Jukepop Serial, Gathering of the Gifts

Prologue: Beacon of Light

Adrianna watched her daring captain lead a gallant charge across the frozen white plains of Endeleas. Two hundred temporal knights raced alongside his regal mount—hooves tossing up a thousand glittering specks of snow and ice. He grasped the looped hilt of his long sword; the blade stood out, a radiant streak of light from polished crystal reflecting off the distant sun. The glow emanating from the righteousness of his cause only strengthened it, and the coalescing of lights served to illuminate him in his gold plate.

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Struggling to hold back a swell of emotions, Illidan kept his gaze and his thoughts before him. He thought of the history and the culture he was riding toward—how, after they had finished each other, it had all but been erased in a single sweep of the enemy. He would not let hatred break his composure, put false meaning to all he had learned or lay shame onto his people. With the time he had left, he vowed he would put his last energies into making his lineage proud.

“For Ither Timeholder!” Illidan shouted the name of his fallen king.

“For Ither Timeholder!” his fellows shouted back.

“For the cross!” Illidan shouted. From what he had read, the glow from the brand of a temporal knight looked much like the aura that from within godly hands bestowed such a gift.

His fellows gave a resounding cry, threatening to overtake him.

Illidan knew every member of his company, the brothers and sisters they were to him. He could say, without fear, they would never succumb like others of their kind and allow darkness into their hearts. They would rather fall, never to rise, than dishonor that which gave them life and made them spend blood and sweat to become the knights they were.

Illidan’s vision shifted, becoming like a moving tunnel before him, although he felt a piece of himself being left behind. Moments later, an eagle’s screech soared up and simultaneously, a thunderous rip spread outwards through the sky. To the south, behind Illidan and his men, the White Mountains flashed to the forefront of his eyes. Already fading to the deepest gleam, they stretched farther than Illidan’s eagle eyes could see.

At the center of these mountains, winding through the heart of a single peak, loomed a mountain pass. At the top of this pass, the eagle saw Adrianna herself and the last of their people, dressed in tattered rags and carrying with them what little they had left, wearily descending to the other side of the mountains.

A cairn of stones stood at the top of the pass, but Illidan kept his thoughts of his fallen king at a distance. A spell of eagle eye could only perceive through keen eagle eyes.

Twelve knights stood pointing their swords in Illidan’s direction. Their silver tips began to glow and absorb the mystical ambience of that cold winter day.

The eagle’s sight blended into the background. Illidan rode forward, atop his brilliant white mount.

The combined lights reached out and encompassed Illidan. On any other day, they would have momentarily blinded him, but on this day he felt only their warmth and the swelling of hope for his people. Although his life and the lives of his men would end this day, their people would survive. One day they would rebuild their paradise city and make Illidan proud.

His orders, issued by Ither’s son at the bottom of the mountain pass, were simply to delay the enemy vanguard long enough for his people to escape and the last of his kind to lock their swords. He pictured the look Adrianna had given him when she first saw him, though he knew he would have been meant for another.

With no other choice before him, he bent his will on the dark cloud that was fast approaching. Only a short ride away, behind it, a much larger and darker cloud tried to blot his kingdom from view.

The conjured eagle was translucent, emerald-green with amber eyes. It saw behind the enemy host and perceived the vast, limitless ruins of Illidan’s paradise city and its intricate pattern of castles, towers, halls, mansions and arks. His end at the near, the veil separating possibilities at its thinnest, Illidan’s memories awoke. His sights bore past the bounds of endlessness, worlds woven together and folded in on each other. He perceived the frozen shores of the Endless Sea lying in sight of spellbound typhoons. Liquid jewels, they held the lineages to their kingdom and him to this fate.

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