Sunborn Rising (21 page)

The Aetherial prepared herself, shaking out her tentacles and getting comfortable. The Nebules signaled one another knowingly, and gathered in close. Lootrinea began, “Let me tell you the story of the Roedtaw…”

There was only the ocean. From the Great Void came a screaming rock filled with heat and fury. It scorched the sky, a tail of blue fire trailing behind it endlessly. It plunged into the ocean, but continued to burn as it arched toward the Cerulean sun. In its wake, billowing clouds of dust appeared and expanded; purple, red, and brown, orange, blue, and green. Like a fiery spear through the water it traveled fathoms without slowing or cooling. But the clouds that spilled from it were its body, and so it diminished, smaller and smaller. And though the furious spear did not intend to yield, the sun bore different ideas. Exploding out in a glorious ring of light, a million Nebules were born at once and they flew to intercept the fury.

Well, the angry head of the spear saw the wall, the silent tiny pieces of the Sun protecting their mother, and its fury shed. Layer after layer, jettisoned, as it tried to slow down. The Great Seeds were among the debris, so they say. And when the last layer tore free, what was left was a simple but gigantic creature, careening fast, still unable to stop. A single Nebule saw the truth of it, but instead of crying out, and gathering her brethren, she only gathered herself. She accelerated in bursts and reached a momentous speed. She swallowed the ocean and grew massive. She flew to meet the creature who couldn’t stop. They collided, and from the cataclysm, the handle of the spear broke free and became the first branch of the root, the beginning of all the Great Trees. The head split open and became the first coral of the Drift, the origin of Abyssal life. And something new was born of both, of the courageous Nebule and the creature who carried the heart of fury: the Roedtaw.

When a star falls, the Roedtaw catches it. He carries the star back to the Sun where its body can be consumed by light and born again. That is his eternal journey. He bears the fallen home, forever traversing the Sea in honor of the sacrifice one made for all.

Everyone is on their way to the Roedtaw, even if they don’t know it. The Roedtaw is there, ready and willing. And though his love is for those lost—for a kiss from the sun—his way is open to anyone.

The bups waited, not wanting to end the quiet. Not wanting to wake up from Lootrinea’s story.

Lootrinea explained, “So you see, the Roedtaw can cross the whole of the ocean.”

Barra held her arm close, the pain noticeably relieved by the little yellow stones. She could think again, and though it was a great relief, she knew it wasn’t a cure. She said, “Thank you, really, but we need to go farther than the Root. Is there any way the Roedtaw or—do you know how we can get all the way back to the Loft? Back home?”

“The
Nebules
have offered to help you with that,” answered the Aetherial.

“What? How?” Tory asked.

“Nebules are born from the sun. They travel through the Void to the Boil where they merge with the ocean and take shape. They can both swim
and
fly.” Lootrinea let loose several long notes, and the Nebules flashed.

Without warning, Blue grabbed Plicks like they were about to swim, but instead, he flew the Kolalabat into the air. Plicks let out a startled whoop, and they skimmed along the surface of the water. Tory and Barra watched in eager anticipation of their own flights. The swooping pair splashed down together, and Plicks became catatonic. Tory went up to him, cheering, and seeing his expression, asked, “You okay, buddy?”

“Oh yeah, I’m okay. I was just
flying
,” he said, and then he beamed brighter than Tory would have thought possible. The pieces all fell together for him, and he added, “We’re going home. We’re really going home!”

Barra stroked her sanguine companion, and Red returned her affection by pushing back into her hand. The Nebules could help them get home. It was true. Barra thought about the dangers, and she had to ask, “What about the Kudmoths?”

Somberly, Lootrinea said, “It’s true, you’ll have to find a way to protect the Nebules. One hasn’t safely breached the Root since the Creeper broke the cycle.” She added, lightness and pride returning to her voice, “But I don’t think we can stop them from helping you. They’re too stubborn, and they’ve developed a fondness for you. It’s a kinship, as it should be.”

Red wrapped around Barra and hugged her tight. She even managed to coil a tentacle around the wound, adding her own kind of relief to the mounting strength of the stones. Feeling more like herself with each passing moment, Barra asked, “Well then, when do we leave?”

Lootrinea said, “I’ll take you to him now. But you’ll need to pay him something precious for the ride.”

23. The Roedtaw

Lootrinea led the bups out of the Drift and into the warm, open sea. It was blinding. The bups Loft-attuned eyes had relaxed within the immense coral, and the bright ocean made them sore, even with the Nebules filtering.

They swam around the Drift, passing through the occasional crowds of Abyssals that hovered near the many, busy entrances. Large kelp forests grew from the Drift in places, but some were free-floating spheres. Lootrinea pointed to one swarming with krill. There were rare flashes of gold within the millions of silvery bodies, exactly the way the Aetherial had described them.

Lootrinea swept her arms back and accelerated away. She curled around deftly and snapped her mouth open and closed in a blink. Like a ribbon on the wind, she returned to the bups. She parted her lips, displaying a gilded krill jailed behind her teeth. The small creature swam around frantically, and Lootrinea was careful not to crush it or swallow it. She gestured with her arms and curled into a bow. Barra knew it was their turn.

Tory and Char entered the swirling mass of krill, determined to be the first to grab a prize. Plicks and Blue flew in after, and the ball of crustaceans parted and collapsed around them.

They seemed able to forget how far they were away from home—more than Barra could, anyway. She felt alone, responsible for her friends, but unable to do anything more than follow the Aetherial and hope it worked out. She felt guilty. Fathoms away, she saw colonies of Nebules, voluminous and beautiful, and it seemed to her that their shapes held the answer to some great mystery, and if she looked long enough, she could solve it. Red pulled at Barra and dragged her back from her distant thoughts.

Tory and Plicks—try as they might—could not catch a golden krill. Eager to show them how it was done, Red tugged at Barra. The resilient Listlespur nodded that she was ready, and they spiraled into the swarm.

The trio tore through the ball, one futile attempt after another, but the krill were always out of reach. A few Abyssals hovered nearby spectating, and they seemed to laugh at the show of effort. Soon, Barra thought she’d never catch any krill, golden-shelled or otherwise.

Together, the bups paused and studied the swarm. Meanwhile, a pair of thick-shelled spectators swam into the ball. They were slow Abyssals with short fins and iridescent, stony scales. Their bodies were flat, and vertical, so that they looked like squat, flying walls. The pair swam into the krill and carved the swarm into two separate balls. They cut again and again, splitting the krill into smaller groups until they were managing less than a dozen. One gilded krill flashed among them. One of the Abyssals shot her neck out—much longer than Barra would have guessed—and snapped up a krill with her beak. She swam up to Tory, parted her beak enough to show the glint of the catch, and then she let it go.

Training session over, the bups divvied up the roles. Plicks was best at dividing and containing; he and Blue made themselves big and flat to corral the krill. They followed the system they’d seen, and soon Tory collected the first of the three they needed. Barra had hers soon after, but Plicks’ took more effort. Tory and Barra weren’t as adept at dividing and containing. Still, it wasn’t long before Blue was allowing a gilded krill to pass through his skin into Plicks’ mouth. Plicks clamped down, careful not to crush the squirmy thing. It felt like hundreds of tiny legs were running on his tongue, and he had to suppress the urge to let it go.

Lootrinea saw they were done and summoned them away from the re-forming swarm. The bups seemed to swim on endlessly, cresting one ridge after another along the outer surface of the Drift. Finally, they rounded a jagged outcropping and saw their first glimpse of the creature of legend, the one and only Roedtaw.

The gargantuan, lapis-colored Roedtaw was as thick as the trunk of a Great Tree. He was long, too, and Barra thought running from end to end would be exhausting. Though it wasn’t the Roedtaw’s size that commanded Barra’s attention, it was that the creature was hollow. Thousands of layers of fins spiraled around the inside of the giant from mouth to tail. The fins flapped in languid cascades, spinning the water into a tight sparkling vortex. There was a constant flow of debris and water funneled through the Roedtaw, though he floated idle.

Lootrinea led the bups to the front of the staggering creature where two curved black slits held his deep-set eyes in permanent shadow. The Roedtaw’s true mouth yawned, the inner lip shrinking away from the outer all the way around the hollow. Dense brushes were exposed, bristles extending from behind both lips. An undulating black tongue pushed out like a tubeworm, and then retreated once again.

If not for the Nebules, the bups would have stayed floating there, maybe forever, the presence of the Roedtaw was so daunting. Barra decided he was beautiful. There was something else, too, something undeniable and magnificent about meeting a creature that was as old as the Great Trees—maybe older.