Twelve Realms

Chapter 4

Lucia

"What I'm about to show you is something older than life itself. Only a very small number of people in the history of the Twelve Realms have ever seen this."

I follow High Priestess Sanca as she leads me down a dark, spiraling staircase. We've been walking for at least five minutes and I can still see no end. To be fair, I can't really see anything at all. The only light is coming from the torch High Priestess Sanca is holding, which is rather dim. 

"What is this place?" I ask.

"This is the most ancient and sacred place in all of the Twelve Realms. Only High Priestesses of the Temple of the Winter River are allowed here."

We walk for a few more minutes before running into a wall of practically solid stone. It's so cold down here I can see my breath form clouds in the air before me. High Priestess Sanca removes a small glass jar from her pocket and hands me her torch. By its faint light I watch her dip a thumb into the jar and pull it back covered in a pale bluish paste. 

On one of the flat, smooth stones of the wall she paints a rune unfamiliar to me and murmurs an incantation I don't know. The rune glows a whitish blue and the stones of the wall begin to shiver. 

And then they fall noiselessly, gracefully downward, not unlike a small waterfall. The space they have revealed is completely dark, and I'm hesitant to enter, but High Priestess Sanca takes the torch from my hands, gives me an encouraging smile, and steps carefully over the threshold. So, making sure to watch my step, I follow her. 

The light of the torch illuminates nothing but the floor- the room must be massive- but High Priestess Sanca seems to know where she's going. 

The first thing I notice is the smell of water. I can feel a gentle mist on my face, but I can't hear any running water. The only thing I can hear is the sound of our feet against the floor. 

The floor is a different texture than I had anticipated- instead of the smooth stone of a cavern, I walk across cobbled stone bricks. 

We walk until we reach what looks almost like a table- a large, circular table made of stone- jutting up from the now smooth floor of the cave. 

High Priestess Sanca once more dips her finger into the blue paste and, leaning over to reach the center of the table, paints a wide circle. Inside the circle she continues to paint figures. This time, it seems less like single runes and more like a message written in characters I do not understand. 

She holds the torch out in front of her, above what she has just painted, and lets it fall. 

It extinguishes upon hitting the table, and at the same time that happens, a gust of wind blows from the spot where it landed, a circular blow, illuminating the runes on the table and what I now see to be the source of the water smell, the giant river surrounding the island of stone on which we now stand. 

The unmoving water glows a soft blue so pale it's almost white. I turn to take in my surroundings, and find where the mist is coming from. 

A giant waterfall thunders silently down into the waters around the stone island, directly behind the table bearing the runes. The water is so thick and frothy that I cannot see what lies behind it. 

"This is the cavern of the goddesses," High Priestess Sanca says. "Every High Priestess comes here at the beginning of her apprenticeship to solidify her connection with her patron goddess. I came here in my third segment to bond with mine, the goddess Atria. Now, it is your turn."

I shiver in anticipation. "What do I do?" 

High Priestess Sanca paints a line of clay down my forehead, the bridge of my nose, all the way to my chin. Beneath each eye she paints an oblong dot, and on my forehead she crosses the vertical line with one going across. 

"Step into the waterfall," she says. "Your patron goddess will reach out to you. You will know what to do." 

I approach the waterfall, heart pounding. I look back at High Priestess Sanca one last time. She nods at me, and smiles.

"Do not be afraid," she tells me. "She will take care of you." 

I take a deep breath and take a step, into the waterfall. 

I do not see the water surrounding me, and I don't feel the wetness. 

I'm standing on a flat expanse of ice. Everything is white. As far as the eye can see, a thick, smothering whiteness. I look around, seeing nothing, hearing nothing, smelling nothing, but feeling a presence. A friendly presence. I am not afraid.

A wind comes from behind me and knocks me off my feet. I fall backwards, but am caught by a wave of warm, gentle water, rising up to catch me. I've never felt warm water before. Not on this large of a scale. 

The water swirls around me, encasing me in a gentle embrace. Gently, it lifts me up higher, higher into the sky, towards the clouds. The clouds are just air, air and water, but they catch me. They dip to hold my weight, supporting me, comforting me, dipping low to skim my outstretched fingertips. 

Then the clouds part, and I am falling, falling through the air, into a thicket of flames. But the flames are not the scorching heat I know. They are a soft warmth, a relaxing heat that fills my chest, warms fingertips that are chronically numbed from the cold of the Realm of Eternal Winter. The flames are playful, and carefully toss me around. 

The flames part, and I'm standing in a place I've only heard of in stories.

A field, full of not ice, not snow, but grass. Beautiful, green, sweet smelling grass, gently swaying in the breeze. The warm breeze. Trees, not icy, not barren, but full of lush leaves. 

I turn, and standing behind me is Dea. Tall, pale hair, blue eyes. An icy appearance, yet a warm smile. 

She cups my cheek in one hand, takes mine in the other.

"Are you prepared to do this?" she asks me. 

I nod. 

She takes my right hand and pushes back my sleeve. She presses two fingers to my exposed wrist and suddenly a rush of images flashes through my mind. I see memories I never experienced, places I have never been, people I have never met. I understand things I have never studied, know how to do things I never learned. The memories are bright, full, mingling with the old ones I earned.

Then the memories fade into the back of my mind, the light behind my eyelids fade, and I'm standing under a rushing, silent waterfall with a significant warmth in my right wrist.

I look down and see a mark tattooed there. I know instantly that it isn't some ordinary tattoo- this is the mark of Dea. This is special. I am special. 

And my journey is just about to begin.