In which a sidetrack brings them closer to the truth

Chapter 13 of The Time-Teller

Chapter 13
In which a sidetrack brings them closer to the truth

Megan’s breath caught in her throat, and she couldn’t move. They were everywhere. They were great beasts, all smooth and scaly. They were each variations of magenta, gray, indigo, and copper. All held several heads above their body and had sharp, uneven teeth that glimmered in the sunlight. They soared above the ground with giant bat-like wings and had tails like scorpions. Their long snouts sniffed the air as they flew in circles around Pyralis, who had now stopped walking, and Megan. Pyralis said something that sounded like the whirring of a wheel. His response was a tumult of buzzing and whistling noises from the huge brutes. Pyralis replied to them with the same strange whistling and whirring noises. Megan wasn’t sure how his throat could produce those odd grinding sounds like the creatures, but somehow, he managed it. Pyralis sighed, “We must hold off our journey for a while.”

 

“Why?” Megan managed to ask without stammering.

 

“Well…” Pyralis said. “Unless you are interested in becoming a sacrificial victim, then, we might be better off going with these creatures.” Megan coughed loudly. The whole world seemed to turn upside down, and her head filled with nauseating pain. She knew she was going to faint, but she didn’t resist.
When she woke up, she felt a strong wind on her face. The tough surface she was sitting on moved about and rocked back and forth, making Megan motion sick. Pyralis was holding her up as they flew threw the air on one of the odd, several-headed creatures. Megan ventured a look down and regretted it greatly. They were very far from the ground, so high, that Megan was surprised at how easily she was breathing, being at such a high altitude. She looked up at Pyralis. His misty eyes seemed to stare off into eternity.

 

“You’re awake,” he stated absently.

 

“Yes,” Megan replied. “Where are we going.” She wasn’t really curious; she just wanted to keep her mind off of the height and the great monster beneath her.

 

“To the Realm of serpents,” Pyralis spoke. “It is a truly majestic place if the constant threat of being burned alive or eaten is ignored.”

 

“Ah,” Megan said, quite unable to conjure an appropriate response. They flew in silence.
After what seemed like a very long time, Megan ventured another look down. They were flying over a great body of water. To their right, Megan could vaguely make out a greenish mass of trees, and to their left, the water seemed to stretch out into the canopy of the sky. The sheer beauty of the moving film of water took Megan’s breath away. She looked ahead, and noticed something strange in the distance. It appeared to be a giant, shimmering, green oval. Megan squinted at it because it looked almost to be made up of light. As the enormous, long-snouted creatures neared it, the green oval seemed to get bigger and bigger until it towered over them. It was made up of tiny streams of green-tinted lightning. Megan let out a short squeak of terror as the beast under her flew into it, but she was not shocked or harmed in any way. Megan almost fell off the creature when she realized that the ocean had vanished. In its place, was an enormous network of green spherical buildings and orange, cube-like edifices with circular, window openings. Creatures like the ones on which they flew, soared back and forth between buildings and in and out of the window-like openings.

 

“Wow,” Megan couldn’t help but say. All the futuristic cities she had seen on television and imagined through books seemed like nothing compared to this. Bright lights flashed everywhere, and the city stretched on as far as the eye could see. Roads of a silvery material connected the buildings. The creature beneath Megan and Pyralis dove into one of the circular openings of a spherical building. Inside, Megan found that they were in a great white chamber. A crowd of the strange beasts whizzed about, creating a strong wind. In the center of the room, the largest of the creatures Megan had seen, about the size of three couches, lay. He appeared to be dead.

 

Pyralis and Megan climbed down from the creature they had been riding on. Then, Pyralis spoke to it using strange noises and buzzing sounds that gave Megan a horrible headache.

 

“I see,” Pyralis said under his breath. He turned to Megan; “Apparently, their leader is dying, and they noticed that I was a wizard, so they hoped we would help them.”

 

“We?” Megan sighed. Pyralis raised an eyebrow.

 

“Yes, we,” he said. “Do you honestly think I can do something like that by myself? I used to have…” Pyralis’ voice trailed off as if he had forgotten something was secret.

 

“Used to have what?” Megan asked, her curiosity sparked. Pyralis shook his head and began speaking to one of the creatures. Megan sniffed angrily.

 

“Megan?” he asked. “Do you have any idea what you did that day when you healed me?”

 

“No,” Megan replied truthfully.

 

“I have never been the best healer,” Pyralis sighed. “Unfortunately…”

 

Megan and Pyralis headed toward the center of the room where the creature was lying. Megan wanted to finish as quickly as possible because every minute wasted was time for Gethin to heal. Megan’s mind filled with imagined images of her mother, suffocating as she struggled to reach the door.

 

“Are you all right?” Pyralis asked, facing Megan.

 

“Yea, of course,” Megan replied, only half-truthfully. “Let’s start then…” Pyralis bent over the creature’s head and inhaled deeply.

 

“I’m not sure how much we can do,” he whispered. “He may already be past the point where we might have been able to bring him back.”

 

“What happens if we can’t save him,” Megan asked.

 

“We will either be killed or left somewhere to die,” Pyralis said calmly. He touched Megan’s shoulder as if in consolation. “I’m sorry if that happens. This will have been all my fault.” Megan stepped back in surprise.  Although she had always blamed Pyralis for her unhappiness, she had never heard him blame himself, and for some strange reason, when she heard Pyralis say it, it seamed somehow less true. Megan shook her head vigorously. They had to save this beast. She would take revenge on the man that destroyed her family. She had to. It was all she had left.

 

“Now,” Pyralis said more loudly, bringing Megan back from her thoughts. He placed a hand on the enormous throat of the creature and whispered something softly. “Close your eyes.” Megan obeyed. “Now, place your hands on his body and focus your energy into your hands.”

 

“How do I focus my energy?” Megan asked, keeping her eyes tightly shut.

 

“There isn’t a how,” Pyralis said. “Just… do.”

 

“I’ll try.”

 

“Imagine,” Pyralis drawled softly. “Pure sunlight filling your hands until they are burning hot.” Megan felt her hands slowly grow warmer and warmer until she could barely stand the heat. “Let all that energy slowly flow into the creature. Let it flow swiftly and steadily as if you held all the sunlight in the world in your hands.”

 

After several minutes, Megan felt as though all the warmth had been drained from her body, and she shivered. Her hands were the only part of her body that still held warmth. Finally Pyralis moved his hands away, and Megan followed suit.

 

“No,” Pyralis murmured. “It’s impossible. He is too far gone.” Megan looked at Pyralis, her face pale and drained of any vibrant energy she had left.

 

“Will we die?”

 

“Yes.” Pyralis rubbed his hands together. “They asked us to do something impossible, and now we will pay the price for something out of our hands.”

 

Megan felt a wave of anger tower over her and splash down upon her with the force of a tsunami.  She looked around at the creatures in the room, who would bring about her end, the creatures who had lost their king. Then something strange caught her eye. A creature, only slightly larger then herself was curled up on the floor, watching her with one of its heads, while the others lay sleeping. It was young, she could tell. Its scales were softer and less firm looking. He was curled up beside another large creature, which appeared by the eyes to be a female. She was looking at the huge mound on the floor. Megan looked again into the eyes of the younger one. She saw the same sadness that she remembered feeling in her eyes when the news of her parents had reached her, and she knew instantly that this had been the child of the dying creature on the floor. Pity took the place of anger in her mind, for she knew the feeling of loss too well. She would not let anyone, not even this monster have that same sadness in front of her. Megan felt a surge of some unknown energy and her body fell to the floor, as she became a strange energy floating above the creature on the floor. She knew she had no form, and she felt her energy cover the creature completely. She could feel every muscle, every bone, and she was inside his mind. The picture of his wife and child weeping at their loss floated through his mind as he fought for survival. Megan left his mind and her energy went into his weak heart, which was just stopping to beat.

 

‘No!’ Megan shouted in her mind. The energy she was composed of rushed into the heart shocking it into sudden life. She floated away from him, and she could feel that the energy, which she had become was now weak and failing. She didn’t think she would survive, but some strange and warm force surrounded her, guiding her to her body. She opened her eyes. Her head ached from the impact of hitting the floor when the strange energy had taken her from her body.

 

“You saved my life,” Megan said to Pyralis. She knew that it was his magic that had surrounded her and guided her to her position on the floor.

 

“You saved mine first,” Pyralis said pointing at the creature on the floor, which was stirring. “He will live. There is no doubt about that. How you did it is an altogether different question.”
The heads of the young creature were now all fully awake, each twisted into a noticeable smile.

 

“You baffle me again, little Megan,” Pyralis spoke to her. “I have never seen magic like that.” Then he whispered, more to himself than to her, “What are you?”

 

“I don’t know anymore,” Megan said softly to him. “I wish I did.”

 

“I know you do,” Pyralis cocked his head to the side in thought. “Megan Cole. I wish I could know who you’re descended from. It must have been a great wizard for his magic to be this strong in his descendants.” With this having been said, Pyralis turned to face the creatures and spoke to them in their language.

 

“They have agreed to fly us to the city we were going to before,” Pyralis translated for Megan.

 

“How far away do you suppose Gethin is now?” Megan asked.

 

“I don’t know,” Pyralis told her. “He could have gone hundreds of miles by now.” Megan looked at the ceiling, exhaling slowly. Then, even more slowly, she hoisted herself into a seated position.

 

“It would be better,” Pyralis said. “For you to rest.” He raised his hand up to her forehead, and as she felt his skin touch hers, exhaustion overwhelmed her. She slept.

 

Megan saw the familiar face of her mother as she dreamt. Her father’s face came into her dream and they seemed to try to say something to her, but then fire ran through her dream, consuming their faces.

 

“Why did you leave me? Why did you die?” Megan asked, her dream filling with a flood of black-blue sadness. The image of her parents’ burning disappeared, and she was floating above a white city in her dream. A woman’s voice spoke to her. It was soft and soothing.

 

“Listen and watch,” it said. “Your time will come, and you will know your magic, but you must be willing to move past this grief.”

 

“How can I move past the deaths of my parents?” Megan wanted to scream, but all that came out was a soft moan.

 

“Find something to love,” the voice whipped through Megan’s hair filling her head. “Find a reason to live. We will be all right. I promise.”

 

“Who are you?” Megan asked.

 

“Find something to love. We will be all right.”

 

“WHO ARE YOU?”

 

“Find us.”