Side A – Nia
Naosha and Marianne were correct. This didn’t come as a surprise to Nia. She had enough experience with each of them that the alternative would have been far more shocking. What was a touch unexpected though was the fact that neither one seemed at all concerned that she’d drawn them out of the Darkwood to a strange and remote land where they were surrounded by literal giants.
Kyra at least was looking properly impressed.
Or perhaps stunned.
For Yasgrid’s sake, Nia wished she had time to help Kyra process the new world she’d been pulled to but Margrada was increasing the complexity of the song they were playing on the fly and it was becoming increasingly difficult for Nia to keep up with her attention split in half.
“There is much we should speak of,” Naosha said, “From Dancer Kyra’s telling of these events though, you and your companion are crucial to securing an outcome where our homes remain to see tomorrow.”
“Sorry to drag you into all this,” Nia said, feeling like far deeper apologies were needed but Naosha simply shook her head.
“I could not be more proud of you for what you have done and what you are doing now,” she said. “Know that you have my fullest support in this and everything else you do, my daughter.”
It was only through a monumental effort of will that Nia kept her hands on the drum in front of her. Both the child she’d been and the woman she’d become wanted so much to throw her arms around her mother and weep with joy.
But that would doom everyone.
Nia wasn’t sure how she knew that but from deep within a sense of necessity rose. Where Margrada lead, Osdora and Gossma were following and together they were changing the song from one of simple communication to one of connection.
Which, at first blush, seemed like exactly the opposite of what they wanted to do, given that their original purpose in contacting Osdora had been to figure out how to sever the connection between the Darkwood and the Stoneling mountains which was in the process of transmogrifying Gray Rift into an unnatural blend of both realms.
In the song her fellow players were building however there was an urgency being cast against a vision of disaster.
“My mother’s right, things are moving a lot faster than they’re supposed to. We need you. All of you. Horgi, Grash, get the drums.” Nia could feel herself fumbling her part of the song, but that was inevitable. With where she could hear the song heading , she needed more drummers or even Margrada and Osdora would fall short.
And they couldn’t fall short.
Through her connection with Yasgrid, Nia started to get a sense of the scope of the calamity before them.
“We had to promise our souls for those two drums, how many more do you need?” Horgi asked.
“All of them!”
Side B – Yasgrid
Yasgrid wanted to argue. The Darkwood was not supposed to embrace the thorns the Elven gods had wrapped it in. No one should ever bow the gods. It was a denial of self and…
And she was thinking like a Stoneling.
An image of the gods laughing at her from their volcano prison rose into her mind, followed by the calming silence of the Darkwood.
Though the forest and dells and glens and bogs were always alive with the sounds of flora and fauna and people, never once had Yasgrid heard a whisper of the divine.
The Elven gods had done terrible things – the Troubles and Endings not the least among those – but they were not like the Stoneling gods. They hadn’t stayed. They didn’t want to undo their creation and start over again.
And for all the mistakes they’d made, some parts of the realm they’d crafted were truly beautiful and wonderful.
Just like the Stoneling mountains.
“I understand,” Yasgrid said, deflating in the dream as the arguments within her withered.
It would have been tempting to see the Darkwood as simply held in thrall by its creators, but the reflection of herself the Darkwood had chosen to incarnate was singing its own song.
It may have been inspired by the Elven gods, they may even have sung the first few verses, but by building a creation which was capable of true change and growth, the Darkwood had long since turned its song into an expression of itself.
“We do not think that you do,” the Darkwood said. “Your light is growing dim, your fire sputtering.”
“I was wrong,” Yasgrid said. “I was certain and I was wrong. I don’t know where to go next.”
“Must you leave?” the Darkwood asked. “We have grown accustomed to the beat of your heart.”
From an entity that had only a short while earlier been inclined to eject her from its sheltering canopy, that was welcome news, especially since Yasgrid couldn’t imagine walking the world lost and alone when she’d found a place that finally felt like home.
“I’ve dared too much,” Yasgrid said. “The storm around us is the Ending of all. If you cannot take it, then it will pierce this dream and scour everything.”
“There will be renewal,” the soul that had been Endings said. “The power that was bound to me did not unmake those it ended.”
“We will be remembered then,” Yasgrid said. “As the soil a new world springs from if nothing else.”
“Do you desire to be the earth from which others may spring forth?” the Darkwood asked.
“That was not my intention,” Yasgrid said. “This was to be the final blow against Elshira, a move she could not predict or nullify. I wanted…I wanted it to create a version of you that would have room for me. That I could truly be a part of.”
Being Nia had been the fulfillment of dreams Yasgrid hadn’t ever known she’d been filled with, but gazing on the Darkwood, she saw how much more she wanted. Not just a borrowed life, but one which she truly belonged to.
“Then you should dare even more,” the Darkwood said, and gestured to the Ending storm which surrounded them.