Chapter 17
Overwhelmed by all the things that Valefar had just told her, Bo became speechless as she tried to digest everything.
She licked her lips and eventually asked, "so…let me get this straight…my mom found the Dark Temple in the underworld. There, she found the Book of the Dead inscribed on the coffin. She also found a device that would allow her to cast the spells. During the war, she somehow determined that my father couldn't be trusted, so she broke the device apart and gave you a piece days before she died?"
Valefar nodded firmly with a heavy sigh.
"Well, if this thing-" Tamsin picked up the dark gear shaped part and examined it. "If this thing is only a part of it, where are the other parts?"
"I believe that Aife had sent them away right before she died. I knew she had them with her the day she died, but they were never recovered."
Tamsin gasped deeply as her eyes shot wide open. "When I was imprisoned, they kept asking me about this raven. It sounded like they were convinced that a raven had carried the device away, and somehow it…it gave it to me, or to my family. Maybe that raven had the rest of the device?"
"Tell me everything you know about this raven," Valefar insisted.
"All I know is that there was a raven, and that the Dark Lord is looking for it because he thinks that that raven had that device, and that now I have it."
"Raven…" Bo murmured abruptly as she gripped Tamsin's wrist. "A raven!" She exclaimed.
"What is it, Bo?" Tamsin frowned at the brunette as she held her hand gently.
"When I was in the Ghost Chapel, I had this vision, remember?"
After getting a nod from Tamsin, she continued, "the fire, the bright light, the pale horse and the salamander…there was a raven too! It was like…it was like it had come from that light, like the light had given birth to it all of a sudden."
"Did that raven carry anything?" Valefar leaned in and asked in haste.
"I…I don't know for sure. I thought…for a split second, I saw there was something between its beak, something…."
"...shiny," Tamsin completed Bo's sentence absentmindedly as a piece of vague, distant memory came to her vividly.
It was the middle of the winter, and she was 6, maybe 7. In search of her family dog, she headed into the snow.
There, she saw her great grandmother standing by the cliff.
The old lady heard her coming and she turned back. She had her right arm reached out, and there rested a raven, a large black raven.
Tamsin still remembered the moment her eyes met the eyes of that raven. Strangely, she had a feeling that the raven was trying to figure her out.
There was a small shiny object between its beak.
A trinket.
A ring….
"Wait…wait…this can't be right…my great grandmother did encounter a raven, but..." Tamsin frowned hard. "The vision…of whatever that might be…the vision of the flames and brimstone was obviously a vision of the war, and you said it yourself, Aife sent the rest of the device away the day she had died, but…the raven that visited my great grandmother was…decades before the war. At that time, I don't even think Aife herself had found that device yet."
"Actually, I think it makes perfect sense," Valefar said slowly. "Aife…during the last moment of her life, she knew she had to protect what was most important to her, her child and that device. I believe that, in order to protect Bo from…everything, she casted a spell to send Bo far, far away."
"Okay…?" Tamsin furrowed her eyebrows at the man.
"By far, far away, I didn't mean a different location. I meant, a different time."
"A different time…?" Bo murmured in confusion.
"Your mother sent you to the future, hundreds of years beyond the time of the war."
Bo gaped at him. "That's why I wasn't found until 270 years later, and I did not age a day!"
Valefar nodded.
"Okay, but what does this have anything to do with the raven that my great grandmother encountered?"
"Sending something, or someone, to a different time is one of the most powerful and most unstable magic spells that have ever existed. For almost all magic spells, a balance has to be achieved. If one thing is sent to the future, another thing, usually somewhat of an equal, has to travel to the past."
"So…Bo was sent to the future while the device was sent to the past?"
"This would be the most reasonable explanation, yes," Valefar nodded. "That raven Vinga encountered, do you know where it is right now? Did it give Vinga anything?"
"No, I don't know where it is right now. I don't even know if it's still alive. I think it might have stayed with the other ravens in our longhouse. And I have no idea if it gave her anything. I think it was carrying a ring or something….You think that was the rest of the device?"
"Well…if it was a ring, then it might just be a part of the device…" Valefar murmured before he turned to Bo. "You mentioned a pale horse, a raven and…what else?"
"A salamander, a red one," Bo replied. "It was tiny and it was super fast."
"Okay…then, my best guess is that the pale horse carried you away, and the salamander had the last piece of the device…." Valefar trailed off as he went into a trance.
"Well…guess we could all use a break," Tamsin grunted as she put the dark gear back on the table. She picked up a candy and tossed it into her mouth.
Bo got herself a candy as well. As she chewed the salted caramel, she stared at the dark gear. It looked like nothing but a dirty old gear from an old clock that would no longer work.
How could this thing be a part of some mighty device? She wondered absentmindedly as she picked up the gear.
She brought it closer to her eyes, wanting to take a closer look to see what was so special about it. Just as she moved the dark gear to about 6 inches from her chest, the ring she had been wearing around her neck suddenly jumped on its own.
The ring, and the dark gear in her hand, started to quiver simultaneously. The dark gear quickly slipped off her fingers, despite that she had been holding it firmly, and flew to the ring.
With a soft click, it mounted itself inside the ring, so snugly that no one would believe that they were once apart.
Both the ring and the gear started to turn like wheels, except that the ring was turning clockwise while the gear was turning counterclockwise.
As they both span faster and faster, the ring's plain, silver coating started to fade, revealing small yet complicated engravings and symbols underneath.
Its shape was changing as well. Grooves and bumps started to appear, until the ring completely transformed into a reptile-like creature which held the tip of its tail in its clammed mouth.
The dark gear inside sparkled and resonated. The dull, almost black coating cracked, letting bright glimmer seep through. As the dark surface turned bright gold, it was covered in glittering engravings.
"Whoa!" Bo exclaimed as she wrapped her fingers around the ring.
However, the ring didn't quiet down in her hand like it had been before. It vibrated in her hand like a vigorous bug.
"I see that you've already found the second part of the device," Valefar said to her with excitement and relief. "Before you even knew it existed?"
"I…I didn't find it," Bo replied as she turned to Tamsin. "She gave it to me."
Valefar turned to Tamsin, somewhat petrified, like he couldn't believe that someone would simply give something that important to someone else.
Tamsin cleared her throat. "I didn't give it to you. I let you use it," she corrected Bo.
"Okay, fine," Bo let out a chuckle.
"I must ask, when you…give that ring to Bo, did you have any idea what it was?" Valefar asked.
"Nope," Tamsin shook her head. "I got it the day of my ascendance. I received it from my great grandmother as a gift. She didn't say what it was and I just assumed that it was one of the many trinkets that she had collected throughout the years. I had no idea that this ring was a part of the device. I don't even know if she knew."
"That might not be a bad thing after all. If you had the slightest idea, he might have already pried it out of you. He probably has exhausted all the places that you would frequent, too. The only reason that he didn't find it already, was-"
"-that he didn't know that it was with me the whole time," Bo murmured.
Valefar shook his head and let out a few chuckles of defeat. "I can't believe that…the two of you outsmarted the Dark Lord."
"Well, now that we have two pieces. Where is the third one?" Tamsin asked.
"I don't know. If Aife ordered that salamander to flee with the last piece, she would be the only person who knew where that salamander went."
"So…she sent Bo to the future, and then she sent the two other pieces away. Did she send that raven to my great grandmother on purpose? I mean, I know it was sent to the past but…."
"I would probably say…yes. Aife never had many friends. Being the ruler of Hell, you just…don't have that kind of luxury. I would say that if there was one person besides me that she trusted, it would be Vinga."
"So…no matter to whom she had sent that salamander, it would be someone that she trusted," Bo concluded.
"Well...if he and my great grandmother were the only two people she could trust at that time, what would she do if she didn't have a third person to whom she'd send the salamander to?"
"Then…if I were her, I'd send it to a safe place and tell it to hide," Bo replied.
"True. Then…the question becomes, is there a place Aife would consider a safe place?" Tamsin asked Valefar.
"I would say the City of Damned since she had spent her whole life there. It was her home."
"No, it wouldn't be the City of Damned. She had already mentioned that the Dark Lord couldn't be trusted. She wouldn't leave that thing anywhere the Dark Lord would visit. She would send the salamander to a place he didn't know about, or at least didn't frequent," Tamsin explained. "She'd hide it somewhere he'd never look."
"What was it exactly that made her believe my father couldn't be trusted?" Bo finally asked Valefar the question that had been haunting her. "I know they were married, but was it just like a political marriage or something? Were they in love? Did he do something…bad to her?"
"It wasn't a political marriage. Aife was in love with him. For the longest time, all she would talk about was him. He was so smart. He was so handsome. He knew so many things that she didn't. He was the one. He was the perfect man."
"Then…what changed?"
"I don't think…her love for him changed. It was just that…maybe she no longer wished to stay blind. Or…something happened between them, something so…significant that she could no longer ignore."
"Like what?"
"I don't know what exactly happened, but I think that she had suspected that his motives of being with her weren't all about love."
"So…maybe she realized that he married her for the device?"
"I don't know, but it could be. I never liked that guy, but Aife was head over heels, so…."
"Why did you not like him? Was there a specific reason?"
"No, not really, it was just a gut feeling."
He paused for a while, before he said, "this probably was the least thing that Aife would ever want to hear, but I think that man had something to do with her death."
Bo jumped out of her chair. "Are you saying that he killed her?"
"No, I'm not saying that he killed her, because I don't have solid proof. After a blood bath, the enemy army was repulsed and we found Aife's body. Your father was there with her, and he was badly injured. Grief stricken, I didn't suspect a thing at the time. The first time I sensed that something was off, was when he recovered and gave one inflammatory speech after another which eventually secured him as the rightful heir to the crown."
"So…you think that whoever benefited the most from her death might be the one responsible," Bo sighed. "This is…this is just a lot to take…."
Tamsin held her hand and gave her a comforting squeeze. Then, she turned to Valefar and asked, "what would that third piece look like anyway? Is it another ring?"
"No," Valefar shook his head. "It looks like a pair of wings. Under the wings there was a delicate bracket that would hold two rings in place."
"Hold the two rings in place?"
"Each spell in the Book of the Dead had a unique way to be… chanted. The wearer would have to slide the two rings until they were both in the proper place. And the wings…not only does it hold them in place, it also grants the wearer the power to travel to anywhere in Hell instantly."
"Wings…travel…" Tamsin muttered those words as she pondered.
"You think of something?" Bo leaned in as she placed her hand on Tamsin's knee.
"When I came to find you in Hell with the damn cat, we hiked in the River of Flames until we reached a specific location where we released a soul. That specific location was marked by a pair of wings. Did Aife ever share the details of her journey to the Dark Temple with him?"
"She probably did, but I don't know if she had shared that much detail. Besides, that journey was a journey that I took with her, and that was way before she had met him. So…there's a chance that she didn't tell him everything."
"But…would you say that it would be a good place to look?"
"I couldn't think of a better place, to be honest," Valefar replied.
"Well, what are we waiting for, then?" Bo stood up.
"Hold your horses, sweetheart," Tamsin stopped her from heading out as she checked her beeping phone.
"I have something to share, too."
"What is it?"
"Kenzi's soul is in Heaven. They've found her."
Bo responded to that piece of information with a gaping mouth and a pair of eyes brimming with tears.