Tyranach (Thunder)
Dark-smudged horizon,
A rush in the leaves;
Hints of the battle
High over peaks.
Hear mountains tremble
‘Neath roiling skies.
Trees shiver and cower
To their branches! We fly!
Clactyrnach! Clactyrnach!
Oh fearsome fight!
Spare us, the elves,
From your thund’rous might!
Stampede of great waters
Tramples the ground.
Babes cling to mothers
(The) assailant surrounds
White coldstone arrows
Pierce at our backs.
Howlers gust through,
Hunting in packs.
Clactyrnach! Clactyrnach!
Oh fearsome fight!
Spare us, the elves!
From your thund’rous might!
The wind howlers die
Ychesge hoof away
Lift up song, little brothers
Paint chromatic array
Clactyrnach! Clactyrnach!
Oh Fearsome Fight!
Spared us today,
Tomorrow is bright!
----------------------------------------
MELLARK
Mell studied the dark haze that tarnished the horizon, just visible between the upper canopy’s branches. Is it getting bigger?
Fenn squinted that direction. “It’s not rained in the time since I first visited, and that was over a moon ago,” he spoke slowly, studying the haze. “But I suppose there are some legends of Fae weather.”
Krid stood and opened his snout, tasting the air.
Unease stirred Mell to shift her weight.“What do these legends entail?” she asked, “Because I am beginning to think we may just be receiving first-hand experience.” The haze grew darker by the minute.
“I… well some of them are magically conjured by great creatures–”
“The clactyrnach!” Gale interrupted him with bouncing excitement.
“That is the most prominent legend, but it takes place in the mountains. Then there are the times Boidhan sent rain to punish Anruwan, or when Dervalia made Naude cry and the whole land flooded.”
Flood. She recalled the little tree by the pond with the moss that grew up the bark as high as her waist. “Would you say most of the rain legends here are torrential? Flooding?” She could feel the dampness in the air now, the pressure aching in her knees. It was a tell-tell sign of two things: she wasn’t young, and the weather would be rough.
“Why, yes, but those would be the kinds of weather that would become legend. Regular patterns would not be worth noting. It… could be nothing.” Fenn’s voice pinched at the end like a question, unsure.
Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.
Krid’s head was turning, tracking something in the forest. Mell followed his gaze to see a fleet of fox-like creatures scattering away from the direction of the clouds–it was clear now that they were storm clouds.
“It is going to rain, and rain dangerously,” Krid declared, beating her to the conclusion. “We should find high ground and shelter.”
“We could pitch camp and wait it out,” Gale offered.
“Sure, if you think tents will protect you from floods.” Syrdin jabbed with disdain.
Mell bit back a reprimand. There’s no time. “The ground is flat, so where–”
“We should follow the animals,” Krid answered before she could finish. “They are covering their holes or fleeing. We should make as much progress away from the storm as we can, quickly, and shelter in the low bows of the sturdiest trees if we don’t find high ground.”
“I thought you were to avoid trees during a lightning storm.” Fenn’s hands fiddled nervously in front of him.
Mell peered into the sky. The gray clouds reached over their heads like fingers grasping at the purple sky, and one rolled across the sun, darkening their shade from above the high palms. “If lightning strikes, I suspect it will hit the upper canopy. We’re doing what Krid says, and we’re not arguing about it any longer. Now let’s move.”
No one protested except Mell’s own feet at the idea of a run. They must have only jogged a few minutes–though it felt much longer to her–when a drop of rain fell in front of her. The sky had turned a smoldering slate. The leaves hissed discontent and fear, and the air seemed to crackle with threats.
Another fat drop landed on her head.
“We need to stop!” she called to the others over a rush of wind. If it began to rain, she didn’t doubt for a moment that floods would overtake them.
“What?” Krid roared back, stopping.
She pointed to the trees, and Krid nodded confirmation that he understood.
Fenn, however, did not. He approached a tree and noted how the leaves had closed, both folded in half and curled inward, a protection against the winds and rains.
“In the tree, Fair Ceann,” she heard Krid say as he gently led Gale to a low, sturdy tree and offered her a literal leg up. “And hang on tightly.” She handed him her pack, clambered up, then received it back.
Syrdin had already perched in the neighboring tree and was tying zheir satchel closed and tightening the strap.
Fenn seemed to be trying to memorize the shape of the curled leaves as he removed his pack. Mell sighed. “Get in the tree, Fenn.” As she spoke, a rushing sound erupted in the distance, rising above the wind.
“What?!” He called.
“In the tree!” Mell yelled this time. Her foot found a knot on the trunk to press on, and her panic gave her strength, allowing her to haul herself up. Droplets flew from the sky in a steady rain as the rushing grew closer. She sat up, puffing, and pulled herself to the tree’s trunk. Fenn was already opposite her, his traveler’s pack wedged in front of him, and he was pulling off his glasses to tuck into a secure breast pocket clearly designed for the purpose.
She shook off her surprise. Right, he is still a spry elf.
“It’s the yschege!” Gale’s voice yelled behind her, something between excited and terrified.
Mell squinted at the stormline. Her heart thrummed its terror, her body tensing as she gazed at the great wall of waters streaming toward them. This could be the day I die.
“What’s yschege?” She tried to distract herself from the possibility of death with the new term. The wall was nearly upon her.
“It’s a stampede of waters, or perhaps a horse-like water-nymph, I’m un–” Fenn’s final words were lost in the roar of the waters as not only a wall of rain, but a tide of floodwaters crashed around them.
----------------------------------------
GALENDRIA
She laughed a screaming laugh of abandon as she clung to the tree. That legendary stampede trampled the ground beneath her, and foam licked and flew on the waves like manes on the necks of wild stallions. She could almost see the heads of the horses in the waves as they raced one another through the forest. The ground shook under their hooves, rattling the trees and her heart with it. The wind screeched in terror as it was thrown about by the whims of the storm, the droplets within them wailing in protest of their suicidal fall from the sky.
Nothing under the scrutiny of that storm could escape the severe judgment it wrought on the land. The waters surged over the ground, deep as an elf’s stomach, and the thunder cracked, and the sky spat its vehemence upon them. She clung there, to the branches that quivered in fear, and felt a thrill: at being alive, at seeing such power, such wonder, such awesome beauty. She found her tears mixed with the rain.
A real clactyrnach battle. She shivered and smiled and cried as she clung there, clung until her arms ached and her body grew numb from the cold rain.
Though it had blown upon them swiftly, it was not so sudden as the end of it. A great wind twisted and blew the waters away to the right and the left, and the ground emerged again. The sun shone out overhead, though clouds hung around on every side. Light glittered on every folded leaf and hunched bow and on the hair and faces of her companions. And Fenn. His hair shone brilliantly, blown in five directions. His ears were purple with cold, and the tip of his nose was nearly blue where it buttoned upward. Something about it reminded her of their youth.
She found herself smiling at him from the next tree over, silly and yet somehow handsome. “Is it over?” she gasped, muscles shaking from both cold and weariness.
“It may just be the eye of the storm,” Mell suggested from her perch in the neighboring tree with Fenn.
“Gods, I hope not,” Fenn retrieved his glasses from a pocket on his odd, white shirt.
Oh! He wasn’t wearing his glasses! It explained why he had looked more like his younger self. He hadn’t had them before he departed Etnfrandia.
“I thought my arms would give out.” He pushed his glasses into place. “And I didn’t care to be washed away.”
“You don’t say,” Syrdin chuckled from under a hood drooping with water.
A huffing beside Gale reminded her that the drakeman was sharing her tree. He was sniffing the air in that strange, open-mouth posture of an animal.
She looked around. It seemed like the aftermath should have been worse: cluttered with torn leaves and broken branches. Instead, it was more like the world had been swept clean.
A gasp from Mell pulled her attention in their direction, toward the origin of the storm. Another gray wall approached. Not a moment later, she heard the distant roar of it, then louder, crashing closer at alarming speed.
“Fenn!” Gale squeaked. He was sitting upright, not holding on to the tree.
The stormwall wailed toward them as Fenn turned to see what was the matter.
He froze and Mell reached for one of his arms to pull him further toward the trunk. He snatched his glasses off his face, and that was the last thing she saw of him before the world was consumed by pelting rain. She squeezed her tree trunk and shut her eyes against the wall. This one came with hail as it whipped over her. It barraged the trees, cracking through the branches and folded leaves over her head to beat on her back.
Once the initial force passed, she opened her eyes long enough to see that Fenn and Mell were gone.