Chapter 5
In the Fairy City, Ariel floated in the center of an open room facing Randiriel. “You can’t keep doing this, Rand. You’re wearing yourself out.” She touched Randiriel’s forehead. “You’ve gone cold.”
“I can’t let go. No one else is building now. I used to feel them, all around, two thousand souls dreaming, yearning, and building. And now—nothing. Have you seen them Ariel? The flowers in the walkways, the moving mazes in the sky, the towers that surrounded the city, the clockwork, diamond monsters that swam in the Faeja . . . they’re all gone.”
“Yes, I’ve seen. But they can be built again. You don’t have the strength to hold these things alone.” Ariel gestured to the flowers and the sculptures in the room, fewer now than when Geuel had visited. Little piles of colored dust marked the places where those missing had finally faded.
“What is the point of us if we end now, if nothing remains?” Randiriel asked. “A thousand years we’ve lived in this city. Will one day end it all? We’ve wasted so much time, built so little. Something needs to last.”
Ariel lifted a crystal flower. In her hand it was the size of a walking stick. It blossomed and glowed as she clutched it, its clear petals flushing with color. “We will last, Rand. And we will build again. But you can’t keep this up. You’ll die.”
Randiriel stared at the flower in Ariel’s hand. She reached out and grasped it. “Just this one,” she whispered. As she lifted it, the other flowers and sculptures in the room disintegrated, showering the floor in new piles of dust.
Ariel smiled. “Focus on that one, Rand. And try to rest. Your light is dim.”
Randiriel sank slowly to the floor and settled onto one of the tiles, letting the flower down beside her. She curled into a ball and stared at the flower’s ruby petals, inhaling the scent of fire and rose. Her voice fell to a murmur as her body resigned itself to exhaustion. “What will happen, Ariel? If he finds the tear?”
Ariel landed beside her and laid her hand upon Randiriel’s shoulder. “Our sisters and brothers will be reunited,” she said. “There will be great joy and building. The memories of yesterday will fade beneath brighter emotions.”
“And me?” Randiriel asked. “What will happen to me?”
“I—do not know,” Ariel said. “You are different from the others. They will forget beneath each other’s emotions.”
“I don’t want to forget,” Randiriel said softly. “For one day I fought beside the council. I don’t want to forget that.” Randiriel’s eyes flickered sleepily, and her voice droned.
“I don’t believe you will,” Ariel replied, a slight catch in her voice.
“Are you weeping, Ariel?”
“Yes, Sister,” Ariel replied.
“I want to weep someday. I wept before, you know, when I was a girl. I had forgotten, but I remember so much now.”
“Perhaps you will again.”
“I remember my mother, her face.”
Ariel stroked her head. “You can not, Rand. You were too young.”
Randiriel shook her head. “No, I see her now. She was beautiful. I was so very sad when she died. I guess I forgot. Maybe that’s why I was able to become a fairy, because I forgot.”
“Perhaps.”
Randiriel’s eyes closed. “I don’t want to forget anymore,” she whispered as the last of her consciousness faded.
Ariel patted her sleeping form. “You will not have to. Only fairies forget.” She stood and fluttered through the door. Her flight dragged, and her arms hung listlessly at her sides. Her eyes pooled with dry sorrow. If fairies could weep.
* * *
That evening, Veil sat in the keep. Behind her, several fairies fluttered about, braiding her hair. They giggled as they worked, glimmering brightly. “And then in the Year of Pilgrimage, we all gather in groups,” said one.
“Nine groups,” interrupted another.
“One for each of the Council,” the first finished.
“And we leave on the stroke of midnight on the first day of the harvest.”
“And fly over all of Rehavan.”
“Well, not all.”
“Most, definitely. And we see all the races and people.”
“We get to sleep in the forests, curled in leaves or hidden in the notches of the diamond trees.”
“That’s my favorite part, to sleep in the diamond trees. They sing when the wind blows through. Their clear wood fills with light like crystal in the morning, and we wake up inside of rainbows.”
“I like to see the ocean.”
“Sometimes we build ships of light and set them sailing for the horizon.”
Veil laughed. “So, you all love to travel?”
As she spoke, others of the fairies came and gathered around her, drifting from the alcoves and hidden recesses of the great hall, from their hideaways in the ceiling and their miniature houses in the chandeliers. One of the fairies on the steps spoke up. “Travel is our favorite time.”
“Not mine,” said another.
The rest grew silent, as if unsure how to handle dissent.
“Have you ever seen the dwarves?” Veil asked. “Father says that they’ve hidden away since the Iris was sewn.”
“Oh, yes,” I’ve seen the dwarves, many times, said one of the fairies. “They live in the Khaien mountains. We visit their city of Unkai.”
“What are they like?” Veil asked.
“Ugly,” said a younger fairy.
The others laughed. “They’re slow,” said one, “and proud. And they have big beards.”
“Ugly,” repeated the younger fairy, delighted with the success of its joke.
Tressa stood in the archway with Ariel floating beside her. “She has a healing heart,” Tressa said. “Even on the farm she’s always caring for the sickly animals.”
Ariel smiled. “It’s good to see them laughing. Veil is the best thing they could have right now. A true child to remind them what they are.”
Randiriel flitted up beside Ariel from a nearby ledge. “Do you know what they are though?”
Ariel nodded. “My children,” she said, “my innocent children.”
* * *
Night fell as Geuel reached the river. It lay, calm and wide in the glow of the waxing moon. He walked his horse south along the bank for a few miles, occasionally spotting footprints in the mud. He found a knot of discarded makeshift bandages, stained deep red despite their rinsing. Reheuel couldn’t have made it far.
An hour later, he saw a prone form in the grass near the river bank, barely noticeable in the half-light. He leapt from his horse. “Father?” he asked. He approached and placed his fingers on Reheuel’s neck. A faint pulse trickled beneath his fingertips. “What have you done to yourself?” he asked, peeling back his father’s shirt to see the wound. “Brash old man.”
He dug his hands down under Reheuel’s shoulders and knees. “Sorry,” he said and lifted.
Reheuel groaned in his sleep and muttered. Geuel lay his body across the front of his saddle and tied his arms and legs into place with bowstrings.
He then climbed up behind and spurred his horse. “Gently, Iridius,” he whispered.
The trees flashed by in the night. Rocks occasionally clacked beneath the horse’s hooves in the fields, and logs thudded on its calves in the forests. Every minute, Geuel waited for Iridius to lurch and whinny, to collapse with a broken leg from some root or tree trunk. But still he nudged him faster.
Reheuel’s head lolled on the saddle, occasionally bouncing against the hard leather when the horse landed a harder step. Geuel laid a hand on his head. “Hold on, Father,” he said. “Just to the city. Be strong, old man.”
Twice during the ride, Geuel heard the shrieks of goblins in the woods, both times distant and unintelligible. He shuddered nonetheless. They were out in force. He prayed silently to Curiosity to spare Gath Odrenoch. To spare his people.
He wondered often what ghastly power the Tear would obtain, wielded with the cyntras of Anger or Malice. Was it already being used? Did Gath Odrenoch burn? He pictured the log walls and rickety spires of the city, the stone barracks behind the governor’s double-story mansion, the well dug by his uncle. He spurred his horse harder. The city would not burn. Not without him inside.
* * *
“And off that way, far beyond the farthest Iris, lie the Western mountains. They catch the rain clouds that would travel west and keep Rehavan lush in the summer,” Hefthon said, pointing to the west from the top of the fairy keep.
“And what’s past the mountains?” Veil asked.
“Not much,” Hefthon replied. The desert mostly. There are people there though, humans like us. Their nearest city is Calimar in the foothills of the mountains.”
“Anything else?” Veil asked, knowing the answer but wishing to hear it again.
“Well, there are the sand dragons in the loneliest areas, giant creatures that burrow into the earth and ambush their prey. Then there are the sand people. Some say they were men once, cursed by Ingway to live forever between dust and flesh.”
Veil grinned. “I want to travel there some day.”
Hefthon ruffled her hair. “Of all the places? Not to Esrathel or Elisidor? Why the desert?”
“There must be people who need help.”
“I guess there probably are,” Hefthon replied. He turned back to the east. The sun was just clearing the edge of the horizon, striking the pale sides of the Fairy City and tinting them a rosy pink. “But there is plenty to do here as well.”
Veil pointed to the north. “Is that something moving?”
Hefthon followed her finger carefully and saw a dark form rapidly crossing the plains by the river. “Yes,” he said. “Looks like a rider.” He headed for the stairs. “Perhaps it’s Geuel or Father. Come on,”
As he stepped out of the building on the first floor, he felt the earth give way beneath his right foot. He collapsed downward, his leg sinking through the shattered crystal pavement. Below, he heard slabs of crystal splash into the flow of the Faeja. With the gap in the road, the river could be heard plainly below.
Veil screamed.
Hefthon kept perfectly still, one leg spread out over the ground and the other hanging down in a jagged hole. Tressa reached out her hand. “Take my hand, quickly.”
He grasped her wrist, and she pulled him upright, his leg sliding out of the hole.
Tressa knelt to examine the place where he had fallen. The road was only about six inches thick. About thirty feet below, she could see the Faeja. “There are cracks,” she said, “spreading out from the hole. We’ll need to use the other entrance when we come back here.”
Hefthon nodded. “The city’s getting weaker by the hour.”
Together they made their way along the street toward the north gate. It lay about a half-mile to the north. When they reached it and climbed the wall, they could see the figure clearly in the distance. A single rider with a load. Hefthon paled. “Father.” He turned to Veil. “Go tell Ariel to meet us. We’ll need her.”
Tressa placed her hand on her son’s shoulder. “Be calm,” she whispered. “We don’t know yet.” Her hand trembled where it rested.
Hefthon grasped her hand in his own and squeezed it. “He’ll be all right,” he said. Turning to the gate, he found the wheel for the portcullis and began turning it. The silver bars of the gate trembled as they rose, and several broke off as the spikes left their moorings.
“So much for locking the gates,” Hefthon said.
Tressa looked around nervously. “The city is rotting. What will happen when the towers weaken?”
Several minutes later, the rider came close enough for Hefthon to recognize him. “It’s Geuel,” he said. “Looks like he has someone on the saddle.” He looked back into the city. “Where’s Veil?”
When Geuel reached the gate, he stopped his horse and slid out of the saddle. As soon as his feet touched the ground, he collapsed. “Get him—get him to the keep,” he said.
The horse stood heaving in the gateway, her breaths deep and hard. Geuel patted her leg. “Good girl,” he said.
Tressa ran to her husband. “Reh?” she asked, “Reh?” She leapt up into the saddle behind him and snapped the reins. “Find Ariel,” she called over her shoulder.
Hefthon extended a hand to Geuel. “Come on, brother.”
Geuel let himself be dragged upright and wiped a slick of sweat from his forehead. “Long ride,” he said.
“Tell me about it later,” Hefthon replied. “Did he find the tear?”
Geuel shook his head. “Wasn’t on him.”
“City’s going to pieces,” Hefthon said, pointing to a tower on the corner. “Been watching that one, it’ll fall at any moment. Already twisted part way.”
Geuel nodded as they walked down the road. “Yeah,” he said as his breath returned, “saw some gaps in the wall on the way up. Stones jumbled on the banks.”
“How’s Father?”
Geuel shook his head. “Doesn’t look good. He’s lost a lot of blood. Brash old man.”
“Don’t do that,” Hefthon said.
“Do what?”
“He might die,”
“Yeah, well, he’d still be safe if he hadn’t charged off alone. He’s not thirty anymore—or forty for that matter.”
“He’s a brave man.”
“He’s a great man,” Geuel replied, “but that doesn’t make him any younger.”
Hefthon nodded ahead. “Iridius is by the door. You should put her with the other horses. Oh, and watch your footing.” Hefthon pointed to the hole in the street.
“Good to know,” Geuel replied.
Hefthon heard sobbing as he entered the keep. Reheuel lay near the middle of the main hall with his head resting on a saddle. The bow and saddlebags lay in a jumble nearby. Veil knelt beside him, shuddering violently, her face burrowed into Tressa’s shoulder. Tressa sat still and dry-eyed, Reheuel’s right hand clasped in hers over his chest. With her other hand, she stroked her daughter’s hair.
Ariel hovered with her council a short ways off. They were whispering, but their voices echoed in the empty chamber.
Hefthon approached. “Can you do anything?” he asked.
Ariel turned away from the others to face him. “We could—with the Tear. Healing is natural to us. But, as is, I do not know. It has taken all we have to hold the city together.”
Hefthon pointed to his father. “He did this for you.”
“I don’t know what will happen to the city.”
“Does it matter?” Hefthon asked. “The Tear’s gone. How long can you hold out? A day, two?”
Randiriel approached from near the stairs. “I can help,” she said.
Ariel nodded. “Help them hold the keep. The rest of the city can fade.”
She pointed to two of the council. “Celine, Brylle, help me.”
Hefthon glanced around. “What do you mean, just the keep?” he asked.
Ariel waved her arm toward the walls outside. “All of that shall fade. We will hold this building intact—if we can.”
“Wait, I have to get Geuel,” Hefthon said, “and the horses.” He ran outside. “Geuel!” he called. “Bring the horses. Geuel!”
A loud groan followed by staccato splinters and cracks sounded from across the road. Horses whinnied in fear. Hefthon ran for the stables. “Geuel?” he shouted. As he approached the door, he felt the ground shift beneath his feet, its brittle surface cracking under unnatural contortions. He blotted out the sounds and ran through the archway, only to stagger to a halt at the edge of a great chasm. Five feet of empty space spread from one wall to the other—a solid chunk of the city’s floor just gone.
Geuel stood on the far side of the gap, his back pressed to the wall. The horses were gone.
“Hefthon eyed the gap. “Can you jump it?” he asked.
Geuel nodded doubtfully.
“The fairies are releasing the city,” he said. “You have to come now.” He spread his arms. “Aim for me. I’m far enough back”
Geuel stepped away from the wall and bent his knees. “Just like hopping the crik back home,” he said.
Hefthon glanced quickly at the massive river thirty feet below. “Yeah—just like that.”
Geuel ran and leapt. His shoulder struck Hefthon in the chest, and they both stumbled backward into the wall. It shattered and crumbled behind them, and they rolled out into the street, covered in silver dust.
Hefthon wiped a spot of blood from his cheek. “Not so bad,” he said, slapping his brother on the back. “You okay?”
Geuel trembled slightly as he stood up. “Let’s get inside.”
Hefthon kicked the damaged wall behind them and watched it crumble. “Right behind you,” he said.
They entered the keep together and found the main hall crowded and filled with chatter. More than sixteen hundred fairies clustered from floor to ceiling through the whole four floors. Flitting to and fro and babbling wildly. Randiriel and the council knelt in a ring holding hands near the stairs. In the center of the room, Ariel and her two sisters hovered over Reheuel.
Ariel looked over to the brothers. “Lock the doors,” she said. “No matter what happens, do not interrupt us.” She turned around. “Let us start.”
Seconds later, a great roar drowned out all noise. The keep trembled and shook, and the fairies screamed, flashing back and forth and batting at the walls, trying to find a way out through the locked windows. Hefthon stumbled and braced himself against the wall. Tressa clutched Veil against the stairs. Geuel staggered unsteadily.
The ground shuddered again, and a massive crack echoed through the room from outside. “Half the city must have fallen away,” Geuel cried out.
“No splash,” Hefthon replied. “It’s just the towers falling into the city.”
Just then a mighty groan drowned out their voices. Veil clutched her hands over her ears and cried out. The keep keeled over to one side, hurling Geuel against the wall and throwing Hefthon to the ground. A deep roar sounded from the water below as the river struggled over a section of the city. Splashed water, running down the sides of the keep, trickled through the crack of the door.
In the center of the room, Ariel hovered over Reheuel, gleaming brighter than Geuel had ever seen her, her scarlet dress blazing like a ruby in the sunlight. Her hands were stretched out to Reheuel's face, and they trembled as if in exhaustion. Her eyes were closed.
“Hold on,” Geuel said, “hold on.”
The keep shuddered again and slid downward. Geuel felt his stomach shift suddenly, and for one single moment he felt weightless. Then he was falling. Falling with the keep toward the water. Veil screamed.
A roaring crash sounded from below, and Geuel and the others slammed bodily to the floor as the keep struck the Faeja’s surface. Water ran in through the cracks of the doors and window shades. Fairies flew upward, shrieking madly and clustering near the roof in a rustling, glowing mass. Geuel dragged himself to his feet and staggered toward his mother. “The stairs!” he called. “Up the stairs.”
Tressa dragged Veil onto the steps and began climbing, Hefthon placing his hand on her back.
Geuel went back toward Reheuel and sank beside him. He was still unconscious, but the water ran about his body, slowly building upward—already nearly two inches deep. Tickling his ears. Ariel and the other two fairies still hovered above him in silence, as if oblivious to the water, to the fact that their tower stood on the floor of the Faeja.
Geuel could hear the current outside, striking and churning around the silver walls. The keep had settled, sitting vertically in the center of the Faeja. He looked to the stairs. The council were still there, hands held tightly, bodies taut with exertion. As he watched, one body went limp. Its light flickered, and it fell, splashing in the three inch water on the floor. Geuel ran over and scooped it up, pulling it from under the water and setting it on the steps. Its eyes were glazed, but it seemed alive. Geuel looked to the other council members. “Come on,” he said, “you have to do something.”
The water still rose around Reheuel, nearly past his ears now. Soon it would cover his mouth. Just as it broke over the corners of his lips, a bright flash of light bloomed in the center of the council ring. Randiriel’s body blazed as brightly as Ariel’s, her skin burning like the sun, her green dress a fluorescent glow. The rest of the council paled beside her. Her body slowly rose, eyes still closed and muscles stiff. She slipped from the grasp of her fellows and rose higher, dragging her tense arms up from her sides as if pulling some great weight. The keep lifted.
On the stairs, Hefthon gasped. “Geuel, the door!” he called.
Randiriel continued to ascend, burning ever brighter as she lifted, soon eclipsing even Ariel. The keep trembled but rose also, the sound of rushing water engulfing it on every side.
Geuel stood by the door and lifted his sword. “Are we clear?” he called. Hefthon watched the trickles of water at the window slowly disappearing. “Wait, wait,” he called.
“Are we clear?”
“Now!” Hefthon called.
Geuel slid his sword into the tight seam between the doors and pried one of them back into its slot in the wall. Water rushed out through the opening, draining over the edge of the floor. Geuel braced himself in the door frame and stared outside, water rushing about his ankles and splashing in the river below.
The keep rested barely a foot over the surface of the Faeja. Towers and walls and roads projected haphazardly all about, cluttering the water and jutting upward like the debris of a silver avalanche. The keep kept on rising, and slowly the Faeja fell away, swollen out over its banks around the ruins of the Fairy City.
“Randiriel, turn!” he cried. “Get us onto the plain.”
Slowly, the keep shifted direction and drifted toward the shore. The silver stones groaned and rumbled as they moved.
A gasp came from the center of the room, followed by a sputtering choke. Reheuel sat up and coughed, emptying his lungs of water. Tressa ran to him.
Hefthon stayed on the stairs staring at Randiriel. She was barely visible anymore as a form. Just a sphere of blinding light. “Help her,” he called. “Ariel!”
Ariel ascended beside Randiriel and clasped her hand. The light distributed between them, and after a few seconds the tower sank to the earth on the Faeja’s shores.
Ariel smiled. “Well done, Rand,” she said softly.
Randiriel drifted unsteadily to the floor and leant against the leg of a bench. Her skin was pale and sickly, her light dimming to a dull, ember-like glow.