Chapter 1: The Garden

A young boy travels in a garden that is frozen in time and finds a urban legend that will change his life forever.

The arch entrance was high, the young boy noticed as he stared deep into overgrown, crowded ancient garden of Tick and Tock. His mother had told him many stories of this place.

The story that he remembered the most was that the garden had received its name through a battle called the War of Tick and Tock that happened over four thousand years ago between angels and demons, and that the demons won and imprisoned an angel in a statue with a unique seal around it and that everyone who touched it turned to stone as well.

It is said that the statues name is Rosie and that for centuries she was the maiden to the clocks and was the statue of an angel with sad eyes that held a clock in her hands that no matter how many centuries passed, still ticked. That is how the garden received its name, its birthright. Today Athenos was going to find out if that was true Athenos, stepped into the garden and all the wild grasses and flowers we gone and replaced with hard cracked dirt, rocks and hundreds if not thousands of statues all holding ticking clocks, but everything had a golden aura lightly sprinkled over it.

The air was old and thick with magic, even Athenos, an untalented boy could tell. At first he was confused and dumbfounded, he stepped out of the garden and looked at it and it appeared the same. “What is going on? I was sure there had been grasses and flowers just a moment ago,” the ten your old boy thought to himself.

He stepped back in, wanting to see what else laid ahead.

Amazingly, relects from the War of Tick and Tock were still there, untouched, unbothered even by the sun itself. Sharp double and broad swords stuck out of the ground, daggers, seals, sheilds, and weapons Athenos had never seen or imaged before stuck out of the ground.

As Athenos wondered deeper into the garden he started coming arcross the fallen warriors, there weren't many at first and no blood was on them, it was like they were just laying there, frozen, untouched. Their hues of color ranged in almost every colour in the rainbow, but the majority was a pale white or a light blue. Athenos was tanned, with kinky black hair, and blue eyes, he'd never seen anything so shocking before, especially not in Seth.

As he went on the frozen, but dead bodies, increased until he stumbled to the middle of the garden, which was void of all death and only had one statue. It was the biggest statue Athenos had ever seen, and it was odd because it had a golden clock resting in her hands, one holding the bottom and the other holding the top. It was ticking. This was the statue his mom had told him about, this was the legendary clock that has ticked for forty centries!

Athenos stared up at the statue in more disbelief than even when he had entered the garden. He stood there, mesmerized, looking at every detail, every curve of this statue, at everything. By the time his eyes went from angels huge wings and down her curvy body, past the platform of the statue to the two swords crossed at the base of the platform, the statue talked.

“Set me free,” he heard the statue say. Even though he was still a child he was old enough to know that statues do not talk. His blue eyes grew wide as he stared at the pale statue and golden clock.

“Please set me free little one,” the boy stood speechless and frozen.

“Grab a stone, the one in front of me shaped like tear, and throw it at this cursed clock. Set me free, Athenos,” the beautifully voiced statued begged.

Her voice was very compelling and Athenos didn't know why but he wanted to help her. So, he did as he was told. He walked toward her, and picked up the rock and threw it at the golden, forever ticking clock as hard as he could.

As soon as the rock touched it, it shattered, and shards of glass and glass fragments fell to the ground. The tick tock stopped, not just in this clock but in every clock in the garden. The angel’s eyes started glowing electric blue and the statue started cracking.

The boy stepped back and tripped over a rock and fell down to the dirt, and stared up in amazement as the statue fell to Earth. Dirt clouds rolled out from under the falling stone and covered the area.

Rosie’s eyes were still electric blue until the very last piece of cement fell off her naked body. Then her eyes faded from her whole eye to just her irises. Still a heavenly blue, they shut and her body, with her long golden hair, fell to the ground.

Her eyes opened again, and she moved her arms until her hands were on the ground then she tried to push herself up. As she stood she swayed, like a toddler just learning how to walk. As she found her balance, she felt something wet on her back, sliding down it. She looked back searching for her wings when she remembered, ‘If an angel is to ever touch the ground on Earth their wings with disintegrate.’ As Rosie realized that she had lost her wings, tears fell from her eyes.

By now Athenos was up, and walking towards her. Rosie didn’t notice this action, otherwise she would have told him to run away and never come back and certainly never touch her.

Athenos reached out his hand and touched Rosie’s arm. A little bolt of electricity shot from Rosie into Athenos hand, and his eyes went cold, dark, and numb. He was seeing every truth that ever existed in this world. He had just seen why the angel was imprisoned in not a statue, but a protective barrier. Rosie was not an angel at all, she was a demon, who had just lost her wings, now she had no power.

The crying demon looked at Athenos and touched one finger to his tan forehead.

Athenos eyes went from blue to red and his hair went from black to bloody crimson, “I have just made you immortal, Athenos, for you will serve me for the rest of eternity. Centuries have gone by, the other thousands of clocks were people or animals who came but refused to throw the rock and set me free. You saw in your mind that demons are not good nor evil we are just a very misunderstood creature created from in a parallel universe.”

Athenos nodded slowly as he understood and then said, “I will serve you, Maiden of Time, Rosie.”

Rosie gave a short, small, amused chuckle.

Author's Note

You learn through judgement, so please rate and comment. :D

Reviews

[Carl Drake Barnard]

Ohh this is well written!!! lovely opening and good suspense! :)
Your wrighting a really good book here keep up the good work :)
I'll be reading :

[SquinklaPsyOps]

This is awesome the Angel's will to save them was stronger than the reaction.

[Hannavas R.]

i love how you write reviews. lolz. and what do you mean by "the reaction"