Erya of the Silent Glade

I watched the slowly diminishing figures of my friends as they soared away from us before I focused on Morgan and Fladrif again. On impulse I reached out and gently took her hand.

“We’ve… I’ve seen what you went through in the Silent Glade, but I’d still like to hear your story and what happened to my home after I was taken prisoner, not killed, mind you. For now though, I guess it would be for the best if I told you how you got here in the first place and where you actually are. That wasn’t my children’s design, nor was it a coincidence but I’m getting ahead of myself. Over there is a small creek, if you listen closely you should be able to hear it, even with your human senses. You can wash off the ash and the worst of your nightmares. Besides, sitting on green grass is much better than the soot covered wasteland we’ve turned this clearing into.” I lightly tugged at her hand. “Come with me. It’s not far.”

Fladrif was the first to move, when I had mentioned fresh water his face had lit up and he had hurriedly made his way towards the edge of the forest. Only when he had reached the tress did he turn around and beckoned for us to follow. I chuckled softly and pulled the confused girl along, all the while wondering what I was going to tell them. The truth, most likely, but maybe a little less bluntly than I normally would. They had been through enough and I would have loved to provide them with a safe haven where they could take as much time as they needed to recover, but alas, I couldn’t. We would be leaving soon and I had to make sure they knew as much as possibly before then. Not that I was going to give them much of a choice in whether or not they wanted to accompany us, I wasn’t going to be separated from Morgan again and the tree would have to lump it. They couldn’t stay here at any rate, this place might be crawling with Amon’s slaves soon enough. If Mephisto was right, we had just blown a huge chunk of his plans to smithereens, after all.

While soot and smoke turned into verdant greens and the acrid smell of burned wood became the vibrant fragrance of a blooming forest I made my decision. I’d tell them my story and mostly everything about what they had been dragged into, with a few exceptions. I wasn’t going to share the nature of the immortals among us, nor would I go into detail as to what we were up against. An ancient sorcerer set on world domination and stripped of morals and compassion should make for a convincing villain all in his own right without adding the plans and ambitions of angels and demons to the mix. Besides, if either of them was anything like me at all, they’d want to stay with the last survivors of a fallen kingdom out of sheer curiosity. Not to mention that they had found kindred spirits who had also lost their home and were looking for a new one. There would be no better opportunity to start anew anywhere. Fladrif at least was still rational enough to see that and Morgan… I might be vain but I was utterly convinced that she was as keen on staying by my side as I was on keeping her there.

We didn’t speak much until we had reached the merrily bubbling brook. With an exclamation of joy I would never have expected an old man to be capable of, Fladrif threw himself forward and vanished with a splash, his stretched out limbs were immediately submerged beneath the crystal clear waves. I gave Morgan a careful push.

“Go on, I’m not going anywhere and you’ll feel better once you’re in there, promise.” She inhaled deeply and sighed with an apparent effort to put the reins on her emotions.

“I know, and… thank you. I don’t know if I’ve already said it but these should have been the first words out of my mouth. Without you, we’d most likely already be well on our way to the next dungeon. I don’t know if I would have had the strength to survive another humiliation. So… thank you, thank you for saving us.”

“There’s no need, you’re family. Besides, it wasn’t even me, technically. If you truly want to, you can thank Cassandra and Mephisto when they come back but I imagine they are going to tell you the very same thing: you’re very welcome. Don’t mention it. You’re not in the fey realms anymore and despite everything you might have heard about the mundane races, I’ve come to realise that they possess much more grace and kindness than we give them credit for, or at least the ones I’ve come to know and… love do. But I imagine you already knew that, given what you were accused of.”

“So you’ve heard,” she asked, the spark in her eyes dimming as the memories of her ordeal rose back to the surface. I bit my tongue and pulled her close again to show her that she wasn’t alone, that she hadn’t been deserted. While I felt her tremble in a valiant effort to push down her tears I whispered:

“I’ve heard, I’ve seen it and it wasn’t your fault. You’ve nothing to be ashamed of. My children do.”

“You haven’t even heard my story, yet,” she snivelled.

“I don’t have to, I can see it in you eyes. You truly loved that elf, didn’t you?” Her whole body stiffened before the flood gates opened again and she began to cry, her heart wrenching sobs echoing through the forest.

“Yes, yes I did,” she managed to press out. “His name was Solus. He… he was…” she tried several times but she couldn’t get the words out past her wails anymore. Instead, she drowned in sorrow and while she dissolved into an a anguished flood of tears I felt my heart bleed, a small piece of it breaking off with every tormented whimper. Mother magic, what had they done to her? Would she ever be able to recover? I sure hoped so, and not only for her sake.

“Let it all go,” I whispered, “but keep the memories alive. Nobody can take them from you. Cry, Morgan, cry and remember.”

And so we stood there, entwined like two trees who had grown together for decades while she slowly calmed down until I felt her rhythmic breath in my ear and I realised that I was holding her upright, carrying her weight. Her ordeal had taken its toll and she had fallen asleep, or maybe unconscious, considering she was still standing upright.

Carefully I lowered her to the ground and used my magic to make the grass weave itself into a small bucket and a soft cloth. I collected some water from the stream and gently began to clean away most of the dirt on her skin. The simple act of caring for her filled me with a deep contentment that gradually overshadow the raging storm of emotions in my chest until I felt myself calm down. My mind stopped spinning in circles and I managed to live in the moment for a while, pushing away the future and the past for the time being.

“You know, I never imagined you, of all people, to become so… human.” I hadn’t heard Fladrif get out of the water and make his way towards us. He had given me a fright and I nearly jumped when his voice suddenly sounded close behind me.

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“What do you mean,” I quickly asked.

“Oh, right, I assume you didn’t recognise me. And I imagine it’s close to impossible now. We know each other, Erya. We have for a long time. But when I last saw you, I was still wearing a different bark, but the old oak has died and I was forced to search for a new host, something a little more durable. Hence the olive tree. I’m Auguros, the teller who sent you to your fateful battle with the golden dragon. I’m the one who lured you there. I’d like to apologise but on the other hand, you should be able to guess by now why I did it and why I told you that you’d find the key to salvation on that island all those years ago. Well, you didn’t find it there, but I set you on the path that led you here. Or should I rather say, to them?”

And again, my mind was set spinning. Images of the battle against Shafeer and the gnawing desperation while I was stuck in the gem rose up, followed by a scene from the Silent Glade, the last one I could remember before I had left. It had been a different time, and the troubles of a young, ignorant queen seemed far away now, but I could still clearly recall what had prompted me to turn my back on the safety of my home and rush towards my doom. I had been hard pressed, powerful fey had encroached on what I had been trying to built and I had sought advice from the only source I had been able to come up with. An ancient spirit, said to have existed since the beginning of time, old enough to recognise the patterns in the world and the junctures that determined the future.

I had found an oak, taller and older than any living being I had run across before, its branches thicker than most trees with a crown that seemingly had touched the clouds, deep within the mists of the oldest realm I knew. He hadn’t even heard me at first, his mind far away, following the intertwining paths of things that were and things that might yet come to pass but after days of meditation, I had finally managed to gain his attention.

He had been sympathetic to my cause and had willingly shared his wisdom, and some of his lies. While it had been him who had first told me about the immortals, heaven and hell, he had also convinced me that I had needed allies and that the powerful races of the mortal realm would have made for a strong bulwark against my own people, in case I would have been able to gain their support. Curiosity, arrogance and no small amount of fear had spurred me on and I hadn’t even imagined that he could be sending me into a trap, we hadn’t met before, after all. So I had started my journey, full of hope and the naive conviction that I was safe, protected by his knowledge of the future. Unfortunately, it had never been his intention to see me return, as I had found out when I had been bested by Shafeer and had been thrown into a cell to spend the rest of my days as an accessory to his plans.

Fladrif had chosen the perfect moment for his confession, which wasn’t much of a surprise, now that I knew who he was. The fires within me had died out, the emotions had been spent and they didn’t ignite again, even though I felt the faintest stirring of anger at his revelation. Without him, I wouldn’t have had to suffer through ages imprisoned and alone while my world slowly crumbled to a shadow of what it had once been. Any other time I would have turned him into a torch and asked questions later. But now… now I just felt tired. Tired and… defeated.

“I should probably be mad at you or scream right now, but I honestly don’t have it in me. Maybe tomorrow. For now, a piece of advice, though, should all of this be part of one of you visions, you’d better tell me now. I assume you know, whom you’ve just met? Do you know who they are? What they are? If you try to meddle with their future, or with mine any more, there won’t be enough ash left of you to plant a seed in.”

“Oh, of course I’m going to meddle, I already have. We are here and Morgan isn’t dead, after all. But don’t worry, I don’t intend to keep who I am a secret, otherwise I wouldn’t have told you.” He paused before he continued slowly in a voice that still sent shudders down my spine. “The night is coming, the flames are near and I need your help. Yours and that of your new friends if we want to see another sunrise. Look to the horizon, Erya, you can already see the first clouds of what will turn into the most violent storm this world has ever seen. Fey, dragons even humans, all of us will know what it means when the immortals go to war. And I don’t know if we will survive.”

I sighed: “You’ve always been full of gloom and doom. Have you met them? If anything those three will make sure we come out alive.”

“I know, but they aren’t the only ones here. And I’m not even talking about the looming shadow that has darkened the paths of the future for years now. No, there are more, so many more, and they are coming. And while the gates of heaven remain sealed due to a hasty promise, the portals to hell will open. You remember what I told you when we first met? Before I sent you away?”

“That my path will be difficult but lead to heights no fey has ever reached? You weren’t wrong about the difficult part, at least. But none of this matters right now. I only have one question: was it your design that turned my children into the icy rulers they’ve become,” I asked softly.

“No, on my roots. It wasn’t me. They had to become who they are, the world depends on it.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Haven’t you listened to a single one of my stories? Do you think that we are living on a dead, malleable thing that has no mind if its own? If so, you should quickly get rid of that notion. Everything is alive, and everything knows fear. And like every being, when you’re afraid, you either hide or prepare yourself the best you can. I told you, the immortals are coming and our ancient world is quivering, afraid it might become just another burned out husk, a broken remainder of another war. It doesn’t want to die and it can’t run. It rallies its soldiers the best it can. It turns soft iron into hardened steel to defend itself and your children are but three of many who were called to arms and incidentally, you’re one of them. I am sorry for what you and yours have had to go through, I truly am… but without your pain, without their sacrifices… you wouldn’t even have the chance to hate me.”

I was stunned. Half formed question drifted through my mind: how long had he known? Was he telling the truth? If so, was there even anything we could do? I had seen the power Cassy already wielded and the thought of a free, fully grown immortal, not to mention several, descending on our world made me shiver. If he wasn’t lying, I might be able to understand what he had done to me and possibly even forgive him for it. When a whole world hung in the balance, the fate of an individual suddenly didn’t appear that important anymore, even if it was my own. Yet another thing that had changed. When I had first met him, I wouldn’t have minded if the cosmos had burned, as long as I would have been able to watch it. Not anymore.

“How can I trust anything you say? You’ve lied to me before,” I whispered.

“But he isn’t now, I can feel it, otherwise he wouldn’t be breathing anymore,” a beautiful but cold voice sounded form above. We flinched and raised our heads to the sky. A few metres above us, Cassandra was standing in the air, her wings slithering around her like living snakes of molten silver while her eyes shone brightly enough to cast fleeting shadows on the ground. The only thing that undermined her angelic appearance was a basket full of food that hung from her hand and two sets of clothes she had draped over her arm.

“I’ve been listening and he believes every word he has told you,” she said while she slowly descended and landed at my side. Her wings vanished and the glow from her eyes dimmed before she continued: “I thought there was something strange about you Fladrif, or should I say Auguros, from the very moment I have seen you in the Silent Glade, but I would never have imagined that you’re one of those who see the future. Tell me, is it worth it?”

The old man was gaping at her as if he had never seen a woman before, but then again, he probably hadn’t, at least not one like her. Never the less he still managed to answer with a barely trembling voice: “Most of the time, it isn’t. It usually is a curse I’d gladly get rid of but every once in a while, it leads me to places that might just make up for all the grief it can cause.”