Authors: Paul Wigmore
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
Once the dragons had left, Clara and Seb ran to the Pub and she put her hands out towards the Trident. It came alive when it realised her presence. The humming became louder and the iron itself began to glow a strange electric blue before it loosed itself from its brackets and shot into her hands.
‘The village’ she shouted and then ran in the direction of the trident path. When Clara got to the top of the path, she could see nothing but flames searching for the sky, she also knew this wasn’t the worst of it.
‘Stay back, just stay there for gods sake’ she cried back to Seb, who was amazed at the strength she seemed to have found since holding the trident. It must have weighed more than a house and yet she carried it with ease, it was still glowing that eerie blue light, but none of this seemed to phase her and now she was yelling at him to stay back. Well he was having none of it, he was about to run to her side to see what had been happening, he could see the cloud of smoke coming from the village so he knew it wasn’t good, but then his phone rang...it was Sophia.
‘Don’t answer that’ Clara screamed, knowing only too well, who it would be, but it was too late.
Seb ran towards the hedge and Clara overlooking the burning village answering his phone as he did.
‘Dad, what’s happening, please help’ came the anguished cry from the other end of
satellite beams.
‘What’s wrong honey?’
‘The fleas Dad, they’re everywhere, my friends, they’re all... they’re all’ and then she broke off.
‘Sophia...Sophia, honey what’s wrong’ he screamed into his phone. Clara touched his arm,
‘We’ll make it right’ she said soothingly only to be shrugged off by Seb this time.
‘Sophia, answer me Sophia’
Clara looked down towards the village and she saw the children that were out playing holding hands and she knew what was coming. She heard it from Sebs phone; all the children simultaneously began to recite the age old verses of that god forsaken rhyme.
‘Sophia...stop that, you hear me, stop that now, but there was nothing he could do to stop it. Her singing joined every other child on Earth as they sang the song of death amongst them.
Ring a ring o’ roses
A pocket full of posies
A-tishoo, a-tishoo
We all fall down
Ring a ring o’ roses
A pocket full of posies
A-tishoo, a-tishoo
We all fall down
Ring a ring o’ roses
A pocket full of posies
A-tishoo, a-tishoo
We all fall down
Clara saw the children down below in the village that had joined hands to recite the rhyme all fall down at the end of the last verse and she had no doubt that Sophia had also done the same.
‘Sophia...Sophia, stop it now you hear me, stop singing that stupid song, do you hear me girl... stop it’ Seb knew he was no longer talking to anyone. He fell to his knees holding the phone to his ear, whispering
“stop it, stop it now, listen to daddy”
tears ran from his eyes and snot ran freely from his nose as he realised he was no longer talking to his daughter, but only what remained of her. He looked up to Clara who had knelt down beside him.
‘Stop this please’ he begged her
through a sob, ‘Please, stop this now’.
‘I’ll do what I can my love’ she said then grabbed his face and turned him towards her and kissed him fully on the lips as she felt the Trident warm in her hands. She stood up and took in the desolate view surrounding her.
‘Come’ she said, ‘we have work to do’ as she lifted him from his knees.
If there were any news reports that day, or papers printed, the headlines would just be three desolate, desperate words, “SAVE OUR CHILDREN” for the moment they fell down, each child across the world became infected with the plague, or the “black death” as some called it. No matter what its name, its effect was the same
, cold, hard and unrelenting death for all of gods’ children.
Clara cried out in despair as she lifted Seb from the floor, that murderous, evil sound broke through. The sound she had heard that night when she first held the talisman in her hands. She knew what it meant, Saul had escaped. The dragons had told her of the hallowed ground that he had been held captive in and why he needed Gavin, to help him escape. The sound was soul destroying and the pain in her head was all but unbearable but she stood defiant with Seb who had also heard the sound.
‘Jesus Christ, what was that?’ he asked. His hands went to his ears as if to dull the sound, but it was a mighty roar that wasn’t heard through your ears. The sound imbedded itself into your mind so there was no escape from it. They both turned to look at the brilliant explosion that ripped through the already dark sky caused by the smoke of a hundred burning buildings looming over the city of Manchester not so far away.
The sky turned a deep orange high above the warehouse in Manchester before turning a deep crimson red, although the redness in the sky wasn’t just localised over the warehouse. They looked on aghast as it spread further and further like a dye in a pool of water. It was just like in the vision the dragons had shown her. Saul had escaped because the angels guarding him, were now needed to tend over the children that had been stricken down
which had left Saul free to break out.
This time it wasn’t only Clara that could hear the might
y cackle of victory from Saul. The throaty bellows were heard for many hundreds of miles, it was the sound of death gloating its victory call across the land. And then those words that struck terror in the heart of The Guardian. It felt as if the words stabbed through her heart like a cold steel blade.
‘Guardian...
prepare to taste the blood of my victory’
There was a moment of deafening silence before the great demon appeared in the sky only a few miles away. He lifted his great arms above his head and let out another mighty roar. Seb could see the red of his eyes from where he stood, it was that brilliant it matched the red of the sky surrounding him. His legs nearly turned to jelly
and he had to grab hold of Clara to stop himself from falling.
‘You’ve got to be shitting me’
‘I wish’ replied Clara ‘Come on quick, we’ve got to get that egg’ she explained as they ran to the hill with the largest oak how the dragons had told her that she was the only obstruction for Saul to defeat before he would have full reign over this dominion. Something that the devil himself had never quite managed, how Saul had grown maybe too powerful for the devil himself to control, so had tricked him into the hallowed ground until he could think of a way to control the beast, and how it was now all up to her and her alone to bring him down.
She stood before the great oak, it looked as if it had been there as long as the egg beneath it and took the talisman from the chain she had fashioned from some old bootlaces which she had placed around her neck and placed it into the hole of the middle prong on The Trident.
There was a dazzling bright yellow light that split across the field and blew Seb to the ground as it sealed itself into the fixings. He sat dazed for a second putting his hands up to his face to protect his eyes from the blinding light. When he shifted his hands he saw Clara although now she really wasn’t Clara anymore, she was “The Guardian”. She stood before the tree with the Trident in both hands repeating some incomprehensible words. She was now dressed somehow in a long flowing white cloak that kissed the ground with its soft hem. Her hair had grown long and flowing and now matched the colour of the billowing cloak. The only thing that remained was the bright blue of her eyes.
He knew what had happened; she was now truly “The Guardian” in all her glory. She had
become
, and she was beautiful. She stood before the old oak tree looking as strong and beautiful as the tree itself.
The ground beneath him began to shake and rumble as if there were an earthquake. He attempted to stand, then thought better of it. The Talisman grew brighter and brighter as The Guardian chanted the name of the Earth over and over, commanding it to move. The mighty tree began to quiver as the soil from beneath it was displaced. It’s very roots were freed and the tree fell with a
n almighty thump that reverberated around them for a while after it fell. When the ground had settled and Seb thought it safe to stand he joined The Guardian to see the egg that had been settled beneath the roots of the great oak.
‘Glad you finally figured out how to use that thing’ The Guardian smiled at him, her face was a picture of calmness.
‘I’ve always known’ she said as she looked deep into his eyes, ‘since Mother Nature whispered her first breath or planted her first seed, I’ve always known, I just forgot, now I’ve been reborn, I remember it all’
He wasn’t quite sure what to make of that so didn’t even try to understand.
‘So what now, there’s the egg, how do we crack it. I’m not sitting on it. The Guardian gave him a reproachful look that said,
now is not the time for childish jokes
.
‘Sorry’ he whimpered as he took his gaze from hers back to the egg.
We must hurry for he will find us soon, and we must be prepared’
Seb really wasn’t sure what he was doing here, how was he going to be of any use? A mere mortal amidst a battle of giants, a battle between good and evil to save the world? All he knew for sure was that he was going to stand at her side throughout.
The Guardian held her Trident in both hands and called the true name of the water and begged it do her bidding.
The Guardian knew that Dragons eggs can take days, years or even millennia to hatch. Of course, there had never been any real research on the subject as they were thought to be just stuff of legend but there were many theories. Forces of nature, acts of God or even atmospheric conditions, but she knew that Dragons were born from water and lived most of their lives under the water. It made sense that water would be part of the hatching process.
As she called the water from the seas to come to her, the Trident began to shake in her
hands; the wind around them grew fiercer. Her robe billowed around her and then the rain came. The wind encircled her so that it looked to Seb as if she was stood in the middle of a typhoon, but she stood tall, not moving. The lightning began to crack in the air above her as she repeated the name over and over at the top of her voice, commanding the water to her bidding and then Seb caught sight of something snaking its way across the red sky. As it drew closer he realised what it was. It was a vein of water flowing across the land to The Guardian. It finally struck the Trident itself with the force of the Great Sea behind it, but through the wind and the rain, The Guardian stood hard as stone as the vein of water was projected through the Talisman and smashed itself against the egg.
The force of the water smashing against the egg didn’t crack it at first as Seb thought it might. He marvelled at how strong the egg must be
, then he marvelled at how strong and even more beautiful Clara had become before he felt the ground shaking beneath his feet again, and that demonic laughter, much, much closer now, in fact if he were to turn around he knew he would be almost face to face with the demon Saul.
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Saul had been searching for The Guardian since he broke free from the confines of the warehouse. She should have been easy to find but somehow she had put a shield around herself so that she could not be found.