The child looked like she was pouting.

"Who are you?" Ingrid asked as her Water and Fire Elementals vanished. "Are you... the Queen of Darkness?"

"Oh look, the meat puppets can speak," the child said. "Your own kind named me Ashe. Do you remember nothing?"

"Ashe," Vaska said. "If any human knew the name of an Elemental Queen, they would be very long dead."

"Dead?" Ashe asked. "Oh right, you bone cages carry around a bunch of dysfunctional organs. You must be very young then. Two hundred moons? Maybe younger? Either way, you didn't answer my first question. What was done to me? Why has it been tens of thousands of moons since I've seen my own sky?"

"You answered your own question," Vaska said. "We are young, and we don't know the details of what was done to you."

"Ashe," Ingrid said. "My name is Ingrid. I am pleased to meet you." She bowed.

"Ah, politeness," Ashe said. "I like you Ingrid. You remind me of my sister... My sister!? What the hell did you do to my sister?"

"We didn't do anything to your sister," Vaska said. "My father met with her just a few months back."

"It's like she doesn't exist anymore! You!" Ashe said as she pointed straight at Titania. "What has become of your mother?"

Something is wrong with Mother. Something is wrong with all of my sisters. Something was wrong with me, but Ingrid fixed it somehow. Titania resumed her position in front of Ingrid, kneeling like a knight. The contract is shattered. Will you bond me Ingrid? It may protect me from what was done before.

"Yes, I will bond with you," Ingrid said. "But I am weak, so rest now. Do not drink of my spirit."

Titania vanished.

Vaska seemed to have remembered the unconscious woman lying on the floor at that moment. She walked over and started to rifle through her clothes. The second Light Elemental was still pinned to the floor by the Firstborn's blades. After a few seconds Vaska held up a Light Crystal. A dagger of shadows appeared in her hand and she slammed it down into the woman's head.

"Did you just kill that poor sleeping woman?" Ashe exclaimed.

"I hold the contract," Vaska said. "It is mine now. Firstborn, you may release my Elemental."

The Firstborn walked toward Vaska, swaying her hips. The Light Elemental, who was still struggling to stand up, vanished from sight.

"Firstborn, take us into the projection and transport us to the Ten Skies."

I cannot bring Mother with us, the Firstborn said. Her voice sounded too old for her youthful features. She is too heavy. It would be like trying to move the moon.

At the mention of the moon, Ashe looked up at the sky and pointed at one of the flying cities. It was long and bloated near the middle, like a giant flying battleship. "Why are there meat puppets living up there? Who would want to live in my realm?"

"They did not choose to live there Ashe," Ingrid said. "They were tricked into it."

"We need to get out of here," Vaska said. "Before the King finds out I stole his crystal. Once we leave the prison we can walk a path that will lead us to the Ten Skies. We'll need to call in the Marines to pick us up when we get to the other side."

"I'm staying near Ingrid," Ashe said, "until I can find a way to speak with my sister."

----------------------------------------

The Feathers had assembled in the map room when Ingrid and Vaska finally arrived. The child had grown tired of walking and insisted on riding around on Ingrid's back. None of the chairs in the room were tall enough for the child, so Vaska used a Metal Elemental to reshape the legs of one of the chairs to be longer.

"Elizabeth," Vaska said "I want your report first."

"About ten percent of the yellow-metal crystals have stopped working," the scarred woman began. "Five percent of water-fire crystals can no longer be used to summon Water Elementals. The White Ravens were unable to enter the Plane of Life safely, so all our crystals still work. Almost thirty percent of our teal-orange crystals no longer work. But by far the worst news I have is that none of our dark crystals work. One hundred percent failure rate. I am going to assume that is the case for our enemies as well."

"One hundred percent?" Vaska asked. Elizabeth nodded.

"That makes perfect sense," the child Ashe said. "Those fools living in my realm probably stopped showing up to work when the eclipse ended and the sky changed colors."

"Vaska?" Elizabeth asked. "Why is this child on my airship?"

"I will give you my report after her," Vaska said as she pointed to Glenice.

"The Taisian Air Navy is making significant progress in the conventional invasion," Glenice said. "Much of the enemy Air Navy was lost in the Elemental Planes. As Elizabeth said, dark crystals no longer work. That means Dark-Three missiles no longer work, and the surface-to-air missiles have stopped firing. We can expect a total victory in just a few days. There are plans being drafted for the invasion of the Royal Palace in Jelka."

"I want the King executed immediately," Vaska said. "Which brings me to my own report. Our plans have been greatly accelerated. I have freed the Queen of Darkness from her prison."

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

Ivan whistled. Reese looked shocked and Mia looked confused by that shock. Rudolf simply nodded knowingly.

"This child," Vaska said, "is named Ashe. As far as we can tell, she is the Elemental Queen of Darkness. There are a few other developments as well. Ingrid?"

"Titania, show yourself," Ingrid said. The Light Elemental, now carrying a spear, appeared behind Ingrid.

"Is it safe for Mia to be this close to that thing?" Reese asked.

"It is perfectly safe now," Ingrid replied. "Titania has been cleansed. She is bound to me directly, and no longer follows the orders of the Emperor. She also appears to no longer follow the instructions of the Queen of Light."

"This means," Vaska said, "That the Order of the Ten Skies is now completely independent. I have my own light crystal, and through the effects of my bond with the Firstborn, I am able to prevent it from being a danger to Mia, at least for now. Ingrid will need to cleanse it soon."

"You can end the war right now!" Glenice said.

"And I intend to. I will summon all of the Ayaruan Elemental crystals and Ingrid will claim them. I just need a room in the airship that is big enough. Elizabeth?"

"It might be safer to summon them on the ground," Elizabeth said. "Have a large staff nearby to sort through them and pick out the ones that still work, and discard the rest."

"The instant I summon the crystals and deprive the enemy military of most of their power, I expect that spies in Jelka will report the incident to their masters in Kanti. It will not be long before they declare war on the Heylin Empire. Hours. Minutes even. And then the true war starts. The Federation will stop at nothing to enter the various Elemental Planes and prevent our sacrifices from honoring our contracts. Then, we slowly lose access to all of our military technologies."

"It's a race to the bottom," Rudolf said.

"We will need to find suitable replacements, fast," Ivan said.

"Exactly so," Vaska said. "Our highest priority right now is recovering our Dark-Three capabilities. Our labs have discovered a new technology that we are calling radar. However our current iteration of the design makes heavy use of green Colored Orbs. Our next mission should be to enter the Elemental Plane of Lightning, where I will attempt to bond a High Daughter."

"I might be able to negotiate such a bond," Ashe said. "The other Elemental Queens are likely deeply afraid of you hairless apes because of what you did to me."

"Why would you help us?" Reese asked.

The Elemental Queen of Darkness simply shrugged. "Ingrid carries a piece of my sister around in her heart. The sister-self I once knew."

The door to the map room opened and the communications officer entered. "Admiral!" he said, "a portal just appeared behind the ship and a tilt-rotor flew through. The portal quickly closed, but the airplane is still following us. It keeps repeating the same message over and over again, and does not respond to our questions."

"What message?" Elizabeth asked.

"'We have a message for the Ghost of Taisia from the Queen of Light. We are requesting permission to land. If you kill us, we will simply return and try to deliver the message again. You may keep the aircraft after we leave.' That's the end of it Admiral, then it just repeats."

"Signal them with permission to land, then send in the Marines to secure the area." The Admiral stood up, as did the rest of the Feathers and the child named Ashe. They headed for the deck.

The tilt-rotor's single massive door opened and eight figures shuffled out. The Marines quickly padded them down for weapons, and then confirmed that the aircraft was empty. Out of the eight figures, seven of them were men, and they all wore the drab olive uniforms common to Ayaruan soldiers. One of the men stepped forward and looked straight at Ingrid with lifeless eyes.

"My name is Alen Mason," the man said in unaccented Taisian. "I was a promising pilot, and it was my dream to train under Jadran. In the Elemental Plane of Wind, I stalled my fighter jet and ended up in a flat spin. The Ghost of Taisia fired a missile at me as I fell, bringing a swift end to my terror."

"Abomination!" Ashe hissed. "My sister has overstepped herself! Making copies of dead people... even I would not resort to such evil."

This outburst did not deter the next man from stepping forward. "My name is Jadran Eduard," he said, "and I was the best pilot in Admiral Zef's fleet. The High Daughter Titania claimed the contracts inside my fighter jet and caused the Fire Elemental in my engine to explode. I was killed instantly."

A cold wind blew across the deck of the Ten Skies. The Marines shuffled about uncomfortably.

"My name is Izak Shoemaker," the third man said as he stepped forward. He was the only man with a mustache. Ingrid assumed the man's odd surname was a Taisian translation of the man's actual name. The man continued: "I was hand-picked by Ervin Dren to fly as his wingman. Like Jadran before me, I too was killed by the Ghost of Taisia when my contracts were claimed by the High Daughter."

A fourth man stepped forward. "I am named Karlo Dren," the man said. "I am a distant cousin of Ervin Dren. Like Jadran and Izak before me, I was killed when my engine exploded at the command of Titania. I was unable to protect my cousin in that fight, and I knew not his fate when I died."

"My name is Ferdo Boro," the fifth man said. "I was given the honor of flying an advanced, two-engine airplane from the Federation of Kanti. I scored two kills inside the Elemental Plane of Water before I lost my life. My killer was the Ghost of Taisia, flying an aerodynamically unstable fighter jet that I was not prepared to face."

The lone woman in the group looked not much older than Ingrid herself. Her light brown hair rolled down her shoulders in beautiful curls. Her hazel eyes must have once been filled with hope and joy, but now they showed no emotion at all. Ingrid could feel tears welling up in her own eyes. No, she thought. Not this. Not a woman like me.

"I'm Amalia Baker," the woman said. "Since the first time I saw an airshow I have dreamed of being a pilot. I had been flying for less than a week when I was assigned to be the personal assistant of Bertrand Vike. I tried to advise my charge to not throw his life away. I followed him through the portal to the Elemental Plane of Metal, and in my inexperience, I was killed by the Ghost of Taisia when a perfect missile struck my flesh and destroyed the cabin of my airplane."

"My name is Emil Baker," the next man said. Like the woman, he had light brown hair and hazel eyes. "After my twin sister Amalia was killed in the Elemental Plane of Metal, I turned to face the Ghost of Taisia. I thought only of vengeance, and in my haste I failed to defend against her missile in time. I was not killed instantly, and instead died a slow death by fire as I fell from the sky."

The final man was extremely old, and Ingrid knew his story. "My name is Bertrand Vike," the ancient fossil of a man said. "In my youth I fought in the Hawks and scored sixteen kills in my warbird. As my final act I decided to die a true death as a gladiator and a pilot. I flew into the Elemental Plane of Metal to face the Ghost of Taisia. It was a challenging fight and I was slain when a bullet struck my skull through the canopy glass."

"On behalf of the Queen of Light," Amalia said, "I give you this message. We will fight on, even after death. No matter how many times you kill us, we will learn from our mistakes and we will eventually kill you."

Golden, mother-of-pearl light began to puncture and then spread through all eight pilots. The light consumed their entire bodies, and in spite of this they stood motionless, their faces devoid of emotion. When the light finished spreading across their bodies, they simply disintegrated and vanished in the wind. This left a derelict Federation tilt-rotor on the deck.

Tears streamed down Ingrid's face. "A young woman just like me," she said. "It could have been me."

Vaska pulled Ingrid into an embrace. "I warned you," she said, "that the other Great Houses are extremely dangerous."

"I hope you like dogfighting," Ivan said. "You're gonna be dancing in the sky with those devils for a very long time."