37.7 Better Than When I Left

General Summary

Days 561 - 562

We spend a few days simply settling into the Crystal Spires and Kaide is quickly adopted as the matriarch of the local youths. It seems that this first wave of awoken Osyr are mostly apprentices and magically talented guards and employees so naturally the atmosphere is quite boisterous. It is hard to imagine that they are not anxious about their loved ones waking but they are mostly young and presumably still very flexible and optimistic about the state of the world.   Any older Osyr have an air of anticipation about them as they supervise the apprentices. I’m sure they are looking forward to the parents waking.   In the days before Magdalena arrives I catch Jaeril and give her the lightest advice I can about my teacher: Set boundaries early so that she can’t claim ignorance. Jaeril now knows that Magdalena knows more about her past than any of us but I want her to uncover those pieces in her own time.  

She’s your teacher; she must be kind!

  I can’t blame her for this assumption but it is still very funny to hear. Fortunately being around Trillium has given my new little sister a very relaxed outlook on the things she might learn about herself.  

Day 563

Kaide and I are chatting with some guards when my letterbox chirps and notifies us that Magdalena has arrived and is asking if she ought to actually abide by the welcoming party clearly waiting for her or just sneak in.   Centuries ago, before I left my family’s farm to study with Mistress, my father would sometimes travel to a neighbouring village for business or friendship. Upon his return my sister and I would link arms and go pelting down the dirt road to pick through his bag and see if he’d brought us anything interesting. I don’t know if Kaide ever had such experiences but she takes to it quite naturally, laughing with me as we race through the crystalline streets towards the North. We arrive unnaturally quickly and burst out laughing again as we see our teacher being carried in on a litter supported by several Osyr guards.   She waves the guards away and descends to take us both in. To me: “You feel better than when I left”. To Kaide: “You really have let go, haven’t you?”   For a few hours before we enter the heart of the city we get to sit on the beach together with my elvish tea and just figure out how to exist together again. I can feel Kaide’s apprehension lessen and even Magdalena just seems…softer.  

• I describe Qing Chen and what we now know about demons. Apparently the Zephyr created them and then abandoned them as a failed experiment, though Magdalena considers them the finest thing they have ever created. The widespread belief amongst Zephyr is that they are too emotional, clever, and independently minded to be considered a success. I am quite suddenly less remorseful about my desire to have Magdalena convince Qing Chen that they do not deserve his worship.
• I mention the songwood tree and she is cagey and evasive about whether this is a good thing or not. To my delight, Kaide points out that Magdalena either needs to hold her tongue earlier to avoid us sensing a secret…or tell us the entire secret. After much prodding and cajoling she sighs and tells us the names of three Treeborn (missing for millennia) who would be displeased about a new songwood tree, and speculates that it shouldn’t be an issue unless the Heart of Song suddenly decides to give out ancient songs to new fae in any of our groves.
• We discuss Amytri and she resolves to visit him soon and give out new homework. At some point in the next 20 years it will be important for him to select and train an heir so that he can leave Solace, and while Magdalena seems very willing to tell him this I think it is my responsibility. My Outlands, my King, my junior who I want to progress in his studies.
• Fortunately one new problem we’ve encountered is easily solvable: To heal and wake Black Tourmaline we likely just need an incredible amount of magical power linked in a gem circle net. 500-1000, depending on how many particularly powerful mystics I might be able to collect.
• I find myself remarkably cagey about the fruit trees and the spirits Thalien and I connected to. As much as I would like to let sworn elves connect to those trees I think it is a puzzle that Uncle Red has earned the right to be consulted on first. If there is any curiosity or judgement over my choice to settle Thalien into the Celestial Grove, Magdalena withholds it. It is a convenient solution for the elves of Urna’low, we agree.
• To my surprise she is quite unbothered the prospect of Bran learning from Nucifera; whatever concerns she has over Bran are entirely related to his human nature of rapid, abrasive growth. Her suggestion is to encourage him to have children to keep him busy. Somehow I think this is not something I will need to actively encourage once he and Vaneilli settle down.
• I’m glad enough time has passed since Mec Ales that the pain of those trees is not top of mind but it is still hard to hear that it’s a problem that we should let calm down for a century or so before trying to fix it. At the very least in a century perhaps it will be something we can all do together - Magdalena and Uncle Red, Mistress and me.
• Almost as a test I mention meeting Tide and thinking about how to project the presence of a dragon. Last it seemed someone else was trying to teach me (Void) Magdalena had such a reaction that I’m curious to see how she feels now. While she doesn’t seem enthused at the prospect of me having a dragon aura, she doesn’t seem as offended as she did with Void. I wonder if being family has given her a stronger sense of security.
• Finally she asks if we encountered any other groves along the river and we have to drag the implication out of her. She says she and Uncle Red have two other close siblings who did plant groves, one of which is in the mountains along the river. It is a place watered in blood and soaked in the songs of the fallen. Apparently this cycle of fae can reap songs from other races and so a ward was erected to allow only a dozen of them to leave their grove at once. These must be the blood-scented fae who watered the fruit trees with tree sap.

  The excitement of our reconnection has mellowed a bit by the time Kaide and I show her our homework in the form of my measuring spoon and her cartographer’s pen. There is some indeterminable softness in her face as she turns them over in her hands and probes at the magic.  

There was a time where I would have failed both of you for this work. Now, I think it exceeds expectations.

  At some point in our travels I’m going to ask her about this. For now, she reaches into her own extradimensional space and pulls out gifts for both of us: The elixir to give Kaide more time in an independent body, a spirit rose for me, along with some ornate earrings that will let me fly faster and a shimmering green tunic that will protect Kaide more.  

You’d think I’d never given you anything before!

  She teases.   With the sun starting to drop in the sky I turn to thinking about Trillium and what we’re going to do about her. Magdalena points out an aspect of Trillium’s plight that hadn’t occurred to me - by retaining the dragon spirits in her she is using her son’s soul as a bridge; he can never rest while he is being used this way. I am adamant that this is not something Trillium would be doing with awareness - I can almost see her in my mind’s eye painting with blood and losing herself in a magic she could access without understanding.   Uncle Red’s plan is to have her release the spirits so that they release her son’s soul as well. It is a negotiation, not a fight. Magdalena, of course, thinks a fight would be easier. She points out that Trillium could subdue the dragon spirits and bring them under her own control so that she no longer needs her son as a bridge, but the act of doing that would change something about her. Finding the strength to subdue dragons would be a change (in a way negotiation wouldn’t be, I wonder?).   Once again I am adamant that Trillium would find a way to release the spirits once she subdued them. Or she would make friends with them, perhaps. There is no part of me that thinks she would be lost to grief and fury again, not with her family around her and the experiences she has had by now.   But still…someone has to make this decision: Negotiate or subdue. And it can’t be her, because she will need to decide and act immediately once she knows the full story. I’m surprised to find that Magdalena and I have traded our usual positions - she has a complicated thought about creating a memory capsule so that Trillium might make the decision and then have it sequestered away so we can enact her choice at a later time. I want to make the decision for her: Fight.