5.6 A Drop in the Ocean

General Summary

Day -4

I wake early in the morning, still holding Mistress. Doing my best not to wake her, I slip out and find the Hand using magic to make himself tea...without using the somatic components because of his lack of...hands.   He accepts my offer of “a hand” but asks me to meet him once again in a dreaming, so that we can talk more easily. In the dreamspace he is young, and uninjured, and bids me to sit with him by the ocean again.   He tells me more of the War of Fire, which is what they called the battle with the trolls and the fae. Just as the Osyr were exiled from the sea, they set fire to the trolls’ ancestral forest, and destroyed the groves of the fae. The forest still burns, and these are not wounds that will be easily forgotten.   The Barrier magic was woven by the trolls, the fae, and even some oathbreakers. It distorts the minds of the people going through it...like a maze, not a wall. It has at least 20 anchors that support it, and he thinks I will have to destroy them individually. No small task.   He also tells me more of the different races - the Osyr were banished to this side of the Barrier along with the elves they had bonded with. They were nearly wiped out by a plague set upon them by the other side in the war, one that killed any who still remained in the water. Now, they are on the other side of the Barrier, where there is no sea. The dwarves had fought against us in the War of Fire, then surrendered and gave up their freedom in exchange for safety. Hearing this, I can understand why their bond is different from the one the elves have with the Empress.   The dwarven kingdom that is trapped by the Valley of Storms will be trapped for as long as the trolls’ forest burns. These magics are connected, and perhaps the way to see the Barrier taken down is to extinguish the fire that has burned for hundreds of years. The Osyr had three cities on the other side of the Barrier, and in their libraries I might find remnants of information I need to put out the flames.   He tells me more of the elven bond, as well. Long ago, the Osyr had forgotten hope, love, and warmth. The bond shared with the elves rekindled those things, and it began with an elf who saved the Empress from the brink of depth and showed her love.   As a final gift, as my time here is growing short, he shows me the pact of a leader and her people. It is horribly complex and carries such responsibility, even more than I already hold. It will allow me to call upon my people and take their energy to fuel my spells when I need it. While new oaths would need to be sworn for this, he also shows me the pact that the Empress holds with the elves. While I am doing her bidding, I can draw upon all elves in the reach of my magic.   The Empress once used this bond to draw the life from an entire city. He tells me she was not always the way she is now, and this must have been before she had learned the warmth and love that the elven people know.   And then we return to the waking world, because he can tell that I will leave soon, and I should spend my last few moments here with Mistress. When I wake her, we simply hold each other for as long as we can. It’s a strange feeling to know that I will leave, but she will still be with a different me from a different time, while I will return to the humans in the future. In my time, we will have been together for five hundred years, and whatever time it takes for us to be reunited is surely a tiny drop in an ocean of time.   The world around us fades to mist...and then we kiss and she fades as well.  

Day 40

And then I am on the ground in the oppressive heat, facing an Ingan that is much smaller than the one I faced just 300 years ago. Bran is near me, still conscious, and Kadia is protecting the unconscious forms of Alder and Shie. Wielding the fresh pain of leaving Mistress behind, I shatter the Ingan and feel the air instantly begin cooling.   We patch ourselves up and make our way out of the mine. Already the air feels better, the tunnel walls are glittering and refracting the light, and the magic feels like a natural wellspring and not the heavy breath of an animal. The Ingan must have been lurking here and feeding on the natural magic.   Safely above ground we make camp and I (briefly) explain what happened. Between time travel, meeting Kadia for my second time and her first time, rescuing the Hand, learning how to defeat the Ingan, and learning more about the path to bringing down the Barrier, it’s easy to keep some things for myself.   Maybe once we are safe in the keep again and I have the time to compose my letter to Mistress, I’ll be able to tell Bran about seeing her. But for now it feels like a warm secret to have for just myself, amidst the chaos of the moment.