“I would, naturally. But, um…”
They all looked down at Alder’s satchel lying at their feet.
“You left the diaper bag behind?”
“I cannot tell you how embarrassed I am.”
The Queen regained her composure. “Very well, Alder, you may come out now.”
There was a dull thud from within.
The Queen waited impatiently. “I said you may exit.”
Another thud.
“It appears that the door will not open.”
“What?”
“I appear to be trapped.”
The Queen’s eyebrow twitched in irritation. Behind her mask, she imagined all of the ways she would yell at him once they were alone.
“This is just like the trial of the mirror,” Captain Tallia whispered. “The room will not release him until the ceremony is completed.”
“But we don’t know what the ceremony is. How could he complete it?”
“Perhaps it is the same as the mirror trial. We could tell him how to complete it.”
“Are you crazy? We cannot divulge the details to a man, doing so would break our oaths,” Teak insisted.
The Archivist marched up to Milia’s door and turned around, outstretching her hands. “I will not allow you to remove the remove the oracles from the inner sanctum.”
“How can he complete the ceremony without the oracles?”
Before she could answer, Archivist Teak was thrown forward away from Milia’s sanctum, crashing to the floor.
“What…what was that?” she asked in panic, sliding loose strands of hair away from her face.
The women were dumbfounded.
Captain Tallia stepped forward and outstretched her remaining hand, but she too was shoved away by Milia’s rippling archway.
“How is this possible? A daughter of the forest is barred from Milia’s Heart?”
“These men,” Teak snarled as she stood up. “These men must have corrupted the royal tree somehow.”
The Queen’s hazel eyes widened in understanding. “No, it is because you are not his wife.”
Archivist Teak furrowed her brow. “What?”
“Alder, did you not say that anciently the position of Ruler of the Forest was held by a wife and husband together?”
“That is my theory, yes.”
Captain Tallia stepped before Athel. “My Queen, just three minutes ago you said you were only humoring him.”
“It has been a very persuasive three minutes.”
Archivist Teak rose to her feet, spittle dripping down her chin. “Blasphemy!” she screamed. “He has corrupted you as well.”
“Now see here,” the guards said, readying their weapons. “You will not speak to your Queen in such tones.”
The Queen motioned for them to stand down and calmly turned to her accuser.
“Archivist Teak, do you really consider me so feebleminded and weak-willed that I could be dominated by a man?”
Teak’s eyes flickered. “Ah…”
“Do you really consider our Goddess so feckless that a few mortal men could alter her inner sanctum?”
Teak lowered her hand. She shifted her weight abashedly. “Um…no, I…”
Carefully she lowered her head. “My apologies, my Queen.”
Gently, the Queen placed a hand on her shoulder. “I share your trepidation, Rosetta, but your wild accusations are not helping this situation. Is the forest known for being rash?”
Recognizing the scriptural passage she was quoting, the Archivist raised her face and completed the stanza. “No, you are right. The forest is cautious, paced, measured, meaningful.”
“Well said. Before we can decide what to do, we must first understand what it is we are dealing with.”
Queen Athel took her staff and spun it once around in her grip. “I am going inside,” she declared.
Her guards protested, but did not intervene as their Queen scooped up the bag and stepped forward, passing unbarred through the thin membrane of amber and into Milia’s inner sanctum.
Once inside, she found things very different from the last time she had been in here. The normally featureless north wall was covered with scriptures in the old tongue. As much as she hated to admit it, she couldn’t make most of it out. In her doubts, she placed yet another block on the pile of reasons why she was not worthy to wear the crown. Spirea’s words still bit deeply into her.
Am I really nothing more than a spoiled child pretending to be Queen?
In her heart, she feared that it was true.
She closed her eyes and let her fears drain out of her as best she could. She could not share her doubts with the link. They needed her confidence if the forest was to survive this war. But, what was the forest? She realized that she wasn’t as sure as she had been before. This was all so new, it shook her roots, made her second-guess everything she thought she knew about Wysteria.
Then she noticed a circular cavity in the center of the wall, barely bigger than her fist. She stooped down to investigate, and found a face staring back at her.
“Ahhhhh!” Athel shrieked, falling back onto her rump.
“Are you all right, Athi?” Alder asked her.
“Don’t scare me like that.”
“My apologies.”
“Are you all right, my Queen?” came the muffled voice of Captain Tallia from outside.
“Yes, I am fine,” she answered, a little embarrassed.
Athel picked herself back up and adjusted her circlet. “What are you doing in here?” she asked through the hole.
“I have not left the chamber.”
Athel scratched her elegantly pointed ear. “So, the two chambers are now connected.”
“Were they not before?”
“No, there has always been only one way in or out.”
“I see.”
Athel noticed that Alder was not wearing his shirt. Through the hole she could make out the deep scars on his back and shoulders.
“Where is your shirt?”
Alder held up Ash, who was cooing happily as he sucked in his thumb, wearing Alder’s shirt as a makeshift diaper. “I improvised.”
Athel wanted to smile, but first had to look around to make sure no eyes were upon her, then finally allowed it to come across her face.
“Thank you for taking such good care of our son,” she said sincerely.
Alder smiled warmly. “Of course, Athi.”
Without thinking, they both naturally reached through the cavity and held hands. As soon as their skin touched, the walls began glowing, and the entire tree seemed to vibrate and shudder.
The far wall of amber thinned and vanished, so much light spilling in that it washed everything else out. Athel covered her eyes, but even through her fingers and eyelids, the light seemed to overpower her.
Alder never let go of her hand.
When her eyes finally adjusted, she was astonished at what she saw. A room of pure pearl and silver, more beautiful than anything she had ever seen. Streams of clear water cascaded along every surface, pooling into a shallow pond that comprised the majority of the floor. The air felt incredible, energized, like life itself.
Without thinking, she released Alder’s hand and stepped into this new chamber, standing on a small platform that hung out over the water.
Alder stepped in as well from his chamber, and they stood together, marveling at the beauty of it. Light reflected off the water on the walls and floor, covering them with ribbons of reflection that seemed to caress every inch of their bodies.
Instinctively they held hands again, Ash giggling happily at the light.
Athel closed her eyes and allowed the radiance to soak into her. It warmed her to the very core. It was more refreshing than water, more satisfying than bread. It was like pure
youth was pouring into her.
She could only recall one other time in her life that she had felt like this. It was the moment when they were married, sealed together through Deutzia. She gave Alder’s hand a little squeeze, and he squeezed hers back.
“A chamber beyond, only accessible by a wife and husband together…” Athel said aloud.
“What is this place?” Alder asked, marveling.
Athel could not help but laugh. “This place should not exist. There is nothing more sacred than Milia’s altar. Why would there be something beyond it?”
Beneath the water on the far wall, was a carving within the pearl. A flawless circle, containing two rivers. The river on top flowed up and then branched, like the trunk and branches of a mighty tree. The river below gathered together from tributaries, forming a mighty river, like the roots and trunk of a tree.
“What is this carving?” Alder asked.
“The top half I know. That is the holy symbol for Milia. But the bottom half…I have never seen before.”
Alder opened his mouth. “It is the symbol for a god.
“Another god? But who?”
“The god of the faceless constellation. The missing god. The god of the men of Wysteria.”
Athel covered her mouth in astonishment. There was only one reason for this carving to exist in the royal tree. Because the goddess herself put it here. “Can you read it, Aldi?”
Alder barely had the presence of mind to answer her. “It is a symbol, it cannot be read phonetically.”
“Right.”
Athel felt light-headed. She had to lean on her husband to keep from falling over. “A second god in Wysteria,” she whispered. “A companion to Milia. How could I have not known about this?”
Alder looked up. At the center of the ceiling lay a golden seal of three rose carvings, intertwined like a wreath. “Athi, do you see that?”
She looked up and recognized it instantly. “A red Cliffthorn rose, a white Holly Rose, and a yellow Dragon Rose. It’s the royal meridian.”
Alder nodded. “Do you know what this means? This chamber lies directly beneath the Throne of Wysteria.”
Athel’s eyes went wide. “Is this what Spirea meant?”
Chapter Five
Moltens grimaced with exertion, his hands trembling as he forced his magic into the crystal before him. Standing opposite to him was Migistra of Lahiti, his lion-like mane drooping with sweat as he did the same. For generations their fathers and uncles, grandfathers and great-grandfathers had made war on one another. Now they cast their magic, not in opposition, but in cooperation.
“Clear your minds, boys,” Mina cautioned as she watched over the synergy. “Make your heart as clear as glass. Your magic must be free of any emotional impurity or the energies will rebound instead of flow together.”
The crystal bent and warped, struggling to maintain its shape as light and knowledge were forced one grain at a time into its form. Moltens grit his teeth and forced himself to set aside his hatred for Lahitians, if only for a moment. He thought instead of his homeland. The beautiful desert spires, deep cool caves of glowing ore, sweet dry breezes through the rocky arches, and juicy cactus root. He reminded himself of everything he wanted to protect. The clear ringing of brass trumpets on feast days, the glowing flicker of hanging lanterns, the rhythmic stomping of dancing feet and clapping tails. His lovely wife wearing a wreath of flowers around her long slender neck, the bright colors picked to match her tamba dress. Their children clinging happily to his feet and wrapping their tails around his legs when he stepped through the cave entrance.
For them, and for a thousand others, he set aside his hate for the lion-man before him, and then it happened.
The beam of yellow sunlight and the gout of grey fire fused together with a crack like lightning. The crystal shrieked in joy, tripling in size as is grew into the shape of a curved crescent of pulsating indigo.
“That’s it!” Mina cheered.
Moltens dropped his arms, then fell to his knees, gasping for breath. Migistra wobbled on his hind paws, and reached out to steady himself on Queen Forsythia, but her guards caught his paw before it touched her shoulder.
“Does it always drain you this much?” Moltens asked Mina as she inspected the synergy.
“Every time, sweetie,” she winked before tossing him a piece of candy. “Try sucking on this, the sugar helps.”
“Why do I feel like she is rewarding a loyal pet?” Migistra snickered as he was thrown a piece of his own. The two men glanced at each other for a moment, then shared a deep belly laugh together.
Mina took the glowing crescent and placed it in the device. Nothing like it had ever existed in Aetria. A rotating Almanian clockwork turret, on which was mounted an oversized telescope. The design of the telescope was unmistakably Timmeroniese, but the lenses themselves were made from Sutorian hard-light. Mina attached the crescent to the back of the telescope and clamped it into place.
“Are we ready for a field test?” Queen Forsythia asked dispassionately.
Mina nodded enthusiastically. She pulled the release lever on the turret and the clockworks whirred to life, turning the telescope to the east and raising it slightly.
“The sibling pendant in the tube is paired with the pendant on other prototype mounted on the deck of the St. Downing,” Mina explained to the dignitaries present, pointing past the treetops around them towards the airship floating distantly on the horizon. “No matter how far away they are, they will always point straight at one another.”
Mina’s long white tail swished confidently as she placed her hand on the crescent, but then she paused.
“Is something wrong?” Queen Forsythia asked.
“What? Oh, no, it’s just that, this will be the first message ever sent by light-carrier. I feel like it should kind of be momentous, but I’m not sure what the message should say.”
Queen Forsythia thought for a moment. “Tell them, ‘this day, the people of the world kindle a light in the darkness.’”
“Oh, I like that,” Rachael cooed, scribbling it down on her notepad.
The assembled dignitaries nodded enthusiastically to one another.
Nikki blossomed with esteem. She reached up and touched the Alliance patch on her uniform. “We should add that to the Alliance crest,” she suggested.
Alder leaned in and whispered to his wife. “Should we tell them that you just quoted The Hourglass?”
“Shhh.”
Mina spoke the message aloud into the synthesis crescent and it purred to life. A thin beam of light shot out from the device, pulsing dozens of colors in quick succession, translating the phrase into a code of light that the crescent on the other end would interpret. A heartbeat later, it was done.
“Now to see if the message was received.”
For several moments, they all waited with baited breath. Then, a signal flare rose up from the St. Downing. It exploded in the air, the burning embers forming into words. The message hung there in the air, exactly as Mina had spoken it, and everyone cheered.
Even the Queen allowed herself a satisfied grin. “Well done, everyone,” she praised sincerely.
The exhausted men and women of the build-team all thanked her.
“Now, we can begin mass production,” she announced.
“What?” Moltens asked, the color draining out of his scales.
“I need fifty such devices by the end of the week.”
The build-team all looked at each other in horror.
“Did you say fifteen or fifty?” Eilsa the clockwork master asked, hoping she had heard wrong as grease dripped off the tips of her heavy work gloves.
“Fifty.”
The Almanian woman looked like she might pass out.
“We’re going to need a lot more candy,” Mina realized.
Kahn Alakaneezer sl
apped Kaiser Duncan on the shoulder with his great white paw, sending the man’s top-hat spinning down into the branches below. “Now is the time for drinking!” he shouted. “We’re going to find the surliest pub we can. The first person to pass out, loses!”
Several of the delegates cheered wildly.
“Oh, not again,” Duke Relivan murmured, drawing his cape in around him as if it were a blanket. “My head is still spinning from last night’s bender.”
Alakaneezer gave a deep belly laugh and scooped the men up as if they were nothing more than toys, carrying them off while their flustered attendants scurried after them. “Come on, ladies! Where is the courage your people showed in the thirty-years war now? Ah, ha ha haaaaaa!”
The Queen politely declined the invitation to join them, then turned to her own attendants.
“Dahoon, please clear my schedule for the next hour.”
Normally, this would have caused the court official to go into a nervous breakdown. Sadly, such reschedulings were becoming so common under her reign that he found he was beginning to develop a tolerance for them.
“It shall be done,” he said smartly as he scurried off, clearly having no idea of how it could be accomplished.
As Alder drew close to her, he saw her eyes focused on a distant point at the center of the forest, nearly hidden by the taller, younger growth that hedged it in. The trees there were faded and withered, having seen so many winters that spring could no longer fully rejuvenate them.
“You mean to speak to the Elder directly?” Alder whispered.
Queen Forsythia nodded. “Male trees normally avoid the link, but never before has a tree completely ignored me like this. If he will not answer my calls through the link then I will speak to him face to face.”
A few minutes later, the Queen and her entourage arrived at ‘emu’ilaa, the oldest part of the forest. The only place in all of Wysteria where male trees still stood.
The air here was thick with memory. Protected from the wind by the taller younger trees, everything was eerily still, allowing a blanket of dust and pollen that accumulated like fallen grey snow. No birds made their nests here, nor flicker beetles their pods. It felt like a place frozen in time. A picture of eras long past when male and female trees grew freely one with another. Thick cobwebs bound the branches together like great, webbed hands that seemed poised to reach out and grab from every direction.
Isle of Wysteria: The Monolith Crumbles Page 17