A Land Of Fire (Book 12) Read Online Free

crestfallen at the thought.
    “But I don’t understand,” Thor said. “I
finally found you. I finally found this place, my home. And now you are telling
me it is just for this once?”
    His mother sighed.
    “A warrior’s home is out in the world,”
she said. “It is your duty to be out there, to assist others, to defend
others—and to be become, always, a better warrior. You can always become
better. Warriors are not meant to sit in one place—especially not a warrior
with a great destiny such as yours. You will encounter great things in your
life: great castles, great cities, great peoples. Yet you must not cling to
anything. Life is a great tide, and you must allow it to take you where it
will.”
    Thor furrowed his brow, trying to
understand. It was so much to take in at once.
    “I always thought that, once I found
you, my greatest quest would be finished.”
    She smiled back at him.
    “That is the nature of life,” she
replied. “We are given great quests, or we choose them for ourselves, and we
set out to achieve them. We never truly imagine we can achieve them—and yet,
somehow, we do. Once we do, once one quest is complete, somehow we expect our
lives to be over. But our lives are just beginning. Climbing one peak is a
great accomplishment in itself—yet it also leads to another, greater, peak. Achieving
one quest enables you to embark on another, greater, quest.”
    Thor looked at her, surprised.
    “That’s right,” she said, reading his
mind. “Your finding me will lead you now to another—greater—quest.”
    “What other quest can there be?” Thor
asked. “What can be greater than finding you?”
    She smiled back, her eyes filled with
wisdom.
    “You cannot even begin to imagine the
quests that lay ahead of you,” she said. “Some people in life are born with
just one quest. Some people, none. But you—Thorgrin—have been born with a
destiny of twelve quests.”
    “Twelve?” Thor repeated, flabbergasted.
    She nodded.
    “The Destiny Sword was one. You achieved
that marvelously. Finding me was another. You have achieved two of them. You
have ten more to go, ten quests even greater than those two.”
    “Ten more?” he asked. “Greater? How is
it possible?”
    “Let me show you,” she said, as she came
up beside him and draped an arm around him and led him gently down the corridor.
She led him through a shining sapphire door, and into a room made entirely of
sapphires, sparkling green.
    Thor’s mother led him across the room to
a huge, arched window made of crystal. Thor stood beside her and reached up and
placed a palm on the crystal, sensing he needed to, and as he did, the two windowpanes
gently opened.
    Thor looked out at the ocean, a sweeping
panorama from here, covered in a blinding haze and fog, a white light bouncing
off of everything, making it seem as if they were perched atop heaven itself.
    “Look out,” she said. “Tell me what you
see.”
    Thor looked out, and at first he saw
nothing but ocean and white haze. Soon, though, the haze turned brighter, the
ocean began to disappear, and images began to flash before him.
    The first thing Thor saw was his son,
Guwayne, out at sea, floating on a small boat.
    Thor’s heart raced in panic.
    “Guwayne,” he said. “Is it true?”
    “Even now he is lost at sea,” she said. “He
needs you. Finding him will be one of the great quests of your life.”
    As Thor watched Guwayne floating away,
he felt an urgency to leave this place at once, to race to the ocean.
    “I must go to him—now!”
    His mother laid a calming hand on his
wrist.
    “See what else you have to see,” she
said.
    Thor looked out and saw Gwendolyn and
her people; they sat huddled on a rocky island and braced themselves as a wall
of dragons descended from the sky, blanketing them. He saw a wall of flame, bodies
on fire, people screaming in agony.
    Thor’s heart pounded with urgency.
    “Gwendolyn,” Thor cried. “I must go to
her.”
    His mother