Monday: 06-24-2030: We arrive on a tree branch in a massive forest, the trees as tall as high-rise buildings and fulfilling the same function. A window in one of the tree-towers opens and a young lady lights upon the branch and notices us. At the same time, her neighbors open their windows and start staring curiously at us. The young lady jumps down from her window and she approaches us. She has thick gold hair and green eyes, and her wings are the color of yellow birch leaves. “Where are you all from?” “We’re from a planet called Earth.” “Earth? I was taught that Earth was cursed, that everything was made mortal. What are you?” “We are Immortals.” “Immortals? I didn’t think that your kind existed anymore. Really the only great magical power in the galaxy is the Darkness. It’s laying siege to our world. That’s why they reacted with hostility.” “I thought it was our sudden intrusion.” “My name is Niamh.” “My name is Ælura Fulmena, and this is my mother Arctica Vulpa and my father Ignus Volarus.” Niamh shakes hands with my parents. “I think you would very much like to meet our King and Queen. Wouldn’t you?” “Are Their Majesties expecting us?” “I know the Queen knows you’re here. She senses it whenever a foreign entity enters the Tewira System.” “In that case, yes, please, Niamh.” “Follow me.” Niamh takes flight and we run to catch up with her. As the sun rises, a large castle made of trees comes into view. “In that castle lives our King Orin and Queen Vylmar. They are fatigued these days with trying to keep the Shadow Queen at bay.” “The King and Queen. What are they like?” “They are a good King and Queen. Always kind and wise.” Niamh calls one of the guards. “I’ve got three people saying they’re Immortals from Earth the Great Mother.” A King’s voice inquires. “Earth?”
Bradley, having woken up, is being given tea to alleviate the residual terror of his experience of the previous night. “The voices stopped screaming, finally. It was horrible. If you ever wanted to know what despair and darkness sound like, those voices, those symbols, are the very definition of madness.” “But they’re gone now,” Kyle wonders. “Aren’t they?” “There’s only one way to be sure, isn’t there? Someone would have to go in there and look.” “And they will NOT be either you or your brother, Silo Eustace Crawford. Both of you promise me that you’ll stay away from there until we know for sure that the ritual worked. Please?” “We’ll stay away, Dad.” “Good.” Buck lays back down to rest. “Why was it that only Dad was affected by it, even with his eyes closed?” “I looked at a few of them earlier yesterday, just for a fraction of a second. They were yelling at me to look again, taunting me in his voice.” “We left after we felt that the symbols were gone. We’ll go over today with a video camera to make sure.” The dog comes down and lays down on top of Buck as he goes back to sleep while the boys watch TV upstairs.
“Earth and its people have persisted for thousands of years, though most are now mortal.” A tall man with bright red hair and wings and green eyes lands gracefully and meets Niamh’s gaze. “Your Majesty.” “Earth is heavily populated. I’ve been told growing up that there’re billions of mortals who’ve largely forgotten magic, even though some prophecies, from our world and others, speak of the Silver Guardian who with spirits of ice and fire will visit our world.” “It’s a pleasure to meet Your Majesty.” We bow to the King. “Come inside.” He has us come inside the castle of large trees grown together. King Orin takes us upstairs. “What else do you and your people know about Earth, Your Majesty?” “We know about the curse, miss. This entire galaxy was cursed long ago. The Shadow Queen invoked nameless horrors which wrought annihilation upon the old empire.” “My family and I know that much.” Orin sees many patches of spiky ice on the wall. “Those girls.” He removes the ice. “They’re always making a mess.” “You have children, Your Majesty?” “Grandchildren. Three, but my biological granddaughter’s not so little anymore. The others are my grandnieces, but they call the Queen and I their grandparents.” “Hello, Grandfather.” “Hello, you mischievous twins.” Two teenage girls wrap their arms around the King’s chest, their wings pulsing with excitement. “Have you been making ice on my walls?” “We’re bored, Grandfather. We want to go outside.” “Where’s Grandmother?” “Grandmother is working, sweet. My wife is always working to keep the Darkness at bay for it enslaves all who it captures. She has little energy left for anything else.” “Your Majesty.” “What is it?” “It’s the Queen. She’s exhausted. She must rest.” “Very well. I’m terribly sorry. It looks like I must leave you now. I’m sure Niamh will tell you everything else. Farewell, Immortals of Earth.” “Farewell, Your Majesty.” The Queen is exhausted, having spent much of her strength fending off the Darkness. Vylmar walks exhaustedly into their bedroom and the two twin princesses go outside to fly and the King goes to continue the work of keeping the Darkness at bay. An older woman with silver hair approaches us and Niamh acknowledges her. “Mother.” “Niamh, who are these aliens?! Does it not occur to you that we are besieged by the Shadow Queen?!” “We understand that your King and Queen are trying to fend off the Darkness.” “You seem human but you may also be disguised servants of the Nightmare Hills.” “What are the Nightmare Hills?” “You and your people don’t know?” “Afraid not.” “It is the home of the greatest evil to ever inhabit this galaxy, the location of her fortress and war machine, the one who ended the ancient golden age.” “I’m getting the sense that it’s on another planet.” “Yes. Not here, thankfully. The King says you are immortals, yes?” “We are.” “Then we are blessed, for the prophecies are true.” “For centuries, our people held that the arrival of a deathless, silver haired Lady from beyond the sun and moon will mark the beginning of the end of the Shadow Queen’s stranglehold over the galaxy.” “How many other worlds are currently being threatened by the Shadow Queen?” “Other than our world, Tewira, we do not know. Our people have very limited interstellar communications and virtually no means of space travel, at least by ship,” Niamh replies, her gaze knowingly meeting her mother’s with that last turn of phrase. Niamh’s mother’s expression softens, with her changing the subject: “Forgive me, Silver Guardian, for being so rude just a moment ago. My name is Birchwood. Edessa Birchwood. Niamh and -” Edessa pauses a moment. “Niamh is my daughter. I am a handmaiden of the Queen and Niamh is the companion of the Princesses.”
“Want to see the city from the air?” “Sure.” Niamh’s wings carry her above the treetops. We join her in the air, and she leads us around the city. “What would you like to see first?” “Surprise us.” “Ok.” Niamh flies towards a body of water at the edge of the woods and lands on a large rock in the middle. A young girl of about 14, wearing a brown leather jacket, pants, and boots, turns around and meets us. “Hello, Niamh.” “Hello, Your Royal Highness. This is Crown Princess Oonagh.” “Good day, Your Royal Highness. We’ve just met the King and your cousins. My name is Ælura Fulmena, and these are my parents, Ignus Volarus and Arctica Vulpa.” “So, it is true, Niamh! The Silver Guardian has come! The Shadow Queen will be defeated after so many ages!” The Princess catches herself. “Forgive my excitement, Guardian. How do you do?” “We’re well, Your Royal Highness. I like your wings.” “Thank you, Ælura.” Oonagh’s hair is bright red and her eyes are the same fiery green as her grandfather and her wings the same bright red, but also with golden feathers on the trailing edges, likely from her grandmother. She also carries a dagger and a sword. “Can you fly, Ælura?” “Yes, Your Royal Highness. I can levitate via telekinesis. Although wings would be nice.” “Would you like to see what I do for fun?” “Sure, Your Royal Highness.” Oonagh picks up a lot of water and splashes Niamh. “That’s totally unfair, Your Royal Highness!” Niamh tries to splash her, but her wings carry her swiftly upwards and the former gives chase. “I’m going to get you, Highness.” “Then come get me, Niamh.” “I’ll drop from the sky chasing you like this!” Oonagh and Niamh play about in the air before getting tired. They take us around the capital. The only real buildings are tight groups of large trees forming their equivalent of skyscrapers, with shorter and more slender trees making up the lesser buildings. Oonagh’s wingspan is easily 20 feet, making her the size of a small plane. Niamh has roughly the same wingspan but is slightly taller. There are no discernible roads or vehicles since these people, the Tewir, mainly use their wings to move throughout their environment. As far as I can see from the air, there are barely any people walking on the ground itself as most are in the trees or in the air. “Since your people live in the trees, what mainly lives on the ground?” “There are a few apex predator animals on Tewira that cannot climb trees, thus are no threat to those who live in the trees. The Shadow Queen’s assault on Tewira began with her servants poisoning, corrupting, and straight-up ripping down our tree-homes and stealing our unhatched eggs in the night, as well as the occasional appearance of Roots of the Empty meant to mark targets for abduction.” “One of my neighbors back home was taken after he touched one of those things.” “As were Niamh’s older sister and father many years ago.” Many new mothers and fathers fear that their children will hatch in a place of pain and torment and never know their parents’ warm embrace. It was only after the first reports of eggs being stolen that Grandmother began casting her shield spells around the planet to prevent any more of our most vulnerable from being enslaved. Our warriors have been tasked with destroying the Roots of the Empty.” “What about the ground predators, Your Highness?” “That’s part of why the Darkness began attacking our tree-homes, to make us more vulnerable, for the beasts are also magical.” “How large are Tewir eggs, Your Highness?” “Roughly as long as a person’s foot. Usually laid one at a time, though some women have been known to produce twins on occasion, like Bán and Dubh.” “There’s also the matter of the dark trees, Ælura. They look like small, leafless, dead trees with black crystals growing out of them.” “And if you touch one, it will screech loudly and poison you.” “Not just that, their touch marks you for abduction to the Nightmare Hills. Like my sister.” “What happened to your sister, Niamh?”
The Vädish woman’s bruises have healed up to the point where she can work in the mines. She and TJ are back mining the black stone. “We must be patient with our next escape attempt. That last one was reckless in hindsight.” “We need more people.” “The workers aren’t allowed to gather in any number. The hobgoblins are always watching, always listening. You especially heard that nasty Shadow woman, the one who beat me up. We’ll have to proceed with care. If we try to do it now, they might have me killed in front of you.” A hobgoblin approaches. “NO TALKING, YOU SCUM!!!” The demon lashes the Vädish woman across the back with the cat ‘o nine tails it carries in its filthy mitts, making TJ wince, and angering him inside to all the hobgoblins of this dark world. The cheetah god, not one to give up so easily, sends his voice into his friend’s head. “I am telepathic, as are all of my immortal kind. We can communicate this way; they cannot hear us and we need not physically gather.” “You will organize us, Cheetah?” “Yes.” “Won’t it exhaust you?” “Maybe. But if we escape, and I can get back to my family, then they can help us free the others.” “I know this much: that dozens of eggs have been snatched from the Tewir homeworld and placed with the Shadow Queen’s own eggs. I also know this: the spirits born here are not born evil, for those that serve Darkness, the hobgoblins, and even the Shadow woman who banged me up, were corrupted by the Queen through some unspeakable dark ritual. According to stories spread by people who have been enslaved here over the years, some of the spirits defied their Dark mother, electing to run away to some secret life on distant worlds.” “Who are the Tewir?” “They look much like you and I. Very tall, but with powerful feathered wings. Sadly, a handful of them, I’ve learned, have chosen to be among the Shadow Queen’s nine most loyal servants.” Then, the same tall, brutal Shadow woman from earlier appears before them. A hobgoblin interjects: “What’s all this, ma’am?” “The boy. The golden cat-boy. He is to have a new job in the Alvearium.” The hobgoblin backs down submissively and the Shadow woman disappears with TJ and brings him to the deepest cavern he has ever seen, even deeper than the crystal mine. “Is this-?” “The Alvearium? Yes, boy.” The Alvearium is a vast cavernous void within the great mountain of the Nightmare Hills, near filled to capacity with a great mound of crystalline black stones each with a faint inner white light, making them look gray. He then realizes that they are floating dozens of feet above a vast underground lake surrounding the mound of what he can only assume are the Shadow Queen’s eggs. “Make sure the largest eggs are properly submerged.” She then disappears, but not before she drops him and he falls, rolling down the pile until he reaches the water, which is quite torrid, like a hot bath. “Which eggs are the largest?,” he wonders. Being at the base of the hill, at least at water level, the eggs he finds are the size of a large watermelon, making the spirits within them each the size of a human baby. “I’m not going to let any of you be corrupted into any hobgoblins.” He begins guiding the largest eggs into the water, putting some of his thoughts into them, hoping that when they hatch, they will flee this terrible place, and seek the light of the Stars, and thus preserve their own inner light.
Billy, having grown tired of his tower chamber, considers climbing out the window. He looks down and sees that the outer walls of the tower are covered in sharp spikes. “Now, you wouldn’t be thinking about jumping or climbing out, little Crawford. It’s a very long way down and it’s very cold on the mountainside.” “I want to go home. I want to see my family. That’s all I want.” He then witnessed the Queen’s mist form glitching between pitch black as she refuses and mocks him and gray as her other “self” or whatever resists the former’s evil will. Settling momentarily on gray, the Queen decides to show him around her great tower. “You are the mother of all the creatures here, aren’t you, Your Majesty?” “Yes, little Crawford. Mother, Queen, and Goddess of all who dwell in this land.” “Why are you a mist cloud, Your Majesty?” The Queen’s mist form turns pitch black, and she emits an aura of terror. “My wretched, perfect, royal sister banished me from my home, shattered my rooted body, and I wandered the void of space for ages uncounted. I met the Others in my loneliness. They became my only friends, who I dwelt with in the dark until the Inanis summoned me, one million years ago.” Upon hearing the name “Inanis,” though he didn’t know why, Billy felt an immediate sense of dread and emptiness, like he had just encountered some Eldritch horror.
Oonagh, Niamh, and the three of us land back at the great castle where Edessa meets us at the entrance to the west wing of the facility. “Hello, Mother.” “Hello, Niamh, Your Highness.” Turning towards us, Edessa proclaims, “You three have been invited for supper and one night by Their Majesties the King and Queen of Tewira. You all shall dine with the royal family in the great hall of the castle and enjoy the finest food in the world.” Oonagh goes with Niamh to another part of the castle. “We’re going to get ourselves dressed. See you in one hour.” Looking to Edessa, I ask, “Where should we be until we’re called, Mrs. Birchwood?” “You three may sit in this room until the meal is ready. I must go to my Queen.”
Edessa goes upstairs to where the Queen, having deemed herself sufficiently rested, is preparing for dinner with the two twin girls, who seem to be around 14 years old, like Princess Oonagh. “Is the prophecy true, Grandmother?” “Will the Silver Guardian really bring the eggs back?” “We’ll just have to wait and see, Bán, Dubh.” The two young girls are strangely very pale. They both have pale blue-gray eyes, but they look radically different. Bán’s hair and wings are bone white while the hair and wings of her twin sister Dubh are raven black. Queen Vylmar’s deep purple robes greatly contrast with her golden hair and massive wings, which, like Niamh and Oonagh, make her comparable in size to a small aircraft. The twins’ wings are both flecked with silver spots reflecting the fading sunlight.
As we are sitting in the waiting room, waiting to be called, I notice that my silver hair still glows with the Light of the First Stars, which I tie back into a long braid that trails behind me. Mom and Dad have also groomed themselves over the past hour. Eventually, Edessa returns to us. In response, we look up from our grooming. “The family is ready for you, now.”
She leads us to the castle’s great hall where the King, Queen, and the three princesses are seated upon the dais, with five seats empty at their table, presumably for us, Edessa and Niamh. “Welcome, Silver Guardian. You and your family are welcome to stay the night in our home, the home of the people of Tewira.” “Thank you, Your Majesties, Your Royal Highnesses, Mrs. and Ms. Birchwood, and to the people of Tewira for your Grace and hospitality. I understand if it feels strange to be hosting three foreigners who appeared in your forest only this morning, even if it was in the fulfillment of prophecy.” We and the Birchwoods take our seats at their circular table. The doorways and flythroughs of the castle, like many of the other buildings, are much larger and wider than the doors and windows of buildings on Earth. I reckon this is most likely to accommodate the Tewir’s greater physical size owing to their large wings and wingspans. The food on the table looks rich and luxurious but organic and wholesome in looks and smell. Oonagh is robed in emerald green, Bán in white, and Dubh in black. The twins gaze at me in wonderment. “How does your hair shine so, Silver Guardian?” “It was washed in a lake in a land far away, a lake where the water, blessed by a cosmic being, shines with the first starlight.” Dubh’s eyes widen in awe whilst Oonagh, whom I am seated next to, is curious. “Isn’t it curious, Oo?” “It is, Bán.” Then, a horrible dark shape, like a goblin or orc, materializes near Dubh, and the creature tries to carry her off, but before anyone else can react, Oonagh lets off a flash of golden-green light, sparkling like fireworks, in the demon’s face, making it let go of Dubh, and forcing it to flee back to the Nightmare Hills from whence it came. “Dubh, are you all right?!” The Princess in black shutters and stands back up, her face, hair, and raiment covered in soot from Oonagh’s pyrotechnic rebuke of the hobgoblin. “I think so.” “Good thing we didn’t panic.” The King’s expression turns decidedly serious. “Seriously, Bán! We almost lost your sister just now to the Shadows, and you’re making jokes?!” The Queen gets up from her seat and makes her way to the room where she was earlier casting her shield spell. “Goodnight to you all in advance if I don’t see any of you until the morning.” Feeling that the Queen should be able to truly rest after doing this every day for Divine knows how long, I reach for the Star of Elysium, and it shines with its blue-white light. “Ancestors! Help this Queen, Leader, and Grandmother! Protect the land of Tewira and its people from the evils of the Nightmare Hills! Let the Shadows never touch their eggs again!” A bright light issues forth from the Star, seemingly engulfs the planet like a lightning flash, and the Queen can no longer sense any evil presence in or around the Tewira System and thus, feels no need to cast her shield spell. “Now, how’d you do that?” “I beseeched the Ancestors, Your Majesty. I told them you and your people were in need of help and how tired you were from trying to keep the Shadows out and away from all the eggs.” Her sleepless eyes say it all, conveying her initial sense of bewilderment and surprise at how I, a child myself, managed in a few seconds something that leaves her drained after several hours, shifting to relief, knowing that she’ll finally be able to get a proper night’s rest for the first time since Tewira’s recent troubles began. “Thank you, Silver Guardian. I should confess that I am tired.”
Having eaten our fill and heard a song from Dubh which made the water in our goblets levitate and dance in the air in front of us, we decided to retire for the night. The Queen had already gone to bed, and no one can blame her. “Come and sleep in my room with the girls and I.” “I would love to, Your Highness.” No sooner had I finished that sentence when Oonagh took me up into the air to her and the twins’ room. Their room is inside a larger version of the inverted acorn structures from the forest. Oonagh’s bed, in fact, all three of the beds, rather than being rectangular like human beds, are large, round, bowl-like structures, like birds’ nests. Bán’s and Dubh’s beds are covered in silver bedding with Oonagh’s bed covered in emerald green bedding trimmed with gold and silver. She drops me into her bed as the twins fly up through the flythrough hole in the center of the bottom of the inverted acorn structure that forms the room. They land in Oonagh’s bed as I am pulling my silver blanket out of my supply sack, making all three princesses gasp in awe at how I am pulling something out of seemingly thin air. “We have something to show you, too.” Bán and Dubh fly up towards an alcove at the top of the room. “We found these when we were little, didn’t we, Oo?” “Found them by the lake, we did.” The twins show me the objects, and I recognize them to be the Wood and Rock elemental stones, taking the shape of cubes. They notice me lighting up with their revelation. “You know what these things are, Ælura?” “Yes. They are two of eight primordial elemental stones created by the old gods. I have been told to find them and bring them home. See how I helped the Queen?” I bring out the Star for them to see and as soon as I do so, the emerald and granite stones glow brightly, to the amazement of the three princesses. “The moment we first saw your silver hair and tail, we knew they were meant to leave Tewira and go with you on your way to defeating the Shadow Queen.” “The emerald controls living things and the granite controls rocks and crystals. They were created by ancient spirits.” “The same that blessed the water of that faraway lake, Ælura?” “Of the same stock, Your Highness, though the being who blessed the lake was the Queen Mother of the old gods, Alÿran-Jakinduria. She has long since vanished, in a Horror of emptiness, confusion, and corruption, and no incarnate being, whether mortal or immortal, has ever seen her azure self.” “Why did she vanish, Guardian?” “Her mate Percec-Ikasi, back in the days when the Universe was young, was foolish and envious of her knowledge, so he stole her heart, which corrupted her into Inanis, the Empty One.” Upon hearing the name Inanis, the girls shudder with dread, but only momentarily, as the light of the Star and of the Wood and Rock stones reassures them. As the girls lift off to clean themselves up for bed, I put the Star back in my amulet, and it is joined by the two stones, making me feel stronger just as the Star made me feel stronger when I put it in my sack. I then wrap myself in my silver blanket and lay down in Oonagh’s nest. The girls finish up and come back to their beds. The twins go to sleep straight away while Oonagh stays awake for a bit longer. “I want to come with you and your family, Ælura. There’s an entire galaxy out there, and I want to find and recover our lost eggs before they hatch. I have a duty to my people. I need you to help me fulfill that duty. Goodnight.” “Goodnight, Your Highness.”
Ida and Lyral respond to the tea alarm and begin steeping the petals in the Star water, which is now boiling and Ida lays out her tools for uncapping the bones and opens her book. After 30 minutes, she removes the bag of petals and uncaps the bones and pours the marrow into the boiling water. “Then, we must take strips of fabric printed with runes and soak them in the broth for 15 minutes. When treating a victim, wrap the strip around the affected area and it will draw out the poison.”
Tuesday: 06-25-2030: I am woken up by the sensation of being in free fall through the flythrough hole in the center of the princesses’ room and by the laughter of the twins. I telekinetically catch myself in the air. Bán and Dubh are hovering around and busting their guts while Oonagh is woken up by their laughter. “Bán! Dubh! What did you do that for? And to our honored guest?” I look down to see the King seated at the circular table, sipping coffee and eating berries. “Morning, Your Majesty.” “Sorry about that, Silver Guardian. That is not proper behavior for the princesses of House Rhianh!” “Sorry, Grandfather!” “Don’t ‘sorry’ me, you mischievous girls!” I descend down to the floor. “If my asking is not too bold, how is the Queen?” “Still out like a light. Thank you for doing that last night. She really appreciates that.” Oonagh swoops down through the flythrough. “Good morning, Grandfather.” “Morning, Oo. Sleep well?” “Oh, yes, Grandfather. Has Grandmother slept well?” “She’s still asleep, but that may have changed since your cousins decided to drop your friend through the flythrough in the center of your room.” “I’ll say one thing, Ælura, they are certainly something else.” “Have something to eat, Silver Guardian.” I sit down and eat a handful of berries, which taste sweet like my apples. Sitting down herself, Oonagh speaks to her royal grandfather, “I’ve always been curious about other worlds, Grandfather.” The King puts down his coffee mug and faces her. “I won’t lie to you, Oo. It’s dangerous. The Darkness is still at large and you’re our future Queen.” “I’m not afraid of the Darkness. I wish to help them find their son and brother, to say nothing of the stolen eggs. I repelled that one Shadow creature last night. That’s got to count for something, Grandfather.” “You’ve always been the one to try new things before the rest of us. Very well. Just be careful. Don’t get captured.” “I won’t, Grandfather, long as you don’t tell Grandmother.”
Oonagh and the rest of us set out for the woods. “That’s a strange book, Ælura.” “It’s the Golden Book, Your Highness. It knows everything.” Oonagh is carrying a sword and dagger along with her magic. She is also wearing armor on her chest, belly, and back and rather than her green and gold robe, she wears the brown leather outfit on her body that she was wearing yesterday. Suddenly, a bright light appears beneath a pair of trees. “What is that?” “It’s our friend, Your Highness.” “Come to the next planet. There you will find the Fire and Day. Use the figures of Erre-Su and Izarra-Hautsa.” “Are those other elemental stones, Ælura?” “I believe so, Your Highness.” “Come through.” “Very well. I never argue with a bright light.”
Previous Episode: The Golden Book.
Next Episode: A Missing Queen.
