Chapter 2 - The Dolmen of Whispering Stars

Moonlight pooled across the salt-damp meadow like quicksilver as Charlie, Sarah, and their parents followed Angus toward the jagged silhouette of the Ulster dolmen. Though the spell-door had whisked them leagues from the burning barn, Charlie's chest still thrummed with the echo of plasma fire—and with something else, a rhythmic pulse matching each step, as though unseen drums kept pace beneath the earth.

They crested a low ridge. There, half sunk in heather, rose three titanic slabs of granite: two upright and one balanced across their shoulders, forming a doorway older than written song. Carved spirals glowed faintly along the lintel, their light waxing as Charlie approached.

"Ley-lines converge here," Angus said, planting his ash staff. "When the stars stand guard, the dolmen remembers its purpose."

Sarah hugged herself, breath clouding in the hard spring air. "It looks like a tomb."

"A womb and a tomb can share stones," Angus replied. "Both birth what the world forgets."

Charlie swallowed. "You mean… me?"

"Partly." His grandfather's gaze softened. "But also us. Humanity buried its own brilliance after the reptilians chained our skies. Tonight we start the digging out."

Leyla brushed the dolmen's lintel, murmuring a greeting in an antique tongue. Runes flared, and the capstone lifted a finger-breadth—just enough for fragrant warmth to spill from the darkness below. Richard unslung a storm lantern, its wick already coaxed to life by the residual magic of the spell-door. One by one they ducked inside.

The chamber beneath the dolmen was unexpectedly vast—a honeycomb of vaulted passages chiseled from quartz-veined rock, walls glittering like frozen starlight. Constellations had been etched into every surface, their patterns shifting as Charlie's lantern beam danced across them. At the heart of the cavern stood a circular platform of green marble inlaid with gold lines that converged at a central depression shaped for a human footprint.

Waiting there, cloaked in a robe the hue of ravens' wings, was a tall woman with silver streaks in her black hair and eyes the same flint-grey as Angus's.

"Maeve Mutton," Leyla greeted, and embraced her sister-in-law. "Thank you for holding vigil."

"I would not have missed it," Maeve replied, voice dusky and melodic. She touched Charlie's cheek, fingertips crackling with static. "The stars said you would come tonight, laddie. They also said we bleed time."

Richard set the lantern aside. "Then let's begin the Sigilfasting."

Maeve nodded and drew a curved dagger, its blade opalescent. Sarah squeaked, but Maeve laid a calming hand on her shoulder. "No harm, wee one—just tradition."

From a stone casket she lifted a scroll bound by crimson ribbon. Unfurling it revealed an ancient chart: concentric circles of symbols Charlie half-recognized from his great-grandfather's journal.

"Stand barefoot on the keystone," Maeve instructed.

Charlie's hands trembled as he unlaced his shoes. The marble was warm against his skin, as if heated from below. Gold veins shimmered, and the hum inside his bones synchronized with a deeper resonance emanating from the floor.

Maeve rotated the scroll until a sigil—an eight-pointed star bisected by twin serpents—aligned with Charlie's chest. Angus intoned solemn words in Gaelic, then English:

"Blood of Mutton, Flame of Shams, bearer of the Template unshackled, awaken memory, seal lineage, cloak the mind from scales of tyranny."

Maeve lightly pricked Charlie's index finger with the dagger. A bead of blood struck the marble depression and—hissed, as if it were molten metal hitting water. Golden light erupted in branching webs up Charlie's legs, coursing into his torso, until his whole body blazed like a lighthouse.

Pain seared—sharp yet strangely distant, like thunder far from the storm. Images flooded his mind: pyramids glowing beneath a violet sky; warriors in tartan wielding swords of light; a woman with sun-disc earrings scattering seeds onto red soil; his great-grandfather in khaki uniform whispering over a battlefield map. All these visions stitched together into a tapestry, and at its center pulsed a geometric heart made of pure song.

You are the Gifted, a hundred ancestral voices intoned. And we are the choir behind your voice. Sing true.

When the brightness faded, Charlie swayed but remained upright. The glowing veins receded beneath his skin, though a faint lattice lingered like sunburn. Maeve tied a strip of linen around his wounded finger, kissed his forehead, and whispered, "It is sealed."

Richard exhaled. "How do you feel, son?"

"Like… I remember things I never learned," Charlie said, voice hoarse. He flexed his arms; static arced between fingertips. "And the hum is louder, but it's mine now, not theirs."

Leyla smiled—a proud, fierce crescent. "Then the veil on your mind is set. Even Tzeker's psionic probes will find only fog."

Angus lifted the ash staff. Runes along its length now glimmered in sympathy with Charlie's pulse. "We must move. The ritual lights a beacon the reptiles can sniff across an ocean."

Commander Tzeker did not need an ocean; he needed only patience—and ambition. Aboard his obsidian dreadnought, he watched holographic maps bloom with fresh telemetry. A crimson flare ignited over Ulster. Tzeker's slit pupils widened.

"Eventborn location confirmed," hissed the sensor tech.

Tzeker's talons drummed the console. "Dispatch the Hushkin—our native collaborators. Let them flush the quarry from stone." He caressed a jagged amulet dangling from his neck: a shard of black crystal rumored to drink souls. "And prepare the psion-wells. I want the boy's lattice gleaned before his Ascension."

Back beneath the dolmen, Maeve guided the family along a tunnel that climbed steeply until it opened to a cliffside ledge overlooking the midnight Atlantic. Waves hammered rocks far below, issuing salty spray that glittered around them like shattered glass.

"The next sanctuary lies there." She pointed across the water to an island crowned by jagged crags. Torches flickered atop a stone monastery clinging impossibly to the sheer face. "Skellig Ionrach. The monks kept solar archives safe from reptilian censors. We go by sky."

Angus chuckled when Charlie's eyes lit. "Well, lad, you wondered when you'd fly."

Charlie's pulse quickened. "Now?"

"Now," Maeve confirmed. She and Leyla clasped Charlie's hands, forming a triangle. Richard lifted Sarah onto his back. Angus tapped the ledge with his staff, rune-light rippling outward to form a translucent platform.

"Breath steady," Leyla coached. "Imagine gravity as a polite suggestion you needn't obey."

Charlie inhaled salt and starlight. The hum within him surged. Invisible threads tugged at his bones—upward. His feet eased off the stone, knees trembling. Leyla and Maeve followed, robes billowing. Angus rose last, staff acting as a keel. They drifted out over the churning void.

Sarah shouted with delight. Richard grinned despite wind tears streaking his cheeks. Charlie dared glance down; the sea yawned beneath like liquid night, yet terror felt diluted, as though a barrier of golden light cushioned his mind against vertigo.

"Lean forward to steer," Maeve called. Charlie angled his torso; momentum obeyed. He laughed—pure, incredulous joy. I'm flying, truly flying!

A thunderclap cut his jubilation. From the mainland, seven sleek skimmers roared, their dark hulls bristling with energy lances. At each prow crouched a Hushkin—humans in black livery, faces masked with serpent-scale motifs. They were descendants of families who had traded ancestry's freedom for reptilian privilege. Charlie sensed their thoughts like knives: Capture. Rend. Obey.

Angus barked, "Scatter formation!"

Leyla veered right, Richard left. Plasma shots streaked, searing the air where their cluster had been. Charlie banked sharply, wind shrieking. Maeve, still clasping his hand, uttered a sharp incantation; mist rose from the sea, coalescing into translucent curtains that muddled the skimmers' targeting systems.

But one rider broke through, lashing a hooked chain toward Charlie's ankle. Instinct trumped training—Charlie kicked, and a burst of kinetic force rocketed from his heel. The skimmer flipped end-over-end, pilot screaming as he tumbled into the waves.

"Nice reflex," Maeve panted. "But use focus—scatter your blast or you'll tire."

Charlie nodded, heart drumming double-time. Another skimmer closed on Richard and Sarah. The Hushkin leveled a sonic cannon. Charlie reached with his mind—Stop!—and the device shattered like brittle ice. The assailant clutched bleeding ears; the craft veered off, engine sputtering.

The remaining five formed a wedge. Angus raised his staff; sapphire light arced, weaving hexagonal shields before each family member. Plasma hissed against them, dispersing into sparks.

"We can't outfly them for long," Richard shouted across the wind. "Skellig's ramparts are warded—if we reach them—"

A dull roar interrupted: a massive shape hurtled from the monastery island, wings beating thunder. A gargantuan stone eagle, animated by ancient glyphs, dove upon the skimmers. Its talons, forged of obsidian, sliced hulls like parchment. Pilots scattered in panic. One skimmer exploded, raining debris into the sea.

The eagle circled back and hovered, its runic eyes glowing amber. From its back dismounted three monks in sun-bleached robes. The eldest inclined his shaven head.

"Angus Mutton, steward of the Archive, we answer your flare."

"Brother Kelan, your timing is divine." Angus gestured to Charlie. "The boy is the Eventborn."

Brother Kelan's gaze softened. "Then all our vigils were worthwhile. Come—Skellig's sanctuary still stands."

The eagle stooped, allowing Richard to settle Sarah between its stone feathers and helping Charlie manifest a platform of light beside it. Together they hurtled toward the island as the eagle's screech split the night—equal parts welcome and warning.

Commander Tzeker watched two red blips disappear from his tactical display, lost to static near Skellig Ionrach. He exhaled a cloud of vaporized frustration. "So, the monks still meddle."

A junior officer approached with a data-slate. "Commander, we intercepted civilian chatter near the boy's hometown—a psychiatrist filed a report labeling the child schizophrenic following auditory-hallucination episodes. The doctor is… amenable to manipulation."

Tzeker's eyes gleamed. "Leverage him. If we cannot seize the boy, we can poison public perception. A world that fears him will do our work for us."

He turned back to the viewport, talons clasped behind his back. The planet's night side glittered with oblivious cities. "Send word to all sleeper cells: the Eventborn must not reach Ascension Day. Activate Operation Veil."

Atop Skellig Ionrach's wind-scoured plateau, the Mutton family stood within a circle of ancient sunwheels carved into the flagstones. Torches flickered, illuminating sea spray and faces lined with equal parts weariness and wonder. Above them, the stone eagle settled onto a perch, wings folding with the grind of tectonic plates.

Brother Kelan offered Charlie a clay cup of luminous water. "From the Well of Solar Memory," he explained. "It will soothe the Sigilfasting's burn."

Charlie drank; cool light slid down his throat, easing the ache in his bones. Sarah, drowsy against their mother's shoulder, whispered, "That was better than any roller-coaster."

Richard chuckled softly, then sobered. "Tzeker's forces will not relent. How long can Skellig shield us?"

Kelan's smile was sad. "A sanctuary can delay fate, not cancel it. Dawn draws near, and with it the first solar flare of the Alignment. By next sundown we must transport the boy to the Heart-Lattice beneath Tara Hill, where the final cipher rests."

Angus squeezed Charlie's shoulder. "Ready for another quest, lad?"

Charlie gazed at the horizon, where hints of violet foretold sunrise. The winds still smelled of danger, yet beneath them he sensed those same unseen drums—steady now, confident.

"I'm ready," he said. And this time, the hum in his chest sounded like the beginning of a song no empire could silence.