now. You need to tell them that darkness will soon trap them here in this dry place and they must leave now, while they can still see the path down. Tell them they can come back tomorrow if you have to.”

Sang nodded. “I will try. I will tell them what you say about being trapped up here in this dry place where it will soon be dark. That may convince them to go back down from here right away.”

“I’m serious,” Richard said. “Dangerous magic is about to begin and if anyone is up here when it does, they will die.

“If they refuse to leave, then you and your friends must leave as quickly as you can or you will be killed, too. You must believe me, Sang. You must leave now. I don’t want you or your friends to be harmed. But if they stay up here, you all will die.”

Sang again touched the tip of his claw to his black lower lip as he studied Richard’s face. Finally, he nodded. “You have done what we needed to stop the Golden Goddess. You have helped us. I will tell those with me that we must run. I will tell the others, too, that it will soon be too dark to see, and they will be trapped here so they must leave until tomorrow. They will be warned. If they don’t leave …”

Richard put a hand on Sang’s shoulder. “You have been a friend, Sang. I wish you a good life.”

Sang’s dark skin bunched above his big black eyes in a kind of grotesque frown. “Are you saying that you will be here when the magic starts, and you will die?”

Richard continued to gaze into those black eyes. “I’m afraid so. This is what I need to do to protect my world. Thank you for your part in this, and for coming to help me protect my people as well as yours. Now go. Hurry. Get to safety.”

“You have been a friend to me and to my friends.”

Sang laid a claw on Richard’s shoulder, as if to thank him, and then he quickly turned and rushed away. He paused once to look back, and then he ran to the others off among the forest of tall rocks to warn them that they must leave at once.