Acacia extended her hand. “Let’s get you back to the museum room. There’s something you have to see.”
Sapphira took Acacia’s hand and pulled herself to her feet. “Did you leave Paili and the others alone?” she asked, brushing the grime from her dress.
“They’ll be okay. You were gone all night, so I had to look for you.” Acacia nodded at the cross on the floor. “Where did you get that?”
“From the land of the living.” Sapphira picked up the cross and tucked it under her belt. “I’ll keep it to remind me of Elam.”
Acacia leaned into the elevation shaft and looked up. “Come on. It’s a long climb. We’ll stop by the pool and clean up when we get to the top.”
“What’s going on in the museum room?” Sapphira asked.
“You have to see it to believe it.” Acacia dropped her torch and pointed at it. “Lights out!” Then, picking up Sapphira’s lantern, she extended her hand again. “Let’s save our stories for when everyone’s around.”
Sapphira intertwined her fingers with Acacia’s and followed her into the elevation shaft. The warmth of her touch fed her soul with comfort. At least she had one friend left in the world. She grabbed the rope and looked back at her twin. “Better put out the fire.”
Acacia smiled and nodded at the lantern. “Lights out for you, too.”
Now in total darkness, Sapphira pulled on the rope and inched her way up. She knew the rest of her journey would be a long, hard climb.
Chapter 9
Circa AD 495
Merlin climbed the rocky bed, grunting as he scaled the incline. This journey had been a lot easier the first time he attempted it, but that was at least thirty years earlier. Now the slope seemed steeper, the jagged rocks, sharper.
He set down a large, leather saddlebag and pushed his long robe out of the way, then, steadying his feet on two stable rocks, cupped his hands around his mouth. “Hail! Clefspeare!”
As he waited, his spindly shadow loomed on the face of the cliff, a phantom in the full moon’s glow. Above him, another dark shape yawned as if stretching to swallow his silhouette the entrance to a familiar cave, the home of his lifelong friend.
He cupped his hands again. “Hail! Clefspeare!”
Again, no response. He turned and looked down the rugged slope. The king stood on a smoother path below, somewhat overdressed in his fine riding attire, now coated with dirt and sweat.
“Come, Your Majesty,” Merlin said, holding out his hand. “I can support you.”
The king, using both hands to steady himself, climbed the rocky embankment, and as soon as he approached Merlin, he grasped the outstretched hand and pulled himself the rest of the way. “Master Merlin,” the king said, “your strength amazes me.”
“I have climbed many hills in my time,” Merlin replied.
Arthur gazed down the slope. “I’m not comfortable with this ruse. Devin is nowhere in sight.”
“He will come,” Merlin said, following Arthur’s gaze. The moonlight revealed scraggly trees and an empty path far below, but little else. “We don’t want him here too early. As long as he stays away from Bald Top, the plan will work.”
“I respect your courage and wisdom, Master Merlin, but would you have me march right into the dragon’s mouth? How can I be sure that he has forgiven my rash decisions?”
“You have to trust me. In spite of that trumped-up story about Andrew, you must believe that Clefspeare is not a danger to us.” Merlin hoisted his bag and continued the climb for a few more yards before stopping to wait again. When the king joined him, the two proceeded on level ground, Merlin again leading the way. After passing a few bare, stunted trees, the travelers faced the entrance of the cave. A gentle breeze blew from within, and then, seconds later, the breeze reversed, and the cave drew the air past their bodies.
“The cave breathes,” the king said, his mustache twitching, “but I smell no rotting flesh.”
“Nor will you.” Merlin filled his lungs and bellowed once again. “Hail! Clefspeare! It is I, Merlin, Prophet of the Most High. With me is His Majesty, King Arthur.”
Again he waited but received no response. Merlin squatted, picked up a pebble, and tossed it down the slope. “He must be in regeneracy.”
“Regeneracy?” The king stooped next to Merlin and peered into the shadows. “What is regeneracy?”
“You will see.” Merlin rose and walked straight into the darkness. As his eyes adjusted, he looked back. The king had fallen behind. “We must hurry,” Merlin warned. “The others will be assembling very soon.”
The king quickened his pace and caught up. “The others?”
“I will explain soon enough.” A strange glow from deeper in the cave illumined the path, dimly at first, but ever more brightly as he proceeded. They passed together under a high archway and into an interior chamber. In the very center, a shimmering, inverted funnel of pure light pointed toward the cave’s ceiling, its circular base resting a few inches from the rocky floor.
Within the swirl, a dazzling array of flashing glitters flew like buzzing bees from one side to the other, bouncing and dancing until they struck the huge, heaving body at the center.
The king drew closer. “Master Merlin, am I beholding a holy sight or an accursed demon? I don’t know whether to bare my head and feet in reverence or pluck out my eyes in shame.”
Merlin placed a strong hand on the king’s shoulder. “Perhaps you should save your artful speech for your diplomatic meetings. It isn’t necessary in the company of dragons.” He waved his hand at the cone. “This light is neither accursed nor holy; it’s a natural process called regeneracy. This is how a dragon prefers to sleep. You see, a dragon’s scales and eyes breathe the light as you and I breathe the air. He absorbs energy and expels the light he doesn’t need. If a dragon were subjected to darkness for a long period of time, he would be overcome by weakness. Without at least a candle to feed his body, he would eventually die.”
Merlin set his bag down, approached the glowing dragon, and stretched out his hands over the cone. “At night he rests on a bed of silver and gold, and the power of the day flows into his bed. The energy grows into a shroud of luminescence around his body, and he reabsorbs the light as it passes over his scales.” He pointed at the base of the dragon’s bed and moved his finger around as if stirring. “Intermixed in the precious metal pieces are polished gems. They reflect the light, making it rebound within the shroud, so that more of the light strikes his body.”
The king took a step closer. “You say that he is asleep?”
Clefspeare snorted and stretched out his leg. The king placed his hand on the hilt of his sword, but Merlin jumped back and grasped Arthur’s forearm. “You have nothing to fear, but if you think or act aggressively, he is likely to sense danger.”
Arthur returned the grasp but kept watching the dragon. “When will he awaken?”
“That’s unpredictable. I don’t understand the process completely, but the light eventually fades, and the dragon awakes.”
“Is he vulnerable to attack while he sleeps?”
“Not likely. Many have come upon dragons in their lairs, but a dragon can sense danger and always awakens. Since I am his friend, and you have come as his new, albeit suspicious ally, Clefspeare senses none. But I must awaken him now.”
Merlin unfastened a string from around his neck and used it to pull a strangely shaped object from beneath his vest, a pendant stone dangling at the end of the string, small enough for his fingers to fully envelop.
“This is a candlestone, a kind of anti-prism,” he explained. “You see, a normal prism bends light and splits the colors. This stone does the opposite. It arrests fractured light and straightens it out. The light passes into it as excited energy and is dispelled as a simple beam. If I place it at the base of Clefspeare’s shroud, it will interrupt the circuit and disperse his shield. It also interrupts a dragon’s photo-respiration, and therefore his energy flow. It can actually absorb light, and with it the life force of his body.”