Bryan Davis - Eye of the Oracle

Arthur’s face reddened, and he spoke through his teeth. “Just make a list of the dragons you want me to protect, and I will forget your careless words.”

Merlin bowed his head. “Although I fear such a strategy, we will make your list.” He climbed up on Clefspeare’s back and looked down at Arthur. “May I assume, Your Majesty, that you do not want a ride to the castle?”

The king averted his eyes. “You may assume.”

“Then I will meet you in the throne room for this council.” Merlin sighed and shook his head. “May God help us all.”

As the king and Palin departed, Merlin grasped the tallest spine on Clefspeare’s neck. “I fear that this war against Goliath will not stop at the boundary of his influence.”

“Nor at the boundary of his species,” Clefspeare replied.

“What do you mean?”

A low growl created a tremor across the dragon’s scales. “I believe Devin has more on his mind than the conquest of dragons, but time will tell.”

Sapphira walked to the edge of the pulsating red screen and patted her dress with her palms. “Fire? What are you talking about?”

Makaidos closed in on the screen from the opposite side. “When we view you through the light, it appears that you are aflame from head to toe. Do we appear the same way?”

“No,” Sapphira replied. “You and Roxil look like dragons, and Elam and Paili are human, but no one is on fire.”

Makaidos stepped to Sapphira’s side of the screen and looked through it. “Amazing! Elam is taller and more muscular, while Paili is smaller and emaciated.”

Sapphira lowered herself to her knees and touched the Ovulum. It was no longer hot. Carefully lifting it, she carried it and the entire screen in her palm. The half oval expanded below her hand into a full ellipse, exactly as long as Sapphira was tall and more than twice as wide as her narrow frame. As she gazed through it, dozens of new details appeared. The fountain gushed; the statues stood erect, polished with a pristine shine; and the brick kilns puffed gray smoke from iron stacks on top. Yet, no one attended the ovens or strolled the immaculate streets.

“I’m going to try something.” Sapphira walked slowly back toward the portal near the broken fountain. The screen of light added no weight, and it shifted with the slightest turn of the egg, making it easy to keep the viewing screen in front of her. Elam, Paili, and the two “dragons” followed, but they kept silent.

When Sapphira arrived at the dimensional doorway, she held the Ovulum out as far as she could and gazed at the city. All of Shinar seemed coated in crimson, yet clear a hundred times clearer than before. She could count the sparkling crystals in every marble statue and distinguish between the tiniest leaves on a distant sycamore tree.

She turned the screen toward the rise where the tower once stood. Her hand trembled. The tower was there in all its glory, an enormous ziggurat, stretching so high, it extended beyond the edge of her screen and out of sight. As she gazed at it, the screen enlarged and seemed to expand over her head and swallow her body, making her feel like she was inside the scarlet halo. The tower grew, and she could see its very top, a tiny point in the midst of the clouds. Looking down again, the tower’s entry portico began magnifying, as though she were flying toward it at blazing speed. The force against her body rippled her muscles, making her arms and legs cramp, and the stiff counter-breeze dried her eyes until they ached.

The tower’s doors swung open, and she zoomed inside, the sudden turns twisting her body. The planter swung into view along with the dozen surrounding statues, but the tree itself was no longer there. Her body swept into the middle, and her feet settled where the tree once rooted into the soil.

Now that her journey had stalled, she looked around, expecting to see the saluting forms, but they were no longer statues; they were tall lanterns with flaming wicks. Each flame swayed like a writhing ghost.

On the museum wall, huge letters burned into the marble, spelling out a message that nearly encircled the entire chamber. Sapphira read it slowly, letting the words sink into her mind. “When a maid collects an egg, she passes it on, giving it to the one she feeds.”

“It’s a riddle,” she whispered. Suddenly, her body jerked backwards, and she flew in the opposite direction. The tree, the lanterns, and the doorway all shrank, and the screen itself came back into view, as though the halo had spat her out onto the ground. Then, the entire screen flashed off.

Sapphira’s arms fell limp at her sides, but she managed to hang on to the Ovulum. She was back where she had started, or maybe she hadn’t really traveled at all. The whole city spun around her, so fuzzy and confusing, her legs wobbled beneath her.

“What did you see?” Makaidos asked. “Your face is as white as your hair!”

Sapphira could barely whisper. “I know where they are.”

She felt her body falling and the Ovulum slipping from her fingers. Strong hands lifted her back to her feet. “Fear not, child,” Makaidos said. “I have you, and I picked up the Ovulum as well.”

Sapphira blinked at a circle of helpers, four lovely, concerned faces. “Help me get to the tower,” she whispered.

“The tower’s gone,” Makaidos said.

“No. Where it used to be.”

With a quick sweep, Makaidos lifted Sapphira into his arms and marched toward the rise. Sapphira laid her head against his shoulder. His powerful muscles felt secure and stable, like the arms of Elohim when he danced with her at the pool. Even though Makaidos bounced up and down with his gait, she knew he wouldn’t drop her.

“We’re here,” he said softly.

His voice seemed to awaken her from a dream, and as he set her gently on her feet, her mind snapped to attention.

“I think this was the center of the tower’s foundation,” Makaidos said.

Sapphira’s vision magnified all her surroundings, and the familiar sorrow draped a sad curtain across her mind. “It is the center.” She pivoted slowly, trying to see beyond the emptiness that surrounded her. There were supposed to be statues, or maybe lanterns, but nothing appeared.

Elam stroked his chin. “Something’s here, right? You sense something that we can’t see?”

“I think so.” She waved her arm in a wide arc. “Statues. Twelve of them, I believe, and they make a circle around where I’m standing.”

“What makes you think they’re still here?” Roxil asked.

“I saw them through the Ovulum’s screen, but they looked like lanterns instead of people.”

Elam raised his hand as if holding a lantern. “You mean like cavern lanterns?”

“Yes. I think ”

Paili piped up. “Light them!”

“Light them?” Sapphira repeated.

Paili bounced on her toes. “With your fire. . like at home.”

“How can I light lanterns that aren’t there?”

Elam lifted her hand. “Light the lanterns with these,” he said, spreading out her fingers. “They feed the hungry and bring light to the darkness.”

“Okay,” Sapphira said, “I’ll give it a try.”

She raised her other hand and closed her eyes, imagining where the statues once stood. In her mind, she fixed twelve spots in the space around her. Then, opening her eyes again, she pointed at one of the spots and shouted, “Give me light!”

A flame burst to life and floated in midair. The fire burned downward, creating a blazing human frame. Without fuel or wick, the flame burned on, its human shape writhing as if in the bonds of torture.

Makaidos shielded his eyes and leaned back. “What now?”

Sapphira heaved breathlessly, her hands still raised. What should she do? Light up eleven more people and let them suffer in flames?