Side A – Yasgrid
Sorcery, it turned out, suited Yasgrid. Or perhaps it was simply how fulfilling it was to reject her own helplessness, no matter what cost it might carry.
In front of her, the burning house was extinguished with a wave of her hand. That was shockingly easy, but on reflection she saw how the formerly Troubled Heart which had wrapped her in gentle and warming flames might, just possibly, know a thing or two about controlling fire.
“You are amazing,” she whispered to the Shining Heart, using the same mental voice she spoke to Nia with.
“You’re not so bad yourself!” The voice which answered her was mirthful and drunk on joy and for a moment Yasgrid’s breath caught at the thought that the Heart had grown so far beyond what it had been that it could speak to her in clear words.
The delighted laughter which accompanied the words though was too recognizable, though the surging flames which surrounded them were altogether new.
“Nia?” Yasgrid asked, at a momentary loss for any other words.
“Among others!” Nia said and Yasgrid caught the faintest echoes of a drum beating.
No. Not a drum. Many drums.
“I can’t see you, but you are dazzling,” Nia said.
“And you’re drumming? How are you doing this?” Yasgrid asked, growing more aware each moment of the scale of the song Nia was playing.
“I’m not,” she said. “This isn’t me. This is both of us.”
“I’m not helping you drum at all though? I’m…” Yasgrid wasn’t sure she should even hint at what she was doing. Nia wouldn’t reject her. Of all of the Darkwood’s denizens, Nia would be able to understand what and why Yasgrid had done what she had.
Yasgrid was sure of that since Nia already knew about the Troubled Hearts Yasgrid was sheltering within her own. Revealing that she’d begun to use them as Elshira had though might come as a shock to Nia and, if Yasgrid was right (and as Osdora’s daughter she was all but incapable of missing the power of the song Nia was drumming), a shock might be the worst possible thing for Nia to experience until she was done.
“Not you and me,” Nia said. “Me and Starflame.”
Nia’s voice was transcendent with wonder and glee.
Starflame? Yasgrid wasn’t familiar with that…
“The Heart! The Troubled Heart!” Yasgrid said, staggering amazement almost dragging her awareness away from the tragedy before her which she desperately needed to prevent from unfolding any further.
“Not Troubled any longer!” Nia’s joy was boundless at being able to make that proclamation.
Around her, the crash of mighty drums grew louder.
Something impossible was happening and Yasgrid’s heart yearned to see it.
Within her chest, a stirring rose.
She wasn’t the only one who yearned for the magic Nia was crafting.
Within the yearning inside her though there was hunger, and fear, and denial. The sleeping Hearts hadn’t yet been soothed. They still bore the scars of the Troubles they’d once been defined by.
Wrapping her arms around herself, Yasgrid promised them all “you are not missing anything. There will be more later. Sleep now and let this be a lullaby of what awaits you in dreams.”
Side B – Nia
Nia felt peace flow through Yasgrid. The Troubled Hearts Yagrid bore weren’t compelled back into slumber. They were simply close enough to her that when she told them that all would be well, her honesty shone through and sent them drifting back to the realm where they were safe and protected from everything, even and most especially, themselves.
One by one, their surging interest faded away until only a single Heart remained awake.
In the timeless moment of a beat, Nia reached out and felt its warmth.
It was so close to Starflame’s. Smaller, newer, but also quieter and more sure of itself.
“What is happening there?” Yasgrid asked. “Who is Starflame?”
“Can’t you tell?” Nia said from within another beat’s timeless moment.
“What I think I know is impossible,” Yasgrid said. “It…they can’t be? Can they?”
“They are. They’re the Heart I took from you the last time I played in a Battle of the Bands,” Nia said. “They came back!”
Nia knew what she was saying was ridiculous. There wasn’t any precedent for what she’d done with the Troubled Heart, but even with that she and Yasgrid knew that once the formerly Troubled Heart was released, it’s sole purpose would be to fly free and experience life on its own terms, unbound by anyone else’s will.
That Starflame had returned was unthinkable in a general sense and far outside the realm of plausibility given that it had somehow, somewhere gained a name, an identity, of their own!
What had been a spark of magic and pure desire had flown free into the cosmos and come back as a full fledged person.
Because that’s what people could do.
Even though Starflame hadn’t had the capacity to remember Nia from their time together, the connection the two of them had forged went beyond conscious memory.
When they’d played together that first time, they’d been one. Nia could have grasped the Heart then and swallowed it, binding it and its power to herself. Her drumming would have been augmented beyond any other players, she could have powered through almost any problem set before her, but that had been the farthest thing from Nia’s desires.
Hurting the Heart wasn’t something she could have tolerated from anyone and most definitely not herself. It had been the warmth she felt for the fledgling spark which had propelled it up and into the skies beyond the world, free from all restraints.
And it had been that same warmth which lead Starflame back.
From atop the song she’d crafted, Nia had let her friend weave themself along her fingers and ride her drumming out to the rest of her drummers who were following her in crafting a song which was beginning to dwarf every other drum in the competition.
Starflame approached the other drummers, kindling in them the same wild joy which Nia was wrapped in, as gleeful as Nia was to be part of something so grand.
Until they felt the warmth which wrapped Yasgrid.
It was intriguing at first, but then they touched on the fierce core of Yasgrid’s determination which had called it forth. Determination which stood against rage, and fear, and pain.
“What’s wrong?” Nia wasn’t sure if it was her or Starflame who asked the question, but both of them had to know the answer.
Instead of answering with words, Yasgrid shared a vision of the burning town she was in and the sense of the tragedy which awaited it.
“I can’t fix it all, but I can hold back some of it least,” Yasgrid said.
Nia looked at the Battle of the Bands.
She listened to the song she was playing.
She sent out a single beat asking her drummers and got back the answer she knew they’d make.
It wasn’t a hard choice at all.
“Then we’ll have to work on it together,” she said.