Free The Last Summoning---Andrew and the Quest of Orion's Belt (Book Four) by Ivory Autumn Page B

than any physical burden you carry, and
make it impossible for you to move forward.”
    Gogindy looked at his feet. The ground around
them was starting to crumble. He could feel his feet sinking into
the earth. “Hurry!” the girl said, grabbing his hand and pulling
him forward.
    “I’m hurrying,” Gogindy cried, running after
the phantom. “But where do I go from here? Where is the tower?”
    The girl stopped and looked at him, her eyes
glowing a brilliant blue. “Your heart knows. Rid yourself of fear,
and replace it with hope, and it will take you where the bell is.
Your heart and the bell will resonate as one. And when it does, a
mighty battle will take place, far greater than the one of old. A
battle that will be remembered for all time!” As those words fell
from her lips the earth trembled, the ground shook and crumbled.
She paused and cast Gogindy one last glance and then turned and
ran, vanishing into the night.
    “Wait!” he cried, the earth crumbling in as
he ran, creating cracks and gaping holes. He cried out and jumped
over a great fissure, then picked himself up and scrambled after
her.
    “Run!” the girl’s voice called out through
the haze, growing soft, and distant.
    “I am!” Gogindy panted, coming to a sudden
stop before a yawning fracture in the earth. Gathering his courage,
he jumped over the crack and onto the other side, only to fall as
the ground underneath him crumbled and gave way. As he fell, his
three tails wrapped around a tree root. There he hung, suspended in
space, swaying dangerously back and forth. He pinched his eyes
shut. “I’m not dead, I’m not dead, I’m not dead, I’m not dead. Not
dead, not dead, not dead. I’m alive, I’m alive, I AM alive!”
    A strange feeling overcame him. He felt the
tree root he was hanging on vanish. He prepared himself for the
stomach-churning fall and flailed out his arms and legs. Yet, when
he opened his eyes, he found that his feet were in fact on solid
ground. Above him the moon was shining and the earth around him was
quite intact, as if nothing had ever happened.
    “Girl?” he called looking around him. “Girl,
where are you?”
    When no one answered. Gogindy carefully
tested the ground in front of him, and when he found that it was
quite firm, he laughed, and hugged himself. “I’m alive!” he cried.
“Alive!”
    His heart filled with a swelling, hopeful
feeling that had long been absent. “I have hope,” he murmured,
thumping his chest with pride. “I do. I am alive. You hear that. I
have hope!”

Chapter Nine
    Zeechee
     
     
    That night, Lancedon and the rest of his friends
made their camp in a brambly enclosure. The air was hot and heavy.
Coral stood watch while Sterling and Lancedon slept. The night
reeked not only of heaviness, but the unnerving feeling that they
were being watched.
    A persistent wind droned through the dry
bushes and trees, sending leaves and twigs on a perpetual journey
of shuffling and crackling.
    Coral sat on a rock, drumming her fingers on
its cool surface. Her eyelids felt heavy. She yawned, and glanced
at the sky.
    In an hour she would wake Sterling, and have
him take her place. Lancedon was excluded from night watching for
obvious reasons. She glanced down at Lancedon as he slept. He lay
on the ground, sleeping like a child. His head was turned to her,
his eyes closed, his lips neither smiling nor frowning. A lock of
hair was draped over his left eye. His hands were clenched into
tight fists.
    Coral wondered if he was dreaming. And if he
was, what did he see? What did the blind see when they slept?
Feelings, emotions, colors, sounds?
    A loud crunch of leaves caused her to jump.
She quickly stood, her eyes glued on the forest. She scanned the
darkness, but saw nothing. The place where they had camped was
nothing more than a dried up forest, devoid of life. The trees were
bent, and old. They groaned in the wind. The ground was dry,
covered in dead vegetation.
    She straightened, and pushed