Second Time Through - Book IVChapter 11: The Mountain free porn video
Tuesday, July 20, 1971
How hard could it really be to find a mountain on an island?
I made it out of the Residence and through the seldom-used North Gate without being discovered. From there, I walked out to the only road and headed due north. After only a few minutes, I had left the city behind so I dropped my shield. Now, I was just another teenaged tourist walking on the side of the road at dawn, wearing blue jeans and a sword.
My luck was running true to form this morning as it wasn’t fifteen minutes later when a somewhat battered Renault with a red light on top and the word ‘Police’ in French and Tapatoan on the sides, pulled alongside of me and rolled down her window.
“Can we help you,” the policewoman asked in her native Tapatoan. When I didn’t respond, she repeated her question first in French, and then finally in English.
“I don’t know if you can,” I replied honestly. “I am looking for the mountain where the first protector died.”
There ensued a lengthy discussion between the officers. I gathered that one of them, the one who spoke English, wanted to take me to the police barracks because I was wearing a sword. However, the older one must have heard about the American who had recently arrived on Tapato for his coronation and so advised a more diplomatic course of action. Scanning them did me absolutely no good, as had been the case all week, simply because I understood very little Tapatoan. Finally, the younger officer asked me if I had any identification.
“It’s in my room, ma’am,” I told her respectfully, “back at the Royal Residence.”
Another, more animated exchange followed, before the older officer got out of the car and offering me her seat, climbed in the back.
“We would be honored to escort His Highness to Palakalani’Ii Mountain,” the younger officer said as she put the Renault into gear. The officer in the back said her name was Halaini’ka, but she didn’t say much more.
Out of habit, I scanned both officers and while doing so, I noticed a large lump in the older officer’s left breast. Without asking, I started working on it as we rode. It didn’t take me too long and I was finished before we reached the mountain.
Which was good because after driving for only fifteen minutes, they stopped at a small car park, with a wooden sign indicating a very well-worn path that headed up the mountain.
Lanali, the one that spoke English, asked, “Would Your Highness like for one of us to escort you?”
“No thank you,” I replied. “This is something I believe I must do on my own.”
I watched as they pulled out of the car park and headed back in the direction we had come. I was sure that my whereabouts would be public knowledge soon. So with a sigh, I turned and started up the mountain.
Like I said, how hard can it be to find a mountain on an island!
As I started up the mountain, the memory of the story Kalani had originally told me, back in Colorado, came back to me.
“Remember, my prince, you are also the Pele Solakanali, and as such, they belong to you,” Kalani told me solemnly.“Me? Why do they belong to me?” I asked as we passed the Pavilion.
Kalani stopped and looked at me. I could tell she wasn’t sure if she wanted to answer my question. I felt myself becoming intrigued. I knew it would do no good to scan her; the majority of her thoughts were in her native language. So, I waited.
Finally, she said, “We are an old people, Michael. And the sword’s history goes back to the beginning of our time and the very first of our people who lived on Tapato. Part of my responsibility as queen, is to pass those stories of our beginning on to the heir. I began telling them to Mikeya and Ileana when they were young. As did my mother to me. The stories have been passed from mother to daughter for many generations.”
Kalani stopped, hesitating. I nodded for her to continue.
“Many, many years ago, so the story goes, a strange young man was washed ashore, wearing those items. He claimed that his ship, a mighty ship, had been lost at sea, and he had floated on an unusual piece of his ship for many days before being washed ashore on Tapato. He was just at death’s door when Tejuan-li, who was the first queen, found him on the beach and nursed the strange young man back to health.
“He appeared to look like us, but he was not Tapatoan. After questioning him at length, they determined that he was not from one of the neighboring islands, sent to spy on us. I think it was the scars. It was said that he had many scars on his body and he claimed he had received them while fighting off large dogs that were bigger than a man. He told many other wild tales of his journeys; most were not believed,” Kalani told me. “But since he was judged not to be an enemy, he was allowed to stay.”
I recognized that the story she was repeating had been repeated many times through the years, and figured that it had likely grown with the telling.
“At that time, the Challenge, which was the contest I told you of earlier, was held each year after the pearl harvest was through, usually in December. When the time came, the strange young man begged the queen to be allowed to compete. He won, of course, and became her unofficial protector. Each year after that, he defended his role, until finally, no one would even challenge him. When that happened, Tejuan’li made him the official Protector and a member of the royal family.”
“He must have been very good,” I agreed.
“Oh, he was. He was very strong, and he knew how to fight in ways the men of Tapato did not know. As the Protector, he became the leader of our defensive forces, teaching the men of Tapato how to fight as he did. During all the years he was the Protector, our island remained safe and secure, never again falling to invaders,” Kalani explained. “Tapato had peace and prosperity for a long time as he remained the Queen’s Protector. First, for Tejuan’li, and then her daughter, and then for each succeeding queen after that for nine generations.”
“Nine generations! That’s over two hundred years!” I exclaimed as I calculated quickly in my head.
“That is so,” Kalani said. “They say that while the villagers were born, lived, and finally died all around him during that time, the Protector never aged. Except maybe when he cried. They say that sometimes, he would talk of his one true love who waited for him on some distant shore. Then he would lament how that, with his ship at the bottom of the sea, he could never return home to her. And how he would never know true love again. Then he would disappear into the jungle for a while, and when he returned, he would appear to have aged slightly.”
“What happened to him?” I asked.
“Everyone knows that part of the story, for it is still told, even today,” Kalani said. “One day, when the Protector was serving his ninth queen, Nepolimée, the island began to tremble and smoke belched from the top of the mountain. Everyone thought the gods were angry with Tapato, and were sending the burning rivers of red fire down the mountainside to destroy the island. The queen and the people prayed for many days, but the gods refused to answer. Finally, when the sky began to turn dark, and the danger seemed imminent, the Protector left Nepolimée and began walking up the mountain. The queen and all the people in the village followed him. When he reached the top of the mountain, they watched as he drove his sword, your sword now, into the earth near the mouth of the volcano, and spoke to the gods in a strange language as the storm clouds turned dark.”
“My sword?” I asked.
“Don’t interrupt,” Kalani said curtly. “As I was saying, when the Protector finished speaking to the gods, he came to kneel before Nepolimée. He asked her to forgive him, then told her that the gods would someday send another Protector. He made Nepolimée promise to keep his possessions safe until the gods sent someone for them. Kissing her one last time, he returned to where he had driven his sword into the ground. Then, with everyone watching, he placed one hand on the hilt of the sword, and the other, the hand with the ring, he raised to the sky.”
Kalani hesitated. I knew she was translating the story to English for me, and figured she was looking for the right words.
“They say that a powerful bolt of light went from his ring up to the heavens, and that another bolt, even stronger, answered back. It went through the Protector and the sword, striking deep into the mountain and killing the evil spirits within. Everyone around the Protector was knocked to the ground by the blast, and when they looked, he was no longer there. The only things that remained of him were his crown, his sword, his gauntlets ... and his ring. The next day, the mountain became quiet again. It has remained quiet, even to this day.”
Kalani looked at me now. Tears filled her eyes.
“My people have waited over three hundred years for the gods to send you to claim the sword and the ring,” she said as she sank to her knees in front of me, bowing her head.
“But ... but how do you know they’re mine?” I asked, confused.
“It’s simple, really,” she thought to me, somewhat sheepishly. “You did not die when A’komi slipped the ring on your finger.”
I unconsciously shuddered as I recalled her telling me how I could have died when A’komi slipped the ring on my finger and decided to take a short break.
Looking out from the mountain where I had settled on a convenient log, I stared at the sea as I considered details of her story that I had not considered before.
Paramount among them was why I hadn’t died when A’komi slipped on the ring.
When Narvenia and Spiro had transferred my being into the brain-dead Michael, along with my mind and all my memories, they had given me a new life in a new time. But nothing they had done, had any connection whatsoever with ancient Tapato or their Protector. So why had the ring not killed me?
“Maybe the ring had somehow lost its power to destroy over time,” I thought. However, the only way I could think of to test that theory was to find some male with a death wish to try touching the ring. I then considered a couple of other theories, each more outlandish than the first, before I conceded that I wasn’t going to find the answer sitting on a log on the side of an ancient volcano. Rising to my feet, I began trekking up the mountain again.
“I wonder whatever happened to that ‘unusual part of his ship’ that he floated in on?” making a mental note to ask Mamunukealilie if she had any idea where it might have gotten to.
And then there was the object of my quest today. Where had the Protector gone when he went away to grieve?
All very good questions. All with no answers. Hopefully something on top the mountain would lead me to the answers.
A short time later I rounded a bend near the crest and there before me was an open area, surrounded by a knee high fence of piled stones. Near an opening in the stone fence was a sign. I studied it for a moment as I caught my breath, but I could only make out a few of the Tapatoan words.
Moving into the grassy knoll, I wandered absently towards the only object inside the fenced area, a polished stone, standing all alone, void of any inscriptions, like an altar to an unknown deity. Tired from my climb, I sat down with my legs crossed Indian style and leaned back against the stone altar. With no other ideas, I finally drew Flaminia from her sheath and using just the power in my arms, thrust the sword, point first, into the earth.
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