The Last Summoning---Andrew and the Quest of Orion's Belt (Book Four) (69 page)

“Andrew!” Freddie cried, “ANDREW!” Freddie
stared up at Andrew, his eyes wide and fearful. Andrew’s skin had
turned the color of ash. The life and light in Andrew had gone
out.

It was the end of all the ends. The world
would never see another morning again.

The Falling of The Fallen

“Ha, ha, ha, ha!” The Fallen howled, waving
Andrew’s form in front of Freddie like a limp, rag doll, beaming
out light and darkness over his army below the tower. “Behold,” his
thunderous voice called over the land. “The mighty warrior of light
is DEAD! DEAD! Fight, ye flickering fools, but your hope will soon
go out!”

He laughed once more, a laugh that was filled
with ugliness, and disregard for everything that was good and
worthwhile. Then, as if he was tossing a piece of trash, he let
Andrew’s body fall from his dark clutches, onto the cracked tower
floor.

A rumble sounded as Andrew’s body hit the
ground. The glowing blade of Andrew’s fallen sword faded into a
dark, dead, gray sheen.

In a flash, something darted beneath The
Fallen, and snatched up Andrew’s sword.

“That’s a good boy,” Ivory said, her voice
ridden with urgency. She looked at Talic, and then to Freddie.
“Good boy, Talic. GOOD BOY!”

Talic now held the sword. He looked stronger,
angry and powerful. He lifted the sword, heavy as it was, looking
quite terrible and commanding, even for a small creature such as
himself.

Ivory stood not far off, motioning for Talic
to run. “Take it to Freddie,” she screamed. “Take it to
Freddie!”

Talic stood there for a moment, undecided,
his eyes shining and his body quivering.

“You leeching, traitorous shadow!” The Fallen
thundered, smacking his dark whip against Talic so hard that it
broke the long dark chain he was bound to.

Talic let out a pitiful cry, and ran towards
Freddie, dragging the sword. He let out a terrified cry, dumping it
in front of Freddie’s feet. The second he let go of the sword, his
face changed, and his animal-like features faded. His long whiskers
and ears melted away. It was as if he had become the old Talic he
had been before. His eyes were lit with confusion, and fear.

“Get behind me, Talic!” Freddie commanded,
picking up the sword, and holding it aloft.

“Who do you think you are?” The Fallen
bellowed, glaring down at Freddie. “There was only one who could
destroy me. And that one is dead. DEAD!” He pointed to Andrew’s
motionless body. “Do you not see?”

A terrible all-consuming anger filled
Freddie, as he saw Andrew’s limp body crumpled on the ground,
lifeless and used up.

He knew he could never do what Andrew had
asked. It wasn’t within his power. He was just an ordinary person.
Not special. Yet knowing all this, he still picked up the sword. He
stared at its hilt. The blade did not glow, nor shine. All he saw
in it was his own gray reflection, cast in The Fallen’s repulsive
light. He felt nothing. It felt as any other weapon. He felt no
surges of power, save his own faltering courage, and the strength
Andrew’s last words gave to him.

“Who do you think you are to hold such a
weapon?” The Fallen shouted, his voice sending swirling bits of
light and darkness surging around Freddie. “You are ordinary. A
simple spark of life, nothing more.”

“Who am I?” Freddie repeated, slowly looking
up as if startled by the answer he felt welling inside of him. “Who
am I?” he repeated, more to himself than anyone else. Andrew was
right, he did have the same strange diamond marks burned into his
hands by default. Somehow they had burned through the rope that he
was supposed to be hanged by. Was this not assurance enough? His
eyes lit up. His face grew stern. He gripped the sword, suddenly
realizing something powerful and great. Andrew was right. True
light never dies, but endures, grows, expands, doubles, and
triples, when it is given, and shared. It never diminishes. When
one falls, someone else must pick up the torch. Light passes from
one to another, to all. Andrew had told him this. This was the
message of the sword, of light and truth. It lives on forever. He
looked to Ivory, to Talic, then to the army of light battling below
him. He represented all of them. He represented Andrew and every
other good soul that had lived and died for the cause. That was
all. Nothing more, nothing less.

Below him, he could see the flickering
outlines of those who still battled the darkness. Though a cloud of
doubt had passed over them, still hope’s light burned true. He
stepped towards The Fallen, his face alight with a new inner
knowledge, a greater glow of hope glistening on his face and
skin.

“It doesn’t matter who you think I am. Only
that I know who I am! Andrew has passed the flame to me! So that
makes me your worst enemy!” The moment he said the words, a
seeping, ebbing flow of energy passed from the sword into his hands
and arm. It was strong, unclouded, and bright. It was so slight
that he was unsure where it came from, and what he was feeling.
Like a new branch grafted into a tree, the sword’s power began to
grow. Yet to those who saw him, it was undetected. Only he knew it,
only he felt it rising and falling like the waves of the sea. He
began to see glimpses of what Andrew had felt. He saw flashes of
people, thousands of people, brilliant, good, people, their hearts
throbbing their voices calling, their strength, their courage,
their love, their faith, seeping into him. Even in Andrew’s death,
their hope had swelled, and surged through him. The feeling was
overwhelming, overpowering, intoxicating, almost too much for him
to bear. The sword felt uncommonly heavy and strong. It was too
much for him. His vision blurred, and he nearly fell. But he stood
strong, and kept hold of the sword. Though it still did not glow,
nor give any inclination that it had somehow bonded to him, he knew
a truth no one else did.

“Enemy?” The Fallen purred, his voice
dripping in honey and chocolate. “Why can we not now be friends? It
was he who was my enemy,” he pointed to Andrew. “Not you. You’ve
seen the light I bear. I am not so bad. In your heart of hearts you
know this. Why do you not let me help you see who I really am, and
what you could really be?” His voice was thick and soft, ridden
with rivulets of light that chimed together like glass, shrouding
Freddie in a mesmerizing veil of light.

“No!” Freddie shouted, shaking off the
cunning, caressing splinters of light that swirled around him like
butterflies. “I know who you are. And I know who I am!”

The Fallen’s eyes flamed, and wafts of
shadows broiled and swarmed around him. “Who you are means nothing
to me because that is all you are. A sputtering spark that will be
nothing but fuel to me, just as the thousands battling below us.
One by one you will die, and one by one you will fall. Worship me.
Bow before my might, and I will let you live!”

“Never!” Freddie shouted, pushing bravely in
front of Talic, and Ivory. “NEVER!”

“Never?” The Fallen repeated. He narrowed his
dark eyes, gazing from Freddie to Talic, to Ivory. “You have
condemned yourselves!” He stretched himself out as if to receive
them into his darkness. “Come, if you will not embrace my darkness,
then it will embrace you.”

Freddie’s face filled with light. He raised
his sword and stared at The Fallen. Every minute, the power within
the sword grew, and swelled inside his chest. It expanded his
vision, and enlarged his courage. “At least I am a spark. Of that
you cannot even boast. You are only a Fallen Star. Your light has
already gone out. It seems you have fallen very far from where you
once stood.”

The Fallen smoldered in mingled layers of
vapors of darkness and light. “It is you who will fall, you and all
your kind. Mankind has always been a fallen race, and always will
be. Come, come. If you will not worship me, you will fuel me and my
void, for I will absorb your pitiful sparks and use your life to
prolong my own!”

He swirled and howled, opening a frightening,
dark gap in his outstretched body. The second the hole was created
inside himself, a frightening sucking howl moaned over the tower,
drawing Freddie, Ivory and Talic into his outstretched gaping
folds.

“For Andrew, for those who have hope in their
hearts, for the world, and above all---for truth!”” Freddie lifted
the sword, and moved himself in front of his friends, and ran to
greet the powerful pull of darkness. “You have polluted the world
long enough. You shall fall, oh Fallen one. And the sound of it
will be heard throughout the world!”

The Fallen roared out, enraged and drunk with
his own borrowed power. “You think you can destroy me with that
dead trinket? Come, and I will show you how powerless you really
are!” Shadows rippled through the air, sucking Freddie into the
gaping darkness, towards the throbbing heartbeat of blackness.
Freddie was propelled towards the ever hungry, dark heart of The
Fallen. In that moment, enfolded in the sheets of shadows, his
sword instantly came to life, its light beaming through the vortex
of darkness, bonding to him, unified by purpose. His body felt full
of light, nothing else. It was as if for one small moment he and
the sword were one, one with every single soul that gave it the
light it needed to cast out this darkness. It seemed that time
stood still, suspended in space. Power, purpose, courage, hope,
truth filled his mind, and gave him strength he never knew he had.
Images of his far-off home, of Hollyhock Hollow, filled his mind.
Images of Andrew, of their long journey, and their struggles, the
moments that had made up their lives had led to this one final
moment. The transcendent moment was fleeting, and suddenly cut off
by the impact of the sword being sucked into the dark heart of The
Fallen. It seemed that if the heart had absorbed both him and the
sword. Then it suddenly expelled them out in an explosion of
fractured light and darkness.

A deafening howl permeated the air, so loud
that it penetrated every cell in Freddie’s body. The sword was
blown from his hands, nearly ripping his fingers off. He felt
himself being thrust over the tower. He reached out and clutched
onto the edge, his legs dangling out beneath him. With the sword
gone, he felt very weak and drained. His hands shook and trembled,
unable to pull himself up. He cried out, feeling himself slipping.
He could barely see through the fractured, mingled pieces of light,
whooshing over him.

Ivory’s face appeared through the mist. “Hold
on!” she cried, crouching over the edge of the tower and grasping
Freddie’s hand. The howling wind surged all around her, nearly
knocking her off with Freddie, but still she held on.

Ivory's eyes suddenly grew wide, she cried
out and nearly dropped Freddie.

“What’s wrong?” Freddie called to her.

“Your hands are burning me!” Ivory
screamed.

Freddie clutched onto Ivory, his heart
beating in fear. “Oh, please, don’t let go. Please!”

“I’m not letting go, Freddie,” Ivory cried,
her face ridden with pain, but her eyes strong and determined. “But
I can feel myself slipping…”Just as she said those words, Talic
reached out and caught Ivory. Without saying a word, he held onto
Ivory, pulling, groaning, and heaving, battling against the wind,
until he had pulled both Freddie and Ivory to safety.

All three of them huddled together, clinging
to whatever they could, to avoid being pulled off the tower. Then,
in a single instant, the sucking stopped, and a burning, brilliant,
orb of light---to surpass all lights, as if all the light The
Fallen had ever ingested, combined into one---was expelled from the
bowls of The Fallen. The light shot across the
sky lighting up the dark sky in a trail of
flames, burning the vapors of darkness it touched. It cut through
the atmosphere colliding with the thick darkness covering the sky,
in an earth-shattering impact.

Crack! The light hit the darkness like a
powerful nail sinking into black wood. The earth shook and groaned.
The tower on which they stood teetered back and forth. A piercing,
ear-splitting crackling cut through the air like a thousand seas of
cracked ice. From where Freddie stood it looked as if the black sky
itself had fractured, causing the darkness to crack, sending
splinters of light over the sky. The cracking sound continued,
slowly at first, gradually building, the lines of light becoming
wider as the darkness split, webbing out from where the orb of
light had hit, stretching out over the sky, sending shards of light
shooting down through the earth.

The howling of The Fallen grew louder as if
trying to drown out the sound of the cracking sky. The earth shook
once more, and groaned, as if giving birth.

And it was. For light was being born. Once
more, though it had been shut out for far too long. Hidden and
buried within the womb of darkness, it was coming. Its labor had
been long and hard, like a still-born child that was slowly coming
back to life.