“Of course, but why do you warn me so?”
“The Matriarch… she loves Rin, but she is a priestess. A runewarden, not a druid. She has… teachings. When you feel religion clouding your mind and hiding you from the clarity of the wind and the earth, return to the jungle. Touch nature for yourself, and you will always be grounded.”
She turned to gaze into his eyes and reached up, touching his cheek tenderly. “Thank you,” she said, “for all that you have shared with me. Let us go into your home and meet your Matriarch.”
He nodded, and without another word, led her down the path into the village.
Odoune took her straight to the heart of the village on a great cleft halfway up the cliff wall and behind the massive waterfall curtain. Trolls, women and men, gathered along the path to catch a glimpse of her. A reverent hush fell over the crowd as they watched with curious eyes.
The troll women looked significantly different from the men, almost like humans, with slightly narrower faces. Instead of manes, they had human-looking hair. Their ears were as short as human ears, but still pointed and narrow like those of elves. Their faces were beautiful by elven and human standards, yet made savage by tiny tusks that jutted from under their cheekbones. Their skin was colored the same as the troll men’s—from smooth and creamy light greens to blues, and leaning more towards the sky-blue and sea-foam hues than the men’s bolder forest and lake tints—but furless.
All of them wore similar styles of clothing, covering themselves in loincloths of animal skins. The women wore cholis as tops to cover their breasts, just as Aradma had been clothed in Kallanista. It was so hot that no one covered themselves more than necessary. Their decorative clothing took the form of feathers, claws, and bones that hung from the leather harnesses and gold chains they wore. For the most part, their weaponry was primitive, bows, spears, and raptor-claw knives. Among the men, Aradma saw more advanced weapons—a revolver here, a finely crafted short sword there—most likely acquired through trade with the ratlings.
The end of their trail led into a great tent of canvas and fur, forming a spherical ribbed blister on the cliff wall. The mists from the waterfall covered Aradma’s skin in a damp sheen, but the air felt reasonably cool enough inside. The tent had a narrow, triangular slit cut for an entrance, and two men with great tusks and cruel spears pulled back the skin flaps to open the way.
Aradma ducked inside with Odoune. Candles lit the interior of the tented antechamber, and hanging strands of glittering beads curtained a doorway at the back of the room.
“This is the sacred chamber,” Odoune whispered to her. “Beyond these beads, men are not permitted. Only my druidic office allows me entry to address the Matriarch in this room.”
The space beyond the beaded curtain was a work of art. The portal led into a larger cavern chamber, cut into a perfect circle. Oiled canvases covered the walls to keep away cave water, layered over with soft and brightly colored woven cloth that brought an air of warmth and comfort. Aradma gasped at the beauty of the chamber floor. Somehow, it was a perfectly flat, mirrored surface of a single piece of black obsidian. It reflected light as a dark mirror, and the candles around the room created the illusion of stars underneath. The ceiling was a twin piece of white obsidian, catching the candle glow and filling the room with a diffuse, milky moonlight.
Cushions and blankets lay over the pristine floor surface in clumps, with women reclined in groups of twos and threes. In the privacy of this chamber, hidden from the outside, every woman was free from clothing, wearing only their harnesses of jewels and metal.
In the middle sat a woman on a black obsidian chair that rose from the floor, all carved from the same piece. It seemed more a throne than a chair, with the seat cradling a single green and yellow cushion. The woman sitting upon it had dark blue skin, almost the color of midnight, and red irises. The right side of her head was shaved bald, as was most of the left. A long, thick mass of hair folded into a single intertwining of jet-black braids that fell down the left side of her face, past her shoulder to just under the curve of her breast. Her high cheekbones held two small, three-inch crescent tusks that jutted in smooth curves to point down to the floor. Unlike the others, who wore thin chains, she wore a mass of metal and jewels, covering her neck to the tops of her breasts. A line of hooped earrings traveled the side of each ear, and thin golden wire wrapped her upper arms with jeweled beads. She sat upright with poise as she spoke with two of her attendants, who sat beside her on floor cushions. Other than the tusks and skin coloring, her face was humanoid. Aradma exhaled, stunned by the Matriarch’s radiance.
Odoune stepped five paces into the chamber and stopped, waiting to be recognized. Aradma followed and waited patiently beside him, staring at the Matriarch. The Matriarch sat as the center of gravity of her universe, an exemplar of feminine power ruling all around her. Aradma found her magnetic, so much that she felt she wanted to be her. To emulate her. To earn her approval. These thoughts are beneath you, the Fae whispered in her mind, but she brushed them aside. The Matriarch held the countenance of a goddess.
The Matriarch fixed her eyes upon them, which then widened in surprise. Every other woman in the room gasped at their matron’s loss of composure. The Matriarch rose from her seat, and her attendants followed her example. She strode forward purposely up to Aradma and reached out with both arms, cradling Aradma’s face in her palms. She stared intently into the elf’s luminous eyes and Aradma’s heart quickened.
“You have delivered on your promise, Odoune,” she stated in a deep, richly feminine voice. “More than delivered. She is the vision of Soorleyn herself.”
The Matriarch’s palms felt hot on Aradma’s cheeks. The seelie’s senses reached out to this troll woman, absorbing the air of her essence. She tasted notes of a wild, unwavering force, deeply primal and immovable in her convictions. There was something intoxicating in her primal potency.
The Matriarch dropped her warm hands to Aradma’s shoulders. “We will gather your people to us, and you will be of the Vemnai. You shall be the first among them, at my side. It is just as I have foreseen. You and I shall rule, as one, for all to see that Soorleyn and Rin are together once again.”
13 - Intoxication
Aradma stood stunned at the Matriarch’s proclamation. Odoune seemed equally speechless.
The Matriarch turned to Odoune. “Leave us,” she commanded the druid. “I would speak with her alone. What I have to say to her now is solely for women’s ears.”
Odoune bowed. As he turned to leave, he whispered to Aradma, “Remember, when things seem cloudy, it is in the jungle that Rin provides clarity.” He departed, leaving Aradma alone with the troll women.
“Come with me,” the Matriarch said. “Walk with me in the cloister.”
The troll interlocked her left arm in Aradma’s right. Linked at their elbows, they walked together, followed by two of the Matriarch’s attendants. She led Aradma through a passage from the rear of the circular obsidian room, beyond which spanned a network of bridges and open staircases through a cylindrical cavern. Lines of waterfalls, caught and redirected by sculpted pathways, created a flowing latticework of water. Carved ledge-roads spiraled around the expanse, hosting doors and windows to women’s apartments.
“This is the heart of where we live,” the Matriarch said. “This sanctuary was made long ago by my ancestors, as conceived by the earliest Matriarchs.”
“There are no men here,” Aradma observed, seeing the lines of women leaning over balconies to get a glimpse at her.
“It is forbidden for men to be here. Each apartment has an outer chamber where a priestess may receive her husbands that does not enter into the cloister.”
“What about women who are not priestesses?”
The Matriarch laughed. “All our women are sacred. We are all priestesses and sisters in the faith or acolytes in training to the sisterhood, except for those who forsake it all to become a druid—but that is a different matter.” Aradma liked th
e idea of all of them being sacred.
The troll stopped and regarded Aradma for a moment. She reached behind Aradma’s neck and undid the ties of her top, pulling it away from her body. She untied and removed Aradma’s loincloth as well, leaving the elf only in her harness of jewels like the rest of the troll women. “Once, we were slaves to men, and they covered us to hide their property. Now, here in the circle of our cloister, we walk as nature intended, free from slavery. We are equals, and we live as Rin made us.” She handed the skins to Aradma. “But you must cover yourself outside, for the sake of the men.”
“Yes,” Aradma agreed, remembering how Hylda and Arda made her cover herself in front of Attaris. “But you allowed Odoune to stand before you thus.”
“He is not a man. He is a druid, and our bodies hold no interest for him. You will soon understand.”
Aradma tilted her head in confusion but said nothing as she took the skins from the Matriarch and held them in her hand. The cave air felt cool on her breasts. She must have spent too much time in Windbowl, for she blushed a little at her nakedness. She moved past those feelings, recalling the freedom of her innocence when she had first been found by Attaris. She decided to pay it no more thought and continued her questions.
“You have male priests, too,” Aradma recalled the ones who had followed Odoune to find her.
“Ages ago we were caught in the war between darkling and sidhe. We needed to defend ourselves against their sorcery, and so we allowed some of our men limited knowledge of the runes, specifically those that aid against demons. They are runewardens of a lesser nature, and they are the most elevated of our men, but only women can be true priestesses of Rin.”
Aradma remembered her conversation with Odoune on the ratling ship about gathering the light elves to the Vemnai. “Will you welcome my people here?” she asked.
The Matriarch stopped and faced the seelie woman. She put her hands on Aradma’s waist. “We will gather them to us so they can be of the Vemnai. But not yet.”
“Why not?”
“First, you must learn our ways. You will rule at my side and be my companion in all things. As I am for Rin, you shall be for Soorleyn. The divine union shall be restored. When your people come, they will need your example to follow. Your men must learn the place of men, and your women shall be priestesses as is proper for women. In time, troll and seelie will be bound in partnership, but that is not to be taken lightly, nor with haste.”
The Fae within Aradma’s mind churned, and she could feel the movement of the Dragon deeper within. They are all me, she reminded herself. That’s what the vision of the Dragon had said when Marta pulled it out of her. They are all part of me. The idea of sharing in the Matriarch’s sanctity appealed to her, for the troll woman held an aura about her that commanded awe. Aradma felt invigorated in her presence.
The Matriarch led Aradma into a small chapel off of one of the walkways. The chapel doorway was crowned by a carved tree capped by a crescent moon. Candles lit the interior, and three troll women sat in meditation.
“This is what I wanted to show you,” she said.
The far wall was covered in fresco panels. The paintings were crude but clear in their depiction. A silver woman and a green woman embraced each other in love, and their bellies and hips overlapped to form a single womb. The next panel showed the troll people springing forth from the conjoined goddesses.
“Our central mystery,” the Matriarch said. “One womb in two goddesses. Neither gods nor men were necessary to create life.”
For a brief moment, a faerie memory flashed in Aradma’s vision. The fabric of the Otherworld reverberated with Ahmbren’s fears, joys, and greatest passions. She saw thousands of Fae temporarily gathering light to make form. They donned mortal bodies, men and women, painted and beautiful. They drank nature’s desire, radiating from Ahmbren as if it were wine. They touched each other with fingers and lips, tasting the essence of their beings with open kisses. They indulged in the pleasures of flesh, a mass of writhing bodies. The chorus of their grunting, moaning, and crying aloud raised an orgiastic hymn celebrating Ahmbren’s life. The memory roused Aradma’s passion, but it passed as quickly as it came.
“But that is not what we see in nature,” Aradma observed. There was something off about what the Matriarch was saying, some flaw that needed to be uncovered. Perhaps… restored. Healed?
“A trick of Yamosh,” the Matriarch said. “He infected Rin, and so men came to be, twisted offshoots of her original creation.”
“But the other races?”
“That is a concern for other gods, not ours. Yamosh touched them all, I am sure, and they—humans, orcs, dwarves—are children of lesser goddesses. We are pure, and with us he was unable to make men in our image. Our men hold Yamosh’s countenance clearly, as you have seen. Yamosh was clever, and before Rin banished him from our midst, he twisted us to need them to bear children, and then cursed us with lust for them. We are very strict in our handling of men. They are for life only; we must not take pleasure in congress with them. There are a few of us, like myself, who are free from this curse. Only we may become Matriarchs, those for whom conceiving children is only duty, not temptation.”
“But all life is this way, male and female,” Aradma said. “This seems…” she trailed off.
The Matriarch spoke faster, caught up in her own excitement. “It is a challenging mystery, to be sure. Yamosh infected all life. Men are his aberrations. He is the father of lies.”
The Matriarch stopped again and leaned forward, whispering into the seelie’s ear. Aradma felt the warmth of her cheek on her face. “But we believe there will be a time again when the full power of life is returned to women. Rin and Soorleyn will return to each other’s embrace, and we will have no more need of men. It will start with trolls, and then the other races, and eventually all life itself. An end to war. An end to bloodshed. An end to the hunter and the prey. Health, wealth, strength and joy, peace and love—perfect happiness. You are the harbinger of this time, the sign that it has begun. You are the scion of Soorleyn, and you and I shall usher in this new age together.”
Blood rushed through Aradma’s heart, and her cheeks flushed a pale green. She grinned awkwardly and looked away. The Fae nobility in her, even the Dragon’s pride, basked in the Matriarch’s adoration.
That evening, Aradma reclined on a wicker sofa on the Matriarch’s balcony, the Matriarch lying on another sofa beside her. The balcony extended into the cascading lattice fountain, and both women looked up the center of the great chasm. At the top of the cylindrical cavern the ceiling tapered into a distant circle that opened into the sky, cradling the view of a tiny field of stars.
The moon gradually moved into view until it filled the aperture with silver light that shimmered and refracted off of the falling water. A haunting tune filled the air as hundreds of priestesses joined their voices in song.
“They sing to the Lady of the Moon,” the Matriarch said. “You arrived at the time of her fullness, on the day she aligns over our cloister. This is a sign.”
Aradma considered the Matriarch’s words. Maybe it was true. Maybe she was following Soorleyn’s will, and the death of the Dragon and the birth of the seelie were parts of a larger plan.
The music, the cool moist air, and the scintillating moonlight pushed her awareness inward. The cloister disappeared…
…and she stood once more in the shadowy court. The amphitheater sat filled with the shades of the Fae lords and ladies. They brooded in silence. The green light softly pulsed behind her.
“I seek your counsel,” she addressed them.
The Fae King came forward. “If this is how we are to live, we will serve as your court.” His red face smiled kindly.
“Is what the Matriarch says true? Am I a scion of Soorleyn?”
The Fae King pinched his lips and tilted his head. “Such would not be known to the Fae.”
A female Fae stepped forward from the shadows. She was wispy, willowy thin,
and smoky green. Her form blurred at the edges as if an artist had rendered her with brushes of the finest detail and then smeared the paints with a wet sponge.
“We reigned in the Otherworld before the worship of gods. The gods revealed themselves to the mortal races of Ahmbren first and never showed interest in our realms.”
“Why?” asked Aradma.
“We don’t know,” the king answered. “They didn’t bother with us, so we didn’t bother with them.”
“Perhaps because we never worshipped them,” the lady added.
The king folded his arms across his chest. “The gods did not teach mortals to worship them, at least not at first. They came forward and answered the call of mortal worship, revealing themselves after many lifetimes.”
“They have never been friendly to the Fae,” the lady said. “Or elven-kind. The sidhe were our children who left the Otherworld. They were Fae first. They did not worship gods either. The gods answered to Ahmbren’s native races. Humans. Dwarves. Orcs. Trolls. Elvenkind has always been at odds with the races of faith. You would do well not to trust this troll woman who makes such claims. Never forget, you are elven. You are of the Otherworld, not Ahmbren.”
“I am of both,” Aradma challenged. “I am of you, but the Dragon is of Ahmbren.”
“Perhaps,” the king mused, “this role is something you could use to your advantage. You need a safe-haven for our people.” Then he corrected himself. “Your people.”
Aradma suddenly awoke. The Matriarch gazed down into her eyes. Aradma reached up and touched the side of the troll’s cheek, tracing a finger down along the curved tusk.
“You were overcome by the moon’s ecstasy,” the Matriarch said.
Aradma inwardly frowned at the Matriarch’s words, but she did not know why. She kept her face smooth, thinking it best not to correct her or reveal the thousands of faerie voices ever present in the back of her mind.
When Dragons Die- The Complete Trilogy Box Set Page 13