A new rush of heat surged into Sapphira’s face. “How can he be ready for that? We haven’t even turned down the magnetic field to test his strength.”
“We’ll start him off slowly,” Morgan said. “But since his stalk thickness is greater than any spawn we’ve ever had, I think he’ll be walking in less than a week.”
“And then you’ll replicate him?”
“Yes. We’ll create a whole new race of intelligent and strong giants, and your spawn will be the leader. But right now, he is bonded to you. He cannot be the general we need until you wean him off your emotional support and release him to Mardon.”
Sapphira glanced at Yereq. He grinned at her. “How do I do that?” she asked.
“I will teach him how to hate, and then you will make him hate you.”
“Hate me? My spawn? I could never ”
Morgan slapped her across her unwounded cheek. “You will do what I say, or else! One more word of defiance, and my next blow will find your other cheek.”
Sapphira cupped her hand over her cut. As Morgan’s eyes flamed, Sapphira slowly backed away, nodding. “I’ll . . . I’ll do it.” Blood oozed onto her fingers, and a single drop fell to the floor. As soon as it touched, the stone seemed to sizzle. A tiny string of smoke rose past Sapphira’s knees. The string grew and slowly stretched out toward Nimrod, curling around his waist and then his neck.
With a sudden jerk, the string tightened into a taut gray rope and pulled Nimrod to the ground. Sapphira leaped back. Nimrod screamed, frantically reaching out, grasping for anything within arm’s length. Mardon caught hold of his father’s hand, but the former king sank slowly into the floor as if a sponge were absorbing his melting body. Soon, only Nimrod’s terrified face and an outstretched arm remained, and Mardon finally had to let go. Within seconds, Nimrod was gone.
Sapphira fell to her seat, gaping at a black spot on the stony floor. Mardon dropped to his knees and touched the spot with his fingertips, murmuring a soft lament in his strange tongue.
Morgan glared at Sapphira, her jaw trembling with rage. “You have succeeded in cutting your teaching chore in half,” she growled. “If your careless use of your power also dispatches Mardon, Paili will feel my wrath.”
Sapphira cupped her cheek again, staring at Morgan as she stalked out of the room.
Morgan sat cross-legged at the edge of a deep pit, caressing a leather scabbard on the stone floor at her side. Next to the scabbard lay two gemstones the one Mara had taken from the inner wall of the abyss and a matching stone Morgan had plucked just minutes ago.
As light streamed up from the darkness, Morgan waved her hands across the opening as if warming her fingers over a fire. Leaning closer and allowing the light to bathe her face, she spoke, her voice quavering slightly. “Samyaza. It is your wife, Lilith. If I have finally found you after all these years, I beg you to hear me and forgive my transgressions against you.”
A loud growl sounded from the blackness, then a shout. “Lilith!” The angry cry echoed through the cavern.
Morgan jerked her head back, wincing.
Samyaza continued. “You black-hearted fiend! How dare you offer your sugar-coated words after betraying me with the very arts I taught you!”
She leaned over the pit again. Her voice stayed calm. “It was not a betrayal, my love. If I had not drained some of your power, you would not only be trapped in the abyss, but I would be dead and therefore powerless to help you escape. Instead, I am alive, and I have come to plan your departure from this cursed place.”
Samyaza remained quiet for a few seconds. Morgan smiled, knowing she had cooled his fiery anger. “Since I am but a wraith, I have no body for you to inhabit, so even if I could climb down there, you would not be able to ride back with me. And it’s possible that I could not make it back at all.”
Samyaza’s voice returned, quieter, yet still firm. “I know you, Lilith. You have a plan. What is it?”
“My plan has many complexities, but the ultimate goal is for you and I to rule the world. Of course, the only way to do that is to exterminate every dragon and create an army that will help us conquer our enemies.”
“What is so complex about that?”
“As long as dragons rule the skies, in your weakened condition, you would not be able to fight them.”
Samyaza’s voice crackled with sarcasm. “Weakened, thanks to you.”
“True, but, as I said, I was your only hope. Who else would wish to free you?”
Another pause ensued, then a quiet, “Go on.”
Morgan raised a pair of her long, slender fingers. “We are trying to build an army in two ways. The spirits of the Nephilim are still alive, and they are beginning to indwell the dragon race. They will be powerful allies in our war.”
“But you said you wanted to exterminate every dragon. Why make them our allies?”
“That’s where the plan gets complicated.” Morgan closed her fingers into a fist. “The Nephilim will make the dragon race virulent in the sight of humans, and I will personally incite war between the two species. To crown my achievements, I will raise up a champion who will ensure that every dragon will die.”
“If every dragon dies, then what of our army?”
Morgan lifted a pinch of soil and let it trickle back to the ground. “We are creating another army from the earth. We are genetically engineering a race of giants, hybrids from the seeds of angels.”
“Farm-raised Nephilim? Ingenious.”
“Thank you,” Morgan replied, waving her hands over the streams of light again. “I thought you would approve. The experimentation is tedious, but we have finally created a suitable combination, a fierce, intelligent giant who will be our model for all the others.”
“How long will it take?”
“The plants grow slowly, so it will take many years.”
“Plants? They are not human?”
“They are fully human. We splice a photosynthetic gene into the human genome at the embryonic stage, allowing us to grow them from the earth. It makes them more self-sustaining, able to gather light and power from their environment. Since they have a full set of human genes, they eventually slough off their plant stems and grow into a completely human form.”
“So once the dragons are gone and your army is in place, how will you release us?”
Morgan paused and leaned closer, lowering her voice. “With Chereb.”
Samyaza grunted a contemptuous laugh. “What good will my sword do in the hands of a sorceress?”
Morgan patted down the streams of light as if trying to quell his skepticism. “I told you I learned the secret to its power.”
“So will its power destroy this prison?”
“I believe so, yet escape from the abyss might not be enough. We sit here now in the lower realms, thousands of feet of earth separating us from the skies above, but even up there we would be in one of the circles of Hades. There is no way I know for you to return to the dimension of the living. I am able to go there for a short time, because of my unusual status as a wraith, but I think that dimension would be closed to you.”
“Then your plan is not complete,” Samyaza growled. “We are at a dead end.”
“No. I have been listening to Elohim’s prophets in the world of the living. They say a king is coming who will open up the way of escape from this dimension. I will watch for this king and learn how he opens the gateway.”
“What if this king is the only one with the power to make such an opening?”
“Whatever is done once can be done again. If I have to, I will find another king who will pave the way. In the meantime, I must neutralize the force that Elohim has sent to destroy my plan.”
“What force is that?”
“The oracles of fire two girls we spawned here. They have extraordinary intelligence and insight. I killed one of them, so I think we are safe, but I want to make sure.”
“So kill the other one and be done with her.”
Morgan shook her head. “It’s not so easy. Whoever sheds their blood ends up dying. Even one of my stupid giants, a fool named Nabal, died before I could kill him myself. He whipped one of the oracles, and I found him dead in his hovel that very night. Something similar happened to a foolish king I know. A very powerful force protects that girl.”
“Then how did you manage to kill the other one?”
“By the only method that always works against oracles sent by God. Betrayal.”
“I see. A most vicious and effective weapon. But take care. Such a weapon can be turned against you.”
Morgan sighed and nodded. “Well spoken, my love. But I have chosen my weapon, and he has already forged his way into the heart of the second oracle. He will soon be ready to plunge my final dagger into Mara’s heart.”
“Her name is Mara?” Samyaza chuckled. “This will be a bitter pill indeed.”
“Yes, and don’t be surprised if she comes here. She is the one who found you for me, and knowing her curiosity, she’ll be back.”
“I will be sure to listen for her. What is the name of the betrayer?”
“Elam. He is a special prize, stolen from the family of my greatest enemy. The pain his departure caused his father and grandfather was sweet to witness.”
Samyaza laughed again. “Ah, Lilith! Your conniving genius fills me with confidence. We will wait patiently for your plan to unfold.”
“Yes, Samyaza.” Morgan rose to her feet and withdrew Chereb from the leather scabbard. “Everything has been set in motion,” she said, gazing at the shining blade. “Nothing can stop us now.”
The second week of language training had finally ended. As she trudged back toward her hovel, Sapphira laid her hand on her aching head, Mardon’s shouts still ringing in her ears. He caught on pretty quickly, but his patience was as thin as her coif veil. Whenever a new word flustered him, he screamed louder than Nabal ever did. At least Nimrod wasn’t around anymore. He would surely have made the training sessions much worse.
Exhausted, Sapphira slipped quietly back into her hovel, a dim lantern in hand. Paili snored gently, her angelic face peaceful under the glow of the flaming wick. After setting the lantern on the floor, she whispered toward the hole. “Elam? Are you there?”
There was no answer.
She pressed her uninjured cheek against the floor and whispered again. “Elam?”
Again, no answer.
The lantern’s light revealed something new, an object resting in the hole to Elam’s chamber. She reached in and caressed something soft and delicate. Pulling the object out, she laid it in her hand, a large flower that covered most of her palm. Though the light was too dim to tell for sure, its seven petals looked white, each one protruding from a golden center. The petals felt as soft as the pod of a newborn spawn. She held the blossom by its thin green stem, turning it in the dim glow. It had to be from the tree in Morgan’s room. She pressed her ear against the cold wall. Obviously Elam got out of Morgan’s room safely, but where was he now?
Feeling the sting in her cheek again, Sapphira set the blossom on her bed and stepped quietly back to the hovel entrance. The oozing cut seemed to get worse and worse, even though she had washed it every evening. Tired as she was, it had to be washed again. There was probably time to hurry to the spring and still get a few hours of sleep later.
After shuffling sleepily through the corridor and into the spring’s cavern, she set the lamp at the edge of the sulfur pool and gazed into the still waters. The flickering light cast waves of orange over the mirror-like surface, a glare that shimmered across her reflection. Sliding the lantern farther away, she kept her eyes on the water until she could see her image clearly. She touched her wound, feeling the ugly gash that scarred her face. Seeing her cheek made it sting even worse. It was more than a physical blemish; it seemed to expose her soul, an ugly rut in her smooth skin that undressed her wounded heart.
Sapphira pressed her lips together, trying not to cry. The empty cavern reminded her of her cruel slavery. Morgan hated her. Naamah wasn’t much better. Mardon seemed to view her as a science experiment that could be thrown away whenever she was no longer useful. Even her spawn now glared at her in disgust, learning more hate from Morgan every day. And the king of all the upper realms, who once sang the praises of her beauty, had delivered a cutting blow, scarring that beauty forever.
Taking a handful of water, she dabbed the cut, tears beginning to flow as heat surged through her face, making it feel as though a bat had dug its claws into the wound and was tearing it wide open. Now, every lash, every cut, and every bruise Nabal and other slave drivers had gouged into her skin began to throb. She pulled down the shoulder of her dress, exposing the whip laceration Nabal had delivered just before Acacia died. It burned like fire.
She knelt again at the pool and gazed at her tear-stained face. Resting her hands in the shallows, she sighed. Who could ever love an ugly little slave girl, an underborn who scarred her body chiseling rocks all day in dark, lonely caverns? She wasn’t a king. She wasn’t a scholar. She knew nothing more than what she read in dusty scrolls salvaged from haphazard piles and squirreled away for clandestine reading during the chilly hours of the night.
While shivering at her own memories, she imagined Morgan catching her out of her hovel after bedtime. In her mind’s eye, the swinging hand of King Nimrod appeared in the pool’s reflection as it ripped across her cheek, pounding her to the floor in agony. As she writhed at Nimrod’s feet, the sound of Morgan’s haunting laughter echoed, joining a chorus of others as they chanted in mocking hatred. The pitiful girl in the pool could only gaze up at her conquerors and cry.
Sapphira slapped the surface of the water. “You deserved it! You’re nobody! You’re just a dirty, ugly slave!” As her reflection began to congeal again on the surface, she pointed at her rippled image. “You’re not Sapphira Adi. You’re just Mara, an ignorant underborn! Nobody loves you! Not Morgan. Not Mardon. I’ll bet even Elohim hates you!” She spat into the water. “If you had been alive back then, he would have kicked you off the ark, and you would have drowned in the flood with all the others.” Covering her face with her hands, she wept bitterly, her body heaving in wave after wave of sobs.