Pining Away

A Chapter by Eddie Davis

While their friends desperately search for a way to save them, Muld and Syndi steadily weaken from the effects of Aleiryid.

25.

Pining Away

It was Muld’s Bag of Holding trick that enabled Sophia and Allea to bring King Eiolmoel to the airship, using the Exchange spell as before.

The Losasidhe King rushed to the side of his daughter and Muld, who had been placed in the Captain’s cabin on the Queen Eioldth.

“Can you cancel the spells on the rings?” Zeatt asked the King and he nodded without a word. Clearly something else was bothering him. “Your Majesty?”

King Eiolmoel looked up, a grim look in his eyes, “I can dispel the Chastity spells on the rings, but they are so weak, I don’t know if they will be able to… come together… to end this sickness.”

“Surely there is a way to restore enough vigor to them so they can… um… consummate their union.”

“I don’t know of such a way, Matron Mother,” The King’s eyes moistened, “It was a foolish idea on our part - insisting on her purity before a wedding ceremony. Now…”

“You don’t have time to blame yourself, Your Majesty. That spell needs to be cast on both of their rings before anything else can be tried.”

“Yes, of course,” King Eiolmoel went to the bedside and gently lifted the hand of his youngest child, “Her hand is so cold!”

He did not wait another moment but launched into the spell that would dispel the magic of the ring. A few minutes later it was done, and he immediately moved over and repeated the spell on Muld.

“What about their Autocaster rings?” Khord asked as he stood nearby, “If they weaken to the point of death, and they are wearing Autocasters, wouldn’t they be healed by that magic?”

“No; the sickness is more than a physical ailment,” Zeatt replied, “It is spiritual in nature and that is something that the best healing spell cannot cure.”

“Then what is the answer?” Khord asked her.

“I don’t know, child,” Zeatt whispered and they all fell silent as the Losasidhe King continued his spell.

***

Soon the spells were reversed, but still Muld and Syndi lay weak and unconscious. Zeatt feared to move them, worrying that the motion of the airship might finish them off.

So the Queen Eioldth remained hovering over the abandoned floating city of Windhaven, while the Losasidhe airship hurried to Losahome to bring Syndi’s brothers and family to her.

An hour later, Queen Synthaeia joined them, also using the Bag of Holding Exchange spell. Seeing her youngest child so near death, Synthaeia lost all of her arrogance and pride and wept like any scared mother.

Throughout the day, more and more people gathered on the ship as if all of them were there waiting for the couple to die.

“Is there anything that you have heard of to reverse Aleiryid?” Zeatt whispered to her oldest daughter in the late afternoon.

“Nothing,” Sophia replied, “I’ve spent the whole day trying to think of anything that might work.”

“I’m not familiar enough with it to know of what happens when the couple does not come together. Have there been other cases like this?”

Sophia shrugged, but King Eiolmoel looked up and went over to them.

“It is probably nothing… but there were old Faesidhe stories that I heard as a child of a star-crossed couple that pined away in Aleiryid until they died. It was a fairy tale, but in this story, the couple, when they died, went to a place deep in a forest - it was unidentified in the tale- where they emerged from a magic faerie pool, stripped of their memories or who they were.”

“That sounds like The Faerie Pool in Helios’ Valley!” Allea jumped to her feet.

The Losasidhe King shook his head, “No, this one was deep in a thick forest, not in a valley, though they might be similar. The couple, when they died, simply disappeared and reappeared in the magic pool. The tale is about the two of them learning to love one another again and slowly getting their memories back as they made their way home. It ends happy for them as after many adventures, they return home.”

“Do you think this tale has some basis in fact?” Zeatt asked.

King Eiolmoel shrugged, “I don’t know; I just thought that might be something to help us.”

“Mother, what about the pool in Helios Valley?” Allea asked excitedly, “Couldn’t we take Muld and Syndi there and slip them down into the pool? Maybe that would-“

A shriek from the Losasidhe Queen caused everyone in the room to spin around and look. Synthaeia was standing by the bed, pointing at it with her eyes wide as saucers.

“They’re gone! They just suddenly disappeared!” She wailed.

“Autocasters?” Zeatt asked, and King Eiolmoel rushed over to a crystal ball that one of his wizards had set for his use on a table in the room.

He waved his hands over it and a moment later was speaking to his royal chamberlain.

“If it was the Autocaster ring activating, Syndi will be found in our bedchamber,” He told everyone in the room. Synthaeia stood tightly clutching her hands together as they waited for the chamberlain to return. Hours seemed to pass, though it was probably only several minutes. No one in the room spoke a word but just stared at the empty bed where the couple had been.

Finally a voice was heard from the crystal ball, “Your Majesty, no one is there.”

Queen Synthaeia wept, though she did not know if it was relief at the thought that her daughter and Muld might still be alive, or fear and pain at maybe never seeing them again.

“Are they gone to the pool in that tale?” Zeatt asked the Losasidhe King.

“Hey look at this!” Sophia called before he could answer. She was standing by the bed and had pulled the bed sheets back. Under the covers were the couple’s clothes, and, close together on the bed, both of their autocaster rings, as well as Muld’s brooch.

“Those tales might be true after all,” King Eiolmoel whispered, mainly to reassure his wife (and himself), “They’re alive somewhere!”

“Naked and without their memories!” Queen Synthaeia said through her sobs.

King Eiolmoel took his wife in his arms, “Yes, but they are together.”

There was something in the king’s words that brought the slightest bit of hope to everyone in the room.

TO BE CONTINUED IN “Mórálach’s Pool” - coming Spring 2017.

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