Side A – Yasgrid
The song the Stonelings were building was immense and already weaving its way through the Darkwood. Yasgrid could feel the power in it through the bond she shared with Nia. What she wasn’t certain of was why the Shatter Drummers were committing so much to an effort which was so far removed from themselves.
“Because we are not so distant anymore,” the Darkwood said.
“That’s my fault isn’t it?” Nia asked. “When I played in the Battle of the Bands, I messed up and joined things together that shouldn’t have been, right?”
“That was not your doing,” the soul which had been Endings said. “Nor was that when your realms were joined.”
“That fits with what I remember,” a new voice said as Ilia, the former deity appeared and plucked one of the shards of Endings from the maelstrom which was still gathering power around them. “I think this world was something of a shared effort. We made the Darkwood and others made the rest. How we got it all to fit together, I have no idea, wasn’t my job, I think, but I do know that we did get it all to fit together. Even the parts that are far away or very, very strange, they’re all one world. You’ve been connected from the beginning.”
“It is getting a little bit pulled apart though,” the Gardener said, surprising Yasgrid by their presence but reassuring her that two divine (either former or current) entities could manage to stand within her. For her idea to work, she was going to have to take in a lot more souls than that.
“That is why the beat of the song is reaching to us,” the Darkwood said. “If we are undone, so are all the rest.”
“Good thing that’s not going to happen then,” Yasgrid said, exhaling her last doubts and breathing in the conviction she needed to take the next step. “Endings power is fraying me, letting the divine mandate it carries escape and you come in. I can’t hold it all in.”
“I could!” the Gardener said.
“Not without becoming the new blade,” Yasgrid said. She’d almost lost herself in the enormity of Endings but when Nia had pulled her back, Yasgrid had returned with a far better understanding of the design behind the blade’s existence.
“It’s better than everything falling apart though,” the Gardener said.
“An eternity of torment for anyone is not acceptable,” Yasgrid said. “Not when we can do better. Not when we can all bear the duty Endings had been given.”
“How would that be possible?” Ilia asked. “I don’t recall the Elves being designed to be an intrinsic part of Endings. The Blade carries the power, if I remember right, and the Elf carries the blade. There was a reason those were kept separated. An Elf who tried to claim the power of the blade would be…well, she would be frayed apart, rather like you are being at the moment.”
“Which is why we’re going to let me fray apart completely,” Yasgrid said, knowing exactly how that sounded but trusting that Nia, at least, would understand.
Side B – Nia
Yasgrid looked to Nia for confirmation that her mad plan was workable and Nia started to object until the twinkle in Yasgrid’s eye showed her exactly what Yasgrid was thinking.
“Oh. Oh that’s good,” Nia said, her mind racing at the prospects before them. “That could work. In fact that could change everything!”
Kayelle was looking at her with more suspicion than astonishment.
“We’re not letting her die,” Kayelle said, “So how will that be possible if she frays away completely?”
“The song, the Shatter Drum song,” Nia said, excitement garbling her words as the implications of Yasgrid’s idea unfolded before her. “When someone plays a Shatter Drum, there’s a state they can wind up in. They call it a Resonance. It’s where the beat you’ve struck blows you apart leaving you one with basically everything.”
“That doesn’t sound terribly survivable,” Kayelle said.
“But it is! I’ve done it! A lot in fact,” Nia said. “Bringing yourself back to yourself is one of the key elements of being a Shatter Drummer.”
“And you’ve done this as well?” Ilia asked Yasgrid.
“No. I started Shatter Drumming with better preparation than Nia did. My experiences with it have all been vastly simpler than hers.”
Nia found that hard to believe. In her mind, she was still a neophyte Shatter Drummer at best. With less than six months of practice at drumming, it seemed like a laughable the idea that Nia could claim more expertise than Yasgrid who’d been drumming since she was old enough to form coherent sentences, and had been tutored by best players the Stonelings had (in Nia’s opinion at least).
On the other hand though, Nia knew that she’d certainly dared more than most Shatter Drummers. Margrada had dared a lot of it with her of course, and was really the genius who’d made Nia’s idea into songs that hadn’t killed either of them.
“And yet you believe your survival is assured?” the Darkwood asked.
It was a valid question. They wouldn’t just be gambling Yasgrid’s survival on the possibility that allowing Endings power to devour her wouldn’t be the end. If Yasgrid couldn’t come back from that, if it was somehow different from the cosmic unity that a Shatter Drum offered, then a wave of divine power would destroy everything in Yasgrid’s vicinity. A vicinity which included the Darkwood, even if it wasn’t incarnated within Yasgrid’s dream, and that would in turn lead to the world itself unraveling, if Ilia was correct.
It was a lot to gamble on.
But Yasgrid was right to do it. Nia could feel that in her bones. With the song Margrada was forming, they would have a chance to put right things which had been wrong for millenia. Their worlds would change, irrevocably so, but the last half year had taught Nia one lesson above all others:
Change is something to be embraced.
Together.
“She does, and she’s got good reason,” Nia said. “Because she’s not going to do this alone. I’ll be there with her. Just like she was for me.”