Zeus 25 - Praxis

17 - A path alone

The House of Sea and Stars had not changed, but the pop of their arrival sent a blast of SsKar air through the blue silk banners that hung from the ceiling. There was now a blue Homing Orb in the black cup, just as if they had never used the Star Portal at all.

"We must go back for Spyro," Eudora said, loosening her bow and selecting an arrow. "If I have my bow drawn and an arrow notched and ready, perhaps I can catch HaziKan before he zaps us."

"No," Praxis said. "Spyro is where he needs to be. He'll have plenty of time to learn the things we couldn't study while we were there. It's better this way."

"Better for Spyro, or better for you?"

"Better for Atlantis. He'll learn about science."

"If he survives a day in that awful place."

"So what the SsKar-people accomplished meant nothing to you?"

"What? You're telling me you admire them?"

"They're accomplishments are real, not like this myth," Praxis said, grasping the peach pit on the iron chain around Eudora's neck.

She jerked back away from him at same moment, and the peach-pit pendant separated from the chain. After escaping Praxis's grasp, it flew against the wall of the next level of the room and cracked, sliding across another of the black circles and hitting a wall.

When Eudora went up a section of stairs to retrieve it, she saw the two halves of the broken pit that had concealed a blue Homing Orb. The Orb must have been inside the peach pit the whole time she'd worn it, and the magnetos that held The Orb to the iron necklace had kept it from unwrapping when the Word of Law was used.

Now it was free, but where did this Homing Orb lead? To yet another world? Or to AvoDar in Shambhala?

"No!" Praxis yelled as Eudora picked up the Orb and moved to the center of the black circle.

"Now you believe this Orb will lead somewhere when, a moment ago, you thought these necklaces where a myth?" She began the Word of Law. He raced to the stairs, but the blue sphere surrounded Eudora before he could even climb them.

Then Eudora was gone in a pop of imploding air.

The blue banners swirled as the eddies in the air quieted, and Praxis stared at the empty room. It was shocking being suddenly alone. He had grown used to the company of Eudora and Spyro, but there was nothing to be done. He was not going back to ssKar unless he could do so as Zeus 25, and if Eudora had just gone somewhere, maybe to Shambhala, there was nothing he could do about that either.

Hopefully, the story she'd tell AvoDar would wake him up to Gaia's danger and cause him to act. Praxis sank to the floor and just stared at the waving blue panels for what seemed like hours. He thought about how almost everything Izador had told him had turned out to be true. Why do I doubt everything I haven't seen? Maybe it's because all the seamen's stories I've ever heard have turned out to be lies.

But I won't end up SaTaan's puppet, he thought. Why couldn't Eudora see that? He'd only been with her a week, but sleeping with her on the Flea kept popping into his mind now that she was gone, yet he couldn't keep sitting around daydreaming.

Ultimately, Praxis shouldered his remaining satchel and worked his way back to the main lobby of the House of Sea and Stars. He checked several of the side corridors and the rooms that branched off them on his way out, but found nothing interesting for his trouble. In the the magnificent lobby, he realized the statue of the lizard fighting Poseidon looked remarkably like one of the ssKar-people. When he cracked the giant door that led outside onto the high meadows of Delos, he was surprised to find it was early morning. He'd lost all track of day and night on ssKar.