“Are you…” she faltered verbally. “Are you Kaltara?”
“To the Sakovans I am known as Kaltara,” the voice answered. “Why do you doubt me, Lyra?”
Lyra’s mind raced with the question. Why shouldn’t she doubt Him? She had not been brought up to believe in Kaltara. She hadn’t even known he existed before coming to the Sakova. How was she supposed to answer the question?
“You were brought up to believe in yourself,” interrupted the voice, “but you do not believe in yourself either. What must I do to make you believe in both of us?”
Lyra tried to shake her head in confusion, but it wouldn’t move. How can God prove that he is God? Perform some magical feat? That would prove nothing but a skill in magic. Do something that cannot be done? No, then she would think she was mistaken about whether the task could have been done or not. Is there something about the Sakovan people that Kaltara would know that no other would?
Suddenly the room was bathed in bright light and it started spinning. It spun faster and faster and colors flashed past her and sang to her. Each color had its own song and they mingled together harmonically like different musical instruments mixing their own song to create a beautiful symphony. Lyra felt light and happy and she smiled.
Suddenly, the colors shifted and took form and she watched in amazement as the forms grew into people and places. They were primitive people and they slept in the open. They fished along the coast. They had children and the children played.
The images started changing rapidly and her mind struggled to comprehend what she was seeing. The people grew in number and made structures, crude lean-tos that changed into wooden huts and then mud-brick homes. The people appeared in clothing instead of the scraps of hide they had been wearing. Still faster the images whirled and she struggled to absorb it all, but is was spinning too quickly.
There were struggles between people and cities appeared. Thousands of people flashed by and farms sprung up instantly yet looked as if they were old and had been weathered for a long time. She saw a man lying on a bed with a dagger through his heart and thunder peeled loudly. A flash of brilliant lightning shot down and the earth peeled away from where it struck like the parting of skin from a deep slicing blade. A lone man materialized carrying a scroll. Then boats arrived in great masses and warriors swarmed ashore. She tried to put her hands over ears as the people screamed as they died to the warriors’ weapons, but her hands would not obey her. Blood flowed like a river and stained the sand of the beaches and the fields of the farms.
The images whirled so fast now that they blurred in her mind, but she could still understand them somehow. Thousands of people doing thousands of things flashed by instantaneously. People making boats, learning to hunt, casting spells, mending clothes, training chokas, all things and all people appeared and flashed by. Then the world went black and silent.
Chapter 32
Awakening
The world slowly stopped spinning and light penetrated the dark shroud of Lyra’s void. Birds chirped and sounds of the city filtered through the buzzing drone of nothingness. Lyra’s head throbbed and her mouth felt like the trampled mud of a springtime field. She opened her eyes with effort against the brightness of the stark white ceiling. She moaned as she turned her head to get her bearings and StormSong and LifeTender blurred into view, concern etched into their faces as hard as a chisel mark in granite. They rushed towards her as if in slow motion and Lyra closed her eyes and opened them again, trying to gain some sharpness to the images and focus properly.
“Are you alright?” thundered LifeTender as Lyra’s ears recoiled from the loud harsh noise of her voice. “What happened to you?”
StormSong said nothing as she faded into the background allowing LifeTender to get nearer to the bed. Lyra finally recognized her own room and struggled to sit up, but LifeTender firmly pushed her back down.
“You should not try to rise until we find out what happened,” lectured LifeTender. “How do you feel?”
“Water,” croaked the Star of Sakova.
StormSong moved swiftly and poured a mug of water from the pitcher on the dresser and handed it to LifeTender. The healing mage placed the mug to Lyra’s lips as she raised her head to drink. Lyra rolled the water around in her mouth before swallowing to rinse the mud feeling away and sighed as she felt the cool liquid cascade down her throat.
“I will tell the others that she has awakened,” StormSong said in a monotone voice.
“How did I get here?” Lyra asked as StormSong left the room. “What happened to me?”
“That is what we want to know,” frowned LifeTender. “You were found in the chapel unconscious. StormSong went to your office to report on Lord Marak and you were not there, so she went to RavenWing and he said you might be in the chapel. She found you and brought you here. She would not leave your side until you awoke.”
“I am afraid I was not good company for her,” Lyra smiled weakly. “I guess I just fainted. Let me get up so I can deal with Lord Marak before he becomes disenchanted with the Sakovans.”
“I don’t think so,” LifeTender said shaking her head. “One does not remain unconscious for two days from fainting, and Lord Marak has been kept entertained. He will not miss you until you are well enough to function properly.”
“Two days?” queried Lyra. “It can’t be two days. You said StormSong stayed by my side.”
“I did say that,” confirmed LifeTender. “She must be a wreck herself by now. She refused to sleep or even leave the room for meals. I finally had to send food up for her.”
“Why?” puzzled Lyra. “Of all people, I would suspect that StormSong cared the least.”
“Then you do not know her well,” smiled LifeTender. “She has admired you ever since you stood up to her when you tried to escape, well before you became the Star. She values honor and courage as much as she values skill and you impressed her that night. StormSong is not the issue right now though. I must know what happened to you if I am to heal you. Tell me what happened.”
Lyra gently pushed LifeTender’s hands away and sat up, rubbing the back of her neck which felt like it had been struck with a hammer. She blinked her eyes and tried to remember what had happened at the chapel, but the throbbing in her head was too great a distraction. “Have you anything for a headache?” she asked.
LifeTender rummaged through her pack and extracted a thin reddish root and handed it to her patient. “Chew slowly on this,” she instructed. “You do not need to swallow it, but it will not hurt if you do.”
Lyra stuck the root in her mouth and bit down on it. A moist bitter liquid escaped from the root and burned the tender insides of her mouth like lava running down the mountainside. She winced at the heat, but it dissipated quickly and the throbbing lessened somewhat. She bit off a small piece of the root and held it in her mouth, chewing gently whenever the lava receded and soon the pounding in her head ceased.
She quickly swallowed the small piece of root and reached for the mug of water in LifeTender’s hands and washed the bitter taste out of her mouth. “Pretty potent roots you carry,” Lyra smiled. “The headache is gone. Thanks.”
LifeTender just smiled and nodded as Lyra tried once again to focus on the events in the chapel. She smiled as she recalled her talk with Kaltara and frowned as she remembered the images that came afterwards. She nodded as she understood what Kaltara had been showing her with the images and suddenly she knew what He had done.
“I became the Star of Sakova,” she informed the healing mage.
“No,” frowned LifeTender with concern as she shook her head. “You were already the Star. Try to get some more rest,” she instructed as she rose from the bed.