Ellas

Kane

As the desert formed around me, and his scream of rage at my escape faded, I sagged to my knees.

My left hand, slick with blood still clenched tightly around the rod, and the other, that only seconds before had held what was left of my sword, grasped the rod's base – there was no way I was leaving the rod behind for him.

‘That was close,’ I gasped. ‘He… he almost had me.’ What the hell was I thinking? I couldn't beat him – I knew that before I began.

‘Stupid. Stupid!,’ I said, into the cold night air. ‘He didn't come. How could I ever think that he would do?’

I slumped onto my back, both hands still clenching the rod, staring up at the clear star filled sky. If there is a God, tell me where I went wrong. Tell me! I should have talked it all through with Jalholm first… and Jain, perhaps. They would have known what I needed to do to make it work.

‘They would have known… or they would have told you how stupid you were!’ I said.

It was cold now, at least by Ellas standards, and the pain from the healing, the new healing, had kicked in. I'd lost a lot of blood from all the wounds he gave me; he'd toyed with me from almost the very beginning. God, I was a fool. How could I have ever thought he'd come?

All my senses were on high alert, and yet I heard nothing. Nothing moved in the night. I was alone.

‘Fool!’ I screamed. ‘You almost gave him everything. You were almost his again!’

As my voice died away, the night's silence gave way to the distant bray of a horse, my horse, I knew.

‘Bright,’ I called, as I sat upright. And at the mention of my companions name, a smile crept into the corner of my mouth, slowly followed by a wave of joy as Bright canted out of the darkness to stand before me, and lowered his huge head down to nestle against the side of my face.

‘Hello, my friend,’ I said.

To which he replied with a snort that I took as a reprimand for leaving him behind. I'd even demanded of Jalholm that he be taken with them forcibly if need be.

So either Jalholm had disobeyed me, or Bright, loyal as ever, had escaped from them.

I stood, took his head in my arms, and cried. The tears began as tears of anguish and despair, and yet within moments, as bright whinnied, snorted and shook his huge head in what I knew was his way of showing his disapproval, turned to tears of joy.

‘You are my friend, Bright. A true friend,’ I said, quietly. And with those words came a revelation. I have friends. People, creatures, that would lay down their lives for me… as I would for them.

‘You have no friends, Dar'cen! Only servants… servants cowed down to you in fear for their lives. Poor Luke is no better. He is your tool, but he is not yours. Not your friend. Never loyal out of choice. You are alone, Dar'cen!’ The last I screamed into the night.

‘You will always be alone. And that is why we will defeat you.’

Bright pushed me to one side as he reared up on his hind legs, kicking out with his hooves as if in battle.

‘You agree, my friend? Yes, I know you do.’

I knew then that I wasn't beaten. Luke had bested me, but it wasn't the end. The war was still to come, and in that we would defeat him.

We had done so once, Anna and I, and all those that sacrificed all to end him, and we would do so again. I had friends. I was not alone.

‘Come, Bright,’ I said as I leapt up onto his bareback. ‘Let us find the others. Jalholm, and perhaps Jain, too, can help with this riddle… why did he not come?

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Why did I not come?’

######

‘So the future is set and cannot be changed?’ I asked, not believing, not even understanding Jain's overly complex explanation of the dictates of his prophecies.

‘No! I did not say that, Kane,’ Jain said, exasperation plane in his voice. ‘Our every action sets us on a path to our future. Everything we do set a path… every change, no matter how slight changes that path… changes the future we will live —’

‘Then how —’

‘You saw the future, Kane. You went there. Nothing you do now will change that. By telling us this, by trying to change what you saw, will only ensure that it will happen as it already has happened for you.’

‘But that makes no sense!’ I said, startling the others who sat just outside our small group as we perched around the rock outcrop whose flattened top served as a makeshift table between us.

‘Your prophecies tell of what may happen; you have said so yourself. They foretold of Dar'cen's coming, and of his defeat… a defeat that only happened in one of a hundred futures. How? How can you have it both ways?’

‘There is a future for us, Kane. Our future… and that future is what we make it. Our actions make it, and the prophecies are the key to directing our actions for a future without Dar'cen. If we choose to ignore what is written then he wins.’

Jain's sighed heavily. ‘Tell him, Jalholm. Make him understand. My belief is all I need, but clearly, Kane, needs more than I can give.’

‘Jain is correct, Kane. And he can have it both ways, I'm afraid. Our actions do dictate what is to come. But by travelling forward, you have seen what is to come. There is only one future for us, Kane. There are many possible, many potential futures. But only one actual future… and you have seen that future.

'And it cannot be changed. Something stopped you from going to your own aid and defeating Luke. No matter how you try, you will not be there to help yourself.’

‘Kane,’ Jain interrupted. ‘Not long ago you sent yourself back… back in time, to relive a life that you has already lived. And you said yourself that you did all you could to make that day, the day of the sending, exactly as it had been to you.

'You were afraid that to do anything else would change what was to come. But can you not see that because it had already happened, nothing could be changed. It was fixed; everything you did was exactly as it happened to the earlier you. It had to be, because it was already done.’

‘Regardless,’ I said, far more harshly than I intended. ‘I go to Xrela… I will try. Luke must be eliminated if we are to defeat Dar'cen.’

‘It matters not, Kane. You will not —’

‘Yes, I know, Jain. But I will try. I must try. Now, here is a request that I will wager neither you or your prophecies will have ever foreseen… will you heal me, Jain? I have no time to wait for his healing to take if I am to stand against Luke. And I have a favour to ask of you, too, Jalholm.’

‘Me? Anything, Kane. Anything at all,’ Jalholm said, the words confident, but his tone wary.

‘Will you accompany me on this fool’s errant? Your strength in magic would be a great comfort to me as I do all I can to change the future I have seen.’

I met Jain's disapproving look with a grin. ‘Now, now, Jain. Does not everything I say and do lead to the one future? Surely, if I cannot change what I have seen, then all I do now has already happened. So do you now frown upon anything that I do?’

The look on Jain's face was a picture. I laughed; I could not help myself. Carthia laughed too. Jain's discomfort was a rare thing indeed.

‘I come with you, too. You cannot stop me, Kane, for it has already happened,’ Carthia said, as she laughed louder. A laugh that I was sure was more forced than genuine.

‘Oh, but I can, Carthia. Jalholm comes with me, if he will. If I am defeated, then I need someone to lead, and that someone is you —’

‘No! I will not stay —’

‘Yes, you will, Carthia. Anna chose you. She saw in you one who is important to what is to come… as did your mother. And now that Alex, your sister, is here, you are complete. You two are complete… what did you call them, Jain?’

‘The Sisters of the Soul,’ Jain replied, sheepishly. ‘The prophecies say that —’

‘Enough, old fool. No more prattle, I beg you,’ Carthia said, angrily.

‘Why not, Kane? Why Jalholm and not me, tell me that?’

‘I have already told you… to lead… and to interpret and understand what it is that you, Alex and Sarah wrote. To lead us all to defeat him. I cannot risk losing you, not because I love you as a daughter, but because if we are to win, you must survive.

'Besides, you have a sister and a mother now that you need to spend time with… and has not Setia secrets that she plans to tell you?’

‘My mother still tends to the people of her village as you know. Her secrets must wait until we return—‘

‘Yes they must, Carthia, but still you are not coming with us! I will say no more on it.’

Turning to Jalholm, I asked, ‘Will you come with me, Jalholm?’

####

Three days it took, and that was riding hard. It had taken ten days to find Luke in my future, and when I returned to the past much of that time was lost catching up with my friends, who rode in the opposite direction.

I have to get there before my other self… I have to get there before they fight. Somehow, I knew that that was paramount.