On Fire's Wings - Christie Golden [120]
“Earth, Air, Water…and Spirit,” she said. As she spoke the words, images of each element began to appear in the water. They whirled about the flame, twisting, leaping, chasing each other in a wild—
“Dance,” she whispered. “We are the Dancers. We’re the Guardians.” She sat down hard on the ground, unable to stand any longer even in this fantastical place that she knew existed only in her mind. “Twice won, twice lost…this is our last chance.”
“It is the last chance for everyone,” came a voice that sheknew beside her, a voice she had thought she would never hear again. Uttering a soft cry, she turned to behold Jashemi sitting in the Dragon’s place. His eyes shone and his full lips were parted in a smile.
A wave of joy and gratitude washed over her. “You’ve been with me, too,” she said thickly. “Haven’t you?”
He nodded. “Every time. The last time…I was too late.” Sorrow furrowed his brow, and Kevla had a dim, fear-laced memory of a man attacking from the shadows. “I am your Lorekeeper. My task, and that of the others—and Kevla, there are many of us—is to seek you out and give you back your memories.”
“Your dreams,” Kevla said. “They weren’t dreams, or even visions—they were memories!”
He nodded. “Memories of all the times before. Memories only the Lorekeepers had. We find the Dancers, help them discover—”
“Who they are,” Kevla said, her voice breaking. My love, you are Fire! “You died so that I could know who I was…what I was born to do.”
He reached to touch her cheek and she closed her eyes, trembling at the contact.
“I gladly died, this time and before this time, for you. For this world. Do you remember what is at stake, Kevla, my lover, my sister, my friend, my soul?”
She reached for the knowledge, and it appeared:
“Everything,” she whispered.
“Everything,” he confirmed. “I do not understand it all yet myself, but I know this: Our world, and the other four that have come before, are not real. They were created, crafted, as a potter crafts a pitcher. Civilizations appear, whole and complete. Some know about the Dancers and their task; others, like Arukan, are utterlyignorant. After each world has existed for five thousand years, the Dancers are born, and each world faces a crisis. If the Dancers can unite and use their powers to defeat this evil, their world is permitted to continue. If not, then it is—”
“Gone,” Kevla finished softly, tearing her gaze away from her Lorekeeper’s face to look upon the water again. Its surface was now cloudy and gray, and fear closed her throat.
She knew she beheld the Shadow, the dreadful agent of destruction that would slowly cover every facet of her world and simply erase it as if it had never been.
“I have seen the Shadow,” the Lorekeeper said. He now looked to her like a little boy in poor clothes, his eyes preternaturally wise, his face smudged and dirty. “You have seen it too. If you fail, all will be lost—not just this world, but all the others that have won a temporary victory against obliteration.”
Kevla’s gaze was still locked on the Shadow in the water. She sagged. The responsibility was too much. All those worlds, all those people, and everything she knew in this world were in jeopardy.
“I can’t do it,” she whispered.
“Yes, you can,” the Lorekeeper insisted. His voice sounded different, and when she looked at him, the being who had been born as Jashemi looked like a woman her own age, with short brown hair and green eyes.
“You know who you are. You are more powerful even than you can understand right now. You have remembered your Companion, and soon you will join with the other Dancers. You were never meant to be alone, Flame Dancer. You were always meant to have allies. Find them.”
Kevla was confused and suddenly angry. She stared at theLorekeeper, not wanting to see what this entity had been to her in the past, wanting to see Jashemi, whom she loved desperately. The Lorekeeper’s face changed yet again, into the visage of an old man with a grizzled beard.
“I want you back, Jashemi!