The Chains That Bind Ch 24

Chapter 24: The Center of the World
“That was fun,” Kat said as the illusion she had created vanished and I was back in my old clothes; jeans and a t-shirt.

We walked back to the car with me behind the wheel and Erika resting in the back seat.

“So how does it feel to be Mr. Sandmin?” she asked me with a small smile on my face as I couldn’t help but blush a bit from her joking. Actually, I had a hard time trying to figure out how much was joking and how much was serious.

“I don’t think it works like that,” I told her. “And I never said I do so we aren’t married.”

“To bad,” was all she said before falling asleep in her seat.

“You know Swift,” Erika started saying from the back seat, but I cut her off before she could finish. I already had too much on my mind to worry about anything else.

“I should concentrate one driving,” I said a bit louder than I had wanted, but Erika got the hint that this was a subject that I didn’t want to talk about. We continued stopping every so often to change the driver or to stop for food. We continued traveling through the night until we had reached the town and we finally knew what we had been looking for. This small town’s only claim to fame was a memorial just north of the town that was the official center of the United States. We walked up to the monument and I could feel the links in my bag begin to react with it, as if knowing the last link was here. The monument itself also seemed to glow and it began to morph and change into a doorway that lead down farther than I could see.

“Well, let’s get going,” I said and Erika and Kat both just nodded their heads. Erika once again pulled out her glowing flowers and we started down not knowing what to expect. As I looked at the walls, they were depicted with drawings of what I could only imagine was the first Titan war. The gods were drawn on the walls battle the forces of the Titans.

“There are seven,” Kat said from behind us, as if surprised by something.

“What are you talking about, seven what?” I asked still looking at some of the drawings but mostly just looking at the stairs ahead of us.

“There are seven gods in this picture,” she said pointing to the gods riding into battle on their chariots.

“Maybe it is one of the Titans that joined the gods,” Erika commented.

“No, the gods are drawn differently,” Kat said. “Look, none of the Titans fighting are drawn with a light behind them.”

As I looked closer, I noticed she was right but didn’t know what this meant. We were where the last link was being kept so maybe there was something in here that Zeus liked to keep hidden or forgotten.

“Maybe he faded,” I commented. “If he was one of the first gods and he faded, the loss of a family member might have made Zeus force the others to remain silent so none of their children would know.”

“That seems possible,” Erika said. After what felt like a mile of stairs, we finally reached the bottom and I saw the entrance. It was a huge doorway that lead into a room that was beyond anything I could describe (but I’ll try). It was a huge stone room with torches that lit the room. The elements of the gods circled around in the air, with streams of water flowing around storm clouds that would blast lightning. The walls themselves were full of flowers that were blooming and continuously growing around the room. The lightning seemed to be absorbed into four large pillars at the corners of the room, all with a symbol of power on them. As I looked around the room for something that could be considered a link worthy of belonging to Zeus, I couldn’t find it. There really wasn’t anything on the walls or a pedestal like the other links had been placed on.

“Does anyone see it?” I asked. Erika and Kat still seemed to be admiring the room itself but started looking around. As Kat and I walked along the walls looking for maybe a secret entrance of some kind, Erika had used the plants as a type of rope ladder to see if she could spot anything from above.

“Oh my gods,” she said just loud enough for us to hear.

“What is it, what do you see?” I called to her, but she just kept looking at the floor and I wondered what she could see that we couldn’t. She climbed down the vines and flowers and jumped down when she was low enough. Before answering she took a few deep breathes.

“It’s…it’s a…” she tried to choke out taking in some more air into her lungs.

“It’s what,” Kat said sounding a little pushy.

“It’s a door!” Erika screamed pointing her finger to the floor. In the center of the room was a large piece of stone with the symbol of Zeus on it. When I looked at it earlier, I thought it was just a plaque, but if what Erika said was true, then it was actually a large door and I wondered what could possibly be under it. As we took a few steps toward it, and I looked at it wondering if the link could be under it or if something else was waiting for us. I walked across it a few times to see if there was some kind of giant door knocker but nothing happened. Erika didn’t want to go near the thing and stood far away from us on the edge of the symbol.

“Get over here and help us look,” Kat said to her before grabbing her hand and dragging her over. However, the second her foot touched the large door, it light up and a voice could be heard from under it.

“I sense the presence of Demeter,” it said. Its voice was dark and rusty, like it hadn’t tried to speak for thousands of years. Every word was laced with evil and it sent more than just a shiver down my spine; it felt like I had an earthquake in my body. All of a sudden, it felt like something had punched at the door and I was flung into the air and off to the side. Kat and Erika had only been on the edge and fell back a few feet. Another loud thud came from below the door and it started to crack open. I got to my feet and ran over to check on Kat and Erika. They got up and stood by me as the ground itself began to shake from the force of the beast. Then there was a short pause and all at once the doors flew into the air being propelled by a geyser of Greek fire. Then, out of the pit crawled a huge monster that I had never seen before. The creature was massive, towering above us like a giant. He was covered in a suit of armor made of what looked to be Stygian Iron and Greek fire leaked from every joint in the armor. He had a set of large wings that he had out stretched as if just waking up from a nap, and a long tail that thrashed from side to side. The rest of his body appeared to be humanoid except his head looked like that of a dragon, still covered in armor but with razor sharp teeth and horns that formed forward. Its’ eyes radiated blue fire and all at once I fell to the ground when he looked at us. This creature radiated fear and hatred like I had never known and I couldn’t more a finger as it came walking toward us.

“You are doomed,” it spoke in that burning voice. Just the words almost caused me to cry out in terror. “All of you and your godly parents are doomed for Leiomenos has risen again!”

Authors Note: So I know that the last few links of the chain were found in pretty short order, but that is because I was really excited about the ending (which I have changed in my head as I've gotten a few ideas from people). And honestly, I felt like adding in a few fights inbetween trips didn't was important because to get each link, they would have to comfront some kind of monster or fight something and I like to build on my characters a bit.

Darkcloud1111 ~Fastest Hero Alive  13:09, July 2, 2011 (UTC)