“You are not like the other,” one of the Drakes announced, her voice just more than a rasp.
“She is,” another remarked, his eyes scanning Inara from head to toe.
“You have come to free us?” the female asked.
“Yes,” Inara whispered. “Yes, we’re here to free you all,” she said louder.
“How long have you all been down here?” Galanör probed, inspecting their dank living quarters beyond.
The female glanced at her kin. “Years,” she stated, appearing somewhat broken by the answer.
“Years?” Galanör echoed in disbelief. “That’s not possible. This entire shaft isn’t even years old.”
The Drake turned her gaze up to the light at the top of the shaft. “Down here, the sun does not hold sway over the passage of time. Only the currents can speak the truth of what we know.” She set her sharp eyes on Galanör once more. “Many years,” she reiterated.
Inara might not be able to read the currents of magic like a Drake, but the truth didn’t escape her, horrifying as it was. She stepped back to the edge of the stone walkway and looked up. The flames of the torch revealed her worst fears and with it a memory. The Guardian had seen this magic before, nearly twenty years ago inside The Bastion.
“She believes,” the Drake asserted.
Galanör turned to Inara. “What is it? What’s happening here?”
Inara directed them to the runes carved into the stone above the bars. They ran in perfect lines all the way around, starting where the prison began. There were even some etched into the walkway and along the steps.
Aenwyn reached up and ran her finger over one of the glyphs. “What spell is this?”
It was easier to show them. Inara removed a small dagger from her belt and tossed it high into the air. As soon it ascended beyond stone, the dagger slowed down to a crawl, its spin barely visible anymore.
“We’re inside a time spell,” Inara explained. “Hours and days up there are months and years down here.” She looked at the Drakes again. “I’m so sorry.” With one hand, she reached out and grasped that of the female Drake.
Galanör moved to the edge of the walkway and looked down at the very bottom. “That’s how he did it. The doorway. He’s kept their magic trapped down here for years.”
“It also means he’s been down here for some time,” Aenwyn concluded.
“He sat there for many hours,” the Drake told them, gesturing to the muddy ground.
“He just sat there?” Galanör doubted.
“Meditating,” the Drake explained. “He entered here with injuries, but when he rose he was strong again.”
“Alijah has had time on his side for too long,” Galanör cursed.
“Well,” Inara declared, removing the Moonblade from the scabbard on the back of her belt, “his time’s up.”
Bringing more light to the gloom, she raised the Moonblade to the ancient script above the bars. The opal blade glimmered with every colour over a base white, highlighting the dirt and blood on her face. With elven strength, she carved a line down and through the glyphs of the time spell. The magic within the Moonblade broke the script, ending Alijah’s hold over the lives of the Drakes.
A moment later, Inara’s dagger - thrown high into the air - dropped back down and dug into the dirt at the bottom of the pit. “Get them out,” she instructed, handing her torch to Aenwyn.
“Inara.” Galanör’s tone was full of warning.
The Guardian looked back at him. “Get them out. I’ll handle Alijah.”
Reluctantly, the ranger nodded once and turned to the cells with Aenwyn. Inara steeled herself and stepped off the walkway, jumping the remaining distance to the bottom. She slowly rose from her crouch, her eyes scanning the shadows between the sparse torches. With Firefly held high, and just a touch of magic, the crystal in the pommel brightened to dispel some of the darkness. Having seen many doorways in Drakanan, she knew exactly what to look for, but here there was nothing but dirt.
Alijah, however, must have gone somewhere.
Following the wall around, Inara soon came to realise her error. From their angle above, and where she had landed, the doorway was on its edge, making it thinner than a piece of parchment. Now, facing it front on, she could see right through to the realm of magic. Like some found in Drakanan, it didn’t move of its own will, but was tethered to the ground by unseen forces. It was also smaller, coming up to Inara’s neck and only just wide enough for her shoulders to fit through.
Rather than dwell on the fact that Alijah had actually achieved what she believed to be impossible, Inara focused on the bigger problem: he was already on the other side.
Once again, she took steps that would see her leave one world and enter another. The beauty of it hit her as if it was the first time all over again. Her eyes naturally lifted to the sky, a canvas of stalactites that glittered like stars. It was hard to say where the light came from, but nothing was in shadow. Mountains lined the horizon, their distance hard to gauge in a world so alien to her own.
Inara walked away from the doorway, her ankles submerged beneath an endless ocean filled with shining crystals. Cutting through it all were thick roots that twisted, curved, and arched in and out of the ground. Following the roots back to their source, the Guardian of the Realm craned her neck to take in the tree. The white bark of its trunk stretched so far it was hard to see where it curved around. Much of the view above it was hidden by a mountainous canopy of red crystalline leaves.
Captivating as it was, Inara’s gaze inevitably turned to the rising smoke. The black clouds were just visible over the tops of the distant roots on her left. Fear gripped the Guardian’s bones and set her to a speed few could attain. She skipped
