The surge of mindless fear was slow to pass, but hunger was a powerful motivator to get her wits about her and eat what she'd been given before she was too weak to do so. She finished what she could stomach of the molasses, then looked expectantly to him.
"Some water please, Gomder," she said.
Ayna knew they couldn't understand her any better than she could understand them, but Gomder was kind enough and attentive enough to look in her direction when she spoke, and he usually offered up a splash from his canteen at the close of every meal. As before, he let a few drops fall into her improvised dish. She drank of it, then used the rest to rinse herself as best she could.
Her nightly ritual complete, she no longer had anything to distract her from the terrible stillness of the air and the impenetrable darkness of the cave. She trembling gaze to her keeper. Gomder was crunching on a piece of food the fairy couldn't recognize, something pale and crumbly. In sharp contrast to her own feelings, he clearly wasn't frightened at all. If anything he seemed more at ease now than when he'd been in the forest. He merely sat, eating his meal and listening as Klei gave this instruction or that.
"How can you stand this?" Ayna said out loud. Again, she knew she wouldn't get an answer, but right now she needed to hear a fairy voice, even if it was her own. "How can you cut yourself off from the sky? How can you stay so steady when life and freedom are so far away?"
Klei made an irritable comment about "noise." Gomder replied with something like "compass is singing."
Ayna continued. "What does it take? How can I be different than I am?" she asked. "How can I be like you are? Brave and strong!"
Klei muttered angrily again. His words were swift and sharp, and the distance and echo made them harder to understand than ever, but his gestured made it clear he was ordering Gomder to return her to the pack.
"No! Please, not yet!" Ayna said.
Gomder shook his head and waved the gesture away, replying with something that sounded like, "We care for our tools properly."
Klei seemed to reluctantly accept this. Ayna breathed a sigh of relieve, and cast a warm and grateful look at Gomder.
"Tool..." she muttered quietly to herself.
She'd more than once heard him use the term in reference to her. He believed compass to be her name, then perhaps tool was something like friend...
In time, the others finished their meals and the time came for her to be stowed from the night. The last thing they did before Gomder placed her carefully into his pack was extinguish even the dim light of the torch, leaving them all in utter blackness. Ayna focused on breathing steadily, hoping that with enough care she could at least bring her pounding heart to a rest so that she could sleep. Something inside her seemed certain that this was just the first of many nights in this deepening, waking nightmare.
#
The days to come taught her that, powerful though they were, her keepers were not invincible. And brave though they were, they were not fearless. She'd been denied, or perhaps more accurately she had been spared, the sight of what precisely had happened, but well into the third day's journey, something had happened. First was a rumble. It began in the distance, and the others heard it before she did. They called out, Gomder moved quickly, and there was much confused shouting as the rumble grew louder. It was like thunder, but continuous, rolling on and on and growing more vicious and deafening. Shaking came next. The whole mountain rattled her captors about as they had been jostling her.
Their yelling took on the flavor of fear, but they didn't give in to the blind panic that was quickly claiming Ayna. A loud crack and a louder crumble spurred the whole group into motion. They ran, shifting directions whenever another crack and clatter occurred. Not until the rumble stopped did they. When the night's meal occurred, there were only seven faces around the torch. The elf was gone.
From that terrible event, things changed. What she imagined could only have been determination still dominated their voices when they spoke and their faces when she could see them, but there was also the familiar twinge of creeping fear. Days passed, more than Ayna had the mind to count. During the journey the motion of the bag seemed slower and more labored with each passing hour. The meals of her captors seemed smaller. The torch was dimmer. No longer was there laughter at the evening meal. Seldom were there words passed at all, and when there were, they were angry barbs spat at one another. Twice she remembered seeing no meals at all when they rested, their light a tiny smoldering remnant of torch rather than a fresh one.
Then, one day, her own meal didn't come. The cask that held her sweet black food was instead being passed between members of the group, each drinking of the contents and gagging as she had each night. And now she realized there were fewer faces still. One of the females was gone, and one of the males. Those who remained barked angrily at one another, their voices booming and echoing from the walls of the black tunnel.
Gomder bellowed loudest of all. He growled words like "lost" and "dying." He spoke angrily of a beast and of hunger. When the humans offered some sort of reply, he shouted them down. The dwarf stabbed a thick finger in Ayna's direction. In his echoing proclamation, Ayna recognized only the words, "Use the compass."
In the dim light, Ayna had to squint to see the hands begin to raise one by one, reluctant acceptance and agreement on their faces. Gomder nodded. He snatched Ayna's cage, more roughly than he'd ever done before, and tugged at the twine securing the weights around the cage. They suddenly released, yanking Ayna forcefully against the bottom.
He passed one of his hands beneath the cage and she felt the twine begin to loosen. What followed was an act of pure instinct. The very hint of freedom, that the twine might have been cut and she was loose again, was all it took for her to buzz her wings to speed and hurl herself into the air. She didn't need to feel for the wind. She'd been fixating on the meager little whisper of wind for days much the same way the warriors had been huddled around the dying light of the torch.
When she reached the end of the slack, she fought and tugged madly, but once it was clear the direction she was trying to fly, Gomder tipped the cage forward and dropped the weights. The rope grew taut, she slammed to the floor of the cage, and the party set off in the direction she'd attempted to flee. They didn't stow her in the pack again, though. Instead, they carried her along. The dwarf held a dim torch in one hand and her cage in the other, stopping every few minutes to hand off the torch and raise the weights once more. She learned by the second time that they did not mean to free her, but it didn't matter. The moment she felt her bonds loosen she couldn't help but try to escape, flitting toward the breath of wind and its promise of freedom for an instant before being dragged back down to the floor of the cage.
It was unpleasant and painful, but at least it seemed to be bringing the group toward freedom. If this was what it would take to escape this wretched hole in the ground, then so be it.
CHAPTER THREE
For what must have been two days it continued in that way. There was no rest, no food. The haggard group of adventurers simply trudged with her as a guide. Each of them weakened, their journey slowed, but each time she was called upon Ayna fought harder. They were nearly free. She could feel it. The life was returning to the air. It was close now, tantalizing. Before much longer her captors could feel it, too. They rushed and stumbled on legs made clumsy by fatigue and hunger, driven by the promise of escape from this terrible place.
At last, they saw it. A glass-smooth slope lay ahead, and at the bottom... light. Light and the promise of day. They cried out in words she didn't need to understand to recognize as joy. Ayna reached out her hands, stretching them toward the gleam of sun as though if she tried hard enough she could touch it. Just when she felt she might be free of the darkness, her captors tossed her back into the bag.
"No! No please! You can't! Please let me see the light!" Ayna cried and pleaded, fear and anger in her voice.
Her words reached their ears as a pitiful and easily dismissed tr
ill of fairy language, lost in the clamor of their desperate rush for freedom. Even from within the bag she could feel the moment they stepped free of the cave. It was a rush of fresh, wild air, not the weak and tamed wisps that twisted their way through the tunnels. It was all around her, slipping through the mouth of the sack. A layer of coarse leather separated her from the freedom she'd helped the others to reach.
With a rough thump she felt the whole sack strike the ground. There were voices, more than just those of the adventuring party. The voices filed the air, shouting words in a dozen languages she didn't recognize, and the wind carried the murmurs of hundreds more. She waited, her heart pounding in her chest and her mind burning with the sting of denied freedom until gradually the voices began to retreat. They were leaving her. They were taking the adventurers away.
"Take me, too! Please take me with you! I'm still in here! Gomder, don't leave me!" she screeched, but her voice simply didn't have the strength to be heard.
Tears flowed anew from her eyes as she tore furiously at the string about her waist. It couldn't end this way. She couldn't starve to death, forgotten and alone amongst a mound of discarded equipment. Her fingers were raw from wrestling with the bonds when she suddenly heard something she had never expected to hear again. It was her own language...
"Newcomers! How many of them? Five! That's remarkable. Five at one time? Have we ever had so many at once?" said the voice.
It was a gentle, frail voice, a female fairy who must have been quite old. Whoever it was must have been following the commotion caused by her captors, as she was far away and getting further.
"Help! Help, can you hear me?" Ayna cried, her voice hoarse.
The other fairy, far too distant to hear the cries, continued. Ayna strained to hear.
"How did they find their way? Did anyone ask? Of course it's important. They could have used a compass."
Ayna shook. It was jarring to hear the coarse word spoken by a fairy voice, but more jarring to have that word be their name for her. This fairy knew she was here!
"Yes! Yes, you forgot me! You forgot compass!" Ayna called.
Still having not heard her, the fairy voice continued. "No, no. A fairy compass. You! You there! Blast it, why won't they pay attention?"
The voice changed now, lowering a bit and uttering all of her words in the same crude language the adventurers spoke. She repeated the same phrase a few times, a clear edge of anger coming to the words.
"I knew it! Where are their bags? Are they over there?" the other fairy proclaimed. "Get them open now!"
Ayna heard the stomp of feet and the jingle of buckles and gear as the discarded bags of the adventurers were tugged open one at a time.
"Here! Here!" Ayna called out.
"I hear her. This one. Get it open!" the fairy directed.
The opening drew open, letting natural light pour over Ayna for the first time in too long. She shielded her eyes with one arm and held tight to the cage with the other as it was lifted free and set gently on the ground. As it was lowered down, the weights that held her to the bottom were lifted and she felt the slack. Again she darted to the sky, now blindly, straining at the cord for all she was worth. For once she knew that if she broke free, she would be free. Not trapped in some dark hole with half a mountain to contend with, but truly free to fly on the breeze again.
"Hold still, child. You're safe," the other fairy murmured.
"Please! No! I'm sorry! I'm sorry I took the food! Just don't make me go back into the dark!" Ayna said, her frenzied mind not able to process the words of assurance.
She heard a sizzle and the scent of burning string tickled her nose, then suddenly she was free. She bolted skyward, casting her still adjusting gaze around for anywhere she might hide. What lay below her was a village filled with structures like those she'd seen in the human city beyond her forest. It was teeming with the very sort of creatures who had held her prisoner for so long. To the south, she could swear she saw humans and other creatures clashing swords in open courtyards. Behind her was a towering cliff leading up into the mountains. Ahead to the west was a stretch of huts, and beyond them a lake and then a sharp drop off revealing an endless expanse of water beyond. Toward the northern edge of the place she saw trees. She rushed toward them. In seconds, she had whisked through the foliage of a mighty oak and took shelter in the crook of two branches.
When she was safely hidden, she sat on the rough bark and hugged her knees, rocking back and forth and fluttering her wings. She was at the very edge of her wits, ready to bolt for the next tree at the slightest sound. It was fortunate, then, that the next thing she heard was the soothing hum of wings like her own. She raised her teary eyes and watched as a fairy approached. She looked ancient and frail, but also pleasant and friendly, meeting Ayna's eyes through the leaves.
"Hello, child," said the elder fairy. "I can only imagine what you've been through. Actually, I suppose that one matter I don't need to imagine it. We have that in common. I know the last thing you want right now is to have to cope with anything else new or different, but I have some nectar here, and I'll wager you are quite hungry."
Ayna paced warily along the branch, peeking out from behind the nearest leaves. She sniffled. "What kind of nectar?"
The other fairy smiled, holding out the curve of a red petal brimming with liquid. "Rose. My personal favorite, but there are other choices."
Ayna sniffled again and tugged the leaf aside as though she were holding open a door. The other fairy landed lightly and stepped into the shade of the foliage. Ayna took the petal and sipped gratefully while she looked over her benefactor. The elder fairy's hair was mostly gray with streaks of the black it had once been. She had a kind face, creased lightly by a lifetime of smiles and laughter. Her clothes, like the cup she'd provided, seemed to be made from red rose petals. They were rendered far thinner and more supple than the now-ragged petals of Ayna's dress, and tailored into an almost regal gown.
"My name is Fiora," said the elder fairy.
"I'm Ayna."
"Ah!" she said brightly. "It has been so long since I've heard a new fairy name. A warm welcome to you, Child of the Cold Wind from the Mountain that Blows Across the Stream and Through the Reeds."
Ayna blinked. She'd not heard her full name pronounced in such a way since her parents had spoken it to her in her youth. The complexity of fairy talk was such that "Ayna" and her full name differed only in the nuances of the tone and flutter, but to hear it pronounced flawlessly was like suddenly being given a glimpse of the life she had been spirited away from.
Fiora continued. "We call this place Entwell Num Garastra. It may not seem it now, but this is truly a place of wonder. I'll tell you all about it if you like. But before I do, are you hurt? Do you need anything?"
Ayna shook her head and sipped some more. "I'm not hurt. I'm just... I don't..." Tears trickled from her eyes anew.
Fiora placed a reassuring hand on Ayna's shoulder. "I know. It was an ordeal. You've lost a great deal, and faced fears you didn't know you had. Take some time. Find me or anyone else when you are ready and we shall teach you what we need to know."
Ayna nodded and drank again, draining the last of the nectar. Fiora took a step, making ready to leave, but Ayna dropped the petal and rushed forward, throwing her arms around Fiora and sobbing.
"It is all right, Ayna. It is all right," she cooed, holding the little fairy tightly.
"I didn't mean to... my mother said not to... there was a jar with something so sweet and..."
"Honey. It is a trick they've been using since my time. I was caught in the same way."
"I'm so sorry I..." The words rushed out between long, bitter sobs.
"Ayna, listen. What happened did not happen because you misbehaved. No one did this to punish you. You made a mistake."
"But if it wasn't for what I did, then why?" Ayna said.
"Those people you saved--and always remember that you saved them by leading them here--didn't care what y
ou did. They are warriors. They came to this place to prove themselves in combat against a terrible beast. And to do this, they believed they needed you. That is all you need to know for now."
"But... but they never fought a beast..."
Fiora sighed. "It is easier to understand if you know the tale from the beginning. For centuries or more, people have entered the very cave you just survived. Many of them never left. People began to spread the word that a beast must live inside, a creature who was taking the lives of the explorers who ventured inside. A call was made for the mightiest warriors to slay the beast. They, like the explorers, either returned having found nothing or, more frequently, never returned at all. The legend grew, and more people began to venture into the cave.
"But many of those who died within the cave learned, in their last moments, the secret of the cave. There was no beast. It was simply a treacherous place. One that claimed the lives of the other adventurers without the touch of a beast. They had perished, crushed by cave-ins, withered from hunger, fallen into chasms, or drowned in rising waters. But some, the luckiest or the best of them, did not perish. They instead found their way through to this place. We are those survivors. This village is formed of the rare adventurers who reached this side of the mountain. We work to share our knowledge and test ourselves against one another. In that way, we hope to achieve something great from the foolish journey into the cave to face the beast."
"But if they thought there was a beast, why would they choose to go into that cave? Why would they choose to fight anything?" Ayna asked, not able to grasp it all.
"To prove their bravery. To prove their skill. To earn a place in history. To earn a great reward. They all have their reasons. But you needn't worry about that. All you need to know is that you are safe. The rest can wait."
The Book of Deacon Anthology Page 199