Chapter 3 #2
Midway, she was forced to drop to her belly and pull her body forward with her elbows. A strange tension built in her chest, as if she had suddenly become claustrophobic. It took her a moment to realize that, again, Kaelan’s emotions had worked into her, even though they weren’t touching.
Picking up the pace, she soon broke from the confines of the tunnel and stepped out into a cave.
Stalactites hung above like the jagged teeth of a subterranean monster.
Some met with the stalagmites below, forming pillars.
Wrapping around the mineral formations, clinging to the walls and the ceiling in curvilinear designs, luminescent fungi filled the cavern with soft, eerie light.
A vast pool stretched away to the back of the cave, where low archways gave glimpses of more caverns beyond.
Kaelan hurried out behind her, sweat sheening his face, breath quick, almost panting.
Hero peeked out from behind one of the stalagmites, his nose and mouth glowing with fungal residue.
“Hero,” she said, stalking up to him. “You weren’t eating this stuff, were you?”
“Magda,” Kaelan whispered in a held-breath voice.
She turned. “What—?”
He stood near the edge of the water, staring down into the glowing depths as if mesmerized.
She approached him and the water’s edge cautiously. She’d assumed the glow on the water was reflected from the waves of fungi on the ceiling above, but in fact, below the surface of the water, something else was glowing.
At first glance, it appeared to be a strange formation of stone, covered completely in the soft fur of glowing fungi.
But then, she spotted the hands, the feet, the shape of a face.
She drew back and then, unable to help herself, looked again.
The creature appeared to be three times as large as a Pixie, curled on its side at the bottom of the water.
Sprouting from its back like bony quills were glowing stalagmite-type formations.
Hero clambered up her back. She flinched, kicking some loose dirt into the water.
“It is Ouda,” Hero said. “The true Ouda.”
“The true Ouda?” she repeated.
Kaelan shifted back. “Is she dead?”
A low, ghostly voice sounded from around them. “Yes . . . and no.”
Kaelan edged closer to Magda. “Let’s go,” he whispered.
In spite of the fear spilling off of Kaelan and her own pounding heart, she held her ground. “Ouda?”
“Yes,” the voice answered. Below the water, the creature did not move. But the fine hair of the fungi rippled slightly.
Magda squared her shoulders. “We’ve destroyed the creature that usurped your name.”
“Yes,” the voice was deep, yet vaguely feminine. “The empusa.”
“What’s an empusa?” Magda asked, speaking up and then down, not sure where she should be directing her voice since Ouda’s words seemed to come from everywhere.
“A soul-eater. It came from the south, fleeing the purges of the Elf King. It fastened itself to my tree. I was forced to retreat to the water. It could not tolerate fresh water.”
“That would’ve been nice to know,” Magda muttered.
Kaelan gave her an anxious look and then turned his gaze back to the motionless figure of the true Ouda. “Then it was you who hid me all those years ago?”
“No, it was the empusa who helped you. She hid you here with the imps and protected your secret.”
“But . . . Why would such foul creature help me?”
“The sylph who brought you compelled the empusa to do so. But I believe she would have helped you even without magical coercion. She hated the Elf King for driving her from her home.”
Kaelan’s face darkened, his eyes growing distant.
“Well, it’s gone now,” Magda said. “Is there some way we can help you?”
“It is too late,” Ouda said. “My physical form has mineralized. I only continue in this world thanks to the fols. They surrounded me and absorbed the last part of my soul.”
Magda frowned. “The fols? You mean . . . the fungi?”
“Through them, I have been able to continue to watch over my forest, though I am much diminished.”
“So there’s no way to bring you back to what you used to be?” Kaelan asked.
“No.” The word echoed around.
Kaelan’s face fell.
“What about someone else? Someone whose body is still alive?” Magda asked.
“You mean the nymph,” Ouda said.
“You know about her?”
“She is one of my children.”
“What did the empusa do to her?” Kaelan asked, his voice ringing harshly through the cavern.
“She consumed a part of Honeysuckle’s soul.”
Magda’s stomach turned. Kaelan’s ferocity, too, seemed to wilt.
“Is there anything we can do to help her regain it?” Magda asked.
A long silence greeted the question. Torpid sadness dripped off of Kaelan, sticking to Magda like toad ooze.
“It might be possible,” Ouda said finally.
“How?” Kaelan asked.
“She is like a tree splintered by lightning. One half is gone. She can never again bring it to life. But the other part of her remains rooted, alive. It is possible for her to continue to grow . . . new branches, new leaves. It will not be a resurrection of what she was, but in time, she might regain a sense of wholeness once more.”
“In time,” Kaelan repeated in a dull voice.
“She can . . . regrow her soul?” Magda asked.
“The soul is like all living things,” Ouda said. “It flourishes with patience, attention, love. For now she must be guarded, for the wound within her soul remains open and leaves her vulnerable.”
“So she’ll never be who she was,” Kaelan said.
“No.”
Magda knelt next to the water to put more distance between her and Kaelan, whose emotions leaked like a bad pipe.
“Thank you, Ouda. Are you certain there’s nothing we can do for you?”
“Yes, Magdalena, Rae of the Eastern Cliffs, there is something you can do for me.”
“What?”
“Protect my forest. Protect the small folk that are my children. I am fading. The fols are not strong enough to keep me here indefinitely. But you are strong, Ljósálfr.”
Magda bowed her head. “I don’t know—”
“One thing more,” Ouda said. “The brownie does not travel to the Spire.”
Her head shot up. “Kirk?”
“He and the owl fly to the Elf King’s territory, to the Petra Islands. On the largest of them is a hidden entrance to the hall of the dwarf lord, Froenz.”
“Wh—why?”
“I cannot speak to their reasons, only to what was overheard by the wind and whispered back to me.”
Magda dropped her elbow to her knee and her face into her hand. “Damion’s going to love this.” She lowered her hand and gazed down through the calm clear water to the glowing creature drowned in its depths. “I’m sorry we were too late to help you.”
“You were not late, Ljósálfr. You arrived right on time.”
The fols’ rippling slowed and then stopped, their glow diminishing, though not going out completely.
Kaelan cocked his head. “What is Ljósálfr?”