Jonah Read online

  Books by Dana Redfield

  Ezekiel's Chariot

  Lucy Blue and the Daughters of Light

  Nonfiction

  Summoned: Encounters with Alien Intelligence

  Jonah

  Dana Redfield

  Copyright 2000

  by Dana Redfield

  All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this

  work in any form whatsoever, without permission

  in writing from the publisher, except for brief passages

  in connection with a review.

  Cover design by Jane Hagaman

  Cover art by Anne Dunn

  Interior art by Rebecca Whitney

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  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 99-95401

  ISBN 1-57174-156-9

  10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

  Printed on acid-free paper in the United States

  Dedicated

  to FRANK DeMARCO,

  friend, editor, starmeister…

  Knowing you has enriched my life immeasurably.

  “We each have a unique point of view of the world, George. That is what we have been given to work with. As we develop that gift, we make our contribution.”

  “To…”

  “To the human race. To life. Each of us is given something unique, to enrich the whole.”

  page 123, MESSENGER

  a sequel to Lost Horizon

  Frank DeMarco

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Geshlama

  Part I

  ZION

  Part II

  JONAH

  Part III

  In the BELLY of STAR ROCK

  Part IV

  THE ART of INVISIBILITY

  Epilogue

  Star Valley

  Geshlama

  {As remembered by Zion Rose…}

  It was a good plan. Even the high elders said it was a good plan…but that was after one fairchild disintegrated, and another fell to Earth….

  If the fairchildren had consulted the high elders, they would have said, “It is a good plan…but have you considered the free will of the archons who reign over the red zones surrounding Earth? ”

  What archons? the children might have chimed…for a certain young lady had convinced them the archons were a myth…. One would think children who could fly, children who lived on love and light, would be satisfied. But like children on Earth, the fairchildren of Geshlama wanted to distinguish themselves as very bright, and especially brave.

  The plan to open a vortex on Earth was conceived by the fairchildren on a hazy, autumn day at mid-break from classes. The blue September roses were in bloom; red and golden leaves whirled in the wind; and birds sang and played in the fountains on the grounds of Topaz, the teaching temple. Older students in colorful tunics, teachers in black, and less ambitious fairchildren in white, mingled outdoors, none aware of the daring five, huddled together in conspiracy under the shade of a pearl tree.

  The plan was sealed in their minds; that night, one by one, the five fairchildren left their homes, and stole into Pali-uli, the sacred dome in the center of Geshlama. There in the shadowy darkness, murmuring in hushed tones, by the light of their palms, the fairchildren studied the sacred Earth maps. By a consensus of feeling, they chose the North America landmass, then, swinging a pearl on a string, they divined the precise destination. The name of the vortex was Hopi; the name of the mountain, Star Pass. The fairchildren made their pact then, palm to palm, sharing light and love.

  The youngest adventurer, nine years of age, was a fairlad by the name of Lancel, a joy to the Silver Arrow clan. Also of the Silver Arrow clan was Erianthmer, age fourteen. Both boys adored Therin of the Cedar Bow clan, practically a man at seventeen. Ariel, Therin's fifteen-year-old sister, was one of the five, but…the high elders would later question…why did they include in the adventure a fairchild of the Indigo Veil clan? Silver Arrowsmen and Cedar Bow clansmen, yes—adventure was in the blood. But those of the Indigo Veil were scholars and devotees of the mystical arts.

  Recent migrants from the Zalos star cluster, the Indigo Veil clansmen were priests and warriors—tall, hawk-faced fellows who wore pointed skullcaps and bodysuits. Distinguished by veils the color of midnight blue, the women moved about Geshlama with the grace of swans, often disappearing into the sacred library, and staying there for days on end. A strange and secretive people, the Indigo Veils were newcomers to Geshlama. They were active in the Great Plan, very willing to serve, but not an adventurer among them. So everyone had thought….

  Before they tumbled, the fairchildren thoroughly prepared. To enrich the plan, they consulted the sacred books of Pali-uli to determine a proper human contact. Brightening the light on Earth would bring them praise, but if they activated a communication link, surely they would glow!

  Lo and behold, they did find in the sacred books a name vibration suitable to serve as a communication link—a man who lived in a valley north of the chosen vortex. Next, they thought to confirm the name of the man. They could not be too careful, all agreed. But Ariel worried—what if the man was not of a will to cooperate? The scribes used codes to mark such things, but none of the fairchildren could decipher the codes. It was decided, if they could confirm his name in the Holy Tree, they would trust the man was of a will to cooperate.

  The Holy Tree towered beside the sacred dome. With bark of a golden texture, it glowed in the dark. Should an elder notice them and inquire of their activity, the fairchildren agreed they would say Dame Helea ordered them to report on the Jordan River clan—almost the truth—JO was the limb they meant to investigate.

  The tallest branches on “Old Holy” extended as high as the highest peaks on the Royal Mountains. But Therin would not have to climb to the top, for the tallest branches were the new tree growing up out of the center. At the end of the Great Cycle, Old Holy would crack and fall away from the emergent tree.

  All of the leaves on all of the golden limbs and branches shimmered an iridescent greenish blue. When breezes danced through the branches, the leaves tinkled like wafer-thin gems. When a child was born on Earth, a tiny bud appeared, the leaf unfolding when the child became an adult. The leaf shimmered on the branch for as long as the adult was alive on Earth. At death, the leaf dropped. Daily the harvesters gathered the fallen leaves and took them into Pali-uli to the scribes who recorded the deaths in the sacred books. Leaves with names of those still cycling in Earth's reincarnational orbits were deposited in the living Midiakwa River, which surrounded Pali-uli like a swirling moat, and flowed down to the white birth zones around Earth.

  How, and where, the Midiakwa River connected to Earth was one of the mysteries the fairchildren would not know until they were elders. “No one knows,” said the girl they called “Veil.” But the fairchildren of Geshlama were skeptical of this child of the Indigo Veil. How did she know no one knew? She was new to Geshlama, and didn't even have any history on Earth.

  (The fairchildren called the slender girl with the long black hair and dark-blue eyes “Veil,” because she had no proper name. The Indigo Veils were strange…allowing their fairchildren to select their own names during ceremonies for the eighteenth birthday. Everyone knew that a name was a powerful herald of a soul's
destiny—a sacred mystery Geshlamans believed should not be tampered with by the vicissitudes of will—especially exercised in youth!

  The fairchildren's plan was a pearl in an ocean compared to the Great Plan. Once upon a time, the fairchildren were taught, Geshlama and Gaia (Earth's birth name), were man and wife worlds, connected by a ring. Still today, many Earthlings exchange rings in the marriage ceremony, as a faith symbol that one day Gaia and Geshlama will reunite.

  The fairchildren were taught that eons ago a jealous suitor lusting after Gaia challenged Geshlama to a duel. The suitor's sword was a lightning bolt, but Geshlama had only a palm frond. The suitor slashed the ring and Gaia fell into the webcoils prepared to ensnare her.

  And the Council on Zalos said fair was fair.

  After the severing, Geshlama's tears flowed so fluently, he flourished in rich vegetation. Deep lakes and wide, swiftly flowing rivers formed, full of every kind of fish and aquatic wonder. In sorrow, Geshlama blossomed. Taking pity, the Council on Zalos promised a day of reckoning. If Geshlamans faithfully kept the books of life for Gaia's children, and shined light down upon her, someday she would spring free of the webcoils that separated man and wife worlds.

  But this would not happen by magic. Everyone had to make light and diligently mind the books. By and by, cousin, aunt, and uncle worlds joined Geshlama in the Great Plan. The day of reckoning was near. Soon a slender window would appear, through which the guardians, angels, and warriors would spin across the spiral time tunnels and slash the webcoils, setting Gaia free. The webcoils would recoil upon the spawn of the suitor, the archons, and plunge them into the Dark Abyss. Wherever that was…

  Veil laughed when the fairchildren of Geshlama told her about Gaia and the Great Plan. “What a quaint mythology,” she said.

  The fairchildren were encouraged by her boldness. The archons, she said, lived far west of the Unisphere. Their kingdom was called Covetloch—a place that did not exist. Veil was always saying enigmatic things like this. It made Therin want her for a mate.

  “You know where the safe zones are, don't you?” Veil taunted.

  In secret, Therin studied the starry vault maps and learned the coordinates by heart—and the chants to sing in harmony with the Sacred Music Clock.

  The fairchildren gathered round Old Holy, and Therin climbed up the trunk, in search of the leaf that would confirm that the man named in the sacred books would indeed serve as a proper communication link on Gaia. Therin climbed far out on the JO limb, in search of the leaf bearing the name of John Arnold Beaumont.

  “I do not see it!” he called down to the fairchildren below. And then a moment later, “The name is not on the JO branch!”

  “That's why we thought to climb Old Holy,” said Erianthmer. “The scribes sometimes make mistakes—Dame Helea taught.”

  “Look on the RO limb,” Veil called up to Therin. “I have a feeling he changed his name.”

  “What do you feel his name is now?” Therin said from his perch at the J-I fork.

  “Jonah…I don't know the rest.”

  “But Jonah is also JO!” Therin complained. “Should be here somewhere….”

  Just then, three elders passed close to the Holy Tree. Therin was so nervous he made the leaves tinkle, the fairchildren would later joke, but now they all fell silent, adopting the serious looks of serious students, as they gazed up at the tree, as if to count the leaves. When the elders were far down the path, Veil called up to Therin, “I feel Jonah may be deeply hidden. A graft, perhaps. Look on the RO limb.”

  In a few moments, Therin said, “By Rose, you are right!”

  The fairchildren palmed the girl with light for her Indigo Veil insight.

  “But the name is Jonah Quiller Mahoney,” Therin said in consternation. “Why on Gaia is he on the Rose Clan branch of the RO limb?”

  “Oh, you know Earthlings,” said Ariel. “Always making new plans, changing things, mixing everything up.”

  Should they consult the books for a link less questionable? But this JO-RO fellow was the only one listed, young Lancel reminded. Cheer up! Was not the name of the vortex Hopi—surely a divine sign their hopes would be crowned with success?

  The night the fairchildren chose to tumble, the light radiating from the Zalos cluster was especially bright, and closer to Earth, Jupiter in Aquarius shone above the gibbous moon. Clothed in clean white tunics, the five fairchildren met at Topaz, and from there they flew, hands locked, up to the highest amethyst peak on the Royal Mountains.

  With a whoop of joy, the fairchildren leapt into the starry vault.

  Strong crosswinds caused them to break apart, but they were experienced free travelers. Each curled, each sang the sacred chant…“Emmanuel, Emmanuel, God is with us”…in perfect rhythm with the Sacred Music Clock. At the sixtieth chant, they unrolled in the safe zones surrounding Earth. Locking hands, they descended through the Van Allen belts over Mount Vancouver, then sailed southward until Therin shouted that he could see the Hopi vortex!

  Ecstatic, the fairchildren hovered like hummingbirds in the warm air above the vortex. They could smell sage, cedar, and sand, and by the light of the moon, they could see up and down the valley the dark silhouettes of sandstone mountains, arches, and monoliths. It seemed a bleak place, devoid of trees and water. Had they made a mistake? “Holy things happen in deserts,” Therin proclaimed, and ordered them to form the arrow, as planned.

  Uncoiling silver cords looped around his waist, Therin wrapped them securely around the waists of the four fairchildren, entwining them, forming them into an arrow.

  Then he kissed Veil upon her lips!

  Once more, for luck, they all chanted, “Emmanuel, Emmanuel, God is with us”…then, gripping the silver cords like the reins of a horse, Therin pushed the four fairchildren. Down they plunged, deep into the vortex. The fairchildren screamed with joy, and Therin hauled on the silver cords, reining them back up the sky.

  Perhaps it was the light they made, reveling above the vortex that attracted the archons….

  “They came like monsters on dark horses,” Ariel said, tearfully recounting the horror before the high elders. The council room was filled with chief elders from every clan. “They had fire rods, and they rode the horses fast and hard, flashing their terrible fire across the silvery night. A fire rod slashed at Lancel, and he exploded into a thousand points of light! Veil shot straight down into the vortex, and did not come up. Therin wrapped around me and Erianthmer, and we formed an arrow. I do not know how we escaped!”

  “Did the Indigo Veil fairchild plunge into the vortex of her own volition?” the high elders wanted to know, after Ariel confessed the tragedy.

  “A monster slashed her cord, and she fell!” Therin said so loud it was almost a shout. His face was very red. “I will return and transport her home!” he said with great emotion.

  Impossible, the fairchildren learned that day. The archons had spun webcoils tightly over every vortex on Earth, expressly to prevent penetration. They had their books, too; perhaps they even knew the name of the man commissioned to open the vortex at Star Pass. Did the fairchildren not think to wonder why a man would change his name? Did they not consult the codes in the sacred books? The codes showed clearly the man would not change his name for many years to come, would not move to the valley for perhaps twenty more years.

  One note of bright news: the high elders knew that Lancel was recovering in the blue zone. His parents were with him now, melding with his soul, to restore his body-particular.

  But the one they called “Veil” was gone.

  Watching Therin weep, Erianthmer vowed he would someday help his cousin rescue the girl they all loved!

  If she lived. Would she survive? Could she survive? An Indigo Veil on Earth!

  Her mother, Elzinan, then spoke. She stood tall, a woman with black hair as long as her veil. “She can survive. She has two fathers. One is of the Rose clan.”

  Everyone in the council room gasped.

  Two fat
hers? The Indigo Veils were strange beyond imagination! Even if one of the fathers were merely a donor, such a deviation was unthinkable!

  Elzinan's proper mate was a warrior, a man gone often and long….

  Who was the deviant Geshlaman? Every eye of every male in the room blinked with equal innocence.

  Was it proper to rejoice that the child was one-third Rose? The Rose clan was a very old bloodline on Earth, some comfort in that.

  The high elders sat unblinking, thinking.

  The child lost was eleven years of age, a blink of an eye on Geshlama where everyone lived for hundreds of years. In this and other small ways, Geshlamans differed from Earthlings. But in matters of the heart, they all learned that day…even Indigo Veils were human.

  Sort of…

  PART I

  ZION

  They had their say, and then I killed them.

  Don't ask me how I did this.

  Chapter A (1)

  25 years later…

  Thunderpaws is one of those cats who sometimes disturbs the people around him for the pleasure of watching them make fools of themselves, cooing and wooing, setting before him Fancy Feasts and other prizes, bells and squeaky rubber mice, to restore his affections. Other times, bored and restless, Thunderpaws pulls a stunt that, if he were a kid, would earn him loss of dessert, a favorite TV program, or worse punishments, depending.

  It is one of those times…a boring overcast day in November of 1998. Employing a special HISS-SCREECH that can drive a grown man to frenzy, the Paws leaps over Dilly Dain's fence, and sets to chasing in six directions Dilly's six pot-bellied pigs (the suckers are worth a couple of thousand each, heightening the thrill of the chase), until the fat little hairless things squeal at such a pitch of grief, only a dead woman could ignore the ruckus. Out the door Dilly runs, thrashing the yellow broom she believes will serve as a injurious instrument, if only she can get within hammering distance of that damn cat, who is again marauding her double-thousand-dollar pigs. Thunderpaws spreads his legs like wings and sails over the fence.