The queen beat a track into the earth, her pacing going around the stone bench in a wide oval. The whole time she mumbled curses and promises to kill Angelina. After her daughter managed to calm her, Eliza went silent, the sound of her steps and vexed breathing were still loud thumps in the night. She listened to Diana’s accounts aboard the Pirate’s ship, the unabridged version, face flushing and eyes watering whenever it came to any harm dealt to her daughter, mental and physical. She clutched her mouth with a pained gasp at the mention of Diana being silenced. Her fingers reached out for her daughter’s projection, wanting desperately to comfort her. Then Jonah’s illness made sense, and even though she had never seen him, she knew of Diana's care for her sweetheart and in her dark gaze there was equal fury.

“You’re certain the Flies are gone, mother?” Diana asked.

Looking to the palace, her hawk still there, she nodded. The stress was adding years to her mother’s timeless face, and the princess had to hurry through the rest. Quickly, she described her first conversation and the true reason it was broken up into two parts.

“Ash Makers, in Alp’a Linn…” the queen breathed, taking a seat. She trembled, hugging herself.

A whoosh came through the night and along the river bank was Diana’s father. He wore his fine midnight blue suit, straightening out the coat of it. His black curls were slicked back and his beard neatly trimmed. He smiled at her, coming to hug his wife, who collapsed in his arms as he sat beside her. Waving his hand, a piece of rune supported parchment hovered in the air, a fine golden feathered quill scratching along it.

“Go on, my sweet girl, I have been listening through Castor, but your mother needs more support,” the king said, kissing Eliza’s head lovingly.

“I’m fine, mother, please, don’t cry over me,” Diana pleaded. She was so glad to have Jonah holding her together, her closed eyes in Alpha were weeping freely.

“A mother weeps anyway for their child,” Augustus said, running his ringed fingers through Eliza’s scarlet locks. His green eyes watered as well.

With a deep breath, wiping her real face off against her sleeve, Diana went on.

“A wise choice, to grow a Sentinel Pine,” Augustus commented once she was done. He took in depth notes about all she said. “I will make sure that the weapon information is not given to Angelina. These new guns present quite a problem, Dee. We were able to counter their lasers with reflection pins, but hot metal and molten plasma on the other hand. I would like to see your man’s arm, safely of course. We can look into development for blocking such weapons in the meantime. The Machinist brought us welders and cutters, their heat is extraordinary. To have it used as a projectile… Thank you, my love.”

Eliza twisted to face her daughter, blushed and tear stained. “You are coming back home, I don’t need you in danger for a moment longer!” she screamed.

Diana and Augustus started at the sudden outburst.

“Eli, darling, stop it,” Augustus said, hugging his wife tightly as she squirmed. It didn’t seem like she wanted to stand, more she was just wildly uncomfortable and nothing would ease it. “You called her here to give her support, there’s no reason to go back on your word now.”

“Support?” Diana wondered.

“Yes, she was going to send you protectors. You don’t seem to be in danger, presently at least. What the Ash Makers said about Blodwyn, oh dear, that is upsetting, but understandable.” He sighed, looking at his record keeping paper. Blinking away tears, he continued, “I have expedited your protection, which isn’t easy. It’s nearly impossible to teleport anywhere around Alp’a Linn.”

“She needs to return home, Gus! She’s dealing with Ash Makers!” Eliza cried at her husband.

“Old men and children, Eli…” the king said softly. “She has Corpine clergy all about her, she’s under watchful eyes, she’s warded, and soon she will have even more protection. Wolf’s boy and Rose will keep her safe.”

“Warren and Rose?” Diana asked, the second name not as appealing to her.

“Yes, darling, they should be there by the end of the day,” the king smiled at her.

“To bring her home…” the queen stated.

Now the king scowled at his wife, a terribly rare occurrence. “If the Ash Makers have not left, then Diana and her fellows can recon and I will arrange a troop to confront them. All of this while not alerting the Heroes. Safe and careful, eh Eli?” He held his wife’s face, trying to coax her out of a sour face with a sweeter look of his own. “Warren is a Captain, he knows how to run an operation.” Eliza’s lips flattened and dipped, but they wouldn’t smile. “We only want peace, don’t we? Think of how wonderful it will look when Diana is the head of a real operation to capture Ash Makers? Our daughter will be a Hero, the first of this hopefully short war.”

“My boyfriend will be one too.” Diana said quietly. “Kalyah, Niae, Warren, Rose…”

“Yes, yes, my love, we will be kind to those poor souls, show the world that we only want Blodwyn gone. We can avoid the destruction…” He took a deep breath, his hands shaking. “Any more destruction. No other mothers or fathers have to lose their children.”

Fully out of her husband’s hold, the queen folded her arms across her stomach, hunching over and staring at the river. “It doesn’t matter what I say, I suppose. You two and your plans don’t include my feelings, nor the constant tearing of soul.”

Augustus ran his hand along her curved back. “Think of Diana, my love. She isn’t happy being contained. If she returns, she will only want to leave again. She has to do something, and the fates or the gods, or probability has brought her here. She has to make her own choices. She’s just like you at that age.”

“I don’t need to be told that, not again,” she sneered.

With a long sigh, the king smiled at his daughter. “Stay safe, I will take care of your mother. Don’t be foolhardy, don’t let your emotions get in the way of your head.” The Master Wizard looked at her with a steeled face, deadly serious.

“I won’t father, I won’t,” Diana said, feeling young again as she shrank before that stare.

He nodded. “Please, once again, let’s go over all of this technology,” he offered. “I hope that simple sound nullification can counter this Blinding noise. No matter what, a Bard will be included should a troop come to the city.”

The queen sat in furious silence on the earth of the shore, hugging her knees to her chest, as the two went over weaponry. The Wizard had Diana go over everything that she remembered, and she asked Jonah for clarification on various topics. Over the course of an hour and a half, the two had several sketched out sheets of the new Ash Maker technology. She also told him of Jonah’s meeting with the Machinist and the Technophile. A few sheets took up every last detail that they could remember on those two as well. The king promised to look into the Machinist.

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“Wolfgang is in the Skies last I heard,” Augustus commented. “I really wish he would break his vow for this. I understand it, but I don’t like it.”

“Yes, maybe information on her could have stopped Blodwyn,” Diana added.

The two met eyes as the queen trembled, quietly sobbing. Without a word, they moved onto another matter. The king said that the Heroes would pay for the pain they had inflicted on Diana, indirectly. If Jonah ever got the solid evidence sorted, then the king would be glad to see it. Having deleted many false tracks, he had yet to find the ones with Fia in them. There were other matters to attend to besides what had happened weeks ago. It didn’t feel like weeks to Diana, more like months. Luann’s death was another lifetime ago, the horror had born Diana and her family anew.

They had all sat on this very bench before, the four of them fit on it nicely. They ate picnics on it and swam in the cool Greed during those hot summers. They had a pool, but sometimes, the Druids wanted to be closer to nature. When Diana was young, Eliza caught the fish, her long lithe body moving through the water as a snake or tiger in her hempen swimsuit. She paddled along with a fish in her jaws, dropping it from her human mouth to her waiting daughters. Diana accepted it glady, amazed by her mother’s transformation, considering it for herself one day. Luann couldn’t stop laughing as a young girl, urging Diana to do it too. Even when she was a young teen, Luann insisted on still riding her mother’s back as she had when she was five. Eliza didn’t mind it was a tiger’s back, not hers. Aiko saw the Archdruid as competition, having Diana swim along with it.

Now, the last three weeks documented, the three sat in silence, even the hawk staring at the river. There was a gaping hole in the love they had shared. They hadn't been all together since Diana had left, and she wasn’t even here now. She wanted to leave, it was too much for the world to be this silent. Where was the laughter? The young girl’s stories? Even the annoying chewing of her food would be better than this.

“I see her, I hear her, I feel her, everywhere…” Eliza admitted suddenly. Her intense feelings withered the Lantern caps and they were thrown into the faint silver of the night. “Sometimes, I wish she never existed. I'd rather mourn a child that never was, one that never drew breath than such a short life. Now I’m stuck with fifteen years of horrible nightmares to remember…”

“Eli, please, stop!” August snapped, more vicious than Diana had heard in a long time.

“No, I don’t mean that. No, I don’t,” Eliza continued, her voice hollow. “I’m just so sad and so angry. That fool child, sleeping in that bedroom. I told her not to be in there! I said, I said, that she would catch her death. That she didn’t have her jars yet, that she would get sick. Castor, I should have left you home with her. I don’t need you, you fucking bastard!” She jabbed her finger out at her hawk, who stood atop a rock on the shore.

The raptor turned its head, blinking.

“You took her tiara, you made her ward it with a spell! You weaved fate! Why? Why did this happen? Speak it! What source do I ask to get my daughter back!? Which god do I pray to?” She rose up, walking towards the river. Throwing her hands up, the water for a hundred feet crackled to ice. The hawk rose, sitting in the willow. She whirled on it. “Tell me! Tell me!” Her hand sprayed out fire.

The Wizard was up, redirecting the fire. The rune sent it out onto the lake, causing the water to boil up on the top. He looked at Diana, an expression of exhaustion on his face. It told her also that this wasn’t the first time. Her mother was broken and was dealing with this far worse than she was. If anyone needed to leave the graveyard that was the palace, then it was the queen. Now wasn’t the time to settle things, she had to leave, before her mother burned down her means of communication.

The queen was in the depths of her bottomless despair. She flopped down onto the ice, bashing her fist into the frozen surface of the river. Her hands were red when they were forcibly stopped by bands of golden magic, she still struggled though, the hawk watching with its emotionless face. Augustus stood over her, considering this matter like one of his rune equations. Although, Diana knew for a fact that none of her father’s work had ever made him sob. There was no repairing this situation with a few corrections, it would never be the same. This was a fundamental change to the existing rules of their family, their universe was forever askew.

“I love you, both of you,” Diana said, returning to the tree.

“I love you too, Diana, your mother sends her love as well,” Augustus said.

“Stop haunting me, you’re supposed to be at peace!” the queen yelled at the top of her voice.

In the glare of Alpha, Jonah had the wind knocked out of him as Diana turned and embraced him. They sat there for a long while, as he brushed her hair with his fingers. He wrapped her curls around his metal fingers, waiting on her to say something. She wasn’t even crying as far as he could tell, but her arms were tight around him. Aiko laid against the two of them, breathing long huffs from its tiger snout.

A long groan left Diana and she surfaced with a drained expression. He held her full cheek, and she leaned into his hand. He knew she had an abundance of pain, but it was worth it. The information they gave her mother and father was needed. If anyone ran into an Ash Maker, thinking they had the same tech as before, then it could be disastrous. They had an obligation to tell them what they knew. Her parents would know what to do with the information, they could keep the source safe.

Breaking from his hold, she laid down into the blooming heather, partly shaded by the strong poplar and much taller Pine. She patted the space beside her as Aiko supported her back. Jonah joined her and he had to admit the plants were soft as bedding, even if these ones weren’t exactly made for it, where people were concerned at least. They stretched out their legs, the organic parts of Jonah’s legs had got quite cramped up.

“They are supposed to drain you of bad humors and restore your vigor,” she said quietly, fingers running through the heather. “I feel so tired, like I’ve run for miles and miles without stopping.”

“Well, I’ve slept a lot today, I’ll stay with you,” he said, holding her hands.

She nodded and held onto his arm as he looked up into the swaying branches of the poplar and the pine.

Maybe an hour later, Jonah woke to the growling of the tiger. Lights flashed before his eyes and rubbing the sleep from them, he saw the source. The Sentinel pine with its deep brown wood and streaks of vibrant blue crystal was lighting up the alleyway. A humming grew and Diana gasped as she sat up, tiny flowers in the curls of hair. On her knees, she placed her hands against the trunk, closing her eyes. Her arms shook for a few seconds, ignoring Jonah’s questioning.

“Children,” she said, struggling to her feet with him. “The children have come to the city. They passed by the park, running.” She fit her belt back on with trembling hands, holding her staff. “We have to leave, they looked terrified.”

Aiko burst through the back door, roaring for the new host’s attention. The elves screamed in terror. “Tell Kalyah we are leaving, have her and the others meet us by Silv’a Park! They have come, they are injured!”

Jonah and Diana were running out of the alleyway into the bright shine of the city, their limbs sore from the unexpected sleep. Aiko met back up with them, bounding on its giant paws, leading them down one street and across another. In a flash, Jonah saw one of the Grand elves in their long mural robes. Through the shadows of an alley, they saw a trio of them walking down a street. He heard chatter and the rush of fabric. Why were they out all of the sudden?

“They’re cleaning their streets,” Diana whispered, as they stopped around the corner of a building. She huffed, trying to catch her breath. The coolness of the city had dried out Jonah’s tongue and hers it seemed. They shared a brief sip of water, finding the canteen was rather low.

“There’s so many,” he whispered back. He checked around one half of the pink streets and its glittering gemstones while Aiko checked the other.

She nodded. “Yes, and the children can’t surface, the Nymphs are confusing them. It looks as if they’ve been in the sewers for a long time.” She held the twig of the Sentinel. “Oh gods, don’t let nature be cruel to them, they're innocent.” She shook her head. “Come on, we must enter from afar and track them…”

The streets were clear, for just a moment as they ran to the nearest back alley and into the sewers.