The Crystal Clipper Read Online Free

falter in this lifetime or through an eternity of lifetimes.”
    The subject bows to her, kisses the elaborate diamond ring on her finger, then walks across the altar and out of sight. Another subject steps up to take his place, and the ritual is repeated again and again, until the dozens of men and women standing in wait on the crystalline steps have been indoctrinated and purified.
    Outside, darkness looms, eclipsing the sun, the moon, and the stars. The only visible light emanates from the Prism Palace, but it lends an eerie, foreboding contrast to the blackness that pervades the Island.
    In the tunnels beneath the palace, hundreds of men toil in the mines, extracting crystals and gemstones from the rocky earth. Glass lanterns provide an uneven, yellow illumination. The heat is unbearable, and some of the men falter from a lack of oxygen.
    As the stones are chipped away, they are piled onto a cart. When the cart is filled, a worker pushes it to the end of the mineshaft where the slave master examines each sample and places it in a bucket. The bucket is lowered by a long rope into an underground well to cleanse the stones. When the bucket rises, the stones are clean and sparkle in their raw, natural beauty.
    Inside his hideaway cave dwelling, Ishtar stares intently into the flickering light of the campfire. He would jump into the flames and disintegrate into ashes if it would solve
    his dilemma. He rubs his eyes and runs a weary hand over his beard. Dorinda offers him a drink, but Ishtar just waves it away.
    “You cannot blame yourself, Ishtar,” Dorinda tries to console him. “You thought you were helping our people, but you were deceived, too, by Jaycina's lies.”
    “I cannot believe she would betray us,” Ishtar he says angrily. “She let me use my skills, my knowledge to design the Temple. I provided the bio-magnetic codes for the Crystal Chamber and literally condemned the Islanders to a life of slavery and hopelessness. How could I have been so blind?”
    “What you did, you did in good faith, Ishtar.”
    Ishtar bolts upright and paces back and forth in torment. “Tell that to Saliana, to my daughter, imprisoned by that hideous – that hideous thing they call our ruler, our god. How can Saliana ever forgive me for what I've done?” Ishtar buries his face in his hands, artistic hands that have brought to life the dream of a divine spirit. Now the dream has been corrupted.
    Dorinda stands beside her dear friend. “Saliana knows that you would never have deliberately brought her to harm. She trusts and loves you now as she did when she accompanied you to the palace. You cannot break under this pain you bear. You must be strong, to find a way to help her.”
    Ishtar picks up his tools, those of a craftsman who works with metals and gemstones. “How, Dorinda? With these?” He shakes the primitive implements angrily in the air. “They are outmoded and useless without the stones and minerals that once flourished on this side of the Island. I have barely enough crystal to make a trinket. He has all of it. That monster. He has all the power now. He is invincible.” Ishtar tosses the tools onto his worktable in disgust. “And now, with Saliana's music, he will also be immortal.”
    Dorinda grips Ishtar's arm. “No. We must not let that happen. We must find someone to help us.”
    “But who, Dorinda? There is no one left but you and I, and Judiah. The others are too weak or too sick to be of any use.”
    “It must be someone not from the Island, but someone who does share your knowledge and your courage. He will rescue Saliana and destroy the Glass Snake.”
    Ishtar is skeptical, but curious. “How will you find such as soul? And how can you possibly entice him to come here at the risk of his own life?”
    “He will come, Ishtar,” Dorinda promises, “to save a life that means more to him than his own.”

Four
    Port Avalon, first day of Summer
     
    David pulls on a thin rope, hoists a small wire basket