The Prophecy Faeries 3: Linisa's Return - Part Ten

“What do you mean?” Victoria asked, looking at Clarisse with concern.

     “It was Khorianna’s voice. She spoke to me, and recited the prophecy.”

     “Claire, that’s not possible. Khorianna died five hundred years ago. You don’t even know what she sounds like!”

     “She said, ‘I have foretold’. She knew the prophecy. She talked about the Sun, and my visions. She knew me.”

     “Are you sure? I mean, how do you know you didn’t just have a vision of someone talking about this, or hear someone’s thoughts?”

     “Tori, I talked to her. I know who it was. Who else would know all those things about the prophecy, the Sun, and me?”

     “Could Fyora have—?”

     “It wasn’t Fyora. I know what I heard, Tori.”

     “Okay, so if it really was Khorianna... what exactly did she say?”

     “She told me that I still didn’t understand the prophecy, and that I had to understand it. She recited it. Then she started talking about the chamber that the Sun was in. She said there were two openings, two big cracks in the rock of the chamber. One is in the ceiling over the Sun. The other one is in the far wall, just above the Sun, but it’s so small that it can’t be seen from the other side of the chamber.”

     “Why would she tell you that?”

     “I asked her, but she just said that I would know when the time comes.”

     Victoria frowned. “What else did she say?”

     “Nothing, except that I should remember what she told me.”

     Victoria sighed. “If I were going to all this trouble to come back from the dead to speak to someone, I’d at least make sure to say something helpful. Can’t she be any less cryptic?”

     Clarisse smiled. “Now you sound like Dette,” she teased. “But it seemed like she was... I don’t know, running out of time or something. Towards the end, her voice was fading away, like she couldn’t stay any longer.”

     “So, there’s like a time limit on becoming a disembodied voice after death?” Victoria said with a smile, trying to lighten the mood. She hoped Clarisse wasn’t reading her thoughts at this moment; she didn’t want Clarisse to know how much she doubted her story. She didn’t think Clarisse was lying or being deliberately untruthful, but Victoria did not believe that such a thing was possible.

     Clarisse knew that Victoria did not believe her, but she also knew that it was pointless to try and convince her. Victoria would not be easily persuaded to believe her if there wasn’t a logical explanation.

     “So, what did I miss?” Clarisse asked, gesturing towards the nearby chamber.

     “Linisa just sent everyone to assemble the other faeries, however many there may be, and prepare for our arrival.”

     Clarisse smiled. “They’re a bit behind, aren’t they? So, are they still in there?”

     “Yes, but I think they’re going to come out soon.”

     “In that case, I think we’d better hide.”

     Clarisse quickly cast a spell that made Victoria temporarily invisible. She then cast the same spell upon herself. She didn’t want to rely on such spells too much, because she didn’t want to be weakened before the battle, but in this case they had no choice; as soon as Linisa came out of the room, Clarisse and Victoria would have nowhere to hide.

     A few minutes later, Linisa and the others still had not emerged, but Clarisse and Victoria heard what sounded like someone else moving down the tunnel towards them. They waited with bated breath as a faerie became visible in the tunnel.

     “It’s Dette!” Clarisse whispered. “But I don’t recognize the faeries with her.”

     “Is that an earth faerie? Is it Tenny?” Victoria whispered.

     “No, it’s not Tenny. I would recognize her thoughts....”

     “Dette!” Victoria called, before realizing that Bernadette could neither hear nor see them because of the spells they’d cast.

     Hastily, Clarisse removed the invisibility spell. The faeries in the tunnel stopped abruptly when they saw them. After her initial shock at seeing faeries materialize from thin air, Bernadette recognized her friends and flew towards them at once.

     “What’s going on?” Bernadette whispered. “I thought you would’ve been back by now.”

     Victoria exchanged a glance with Clarisse. “It’s kind of a long story. Clarisse had a vision thingy, and—hey, who are they, anyway?” She looked at the other three faeries.

     “They say they were sent by Fyora. Apparently she got a little tied up with organizing some armies and stuff, so she sent five faeries ahead to see what they could do to rescue us or stop Linisa. This earth faerie is Lyna; she’s Fyora’s new assistant, replacing Linisa. The other earth faerie is Halliana, and the air faerie is Kyra. Everybody, meet two of the other Prophecy Faeries: Victoria and Clarisse.”

     The faeries behind Bernadette seemed rather awed, and remained silent.

     “You said there were five,” Clarisse pointed out. “Where are the others?”

     “They stayed behind to guard the chamber so I could come and find—”

     At that moment, the faint voices issuing from the nearby room ceased abruptly. Immediately, the faeries realized their mistake. Linisa and the other faeries in the chamber had heard their voices.

     The spell shot out of the chamber so fast that it was only a blur of light, but Clarisse was expecting it, and quickly deflected it back into the room. The spell was immediately followed by another as one of the light faeries emerged from the room. “It’s them!” she shrieked.

     Her scream was immediately followed by the blaring of a loud alarm. They realized, too late, that the guards must have implemented some form of magical alarm so that they could alert each other. Linisa was now using the alarm to summon the other faeries.

     The light faerie fired several rapid spells before speeding off down the tunnel, back towards the main chamber. Halliana deftly dodged one of her spells and raced after her. Victoria deflected several spells that were heading for Lyna, who didn’t have room to dodge the spell. Kyra flew straight into the nearby room, looking for Linisa, and a resounding crash ensued. Bernadette and Lyna flew after Halliana and the first light faerie, while Clarisse and Victoria followed Kyra into the nearby room.

     Someone had struck Kyra with a spell, and she had fallen into some of the equipment. Though the spell itself hadn’t done more than knock her out of the air, she appeared to be bleeding from the collision with the equipment.

     Tyrrin took the first opportunity to flee, and bolted for the door. A light faerie took one look at Clarisse and Victoria and followed him, shooting a few quick spells over her shoulder.

     “Cowards!” Linisa roared, rapidly firing bolts of light towards the faeries. Clarisse quickly conjured gusts of air that spun the spells across the room, where they collided with the wall and disappeared. Victoria summoned her energy and conjured enough water to flood the chamber. Sensing what was coming, Clarisse yanked Kyra to her feet and dragged her out of the room just as a torrent of water exploded from Victoria’s hands, cascading throughout the room and filling it with water in seconds.

     Together, Clarisse and Kyra created a wall of wind that sealed off the entry to the room, trapping the water within it. Victoria, who was more at home in the water than anywhere else, held her ground against the flood. Linisa and the other faerie were swept underneath the current and did not resurface.

     From outside the room, Clarisse and Kyra waited to see what the light faeries would do. For several long moments, nothing happened. Two glowing pinpricks of light beneath the water were the only signs of the light faeries.

     Quite suddenly, one of the spots of light began to expand rapidly; as it grew, tendrils of light spread through the water, combining with the second spot of light and growing until it filled the room. It happened so suddenly that Victoria didn’t have time to get out of the way. As the light swept through the water and made contact with her, she let out a scream of pain and collapsed, falling beneath the surface of the water.

     “Look out!” Clarisse cried. She leaped up from the ground and pressed herself against the ceiling. At the same moment, she released her hold on the current of air blocking the door, allowing some of the water to gush out. Kyra imitated her a second later, and the entire torrent surged into the corridor. The light within it glowed threateningly, but there was no sign of the three faeries trapped within.

     Abruptly, a figure burst forth from below, spraying the air faeries on the ceiling with large drops of the golden water. As the water touched their skin, it burned, like intense rays of sunlight. Before they had time to recover, Linisa sped off up the corridor, heading towards the main chamber. Kyra flew off after her.

     “Tori!” Clarisse shrieked, scanning the water for signs of her friend. “Tori!” Clarisse caught a flash of blond hair in the water, and lunged downward. She ignored the burn of the water as she reached forward, grabbed the body in the water, and dragged her out. She realized, too late, that she was holding the other light faerie, who was gasping for breath and sputtering. Clarisse immediately immobilized her but also placed a levitation spell on her that would keep her safely above the level of the burning water.

     Clarisse scanned the water frantically, searching for any glimpse of her friend within its depths. Finally, she gave up on seeing Victoria with her eyes. She closed them and let her powers take hold of her mind. She reached out with her powers, searching for the familiar feeling, the jumble of emotions and thoughts that was unique to Victoria. At last, she felt it—weak, as if she had lost consciousness, but still there.

     Clarisse did not hesitate. She flew down into the water and swam through it, heading towards the water faerie trapped below. The burn of the light against her skin was unbelievably intense, and Clarisse felt her vigor waning as the magic within the water ate away at her strength, but she was unwilling to give up. At last, she found her. Wrapping her arms around the limp body, Clarisse dragged her upwards, using all the strength she had to haul Victoria out of the water.

     Clarisse noticed, as she opened her eyes, that the water was spreading, making its way up the tunnel. She looked at Victoria, who was unconscious but clearly breathing. Clarisse knew that they had to get out of the tunnel and away from the water. Immediately she began to fly up the tunnel after everyone else, never losing her grip on the unconscious water faerie.

     About halfway up the tunnel, well away from the water, Victoria’s eyelids fluttered, and she let out a low moan. Clarisse immediately stopped and flew to the ground, resting Victoria against the wall as she awoke.

     “Thanks, Claire,” she murmured when she opened her eyes.

     “Are you okay?” Clarisse asked.

     “Fine,” Victoria replied, “just a little burnt, I think. What was that, anyway?”

     “A spell of Linisa’s, I guess,” Clarisse said. “I got the other faerie, but Linisa got away. Everyone’s up at the main corridor now.”

     “We’d better go help Dette,” said Victoria at once, “and Tenny too, if she’s back yet.”

     “Can you fly?” Clarisse asked.

     “Yes,” said Victoria, standing slowly and stretching her wings. “Let’s go.”

To be continued...