The Element Order: Crown of Ida

Parker.

1

The book of the fifth

A crunch of breaking woodland, buzzed through the forest as Mendra thrashed her feet, hard against the ground. As fast as her legs could transport her, she ran. She could scarcely breathe. With a heavy sack hung over her shoulders, it made her escape more taxing. Her heart raced, and almost caught up with the pace of her sprint. At the side of a wilting tree, she dragged the sack from her shoulders, and placed it down for a moment of rest, but the sound of her followers, still in fast pursuit, closed in. She hauled the baggage up again, and moved quickly.

With each scan she took back, Mendra grinned, as the tracking army in follow, began to drop sight of her. Ahead, only a few metres away she spied a small opening amongst a formation of rocks. She headed straight towards it. Buried in drooping vines, she swiped them from her path with one brush, and bolted into the dark hollow.

Inside the gloomy cavern, Mendra dropped the sack, and then rested against a wall of dank rock. She struggled to relax. Agony surged through her. Her mind, filled with torture that retold of how she had arrived in this situation, stressed her so much, that she pulled at her muddied clothing, as though it strangled her body. ‘Now…do it now,’ she said. Rinsed with self-persuasion,’ her voice trembled.

Mendra bowed down, behind a mound of hoary timber. A sudden spurt of laughter, clearly confused with upset, fired her haste, as she promptly delved into the sack and pulled out a white, leather-bound book. Engraved on the centre of the cover was a group of gold, linking triangles. Exactly page marked, with a silver ribbon, she opened it. Her eyes hurried across the paper in frantic search over its words. She looked outside to the forest and attended the passing sound of lurid mongrels, and hurried feet, still in pursuit of her. She gripped the book to her chest. It was now the only matter in her world. She embraced it tight, and calmed her pant, until the army had gone.

Assured that her hiding place was safe, Mendra re-opened the book and grinned at the discovery of the paragraph she required. ‘Utopia will be mine with or without you,’ she said. And another laugh, bellowed through the cave, masking an odd anguish.

Mendra rested the book on top of a wedge of rock. She took a step back, and drew a snippet of silver hair from her pocket. She carefully positioned it across the top of the page, and began to read. ‘Voices of dark, voices of light, summon to me Utopian mite.’ She pressed her hands together, and her heart started to race again. ‘Power of sky, ground, fire and sea, bring me the elements, take them from thee.’ As Mendra read the second line of the spell, the hair locket burst into flames. Reduced to ashes, the remains scattered across the book and descended into the paper, vanishing from sight. Mendra beamed, and then she read on. ‘Day turn to night, minute change to hour, take my black heart and submerge it in power. Ability of fire, air, water and earth, take this body and…’ Thrown backwards across the cave, before she could complete her recite, Mendra skimmed the ground along her back, as a rush of energy, coursed through her.

Her body convulsed with a violent streak, and although it pained her, she gave a plentiful smirk. ‘It’s…working,’ she said.

Black fog poured from the pages of the book and smothered her. She lay still, fixed to the ground, unable to move, as the weight of the strong smog pressed her down. She whipped her head to the caverns opening as a rapid sound of distant explosions, rang from the forest outside. The cave shook, and slights of rock fell from its surround, disturbed by the aftermath of tremors. Mendra reeled from side to side as the spell squirmed inside her like a thousand rods of electricity. Then, as fast as it had devoured her, it stopped.

Silent, Mendra glared to the gravelly ceiling through dark tormented eyes. Her enlarged pupils swam with hurtful memory and betrayal from her past. Her body remained weightless, her mind heavy, and through a strained smile she finished the spell.

‘Take this body and compel its rebirth.’

2

Fragmented family

A ghostly stillness bounded Mendra, as she gently opened her eyes, and scoured the harlequin patterned ceiling of her bedroom. Below lengthy, thick, black hair, that flooded across deep lilac, satin pillows, a look of triumph magnified in her expression, as from outside her chambers, a sound of footsteps approached. Despite no recall of how she had arrived back in her room, and although only just awake, Mendra visibly expected the arrival, made clear by the rapid change in expression on her face. Ready to greet her visitors, she turned her head to the door and grinned.

Outside, the footsteps stopped, and after a brief silence, a persistent knock hammered against the lavishly engraved wood. Mendra’s calmness to rise, told that she already knew who insisted her presence. She threw back the generous layers of silk that wrapped her, and climbed out of the majestic four-poster bed, draped in layers of purple material. She grabbed the leather bound book from her night table, and caressed its cover with much adoration. ‘It won’t be long now,’ she said, and then she pushed it under the mattress.

With no hurry to attend the visitors, she neatened her bedding, and looked proudly at its sleek arrangement, and after a swift glance around, she took her nightgown from the foot of the bed, and quickly put it on. The knocks continued. ‘One moment please.’ She casually approached the door and leaned in to listen. A faint mumble of voices she recognised, gave her a strange relief. She sighed. ‘Finally,’ she mumbled, and she gripped the steel door bolt to unlock it.

Outside the room, eight, sturdy-built soldiers, garbed in black military attire stood in two single file lines. Side by side, they held themselves, efficiently to attention. They wore black, diamond jewelled faceplates, and attached to each side, large silver rings held onto glossy black cloaks that draped down their backs, and across the ground like a stream of tarmac, behind the rest of their heavily armoured bodies.

‘It’s late,’ Mendra said. She looked past the two rows, and further down the sculpture-galleried corridor. ‘What is the meaning of this?’

None of the men spoke, instead, one of them, at the very front held out a scroll.

‘What is this?’ she asked, cagily accepting the piece.

Again, the standing troop resided in silence.

Visibly irritated by the quiet, Mendra shook her head as she unfastened the polished gold ribbon that held the parchment together. A quick sigh showed that whatever the document contained was of no interest to her anyway, as she swiftly unravelled it. However, her eyes widened with fury, as she read the letter quietly to herself. ‘You foolish man,’ she said, with her eyes retained down to the contents.

Despite her evident anger, the soldiers still did not respond, and once she had completed matters of the scroll, Mendra looked to the guards with a potent glare. They all stepped aside and gave a clear pathway between them, steering Mendra to follow through.

‘I’m not sure he will want to see me in my night gown do you?’ she said.

The two lead guards turned their heads to one another. They shared a simple nod, and then one of them spoke. ‘He requires your attendance immediately.’ His voice croaked with tightness, as though he spoke through flakes of metal attached to his throat.

The second guard moved his leather bound hands behind his back, and gripped them firmly. ‘He knows it was you, who stole the Book of the fifth.’ Like, the other guard, his voice splintered like the fracture of ice, as it bled through the shredded mouthpiece in his mask.

‘Of course he does. But what’s his, is mine, so surely it is not stealing?’

The guard turned to his partner and again, he nodded in return. ‘He knows it was you who read the division spell.’

Mendra lifted her chin, and despite all of the evidence against her, she grinned at the soldier’s damaging knowledge. ‘Well, there is no escape for me then is there? May I have a moment to dress myself?’

Both guards bowed their heads and spoke together. ‘Yes your highness.’

Mendra closed the door; she pursed her lips and looked back to her bed. Unnerved, she rushed to her wardrobe and flung their doors open. ‘Black,’ she said, eyeing an endless array of dark pencil skirts, and high-necked tops, hung in perfect order. She dragged an outfit out from the centre of the row, and lifted it up in front. She then agreed to herself, that it was suitable. ‘It is a day of mourning after-all.’ She smiled, and turned away from the wardrobe. With the outfit pressed against her chest, she admired the look from a freestanding crystal-framed mirror across the room. The sight of her reflection amused her. She tilted her head, accepted the view, and then flicked her hand. The long trail of hair that covered her shoulders and arms, slithered up her neck by itself, and then wrapped into a tight bun on top of her head. ‘That’s better,’ she said.

Once dressed, Mendra ironed out the ruffles in her outfit with her hands, then, she hurried across to an oak chest at the foot of the bed. She flung the iron-framed lid open, and peered inside. ‘No, it can’t be. Where is it?’ she said. Quickly Mendra thought back to her casting of the division spell in the cave, and the awareness she had left the sack she had so tirelessly kept with her. She slammed down the lid, and turned quickly to face the door, as again, the soldiers outside, knocked.

‘One moment please.’ Mendra gripped her fist between her teeth, and then she dropped her hands, down by her side. ‘No matter,’ she sighed, forcing calm in herself. ‘I will retrieve them later.’

Mendra left her room, and scowled at the line in front of her. ‘I still have authority here, you know,’ she said. The soldiers stooped their heads awkwardly, and then separated further, to give her an open pathway. Each guard received a penetrating sneer, as Mendra stormed between the two lines, and as she reached the end, and past the final two guards, she continued with no wait and the army followed close behind.

Veiled in vivid white ceramic, from floor to ceiling, the corridor gave a plethora of open space for the echo of Mendra’s heels, as they clacked across the ground. Lined with polished golden doors, each had a black glossed plaque above that titled their purpose. Mendra eyed a couple as they continued on whose inscription read Tower of chests and Spire of riddles.

On approach to a door at the end of the corridor, significantly larger than the others, Mendra smirked at its décor. Her eyes veered up its bleached facade, she pursed her lips to the sight of an exquisite white crown, hovered proudly above its framework. Behind her, the soldiers separated, and positioned themselves with their backs against the wall. As they relaxed their heads against the white washed surround, their black attire, drowned from the head down, into the same colour, and as Mendra watched from the door, the army melted into the walls and constructed sculptures of battle poses, frozen in time.

Mendra cast her fingers across a miniature crown, mounted at the centre of the door and sniggered. ‘Akasha,’ she whispered. Her voice slithered across its surface like a snake and forced its many encrusted jewels to glisten. Shocked, Mendra pulled her hand back quickly as the crown scorched her fingertips. She looked back to the monument of guards and moved closer to the protruding arm of he who had spoken to her at her chambers. She slowly wrapped her bony fingers around his bicep, held it tight, and moved her face closer to his ear. ‘Soon you will all obey me,’ she said, and with a quick pull, she snapped his arm from his shoulder.

Mendra smiled as a faint sound of agonised pain from the frozen soldier, echoed through the corridor, and as his torn arm, smashed over the ground, from his wound, a single line of blood, ran down the wall.

The door opened by itself. Mendra gripped her hands together tight, and from the corridor, she peered into, a large oval-shaped room. Although decorated the same as the corridor, its brilliant white flashed with a smothering of coloured reflections, radiating from a glass box, lodged into the ground, at the centre of the room. Crowded with swirling lights of red, yellow, green and blue, the ice-cube like structure, soaked the area, with energy so vibrant, Mendra appeared hesitant to enter because of it.

The box proudly constructed the room’s main focal point, and behind it, the rear of a tall chair, decorated with a curved spinal column in chrome, faced Mendra. She remained at a safe distance. ‘What exactly is the meaning of this calling at such an unreasonable hour?’ Mendra said, holding out the scroll.

From behind the chair, a brittle voice of a man spoke, and although a fair distance away, the sparse existence of furniture around, gave way to his loud echo. ‘Won’t you come in Mendra.’

Mendra hovered her foot over the doorway, but, cautious, she placed it back. ‘Tell me what the meaning of this summoning is first,’ she said.

The man laughed, as he listened to the angst in Mendra’s voice. ‘Your bravery has always been somewhat…selective with me,’ he said.

‘I should congratulate you, but I won’t.’ Mendra took a single step into the room and then stopped. ‘It is no use you know. I have already set in to motion the spans of your fate.’ Mendra spoke through a confident grin, yet she remained close to the door.

‘Your plans will fail, you will not succeed in merging the two realms,’ the man said.

Mendra folded her arms, tightly as she listened to his responses. ‘Why don’t you show yourself, old man?’

The chair slowly turned. Mendra stepped back tautly, but, as it rotated fully, the gradual reveal of a withered old man, evidently able of no fight, and slumped to one side, gave Mendra a pleasurable self-assurance. She lifted her head and stepped forward again. ‘You see? The spell is already taking its toll on you, Akasha.’

‘The book of the fifth is only to be read by its elected holder.’ Akasha tried to lift himself, but he was so feeble, it was a task too much. ‘That holder is me.’ Unimportant, and fragile, his body seemed to drown below the demanding heavy white robe that he wore. ‘Your larceny has only resulted in slaying my wife,’ he said. A heavy loss filled his throat, while days of agony and pain, outlined his eyes, with a tired shade of red that hovered over sunken black circles, and a saddened expression. ‘And where are the weapons of Aether?’

Mendra frowned and gave an obstinate, guilt-ridden look, down to one side. ‘Safe,’ she said.

‘In the wrong hands, those weapons will end everything,’ he said.

‘And in the right hands, they will begin all.’

Akasha pressed his hands down onto the glass cube. His eyes lowered, and reflected the frolic of painted light. ‘The only place those weapons should be, is at my side.’

‘At your side? Don’t you mean ours?’

‘Mendra you forfeited, any shared entitlements a long time ago where those artefacts are concerned. You cannot be trusted with them.’ His voice cracked as a sharp pain, swept across his chest. ‘Your desire for power and reign has fragmented your judgement on what is right or wrong, you proved that when you murdered my wife.’

A small bout of guilt ran through Mendra. ‘An unfortunate mishap, one I’m afraid I can no longer…’ She lifted her gaze back to Akasha. ‘Well…care for.’ She shrugged her shoulders.

‘How can you be so indifferent, you…?’

‘How can you ask me that?’ Mendra fumed, she unfolded her arms and placed them onto her hips. ‘It mystifies me that you are able to dare ask me that question. You banished my sister to a world I cannot find, a world where only deity’s know if she is safe, Akasha. If that makes me indifferent, then so be it.’

Akasha looked away from her stare to respond. ‘You speak of gods you care nothing for. That sister had a darkness no one in this realm could govern, not even me. I did what had to be done, for the safety of this realm.’

‘And in that course of action, you left me alone, by myself in this relinquished place. She was the only friend I had, the only other person who could understand me.’

Akasha looked back to Mendra. For a moment, he felt sympathy for her, but it was too late for she had devoted her time to so many unspeakable acts. ‘You knew Anya more than any of us; you knew she could not be trusted. You yourself have experienced her deception, on many a level. It is apparent now, that her punishment should have included you.’

‘Enough, do not speak anymore ill of her as I stand before you,’ Mendra said.

Akasha gave a sudden sob. ‘My wife was with child.’

Shocked, Mendra lurched back and swallowed forcefully. ‘What? When did she…I mean…’

‘The instant you read that spell yesterday, you caused a rift so powerful, it sent a surge through this realm, and killed many. The toll included my wife. Our wisdom allowed us to save the child, but… my love…’ Akasha crumbled inside as he continued. ‘My Darana, she was lost,’ he said. The words Akasha spoke, so clearly forced a strain on the remainder of life he had left. He withered further. Slumped back across his chair, he could barely speak. ‘Did you think… that I would make… this easy for you?’ he said, as he struggled to hold himself up.

‘No, but you always were difficult.’

‘The ancient spell you have used on me will only come with a sacrifice.’

Mendra’s eyes enlarged, she took a profound breath. ‘What sacrifice do you speak of, old man?’

Akasha strained a laugh that forced him to cough, through a tight chest.

Mendra moved further forward, and placed her hands, down on the glass. ‘Speak,’ she said.

He took a moment, but the insight that he faced no other choice consumed him. ‘You may have dragged my elemental powers from me, but they will never be yours,’ he said.

Mendra folded her arms again and stood smug. ‘You know, for a man close to his last moments of life, you seem awfully sure of yourself.’

‘Do you think when he wrote that spell book, our father was stupid enough to write its content without failsafe’s for his family?’

Mendra banged her hands onto the glass, the hit, forced Akasha to jump in his seat. ‘He was no father of mine, only yours Akasha. You were always the golden one, the shining light, the beacon of hope. Our father cared nothing for me, only you.’

Akasha gripped the arms of the chair as Mendra leant across, towards him.

‘He cared only for his precious son, that is why he gave this realm and his crown to you.’ Mendra’s eyes crammed with a darkness Akasha visibly feared. ‘Yes, that’s right; you should fear me, brother. Now tell me, what is the, failsafe you speak of, and where is the child?’

‘I will never tell you of the child’s location, because I do not know. But, he was sent away from this realm.’

‘You would cast away your only child?’

‘He was cast away for his own safety, away from you.’

Mendra patrolled backwards and forwards in front of the glass chamber, the lights cascaded across her silhouette on the walls in an array of distorted patterns. She tightened her lips so hard, the air in her mouth drew her cheeks inwards, and showed more of her bony facial features.

Akasha noticed her frustration. ‘I presume you still do not feel any different from yesterday, when you read from the book?’ he asked.

Mendra paused. ‘Well I didn’t expect to feel different so soon,’ she said, gazing down, at her strictly fitted clothing. ‘But, I am patient.’

Akasha laughed again. This visibly infuriated Mendra. She hurried around the side of the desk, in rage, and she dragged the chair to face her. Akasha pressed back, and Mendra took hold of his chin. Her touch, initiated a ripple of shadows across his skin that made him quiver, with fear. ‘Not so funny now is it?’ she said.

‘What have you become?’ Akasha asked. With her face so close to him, he could feel the warmth of her breath, brush over his face.

‘Why is it every time I look at you, I see him?’ she said.

Akasha turned away.