Laurel

3:14 Sky

I was leading an army, fighting on the side of my loves, for light and what was right. I said I had only ever dreamed of freedom, but once I had achieved freedom, I needed a new goal. I had started to learn to read the various languages of the books that I collected. Human stories of heroes had become my favorite, I had wanted to do something worthwhile, something heroic in gratitude to the world above for letting me live a better life.

As I directed various species of Fae to different tasks that were needed to establish our base of operations, all I wanted to do was turn back to my cottage, taking our mates with us, and hide away as long as our lives allowed. I didn’t want to be a hero anymore. I wanted to be happy. I looked towards Laurel, she was at a large table, maps, and other documents spread out around her as she and Brydel lead a meeting on strategy. Auris and Delia were nearby, looking lost in the crowd. Auris must be hunching his shoulders down or lowering himself to be nearer to Delia right now if I couldn’t see his head above the crowd.

Discouraged I hadn’t laid eyes on two of our mates, I sent one of the nearby Fire Fae to locate Auris and Delia and bring them nearer. I felt on edge. Like a long unused part of my brain was sensing something but I couldn’t remember how to interpret the signals. Our location was enough to put most on edge. The Endless sea was right there, the occasional roar of large unimaginable monsters heard over the crash of the waves against the sheer rock cliffs; and if you believed Laurel, like I did. Then the Sunless were nearby, hidden under the earth, ready to spill out into the sun for the first time in generations. So I had reason to be uneasy.

My eyes drifted while I was telling a young Centar the ideal frequency of perimeter patrols, and how to vary the schedule enough that it wouldn’t be easily predictable to an enemy, when my eyes drifted towards the mountain, the first place where I had seen an open sky. The memory of the collapsed cave ceiling, open in a wide oval and my first look at the stars filtered through my mind. The stars that night had been the most beautiful things I had ever seen in my life. Until I fell in love with the daughter of a star brought to me by fate.

Gotha had led me to the surface, to Laurel, to this moment. Fate had done well by me so far in my approximation. I had enjoyed a life, with peace, and love, and knowing I had done right by my own measure. My hand reached down to the pocket of the strong woven cotton pants Laurel called jeans. The hell stone was there, burning against my thigh. I hadn’t wanted to bring it with us, I did anyways. We needed to have any advantage possible. I would rather have it on my person and not use it, than not have it and wish I had. 

It had been a few moments since I had sent the messenger for Auris and Delia, I wanted them nearby. The closer we all were together, the easier it would be to protect everyone. I didn’t like having us separated. I was thinking about sending a second messenger when I felt the earth move under my feet, and I realised what my body had been trying to tell me. The ground had been vibrating with the movement of a second army, one underground. There was an echoing boom from far away. I looked towards the mountain I knew so well, and saw the grey smoke drifting upwards from two thirds the way to the summit. A rockslide tumbling down the front of the mountain facing us, rocks, dirt, and what looked like bodies tumbling into the Endless sea below.

My mind went blank as I watched dark bodies pout out behind the still billowing smoke. A boiling mass of bodies, some being tossed down the scraped raw face of the slope where the rocks had already torn a path down to the water below. No matter how many seemed to fall limp and useless into the sea, far too many lived and poured in a roiling mass down the mountain pass at a fevered pace.

Even from this distance I knew what was coming first. At least a full  battalion of berserkers, possibly more. Warriors as well trained as I was, then cursed or enhanced depending on perspective with no self preservation, and enhanced strength, speed, and aggression. Every body in that destructive mass would do everything it could to fulfill the mission they had been cursed to complete.