Rivers of Reverie

10. Awakening

"You haven't eaten anything since this morning," said Thesyl, sitting on the back of the ship.

"I'm not hungry," Sanya replied laconically, her eyes staring at the surface of the river.

"It's the same thing you told me yesterday night, too. I don't think Liryl would be happy to know that her friend starved to death before finding her."

The mere notion of her friend's name made Sanya wince. She did not say a thing, but Thesyl had little trouble guessing what was going through her mind in those moments.

"Sanya, you shouldn't blame yourself. Besides, we don't know if anything serious actually happened to her. Maybe she just left on her own initiative and ..."

"I know she left on her own initiative," Sanya interrupted her. "Ever since we came back from the Spring Mountains, I'd been having this feeling that Liryl was hiding something from me. If only I had acted then, maybe I could've stopped her ... but I'd rather think I was wrong." The girl barely suppressed a sob. "It's only my fault."

Thesyl sighed. "Have you forgotten what I told Liryl, about other people's choices? The same goes for you too, Sanya – there's nothing you could do to stop her, if she had it in her mind to go alone."

"Do you think she's still ... alive?" Sanya asked hesitantly, after a short silence.

"Liryl is a smart girl. I'm sure she's all right, no matter what happened to her. Don't get me wrong," she hastened to add, "you really did the right thing to go back to Fys Espyr as soon as you found out she was gone ..."

"Before coming to ask for help, I looked for her all over Fys Narhal," the girl told in a broken voice. "I was so anguished, I felt I would die."

Thesyl smiled and wrapped her arm around her. "When this is all over, I'll take you out with me and Rheya to dance – both you and Liryl. Okay?"

Sanya looked at her with watery eyes, then nodded.

"Good," Thesyl said in an affectionate tone. "Now go eat something, or we'll really have to begin worrying."

The girl nodded again and, albeit reluctantly, went looking amid the supplies for something to fill her stomach. Thesyl turned her eyes towards the sentinels, and the two priestesses who came with her to help her in the search of the disappeared novice. On the horizon, the shape of Mount Esper started emerging from the forest.

Liryl, please be still alive.

***

The sun had already set a while before, when the ship moored in the vicinity of Fys Narhal.

"We'll begin our search here," Thesyl explained firmly to the rest of the group. "Sanya and the other sentinels will question the villagers to try and find out any clues, while we priestesses will attempt to commune with the spirits of this place."

The other nymphs nodded unquestioningly. However, as soon as they walked into the village, Thesyl ordered the group to stop.

A strange transparent layer covered the houses and the surrounding land. Some bodies were lying on the ground, while other were still kneeled or crouched, looking like statues. Thesyl walked up closer to inspect the weird substance.

"It's frost," she acknowledged in surprise. "How can this be?"

"What is it?" Sanya asked, perplexed.

"Frost is a substance which forms when water reaches very low temperatures," she explained. "Sometimes it forms on the mountains to the north, during winter. But at this altitude it should be impossible. Moreover," she noted, looking around, "it seems that only the village is covered by it."