Chapter 15: The Mountain's Wrath

Miko:

Miko brought his hood to the side to block the wind, “The air swells in the middle. It will be strongest there.”

He was right, it wasn’t quite a pit because the field was primarily flat, but water would no doubt pull to the center with the angle and fall into cracks that lead to the caverns below. The sharp winds were slowly cutting into this mountaintop. That explains why the rocks are so smooth and spherical; they’ve been carved away by time and this monstrous storm. The ground was flat, but that wasn’t the odd thing. Five pillars rose out of the ground like the dots on playing dice. They were each separated a hundred feet apart, the center one being at the heart of the storm. Turning my head, I spoke closer to Miko’s ear, “I’ll try going around.” He nodded in approval of the choice, so I stuck to the rigid outer wall. This whole peak was circular, so sticking to the outside where the winds weren’t as harsh was safer than heading towards the center point. Our fields back home were as large as this mountain’s flat peak; at least those were covered with soft grass and weeds instead of rough snow-covered ground. After getting halfway to the other side, the dark maw of the storm flashed with lightning, filling the sky with bright searing fire that cracked like a whip. Every part of my body recoiled in a jolt of fear from the sound; thunder soon followed and stung my piercing ears. Falling backward, I recovered just long enough to let my side crash instead of piling my weight on top of Miko. Ears ringing, and in a daze, my back and arm took the brunt of the damage from the short fall. My screams could not have been heard by anyone other than Miko, who was gripping the skin of my shoulders tightly as he attempted to fight the pain that clashed with our eardrums. My palm found the cold mountain ground and pushed up halfway as Miko clung to my back. I stood tall, dazed from the lightning strike, as my body screamed at me to give up as it writhed in pain that I sought to ignore.

Across the field from where we entered was a tall gate made from the same material as the pillars: black and white stone with silvery metal. These pillars and the gate reminded me of the architecture in the temple back in Quavoris; so did the fiery death trap, now that I think about it, but the sweat in my eyes and eager beast prevented me from ever getting a good look at anything else. My head pounded from the pressure of fighting my body’s pleas, but I continued to the tall, shiny metal gate. It was at least twenty feet tall, connecting with the height of the mountain’s barrier wall. Drawing closer, I turned my back to the storm and gripped the gate, hoping it would open up. My body convulsed, shaking from the shock of touching the metal.

“Maleki!” Miko yelled through a wounded breath. “The metal absorbed the lightning strike…We have to find another way.”

Headache was an unfair word. I leaned over myself with my palms gripping my knees from the electrocution. Finding my breath, I looked inward at the pillars. They were made of the same metal, but near the middle of each tall pillar was a black sphere with four symbols.

“These pylons — the gate — spheres — runes.” Miko attempted to explain, but the winds splintered directly at our faces, preventing the words from forming into a fully coherent sentence. Fortunately, I could translate the gist of it, having spoken ‘Miko’ as a second language for a long time. We need to get out of here and soon; if this storm gets any worse, we might get charred by lightning. The barrier wall was smooth like the rock of a waterfall, so I couldn’t climb it and bypass the gate. We have to figure out this trial without any shortcuts, it seems. Miko seems to think the spheres are the answer, but that means I have to get closer to the eye of the funnel. I still hadn’t shaken off the shock, nor had the pain left my ears or spine, but the sooner I could set Miko down, the better. Every ten steps, the wind speeds seemed to increase. Slight changes, but the increments added up, and by the time we were near the closest pylon, I had to step strategically and position all my weight forward just to stay upright. Using my scythe as a walking stick, I dug the butt of it into the ground and pulled myself forward. These last ten steps would be difficult to cross, so I needed every tool to my advantage. When I carried Miko, I wore my pack in reverse, which allowed the wind to divert along the sides and pass through my arms. Our packs weren’t particularly heavy, but wearing them like this allowed me to lean forward and counterbalance some of Miko’s added weight while the curve of my spine did the rest.

I fell to my knees in front of the pylon and allowed Miko to inspect the sphere more closely. The black globe sat on a pedestal within the pillar but was misshapen so that it could not be forced or blown out of its containing metal structure.

Miko found my ear and cupped his right hand to block the fast winds, which would ordinarily have worked had my ears not been crackling from the thunder and lightning. That feeling still hadn’t left my body, isolating near my chest — the shock from the fear of the sound and the shocking tendrils of the electric jolt when I touched the metal. “Spin — sphere — hold tight.” He explained, which I heard in pieces. Miko slid off my back as he released his crossed legs from around the top of my waist.

Preparing myself, I knew what to do. No reason to fear what must be done. I grabbed the black circle with both hands as the electricity entered through my fingers and spread out quickly through my arms and remaining limbs, shaking my entire body forcefully. The seconds seemed longer, and I found my strength, turning the sphere so that a new rune faced us. Nothing changed, not even the wind.

Miko grabbed my arm as two beads of sweat slid down both sides of my forehead. My eyes were stuck forward as my body refused to move. His grip tightened, shaking me more un-naturally than the metal did and waking me from my stupor. I looked over to my brother, who was digging in one of his pockets. Miko pulled out a compass, the one I had given to him when he was suffering from his first episode of blindness. His pointer finger found one of the four cardinal directions as he faced it toward me. Then he placed it on his side, now having my full recovered attention. Pointing it from side to side, the arrow found north; Miko pointed towards the directions as well to be sure I understood. I did. The first rune that was already there was wrong, and so was the second since nothing changed within the towing spire of metal and white stone. We had one guess left before the last one would be correct by default. Again, I summoned whatever remaining power was left in me that wasn’t sapped from the previous turning of the sphere and brought my hands out in front of me. Tiny snakes of lightning sparks connected to my hands off the black sphere, binding my hands and the metal together like magnets. Bright lights filled my eyes and clouded my vision, but I focused on the bones in my fingers, imagining the combined force being enough to crush the sphere. The pylon fought back with a creak, but it was already done; the sphere had turned. The rune in the middle lit up a soft blue, the colour of the lightning that crackled earlier in the sky, and then then the pillar thumped a wave of energy that shook across the ground. Though I was more dazed than before, my eyes found Miko’s, containing excitement from the successful turn.

Now that we know one correct direction, the remaining ones should be easy. I collected myself and then Miko. His weight seemed heavier than ever after two shocks, but I burdened it nonetheless. The bottom of my scythe’s shaft found a crack in the ground, supporting my body as it gained composure. The storm raged above us, twirling in an even more violent fashion. Droplets of water prodded my skin as my scythe dug into the ground to allow a step forward. We made it half the distance to the next pillar as a drizzle turned to rain, soaking us at the top of his chilly mountaintop. Suddenly, the tempest roared, and a downpour of winds collided with my shoulders, forcing me to one knee, only held up by the tight grip on my weapon.

Miko grunted underneath the strong force, “Microburst.”

Digging my fingers into the cracked rock, I pulled my left side down and swung the blade of my scythe into the ground in front of me. Then I brought both hands to the weapon’s shaft and started dragging us forward like a game of tug of war with the wind itself. The winds cut at my arms, pulling my sleeves back to my shoulders. Thin scratches flicked open at my skin as small pieces of rock were flung at me at high speeds. Miko tucked his neck, but I continued forward to the next pillar. We reached it, falling to the floor and holding on to the chalky white stone for dear life. Bringing myself to my knees, I reached a deep squat and gripped the electrified sphere again, picking it up out of its bind and twisting it so the rune would face west. My head peered to the sky, feeling the tremble of the ground and watching the storm as its black core expanded. Three shocks had worn my body, and now the sky seemed to shift sideways. No, that’s not right. I was falling. My body collapsed, and my eyes crossed back and forth as they focused on the field in front of me. The remaining two exterior pillars were in my view, and I could barely make it out, but the pillar facing the east had blue-lit runes. That meant we only had the north one remaining, but I couldn’t even raise the top of my hands off the ground.

Miko said something aloud, but the void above us thumped with energy after the second sphere’s adjustment, and all I heard was, “Stay — be back.”

“No!” My screams were lost in the torrent of winds. He can’t even move his legs; he’ll be swept away. My brother sat his pack in his lap and dug through it, pulling out his gift from Grandpa, the twin discs. Without hesitation, he wielded one in each hand and crawled towards the northern pylon. I have to get up and help him, but my body is betraying me. Warm air caressed my skin, replacing the frigid temps that I had felt before. It was like jumping into a hot spring after a cold bath. Miko pulled himself every step of the way using just his arms. As I watched his slow crawl, the warmth on my skin turned to an itch. The air here was thin, but instead of the ice-cold air in my lungs, there instead was an uncomfortable heat. Pressure from the atmosphere collided with the warm air and shot it downwards toward us.

Those discs cut through the ground as efficiently as my scythe did and got him all the way to the next stone-metal pillar. He couldn’t stand, but he dragged himself up the base of the stone until he was half upright. Like a tight hug that squeezes the air out of your lungs, Miko grabbed ahold of the black sphere with all his might. He had no legs to brace himself nor the strength I had procured from our differing specialties, but he held tightly to the object. What I could do in seconds took him far longer since he was unaccustomed to the effort. His weaker body shook violently as he poured every ounce of effort into his squeeze. Finally, after fifteen long seconds, he endured the hold and positioned the sphere in the correct direction. He fell to the ground, his palms bearing the force of the fall as his arms trembled from the electrostatic shock.

In anger, I managed to flip my wrists over and claw up the wet snow. My body was weak; my senses were dull from the multiple attacks of static convulsion. Miko looked as bad as I did, but he was younger, smaller, and weakened by his curse. This wasn’t his job. I was supposed to protect him, but I’ve put him in danger. Miko’s words from earlier echoed in my head, ‘Let me help you when I can.’ Could I escape this need to protect him and let him endure weight of his own? No, that’s not who I was. It’s not what our father tasked me with. “Be strong in his stead. You must be the man I am not.” He had told me. What was I supposed to do with those words? They didn’t change anything; I had already embodied those things before they ever abandoned us.

Now, a hundred steps away, my brother struggled to find consciousness. As the sky cooked us from above, a chill of cold air stroked accessed my pant leg, twitching the muscles in my calves. That was the last calm heartbeat before the dark funnel consumed the remaining light gray clouds. The hair on my arms stood unnaturally, and a taste like metal grew strong under my tongue. A crack of lightning whipped towards the ground before my eyes could even track the motion, colliding with the middle pylon. Had I been of sound mind, that strike would have sent me reeling backward, holding on to my ears for dear life, but my hearing had not fully recovered from the last strike. Heartbeats seemed to quicken in my chest as I lay there frightened. The metal had distracted the lightning from the rest of the peak, keeping Miko and me safe. Another breeze of cold wind pulled through, and I felt simultaneous sensations of hot and cold. No — I didn’t have to read from a book to know what was coming next.

We grew up on flat fields safe from most of the large storms, but we were familiar with dangerous clouds and their children, tornadoes. Dark finger-like clouds disconnected from the maw, forming into sharp points that spun at impossible speeds. Five of the dark clouded tornadoes touched down all around the field of stone. The pressure from the winds in the sky lessened as they focused into these shadowy tendrils, and my body regained movement, allowing me to push up off my palms and hold myself up on my knees. Miko was still struggling, but these tornados would close in on us soon enough. I must get to the final pylon in the middle and open the gate. Since the wind speeds condensed into the twirling figures around us, the areas away from them were safe, and there was nothing touched down in the middle. This was my chance. I need to move now and quickly. Although these tornadoes were small, they were still fast enough to pick up a human and send them hurtling towards the stone floor, or worse, into or over the barrier wall.

My feet found their footing, and my grip tightened around my scythe. Looking more like Miko on a good day, I limped as quickly as my body would allow.

One hundred steps…please let me get there, I pleaded in my head. Short pants of breath left me as I forfeited the conserves of air in my body to reach my goal quickly.

Sixty steps, let the sky ignore me, I begged. At forty steps, the winds raged, rocking the ground underneath me until I lost my footing.

Just give me forty more steps, I begged. My scythe dug into the ground as a shadow cast over from above. The tornado was at my last pylon and sweeping pebbles into the air like arrows. They slid against my skin like the talons of a small bird. I kept moving, digging my scythe’s curved blade into the ground to stay standing.

Ten feet, my screams were lost in the storm. I stepped forward, and the shiny pylon was only a few steps away — then the world tilted. Crashing against me, a stone the size of my palm was sent flying, accelerated by the tornado. The piece of rock hit directly into the middle two gashes in my back that I had retrieved from the Aeternae, sending me to my stomach and knocking out the remaining breath in my lungs. If that didn’t break one of my ribs, it definitely bruised a few. My eyes drifted into the blackness. No. I’m so close.

Fight through the pain; don’t let the dread overwhelm you, I pleaded to myself. I sunk into my mind further into the void as a cool sensation flowed down my back. It was not the wind; my wounds had been reopened, and the cuts were bleeding again. In that darkness, my father’s words coasted like a breeze into my dazed mind. ‘You must be the man I am not.’ His hand reached into that dark void I was trapped in and found my shoulder. His eyes were blacker than the void. How is that possible? Was this a memory, or was I imagining it? Father’s voice was stern but calm, “Both of you shall be better than I ever was.” His fingers rubbed his temple, shading a face that wore its failures. “Be strong together.” His frame and arm dissipated into shadows, and a light opened through the void. As my eyelids flickered, my senses returned with renewed vigor. My fingernails took in the dirt as I clawed to my feet, pulling myself forward and gripping the bottom lip of the pillar.

I stared at the black cube, analyzing it. This one was different; it did not turn. Instead, it looked like it needed to be pushed down to activate. Tiny blips of lightning snickered through the air around the cube, cracking like the wood in a hearth. Lightning had recently struck this tower, so the metal was charged. In my condition, this would be impossible — this or death. My decision was made, and my palms found the top edge of the cube. This was too much, far more than the spheres. I held through and angled my shoulders above the object. My own strength was not enough, and the electricity flowing through me felt like it was burning my skin and boiling my blood. Then, he appeared.

An arm extended above the opening in the pillar, and a single palm slammed into the rune that sat at the top of the cube. Miko had crawled all this way. He must have started moving when the stone knocked me out. The cube connected the stored lightning to his body, and I could feel the effects lessen on my body. With two people, the energy transfer was shared. My forearms pulsed, and the bones in my hands clutched the cube with invigorated passion. The scream I let out was guttural, like that of the beast we faced, but it gave me power in a way I had never felt. With enough provided force, the five-sided shape dipped below and clicked into the base of the stone. A circular rune lit up blue, and my body collapsed. After a few moments, the wind calmed, and the storm above fled in all directions. We had surpassed another trial.