The Stone of Valshar: Chapter Three

CHAPTER THREE

STAIRWAYS TO HEAVEN

It was already late at night and the moon was up at the sky. Drigesh gazed upon the moon and saw that it was not the usual pearly white; instead it showed the unfamiliar blood red glow. Now that the sign was clear, she had no reason not to tell Drylem about all the incidents that just happened. She sighed, knowing that it would not be easy.

Drigesh got up from the boulder and walked to the four people. They had left the warm hospitality of the kingdom of Mount Boræ and were sitting near the campfire. Everything looked so peculiar, even for the eye of the Whale. None of them should be here; none of them should put their toe in this dwelling of Aña.

“Tell me, sisters.” Wood Spirit suddenly spoke out, “where is your next destination?”

“We will be leaving for Quelfah’ra.” Drigesh made the answer simple.

“I surmise that such decision would be wise.” Said the Wood Spirit.

“Yes, and we would take a far more secure path to there.” All the others sat bewildered as they heard the acclamation made by Drigesh. They did not understand Drigesh as there was no more path that would lead them to Quelfah’ra safely. All the path might as well had been guarded by the foul creatures. “Take a rest now. The departing time is moments away.” She turned and said to Drylem and Enya.

The night had come and goes for nearly in instance. Drylem did not sleep well these days, as he feared that anyone would come and snatched Mir’Valshar away from him. The task of protecting the stone was crucial to him. The stone must not fall into the hand of the foe, or the consequences would be severe.

Drylem woke up to see that the moon was still up in the middle of the sky. It was odd, and that means danger ahead. The worst guess would be that the war of the stone had begun. He strolled to the side of Drigesh and asked her if it is true.

“The moon had stopped moving, and my greatest fear had come in view.” was the answer of Drigesh.

The dawn had past them and it was in great haste that they should leave this newly cursed land at once. They picked up all their belongings and put out the fire. They soon departed to a place where Drylem did not know where. The journey was worse than before. Even though their food was enough for them to survive for months, the path itself pained their feet as it covered with point edged rocks. Drylem and Enya’s feet were full of blisters and bruises when they had travelled until midday. Their condition was getting worse when they had to keep up their paces with the Spirits and Drigesh, who had no effect of weariness from the journey.

The route they took was steeper as they were more uphill. Enya could not accept anymore torture from the environment as she felt extreme pain from the wound she gained from the previous engagement.

“How long do we have to travel?” Enya spoke out.

“We are here.” Drigesh said.

The path ahead was hindered by thousands of trees which emerged from the solid rock, which was far from acceptable. From the knowledge of the Noturiaz, it was impossible to grow any plants from such a solid object. Drylem suddenly thought that there maybe some knowledge that the Spirits refused to teach them.

“This is impossible,” Wood Spirit was also amazed by the fact that such magic exist. “In the name of Aña that I swear I had never seen such a magic.”

“The ancient magic hid many secrets that we not know of,” Wind Spirit said.

“No, my siblings.” Drigesh explained. “It was only the simple magic of Durugah to conceal an ancient path. This is the safe path that I was foretold by my father. It will aid us in our journey.”

Drigesh went over the trees and began rummaging the trunks to look for a sign and she found a carving of Barith Ildar, the Edelweiss, on one of the trunks. The carving was so hard to be found as it was made with utmost precautions. It was hard to be seen with normal eyes. Certain magic would be needed to differentiate the carving from its environment.

A magic was performed in front of the carving. Drigesh used a flock of her hair to transform it to the shape of the carving with a stick emerged from it and formed a key. She pressed the key into the carving and it glowed the light of red. There was a mirror forming in front of the tree, with its frame carved with Barith Ildar, hanging in midair. Everyone was told to walk into the mirror.

They walked into the mirror and found themselves still in the middle of nowhere, and were companied by more boulders. But what is convincing was the mirror that they walked into was actually a part of the glass wall that stood imperially behind them. The glass wall extended at both sides to form a dome around the path they were about to explore. At the end of the road, Drylem could see something in the middle – the glass stairways.

The company of five follow the stairways, with its glass steps leading up to the sky, with Enya guarding the rear. After a long climb up the steps, she turned back. What she saw gave her a shock. The steps were falling pieces by pieces to the ground at the rear; the steps they were standing were bringing them higher up to the sky. Nonetheless, she climbed the stairways.

It was long before they knew that they had reached the end of the stairways, which led them to a glass plinth with no wall or anything to bar its edge, preventing them from falling down. Nevertheless the architecture was magnificent. If they had noticed before, they would see that the carvings of the stairways were alike to the plinth, which were the flower of Edelweiss.

Drylem went to the edge of the plinth and found out that they would die of shock instead of broken bones as he could only see the clouds was far beneath his feet. It was then that the whole plinth shook.

“The enemy is here.” said Drigesh. She quickly went to the centre and began the chanting. It was a beautiful song, but full of forlorn and fear. If one did not understand, they would think it was Drigesh’s feeling that made the song in such condition.

The whole stairways and the song are from the hands of the Di’en Rashna. It was foretold that they were good craftsmen of glassware. From houses to daily equipments, the Di’en Rashna were proud of their art work. When they knew that their land was no longer able to provide them with food, they began to gather all the glasses they could find and built up the stairways and the plinth. The whole architecture was built for them to run south toward the Kingdom of Hashboræ before they set their journey due east.

When the buildings were completed, the final touch of magic was needed to pull everything together. That was when the creature they feared suddenly awoke from its deep sleep and began to kill their people in sight. Most of their people died as they did not know of the awakening of the creature. Nimu’ah Pir, the eldest among their magician cast a protective shield around their land.

Now that we know the Di’en Rashna was in forlorn and fear, the song they written would surely affected by their feeling.

After the final words of chanting, there was a portal forming at the centre with a vivid stairs inside it. Before they went into the portal, Drigesh had warned them not to look back when they followed the path ahead.

They went into the portal and down the stairs. It was a long hallway when they reached the end of the stairs. The hallway was dark and lit with torches. It gave out the uneasiness to those who pass through, even though there was no ghostly or deformed figure inside it.

The hallway was shortly after reduced into a tight passage of brick wall, only wide enough to let one person through at a time. It was a long passage and, once in a while the scenery changed. The brick wall was finally covered with maroon coloured roses with their thorns protruding with full extent, threatening to scar their skin when they passed through.

The thorns of the roses began to shortening and their colour became lighter along their way, from maroon to red, and to pink, finally to white.

“Stop.” Drigesh ordered when the others at the rear had a glimpse of light from the front. At this, Enya had lost her fight to the curiosity that grew inside her and turned herself backward to see what Drigesh restrained them from looking at.

Her feet slipped and she fell. Luckily, Drylem was quick to catch her around the wrist, preventing her from falling down. Now that she saw that there was actually nothing on the floor of the passage, Enya had another worry in her mind. She could no longer touch the floor, even though it was the floor that Drylem was standing on.

As she was dangling, Enya was exposing herself to the environment outside the passage, and she saw mountains covered with snow. There was another concern ahead when she saw the blue raven, ten times larger than the size of an ordinary eagle, swung backward and flew toward Enya. It shot out a blue light from its mouth, but slightly missed Enya.

“Quick! Pull her up.” Wood Spirit said. Drylem is a strong Noturiaz. He need only to have a swift pull and Enya was in the passage again. Hence Drylem had no choice but to carry her on his back as she was unable to touch the floor.

The brick wall could no longer be seen when they stepped out to greet the sunlight. The whole passage was made of glass, allowing full sunlight to shine through it. The blue raven was still flying around the area, searching for some secret hiding place. There was once that they thought it saw through the glass and flew towards them, but they realize that the glass passage was full with magic of concealment, hiding them from the outside world.

The blue raven flew away eventually, leaving its despair behind. It would report this to its master, Drylem thought. He did not notice that they had come to the end of the passage when he had his mind on the blue raven.

There were yet another few staircases for them to climb. When they reached the top, the portal suddenly appeared from nowhere, allowing them to pass through. The platform spread out widely in a circle as Drigesh stepped out on the only glass in view a moment ago. When everyone was out from the portal, the platform began descending in slow pace.

It was unpleasant scenery when they finally reached the bottom. All the surroundings were full of stones and sand, no living thing was able to live in such condition. Now that they had reached the border of Quelfah’ra, the only route for them is to go to Idapunh, the Tower of Gems.