Aerisian Refrain, page 30
part #1 of Beyond the Sunset Series
“Hold fast to that vow and let nothing sway you from it,” she said solemnly, reaching out to give my shoulder a squeeze. “For I venture a time will come when your resolve will be tested. In that moment, you alone can make this decision. Make the right one.”
I nodded soberly, and she let me go.
“Now,” she said, “as to using your voice to work magic, I cannot guide you in that. But traditional fairy magic, such as the use of transporting doors? That is more easily taught. What I am going to teach you is simply another element of that. This time, we will use a door, but when we arrive, we will not simply visit a place. We are also going to journey through time. I am going to show you the Sanctuary, where the male fairies used to meet. I want you to see it as it was so you can better understand your heritage.”
“I don’t understand why you’re telling me these things, and showing me all this,” I insisted again. “Why are you helping me? Isn’t it better to keep me in the dark?”
“Your blood will not let you remain ignorant. Your powers are going to grow and they are going to spring forth. I would have you understand who and what you are, and have some ideas of the battles you will face. The ignorant are easily manipulated. The educated less so.”
“Forewarned is forearmed.”
“Precisely.”
“Alright,” I said, emotionally if not physically squaring my shoulders. “I’m ready to learn whatever you want to teach me and see whatever you want me to see.”
Chapter 40
The Sanctuary
We stood at the bottom of a stone staircase that spiraled up a hillside. A statue of a beautiful winged man guarded the bottom step on one side. On the other, was a winged woman. The steps clung to the steep hill, twisting and winding onwards and upwards, great rocks and boulders lining the entire staircase. At the summit, nearly surrounded by fog, was a tree so large it covered the entire hilltop. Walkways and swinging bridges connected the massive branches, and at the very top the limbs had grown into what I would’ve described as a gallery: a gallery with a platform in the center, suspended by ropes. A hushed breeze rippled the tree’s lush, green leaves, but as it twined around the massive tree and slithered down the hillside, across the steps, around boulders and more fairy statues lining the stairs it morphed into a sad, mournful dirge.
Before we stepped foot in the Sanctuary, Aureeyah had told me to open my mind, open my ears, and open my senses. She’d said to listen for the rhythm and sounds around me, to listen for that music. To hold onto that music. To latch onto it with my every sense, and then to open myself to my music. To merge the two…and let my natural, inborn magic do the rest. I’d been skeptical, but I did as I was told. Quieting my mind, I unbridled my senses, letting my mental awareness flow out into the harmony of nature. As I heard the noises, caught the cadence, I enlisted my own music, finding a tune that was as simple, as natural, as the melody around me. Without even realizing what I did, I swayed slightly to the tempo, joining my body, the music in my soul, and the music of nature.
Wordless, Aureeyah touched my hand, guiding me into the transporting door. I didn’t release my song, knowing instinctively that I was having success. Not until we were there, and the fairy said softly,
“Not yet, not yet. Listen for the music. Find it. Meld with it. Then open your eyes.”
So I waited, quieting my own song until I could hear the night sounds around me. Again, I let the two songs naturally merge. My guide saw when I was ready.
“Now,” she said, and I raised my eyelids to look around.
“This is the Sanctuary,” she announced, “but not as it is now. Your magic, my magic, and the door have allowed you to see it as it was then. Though in their day,” she continued, leading me to the steps that ascended up toward the enormous tree, “it would have been full of light and life. It is empty now, for this place retains only memories of itself: not of them. This is the Tree of Unity. So it was named, for so it was meant to be. Alas, the fairies divided, and it became a place of contention rather than peace.”
That seemed so sad to me as we passed the arresting statues at the bottom of the staircase. I took a moment to stop and study them. Both had been carved by an artist’s hand, a true master. The male was taller than the female, and his wings birdlike, complete with feathers. The female’s frame was more delicate, and her wings fragile as a butterfly’s, but there was no mistaking the strength in her face and the authority that blazed from her stern, cold eyes. I could’ve stood there studying the statues for hours, but Aureeyah was already wending her way up the stairs, so I followed.
It was night in the Sanctuary, just like in the world we’d left. Fog curled through branches of the great tree even as it slid around stone corners and drifted down the steps. A bright moon lit up the landscape, specifically the gallery, where the top had been pruned back to allow light to shine onto the platform. Only there was no audience to appreciate its light, none except Aureeyah and me. I wasn’t surprised to see a raven appear around the corner of the square, stone arch guarding the top of the staircase. It took to wing, flew a short distance, and lighted on the railing, staring at us cockeyed.
“Aureeyah?” I whispered.
“I see it.”
We both stopped in front of the bird, who angled it head, opened its beak, and released a gurgling croak from the back of its throat.
“You should not be here,” my fairy friend said.
The bird shrieked, hopping away from her and towards me. Unfolding its wings, it launched itself at me, soaring a circle around my head before dropping onto my shoulder. I stiffened as the bird dug in its feet—not enough to hurt, but to steady itself. Almost lovingly, it nuzzled at my ear with its beak. I froze.
“Aureeyah?”
My voice was barely above a whisper.
She was frowning at the bird, but not attempting to shoo it away.
“It should not be here. It should not have the power to be here, even in that form. It is a form we cursed them to inhabit, should they escape. We did not think they could escape. Even if one of them did, he should not be here. Not only did we erect barriers to keep intruders out, but it should be terrified of this place. I think it’s been drawn by your magic, Annie.”
“How comforting.”
The raven’s beak was still next to my ear, and it was emitting a series of sounds: from croaks to shrill alarms to soft caws. At first, I thought they were just bird noises, but as I listened, the croaks and shrills mutated into syllables, into the sibilant whispers I knew so well.
“Sing us to freedom, here in this place. Sing us to freedom, to life. You are finding your voice, now find the song. Sing us awake.”
All of a sudden, the fog surrounding us shifted and I saw ghostly figures formed of shadow and moonlight. They were male, beautiful and ethereal as their female counterparts, but dark and dangerous as the Raven himself. Their wings were like birds: ravens, eagles, owls, blue jays, vultures, cardinals. Some were sharp featured, and some were fair. Some had talons, some hands. Some had crests on top of their heads, just like birds, but on all of them their hair morphed into feathers as it trailed down the back of their necks. They were banging or pressing against an invisible wall, a shield behind the curtain of fog that kept them from this world and bound to wherever their sister fairies had sent them.
“There we are,” the raven crooned to me. “We are so close. Free us, my daughter. Free us…”
Abruptly, I snapped back awake. With a shout, I twisted, raising my arm to knock the bird off my shoulder. It plummeted a few feet in the air before it managed to catch wing and right itself. Taking flight, it soared around Aureeyah and me both, circling over our heads, cawing angrily before spiraling up over the great tree and disappearing into the night.
I must’ve been cold, because I was shivering like crazy. Wrapping my arms around myself, I tried to stop the shakes. My back was killing me.
“Did you s-s-see them?”
“See who?” The fairy tripped down the steps toward me, grabbing my shoulders. “See who, Annie? Who did you see?”
“I saw th-them. All of them. They were trapped. They were tr-trying to get out. They wanted out. The Raven—it, he, told me to s-sing them out to freedom right here. In—in this place.”
Her emerald eyes widened. “It spoke to you?”
“You didn’t hear it?”
“I heard its sounds, but I heard no words. I—”
She stopped, glancing around wildly as to make sure no more ravens were going to appear.
“I fear I made a grave mistake in bringing you to the Sanctuary. We must go. Now.”
Without further ado, she opened a transporting door and dragged me through it. In an instant, we were back in Laytrii’s palace, in my bedroom. All was quiet and still, as if I hadn’t just been on the journey of a lifetime. I drifted toward my bed and sat, still in a daze, wrapping the blanket around my shoulders. Without even meaning to, I glanced toward the door, wondering if Cole was still outside like he’d promised, knowing instinctively that he would be. Pain hit, and I lowered my chin, wrapping the blankets tighter around me as if they could stave off the hurt of his betrayal.
The fairy’s fingertips touched the top of my head. I glanced up.
“Are you well?”
I nodded shakily.
“Think so. I’m just—just so freakin’ scared that this is going to happen, and I won’t be able to stop it. They’re growing stronger, Aureeyah. We both know it. And it’s happening so fast. What if it isn’t years, like Braisley suggested? I don’t want to be used by them. I don’t want to be the reason they break free.”
“I believe you,” she said, “and I want to help. I had hoped by offering you more understanding of what you face that I could assist you. Instead, I am afraid I led you deeper into their web. You see, that place, the Sanctuary—it is the last place they should have appeared to you. Of all the places in Aerisia, they should have feared to come there. It is where they were bound and banished.”
“That’s where it happened?”
She nodded gravely. “We came upon them unawares, there, in their own meeting place. It was sacred to them. It ought to have been for us, especially as a place of Unity. But we were so convinced that we did what was right…”
She blew out a sigh, hung her head. I was puzzled by this, puzzled by her attitude. Throughout the past hours, as she’d told me the story of the ravens and the fairies, her attitude had seemed that while she thought the fairies were probably right, maybe there’d been a mistake. She obviously wasn’t dead set against me or a hundred percent behind what her sister fairies had done.
“Do you have doubts about what you did?”
“For so long it has been done,” she replied, taking a seat beside me on the bed. “It was in the past. Nothing could be altered or rectified. I quieted my conscience and chose not to dwell on it. Now you have come and reopened the wounds I thought were healed. I see why the fairies fear you, but I also recognize that your heritage and your powers are not your fault. You no more chose to be who you are than I chose to be a fairy. What matters is what we do with our gifts and abilities, yes?”
“I’d like to think so.”
“When I think of him, I think of how he looked at me when we attacked, when he saw what we intended to do…”
“Are you talking about your friend? The one you mentioned earlier?”
“Aye. I wish I could speak his name, but it is forbidden. He and I…we were never at odds. He never took part in the sins of the others. Not all of them did. Sometimes I wonder: was it fair to punish each one of them? Was the threat they represented sufficient to justify banishing them all? Or should we have saved some, like him?”
“Why didn’t they save him? Is it ever fair to punish everybody in a group if they didn’t participate in or support what was going on?”
“I do not know,” the fairy sighed. “We had to move quickly. Braisley, Sorelle, and the other leaders—by that point, they trusted none of the male fairies. They felt where there was corruption in leadership it would have spread. They would not wait to weed out who ought to be punished and who should, perhaps, have been spared. To them, there was no way to be certain, so everyone was banished.”
“But you think they made the wrong decision.”
“I cannot say.” One shoulder rose and fell. “How can any of us ever be certain with a matter this weighty?”
“That’s what terrifies me,” I confided in a whisper. “If there comes a point where I have to make a decision like this, how will I know that I made the right choice?”
Chapter 41
Quarrels
He had wanted to stay. Cole was honest enough to admit that. When Annie had looked up at him, her eyes full of fear for what had occurred but equally full of trust in him and his ability to safeguard her, he had wanted to stay with her. It was difficult to make himself leave. The right thing to do, but difficult, nonetheless. His friendship with Lady Hannah aside, he had never known what it was to have a woman want him near. Perhaps that was why from the first moment she’d opened her eyes and looked into his he had been under her spell. She had not been frightened. She had responded to him with trust, not disdaining his Simathe heritage, which set him apart in the eyes of the women of his world. It had not mattered to her then. Clearly, it did not matter now. She wanted his company, his protection. It was astonishing. It simply did not happen: not to a Simathe.
He kept his post the night through. Every sense was strained for any sound of danger within, yet he heard nothing that signaled the creature had returned. So far as he knew, Annie slept. In fact, she slept exceeding late the next morning. He waited until he felt he could wait no more without his being stationed outside her door becoming apparent. Before he left, he peeked into the room to check on her. All he saw was the top of her head, her mussed black hair a stark contrast against the white of the pillow. The mound of blankets concealed her body. The room was so quiet he could hear her steady breaths.
He left to go about other duties of the day, but was torn.
Duty. Always duty.
Duty told him he should go to his lords and recount last night’s occurrences. They would expect him to report it, especially given the tidings broken last evening about the male fairies and her connection to them. Never had he failed in his duty to Treygon, or even considered it possible. Not until he met her, with her soft brown skin and enchanting violet eyes. Her quiet voice and slow, sweet smiles. Never had he known feelings like this, and he realized they were strengthening towards her every day. While they strengthened towards her, they also pulled him further from that which he’d ever sought to serve: Treygon, and, by extension, Aerisia.
Or by shielding her was he serving Aerisia? What if her powers were not corrupt, despite the accusations of the fairies and the Simathe rulers? What if they could be used on behalf of his homeland? Who was to say they could not? Cole believed—he firmly believed what he had told her. That her powers were her own and she could take control of them and also her own destiny.
As he contemplated this, the warrior-lord knew his decision was made. He would keep silent about that creature, the male fairy she had called the Raven. He would not betray Annie’s secrets to his lords. For the first time in his considerably long life, he was making a choice against duty, Treygon, and its leadership. He was choosing Annie over them. And he had never been more confident that he was in the right.
The confidence lasted throughout the next few hours as he attended various meetings with other Aerisian dignitaries. As a lord, he was there to sit and to listen and to silently lend the weight of his position to whatever the Artan did. As Aerisian leaders wrestled with issues of borders and boundaries; accusations of kidnapping and buying and selling humans; dealing in contraband and stolen goods; who had begun what quarrel and who had enflamed it, his mind was miles away from his physical presence. He ought to have been paying attention. Some of these issues he had dealt with himself. However, in matters like these he was prepared to let Treygon decide and he would follow Treygon. No conflict of interest there, not like the issue with Annie.
He was drawn from thoughts of the girl and his dilemma over her when, at one point, the Sanlyn chieftain who had shown an early interest in Annie (for which he could not fault the man), leapt to his feet at an accusation of human stealing from Lord Ri, the High Elder. He was angry, swearing, pointing a finger in the ruler’s face. Ranetron guards standing at attention in the corners of the room stepped forward, causing the Sanlyn’s men behind him to step forward as well.
The entire audience chamber was fraught with tension, but before anyone else could move Lord Ilgard, the Simathe High-Chief, rose. His hand on his sword hilt, he said firmly, “Enough.” Such was the weight of his authority that he needed but a single word to bring Sanlyn and Ranetron alike to heel. The men flicked irate glances at each other, but retreated. All except the chieftain himself, who remained standing, glaring stubbornly at the High Elder.
“I’ll listen no further to these baseless accusations,” he said, calmer now but still angry. “If all you can do is accuse, my retinue and I will leave.”
“Lord Kirrian.”
All eyes turned to Lady Hannah as she stood. The High-Chief hadn’t sat, but now his wife rose beside him. The authority in her voice could not be mistaken, yet there was patience in her tones, as well.
“We understand and appreciate you wanting to defend your people. However, what you don’t know is that we have incontrovertible proof of what we’re saying. Before these meetings started Lord Cole here…” She nodded towards him. “…and his men not only intercepted a shipment of contraband, but also took prisoner three men who had kidnapped a woman they admitted outright they were planning to sell to the Sanlyn. If that isn’t proof of what we’re saying, what is? I don’t see how you can argue with this.”
