Chapter 7: A Frozen Coda
Descent, Deciphered
Micah doled out the story piece by piece over almost ten suns climbing the mountain, which I will not be so cruel as to force upon others. Rather, I will tell it all at once when the time comes.
In the meantime, the climb was worse than any of us expected. Several near-vertical slopes combined with several actual-vertical walls interspersed with long low paths with a hundred or more switchbacks. More than once, I took Tareth's bag, and he carried Eliana on his back as though she were a child. If I hadn't threatened to push him off the mountain, I'm not sure he'd have let me carry anything more than my normal load.
All three of us did what we could to give Micah the space they needed to share all there was to tell. There wasn't much conversation during the climb as a result. Even if we'd wanted to talk more, there was little incentive to do so, given how heavy our breathing was.
Any time Micah spoke, Eliana took out her journal and wrote. She was convinced that Dee's story was just as much a part of what we were putting together as any other piece of the tale.
She was correct.
What follows is a complete recreation of Micah's words in as near flawless fidelity as feasible for our foray into fate's design.
I wasn't raised in Ivory. But Ivory became my home after Dee saved me. That may sound overdone, but it's how she felt to me. I was born in the queendom's capital city, a hapless victim of the Liatris monarchy like anyone else. Dee was special.
She showed up one sun claiming to be lost but very clearly exactly where she meant to be. I was working as a stablehand just on the border of the richer part of town the sun she showed up looking for answers.
After that, Dee always said, "I was looking for answers, but what I found was you. So same thing, really." The woman wasn't great at wooing, but she certainly spoke my language.
I still don't know, to this day, what she was doing in town, and I don't know what made her leave. But I'll be forever grateful that she saw me, and she took me with her.
Now I know that I've not described her, not really, but it's difficult to appreciate how Dee looked without knowing the kind of person she was. A mystery story opened to the final page. A wanderer warrior who took nothing from no one and gave everything back. A contradiction in the finest terms.
Dee was always peculiar, if I'm honest. Looking to the stars somewhere between Deim and Phob, then following a line toward the horizon. Occasionally, she'd find herself suddenly absent for a moment, like she didn't recognise the world around her.
But that peculiarity became a forest after we married. Each night, she would toss and turn, saying the same four names over and over. "Aurelin, Draethis, Salora, Vaelis," she would mutter time and again. I didn't think much of it until she left.
Probably ought to have noticed that there was a pause between the fourth name and the first. Like something was missing. Some nights, she'd choke on her breath as though something was stealing her voice just as she hit upon some deeper truth.
Every morning, she'd wake up looking a little different than the night before. Every night she'd already be back to normal. Although normal was a challenging thing to pin down because of this incongruity.
But I'd wake next to her. Black hair, black eyes, skin like loamy earth. She was darkness perfected, and she was at peace.
When our little girl was taken, the dreams got worse. She wasn't just saying the names, but she was yelling them. Like they were lost friends. It didn't take long before she couldn't take it any longer. And she up and left me, but she left me two gifts. The flower I told you about, and a note. All it said was "I'm going to find them. Aurelin, Draethis, Salora, Vaelis, and —"
The last name was unreadable. Scratches in paper that seemed to scramble before my eyes. But it was clear she had written something, clear she had remembered.
And that was the last I saw her. I was alone in Ivory, the last person in town who'd seen what the world could be in the eyes of one who loved me.
I suppose I stayed in Ivory hoping beyond hope that my little girl would be brought back. Or that Dee would return. But that was pointless dreaming, and even I had to admit it eventually.
And then you three showed up.
"And then you three showed up." It was as much gracious and thankful as it was an accusation. Hiding within it was all the fear of, "What if I'm wrong and they do come back." I'd heard enough about the conscriptions to know that the likelihood of their daughter's return was negligible at best and nonexistent realistically.
That was to say nothing of their wife. Dee. I had a suspicion about her, but I wasn't ready to put a finger on it. Sure, Gormlaith was one of five sisters. But so was her Lady. Five sisters. Five gardens. Five homes. And each of those goddesses had a flower, the same as their Mavi's flower.
I couldn't say the words. It would destroy a part of Micah, I was certain.
On the eve of the tenth sun, we arrived at last at the top of the mountain, where we should have found the garden Gormlaith watched for so long. Where her successors had sat and tended. Instead, we found a great five-sided temple.
It stood tall and proud, a fantastic eyesore in an otherwise beautifully natural scene. The space held five grand columns, beginning to wear with age, positioned at each corner and holding up a roof that offered shade to those who took to the space. Between each pair of columns along the edges of the shape were raised platforms, with stairs leading high above our heads.
Because our vantage atop the mountains allowed such far vision, I could see clearly that the phobward platform was raised slightly higher than all the rest. This was, after all, the temple to the phobward goddess. The forgotten goddess.
"We make camp here," I said to the others, not waiting for a reaction before I began climbing to the top of those high steps. Micah followed, silent until I addressed them. "I don't know what I expected when I got here. It's so empty."
"I always wondered where Dee might have gone when she left," Micah whispered, just enough for me to hear and no louder, "and seeing this place, somehow I know she had no choice."
We climbed higher as a group, but at some point Eliana and Tareth seemed to fall behind. It was the silence that drew my ear, as I no longer heard Eliana's incessant cooing or Tareth's embarrassed sighs. All that remained were Micah, me, and our thunderous steps echoing throughout the temple.
"I suppose," Micah said stiffly, "this part is meant for us alone."
As they finished speaking, we stood before an altar, if it could be called that. It was really just four small tables arranged just so. The tallest table at the back, the shortest in the front, two medium tables positioned at either side. Upon each were the dust or ashes of offerings left behind.
Flowers, bottles, plates that likely once held foods, candles.
Front and centre of it all was a black flower on a black stick with black leaves. Voidstem. Micah's tearful reaction as she took it from the altar told me my suspicions were correct, or at least close to correct. Dee was somehow tied to the goddess Draethis of the Black Lakes. Something was calling Dee, perhaps to let the other goddesses know they weren't alone, were they to find their ways home.
I couldn't bring myself to tell them. Even if I had the capacity, I didn't have the time. Something took hold of me, and I was suddenly immensely tired. I barely had time to retrieve a pillow and bedroll before I curled up on the stone floor in front of the altar and fell into a deep sleep.
Dreams Forgotten
There was no question that I was dreaming. No other explanation could be possible. Except perhaps that I had passed on and was remembering some sun from a past life or perhaps my own life shed in a new light. And in any case, I knew that I could not have travelled so far from my resting place without Micah at my side or Tareth and Eliana on my heels.
But it didn't feel like a dream. It felt like a pilgrimage. I was going home, joining my sisters at the Grand Temple at the heart of Lafleur. We had decided once this communion was finished, the people could make homes in within the temple, bringing them closer to each other.
A time of great peace was upon Lafleur at last. Our Mavi would finally be able to put down their weapons and live the lives they were meant for. Gormlaith walked alongside me, a loyal daughter through and through, though even I could see she was developing an eye for one of my sisters.
Good on her.
To call the Grand Temple extravagant was to insult it beyond recourse. At each corner of the temple stood a grand palace where one of I or my sisters would hold court. In the centre was a pavilion, built for communion and fellowship. Unlike our five-sided temples of dominion, the pavilion was a fine circle, forcing each soul in it to look on the others with equal gravity.
Processions of the sort we were managing were rare before that time. All of us had not come together since the beginning when we were dreamt by the people of Lafleur before the land was called Lafleur. Such an age had passed since then that no one was certain what would happen when we finally did.
My first step within the bounds of the Grand Temple was electrifying. I knew they were all arriving, though I could not see them for the great distance between us. I fought to slow my steps. It was only proper for us to arrive together, even if our Mavi went ahead to be certain all was prepared. Gormlaith did just that. Still so much like a child, even after hundreds of years.
The first of my sisters to come into view were Salora the Grave Misfortune and Draethis the Dark Obsession. A smile passed between my sisters and me. It had been so long, even as close as our domains stood to each other.
We arrived at the pavilion together, and I was able to finally see Vaelis the Sacred Illusion and Aurelin the Creeping Stagnation. We were all gathered, our Mavi already within the pavilion, and we stepped beneath its cover as one mind.
"Sisters," Vaelis spoke in her characteristic hollow tone, though the joy was clear on her expression, "we have long sought this time, labouring across an age or more to bring about a peace that would persist."
The rest of us nodded. We all knew well the purpose of the gathering.
"I have brought a gift from the Crucible," she continued, her violet eyes shining as they were wont to do.
Each of us echoed assent. We had brought our own gifts, in the hands of our Mavi, who had already placed the lot on the table. Salora had brought fishes of kinds the rest of us had never seen. Draethis's gift was a small brown grain she said could be used for near any purpose. Aurelin brought several green stalks, said to be hydrating and nourishing while soothing the soul. Vaelis brought with her livestock, the finest mutton beasts of her domain.
My own gift was simpler. Gems I had quarried by hand within the Aerie. Their sheen matched Gormlaith's eyes – and mine as well – and shone with all the beauty of the Huntress's Arrow. Each stone was milled by hand into a perfect five-pointed star. I had inlaid several similar stones into the haft of my warhammer before the peace befell us. Now I gave them as gifts, a promise to my sisters.
Once all of the gifts had been distributed, a titan vessel was placed on the centre of the pavilion's table. It was filled with the darkest of wines made from berries that only grew near the Grand Temple.
"It is our way," Vaelis said, "to make the covenant of wine. As such, by drinking from this vessel, we bind ourselves to the peace we have hewn from this world's chaos." She took the vessel to her lips and spoke her name after she drank. "Vaelis, the Balance."
The vessel passed to Salora, who drank without hesitation. "Salora, the Timekeeper."
Draethis took the vessel with a lively gusto and gulped more than necessary. "Draethis, the Just."
After her, Aurelin took the vessel and nearly spilled as she drank from it excitedly. "Aurelin, the Innovator."
When it passed to me, I drew it close and prayed quietly for a moment. "I'm so sorry that you must shoulder this burden, Nyxara," I said before taking a healthy draught and speaking a name that I had long forgotten. "The Ever Stable, Lysandra the Despairing Truth."
The words were on my lips as I awoke. I had spoken them clearly, for Micah awoke at my stirring. "Nyx, my friend. What did you just say?"
"Lysandra," I whispered hesitantly, frightened the name would leave me once more.
As the whisper of it echoed around the temple, causing the air to tremble in deference, the cracks on every surface began to glow an unsettling white, the same as the gems from my dream. The cracks formed words more ancient than Lafleur, more aged than time or the woman outside it who dreamed of our world. Though I knew not how to read them, I knew the words. They formed a name. Lysandra's true name that held her to task for any demand of the speaker.
Niamh Togha, The Ever Stable and Despairing Truth. Lady of the Aerie. Cornerstone of the goddesses of Lafleur.
The Aerie was welcoming home its Lady. And I was to be her. If I chose.
But I could not choose that. Not after I fought so desperately against it for so long. I didn't deserve to choose that.
Several scents swirled sweetly and stalked me from upon a subtle breeze, causing tears to threaten at the borrowed memory of sisters I never knew. My gaze snapped toward the source, and in the pale glow of the temple, I finally saw it. The garden Gormlaith had patiently guarded for an age. Scion after Scion had carefully tended to it, looking over not just snowpetal, but all five goddesses' flowers. For generations, they waited.
Hoping.
Longing.
For me.