28.2 Reclaim Your Wings

General Summary

Day 444

We stay up far later than is responsible but between Andstella and I it is hard to resist the pull of nighttime.   When we finally wake, I am surprised to find two others still sleeping - Andstella with delicately fluttering wings in time with her breath, and Alrudian nestled into Crag's curled form. Onyx and Hue are playing a game together with Haze's enormous head peering curiously at the game board.   For the first time in a while I get properly brewed tea from a well-trained apprentice and we get to sit and talk for a bit. Their journey back across the Barrier is approaching and Tira would like to have a formal engagement made between her, Alder, and Knotrael before they go back. It's a good idea, one that will give them some standing with her family. There will be a few formalizations done in Dreamfall before they depart.   The number of people crossing is all that Haze can carry: Tira, Alder, Knotrael, Miriam, and the single body shared by Hella and Kadia. As it is Knotrael will have to leave his armour behind, though it will be easy to find new equipment at home. Rather than travel light, I think the solution is to add at least one more member to their travelling party. I want to send Onyx back to the Empress, having seen that the city of her friend will be safe even without him at his post.   With two dragons we will be able to send more people, particularly Caravel and Rina. Both are people who might wish to cross and who I would be happy to send. As much as Caravel is beloved here and well-occupied as a teacher to young heroes he has his own family who he deserves to be with. And I have not forgotten that he slipped through the Barrier while on his way to provide aid to Mistress.   Moreover I hope Onyx will be able to carry Ember's bones back to her clan. They have been weighing on me.   But such planning can wait. The rest of the day is for exploration and we all set off throughout the ruins together. The island is overgrown with vegetation and many of the trees seem like cousins of the Eldritch trees. They're smaller but still have the strength to have lifted up houses and portions of buildings as they grew.   From some of these trees I catch a faint thread of energy that collects and draws towards the centre of the island, joining with other threads. It leads to a courtyard encircled by two enormous stone dragons lying nose-to-tail with a tree at the centre. Andstella laughs and asks if I'm going to bleed on this one too and while I still think this is a general good strategy with trees, I hold back. This time I press my hands and forehead against it and try to feel where its energy is going, why it has so many threads tied to it.   From behind me - an answer! A dusty-skinned elven man in comfortable leathers steps out of nothingness to greet us. He looks elvish...but he is so clearly a dragon that I laugh with delight. Just like Hue chose a fae form and Onyx chose a dwarven one, here is a dragon who chose to look like us!   He introduces himself as Sandstorm (child of Earth and Sky), one of two guardians of Avan'Nal since the time it was created. The other, Shale (child of Earth and Ocean), sleeps still.    

You are an elf! But the wings - has the dream been realized? Are the elves reclaiming their wings? Have you come to find a way to reforge the old bonds?

  This place fell to ruin even before Onyx and Hue had hatched but clearly it was established after the Pruning. Sandstorm tells us that the dragons have been elvish guardians for as long as elves have been elves, that this place was built so close to one of the remaining Groves as a reminder to the Fae of Seasons that their kin still lived and were loved. It was a reminder that by joining hands across differences, greater things could be possible. Sandstorm is ancient beyond anyone I've met here aside from Magdalena herself, if he remembers the Pruning. But for now he simply asks to hear our stories and dreams, remaking that he could speak for years about history but it always feels inconsiderate to ask so much time of the unbonded. Privately, I look around at our gathered party and think that none of us will pass on before we see at least 2000 years.   With that, we all try to tell our stories. Without discussing it, it seems that we have agreed that I will go last. It is humbling to hear my name spoken in each story.   Alrudian describes herself as a simple girl from the Frontier, inspired by stories of great heroes like me. She wants to be a hero and keep people safe from the things that threaten them. For those which can only be stopped by violence, she says she'll do violence well. She picked up sword because it needed to be done but she dreams of the day she can put it down. She wants to be a hero until the world doesn’t need heroes.   Crag says he is younger still than Alrudian and that she speaks for him. He talks about how Alrudian rescued both him and his mother, freeing them from enslavement and showing him the heart of someone who would risk their life to do the right thing - he dreams of growing together with her, taking on whatever comes their way, and protecting her like she protected him   Tira identifies herself as the apprentice of a Hand of the Empress who has sheltered and protected our people. She describes me as someone who gave her and Alwen a place to call home and be family and sent her to find the Kindred as allies. While she was there Haze surprised her by playing hide and seek without telling her they were playing. Of this, she paints a picture of him poking out of the mist and tagging her before vanishing again, insisting that they were playing a game. She dreams of a time when I can have peace and return to the studies I crave.   Haze says he simply wants to relax and play but he can’t do that until everyone is safe. His dream is to extend that safety to everyone so that I can settle down with books and Tira can be the kind of apprentice she wants to be. This elvish family has so much love for elves, humans, fae, dwarves, and dragons too. How could he not want to share that with people?   Andstella calls herself the first of the returned Fae of Day and Night. She grew up by herself with the memories of the first Tree of Day and Night in many millennia. The Treeborn Magdalena is her mother. Now that we have our Grove, she dreams of a day when we thrive together and become commonplace. We want unity not just with fae but with elves, dragons, kin from far away.   Onyx laughs and notes that I even managed drag him out of his city to see my friends and family. Already he has seen two people inspired by her reaching out to dragonkind. How could he not reach out to help her? He dreams of solving puzzles - the mysteries of magic are intricate. No grand vision. It seems like it will be a distant thing before he can return the city to the dwarves. For now he dreams that "this little one" succeeds at creating the world she’s aiming for.   Hue says that she’s a guardian who protects a place that was established long ago as a sanctuary for living things. She will protect it for as long as she draws breath. Dreams come and go but she’s old enough now that all she dreams about is tomorrow and whatever each day brings.   Jerun introduces himself as the child of a dedicated healer, a person who dedicated their life to nurturing their children, plants and anything in need of care. It's an example of life he's tried to follow in his own way, even though he seems to be incapable of touching magic. When he talks about dreams, he mentions a feeling that grows every time he sleeps - a feeling that something he doesn't understand is locked up inside of himself... recently, thanks to me, he's managed to glimpse that thing... he dreams of understanding himself and in so doing, he hopes that what he learns helps him care for others.   My words have weight and I deliver them carefully. Speaking them aloud feels right as I name myself.

I am also a Frontier girl. I was born an elf and have grown into a fae as well. I once told one of my apprentices that our life’s work will be expanding the circle of who we consider to be our people. I am an expander of circles, a maker of families, an Empire-builder who wants the Empire but not the title of Empress (because that one is taken). I have always been a scholar; long been a warrior and commander; more recently I have become a healer. My dreams are of dropped Barriers, broken chains, new growth trees, extinguished fires, and reforged bonds. There are so many ancient pains between people that need a gentle touch, a release of tension.

  And yet another ancient being looks at me with clear eyes and finds truth. But this one, at least, is not someone I'm asking anything of. Instead he leads us on a tour of the ruin   He points out an enormous hall as one where hatchings and celebrations would take place. Dragons parents would arrange competitions amongst elves to determine who would be allowed to be present at the hatching of their clutch. Such competitions ran the spectrum from tests of strength, determination, magic, and intellect.   Elsewhere, a grand bazaar surrounded by three statues. Formerly it was five, and I assume it would have been the first five dragons.   And finally, a partially collapsed rotunda atop a hill that Sandstorm has us clear away. With his help, Haze transforms into a small, fae-like person with wintery dragon wings (I can't help but think as soon as he learns to do this on his own we will never be able to find him again).   Then Sandstorm leaves us to descend into the hill and listen to the songs there, for this is the Hall of Songs, where elves and dragons sang their songs at the end of their life. The barrow is lined inside with gems, each containing a song that can be replayed.   All of us wander, entranced, late into the night.   The songs collected here are distinct and different from Fae songs. Each recording begins with a brief narration: The singer gives their name, the year of their birth and the year of their song, as well as the names of their parents and children.  

In the hopes that the branches who continue to grow may always find their roots.

  Some of the narrations speak directly to people who have died.  

Mother, father, it's been two hundred years since you placed your song here. Elder sister and elder brother have already shared their songs with you, now it's my turn, the last until your grandchildren join us all, may it be many years from now.

  For the elves that lived here, they would have known that people would have to seek out or discover their songs... there is no Grove to guide songs to the ones who need to hear them. Unlike Fae songs that I know, these songs are left as an inheritance for those who follow after. Not to a nebulous future generation, but to their own descendants.   There are less than 20 songs of dragons and riders but each of them ends in tragedy. No pair that left songs here died of old age at the end of their life.   As much as it hurts to hear these tragedies and watch my own young riders listen solemnly, I also know that with the lifespans of these people, none could have died of old age before the city was abandoned; any riders who lived must have either left or not returned to sing their song. Avan'Nal must not have lasted more than several thousand years (how strange to think of this as a short timespan) and according to Onyx no one really knows how long the earliest generations of dragons might live. It is the younger generations who seem to measure their lifespan up to 5000 years.