Chapter 24 #4
Theron smiled at her between one twist and the next and caught her open-mouthed stare.
Apparently the deity of the sky shared her naked lust, because at that very moment, rain came down in a torrent.
Theron ended the dance with a last graceful turn and prowled over to his wife.
She blinked at him half in a stupor as he leaned over her.
“It appears that I’ve won the bet,” he purred, caging her between his arms on the bench. “Prepare yourself, my little fairy.”
“How did you…?”
“Your Majesty, Your Highness, perhaps next time you might inform us before you perform the rain rite?” Polydorus asked, hunching over a nearly soaked scroll.
“Come along then,” he whispered in Aurora’s ear. “If you’re very good, I might be more charitable this time tomorrow.”
“I…goodness,” she swallowed, her eyes devouring him.
She took his offered hand with a fierce blush and joined him back inside the palace proper. He wiped the rain from his face and grinned at his advisors.
“A wellspring will appear very soon. The rain should convince the worst of the predators to go back to their lairs. Canthus, mobilise the soldiers to help protect the children who hear the call.”
“At once, Your Majesty.”
“Polydorus, arrange for a bath and meal for the both of us. We need to be presentable shortly.”
“Your Majesty,” Polydorus said, bowing deeply before racing off.
“Nireus, how did it go with the avatar?”
“He’s amenable to the arrangement.”
“Good. Get him a uniform and make him Aurora’s primary bodyguard.”
“As you command,” Nireus replied before heading off to do just that.
In short order, they were bathed, dressed, and fed.
Theron felt giddy. Aureum had called Aurora to be a monarch.
He’d been so worried she would choose not to be his queen.
They still had things to work out between them, and a future to plan that involved skipping through time, but for the first time in what felt like an age, he was…
optimistic. With her at his side, they would end the blight.
His people would be saved. Not even Drakon could spoil his mood.
Then he heard it, the call of the wellspring, a blending of the senses. It was close. Probably just outside the walls of the city. And he had the perfect place to watch the young ones discover their wild magic for the first time.
Aurora met him in short order, dressed as a queen, an ornate crown upon her head. He offered his hand.
“Where are we going?”
“To the walls.”
Attendants held up umbrellas as Theron and Aurora made their way to the walls and rose to the top. The children were already racing through the rain, heedless of the calls of their parents. As they ringed the city, Theron was proud to see just how many were being called from every district.
As they made their way to the main gate, now opened to allow the children easy egress, he could finally see what had drawn the children.
A giant orchard of golden trees had sprouted outside the city entrance, the fruit ripening in the heavy, low branches that seemed to be reaching towards the approaching children.
Aurora gasped.
The plain outside the city was packed full of children entranced by the melody of Aureum, drawn like bees to nectar to the tree that held their magic within.
“There are so many,” she said, plainly shocked.
“This is how it’s meant to be,” he said.
“I think…Triad preserve me, if this is normal, then something has gone terribly wrong in my time. This must be another part of the reason I was sent here.”
“How many heeded the call at your wellspring? Only a few hundred?” he asked sympathetically. Almost every child in Altanus was right now heading towards the golden trees. Perhaps several thousand, maybe more. How lonely it would have been to be called among so few in her time.
“Two,” she swallowed, paling the longer she watched the children below.
“Two hundred?” he asked.
Then things were very dire indeed. How did anything function with so few who could wield wild magic?
Perhaps this was why, as she said, they all worked at her imperial palace.
Given how few would be called each generation, the palace would need every single one of them.
It would also explain why she’d thought the elder gods merely myth or gone.
With so few left being called, fewer still would have been made clerics and held the knowledge in trust.
“No. Two. It was just me and Fae.”
Theron choked on his next breath.
“Theron!”
“Your Majesty!”
“I’m fine. I’m fine,” he lied.
Two.
Merciful Triad.
It was a catastrophe of cosmic proportions. How many people lived in her time lacking an intrinsic part of their very souls? The elder gods must be on the very brink of annihilation. And when they died, Trisia would be rendered uninhabitable.
“Aurora…”
“I know, Theron. I understand now,” she said, her hand over her heart, turning her gaze back towards the palace. Taking a deep breath, she faced him with conviction. “We’ll change the future. We have to. I’m ready to be your queen now.”