Disclaimer: I don't own CCS. I never have and I never will. There, done. ^__^
Summary: It is believed that a coin cast into a wishing well grants wishes. With a small splash, the coin lands in the water, slowly sinking to the bottom. Syaoran tossed his coin in and asked a wish... and he got an answer. Thing is, was it the right one?
Notes: And this chapter is finally off my back. It's taken so long to get into gear again, so I'm just going to leave it as it is. I hope you guys enjoy it... And yes, this has been revised. This chapter, however, is a new one. I'm sorry to those who weren't confused, no the story has not ended. It will be a while. Meanwhile, enjoy the new chapter.
Wishing Well ~ Sealing of Stone
"I need to talk to her..." Mayare whispered.
Shika stared over at Mayare. "Did something happen between you two?" she asked. "I don't mean to intrude, but something, I don't know what it is, seems to be forced between you and my daughter. Did I miss something?"
Mayare's eyes were distant. "It's just something that concerns the other two angels and me. Salyra is one of them, did you know that? I made her one when another grew too old, or wasn't strong enough to hold down the reins of the Asyliah Realm. That's Taiaha's domain now." She stared at the boundaries of the world. "I would've been trapped there, had you not stared me away. It is a dangerous place. Celestial angels are meant to keep everything in there in check, but sometimes, even we have difficulty. I fear for your daughter, Shika."
"I know..." Shika whispered. "Something seems to be corrupted between all of you, and I know that you might have some idea of what it is. I know I do, but I want to hear what you know first. You've known those two a lot longer than I have and there might be some reason of it that I am unaware. I have been following all of you around for some time, and my only wish is to keep this world safe."
"I understand where you're coming from, and yes there is some tension, mainly between myself and the other celestial angels. I don't quite trust one of them anymore, and I am afraid that Salyra's judgement has been clouded with doubt. She doesn't trust me anymore, and she tends to turn more to Taiaha than me anymore, even though I was the one that found her and rescued her from all other things. I don't know what to do with her anymore." Mayare shook her head sadly. "It just all seems so hopeless..."
"Yes, it may do, but you can't give up on anything. I'm sure that Salyra will come around something, as unreasonable as she may be. You have her companion with you, do you not? Maybe he can get through to her in a way that we can't. The bond of their friendship might be enough to get through to her. Though you've raised her from the time when I was unable, she still might have a slight mistrust about her that you might be unable to break through. Try her companion. I believe he's an eagle, isn't he?" Shika asked.
"Yes, he's an eagle, and one that is more likely to be able to find her. I can sense that she is somewhere nearby, but I don't know where Wing is. He was with us up until about fifteen minutes ago and then he disappeared. He may have gone to find Salyra, but somehow I really doubt that. I had just healed him, and he was unfit to fly very far. Yet he insisted on following me. If we could only find him..." Mayare whispered.
Shika racked her mind for some sort of tracking spell, and she found one that might just work. "Mayare, I think I have something. I used this to find you and Salyra, but I don't know if it'll work on magical creatures. I think it's worth giving it a go though, since it's the only thing we have that might even remotely work. Would you like to hear it? I need someone who knows the creature relatively well, and I assumed that you would, since you seem to be accustomed to this bird. I don't know him very well at all."
"Yes, I know Wing well, and I remember his aura like it was my own. I should be able to track him, if this spell works. Are you sure that it will?" Mayare was doubtful.
"Positive. I just need a few things."
"Like what?"
"I need you to concentrate, and remember a picture or image of my daughter or this eagle of hers. Since he is her companion, her vibrations should run all through him and we should be able to pinpoint his exact location like that. This is a difficult spell to perform at the best of times."
"It's still worth a shot," Mayare stated. "Just let me get a grip, and try to summon up an image. If you keep talking to me while I don't have it, you could stray my thoughts, and that will only make this take longer, and I know that we both don't want that."
"But please hurry..." Shika whispered. Her eyes strayed to the boundaries of the Asyliah realm. She could see the evil swirling spirits on the outside, struggling to get out. Had she not rescued Mayare from them, they could have taken over her body, and used her magic to do their evil bidding. That would just have caused disaster for everyone. They couldn't have let that happen. Shika was grateful for her quick thinking.
She didn't really like that realm much, having been in there before. That was how she had died, and those spirits had claimed her body and cast her own spirit out of the realm, so that she had no chance of being able to go back and claim what was rightfully hers. She hoped that Mayare could help her in some way after they had found Salyra and Wing.
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"Where are we going, Taiaha?" Salyra asked. She was still distrustful of him, but she had relinquished her self-control for a moment, and decided to follow him to see what was happening. There was clearly something going on within her fellow celestial angel, and she would probably be the only one that was able to find out.
Mayare had always distrusted him, but Salyra had seen no reason to that. True, the healer didn't trust many people, but she had had plenty of experience with Taiaha in her time, and had found no reason. He had been all but nasty to her, and she was grateful that he treated her like an equal and not as inferior to him, like how she felt Mayare treated her sometimes. She knew the healer didn't mean to, but it still hurt.
"I'm not going to tell you yet, you know that this is a surprise," Taiaha stated.
"Taiaha, you know that I hate surprises," Salyra replied, "and this is no exception."
"Trust me, this is worth it." Taiaha hid his face from her, feeling a little guilty about what he was about to do. "We're nearly there, don't worry."
Salyra's eyes narrowed a fraction and she furrowed her eyebrows. Something didn't seem quite right. It was times like this that she wished Wing or Mayare were here. But that wasn't going to be likely, because she had told Wing to stay away, and Mayare to leave her alone. She was suddenly regretting her bad mood.
"Let me go, Taiaha," Salyra whispered. "I want to go back."
"I can't let you go back. We've already come so far," Taiaha stated. He tightened his grip on her arm and Salyra cried out with pain.
"Don't do this, Taiaha, don't. You don't need to. I don't deserve this. What have I ever done to you?"
"It's not what you have done, it's what you will do that will hurt me. I'm sorry; I just can't take any chances."
"But I don't get it..." Salyra whispered. Tears began leaking out of her eyes.
"We're here now," Taiaha said, "stay still."
Salyra's eyes widened in horror. "No! Not the Asyliah Realm!" she cried. "Please, no!"
"We have to..." Taiaha whispered. He dragged her through the boundaries, ignoring the spirits that threatened to advance on them. He knew that they would not touch them.
He tossed Salyra to the hard ground, and brought out his angel staff. Except now, to Salyra, he looked now more like a fallen angel than ever.
"Wing!" she yelled. "Help me!"
And miles away, Wing heard his companion's call.
"He's not going to be able to help you now." Taiaha was undergoing a transformation. His body became covered in fire, and the aura of light that had used to surround him became dank and dark. Instead of the usual white, it was now black, and Salyra could see that something was going horribly wrong.
He was changing.
She was right; he was a fallen angel now. Something had happened to him to make him this way, and she wished that she could find out, only she knew that she wouldn't have a chance, because everything was going so wrong, and he wouldn't give her any time once he had finished his full transformation. Why couldn't she have seen through his façade? Was she really that dense? Was this why Mayare hadn't trusted Taiaha like Salyra had thought she should have?
How could Mayare have sensed this? She knew that Mayare had more power than herself, but it wasn't by much. Salyra had been born a powerful magic-user. It ran in her family's blood, or so Mayare told her.
Had Mayare just been born with an innate sense of being able to determine light from dark? It certainly seemed that way, and now Salyra was regretting her decision to cast off Mayare. She should have listened to her more... if only Mayare could forgive her.
Knowing the healer, she probably would. But Salyra wasn't so sure.
The transformation that she could see taking place broke her heart. She didn't want to see her friend like this; she had thought that there had been some good in him, something that she could save. Maybe she was wrong, maybe he had just been with the dark the whole time. It wasn't worth going through all of this again; she wouldn't be able to trust anyone else again.
They had used her. He had used her.
And now she was going to pay the price for her actions dearly. If only Wing was here, he could have helped her. Where was he? She had called him, and he wasn't coming. She understood.
Taiaha was almost finished transforming, and she could see traces of the evil, twisted being that he had become. It was something that was going to leave her scarred for life.
He was going to finish her off. She knew it, and there was nothing that she could do to stop it.
With one final blow, Taiaha's transformation was complete. Even his angel staff was completely changed. Black, like his soul now. There was nothing she could do, and she wished that she could reverse this, but it was not meant to be.
She bowed her head in the fore-shadow of coming annihilation. And she rose to her feet.
"There is a chance for you, you know, Salyra. You are a strong user, and there is much that I could teach you. I don't know if you'll want to join me or not, but know this, you choose to come with me, and you live, you don't, and you die. It's your choice. These spirits will come to claim your body, like they did to your mother all those years ago," Taiaha said.
"I choose..." Salyra trailed off. Her mind ran through all the outrageous possibilities. Was there some way that she would be able to defeat Taiaha without threatening anyone else's life? She didn't think so. She could tell that he had become much more powerful than he had been before.
His soul must've been very dark for all of that to happen. She didn't know whether she could trust him anymore, after all, he had said this stuff about her mother and she didn't know if he knew her mother at all.
Even Salyra couldn't remember her own family. She didn't know what they looked like, but she knew that they must've born some resemblance to her. Otherwise, she wouldn't be here, and Mayare wouldn't have said that she would tell her about her family.
Salyra had heard many stories, but she didn't know what was fact and what was fiction.
Sometimes she could feel something following her, but often, she had looked behind her and seen nothing. Maybe she was just oblivious to it.
This was going to be her downfall, if she didn't speak quickly. She could feel it.
What would she gain from joining him?
Nothing.
"...not to follow you," Salyra said strongly. "I am a celestial angel. I have the right to great magic and power. I harness the power of good, and I could never harness the power of evil. It's who I am. I don't know what happened to make you this way, Taiaha, and I wish that I could find out, so that I could help you work through it. You said that you brought me here because of what I would do. Did that mean that I was going to overthrow you on your path to great power?"
"Yes, you would've. But being at the stage that you are now, you have not enough to defeat me. For I am the strongest that this world and the next have known. No one can beat me."
"Well, in that case, Taiaha," Salyra said, narrowing her eyes and bringing out her own angel staff, "I'll be the first to try."
"The first of many, Salyra," Taiaha said, laughing. "You will be the first to fail. Your powers are pitiful compared to mine. It will be your downfall."
"I would rather die trying that be your loyal minion. As long as there are people who are willing to go against you, my spirit will live on. I would rather see that, than see the world suffer at your hands. There will be some suffering for some time, but I will live on, Taiaha. You will not be able to destroy me. You may be able to destroy my body, but you will never be able to break my spirit. I will not allow it. I've done too much now to let you get further ahead," Salyra clasped both hands onto her staff and then held it up into the air. "You will never defeat me!"
"I admire your courage, Salyra, and your determination, but you need more than that. You also need great power, which I have in abundance." Taiaha's mouth curved into a smirk. "And unfortunately, you do not."
"Like I said, I'll go down trying, Taiaha!" Salyra yelled, and light burst out of the orb from her angel staff. The spirits around them cowered and fled. They didn't like light.
Taiaha merely laughed. "You expect that puny glow to be able to defeat me? Ha! Unlikely!"
Salyra gritted her teeth. Taiaha couldn't see her real objective with the light. It was so bright that it was pinpointing exactly where she was. She could feel that Wing was nearing closer to the Asyliah Realm, and that he would need guidance in order to be able to find out exactly where she was. He was only minutes away now, and if she could keep this up, without Taiaha destroying her, maybe she would have a chance.
There was power that she had hidden deep within Wing when she was just a young girl. She had been afraid of her reserves, and had transferred it because she was afraid of what it might do to her.
Wing had promised her that he would keep it safe and give it to her when she needed it.
Salyra hadn't been aware of the fact, that at the time, Wing had foreseen this battle; he had foreseen that Taiaha would turn on them, and betray all of them. Hence why he had never used any of the magic that Salyra had given him, not even to heal himself, he had always gone to Mayare for that, and she had been only too willing,
She knew about the reserves too, and she had never extracted them, for fear that Salyra might need them at sometime too.
Taiaha didn't know about these reserves, and Salyra had kept him in the dark about it the whole time. She didn't quite remember how powerful they had been, since she was only about seven when she transferred them. But she remembered enough to know that they would probably help her greatly in this battle.
She could see the silhouette of her companion coming into view, and he glowed with bright light, absorbing some of the energy that radiated from Salyra's staff.
Her heart leapt with joy. She would be able to help!
Then Taiaha noticed that something was wrong.
Before Salyra knew what was happening, Taiaha had hit her with a powerful spell. She felt rooted to the ground, and she looked down. With horror, she realised that Taiaha was turning her into a statue. No... she thought. This can't happen. I need to protect the others.
Her legs were completely stone now, and she realised that there was nothing that she could do.
Her quick thinking kicked in. Twisting her upper body before it became completely solid, she glared fiercely up at Taiaha, and she lifted her staff as high as she could.
Muttering a spell, she fired it at Taiaha.
There... that binding spell should stop his powers from taking over for at least a couple of years. I just hope that it works... Salyra last thought before the stone covered her head and she became a full-fledged statue.
"And here it starts..." Wing whispered and took off from the Asyliah Realm, never to be seen again.
Never give up hope, for it will arrive soon. Sometimes you just have to be patient.
To be continued...
Well, there's the end of that.
Sorry about the LONG wait. I hope this makes up for it.
We see the lovely CCS gang next chapter. ^_____^
And thanks to all the reviewers as well. I never thought I'd ever get 100 reviews...
--Kari