Crusader. Sara Douglass

       Chapter 15 The Secrets of the Book

      DragonStar tucked the Book under one arm and considered the lizard carefully.

      “You stay here for the moment,” he said. “I will be back for you.”

      The lizard dropped its head, its emerald and scarlet crest deflating mournfully, and turned away.

      Faraday’s mouth quirked. “It is just as well he does not speak.”

      “He does not have to.”

      “Will you take the hounds, and the horse?”

      DragonStar hesitated.

      “DragonStar, please, take them.”

      He nodded.

      “And be careful in Spiredore.”

      “I will be more than careful. I will use only its power to transfer myself into the Field of Flowers. I will not enter the tower itself.”

      Faraday stared at him, knowing his words were useless bravado. Even if they only used the power of Spiredore to transfer from one location to the next, DragonStar, as any of them, would be vulnerable in that instant they stepped through the doorway.

      For in that instant, if they were unwary, or unlucky, or damned by Fate itself, Qeteb could snatch at them. They could only hope that he didn’t spend his entire time wandering the stairwells of Spiredore.

      “Not he,” DragonStar said softly. “But he might have any one of his Demons patrolling. Faraday … I will be careful.”

      She leaned forward and hugged him, longing for that time when their fight against the Demons was truly over and she and he could find the time to indulge, and relax into, their love. “I hope Caelum can help.”

      “And if not he, then there is one other I can turn to,” DragonStar said, but he was gone before Faraday could ask who this “other” was.

      She sighed, and sat back on the window bench with Katie. “I am so glad you are safe here,” she said, stroking the girl’s head. “I could not bear it if you were exposed to danger again.”

      Katie smiled, and looked away.

      DareWing felt a savage glee as he wheeled his Strike Force through the skies above the Field of Flowers.

      They were superb.

      Death had altered them, but only to give them a greater purpose, and a more lethal desire.

      DareWing flew among them, almost lost in the swirl of jewel-bright wings and eyes and the haunting shadows and shapes of their silvery liquid bodies. The members of the Strike Force had lost none of their ability, or their tight discipline.

      They wanted to hunt, to fight back, to strike.

      And why not? thought DareWing. Stay here, DragonStar had said, until I need you, but DareWing was impatient with the waiting. When was DragonStar returning? In the wasteland there was corruption to be cleared, and DareWing and the Strike Force were doing no good sweeping colourfully through the skies here.

      He alighted within the Field, letting his wings relax and trail luxuriously through the poppies and lilies, and looked up to the molten colour swirling above him.

      “Come with me,” he whispered, and then DareWing closed his eyes, and thought of the icy drifts of the northern Icebear Coast, the feel of the cold-edged wind sliding through his feathers, the cry of the seagull, the roar of the icebear…

      … and they were there, the Strike Force wheeling above him, and crying with wordless voices. DareWing smiled, and lifted into the air.

      DragonStar passed through into the Field of Flowers without incident, and with a considerable amount of relief. Even Belaguez relaxed beneath him as he felt the spring of the flowered field beneath his hooves, and the Alaunt bayed with joy, and bounded among the flowers, snapping at butterflies.

      And with every snap of jaw, the butterflies soared drifting into the air a handspan above the hounds, and DragonStar smiled.

      He kneed Belaguez forward, letting his body fully relax for the first time in hours, and drank in the beauty about him. The scent, the gently waving flower heads…

      … the crash and roar of surf in the distance.

      DragonStar halted Belaguez for a moment. He could vaguely discern the smell of salt underlying the scent of the flowers. He let his eyes scan the horizon, stopping at a spot that was hazier than the rest. A coastline.

      DragonStar urged Belaguez forward.

      He found Caelum sitting at the very edge of a cliff that plunged down hundreds of paces into a foam of rocks and sea spray.

      RiverStar sat with him, her arm linked into his, their heads close together as they murmured to each other.

      “Caelum? RiverStar?” DragonStar lifted a leg over Belaguez’s withers and slid to the ground. The Star Stallion snorted, then wandered away a few paces to nose among the flowers.

      Caelum and RiverStar turned slightly, and smiled at DragonStar.

      DragonStar stared, taken not only with their beauty, but at the peacefulness that they radiated.

      Neither had been particularly peaceful in life.

      Caelum’s smile broadened a little, almost as if he could read DragonStar’s thoughts. “Welcome, brother,” he said. “Will you join us?”

      RiverStar said no words, but she stood in one graceful, fluid movement, and took DragonStar’s hand. She pulled slightly, encouraging him to sit with Caelum and herself, but DragonStar baulked.

      In life RiverStar had loathed him, goaded him, and taken every opportunity to make his life miserable.

      Who was this caring, lovely-spirited woman now standing before him?

      RiverStar lifted her free hand and laid it against DragonStar’s cheek.

      “In life,” she said, “I was hateful, jealous, and spiteful. But once I passed the gate into the Field of Flowers I entered a state of… of…”

      Her brow creased slightly, as if her mind could not quite find the word to describe her state of existence.

      “We entered,” Caelum said, “a state of contentedness. Contentedness not only with our environment, but with ourselves.”

      DragonStar nodded slowly, realising the difference in his brother and sister. They were deeply at peace with themselves, because they were contented — a spiritual state rather than an emotional one.

      And suddenly he was content as a huge weight lifted off his shoulders. DragonStar’s mind had been worrying at the fact that so many people appeared bored and irritated with the peace of Sanctuary, and he’d worried about how they’d cope with the eternal peace of the Field of Flowers.

      Now he understood. When people passed into the Field of Flowers they underwent a spiritual transformation.

      And they became content.

      Caelum nodded as he understood DragonStar’s realisation. “There are only a few who do not undergo this transformation,” he said. “Those who know that they must return to Tencendor, and those who know they have work unfinished remain impervious to the contentedness of the Field.”

      “The Strike Force,” DragonStar said. “They remain vengeful.”

      “Aye,” Caelum said. “But come, sit down. We are gladdened to see you again.”

      DragonStar smiled, and sat down beside Caelum. RiverStar let go his hand, and stepped back, saying that she would leave them to talk.

      “There