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A few of those who listened gasped and clutched their hands to their hearts in obvious horror. I didn’t dare move, I didn’t dare breathe, even as every muscle in me flared and tightened at the memory of Lilly falling into the black, and Jack being whisked into smoke, and Amari… Amari standing alone. The bright power of my fire roared right to the surface, stronger than it had ever been.
It pushed against my skin, growling like a living thing. The fire between us sparked and grew, embers flying through the air in a shower, as though someone had called to it.
“In her pain,” Ryndle continued, oblivious to the fire and the snarling danger that was roaring inside of me. “Cassia went to her father, the King of the Fae, and told him what Leilan had done. The King and Cassia declared war against the younger sister, but she had already built herself an army of Lynar, the ancient people who carry a remnant of magic of the Fae.”
“The Lynar,” I interrupted, “You say they have Fae magic, not that the Fae stole their magic as the stories say.”
“I do. I have always known the Fae to have magic, but I assume you know that as well. Fae who are not supposed to have magic that suddenly do.”
I shifted, subconsciously reaching for the blades that were not there. My magic rumbled and growled under my skin as Ryndle’s knowing gaze burrowed into me. I didn’t dare look at Ziah.
“The stories say that the Fae–”
“Odd thing about stories,” this time he interrupted me. “They can be changed, mutated to fit those who have need of them. Who enslaved who, who stole what magic. It’s all an abstract thing, isn’t it?”
“All stories can be changed, Ryndle,” he didn’t even flinch as I said his name. “Including this one.”
“True. Then, perhaps I will tell it the way that you know. About how the elder Leilan saved the Lynar from the Fae rather than the truths that I know, that she used them to build her own army. Either way, the Lynar were under her thumb as she declared herself a Goddess and drove them into war against her sister.”
“The Goddess and the sister,” I whispered, putting the next piece together. A few people nodded even though I was sure I had only whispered. Ryndle nodded before he continued, roaring the story to life before the flames.
“Yes, it was in the beginning that the Goddess stole the mind of her sister’s lover, turning him against her as she made him the first Ramal, made him fight against the one that he loved. The sister was fighting for her life and the family that had been taken from her, but was fighting against the man who she had left everything for. The Goddess and the sister fought for a century, the Fae trying again and again to reach the Goddess through her army of Lynar, the sister fighting again and again to end the Goddess who had become cruel and twisted toward the Lynar.
In the end, they met at the end of the Forest of Ok, and in a rage they fought. The Goddess pushed the Fae back, sending them into exile. The sister would not accept defeat, however, she vowed to stop her younger sister. She vowed to send her light to end Leilan, to take the Goddess’ life in return for the blood of her children that was spilt.”
Ryndle ended the story with a flourish, a few of his followers gasping and clapping as he took his seat.
“What happened next?” I hated that I was suddenly interested. I hated more that Ryndle enjoyed it.
“That we do not know, not yet.”
“But that’s not… that’s nothing…” I wasn’t even sure how to voice all of the questions that were rumbling in my head.
“Is there a problem, Caspyn?” Ryndle asked, settling back in his seat now that he had finished his very dramatic presentation.
“Where is the enslavement of Lynar by the Fae, the severing of magic?” I asked, my mind wading through everything he had said.
“As I said, things can be changed to suit the interests of others. This is no different. I believe you will find the truth.”
There were his damn riddles again.
“Are you sure you aren’t a Izyarian witch, Ryndle? You speak like one.” I snarled and sat back against the barrel I had perched myself against. There was no getting answers out of him now. If I had my blades I could easily get answers out of him. Of course, my magic was healed enough that I was sure I could get answers out of him that way.
“Not a witch, although I have known many in my years.” My focus snatched over to him, but he only smiled with the vile secretive look of his. “All things make sense in time, Caspyn. I first heard that story at the knee of my grandfather as he read it from The Book. I share it here because I want it to live on, I do not wish it to mutate as so many histories have such a way of doing.” Several of his followers nodded in agreement at that, Ryndle nodding alongside them before he continued. “I want my people to be prepared for when she returns so that we can help her in her quest.”
“When she returns? The Goddess or the sister?”
He shrugged, “There is only one who will return to save the ones lost in the war, that will save magic. She will return to save us all.”
The fire stopped its crackling, the stars blinking out as the breath locked in my chest.
She will return to save us all.
It was the same verbiage as with the Princess Elara, the princess who faced the Queen before she ended the Catalysts. Princess Elara who faced her mother before the crimson stained altar and was to come back and save us all. A Goddess who was to come back and save us all.
The tale that Da had told us in hushed tones around the fire, it wasn’t about Princess Elara. What if it was about another princess, the Fae princess who vowed to return and save them from the Goddess.
It couldn’t be both, not when the Princess Elara was sickly and dying. There was no way she could face the Queen, because she never did. It was The Goddess who everyone worshiped.
