Clara and The Prophet of Oria had stayed in the dingy pub until it closed. Every hour or so, Reg would look darkly in their direction, as if they had been causing trouble. At that point, The Prophet of Oria would reluctantly get to his feet and part with another couple of silver coins, returning with another flask of wine. That seemed to satisfy Reg for a little while longer.
Eventually, Reg walked over to their table, telling them that he was about to close and that they had to leave. With a nod, The Prophet of Oria got to his feet, leading her outside in silence.
If it hadn’t been for the light from the half-moon, it would have been pitch black in the narrow streets. ‘This way,’ he muttered, leading her in the direction of the border where she had been denied access earlier that day.
‘But they wouldn’t let me cross the border earlier,’ she said as the tower came into view. The crowds that had gathered at the tower waiting for passage earlier had disappeared, save for a couple of people with small hand-pulled carts. Beneath the flaming torches, which sat in holsters on the tower walls, a pair of guards sat watching the people pass.
‘Which is why we aren’t going to cross the border,’ he said quietly, ushering her away to the right. ‘Not here at least.’
‘Where are we going then?’
‘Come on, it’s getting late,’ he said slightly louder than he would normally speak as a guard passed them. He paid them no mind as he wandered towards the tower. Checking that no one was watching, he grabbed her by the arm. ‘Down here.’
Clara hadn’t noticed the stone steps leading down the side of the cliff the last time she had been here. She didn’t have any choice but to follow as The Prophet of Oria pulled her along quickly after him.
‘I’ve been waiting in Morlock for you for a few days,’ he explained. ‘It gave me some time to find another way across the border.’
‘You saw them stopping me from crossing in one of your visions?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I think it would be best if they didn’t know we were heading to Oria.’
‘Why are they interested in where we go? Who are they anyway?’ Clara asked. A hundred or so feet beneath them, she could just make out the dark water rippling in the moonlight.
‘The people who came to your village are searching for the same thing as you,’ The Prophet of Oria said. ‘If they know where we are going, they’ll follow in the hope that you’ll lead them right to what they seek.’
‘But I’m just looking for my brother and sister,’ Clara said.
‘What do you know about your brother and sister, Clara?’
It struck her that she actually didn’t know anything about them except for her sister’s name. ‘My sister’s name is Emily.’
‘Is that it?’
Silently, she nodded.
‘The people, the ones who attacked your village, are searching for a Seer Precursor,’ he explained. ‘It just so happens that your sister and the Seer Precursor they seek are the same person.’
‘What’s a Precursor?’ she asked. It wasn’t a term that she had ever come across before.
‘The Precursors were the origins of humanity. While they look no different from the people who sat in that pub with us earlier today, they are something entirely different,’ he said as the uneven stairs doubled back on themselves, leading them closer to the water.
‘Precursors have these ‘powers’. Some of them can control the elements, while others have the ability to heal wounds. Throughout history, there have only been a handful of Seer precursors. They have the ability to see events that are yet to come.’
‘So, you’re a Seer Precursor then?’
‘No, I’m a Prophet,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘Seer Precursors have and always will be female.’
‘But you can both see the future,’ Clara said, confused. ‘You showed me the vision of the men fighting in the pub before it happened.’
‘A Seer’s abilities are natural,’ he explained. ‘Mine are not. I have different powers; I had to learn to open my mind in a way that allows me to see glimpses of the future.’
‘I’m confused,’ she admitted.
‘I wouldn’t be surprised! The precursors are very complicated, and their powers even more so,’ The Prophet of Oria said.
‘How did you find out about your powers?’ she asked.
‘It was a long, long time ago,’ he said wistfully as they reached the bottom of the stairs. Moored to a large, jagged rock nearby was a tiny wooden row boat. ‘This is our way across the border,’ he said, holding the boat steady. ‘Get in.’
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Doing as she was told, Clara climbed into the boat unsteadily. When she had taken her seat, he climbed in, the boat sinking deeper into the water with the addition of his weight. Taking the oars that lay in the bottom of the boat, The Prophet of Oria used one to hook the rope from the rock, pushing them away from the bank.
‘So, it was a long time ago?’ she prompted as he began to row them out into the water. To her left, she saw the road that made up the border crossing high above them. It was supported by a handful of natural pillars. A dozen archways were scattered along the underside of the road, allowing the sea and any boats to pass beneath.
‘When I was a young child, I started to have these vivid nightmares,’ he said. ‘In the nightmares, I would panic and try to defend myself. The horrors I saw were confined to my dreams, but the powers that I used to defend myself weren’t. It scared my parents greatly.’
‘It couldn’t have been that long ago. You’re what, fifty?’ she guessed.
He laughed quietly. ‘Try two hundred and fifty-seven.’
Clara’s jaw dropped in surprise. How could he possibly be two hundred and fifty-seven? He only looked a few years older than her mother had. ‘How?’ she asked once she had recovered from the shock.
‘I’ll get to that later,’ he assured her. ‘Anyway, the powers scared my parents. On a windy night, just after my eighth birthday, they carried me out into the desert while I slept. They went perhaps ten miles before they put me down on the sand, still fast asleep, and left me there.
‘When I woke in the morning, I was lying on the sand. All I could see in every direction was sand; the wind had moved the sand in the night to cover their tracks.’
‘What did you do?’
‘I wiped the sand from my eyes, got up, and started walking, he laughed. ' I walked all day, the sun beating down hard on my back. Just as the sun was beginning to set, I walked back into Oria. You can imagine the look on my parents faces when they opened the door to find me standing there, sweaty and covered in sand.
‘They let me back in and gave me a glass of water as if it had been some sort of test. Now that I look back on it, they probably didn’t know what else to do. So, life went back to the way it had been for a while, until the nightmares came again.’
‘Your parents left you in the desert again?’ Clara asked in disbelief. How could they just leave any child, let alone their own, alone in the middle of the desert?
‘Two more times they took me into the desert and left me there while I slept. Each time, they took me further into the desert, picking a different direction to try and throw me off. Both times I woke up, I just got up, turned in the direction of Oria, and began walking.’
‘The last time they took me so far into the desert that I nearly died from dehydration. An old alchemist who lived on the next street found me wandering around delirious. He took me home to my parents. That was when he saw the destruction that had been caused by the outburst from my last nightmare.’
‘He was the one who recognised your powers?’ Clara asked. They must be getting close to halfway now; she thought as she looked back at the shore they had set sail from.
The Prophet of Oria nodded as he continued to row. ‘My parents, being the simpletons they were, asked him to cure me. I’ll never forget the look on their faces when he laughed at them. He told them that my powers were not an affliction that could be treated with any medicine; they were a gift.’
‘He had come across one other person with powers similar to mine a long time ago. He told them there was a place hundreds of miles to the north, far beyond the desert and the sea. As far as they were concerned, the further I was away from their precious porcelain ornaments, the better. They paid the alchemist to take me to the place in the north, The Tower. It was there that I learned to control my powers.’
‘But I don’t understand; how can you be two hundred and fifty-seven and not look a day over fifty?’ she asked.
He smiled, as if he were about to crack a joke, but suddenly his face fell. ‘Take the oars,’ he said, throwing the handles to her as he scrambled to his feet, staring out over the dark waters.
With a lantern on the front, a boat five times the size of theirs floated out of the darkness. In the light of the moon, Clara recognised the emblem on the sail as the one the border guards had on their uniforms. Someone had spotted them rowing across the border.
‘Halt!’ someone shouted from the boat. ‘You don’t have the authorization to be in these waters!’
‘Row,’ The Prophet of Oria hissed as he watched the boat slowly getting closer.
Clara tried to replicate the strokes that The Prophet of Oria had been making, but the oars were heavy. For a moment, they began to move forward again before the boat started to spin in the water.
‘Just let go,’ he sighed, rotating a hand in the air.
To her surprise, the oars jumped out of her hands and began to row the boat in the right direction again. In awe, she sat and watched them as they gained speed with each stroke.
‘After them!’ a voice cried in the darkness, the larger ship turning towards them.
‘What do we do now?’ Clara asked hurriedly. The ship was closing in on them far quicker than the enchanted oars were able to move them.
‘You wanted to see what other powers I have?’ he asked.
Holding his hands out at his sides, The Prophet of Oria closed his eyes as he opened up his body. With a gentle exhale of air, Clara felt the temperature drop. It was so slow that she didn’t notice it at first. In the wake of the rowboat, the water began to freeze. As he lifted his hands, the ice began to spread faster, with huge chunks of ice jutting out of the water.
With an almighty crash that echoed through the still night, the ship that had been pursuing them crashed headlong into the ice. In the distance, she could hear someone swearing loudly.
The Prophet of Oria sat down again, taking the oars in his hands as he began to row once more as if nothing extraordinary had just happened. ‘Will they be okay?’ Clara asked as the ship disappeared into the darkness.
‘They’ll be fine,’ he assured her as he glanced up at the clear skies. ‘It’s going to be hot tomorrow; the ice will soon melt.’
At The Prophet of Oria’s lack of concern, Clara turned her back on the other ship, watching as land began to come into view. ‘I’ve never seen anything like that before.’
‘That’s nothing,’ he assured her. ‘The Great Precursors could freeze entire seas and move mountains. The most spectacular things you could ever imagine, they could do that and more.’
‘What happened to The Great Precursors?’
‘Almost all of them died in the war, and the few that didn’t, went into hiding,’ he said. ‘Arcadia, the city that you grew up looking down on, is what is left of The Great Precursors now.’
Clara fell silent. If the powers of The Great Precursors were anything like what The Prophet of Oria had described, then she found it hard to see a way in which they could have been defeated. Mulling over everything that he had told her, she watched as the beach drew ever closer. She had so many questions that she wanted to ask, but she sensed that he no longer wanted to talk.