Maggie Furey - Harp of Winds

Anvar waited . . . and waited, until he could bear the suspense no longer. It seemed as though time, and reality itself, must snap, twanging like a frayed and taut-stretched bight of rope. Then the Mage remembered how Aurian had won the Staff of Earth, and what she had told him of her encounter with the dragon. Nothing had happened until she had taken action, and broken the spell that took the golden Fire-Mage out of time .

Anvar braced himself. It was obvious that the Cailleach was aware of his presence. The next move, then must be up to him. “Lady, I am here,” he called. “In the name of the ancient Magefolk, the Wizards that once you sheltered, I greet you.”

There was no reply—not in human tongue, at any rate. Instead, just as Anvar was beginning to wonder what to do next, a skein of fragile music crept out across the lake. An alien music so wild, so ethereal, so heart-breakingly beautiful that the Mage found his throat growing thick and tight. His sight blurred with tears, and all unknowing, he wiped them away with his sleeve in an unconscious echo of Aurian’s childlike gesture.

It was the music of a harp. As each note drifted, clear and perfect, across the darkling waters, it became visible to Anvar’s sight: a cascade of music like a starfall with each crystal note a clear and perfect point of light. The Mage watched, lost in wonder, as a bridge of song arced forth across the stillness of the mere.

As the last, entrancing phrase chimed to a close, a final cluster of stars fell to the stony beach, grounded, and took hold. The Mage took a deep breath, closed his fingers tightly around the Staff of Earth, and stepped onto the bridge of stars.

The Windeye patted Aurian clumsily on the shoulder, and she welcomed his gesture of sympathy. “You say your companion, the other Bright Power, is in Aerillia?” he asked her. The Mage nodded, unable, despite her worry, to keep from smiling wryly at his description of Anvar. She’d taken an instant liking to this round-faced, shy young Seer with the delightful smile.

“You said earlier that you might be able to help me. How?” she asked.

“I will use my Othersight to ride the winds to Aerillia,” the Windeye told her. “There, with luck, I should be able to locate your companion.”

Aurian watched, amazed, as silver flooded Chiamh’s eyes. Leaning on the parapet, he relaxed, all expression leaving his face, and the Mage realized that his consciousness had left his body. Suddenly, she was seized by an idea. Breathing deeply, she relaxed her own body and slipped easily out of her mundane form.

Chiamh was still hovering above the tower: a golden swirl of incandescent light. She saw his astonished flicker as he noted her presence. “Can you hear me?” Aurian asked him. In their physical forms, she had not thought to try mental communication with the Windeye, and for a moment, entertained some doubt about the extent of his powers.

“Lady, yes!” His mental voice rang out, clear and joyous. “How beautiful you look: a being of light, just as I first saw you in my vision.”

In her anxiety, the Mage had little time for compliments, however pleasant, but she could not bring herself to be angry with the Seer. “I wondered, Chiamh—could you take me with you when you ride the winds to Aerillia?” she asked him.

“Let us try!” As if he were extending his hand, the Windeye held out a glimmering, luminescent tentacle, and Aurian stretched out a similar strand of her own being to touch it. The two lights met in a flash of warm brilliance, and suddenly, the Mage could see the world as Chiamh saw it with his Othersight. She gasped with amazement to see the mountains, like translucent, glittering prisms, and the winds as turbulent rivers of glowing silver.

“Are you ready?” Chiamh’s voice rang proudly in her mind, and Aurian knew that he had sensed and appreciated her delight.

“I’m ready,” she replied.

“Then hold on tight!” The Windeye stretched out another glowing limb and snatched at a strand of silvery wind. The next minute, they were being borne aloft over the mountains at an incredible pace, riding on a stream of light.

“This is wonderful,” Aurian cried exultantly. Attuned lo Chiamh’s thoughts while they touched, she could also feel his joy in the wild and exhilarating ride.

“I never knew it could be like this,” he replied. “Always, before, I have voyaged alone, and it was lonely and not a little alarming. But this . . . Lady, what a gift you have given me. I will never fear my powers again!”

Aurian was glad that she had helped him, for he too had given her an amazing gift by taking her on this journey. It was one of the most incredible experiences of her life, only marred by the shadow of concern, always at the back of her mind, for the fate of Anvar and Shia.

“Here is Aerillia, far below us,” the Windeye said at last. To her astonishment, Aurian saw what seemed to be a cluster of brilliant sparks far below her, and recognized them, with a start, as the myriad life energies of the Winged Folk who dwelt atop the soaring peak.

As the Windeye swooped down closer, Aurian strained to make out details of the peaktop city. Now, the weird, prismatic effect of Chiamh’s augmented vision was a decided disadvantage. “Is there any way I can get my normal sight back?” she asked him.

“Surely.” Chiamh’s mental tone was tinged with regret for the end of their journey. “You are here now—at least, your inner self is here. Simply let go, and you will see normally. I will stay close at hand, to take you back when you wish to go.”

Thanking the Windeye, Aurian withdrew the attenuated tentacle of light, severing her connection with Chiamh’s inner form. Looking down, she gasped. On the highest pinnacle of the mountain was the shattered shell of a peat black building, with Winged Folk wheeling all around it in panic. It certainly looked as though Anvar had regained the Staff! But why in the world would he not answer her?

Lowering her inner form toward the ground, Aurian tried calling for Shia, instead, and at last she got an answer.

“Where the blazes are you?” the Mage demanded, brusque in her anxiety, “What happened? Where is Anvar?”

“I’m hiding,” Shia replied grimly, “with Khanu, another of my people who came to help me. We are in the passages below the temple. There is no one to explain to these winged monsters that we came to free them ...”

Cold dread swept through Aurian as she heard the hesitation in the great cat’s voice. “Why could Anvar not explain to them? Where is he?” Her mental tones began as little more than a whisper, rising to an anguished cry. “Where is Anvar? He can’t be dead! I would have felt it!”

“You are right.” Shia’s matter-of-fact voice helped to calm the distraught Mage. “I kept in contact with him while he pursued Blacktalon from the temple. The priest fled to a tower, where Anvar slew him. Then there was an earthquake—not a natural phenomenon, I’m sure ...” Shia’s mental tones betrayed her puzzlement. “When the tower collapsed, I lost contact with Anvar’s mind, but it did not feel like death ... It felt similar to that time in Dhiammara, when you were caught in that magical trap and swept away into the mountain. It was as though he simply vanished,”

“Dear gods!” Aurian was stunned. What could have become of Anvar? Was it some trap set by Miathan, to steal the Staff? But surely the Archmage was currently out of the reckoning, having been hurled so abruptly from Harihn’s body when the Prince was slain, “Listen, Shia,” she said abruptly. “I must find a way to get to Aerillia. I’m not in my body right now, but—”

“Then the child has been born?” Shia asked anxiously,