Light as a Cloud

Chapter 16

The night came, and with it the legendary "Grisian bad weather". Ayra had found shelter inside the dead oak. Jewel had curled up before the entrance, leaving it just a little open for fresh air. 

Ayra tried her best to fall asleep listening to the rain against the oak and Jewel's soft, rhythmic breathing. However, despite her feeling exhausted, sleep wouldn't come. 

For some reason, her mind wandered off to Meroch. Where would he be? Still with the elves, or would he have left them too? Sure he could have reached Fennekirch by now- wait, of course, Meroch couldn't fly. 

Meroch was actually in the middle of the path that separated the forest from the field. The rain flooded over him, but he dared not seek shelter under the trees. Besides, he told himself, the leaves would just merge smaller drops into bigger ones. 

A cracking lightning tore open the night sky and struck the Crystal Garden right in the center of Meroch's view. The crystalline flowers broke the light into a screen of bright, swirling colours that had Meroch blinded for a moment, but even before the thunder sounded, he had jumped up. In the light he had noticed a winged silhouette! 

Meanwhile, Ayra had nearly fallen asleep to the thunderstorm above her. Though the noise was broken by a different one: the howl of a wolf. Another one, closer to the oak, replied on a higher tone. 

Ayra's heart shot up to her throat. She listened carefully to Jewel, but it seemed to be sleeping through it. A sense of powerlessness and anxiety overtook her as she realized she was facing this all alone. Was this then the way of the woods? Would Jewel and Ayra meet Death here? She felt a strong urge to scream, but no sound came out of her mouth. 

Another lightning illuminated the Crystal Garden. Meroch saw a different image now: the eminn silhouette got company from a few elves. 

Meroch took a step forward. "Mom?" he whispered. A long-haired eminn among elves- it had to be his mother. Was her spirit trying to talk to him? What was she trying to make clear?

However, in the next flash, the eminn was holding an all too familiar dagger. Meroch swallowed hard. This wasn't his mother, it was... 

The howling had stopped, but that just meant the wolves had gathered now. Ayra heard their many paws making their way through the bushes. Jewel's breathing was still as slow and rhythmic as they had been all night, telling Ayra that he was still asleep. 

Tears of panic streamed down her face. She clenched her teeth together and struggled to stay completely soundless. She barely dared to breathe. The wolves were coming for her, at a nerve-racking slow pace. 

The eminn silhouette was slashing open cages, that seemed to contain fairies. Every flash, they were swarming away. However, a small elf figure with a club enclosed her from behind. 

"Ayra!" Meroch yelled, and he ran towards her. "Ayra! Behind you! Watch out!"

Ayra screamed. She could no longer stop herself. She screamed and screamed and caused Jewel to wake up. It spat a flame into the air to provide some light, and in this light it saw the last wolves running off in every direction. Ayra's screaming had scared them away. 

Ayra's silhouette turned to Meroch. "Watch us, don't touch us," she spoke coldly, and then she vanished. As by magic, the clouds dissolved and the moonlight casted only a faint afterglow of the magic screens in the Garden. 

Meroch found himself in the middle of it. The path and his bag were nowhere to be seen. The never-resting forest in the distance rustled once again with scornful laughter.