D. MacHale - Raven Rise

The most important person in my life, by far, is Telleo, Genj’s daughter. She has become my best friend here. You should have seen her after the battle. She cared for more of the wounded than I could count. I don’t think she slept for days. It was incredible. She seemed to be in so many places at once. With all that responsibility, she still took time to find me and ask how I was doing. Those amazing green eyes never seemed to lose their sparkle. She has become my guide to this territory. You might even call her my acolyte. Of course, since I’m no longer in the Traveler business, I don’t need an acolyte, but under other circumstances I’d consider her a perfect candidate. She has strong opinions, but she listens to others. People are drawn to her. They trust her and I can see why. It’s almost as if her touch is healing.

We’ve spent many nights together, sitting on a secret ledge high up on Tribunal Mountain. During the day she’d tie up her long, deep red hair in a practical knot as she went about caring for the sick and wounded. At night she’d let down her hair, literally. It was a time to relax. Nobody knew we were there. It was like floating on our own private cloud high above Rayne. There was no pressure, only possibility. We’d look out onto the sea and the stars, imagining a new future for Ibara. Not that we had any real say in the matter, but it was an amazing feeling to be in a place that was more or less starting from scratch. Everyone here has complete control of their own destiny. It’s a very bright future, and Telleo and I are going to help shape it. How great is that?

She seems perfect in so many ways that I feel bad for writing this next part, but since these journals are about documenting everything that I experience, I’d be remiss if I didn’t. Telleo is as bright and open and friendly as you can imagine, except when it comes to one topic: her mother. The first time I brought up the subject was when we were sitting up on that ledge on a warm, clear night. Her father, Genj, had been working pretty hard, and I was worried about him. He wasn’t a young guy and he was pushing himself. Maybe a little too hard.

“How’s your dad?” I asked, trying to sound casual and not cause her any real worry.

“Happy” was her answer. “I think he’s finally seeing past the loss of the pilgrims. He thinks you’re wonderful, by the way.”

That made me feel pretty good. “He’s working kind of hard.”

“He wouldn’t have it any other way,” she replied confidently. “Do you think that’s wrong?”

“No,” I said quickly. “I just thought that since he’s kind of older, he should take it easy.”

Telleo gave it some thought, then nodded. “I’ll visit him in the morning. If I think he’s too stressed, I’ll tell him to lighten his load.”

“Will he?”

Telleo smiled slyly. “He can’t say no to me. I’m his only daughter.”

I chuckled. “Right. Hey, you haven’t told me anything about your mom.”

As soon as I said the words, I realized it was a mistake. Telleo’s bright eyes turned dark. It was weird. She suddenly got all vacant. Up until that moment neither of us had talked about anything personal. I mean, about our backgrounds. It was a subject I wanted to dodge at all costs for obvious reasons. The few times I thought about asking Telleo about her family, I stopped myself because I didn’t want the same questions coming back at me. That night I asked without thinking. It just came out. I realized my mistake too late and shut the heck up. Telleo was silent for a long time. It was pretty clear that her thoughts had gone to a troubling place. I didn’t know whether she was going to ignore the question or was working to find the right words to answer me. When she finally spoke, it was as though the words were coming from’ a different person. A darker person. Someone with secrets.

“I don’t talk about her,” she said, so softly I could barely hear. The words “Why not?” almost flew out of my mouth, but I swallowed them.

“I’m sorry,” she said, softening. “It’s just…difficult. My mother and I had problems. I want to let it go at that, okay?”

“Yeah, sure, sorry,” I said, trying to do damage control. “Don’t be sorry. Just don’t mention that woman anymore. To anyone.”

That woman. Yikes. Whatever had gone down between Telleo and her mother, it wasn’t good. My curiosity was running wild, but I had to respect her wishes and made a pact with myself to forget all about Telleo’s mother. It was a smart thing to do for lots of reasons.

As time passed and Rayne healed, my thoughts returned to the bigger picture. I guess that was inevitable. My main goal in destroying the gate was to trap Saint Dane here on Ibara. I could only hope that it had worked; I had no proof. Since the battle, not a single Flighter had been seen on Ibara. Sentries were positioned all over the island. That was one of the big changes that was made after the dado attack. There were no reports of Flighters trying to land. In some ways that worried me. Since Saint Dane was stuck here, you would think he’d try to rally them for another shot at Ibara. Why not? There was nothing else for him to spend his time on. What was he doing? Hanging out in Rubic City watching the buildings crumble? In some weird way the fact that there were no Flighters hanging around made me nervous.

A few times I went down to the rocky rubble on the beach to see if there was any way to get to the flume. There wasn’t. I suppose a dygo could dig down to it, but there was nothing on Ibara that could tunnel that deep through so much rock. I tried myself once, for about a minute. I threw a couple of boulders aside and quickly realized it was a waste. The flume was buried. Still, I didn’t have proof that Saint Dane was trapped.

That is, until one afternoon that I don’t think I’ll ever forget.

I was working with Twig and Krayven, carrying what felt like the one-millionth dado part down to the junk pile on the beach. No sooner had I lobbed the foot (yes, foot) onto the pile, when I heard something overhead. Nobody else would have given it a second thought. In fact, Twig and

Krayven didn’t. But I did. The sound was the single, loud caw! of a crow. A big crow. A raven. I looked up to see the huge bird circling the pile. I froze. Could it be? “Big bird,” Twig commented.

That made me think of the big goofy yellow dude from Sesame Street. I should have laughed at that. I didn’t. The black bird circled once more, then flew off along the beach… in the direction of the buried gate. It didn’t seem like a random move. It felt more like it was waiting for me to see it before shooting off.

I wanted to puke.

“I’ll meet you back at the village,” I told the others. “I want to check something out.”

“What?” Krayven asked. “I’ll help.”

“No!” I snapped, a little too quickly. They both jumped in surprise. “I mean, it’s not important. I’ll be right back.”

I didn’t stick around to debate and walked quickly along the beach. My heart raced. What did this mean? Was it a random bird that I was following? Was my paranoia meter set a little too low? Or was something else going on? I knew where I’d find that answer.

It was the fifth time I had gone to the tomb of the gate. Each time I came away with the same conclusion. The flume was buried. It was inaccessible. No problem. Then time would go by; I’d get itchy and go down to make sure. Again. What can I say? I’m paranoid. This time was different. My paranoia was justified. I followed the shore until I reached the huge mound of volcanic rock, turned inland and began to climb. Normally when I’d reach the pinnacle, which was around three hundred feet high, I’d look to see if there was any possible way to get to the flume. This trip would be different.