The Search for the Red Dragon - James A. Owen [115]
“That’s why he could never enter the cave. In Plato’s cave, all shadows are cast by real things. But a shadow cannot cast itself. He couldn’t enter the cave without revealing who he really was.”
“Oh no!” John exclaimed. “Look!”
While Peter and the companions had been occupied with Mordred’s shadow, Burton and the Croatoans had quietly commandeered and lifted off in the Indigo Dragon.
“Farewell, Caretakers,” Burton called out from the aft deck. “And—thank you.”
“Well, I’ll be damned,” said Bert. “That’s almost as surprising as Mordred.”
“I’m sorry,” said Charles. “One of us should have been watching her.”
“It’s all right,” Bert reassured him. “Burton won’t damage her. He knows her value. And besides, we have all the other Dragonships now.
“For the first time since they were created, all of them are together. And all the children have been saved. All in all, I don’t think we could have asked for a better ending to this adventure.”
“Maybe you spoke too soon,” said John, pointing over the beach. The Time Storm had continued to boil, and one more patch of air was shimmering. Something was coming through.
“Father!” cried William the Pig. “It’s father!”
“Christ above,” said John. “I think that’s Jason.”
From the portal of Time, a group of weary-looking wanderers dressed in ancient Greek attire walked slowly across the sand.
The leader wore a haggard expression, and his face was deeply creased, more with living than with age.
They approached the companions, ignoring the throngs of children who were watching their passage.
“We seek two boys,” Jason said to John. “My sons. Have you seen them?”
“Father, please,” said William the Pig. “We are here! We are right here in front of you!”
Hugh the Iron began to sob. “Will…it’s no use. I—I don’t think he knows we’re here.”
The shade of Jason made no indication that he heard or saw his sons, but merely turned away from John and stared out across the waters, his face racked with sadness and loss.
“He can’t see them!” John said softly. “He can’t see them at all!”
The ghostly procession passed around them, even through them; a parade of spirit that hardly acknowledged them, if indeed they even knew anyone was there.
William and Hugh fell to the sand in sorrow and grief. And after a few more moments, Jason and the others who followed him walked past the companions and vanished back into Time, still searching for Jason’s lost sons.
“This is what Dante was warning mankind of in his writings,” mused Bert. “He said that the hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who in time of great moral crises maintain their neutrality. I think what we just witnessed happening with Jason is precisely that.”
“Remember Milton’s caution also,” Charles whispered. “‘The mind is its own place, and in itself, can make a heaven of Hell, and a hell of Heaven.’”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Second Star to the Right
It was an organizational nightmare, but within a day, the companions were able to get all the children aboard the seven Dragonships for the journey home. They had planned to go directly to Haven, but William and Hugh made a curious request, which Peter and the Caretakers chose to grant. And so their first stop was Aiaia.
They moored all the ships and accompanied William and Hugh to the labyrinth, where John explained to Asterius that the brothers had requested to live there with him in the Abbey of the Rose.
For his part, the odd creature protested mightily, but the broad smile on his face told them that he was very pleased to accommodate their request.
“They didn’t want to come back to Haven,” Peter explained to the companions. “They felt they were deformed. I tried to convince them otherwise, but they wished for this—and actually, they may find their calling here.”
“Find a good place for it, won’t you?”
“Interesting children you’ve chosen to succeed you, Herb,” Peter said when they returned to the ships. “Especially that one, John.”
“He has the talent to make connections where none are evident, Peter,” said Bert. “He has the rarest of abilities—to retain