William J. Bennett, American Politician
“Have you all taken leave of your senses?” exclaimed Elder Tidebreaker in outrage. “These outsiders brought the wolves to our door, and you would bind yourselves to them? You abandon our ways as you dig the graves of our kin.”
“Elder Tidebreaker, be calm,” spoke Elder Lightpaw in a soft voice that carried across the Elder’s stone circle. “You do a disservice to the Drifting Cloud clan by treating Ms. Gale and Ms. Brown with such hostility. Without their assistance, we wouldn’t be here right now.”
“Tell that to those of us who didn’t make it,” retorted Tidebreaker, his anger escalating. He gestured towards the empty stone seats. “Tell that to Chief Elder Tamarind, whose body lies in the belly of that beast.”
Milly and Calista sat in the sand in the middle of the stone circle as they listened to the elders argue. Only six of the stone Elder seats were occupied – the sole surviving elders of the fairy clans.
“How many others would Fairy Killer have murdered if you hadn’t killed it, Cally?” whispered Milly as she clutched Calista’s hand. Calista squeezed her hand in reply, intent on the arguing elders.
“The Chief Elder would want us to survive,” interrupted Elder Sapphire, her spear stuck in the sand beside her. Covered in shallow wounds, she had refused treatment to preserve the healers’ strength. “This is the best – perhaps the only – chance we have to rebuild.”
“Of course you would say that, Sapphire. You’ve been enamored with these outsiders since they stepped foot in our most sacred of places,” accused Tidebreaker. “You’d throw your Eastern Waves to the wolves if it meant spending another hour in their company.”
Sapphire’s hand shot out and grasped her spear, her eyes flashing with anger. Tidebreaker squawked and jumped back a step, his wing torn from his encounter with Fairy Killer.
Calista’s eyes flared with outrage. She started to rise to defend Sapphire, but Milly held her back.
“This needed to be their decision, Cally,” she whispered.
Calista settled back onto the sand, steaming mad.
“You would treat your fellow elders with such distain, Tidebreaker, after the loss our people have suffered?” chimed in Quickstride. Although he had given up his elder title before the battle, he sat as an equal in the circle. “We owe it to our people to consider the outsiders’ offer. Their generous offer.”
“You too, Quickstride? So the Galloping Winds will join in this collective suicide,” Tidebreaker spat, as he began to feel outnumbered. “And I suppose the Floating Leaf Skulk and Lost Foals are as foolish as the Winds and Waves?
Tentongue and Lightpaw nodded their support.
“We’ll take our chance at their Castle of Glass,” Lightpaw replied. “The wolves have been picking us off, one by one, for years. Today was meant to be their final blow to our people. If we return to our old ways – if we don’t adapt – the wolves will come back to finish us.”
“You are all fools. These outsiders will enslave you, as surely as the wolves. If you do this, the Drifting Cloud and the Swinging Vine clans shall be the last free fairies in this world. Right, Elder Durian?”
Elder Durian sat in silence for a long moment. The monkey elder slouched against his quarterstaff as if burdened by an impossible weight.
“… The Swinging Vine clan will join the other clans at the Castle of Glass,” he finally said, his voice low and filled with defeat.
Tidebreaker stared at his long-time ally, his beak opened in shock. “You… you can’t be serious, Durian,” he pressed. He looked into his friend’s eyes and saw within a deep sense of inevitability, as if the world had fallen from the monkey elder’s control and had been carried away on the winds of fate.
“It’s the only choice we have left, my friend,” Durian murmured. “Our only path to survival.”
“… You… you are all mad,” Tidebreaker whispered, his anger collapsing as if it were a breaking wave. He sat down on his stone, diminished.
“Your people will not be slaves,” Calista said as the elders fell silent. “I can’t promise that you will be welcomed by everyone at the Castle of Glass. There will be those among our coworkers… I mean, our people… that will need to be convinced. But Milly, Rain and I will protect you, and we have allies there who will help you.”
This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.
“So you promise us charity and protection? Is that not simply another means of enslavement?” Tidebreaker muttered, his venom faded.
“There is plenty of land around the Castle of Glass – jungle, mountain, and plains – and a wide-open ocean for Sapphire’s clan,” Milly chimed in. “Fish and game, and the bounties of the wilds. You don’t have to rely on us. You can support yourselves. You can raise your children in safety and rebuild.”
“Well, Tidebreaker? What will it be?” Lightpaw asked the gull. “Every moment we argue is another that puts our people in danger.”
Tidebreaker slumped over and stared at the sand, defeated.
“What choice do I have?”
Milly smiled softly, and they began to plan the Exodus of the Fairies.
* * *
It was mid-afternoon by the time their small party crossed the Lake of Memories and set foot on the obsidian stone island. The Waypoint Pillar towered above them, ready to take them home.
Home. I suppose the Castle of Glass is my new home. We’ll make it their new home too.
Milly glanced back at the shore, where the fairies prepared their children, elderly, and wounded to be transported to the island. They carried only their most critical belongings with them – the ones they would need to survive the night. The priority was to get the fairies out of the valley as soon as possible in case the wolves returned.
In the morning, they would return to retrieve the remainder of their lives and bury their dead.
“Lightpaw, are you ready?” Calista asked.
“I am,” answered the newly elected Chief Elder. “I trust you, Ms. Gale. Show us the way.”
Milly lifted Rain off their raft and held the unconscious woman gently in her arms. Rain’s leg was shredded and her breath was shallow, but Whitewing’s healers had managed to stabilize her bleeding. It was all the healers had time to do before they had to focus on the dying fairies.
Calista stretched her hand towards Lightpaw, and Lightpaw grasped it with his paw. Milly completed the chain as she wrapped her hand around the other fuzzy paw.
We’ve never transported a non-player. I hope this works.
Calista placed her hand upon the Waypoint Pillar.
Waypoint Pillar activated. Select destination.
- Castle of Glass
- Arena of Choice (Overlook Mountain)
- The Jungle Spire
- Arena of Domination (The Swamp of the Undying)
- Arena of Protection (Lake of Memories)
- (All other Pillars are currently locked)
Calista removed her hand from the pillar in surprise, and the window disappeared.
“Someone completed another arena?” Milly said, shocked. “Who?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Calista answered. She returned her hand to the pillar and the destination window appeared once again.
“Castle of Glass,” Calista said firmly, and braced herself.
An instant later, Calista, Milly, Lightpaw, and an unconscious Rain were hurling down the kaleidoscope tunnel, headed for the Castle of Glass.
Headed for home.
* * *
Thirty seconds later, they appeared beneath the Castle of Glass Waypoint Pillar.
“We need to find Elmer and… woah,” Calista started, just as two of their coworkers ran past them carrying a ten-foot-tall log of pine, its bark and branches stripped off. They were dressed in peculiar, mismatched equipment and scurried across the jungle as if their burden weighed nothing.
“Was that… Amir and Kenji, from accounting?” Milly asked.
Those little perverts. Last I saw them, they were too scared to leave their cubicle. Where did they get magical equipment?
“They got stronger while we were away,” Calista said, as she gazed at the flurry of activity around them. “And they aren’t the only ones.”
The land around the Castle of Glass was awash in activity. Hundreds of their coworkers, most dressed in similar mismatched equipment, hurried about as they worked on half-completed projects and carted supplies into the tower.
The Waypoint Pillar had been at the edge of the jungle terrain a week ago. Now, it stood in the middle of clear-cut terrain, the wilds all around the Castle of Glass pushed back two hundred paces. Fallen tress littered the ground, and a dozen players hacked them into firewood and building material.
Amir and Kenji carried the log to a pile at the edge of the cleared jungle terrain, where a massive team of players was constructing eight-foot-tall log wall. It started at the eastern ocean – where the Battle of Tower Beach had been fought – and already stretched half-way across the jungle terrain.
“We’ll need another ten pines for the Jungle Gate, Amir,” The foreman shouted, and Amir waved in response as they quickly dashed across the sands towards the northern mountains.
Colored stones marked their construction path. It stretched into the plains and around the gardens, which had ballooned from a small hobby garden to four acres of tilled earth. A team of gardeners worked on the soil, and Milly saw small flashes of green magic as they knelt in the earth. Tiny seedlings already sprouted in tidy rows, spurred on by the spells they cast.
The colored stones stretched onward into the mountain terrain and out of side behind Tower Three. Upon completion, the palisade wall would encircle the Castle of Glass.
“If only we’d had that wall last week…,” said Milly regretfully, the deaths at the Battle of Tower Beach raw in her mind. “Veronica, Matt, and the others. Maybe they’d still be with us if we’d build some defenses.”
Calista placed a sympathetic hand on the small of Milly’s back. “We’re learning, beautiful. We’ll be better prepared next time.”
“We already are,” Milly agreed, as she clenched her fist and felt the twin rings of Obsidian Fist against her palms.
“There will be time to see everything later,” prompted Calista, focused on their goal. “Lightpaw, let’s find Elmer and make the arrangements. You’ll… Lightpaw?”
The Chief Elder hadn’t noticed the wall. He stared up at the quadruple towers that rose sixteen stories above him at the exact centre of his world’s four terrains, their glass and steel brilliance sparkling in the afternoon sun.
The Non-Canonical Aftermath: