The Flame of Wrath (24 page)

             
Maven frowned. “Tools for what?” she asked.

             
“For survival.”

             
Maven tentatively raised her head.

             
Rapier extended her hand, pointing to the flower standing apart from the others. “That bloom is unlike any other I've seen. I've been making notes on our travels and each time I see this plant it seems to keep an odd sort of schedule. It opens and closes at very particular instances while other flowers here are forever in bloom. I think they can be used to gage the passage of days.”

             
She was almost too terrified to ask, but somehow Maven forced herself to speak. “How long have we been here?”

             
“Roughly thirty days,” Rapier said.

             
Maven released a lengthy sigh. And yet knowing that there was some sense of normalcy in their newfound ability to count the days brought her an odd sort of comfort. “Inform the men,” she said. “It will bring them peace of mind.”

             
Rapier nodded before turning to leave. She stopped and pensively asked the question on her mind. “And you, Highness, what does it bring you?”

             
“I have a new sense of calm,” she said. Maven stared after the woman whose eyes she had seen begin to shine with happiness. As she did, she realized what she could not say aloud. The great sense of calm which had washed over her like a soothing tide had come not from Rapier's words, but from Rapier, herself: Rapier, her friend, Rapier, her rock. Quietly, she mused over the strength with which tense situations can bind two people.

********

              Each day found them journeying forward, but can one truly claim to move forward when the distance you have traveled is an endless circle of aimlessness? As the days ticked onward, the answer to that question became an adamant, 'no.'

             
They trekked in the direction of the lighthouse, but no matter how much land their weary bodies thought that they had crossed, the distance between their caravan and the shining lighthouse never appeared to change.

             
Scattered bodies lost their battle with exhaustion. They fell with violent thuds to the ground. Around them, hollow-eyed soldiers reached down to them and helped them to their feet. They supported one another, but only just. In the copious fog, they were wavering shadows.

             
Maven stopped. She held the reins of her owl, wondering ---although not for the first time--- if she should be a generous master and release the creature from the grips of this land. As she imagined the bird taking flight for home, it made her heart swell for the life she had known before falling into this place of delusions. Her thoughts were shattered by the thundering sound of screams.

             
“Help us!” she heard.

             
She scanned around her with wild eyes. Her hand reached for her sword. Green eyes were wild with rage and fear. It had finally happened, she thought. The Guardian had come to claim them!

             
Maven trembled as the voices rose upward.

             
“Sacred Mother, help us!” a soldier pleaded.

             
“Please,” another cried. “We are Your children!”

             
Soldiers kowtowed to the glory of the land. They trembled beneath the breath rolling over them.

             
“Forgive us if we have angered You!” another screamed.

             
“Please!”

             
“Please.”

             
“Please!”

             
The fog hissed around them. Whispers tickled their ears but their words were unclear. Then slowly the fog began to clear. The lighthouse which had hovered elusively in the wavering distance solidified.

             
Maven fell to her knees along with her men. She coughed out her tears in dizzy sobs. Her hands clutched the earth as her tears fell heavily from her eyes. Her lips moved in a way which felt all too foreign. She was outside her body, beyond the intensity of this moment. Floating above herself, she heard her own voice travel upward timidly.

             
“Please,” she prayed, “please allow us to live through this quest and I will be a better child to You. We're frightened and alone.”

             
Tears lined her deep green eyes. She found her mind flashing to image of Aurea's face. She wanted to return home once more, to see Aurea once again, but as she felt her sense of self slipping further from her grasp those things began to matter less. Upon Logos' land, Maven had been forced to reevaluate what was truly important to her.

             
“Please, Mother,” she whispered. “We are lost children. Our spirits are nearly broken. We need Your hand.” She frowned inwardly, wondering what it was about this land which had inspired so many to resort to the ways taught to them as awe-filled children.

             
Rapier knelt with her forehead touched to the cool earth. She shivered. Fearfully, she turned her head to the side. Her head was still lowered, but even so she could clearly see Maven's shaking body as the Queen prayed. With a trembling hand, she reached out for her. Much to her surprise, she found her hand met within the tight embrace of Maven's hand.

             
Green eyes locked tearfully with hers.

             
“Thank you, Sacred Mother,” Rapier prayed, wondering what she was grateful for most: the clearing fog or the woman next to her.

********

              When the very sight of you no longer inspires God's wrath, you are humbled and grateful for so many things. To feel even the slightest favor is a blessing which restores the lightness of the soul that one once knew at birth. For the army facing a land which changed its moods with all the fickleness of a temperamental soul, it came as a much-needed pardon. Their lives were far from easy but simply being able to walk without life continuously shoving them down gave them a certain air of weightlessness. That is, weightlessness was theirs until an ominous shadow on the distance ripped it from their hearts.

             
“The Guardian,” a soldier gasped.

             
He moved toward them. Each step his feet made against the earth brought a sickening quiver to resound throughout the mortals' insides.

             
Maven awkwardly searched around her, wondering what they could have done to offend him. She saw nothing. They had been very respectful of the land, of the animals there. Each time they made a kill for food's sake, they thanked both, the animal's spirit and Logos, itself. Still she wondered. What could they have done?

             
Her army fought not to cower.

             
The Guardian stopped directly before the golden-haired Queen. His eyes lanced into her. “Decide.”

             
His voice, his otherworldly voice was not meant for human ears. Maven battled not to run from its sound.

             
“Decide, noble Guardian?” she stammered.

             
“You have been here far too long,” he said. “You must right this wrong.”

             
Maven's skin blanched. “How, my Lord?”

             
“Payment.”

             
Though it had been merely a single word, it raced through their bodies with all the might of the lightning clapping in the distance. A storm was coming. It electrified the air.

             
Frowning with fearful uncertainty, Maven nodded. “Yes, of course.”

             
“The penalty is a life.”

             
Groans filled the air as her men shook their heads. Their horrified expressions pleaded against what they had only just heard. In their eyes, they remembered the gruesome death of the man, who had fallen to the griffin's talons.

             
“Choose,” the Guardian commanded.

             
Maven turned her body, seeing the world smear in vertiginous lament. She wanted to flee from this moment, to drift to another time, but her soul sank heavily into her stomach. She stared forward unseeingly. Her tear-lined eyes did not see the men begging for mercy though her ears clearly heard their pained voices. Then another voice shattered the brittle life of the others.

             
“I will go, noble sir.”

             
Gasps filled the air. Maven blinked.

             
“I will go, noble sir,” the voice repeated, this time louder.

             
Maven turned. Her own voice echoed resoundingly throughout her consciousness. She had seen too many of her men go mad or die from the elements to condemn yet another to death. “I will pay the price,” she rasped.

             
Rapier stepped forward. She stood beneath the shadow of the griffin as she trembled. “I will pay the price,” she said.

             
In that moment, the men gazed to their leaders with as much awe as they had known while in the presence of the Mother. These women were willing to die to spare them.

             
One by one, other voices began to vow that they would carry the burden until each member of the army had spoken.

             
“You are all willing?” the Guardian asked with a glare.

             
Maven nodded.

             
The grumbling clouds boomed with the sounds of thunderous laughter. The griffin pushed off the earth with powerful legs. As he rose high into the air his ivory wings outstretched across the sky. His face transformed from a noble bird to the mask of the proud animal. His skin was golden as once his fur had been. From his hips, an ivory fabric ethereally danced within the winds created by his wings.

             
Angels, Maven thought.

             
The Guardian hovered high in the sky. He spoke in a voice which caused their knees to buckle. As a rolling sea, the mortals fell.

             
“For your willingness to surrender your lives for the sake of your brothers, you shall all be spared. Never lose your connection to this feeling, of your bonds as a family so says The Mother.”

             
As he turned and flew from their shell-shocked faces, the storm vanished with him. Twilight as it had been for so much of their journey broke to reveal the comforting beauty of a night's sky. Stars twinkled brightly. A cool breeze kissed their skin.

             
“Make camp,” Maven commanded hoarsely. Her voice startled them from their daze. “Let us rest in Her good favor.”

             
Slow-forming smiles of relief broke across the faces of her men. Maven watched over them with a maternal air consuming her. She woke from her reverie in time to hold a pair of expressive brown eyes.

             
Maven lightly touched her hand to Rapier's shoulder. She held the woman's gaze, joining them together in the intimacy of unspoken words.

             
The realization of what might have happened sent their hearts racing. What if the griffin had taken their offer for one over the other?

             
Through it all, Rapier had been Maven's constant. She needed Rapier. She needed that constant belief that anything could be overcome. Rapier, alone, never failed to exude that confidence in both, herself and their mission. And yet as she held her eyes, Maven began to witness the very beginnings of Rapier's determination floundering beneath exhaustion.

             
Maven pressed her body close to the mesmerizing warrior with silver hair. Her eyes were pleading if only for a moment. “Do not abandon me to this world,” the Queen breathed.

             
Rapier took possession of Maven sultry hips. She hoisted the captivating blond upward, safely depositing her upon the owl's leather saddle. Face upturned, she gazed into the green eyes which had never broken contact. Silently, she tore her eyes away.

             
Rapier took the reins and in so doing, once again gripped tightly to her composure, to her faith that this would all be all right even if she could not yet see how. She had to be strong if not for herself then for Maven. As she walked forward, she led Maven's owl within the night so that together they could make camp.

             
The Queen exhaled shakily as she peered down at Rapier. She swallowed at the lump in throat, but said nothing more.

********

              A zealous clap spirited them into the skies. Her arms were strong feminine pillars which enveloped a resting Queen within her protective embrace. Maven's body leaned against Rapier as the winds whipped through her golden hair. They had journeyed for the better part of the day, but it was hard to know how far they had come. Lost within swirling aerial froth the hours lethargically transformed into eternity.