Bryan Davis - Eye of the Oracle

The stranger, now in a singlet undershirt, knelt at Elam’s other side and mopped his brow with a torn sleeve. “My dear lady, you seem to have experience with healing fallen warriors.”

Hannah kept her head turned toward Elam. “And you seem to have experience with heroic rescues. You remind me of a very dear friend of mine, an old friend from long ago.”

“How kind of you to say so. Was your friend a hero?”

Hannah’s eyes misted. “To me, he was much more than a hero much, much more.”

“I see.” He angled his head toward Elam but kept his eyes fixed on her. “Was this hero a former flame?”

A sad smile wrinkled Hannah’s lips. “You have no idea how well you have described him.”

The man’s eyebrows lifted. “Perhaps I do.”

“No,” Hannah said, sighing deeply, “you do not.”

The man turned his cloth over and dabbed Elam’s forehead again. “Have other flames come to warm the embers this love left behind?”

“What?” Hannah glared at him. “I would expect better manners from a man who sprang forth from the Ovulum!”

The man lowered his head. “Forgive me, dear lady. The Eye of the Oracle commanded me to ask that very question.”

As Hannah’s glare softened, she sighed. “Well, if the Eye bids me to answer. .” She shook her head slowly, and her voice pitched slightly higher. “My embers are cold, and they are slowly crumbling to dust.” She yanked a blade of grass away from Elam’s cheek. “I do not allow even a spark to approach them. No one will ever rekindle my coals.”

“May I venture to describe this lost flame of yours?”

Hannah sniffed, her chin trembling. “If you must.”

The man took a deep breath and spoke with a poetic cadence. “Embodying the spirit of a paladin, he ignited the passions of your heart. Flashing the courage of a warrior, he burned away all your fears. Massaging with the gentleness of spring sunshine, he warmed your scales on cold, anxious nights.”

“Well done. It almost seems that you ” Hannah clenched a handful of grass. “Did you say, ‘scales’?”

“Yes. And if he is the fiery romantic that I suspect, he probably told you that he would eventually come back.” He gazed directly into Hannah’s eyes. “Is that true. . Thigocia?”

Hannah’s lips quivered. Still keeping her hand on Elam’s arm, she leaned closer to the stranger and gazed into his eyes. After a few seconds, a tear trickled down her cheek as she whispered, “My. . my husband?”

He took the ends of her fingers into his hand and guided her around Elam. “We said, ‘till death do us part,’ but even death could not keep our love apart forever.”

“Makaidos!” Hannah leaped into his arms. “My darling husband! It is you! It is really you!”

Holding her close in his lap, he stroked her silky hair. “My human name is Timothy, but I will answer to any name you wish to give me.” He gently pushed her toward Elam. “You had better tend to your patient.”

“Oh! Yes! Of course!” She stepped over Elam and pressed down on his arm.

Elam grimaced, but the pain wasn’t quite as bad as before.

“How did you do it?” she asked, a broad smile stretching her cheeks. “I mean, how did you come back to life?”

Timothy mopped Elam’s brow again. “God preserved my spirit in the Ovulum, and I spent over a thousand years there learning from Enoch. He said that someday God would create a new body for me from the dust of the ground. When the Ovulum broke open, Enoch closed his eyes and said, ‘It is time.’ Then, he disappeared.” Timothy laid a hand on his chest. “And now I am here, back with my beloved.”

Hannah reached across Elam and took Timothy’s hand, drawing it close. She kissed his fingers and rubbed the back of his hand across her cheek. “What happened to Enoch?”

“I am concerned about him,” he said. “God took him from the earth long ago, and he resided in the Ovulum as a prophetic eye for thousands of years. But he knew he would be leaving, and he said he did not know where God would take him next.”

Hannah released the pressure on Elam’s arm and slowly peeled the blood-soaked shirt away from the wound. “It is just oozing now.” She patted Elam on the cheek. “You are certainly a fast healer.”

Elam forced a smile. “Must be from clean living.” He rose to a sitting position, blinking at the beams of sunlight filtering through the high treetops. Two horses stood in a shallow stream that trickled over their hooves, while the third nosed through a patch of clover next to a nearby oak tree. He raised his good arm. “Help me up. Devin will follow my blood trail, so we have to keep moving.”

“There is no hurry.” Hannah rose and pulled Elam to his feet. “With that bad leg of his, he could not possibly keep up.”

“He was a knight,” Elam countered. “He and Palin know how to mount and ride horses.”

“An excellent point.” Hannah brushed off her dress. “We will follow the stream to the River Clyde. If we can make it there by nightfall, we should be able to erase our trail in the water under the cover of darkness. Then we can follow the river to Uddingston.”

While Hannah gathered the horses, Elam picked up the drenched bandage and wadded it into a ball. A drop of blood slowly gathered at the end of a sleeve and dripped to the ground. “I have a better idea.” He forked his fingers at Timothy and Hannah. “You two can go to Uddingston. I’ll lead Devin away with a trail of blood.”

“No,” Hannah said, now riding on Clefspeare. “If he catches you ”

“The boy is right.” Timothy turned to Elam. “You must separate from us. Now that Thigocia and I are together, you are finished here. Enoch told me that your next assignment is to find Valcor, another dragon turned human. Although he fled from Europe for a time, he now lives in Glastonbury, England, under the name of Patrick Nathanson. You will learn how you must aid him as you so faithfully aided Thigocia.”

“My name is Hannah now,” she corrected. “And you will need to learn the new tongue quickly.”

Elam shook his head and chuckled under his breath. “Both of you could use a lot of work with your speech. Just relax, and don’t try so hard. I mean, you sound as stiff as dragons’ armor.”

Timothy smiled. “Is that so,” he said in modern English, his words lilting with the rhythm of a perfect Scottish accent. “You’d be surprised at what a man can learn trapped inside a glass egg for hundreds of years. I just breathed the Scottish air for an hour, and I’m already a Scotsman!”

“Excellent!” Hannah clapped her hands and laughed. “You even used contractions. I always found those difficult to master.”

A low rumble vibrated the ground. Elam strained to listen. Hoofbeats? If so, they were still far away, but closing fast. He waved toward the gray mare. “Timothy! Hurry! Whichever way you go, I’ll ride in the opposite direction.”

Timothy boosted Elam onto the bay mare, then leaped aboard the dapple gray’s back. “I trust we will see you again, Elam.”

“If it is in my power.” Pressing the horse’s shoulder with his good hand, Elam steadied himself and nodded to both former dragons. His throat caught, and tears welled in his eyes. “It has been an honor to serve you. May the Lord Christ be with you always.”

Hannah rode to his side and patted Elam’s horse. “Legossi, stay with him and keep him safe.” Legossi gave her a horsey snort and nodded.

Hannah pulled Elam’s sleeve. “Farewell, brave warrior.” She kissed him on the hand. “Thank you for watching over me.”

With a firm kick into Clefspeare’s side, Hannah rode into the creek and galloped downstream.

Timothy guided his mare next to Elam’s. “You recognized me all along, didn’t you?”