Bring Me That Horizon, Coda

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Gold ringed eyes darted across the page, reading delicately scrawled words at an inhuman pace. This was huge. One of the final pieces to this long drawn out puzzle finally revealed. But they were all running out of time – as so often is the case with these situations. Each moment not taken doing something is a chance lost. There are too many people to contact, too many parties to inform.

Others will be doing that already, though – the Silent Siren’s report mentions the Queen of Ken and Cunning and the Fey Ascendant herself were the ones to allow the party this groundbreaking secret. It felt strange to Merla, having others do the footwork she used to so readily do herself not two moons ago. Her passion project, the theatre in Daring Heights, had been taking up all of her spare time around her other duties as a new fey monarch. Not to mention all the meetings she had to have with advisors and dignitaries from other Courts, all the parties and appearances she had to make. It was a lot. Yet Merla found she was thriving – her lands were flourishing, growing, strengthening each and every day. She still pinched herself every now and then to make sure her life as it is now wasn’t a dream.

But this report is no fantasy. It could very well be the beginning of a nightmare.

An anchor that crosses three planes.

Why was that ringing a bell? Merla has never been to a place like that before. She would remember it. But someone else, one of her friends perhaps?

It comes to her like a bolt of lighting shot from the dark. Just as quick, she is moving, flying past centaurs and harengon, grung and young treants, fairies and displacer beasts. So many have come to the Court of Harmony, countless fey but also a surprising number of mortals too. Perhaps hearing the newest Fey Noble once used to be like them gives those from the Material Plane hope that can one day become something more.

Flying up to her shoulder are a pixie and a sprite, the only ones who would be bold enough to come so close to the Queen of Virtue and Virtuosity as she zooms across the bright sky.

“My Queen, what is it? Your music is causing the riverbeds to dance,” Cay says with concern.

True enough, below them a small pod of nixies are being tossed up into the air, the froth of the lilac coloured water mirroring the jumping and rolling movements of the stones in the riverbed.

“I’ve never seen it do that before,” May adds, her little hand going to her mouth in worry. She tears her eyes away.

Merla takes one, long deep breath and the river begins to settle back down. The nixies, despite being tossed about mere moments before, continue the swishing movements of the riverdance, the water frothing, a percussion that makes them swim faster and faster.

That was another thing Merla was still not used to. Just like when her mother was in a particularly foul mood and storm clouds would roll in to block the sun over the Summer Court, Merla’s emotions could be seen coming out through the land of the Court of Harmony. There haven’t been many instances so far, but she needed to be careful. She already was known to wear her heart on her sleeve. Now she had a whole Court that could reveal her true emotions.

There was so much she still needed to learn. But first thing’s first.

“May, Cay,” Merla starts as she begins to descend, “tell the Watchers I am not to be disturbed for the next hour. When I come out, be prepared to make a journey to Summer.”

“Yes, your Singingfulness,” they say harmoniously, bowing midair as Merla lands, already striding towards an intricately carved hawthorn door. The two zoom away in opposite directions.

Lumina alights on Merla’s shoulder as she passes through the door. The faerie dragon nuzzles into her neck, which elicits a small smile. But fades quickly as Merla focuses on locking the warded door.

Lumina tilts her head. “I was wondering why the sugar cane trees were suddenly tasting a bit too sweet, and that’s saying something coming from me,” the little faerie dragon chirps.

“Lu, I need you to go find Kruxeral. I must speak with him, but there’s something I have to do first, and there’s not enough time for me to do both. Would you-”

Lumina stops Merla with a tiny, fuzzy lick to her face that erases the tension in her brows.

“So long as you promise to bring back two of those delicious sweet pies from that shop in that town you go to,” she purrs. Lumina’s bright dragon eyes dilate a little. “With extra whipped cream.”

Merla chuckles. “I promise,” she says, giving Lumina a little scritch behind her feathered ear.

Once the faerie dragon has flown out the stain glassed window, Merla latches it closed and the final wards fall into place. The skyward window in the centre of the oval-shaped room lets in the light and warmth from the sun that is refracted down by the use of various shimmering seashells strategically positioned at the top. Each shell changes the light to a different colour, so by the time it reaches the floor where Merla stands there is a spiralling pattern of light beneath her feet. She looks around the room, thinking, as her eyes drift across four objects in there with her.

It is a quiet space. The soft sound of her beating heart and the passage of her breath as she breathes is muffled easily. But other sounds, other notes are much easier to hear in this space. On four platforms are four different instruments, ranging from being large enough to need at least two folk to move it, to tiny enough to carry on one’s belt. The Queen of Virtue and Virtuosity slowly walks over to the smallest one, feeling drawn to it’s rose gold cylindrical shape with violet butterflies and a taffy pink tassel. The last time she had played this instrument was at Nerry’s when she gifted Taffeta a similar beautiful flute. Fey made, the sound it created was said to call to any bird who heard it.

An anchor that crosses three planes.

With habitual certainty, Merla is bringing the golden flute up to her lips to play a scale of trills as she uses the end to trace out a symbol of a chrysanthemum in the air. When she stops the notes become balls of light, floating around the flute, waiting for the message they will carry across the Planes.

“Hello Taffeta! Hope you’re well. Enjoying that fresh sea air?” Merla asks, her voice bright and warm. Then her tone changes slightly. “Heard some news through the grapevine and wanted to ask you something.”

The motes of light fly up and disappear into a mint green coloured beam of light. Merla waits.

Then, from the same beam, light begins to pour like water onto her upturned face and Taffeta’s voice echoes through her head.

“Oh, hello Merla! Good to hear from you. I’ll help if I can – what is it you’re wanting to ask?”

This time, Merla plays a series of lilting notes, their cadence giving the feeling of being on the deck of a ship. “Last year you helped a gold dragon save her eggs – saw Langston. The palace you went to, what was it called? Where was it exactly?”

Again, the motes of light fly up to the mint green coloured beam of light and disappear. Not a moment later, light pours down again, this time flecked with specks of rich brown.

“In the Shadowfell somewhere, I don’t know that it has a name. I know how to get there though. A portal in Xarribia. Why?”

Merla frowns, trying to think if she knows where that is but comes up with nothing. This time when she plays, the notes are short and sharp, like a bow being hit with spray as it cuts through the waves.

“Xarribia – where’s that?” She hesitates for a fraction then decides to go all in. “We know what Langston and Jack are doing. Need to find Corellon’s anchor urgently. It goes through Shadowfell, Material Plane and Feywild.”

With each word a mote of her magic shoots up to the beam of light.

“Where the arrow went through and connected the planes? Yes, I know those places. Some are hard to find, though. Xarribia’s in the Underdark. The-”

Taffeta’s words are cut off. Merla does a quick trill on the flute to pick up the conversation again.

“You were saying?” she asks, then decides to add. “It’s twenty-five words or less.” Merla’s laugh is brief but genuine, despite her ever increasingly serious tone. “You finished with ‘Xarribia’s in the Underdark. The-’”

“I always forget! The Council have maps but it’s five days. Quicker to teleport. Rholor can do it, probably Aurelia too. Need me to come?”

There is no mistaking the contempt when she says the High Diviner’s name, and Merla grimaces. Knowing Aurelia, she is already trying to find out what she can for such information as this would be spreading like wildfire through the adventurers. Gossips one and all. But what can she do to help?

There is a sudden knock at the door – or rather there would have been a knock had this room not been warded against unwanted sound. Being the one who designed and helped create this space – her own version of a “war room” – Merla knew who was at the door and so unlocked it to allow them to enter.

“You wished to speak to me, your Singingfulness,” Kruxeral teases, swooping into a bow. But one glance up to Merla’s face and his playful vibrato is reigned in, concern replacing it in his verdant eyes. He enters and Merla locks the hawthorn door once more, the wards falling back into place.

“Give me a moment, arael’salif*,” she tells him, adding a brief kiss at the end. “I was just finishing up something important.”

Kruxeral inclines his head and hangs back, allowing Merla to Send one last message.

“I’ll speak with the others and let you know. Noted on the location and who to ask. Thank you Taffeta. Summer’s Light watch over you.”

The motes of musical light form a skiff and then sails of light expand as it soars up to that same ray of light to disappear.

Merla carefully places the flute back on it’s plinth.

“What serious thing are you getting involved in this time?”

Merla turns around, stealing herself for what she is about to tell him, knowing he is not going to like hearing it.

“It’s about Langston Farstep and Jack, the Mad Modron. The adventurers in the Dawnlands found out what those two have been up to, what they’ve been doing. It is serious – and seriously dangerous for the three realms that are connected to each other if they get what they want. Not to mention what it could mean elsewhere. And-”

“And you feel compelled to do what you can to try to stop them,” Kruxeral finishes for her, raising an eyebrow.

Merla frowns, the gold ring in her eyes blazing a little brighter. “You know I will not stand by and do nothing whilst some cockalorum, wanna be, entitled man-baby, who is trying to break the Realms because he’s a selfish twatbag tries to- What? What’s so funny?”

Kruxeral’s shoulders shake as he tries to contain his laughter.

“Oh just the colourful language you use when you get impassioned or angry. One could write whole symphonies based off of the music I just heard!” He laughs. “It’s so rare I see this side of you, Merla, and I do love it as much as any other – so long as it is not directed at me.”

She finds herself trying not to smile despite how serious she was trying to be. “Well, the fact remains I need to do some quick prep work before I travel back to Daring to speak with Varis and Baine for sure, maybe even Ghesh and BB – if she’s returned from visiting her family in Faerûn – and Taffeta too. Yes, definitely Taffeta.”

Merla has been pacing, playing with a lock of her hair as she thinks out loud but stops when she feels a warm hand on her arm. Looking down – again, something she has not gotten used to was her ability to change her height – at Kruxeral’s deep green eyes, she finds herself settling again, the music of their love filling her ears.

“I apologise. I thought…” She blushes, embarrassed. “I thought you might try to talk me out of going.”

“Why would I do a thing like that?” Kruxeral asks, taking both of her hands in his. He brings them up to his lips as Merla shrinks down to be the same height as him. She closes her eyes and rests her forehead against his, letting the melody she hears give her strength and comfort. It supports her as well as lifts her up. It does all of that and more – as does the fey holding her in his arms.

When Merla opens her eyes, Kruxeral smiles.

“In my experience, there is nothing in this multiverse that can stop you, Merla. Those fools will not know what’s coming for them.”

She hoped he was right.


*arael’salif – Heartsong (said to someone you love)