Chapter 24 The Spiritual World
Blinking and groaning, Lizzie opened her eyes slowly. She was lying on her back on something warm and malleable. Above her there was nothing but an infinite blue sky.
Yelping in surprise, she jackknifed and found herself staring at an emerald sea. The soft waves gently lapped at her bare feet.
Bare feet?
She scanned around confirming that she was on a beach. The sand stretched as far as the eye could see in both directions. She frowned.
“This is familiar…” she muttered slowly.
“I saw your memories and made it look like Chapel Porth Beach,” a melodic voice sounded from behind her and with a yelp, Lizzie scrambled to her feet.
A tall woman with black hair was standing on the sand. She was using a long gown made of something between silk and velvet in a light turquoise colour, almost the same colour of the sea itself. Her feet were bare too, her olive skin contrasting with the whiteness of the sand.
The woman smiled at her and took a step closer, making her bright emerald eyes perfectly visible under the sun’s brightness. Her features were familiar and Lizzie guessed who she was at once.
“Aranna?”
The woman’s smile only broadened, “I am only glad you have inherited my intelligence, little niece, it shall save introductions.”
Lizzie rubbed her eyes, realising that her glasses were nowhere to be found. Strangely, she could see perfectly without them.
“How is this even possible? Aren’t you dead?” she blurted and then bit her lower lip, realising her blunder, “Sorry, I didn’t mean–” and then she cut herself, feeling all blood drain away from her face, “Wait, if I can see you, does that mean that I…”
Aranna’s eyes glinted like polished gems as she laughed heartily, the sound reminding Lizzie of the twinkling of crystal.
“No, Lizzie!” she chuckled, “You are not dead, I have brought you to the Spiritual World for a brief moment.”
“And the Spiritual World is just like a beach in Cornwall?”
Aranna laughed again, “No dear niece, but I thought it would be easier for you to meet me in a familiar place.”
“Are you telling me that this is real? You are real? And how do you know who I am?”
“Oh yes, I am plenty real, though I am a spirit and as you must know, spirits are notoriously all-knowing. Well, also you are the spitting image of my eldest sister in case you didn’t know…”
Lizzie studied her surroundings one more time, fascinated at how real it felt. She could even smell the briny scent of the sea.
“So is this some kind of dream? The last thing I remember that locket of yours opening and then boom!”
Aranna bobbed her head. Her black hair was glossy as silk, “No, you are not dreaming, but in a form of trance… The locket opened a portal to the Spiritual World, where I now dwell.”
“You built a portal in that tiny locket?” Lizzie was stupefied.
“Not exactly,” Aranna explained patiently, “The locket was only a key, if you will, connected to the Endellys bloodline. Once the seal was broken, only one of my Clan could trigger it, similarly to the puzzle box I left on the tree.”
Eleanor has the key. A key to the land of the dead!
Trippy…
“Yeah, well, don’t even get me started on that tickling trick you pulled!” she shivered at the memory and Aranna giggled, “Why this complicated treasure hunt? Did you indeed create a trap for the Dreams Thief?”
“A trap exists, but I cannot claim full ownership for its creation.”
“Do you need to speak in riddles?” Lizzie groaned in frustration.
Aranna smiled, “Apologies, little niece, your languages were not native to me and it’s been centuries since the last time I spoke them. I shall try to be more clear.”
Moving like the sea waves, Aranna walked up to a boulder and sat on it, making an elegant gesture for Lizzie to sit beside her. Her movements were fluid and unreal. Spirit or not, it was quite clear to Lizzie that Aranna was anything but human.
With a long sigh, Lizzie obeyed and sat beside her great great-aunt. On close inspection, Aranna’s inhuman features were more evident: her irises were of an almost iridescent green and there was faint glow over her skin. She was also a big woman, almost a head taller than Lizzie, possibly as tall as Brun.
“There is much to be said, little niece, for you to understand what needs to be done. Yet I cannot tell you all,” she turned her gaze to the sea and for a moment Aranna’s irises perfectly reflected the colour of the water, “Surely you have learned about the Dreams Thief from Brun?”
Lizzie acquiesced, “Yes, I mean, there isn’t much to know, is there? He has managed to evade detection for millennia!”
Something flashed on Aranna’s face.
Was it… surprise?
Whatever it was, it flickered away fast.
“What makes you think that the Dreams Thief is a male?”
Lizzie was taken aback by that question, “Nothing, I mean… Brun refers to… it as a male. I assumed that much was known.”
Aranna nodded slowly, “Yes, well, the Dreams Thief identity was never uncovered, so naturally everyone assumed that such powerful evil monster bent on the destruction of my caste ought to be a male. Like humans, male Fae can be a lot more… belligerent than females. Greed, however, my little niece, is quite universal.”
“Are you saying that the Dreams Thief is a female?”
She hesitated a moment, as if choosing her words carefully.
“I am saying that you can discard no possibility if you are to solve this riddle.”
Lizzie’s eyes widened, “But you must know who he… or she… well, who it is? You must have seen it when it… when it attacked you…”
Aranna lowered her eyes, “Alas, I’m afraid that the Dreams Thief is a rather cowardly creature. The spell renders you unconscious quite fast,” she replied sadly.
“I’m sorry…” she tried, but Aranna paid her no mind.
“My sisters and I were there when the first attack happened, two and a half thousand years ago. Initially we thought it had been some kind of beast. The byproduct of Unseelie magic. More attacks followed quickly and our best scholars were at a loss to find an explanation. My father, Elyon Torhorn, was the one who riddled it out that the murderer was a Conjurer.”
“How did he find that out?”
Aranna lowered her eyes and her pain became nearly palpable.
“He baited the monster and set a trap.”
Lizzie swallowed hard, but said nothing, waiting for Aranna to continue.
“The snare was not strong enough to stop it, though. When we found Father, well, his empty shell,” Aranna lowered her eyes and Lizzie saw a tear roll down her flawless cheek. It looked like a rounded diamond, “we found something else which had never happened in previous attacks.”
Lizzie leaned forward and nearly fell from the boulder.
“In this world you call it aura, which can be explained as a physical manifestation of one’s soul, but the Fae have another word for it, which roughly translates into your language as life essence. For beings with magic, our very life essence has power.”
“Which is what the Dreams Thief can drain?” Lizzie cut in and Aranna nodded.
“That is correct, but also a Fae’s life essence possess a certain… energy signature. In other words, no two Fae have the same signature and because the kind of magic each of us wield, the life essence of a Conjurer is quite distinct from that of an Enchanter. When the Dreams Thief attacked my father, traces of its own life essence were left behind.”
“So that is how you discovered that it was a Conjurer?” Aranna nodded and she continued, “And couldn’t you use this signature to identify who the Dreams Thief was?”
“Alas, the life essence of a Fae can only be seen during the infancy or at the time of death. My father’s enchantment linked his own life to that of his killer and hence snatched this ephemerous glimmer into the monster’s identity, a glimmer which was not enough to identify the killer, but which was sufficient to widen the rift between the two castes.”
Aranna cast her eyes down.
“Mistrust became rife, skirmishes broke out on every corner of our motherland. Many died…” her eyes widened and she stared at Lizzie unblinkingly, “To make matters more… complicated, this knowledge caused scores of acolytes to be drawn to the Dreams Thief’s cause, because many Conjurers felt belittled by the Enchanters. War broke out, engulfing our whole world. We endured a millennium of strife…”
Lizzie gasped when vivid images appeared before her eyes. She saw large green expanses, silver-blue forests, crystalline lakes and snow covered mountains. Then she saw Fae of all colourings, the females dressed in long robes like Aranna’s while the males donned embroidered tunics.
Next, the skies darkened and Lizzie heard screams and cries and the metallic clash of blades. There was so much pain and blood and death.
She closed her eyes tightly and when she opened them again, Aranna still had her gaze trained on her.
“That’s… horrible,” Lizzie knew that the comment was inane as soon it was out of her mouth, but she felt the need to say something.
“Yes… yes, it was. Even for the Fae, who have little attachment to life.”
That assertion caught Lizzie’s attention, “What do you mean?”
Aranna sighed, turning her gaze to the sea, “Do not misunderstand me, little niece, the Fae do respect and enjoy life, but our lifetimes are long. We seldom mate and have children, thus thousands of years to live can be quite lonely. Yet, we value our time together, the knowledge we acquire,” she looked at Lizzie again, “Our attachments and emotions are simply… different from humans’.”
Lizzie huffed, realising that she would probably never fully comprehend what Aranna was trying to say. People forgot that other creatures did not feel things the way a human would. It was like watching a cartoon with lions and elephants using trousers and having nervous breakdowns.
Beyond that, trying to understand Fae emotions was really not the point of her little trip to the Great Beyond…
“Well, what happened then?” Lizzie asked. Aranna smiled and she was sure that her long dead ancestor knew exactly what she was thinking.
“A truce was brokered between Enchanters and Conjurers. Rather than kill each other till the last, we sought to unite our efforts in hunting down and destroying the Dreams Thief. My mother, Ioelena Endellys, and Fayla Theynore were responsible for achieving that.”
“Fayla? As in Brun’s mentor?”
“The same. Fayla was the oldest Conjurer and respected as a leader of sorts amongst her caste, in the same way that my mother was seen as a leader to the Enchanters. Rather like your Queens if you will, though we do not use such titles. Together they brought an end to a thousand years of bloodshed. And then the Dreams Thief disappeared.”
“What do you mean disappeared?”
“For three hundred years no attacks happened. We even began to believe that the monster had died. However, it fooled us all, and when it struck again, it took my mother.”
Lizzie’s hands flew to her mouth, “Oh my God!”
Aranna lifted her chin, inhaling the briny air, “Yes, it was a hard blow to my sisters and I. Triarell was the one who suffered the most, because she was quite attached to Mother. She grieved her death for decades…”
Lizzie blinked, trying to convert Fae timelines into human terms when a lifetime was thousands of years. A couple of years of grieving for a human would last decades for a Fae.
“After my mother fell, the monster’s hunger could not be satiated and Enchanter after Enchanter fell. There was barely time to mourn one death and another happened.”
“It’s almost as if the only thing holding the Dreams Thief had been your mother…” Lizzie muttered.
“Exactly right!” Aranna exclaimed and her eyes sparkled with pride, “You’re an Endellys to be sure!” then her face reacquired the serious expression, “That was the same conclusion that my sisters and I reached. My mother was the most powerful Enchanter in the history of our caste – until Triarell that is. Her protective spells were strong enough to shield miles around our home. Many Enchanters found refuge in our lands… To continue its gruesome work, the Dreams Thief had to remove her.”
Aranna fell silent and again Lizzie felt deep sorrow emanating from her. Even if she spoke of the Fae’s detachment to life, the love between a child and her mother was a powerful thing.
She frowned.
“But if your mother’s protective spells were so strong, how did the Dreams Thief get past them? Unless… Unless the monster was someone from your inner circle!”
“That is precisely the conclusion we reached, little niece,” she bent down and grabbed a handful of white sand in her hand and let it sieve between her long fingers. It was as white as caster sugar, “We realised that to kill our mother, the Dreams Thief ought to be someone with access to her. That is when we decided to leave the Otherworld.”
Then realisation hit her
“You were not fleeing! You’re hoping to bring the Dreams Thief with you!”
“Correct again.”
Lizzie stood up and began to pace. The sand felt cool under her toes.
“Because there was a prophecy, right? Something foreseeing that an Endellys would destroy the Dreams Thief?”
“Aye: The song of the nightingale shall be the thief’s last.”
“Wow, that’s pretty…” Lizzie hesitated.
“I believe the word you are looking for is lame.”
“Well, I was trying to be polite…” she bobbed her head.
Aranna chuckled, “Don’t worry about it, little niece, Fae soothsaying is a lot less… elaborate than humans stories would have you believe,” she grabbed another handful of sand and repeated the process, “Scrying is not an exact art by any measure, but it was quite clear from that that only an Endellys would be powerful enough to destroy the Dreams Thief. Therefore my sisters and I pretended to flee our world. Then we secretly sealed the gateway. Permanently.”
Lizzie’s eyes widened again, “So… the human world was the trap!” she gasped, “But wait: does that mean that the Dreams Thief never left the human world?”
“Just so,” Aranna agreed, “We hoped to protect the remaining Enchanters in the motherland. And to narrow down our list of suspects! Surely Brun must have told you that part of the story?”
Her expression darkened, “Yes, and how you kidnapped human children and enslaved them.”
Aranna trained her otherworldly eyes on Lizzie, “You judge us cruel?”
“Do you have another word for it?”
She lowered her eyes, “No, I suppose not… All I can say in our defence is that we were fighting for the survival of our race. I know it is hardly an excuse,” she added before Lizzie could object, “It is only the truth. We were at war and needed soldiers.”
It was of course a valid argument, but it did not lessen the sting of what her ancestors had done to humans.
However, any moral protests Lizzie had wanted to voice died inside her at Aranna’s next words.
“And that is how we found Brun.”
The brightness was still as strong as if Brun were standing in front of stage lights.He squinted, covering his eyes with his hands to shield them from the intense glare.
“Lizzie?” he called, but there was no answer.
He closed his eyes tightly and stretched his arms blindly around him. They had been sitting by the kitchen table when the explosion happened, but instead of finding the kitchen island, the sink or even a wall, there was nothing but empty spaces.
He took a step forward and heard a crunching sound.
Crunching?
Shielding his eyes with his forearms he squinted down and confirmed that there was no mistake.
He was standing on pebbles.
“Lizzie!” he called again, panic gripping his heart, but instead of her voice, he heard the soft swishing sound of water.
Heavens, am I by the loch?
The thought had barely formed in his mind when the blasted light finally dimmed a little and his stomach sank when his suspicious were confirmed.
However, that was not Loch Tay.
The waters of the lake barely moved, reminding him of a giant silver mirror. A thick forest surrounded the shores.
Where am I? And where is Lizzie?
Movement caught his attention and he saw a silhouette in the distance moving slowly towards him. It was human…
A man.
“Who are you? And what is this place?” he shouted.
The man halted, startled by Brun’s presence. Then he tilted his head and resumed his pace towards Brun, only… faster.
The hairs on the back of his neck rose and he felt his hand hover towards his waist, but of course he had not carried a weapon in a long time.
The man was moving with inhuman speed and Brun’s heart thundered in his chest. Whomever he was, he was Fae, and although Brun could not see the man’s face, there was something oddly familiar about him.
Light was still glowing behind the man, making it impossible for Brun to distinguish his features. All he could see was a mane of blond hair.
“You are not supposed to be here!” the man bellowed in the Fae language, “How did you come here?”
The Dreams Thief! It must be the Dreams Thief!
Maybe this was Aranna’s trap? A way to track the monster?
The man was close now. Brun scanned the surroundings again, but there was nothing he could use as a weapon, thus he planted his feet firmly on the ground and lifted his fists. He was ready to fight the Dreams Thief with his bare hands if that would give Lizzie a chance at life.
“You will not win this time!” Brun yelled back.
“Fool!” the Fae male snarled and his golden hair became more pronounced in the light, reminding Brun of a lion’s mane, “You must leave now or you will regret this!”
Light exploded again and this time Brun fell into oblivion.
“What do you mean you found Brun?”
Aranna stood up from the boulder and stepped towards the sea line. She moved as fluidly as the water and for a moment Lizzie thought that her body was just going to dissolve into the waves like The Little Mermaid.
“Walk with me, little niece, your time here is almost over,” she replied cryptically and Lizzie felt the urge to throttle her ancestor. If Aranna noticed, she gave no indication.
She huffed impatiently but obeyed.
“Creating the Changelings was the Conjurers’ idea. They were raised and trained to defend the Enchanters.”
“Yes, Brun told me that,” Lizzie exhaled, finding hard to keep the annoyance from her voice, “They were tricked into believing that they were a lesser branch of Conjurers.”
Aranna bobbed her head, “Just so… But what Brun did not tell you, simply because he did not know himself, is that this was not entirely a lie: Changelings were not random children.”
She halted, feeling her entrails begin to churn.
“What are you trying to say?”
“I am saying that all Changelings were like you, in a way they were a lesser branch of Fae, because they were humans who carried Fae blood. My sisters and I, and those who came with us were not the first ones to come to your world, but rather the last ones. For millennia before that, Fae crossed the gateway and occasionally mated with humans. When we arrived, we encountered a number of humans who could wield magic, albeit in a weak and undisciplined form, and that is when the Conjurers had the idea of actively search for these Fae descendants and change them. The rings were used to extend the Changelings’ lives, but also to control their innate magic powers, which could be quite unpredictable.”
“But what do you mean by you found Brun? How was he different from other Changelings?”
Aranna’s eyes darkened and for the first time since their conversation begin, Lizzie sensed a hint of fear in her voice, “Because he is related to one Conjurer in particular.”
Lizzie thought she was going to retch when the dots began to connect in her head.
“Oh God, are you saying that Brun–”
“Yes, little niece, Brun and the Dreams Thief are related.”
Lizzie pressed her temples with both hands, feeling that her head was about to explode, “How could you know that?”
“Because of that energy signature I spoke about. Though it’s unique from Fae to Fae, it tends to be similar amongst members of the same lineage.”
Lizzie gasped, “Wait, then that’s what the second prophecy refers to! Thirteen fathers will be in their graves after the gate is opened.”
“Just so,” Aranna acquiesced, “You and Brun are connected, little niece, just as the Dreams Thief is connected to the Endellys Clan. The path of his destiny has always been intertwined with our bloodline. That is why he felt infatuated by Triarell.”
Those words hit Lizzie like a punch on the stomach and she began to breathe hard as the implications of Aranna’s words took shape in her mind. If Brun’s feelings for Triarell were never real, did that mean the same for her? Was it just some sort of magic side-effect of this connection?
But what about her feelings? Was she just as trapped as he was?
The edges of Lizzie’s vision darkened and her body began to lose consistency.
“Oh my God, I’m going to pass out!”
Apparently oblivious to all the turmoil she caused in Lizzie’s head, Aranna chuckled, “No, it only means that your time here is almost over. The power of my spell is nearly spent. Although a little sooner than I would have hoped…” then she held Lizzie by the shoulders, making more evident how much taller she was. Aranna ought to be nearly six feet tall, “To find out the truth, you and Brun must go to the place where my spirit found peace. You both will find the missing piece of the puzzle there.”
Lizzie glared at her ancestor, “The missing piece? Can’t you just tell me? Who is the Dreams Thief and how can we defeat him, or her or whatever it is! It would save a lot of time!”
Aranna smiled, “You truly have my intelligence, little niece, and Gweyir’s humour, but your impatience surely comes from your great great-grandmother! Spoken words, even written words can be lost: the only safe knowledge is the one coming from inside you. All you need to know now is that Brun holds the solution.”
And with those words, there was another explosion of light and then all was dark and silent.