ALLORY STOOD UPON A Giant’s palm, hardened with much use and mottled with age, and tried not to consider how Yaarah could have stretched out and not reached its sides or length. Giants probably had fleas in their beards bigger than her. She prayed she could find the opposite of what Sabline had taught her. With actual control? Ha. Not very likely.

A butterfly alighting upon Ash’s hand would be far larger than she was here, standing lightly upon this aged Giant’s palm.

Pressing inward, she pushed through the quivering lump of jelly-sap that was her courage and searched deeper. Something else lay hidden. Another Allory who had the gumption to pop out at odd moments.

Her nape crawled.

Stronger than a Giant? Oh please, he had to be two hundred times bigger than her. Not that the comparison actually mattered, because her powers had chosen this moment to abscond, right along with any last shred of common sense she might have claimed and very shortly, her life in addition.

Maybe she thus invited the shadows to feast?

Whatever the case, a lifetime’s worth of seconds passed in silent despair before Allory suddenly sensed the unbearable weight coming upon her. She was not aware of having done anything different, nor of any specific change or a violent charge of magic, perhaps, but her limbs immediately became as lead, while her gleaming wing clusters folded to hang down her back as if each were pinned to the world’s bedrock. The Giant tensed up. He stared! The massive muscles of his biceps and forearm corded up into his neck as he fought the sudden onset of that terrible burden. With a roar, the greybeard added his other hand, gripping the wrist with white-knuckled strength as he failed to hold her up. His hand continued to sink.

Crying, “Grandfather!” Imorenne rushed forward, cupping her hands beneath his. A second later, she collapsed to her knees. “What?”

“Aye, what is this joke?” thundered another Giant. He must be of a different tribe, Allory realised peripherally, for his booming accent was very different to the others. “Let me try!”

The pair managed to tip the eleven-inch tyrant onto his palm. The Giant’s mouth gaped in a comical picture of shock as she drove his hand straight down into the grass, so hard that she heard and felt a bone pop beneath the impact.

“Blood of my ancestors!” he roared in shock, trying to leap away.

One hundred and sixty feet of Giant toppled with a crash that shook the barrens, clearly pinned by the never more startled scrap of sparkle perched upon his palm.

Breathing raggedly, Allory tried to halt the effect before she punched right through his hand.

Phew. Made it.

Everything within her knew what this must have cost. Another number of lives entrapped, without a doubt. Another chance for this evil to continue attacking her world, and if it broke through, that would spell the end of all she knew. What was the fearful secret behind this soul locket? How could souls carry the very weight of a world?

Too many questions. Not a single answer.

Fluttering forward to her side, Varzune said lightly, “You should see her flex her biceps. It’s incredible! Well done, Allory Fae.”

Her piercing giggle of delight set off a chorus of appreciative hoots and gruff chuckles from the great Giants. Flitting to over him, she shyly deposited a kiss upon the Chameleon Faerie’s cheek that raised further laughter from most of his kin and growls of discontent from Harzune and Yaarah in particular. Varzune put on a decent swagger and invited all the other pretty girlfae to follow suit.

The Princess said, “Allory Fae, what must we do?”

Aye. The Giants waited.

“I … I think I must dance. I’ll need music – sombre, melancholy, reverent music. I should … I should touch some of these with my hands. Aye. Touch them, sense their Giant-ish-ness … o great one, may I – may I have permission to touch your kin? Please?”

“I gave my word,” said he, in tones like gravel rushing down a hill. He gestured with an expression of terrible sadness creasing the corners of his eyes. “Here lies my wife Yamorenne, the strength of my arm and the pride of my heart. I have loved her since my youth. All I ask …”

He could not complete the sentence.

Allory bowed. “I will honour your wife.”

Wings fluttering before she thought upon what she intended, she landed lightly upon the prone Giantess’ left cheek. Deep breath for one who, if this Giantess had been alive, could as easily have been swatted like a mosquito. Steady the heartbeat, if that were even possible. Having expected a pulse of life, however tiny, or perhaps a stirring of breath upon her cheek, Allory sensed only desolation here. Yamorenne had been stung many times. Black poison mingled with crimson blood crusted those puncture points. Her throat gaped with a long, slit wound any Fae could have walked into with ease. Averting her gaze, she tripped lightly up to her eye instead, considering the lay of her long, curling eyelashes and the hint of pearlescent turquoise makeup the woman had applied to her eyelids and high cheekbones. Elderly as she was, a fine strength of beauty shone from her features and Allory understood why this Giant Elder loved her so tenderly.

She knelt, reaching out to trace with her sapphire fingers a fine white scar lying just beneath the orbital bone. Impossible not to fear that this was the end, unless a gift greater than any she had to offer, could be besought.

What power did one even invoke? She knew so little.

I am so little.

Allory considered this thought for the longest moment. Nearby, she heard the Chameleon band tuning up briefly. Darkness must come to every life. What right did she have to decide that this was wrong or untimely? What did she even know?

Nothing.

One spark. She would offer a spark and see what happened. It was all she had.

Hovering just above the woman’s skin, Allory dipped to kiss her shuttered eyelid tenderly, with the utmost respect. She whispered, “Well, Yamorenne. This is it. You and me, and only the whole world watching. Will you show me who you once were and who you should be?”

Garobixi’s mortal dust had yielded to her plea. Could there be a common thread here?

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

Rising, Allory flew up the Giantess’ lined forehead to find a lock of iron-grey hair. She stroked it as her Momfae would have stroked her own sapphire spikes, only, this was like handling a thick rope. “You have the strength of Giants. You are beautiful. Remember that beauty, how you used to run in your youth, with strength and grace, love and power, like the breath of the canyonlands released unto joy? That is what we shall find again.”

Drawing a ragged breath, she realised she had been singing the last part. She considered the echoes of that music in her being, blazoned as if written like one of her never-fading poems.

It was one of the harpist’s chord progressions, a complex diminuendo that somehow evoked the fragility of life in a place of barrenness. A slight smile touched her lips. Well, if her imaginary harpist could offer just the right melody, who was she to refuse?

Fly with fate. See where it led.

She called, “My friends, can you help me? This is the music I need. Could you … improvise … if I provide these notes? Sorry. Not much of a musician here. Not much of anything, come to think of it –”

Yaarah sniped, “Allory Fae, stop apologising this instant and –”

Sabline cuffed his shoulder. “Gnarr.”

“You must dance, hrrr-prrrt,” he clarified at once. “Let the magic rise as it may. Sing for us, and dance, and we will follow your lead.”

True.

Miniscule, with a sorrowful lilt, her voice whispered into the night. Allory repeated the phrases, the impromptu verse which had come to mind, elaborating it until she settled upon a rhythm and wording that best suited the upwelling of her heart. She sang:

In the place of death’s eternal dusk,

The strength of your beauty,

Shall shine,

As a young Giantess,

You shall sprint and rest, laugh and love,

The grace of these canyonlands,

Released unto joy.

Her bare toes flexed upon the Giantess’ cheek. Beset by cloying doubts as dark as the Wraith’s eerie, alien shadow ever had been, the Scintillant glanced once more at the great Giant who looked on, his gaze brooding, profound, unreadable – yet writ there too was the tale of the many decades of his love for this woman. That, she could celebrate. She must.

Allory danced up the woman’s cheekbone and over the bridge of her nose, nimble yet stately, seeking to honour her life in all her actions. Bend the knee. Delicate pirouette. A lithe leap, her leading leg pointed to the fore while the rear curved up to touch her wingtips, changing the note their buzzing created. Her voice rose with the help of the instruments, weaving the complex melody with increasing confidence. Her eyes flicked shut. Only this. She must choose to live in the moment. Spinning about her axis, she twirled down over the woman’s mouth and leaped again, gracefully honouring the lay of her lips, one movement flowing into the next, willing breath to return, for her soul to find its way home from the farthest place.

She knew nothing of time’s passing.

Where was the sparkle? Why did it not come to grace this hour, this moment, when her heart ached with purity of yearning, when all she wanted was to – what?

A blast of light so brilliant it penetrated her eyelids, smote her right off the Giantess’ face!

The instant her dance stopped, so did the light. The aftermath was a shocking contrast of darkness. Reddish-blue spots danced behind her eyelids.

“What was that?” she piped, rubbing her aching eyes. “Who … what?”

When her eyes readjusted to the deep sapphire gloom of early evening, she found everyone else acting just as confused as she was. Allory tugged at her antennae and tested the fluttering of her wing clusters. Her skin hurt, not in an unpleasant way. What in all Centresky had just hit her?

“Yaarah?”

“It was Middlesun,” Ashueli stated.

“Oh, frrr-hssst, come on,” Sabline complained.

“It came from above. It was a ray of pure blue light, just like our Middlesun –”

“Princess, you’ve taken leave of your senses, to put it politely,” the Sabrefang purred, but not unkindly. “Yaarah, what did you see?”

“Well, I was wholly blinded by brilliance, mrrr-frrr, so I could not quite say with certainty what the phenomenon might have been,” he hedged awkwardly, pausing to start licking his forepaw before placing it down again as if mimicking the greatest care of his conversational tread. “However, what else but Middlesun could generate such a burst of light –”

“Call yourself a scholar, hrrr-pssst? Fine!” Sabline hissed, glaring at him. Her black paw gestured rudely. “Allory Fae, get back to work. Shoo. Do your thing. We sane and rational friends will watch to see what happens this time.”

Sane? Rational? Two words she was most emphatically not prepared to venture at this point.

Try again?

Her dance-hiccough had seemed to stop … whatever it was. Behind her, the Chameleon Fae music restarted, providing just the right atmosphere. A glance at the mighty Giant Elder showed how he slightly inclined his head, as if to suggest encouragement.

Very well. Winging back up to the prone Giantess, Allory stooped to kiss the corner of her lips. “Sorry. I’ll try to do better this time.”

Halfway into the second verse, she was never more grateful to have her eyes firmly closed because the light walloped her a second time, setting her world ablaze with glory – not burning her up, but still so intense, warm and dazzling that she feared to open her eyes. Perhaps those outside of the sunbeam’s immediate ambit could still see, because the Giants all murmured and guffawed, judging by the creaking of their necks, gazing up at the sky.

Yaarah said, “See? I told you so, hmmm-trrrt. It’s coming from Middlesun. The Dragon is always right.”

“Oh, be quiet, you fraud,” Sabline snorted. “As if you had anything to do with this.”

She had to peek. Shading her eyes with both hands, Allory tried to see what was going on. As best she could tell, she had attracted a personal sunbeam. Not a big one, perhaps a foot and a half in diameter, but it shone halfway across the world to ignite the Scintillant Faerie as if this Giantess were her stage and she could reflect something of this immense power that set her tingling in waves from her antennae down to her toes, chuckling helplessly as the wonder of the moment captivated her soul, this overwhelming sense of connection with something awesome and elemental and alive.

It said, ‘I see you, Allory Fae.’

Impossible!

Yet the sun saw her. It shone upon her like a javelin of inconceivable length cast through what must be the tiniest gap in the enveloping shield of Shyraiama Dragons, illuminating all the great lined faces around her as if midday itself sparkled off her translucent wings and her flying arms and legs, as the song of her joy and gratitude rose untrammelled, as effervescent as the song of her soul, the sunlight spangling far and wide as it reacted with the Scintillant properties of her person. Every iota of her being thrilled to the sensation.

Sensitive materials? And how!

Join me, she cried with rising desire. Join my cause, please. I can’t do this without you.

This was what being a Scintillant was all about. This pure exultation of service, dancing with Middlesun’s unadulterated blessing shining – no, blazing – upon her endeavour.

Light coruscated for hundreds of feet around her as she spun in a novel dance, highlighting every corpse, every gasping, dying creature, all the spillage from terrible wounds torn open by fangs, horns, teeth and claws, all the charred bodies and scattered limbs. Also, it showed all the shocked, astonished Giant faces turning to watch, old and young, those of different tribes too stupefied to care who they stood alongside.

It was too much. Too great a task, surely? Tears spilled unheeded down Allory’s cheeks, wetting her flying limbs and body as she mourned the tragedy that had transpired here. Her singing cracked and faltered for the overwhelming deluge of grief, but that was when she heard another burry voice pick up the refrain. Yaarah! Now Ashueli and even gruff Sabline, backed by a chorus of Chameleon Fae vocalists, added their particular strains. Many Giant voices joined in, resonant and rich, voices used to resounding across the miles of the canyonlands to speak with their kin afar. The mighty chorus joined together to gild the night with longing.

In that instant, a shallow exhale wafted against her legs.

A gasp sent her tumbling through the air, only to return with a triumphant laugh as the Giantess’ lips trembled and her chest quaked. All around her, breath rasped afresh into lungs which had expected never to fill again. Eyes blinked and limbs twitched as they stirred, eternal sleepers returned to life.

An ineffable sense of lightness sent Allory rocketing skyward amidst an explosion of Giant exultation.

If you’re out there, Wraith, know that I’m coming for you.

An unnatural cold pierced her breast for a fraction of a second before the presence, weak and far off, vanished from her perception. Shaken to her core, Allory winged down to join in the celebrations with a heart that could no longer be glad.

Why, why had she boasted like that?

Now it knew.