Bottomless
From the world of Tales of the Snow Queen
*Note: Apologies in advance. I’ve been out for nearly two weeks dealing with a stomach bug–large family and we all believe in sharing. I got hit last and am still working through the bug (may it die a fiery death!), so I wasn’t able to get this line edited and proofed in time. There will be typos and errant commas, for this I apologize. Especially since this is my favorite short story I’ve ever written. It will go through the proper editing before I send it out as a Subscriber’s Special and publish it through Amazon et al. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this story–warts and all. 🙂
Lyralind hadn’t meant to steal the apple, and she certainly hadn’t meant to send the sky lord and lady into an impossible sleep from which they had no hope of waking.
The problem was that she was a thief, and as such, well, the results spoke for themselves.
The Ruby Thorne, keeper of enchanted apples was nearly the color of her title from her nearly apoplectic rage. “I guard those apples for a reason,” she said, her voice hoarse from all the shouting she’d been doing. “To keep them out of the hands of the likes of you! My gates and walls reach nearly to the sky itself, and my Bartsolo is under direct orders to eat everyone who dares enter but through the hero’s gate. So how, pray tell, did you manage to steal the very thing that will be the ruin of us all?”
Exausted, the Ruby Thorne fell back into her chair, the bright crimson of her wrath fading to a dulled ember.
Lyralind licked her lips as she gathered her thoughts for her defense. She didn’t suppose the Ruby Thorne meant for her to answer her question, and even if she had, it would have been the height of foolishness for a thief to divulge her secrets.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “Truly, I am.”
“Sorry makes no difference,” the sun said, glowering at her from the head of the table. “Through your own selfish actions, you have locked me and the moon out of the sky, trapped the winds in their tower, and brought about the doom of the mortals we have sworn to protect. You’ve even managed to keep the night and the dawn from giving comfort to the mortals. How long, exactly, do you think they will fare against an eternity of nothingness?”
Lyralind frowned. “It isn’t completely my fault. I took the apple, yes, I admit it.” She shot a quick look at the Ruby Thorne who was staring at the ground with the desperate hopelessness of someone who has peered into their doom and found themselves staring back. She sighed.
“Not your fault?” the Emerald Ivy thundered, slamming a fist down on the table. “I suppose it was the lord and his lady who are to blame?”
“I stole the apple,” Lyralind went on doggedly. Sooner or later they’d have to listen, and once they did, they would see reason. “But I didn’t give it to the lord or lady. In fact, I was quite upset when I found out they’d eaten it.” She sent a forlorn thought to the memory of what had truly been an exquisite trinket, and the only one of its kind at the moment.
The Sapphire Stone and Amber Glimmer stared at her as though she were stark raving mad. The sun choked on his words and the moon pounded her brother on the back, glaring at Lyralind.
Night had fainted dead away, and Dawn was too busy trying to revive her that she didn’t have room to yell.
Seeing her opening, Lyralind took a deep breath and plunged in before any of them could spit out their words past their incredulous fury. “It was my pocket, you see. It had a hole in it. Only I didn’t know it had a hole in it until that dratted little gossip swooped in at took the apple the moment it hit the ground. And anyway, none of this would have happened if I had a place of my own to keep things. Pockets can only go so far, and mine are stretched to breaking.” She gestured to the bulging pockets in her vest and trousers.
“You ought to be grateful to that ’dratted little gossip’,” the moon said in measured tones. “Were she not their to care for Sky, its people would be lost completely and our end assured.”
The sun gave his sister a weary look. He, like most of the rest of them, had spent most of the morning shouting insults and accusations. “So there is yet hope?”
The moon sighed and dropped her gaze to her hands folded neatly in her lap. “From what I remember, yes.” She lifted her eyes to give Lyralind a baleful look. “But my book and tapestry are with my stars, and they are trapped in the labyrinth. We won’t be able to get to them until we can get to everyone else locked in Skye.”
The Pearl of Perchance shifted in her seat. She was the only one who hadn’t said a single word from the moment twilight had hurled Lyralind into the hall to face their judgement.
“Dusk will not last long, “ she said, her voice echoed like waves throughout the hall. “She hasn’t the constitution for it. Already there are holes appearing, and I do not like what stares out of them.”
Lyralind shivered. She might be a thief, but even she had heard the tales. The lord and lady had built Skye for a reason. And, as she well knew, walls were built to keep the undesirables out. She didn’t like to think of what was powerful enough, horrible enough, that the lord and lady had needed to take the measures they had.
“What are we then to do?” someone, Lyralind wasn’t sure who, asked, the despair in the question lashing them all in place.
“There will be war,” the Emerald Ivy slumped in his chair and stared at nothing.
All about the hall, faces blanched as the meaning of his words hit them.
War.
There had been a war once, so long ago the details had been forgotten, but the terror and dread had not.
The moon hiccuped a sob and even the sun lost much of his fire.
“What have you to say for yourself?” he asked wearily.
Lyralind furrowed her brow. She’d already spoken her piece, what more had she to tell?
“He means,” the Pearl of Perchance had a grim smile in place, “what are you going to do about it?”
“Do?” Lyralind asked blankly. Wasn’t the root of the whole problem that she had done something in the first place?
The Amber Glimmer darted a quick look at the moon who nodded. “This is your story, and you must finish it.”
“You must right the wrong,” The Sapphire Stone agreed.
“Keep back our doom.”
“Wake the lord and his lady.”
“Free Dusk.”
“And let us get back to our duties.”
The Emerald Ivy looked at his companions with a disbelief Lyralind fully shared. “You realize what you’re asking, don’t you? We would be trusting both our fates and the fates of all to this . . . this thief.” He spat the word out with violent disgust before crossing his arms and muttering dire prophesies to himself.
“We have no choice,” the sun said, resigned.
The moon nodded, her mouth curved unhappily at the corners. “All the stories say it must be so.”
Lyralind waited for someone to smile and for someone else to laugh at what was clearly a preposterous idea. “I’m not a hero,” she said, ignoring the Emerald Ivy’s snort. “I just collect things. Impossible things.” Oh, if only she could have held on to that apple! It was one of the most beautiful impossible things she had ever had the fortune to steal.
“Precisely,” the sun said, a hint of his old fire warming his voice. “And this, perhaps, is the most impossible thing of all.”
“I still think you’re all being uncommonly stupid,” the Emerald Ivy harrumphed.
The sun nodded sharply, frowning. “Noted.”
“You cannot fail,” The Sapphire Stone said, her own power awakening and chasing out the earlier despair.
“Indeed not,” said the Pearl.
“This, then, is your judgement and your task,” the sun said. As he spoke, a golden writ appeared before him, etching his words into the parchment that would never crumble with ink that would never fade so long as the worlds remained. “You must undo this great evil you have brought upon us all. You must find a way into Skye and wake the lord and his lady before Dusk gives way completely.”
Lyralind snapped her mouth shut. There was nothing she could do now, not with the golden writ bearing witness before her and before them all. For the first time in her existence, she agreed completely with the Emerald Ivy. They were sending her on a fool’s errand, but she couldn’t deny the sun’s pronouncement, and her heart had a soft spot and her hands a knack for impossible things.
“Well,” she said, surprised by the plan already taking shape in her mind. “If I’m going to do this, I’m going to need gifts.”
“Gifts!” the Emerald Ivy sputtered, turning a similar shade to the Ruby Thorne.
She nodded, no longer anxious or shaky on the inside. Her feet had a path, her heart a purpose. She was about to pull off the most incredible heist of all time, and the lord and lady couldn’t complain if she happened to acquire a momento of the occasion after she woke them up.
And even if they did, she would be long gone.
“You seek the hero’s tale, after all?” the moon asked.
“Not quite. Something a little more sideways, I think.” Yes, getting past the walls would be difficult, and likely impossible. But she was a thief, not a hero, and wasn’t going to let a little thing like gates or locks to trouble her overmuch.
“What do you want?” The Pearl of Perchance couldn’t quite hide the grin darkening the corners of her lips.
“A bit of night, I think,” Lyralind said.
Dawn squawked indignantly and night waved a hand weakly as she came to. The sun pressed his lips together into a single line.
“Very well. You shall have—“
“And a boon from Perchance.”
“All right—“
“And a pinch the Glimmer’s dust.”
The sun, by this time, was looking severe enough to start several droughts. “Is that all?”
“And three seeds from Ivy,” she finished, giving the Emerald a smug look.
He, in turn, looked as though he was about to explode, and it was only his incredulity at her temerity that kept him both in place and silent.
“That’s four gifts,” the moon said, a worry line between her eyes. “In all the stories, only three are given.”
Lyralind shrugged. “I’m making my own story now. I’m going to need all of that if you want me to succeed. Of course, this being impossible and all . . .”
The sun put his head in his hand as though suffering from something as common as a headache. Lyralind grinned. Today seemed to be ripe with the impossible, and her fingers were getting itchy.
“Very well. Night, Pearl, Amber, Emerald.”
Night nodded, resigned, and Dawn plucked at her cloak, gathering bits and pieces and threads. Once she had a fistful, she held it out to Lyralind. “Will this be enough.”
The thief quirked her mouth as she accepted the wisps. “I was hoping for something a little more substantial.”
Dawn bit off an angry retort when Night held up a hand. “Night, like all darkness, is larger than it appears. And, if properly nurtured, it grows. You have enough to fill a world.”
The sun raised a brow. “Pearl?”
The Pearl of Perchance floated forward, removing an opalescent bead from her necklace. “You have my boon, be wise in how you spend it. It cannot be replaced.”
Lyralind pocketed the pearl, making very sure there weren’t any holes for it to escape from. Next, she tucked in the strands of night. Might as well start growing it.
“Amber Glimmer?”
“I can’t imagine what you’re going to use this for,” she fretted as she opened the pouch at her hip and removed a pinch of her golden dust. “This is powerful stuff, and you need only a grain or two to work mid to minor magics.”
“What about major magics?” Lyralinda asked as she wrapped the dust up in what had once been the Duke of Albernage’s favorite handkerchief.
The Glimmer gave her a cold stare. “Three grains, and no more.”
“Emerald Ivy?” the sun said.
“I fulfill the thief’s request only under duress. Had I my way, there’s an oubliette or two that could use an occupant.” He slapped three tiny seeds into Lyralind’s hand.
“Noted once more,” the sun said with wry amusement. But when he addressed Lyralind, all signs of levity had vanished.
“Do you accept your task?”
“Do I have a choice?” she asked, determined to do what needed to be done without all the ring kissing and kneeling.
The Emerald Ivy roared to his feet, but the sun only put out a hand. “Peace, Emerald Ivy.” Then he turned back to her. “You made your choice when you stole the apple.”
She shrugged. It had been worth a try. “In that case, then suppose I do.”
“Hurry,” the moon said, her eyes on the window. “You don’t have much time. Dusk is doing all she can, but she will be overcome at the last.”
Lyralind sighed. Normally she welcomed complications. They kept her on her toes and only served to sharpen her wit, but even she couldn’t deny the gravity of the situation. “If that is true, then I’ll need help getting to the wall.”
“You found it just fine on your own before,” the Sapphire Stone said. She smoothed her skirts with an air of disdain that almost made Lyralind grin.
“Yes, but my . . . methods are a little roundabout, and seeing how time is of the essence . . .”
The sun sighed as he stood. “I’ll take you.” Then, before she could start congratulating herself, “but remember that not even I can reach high enough to get over the wall.”
***
The flight from the Tower of Leanings was short and more uneventful than Lyralind had anticipated. To her disappointment, the sun didn’t bring out his chariot. Instead, he saddled a rather uninspiring brown horse that didn’t even have the decency to have a flaming mane and tail.
“It would be unwise to attract attention,” he said when he noticed her disapproving glower. Then he pulled her up behind him. “Hold on tight.”
Lyralind barely had time to settle herself before the mare was off at the speed of which, some might conjecture, would outpace shooting stars. Three frantic beats of her heart later found them in the clearing next to the imposing walls of Skye.
“We will not think less of you if you fail,” the sun said as he dismounted gracefully after Lyralind had pitched over the side of the mare’s back and landed in a patch of springy clover. “Of course, many of us do not think much of you to begin with.”
“So I’ve heard,” she muttered as she sat up and checked to make sure she hadn’t left anything essential to herself back at the sun’s stable. As everything appeared to be in order, she got to her feet. “Have no fear, I heartily return the sentiment.”
She walked away from the sun and over to the wall. Most of the stones were firmly in place, though here and there the mortar was beginning to flake away. Higher up, a few of the smaller stones were leaning dangerously forward. It wouldn’t take much to knock them out, but she was still bigger than the hole they would leave behind.
Just to be thorough—she could feel the sun watching her as she worked—she checked to see if her magic rope was still there. To her disappointment, but not her surprise, the golden rope she’d woven out of some discarded hair no one seemed to want wasn’t laying against the wall where she’d left it. However, on closer examination, when she squinted and looked up, she could just make out what might be the ragged ends of a hair rope, provided it had been chewed away by something with sharp teeth and molten breath.
Lyralind shook her head. Such a waste. Yet she couldn’t stop the shiver running up her back. She didn’t want to meet with whatever it was that had killed her rope, now or ever. Surreptitiously, she checked over her shoulder to make sure the sun was still there.
“Argh!” She bit off her cry of surprise when she found the sun directly behind her, but he was too busy regarding the wall to pay her much notice.
“I can’t fly you over the top,” he said, resting a golden brown hand against on of the stones. “Not even rabbit could get up enough speed to scale it.”
“Rabbit?” Lyralind sat down to think. She had a pearl, some dust, some seeds, and some night. Which one of them was going to get her inside the walls?
He nodded back at the mare who was investigating the patch of clover. “The horse.”
“Oh.”
“You won’t be able to tunnel under either,” the sun warned. “The wall extends all the way down to the heart of the earth.”
Lyralind frowned. She couldn’t go over, nor under, yet somehow she needed to get inside. Inside! Her eyes lit up and she carefully gathered the night from her pocket. As Night had promised, it had already begun to grow, and better yet, it had knit itself together so it could flow through her fingers like black water.
She glanced back at the sun. Doubtless he was here to make sure she didn’t run away—as if she could with that golden writ decorating the hall.
“You can go away now,” she said. “I’ve got this sorted.”
He laughed and raised a brow. “This is an impossible feat, and we’ve been here for only the smallest of minutes. Yet you think I would believe such a tale as that?”
Lyralind sighed as she stood. So much for keeping her trade secrets to herself. Still, she was looking forward to the expression on his face when she proved him wrong. “That’s the problem with the whole lot of you. You’ve got no imagination. Even before we left, you were so busy trying to get over the wall that you never thought of going through.”
His stunned silence was all she could have hoped for and more. With smug satisfaction, she shook out her piece of night, relieved to see that it was large enough for her to wrap up in.
“Through?” He touched the wall again, and it did a very convincing job of being completely solid, but she knew something he didn’t.
“Why do you think Night was so taken by vapors today? She likes me only a little more than Ivy.” Probably because Lyralind had outwitted the Night on too many occasions and often sent little notes of thanks, acknowledging that she couldn’t have stolen whatever she’d been after without her.
The sun opened his mouth, but couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
“Dusk had a head cold,” Lyralind went on. She unfurled the night and fitted it against her shoulders, making sure there was enough to cover her head. “Night stuck around a little longer than usual to help him with his duties. She was still in there when the gates all locked.” Lyralind shivered inside. As it was, she had only managed to escape by the skin of her nose.
“You’re saying Night can move through walls?” the sun said blankly.
“No,” Lyralind pulled the night close until she was completely wrapped up inside of it. “But I’m not saying she can’t either.” Then, before she could lose her courage, she squeezed her eyes shut and pushed herself through the wall.
The sensation wasn’t as bad as she feared, but was in nowise pleasant.
Once she’d made it through, and stood gasping on the other side, she found a new appreciation for how the going had made Night so ill. Still, she didn’t have the luxury of going off into vapors. There were worlds to save, and she was the only one who could do it—or so the golden writ said.
For a split second, she could have sworn she’d seen a streak of dun colored gold run past her, but her vision wasn’t exactly reliable at that point.
So she straightened and shook her head until she could see reasonably straight once more.The one thing she didn’t do was remove the night she’d been cloaked in. Glancing around the grounds and manicured courtyards, she couldn’t pinpoint anything that had necessarily changed. But something was quivering along her highly developed thief-sense, and she’d learned long ago not to discount that feeling no matter how much things appeared to the contrary.
Carefully, she inched her way toward the side doors that nearly nobody used anymore. The grounds had a certain sleepy feel to them, which was only to be expected, but as she strained each and every one of her senses, she gradually became aware of a sort of high-pitched hum that brought to mind the sound metal would make if it were shrieking.
A heaviness had also fallen upon the land that couldn’t completely be explained away by the lingering affects of the apple. And save for the small hare sniffing at a patch of clover one courtyard over, the animals and birds were all gone.
Lyralind stopped to rest beside a tree, her breathing labored and sweat dripping down her face and stinging her eyes.
It was only then that she thought to look up.
What she saw nearly stopped her heart. Outside the walls, she noticed a few places higher up where a few of the smaller stones were either on the verge of, or had already, abandoned the wall altogether. But inside the walls, the picture became horrifyingly clear.
The gaps were not, as Lyralind had earlier supposed, empty. Instead, each had something dark and monstrous stuffed inside it. That, in and of itself, would have been bad enough, but things were about to get a lot worse if she didn’t do something soon. For each monster wiggled and scraped and clawed at the hole it was corked into. Each movement made the hole a very little bit bigger, but it wouldn’t be long until the monsters had widened their holes sufficiently to descend upon the grounds like a cloud of evil locusts.
For a heartbeat, Lyralind’s mouth went dry and she forgot to breathe. The impossibility of the situation nearly crushed her with its insistence that nothing she could do would forestall that which was to come.
And the monsters jutting through the walls were definitely coming.
Just as she was about to lose her nerve completely, her heart let off a spark that burned through the fog of despair cradling her.
What kind of thief was she if she let a little thing like can’t, couldn’t, impossible, and we’re all going to die horrible deaths get in the way of doing what needed to be done?
“An ounce of prevention and all that,” she muttered as she carefully removed a single grain of the Glimmer’s precious dust. She nearly made the mistake of wishing to be invisible herself, but certain stories were still fresh in her mind, and well she’d learned over her lifetime that magic had its own peculiar sense of humor. “Allow this cloak to make its wearer invisible.”
She placed the grain on the sleeve of her cloak and held her breath. For a moment, she wasn’t sure she hadn’t just wasted the Glimmer’s gift. But just as she was trying to decide whether or not to risk using a second grain, her cloak of night grew dimmer and dimmer until it had faded completely away.
Lyralind snapped her mouth shut and determined that once she got out of this—and saved everyone in the process—she was going to have to visit the Glimmer’s house on a dust collecting expedition.
“All right,” she whispered to herself. “Don’t think, just walk. You belong here. You aren’t important enough to notice. Just part of the setting, really.”
By the time she made it to the side door, she nearly collapsed on the flag stones from the exertion. Either she was horribly out of shape or something was horribly wrong. Whichever it was, she sincerely hoped it would be easier going once she was actually inside the castle.
Out of old habit, she eased the latch open, wishing she’d thought to bring a little bit of oil or fat to ensure the hinges didn’t tell on her. To Lyralind’s relief, the door swung open silently, and she was in and through without a second thought.
The inside of the castle was grim and full of twilight. Where usually burned fires to warm and brighten the halls and corridors, only cold ash remained. The air was crowded and stuffy and didn’t allow sound to filter properly through it. Lyralind took extra care not to make noise, as what noise was able to be heard came out twisted and dim like the whisper of night and the hush of conversation just out of reach.
Holding her breath and nearly running, she made her way back to the small chamber where the lord and his lady had had their ill-fated apple turnover. She slipped into the room like the back of a whisper, but to her dismay, the room was completely empty of either lord or lady.
Lyralind couldn’t stop her cry of dismay as she stepped into the room and slid the hood of her cloak off her head. She had been so sure the hard part would be getting into the castle, that once she did that, everything else would fall into place.
“I have been expecting you,” a voice like old, moth eaten velvet said. Lyralind blinked and noticed a hare sitting placidly in the lady’s chair watching her with button-bright eyes.
“Why is that?” Lyralind asked, her thief sense warning her that having three or four alternate escape routes would shortly come in handy.
The hare yawned and stood up on its hind legs. “Because you never were one who could leave well enough alone. It is interesting though, that when the worlds hang in the balance, our exaulted leaders send not a warrior nor a sage, but a thief.”
Lyralind frowned. The hare’s voice sounded very much like one would expect a hare to sound, but there was something maddeningly familiar with the way it spoke.
“What? No witty retort? No perfect innocence? No bluster or boasting?” The hare stretched taller still, a bit like furry toffee. It was then that Lyralind saw the tiny golden key hung round about its neck by a bit of ruby ribbon.
She narrowed her eyes. The mannerisms, the ribbon, they were were far too familiar to be anything else.
“I’ve come to wake the lord and his lady,” she said without preamble.
The hare nodded as though this could only be expected. “And I am here to stop you.”
“I see.” And for the first time, she really did. And it bolstered her spirits to know her dislike of the lady’s wretched little serving woman hadn’t been without reason. “I suppose you hope to manners me to death, or perhaps you plan on biting me with your little furry teeth?”
The hare gave her a most unladylike snarl. “I need only keep this key from you. For without it, you have no hope of finding either of them.”
Lyralind opened her mouth to ask exactly how the hare planned on doing that, but it was already gone in a streak of dun-colored gold, and she cursed herself for not thinking to close the door.
With a sigh, she pulled the hood back over her head and went after the hare. This, of course, was the easy part, for the hare could not resist do all she could to nettle Lyralind by shouting biting little insults at her so often that it was easy to know where the hare was at any given moment. The hard part was that by the time she got there—and despite the cloak of invisibility—the hare was already gone.
After a few moments of this, Lyralind stopped to inspect a thought that had been doing its own needling. At this rate, the monsters caught in the wall would have wiggled their way free before she caught the hare—
The blood drained from her face as she finally understood the hare’s game. It was a classic case of misdirection, and one Lyralind ought to have seen from the beginning as she had used this tactic often enough.
The hare wasn’t trying to keep the key away from her, she was trying to keep her busy long enough for the demons to work their way completely through the wall.
Biting down on her frustration, she dug into her pocket and pulled out another precious grain of dust.
“Find and beguile the hare into staying put,” she murmured, and then dropped it. The grain sparkled for a moment before winking out. Trusting that it would accomplish the job, Lyralind hurried off a little sideways in the direction the hare was busy hurling insults at both Lyralind’s profession and her parentage.
When she got to the main hall, the hare was still there, dashing left and right upon the dais where the lord and his lady heard petitions. The hare’s nose quivered frantically and the mad gleam in her eye warned Lyalind not to get close enough to make acquaintance with the hare’s rather large teeth.
She turned around and made a slight detour to the kitchens to pick up one of the longer serving trays before she approached the hare that was still running back and forth so quickly, she might as well have been running in place.
“You’re never going to catch me,” the hare screeched. “I am faster than five winds and twice as clever!”
Without further ceremony, Lyralind introduced the tray to the hare’s skull with a resounding bong! The hare collapsed to the ground, but even unconscious, her nose quivered faster than ever and she kicked out her paws as though she was still running.
Lyralind grinned. She’d been wanting to do that since the moment she’d first laid eyes on the lady’s new serving lady.
She tugged the ribbon loose and snatched the key. Then, before she went to find the lord and his lady, she went to the window and threw it wide open. A number of monsters were nearly through, with more of them coming.
Lyralind fetched the handkerchief holding the dust, and with not a little reluctance, emptied it into her palm. “Bind them in place and hold the wall.” Then, against the Glimmer’s better judgment, she blew the dust out the window.
Then she turned and ran from the hall. This key, so far as she knew, only opened one door. And, of course, it was the only door in the highest tower. She didn’t know how long the Glimmer’s dust—no matter how potent—would last, and she was honest enough to acknowledge that neither she nor the world really wanted the monsters to be her problem.
By the time she made it to the door, her lungs were bands of fire and dark specks clouded her vision. She put her shaking hand to the door, and on the third try, managed to fit the key into the lock and turn it.
Lyralind stood on the threshold, fighting just to stay upright. But the sight of the lord and his lady reclining on couches, fast asleep, allowed her to put one foot in front of the other.
Again.
And again.
And again.
Numbly, for she could no longer feel her fingers or her toes, she dug out the pearl Perchance had given her. The cool stone was solid water in her hand and gleamed with a radiance Lyralind would have coveted at any other time.
For now, though, she was tired enough that she just wanted to finish her task and go home to sleep for a season or two.
It was only now, rolling the pearl about her palm, that Lyralind realized she hadn’t the slightest idea how to work the magic. Receiving a boon was all well and good, but how, exactly, did one go about collecting it?
Hoping against hope, she tried the magic she’d used with the dust. “Wake the lord and lady.”
The pearl did nothing that was outwardly unpearly, which meant the lord and his lady were still stuck in their enchanted slumber.
Despite her momentary reservations, Lyralind tried again, this time blowing against the pearl after she’d issued her command. The pearl rolled with her breath and clacked against the floor, but neither the lord nor his lady moved. In fact, the lord’s snoring deepened.
Lyralind bit back a cry of frustration. She hadn’t come this far to lose everything now. She glanced out the window where what could only be described as golden sparkles held the shadow monsters in place. But even as she watched, the sparkles were dimming, and it wouldn’t be long before their magic failed altogether.
“Blast you six ways past moonrise, Pearl of Perchance,” she growled. “I want the boon you promised.”
“No need for cursing,” Perchance said as the pearl she’d given Lyralind unfolded into the shining Pearl herself. “You had only to ask.”
It was only because exhaustion had frayed her far past feeling much of anything very deeply that Lyralind didn’t tell the Pearl exactly what she thought. Instead, she ignored the sparking of her temper and settled on the task at hand.
“For my boon, I’d very much appreciate it if you would wake the lord and his lady.”
Perchance glimmered a smile and walked over to the couches. “I’ll do what I can.”
Lyralind eyed the plump chair next to the hearth with regret. It practically promised it would be every bit as comfortable as it looked. But her task hadn’t yet been completed, and she couldn’t allow herself to rest until it had.
“Rise, my lord,” Perchance commanded as she took the lord of Skye by the hand. With her other hand, she made a watery, wavy sort of motion, and a sea-colored glow surrounded the lord.
Then she plucked another pearl from her necklace and dropped it onto his face. Instead of bouncing off, it glowed against his forehead before seeping into his skin like water.
A moment later, he sneezed and opened his eyes. “Where am I?” he asked blearily.
“You’re safe, and that’s all that matters,” Perchance said.
“One down, one more to go,” Lyralind muttered.
“I’m afraid the boon was sufficient to awaken only one,” she said as she turned around. “And even that required a little extra magic.”
Horror sunk in through the torpid fog clouding Lyralind’s mind. “So the lady will sleep indefinitely.”
Perchance gave her a weary smile. “It was a rather strong enchantment, but no. True love’s kiss should be sufficient in this case.”
Lyralind glanced out the window. She could hardly see the specks anymore—and wouldn’t have been able to see them at all if she hadn’t known they were there.
“If that’s what it will take, then you better get on with it. I’ll see what I can do about,” she gestured to the monsters grinning through the gaps in the wall, “them.” Then she thought of the stairs upon stairs she would have to face if she wanted to get to the courtyards. “I don’t suppose you might . . .”
Perchance nodded. “Just keep this between you and I.”
She waved a hand at Lyralind and then turned back to the lord who had managed to sit up. “I’ll explain in good time, my lord, but for right now, we really need your help.”
Lyralind had only a moment to catch her breath before Perchance’s magic whisked her away. She landed in a crumpled heap in the center courtyard, and her cloak of night shivered away into a puddle of nothing.
She didn’t have time to complain about shoddy workmanship, for now that she was completely visible, she found she’d captured the attention of all of the monsters caught in the wall. They grinned at her and redoubled their efforts.
The Glimmer’s dust held for a moment, before that, too, failed. The creatures howled with delight as they set to work on the wall once more.
“This had better work, Ivy,” she said as she pulled the last gift from her overworked pockets. How three wrinkled seeds had any chance of holding the walls, she had no idea and no energy left to worry about. Besides, these were of Ivy and might work by the power of sheer cantankerousness.
“Hold them in place,” she called as she hurled the seeds toward the walls with the last of her remaining strength. Then, just to be sure, “Forever.”
The seeds fell to the ground and burrowed deep into the soil. Then, because there was no one to insist on obeying the rules, the ivy grew as fast as a blink, twining up the walls and wrapping about the creatures as though they were no more than ordinary protrusions.
The monsters howled as the ivy closed round about them, but as Lyralind had long ago learned, screaming curses and promising threats rarely stood in the way of powerful magic. Indeed, the ivy grew with such enthusiasm that it soon buried the stone beneath its layers of leaves.
The only sign that all had not been as it should were the bumps of demon faces grimacing out of the ivy.
Lyralind collapsed to the ground, too tired to notice whether or not she was comfortable. The cloudy haze of exhaustion had nearly totally covered her mind in a thick fog and the dark specks dancing across her vision grew larger.
Somewhere behind her, she heard the vague sound of footsteps.
Someone gasped.
“Oh, my!” said the Lady.
“I can see I’m going to have my work cut out for me,” the Lord said with a yawn.
“Our thief has a reputation for being both clever and thorough,” Perchance said with what might have been the tiniest amount of pride.
“Still,” the Lord said, “they are a bit ugly and unsettling, are they not?”
“I dunno,” Lyralind slurred as sleep crept in. “I think they’d make lovely gargoyles.” Then all went dark as sleep took over completely.
***
When she awoke, she was back in the hall with the golden writ hanging suspended over her head. The lord and lady were seated in the center of the row of chairs, and everyone looked fairly somber.
Lyralind yawned and stretched to her feet. She gestured to the writ. “I suppose I’ve fulfilled my task adequately?”
The lord nodded.
“There is still the matter of the apple,” the sun said, giving her a stern look.
“I just saved everyone and everything,” Lyralind said, amazed, “and you’re still going to hold one trifling theft against me?”
Ivy choked and sputtered while the lord gave her a tired look. “I wouldn’t call stealing—“
“—Collecting—“
“—The apple of [x] and putting everyone and everything else trifling.”
“So you’re going to punish me?” she asked dully. She ought to have expected it, really. It didn’t matter that she’d fixed everything. She wasn’t one of them and never had been. “It wasn’t my fault that the serving woman was a traitor.”
“No,” the lady said. “And for my part, I am sorry I did not see what she was up to from the beginning.”
“Yes,” the moon glimmered a smile, “it seems I owe you an apology as well.”
Lyralind gave the sun a pointed look. He quirked his lips to keep his grin from escaping and nodded. “So noted.”
“There isn’t a punishment sufficient for what you’ve done,” Night snarled, and Lyralind was happy to see she was back to her healthy, grouchy old self.
“Nor,” Perchance interjected quietly, “is there a reward.”
“You are a bit of a conundrum,” the lord said. “And after much thought, we have decided to give you both an offer and a gift.”
Lyralind folded her arms, immediately on guard. She wasn’t quite so foolish as to think she was going to like either the offer or gift without reservation. “I’m listening.”
“We would like to offer you a place working with the Ruby Thorne,” the lord began.
Lyralind stifled a chuckle. So that’s why the Thorne was redder than usual.
“You would work to keep others as talented as yourself from being able to slip in and steal any of the other apples.”
“All right.” Accepting the offer would be painful in more than one way. Thorne had about as much humor and imagination as a particularly irritable slug, and Lyralind didn’t exactly relish in the thought of sharing some of her trade secrets, but what choice did she have? Besides, the monsters were still fresh enough in her memory to make an otherwise unpalatable job a little more bearable. “And the gift?”
The lady smiled at her as though they were sharing a secret. “The sun tells us that all of this might not have come to pass if your pockets had not been stretched so thin.”
“Or if her fingers weren’t sticky as honeyed molasses,” Ivy grumbled.
“And there is the matter of your other gift—the bit of night.”
Lyralind furrowed her brow. “I thought it got destroyed.”
“Transformed, more like it,” Night snapped.
“I think,” the lady said gently, “that you will find it suits your purposes admirably. What it has become is a sea of sorts that appears to be quite bottomless. It should be able to hold everything even you can come up with to store within it.”
Lyralind frowned. She wasn’t stupid enough to not hear what wasn’t being said. This “bottomless sea” was in a courtyard in Skye where the lord and the lady would be able to keep a careful eye on everything she did, anything she brought back home. But Night and Ivy were looking a little too smug for a little babysitting to be the only price.
“What’s the catch.”
“The essence of night is to be blind, to forget—“
Lyralind snorted. Of all of them, Night had the longest memory.
Night glared at her before continuing. “You may store your ill-gotten gains—“
“—Collections.” She was going to be quite firm on that point.
“Collections,” Night spat, “but you will not be immune to the effects of the magic.”
“So I’ll lose my sight and my memory?” her voice hitched at the end. Surely the lord and the lady couldn’t be that cruel.
“To protect everyone—yourself included—you will forget you are a thief every time you walk into the sea,” the lord said.
Right as Lyralind’s heart cracked in two—for her choice in accepting either the offer or the gift was nothing more than illusion—the lady spoke once more. “Yet even the magic of the night, with all the power of Skye, cannot make you forget your true nature. You may not remember Lyralind, but your heart will never forget who or what you are.”
Lyralind sighed. Not so bad as being thrown into an oubliette for the remainder of her life—and as an immortal, that would be a very long time—yet, at the same time, it was infinitely worse.
“I don’t suppose we could all just live and let live?”
“No!” Ivy thundered. The others remained silent, but they also remained unmoved.
“Fine,” Lyralind said. Maybe it wouldn’t be as bad as she thought. If they were going to take everything away, she wouldn’t be any use to Thorne. “I agree. May I go now?”
The lord nodded. “You may.”
Lyralind sighed again before she turned to the sun. “I’m going to need a ride.”
***
This time the sun was happy enough to drop her off at the gate without feeling the need to stick around, which was good for everyone involved. For, in going through her pockets to make sure she had all of her most precious collections, Lyralind had found a single grain of the Glimmer’s dust that had hidden in the corner of the handkerchief.
She strode through the gate and nodded at the gargoyles snarling at her from their lofty places among the ivy. As she passed by a bush growing a flower unique to Skye that looked part five-petaled rose, part diamond, she snapped off a flower and continued to the bottomless sea.
The dark waters glimmered without the wetness inherent to water, and in a strange way Lyralind hadn’t expected when she’d received her sentence, the bottomless sea was a bit like coming home.
She held up the flower and began stripping it of its petals one by one.
“I wish to hear my heart over my mind,” she said as she dropped the first petal into the not-quite-water. It trembled on the surface for a moment before sinking away. But though it had disappeared, she had felt the magic take. Encouraged, she went on—one wish for one petal.
“I wish to always find myself again, no matter how long it takes. I wish to always find and keep the impossible. I wish my treasures to be safe. I wish to remember each treasure as I need it.”
With only the heart of the flower left, she hurled that, too, into the waters. “This I simply wish to keep to remember.”
Then, before anyone could stop her, she held out the very last grain of the Glimmer. “Take this sea to the outermost reaches of the world that’s improbable to find and impossible to get to.”
She curled her fingers into her palm so as not to let the grain escape. Then, as someone sounded the alarm over the magic she had just wrought, Lyralind the thief stepped into the waters and they both disappeared as the night closed over her head.