The Gaping Maw occasionally creaked, but the night was otherwise silent. Iris stared up at the ceiling from her bedroll, begrudgingly indulging her wandering thoughts while finding it nearly impossible to fall asleep. Though she had gone to great lengths to tire herself physically and mentally -- as she had done every day since leaving Gellorn Keep -- her mind still refused to rest. The two theories she had come up with so far were that either she had developed an instinctual fear of sleep over recent weeks, or it had simply taken so long to fall asleep that now she was too bored to have any hope of it happening at all.
Eventually she sighed and rose from her bedroll. Littletooth was sound asleep beside her pillow, cuddling with the bottomless bag and a single tentacle that wrapped around him like a protective arm. Beside them was her adventuring journal, which she quietly picked up.
"I'm going for a walk," she whispered to Abby, "you can stay here with Littletooth."
Quiet, dissatisfied tones came from the bag.
"It's okay, I'll stay out of the dark."
After a moment, slightly less dissatisfied tones came from the bag.
Iris smiled at her familiar's concern, and then rapidly blipped upwards through the ship -- appearing only for an instant on each level before reaching the main deck. The air was cool and humid, the purple-orange moon was blocked by clouds, and a strong tail wind filled the sails. By all means, the ship was traveling quite fast, but the river had spread wide over recent days as it collected tributaries along their journey and the extra space gave the impression that the ship was meandering along at a casual pace.
Guided and protected by the light of her various glow stones, Iris casually strolled down the length of the deck. Though it remained much quieter than during the day, the main deck was more active than a normal night. She counted double the usual number of crew manning the sails, though most weren't actively working and instead appeared to be on standby. She guessed there must be a fork in the river coming up soon.
At the end of her stroll, Iris blipped to her usual spot on the small platform that wrapped around either side of the bow. It was rare for her to go anywhere without Abby and Littletooth, and as much as she had grown to love them she reveled in the sensation of being truly alone. The glow stone necklace lit the pages of her journal as she flipped it open and reread the most recent journal entry from her mother.
The entry told of strange happenings. Mary's companions had abruptly disappeared, and the seasons appeared to have inexplicably changed. A storm had brewed in the distance which seemed far too reminiscent of the unnatural storm Iris had experienced a few months prior to be unrelated. Iris would be quite concerned were she not already certain that her mother survived whatever threats must have faced her at this point in her journey. Instead she was filled with curiosity -- and in that precise moment, abruptly reminded of a dream.
It was a night spent in an ancient, abandoned temple deep within the Great Forest, not long before the Matriarch expedition had begun. Iris had fallen asleep while sketching a dragon from a mural on the temple wall -- quite possibly the same dragon which had appeared from the parting of the storm clouds not long after. She had dreamed that night of wizards caging a creature in lightning and abducting it, just as they had done with Littletooth’s mother, and in that dream she had seen a woman with long dark hair wearing silver robes -- just like her mother wore.
Iris didn't know how exactly how any of it made sense -- but she was suddenly certain that it was all connected. She hadn't realized it until now, but that woman in the dream had been her mother, and it wasn't the first unnatural storm she had witnessed. All these years later Iris had found herself in one of those storms as well, and her mother had been there to guide her through it. She recalled a line from her mother's earliest entry in the journal and frantically flipped through the pages to find it.
Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.
*Dear Iris,*
*I do not know who you are yet. I do not even know how I know what little I do. I know the time will come when I will be gone, and this book will be yours. I know you will have a heart like mine, and you will finish the work that I have yet to begin. Finally, I know power comes to those who are meant to have it.*
*Travel safely,*
*- Mary Orion, 968*
"You will finish the work that I have yet to begin," she repeated to herself in a quiet whisper.
Mrs. Rousey the herbalist, Mary's oldest friend and the closest thing Iris ever had to a mother after her death, had told her that Mary had a way of knowing things to be true before they happened -- and that she had known before her death that Iris would one day gain power of her own.
There was a plan at work, she was quickly growing certain of that. It was something set in motion from the earliest days of her mother's life as an adventurer, and it carried through to this very moment and beyond. The work her mother spoke of in that first entry had something to do with the lightning wizards, which meant it had something to do with the Agents of Morose and the prophecy they had proclaimed to the masses on the day of their coup – which meant it had something to do with a lot of things she had thought were far too big to be of her concern.
Iris removed her hat and leaned back against the hull of the ship, tilting her head up to the sky, "do I really have a part to play in all this?"
Hope filled her chest that her mother might appear beside her -- or somehow whisper to her on the wind -- but she heard only the gently creaking ship and a distant roar of rushing water.
She abruptly leaned forward and stared out across the river. There wasn't much to be seen in the night, only the water stretching out into darkness and the black silhouette of trees on either of the distant shores. The roaring water was growing louder -- closer. What little light reached the river was only barely enough to highlight the mounds of white foam that perpetually drifted with the currents -- and they were speeding up.
Her eyes went wide as realization dawned. She snatched her hat from the platform and blipped to the main deck where she shouted as loud as she could, "waterfall!" maybe she was wrong, but she’d rather be embarrassed than dead.
Several consecutive blips brought her to the quarterdeck in only seconds. She was surprised to see not only the first mate on the quarterdeck, but the captain at the helm.
"Waterfall!" she gasped, "there's a-- waterfall!"
Meredith looked at her with a mixture of criticism and pity, "has no one told you?"
"About the waterfall?!" she asked in a flabbergasted panic.
The captain bellowed a brief laugh, "best hold on to something, lass!"
"How is that going to help with a waterfall?" she was growing indignant.
"Full sails!" the captain called out with glee.
The crew immediately set to work, and soon the sails across all five masts were fully unfurled and fueled by the generous tailwind.
"What are you-- we need to slow down!" she shouted, then blipped to the quarterdeck railing behind the helm and wrapped her arms tightly around the beams, "you're insane!"
The captain laughed louder as he wrapped a chain around his hand and clenched his fist. The chain came from a hole in the quarterdeck just beside the helm. The roaring waters grew loud enough to hear even at the back of the ship, and mist began to fill the air.
"Now's probably a good time," Meredith observed.
The captain pulled the chain taut, "almost."
"Definitely now," Meredith said with slight concern.
"Almost," he repeated.
"Captain--" she faltered, then shouted in panic, "pull it now!"
The captain yanked hard on the chain and rumbling clunks of machinery echoed through the hull. The first mate and captain swayed forwards as Iris was slammed against the railing -- the ship was tipping forwards. The distant silhouettes of trees dropped away as mist and water rushed past the deck in a flurry and the wind abruptly flipped directions.
"You waited too long!" Meredith shouted over the roaring waterfall, while the Shark Titan cackled maniacally.
Iris felt herself rising from the deck as if falling upwards, only her death grip on the railing held her down. Before she clenched her eyes tightly closed she glimpsed Meredith clinging to the captain who held tight to the helm and the chain. If Iris was screaming, she couldn't hear herself.
After a few eternal seconds of panic, Iris landed with a thud. She gasped desperately for breath and shot to her feet, "what the fuck was that?!"
"See for yourself," the captain motioned towards the rear railing of the ship.
Iris blipped to it. The clouds had parted and moonlight now gleamed and sparkled off the mist of a massive waterfall draping over a mind-boggling tall cliff which extended for miles in either direction. The waterfall ultimately terminated in a large reservoir impossibly far below. Open air extended out below and behind the Gaping Maw -- they were flying.