*Sorry I shortened the discovering of the Rune-Gods thing, but I didn't really want it to take all year, you all know how the Rune-Gods were discovered. I mean really, I've had enough trouble updating this fic as it is. ^.^ Hope you enjoy*

Chapter Four: Revival

His attack came as a spiral of blue and white magic toward Umi, who was defenseless. She screamed and tried to shield herself with her hands, but Clef's shield came too late, and the attack drove her into the ground.

'Water Knight, do not let him win, fight back,' a voice ordered, and she struggled to stand, summoning her sword as she did. She lowered her hands and crossed them over her chest; her eyes flashed open and in them shone bright blue Dragon eyes and wings that flew toward an unknown enemy.

"Those eyes," he whispered and tried to attack her once more, but this time Clef was ready and shielded her.

"Umi, go to the voice in your head," he instructed.

"No, I won't leave them here," Umi refused, but he glared and threw her with a hand toward the Horses. She turned back and glared at him but went and jumped on her Horse anyway. "Yah!" she kicked the mare into a canter and headed toward the waves that were once again crashing in her head.

§§§~~~

"You let her go, stupid," he muttered. "She'll do the same to you, her and that damned Dragon. You will serve my sentence."

"I've lived four hundred years with the sentence," Clef told him vehemently. "My form, my constant protection of the Pillar. But the Pillar system has been abolished and my sentence has been ended. I chose the right path, Ferio and Lantis took the course of the light, and they have been reunited. Silvius, you will die because of your choice."

"She will die for betraying me!" he shouted and raised his hand.

"And in betraying you she betrayed herself!" Ferio shouted back and drew his sword.

"She has paid her price as well Silvius, she is still paying it, but it will end very soon. She chose the right path, so did the other two. They betrayed themselves, but they did what had to be done for the good of Cephiro. Only you chose the selfish road," Clef raised his staff and closed his eyes.

"She said she loved me!"

"She once did," Clef whispered. "Then she realized the full extent of your hate, and she had to turn from you. Now be gone, this situation does not need to be discussed in front of unknowing eyes," he sighed heavily.

"You will never be rid of me until your death Clef!" he vowed, and a spiral of blue and white shot toward him, but Clef shielded himself and raised his staff. A beam of white light shot from it, and Silvius screamed, as it burned into his flesh, then disappeared.

§§§~~~

She and the Horse ran hard, but they didn't have very far to go. When they reached the shore, Umi closed her eyes and asked the voice what to do. Instantly, she was in the Water Temple, and the stones made her breath catch. Everything was a solid blue; the room was cool and somewhat damp, but not so much to make it feel foreboding. She heard the voices of whales, long, slow, almost mournful calls, through the walls of the temple. She walked around and heard the sound of her riding boots hit the cool stone, staring in wonder all around her. She approached two large wooden doors that had images engraved in them; the colors were as vivid as they would be if they were real. The left door had a background of her sword, but wound around it, was an image of a large blue Dragon; Water spiraled from its mouth. The right door was a huge blue rose that looked to be made of Water. As the petals fell, they turned into droplets of Water and fell in a puddle at the bottom. The thorns glittered dangerously in the half-light of the room. Umi gasped and admired their beauty as she went to touch them. Engraved just above the blue rose were the words, "She never was and never will be. You don't know how you've betrayed me. Somehow you've got everybody fooled. Without the mask, where will you hide? Can't find the truth, lost in your lie. I know the truth now, I know how you are. And I don't love you anymore."

Umi was oddly touched by the words. They were full of anguish and years or suffering. She pushed an intricately carved 'S' on the doors, and they opened, despite fears of what might lie inside.

When she walked inside, she found a stone statue of the warrior from the Manga with the girl that looked oddly like her. She was holding the neck of a blue Dragon; tears were pouring down her cheeks. The Dragon's wings were raised, as if ready to take flight.

She fell to her knees by the statue, endeared by its sad beauty. She reached out and touched the face of the girl. Suddenly, she was kneeling behind Clef, tears streaming down her cheeks, "Selece!" she sobbed.

"Sh…Umi…your punishment is nearly lifted," Clef bent down and held her close.

"Why Clef?" she demanded. "Why did Selece leave me?"

"You haven't discovered all yet, but…you will. You have revived him Umi, now you must only revive one other and your own memories, and your punishment shall be lifted," he ran his hands down her silky blue hair and closed his eyes as he hugged her.

"I remember Selece. I remember the words appearing on the doors to the Dragon Den in the Water Temple. I remember what he said. I betrayed him, but I…how could he leave?" she couldn't end the tears. She didn't understand because she couldn't remember everything.

"It was the way it had to be Umi," he moved hair from her glittering blue eyes. "For the good of Cephiro."

"For the good of Cephiro," the words struck a note in her that made her pull back from him, shy from his touch. Being near him suddenly made her feel dirty and guilty.

He sighed and closed his eyes, standing from where he had been kneeling with Umi, "We head North, toward the Wind Temple."

§§§~~~

Ferio met back up with them the next day. He told Clef grimly that the people of the palace were ready. Clef accepted this, and they continued North.

As they rode further North, a growing sound began to appear in Fuu's head. It was like a loud Wind rushing past her, but there was a crying too. At first it was soft, then it got so loud she thought she wouldn't be able to breathe. It got so loud she couldn't hear anything except for it and the whistling Wind. Then, suddenly it was choked. Fuu looked up, and the Horse stopped.

Everyone had been following her silently; Clef had guessed from her silence what was happening. The sudden consciousness on her part made them all wary.

"Where did it go?" she asked them.

"Where did what go?" Hikaru inquired.

"That-that crying," they looked at her, all but Umi and Clef were clueless. "You didn't hear it?"

They shook their heads, "Only you'll hear him Fuu," Umi told her softly.

"But it-he's…gone…" Fuu looked around herself hopelessly.

"I may have something to do with that," Silvius appeared in front of them, and Clef stepped in front of Umi, Ferio in front of Fuu, and Lantis in front of Hikaru.

'Traitor! He has not born his punishment!' a voice shrieked in Umi's mind, and her eyes began to glow with hate. 'Now he wants thou for only power. Magic Knight, do not him defeat thee.'

"He never loved me enough," she whispered and drew her sword.

Clef looked behind him at her angry eyes, "If only she knew," he muttered.

"If only she knew what Clef? The truth? What truth could you give her? Now that you've both spent four hundred years in exile, she doesn't remember what she's been exiled for. All she remembers is that damn Dragon! That's the truth Clef, do you feel like me now? How does it feel to be second best? Welcome to my world," he taunted, and Clef closed his eyes and raised his staff once more. This time though, Fuu disappeared, and Silvius remained.

"Let her go, watch her revive her precious Phoenix. Then we'll see how innocent you are Ferio," Silvius laughed. "Besides, it's not her I want."

"You will never have me Silvius!" Umi screamed, though she didn't know how she knew that he was looking for her.

"As I once did?" he mused. "As I once had you? Before you went and confessed your sins to the Dragon?"

"It was for Cephiro, I am a Protectress of Cephiro," she protested.

"And sin you did," he chuckled. "You not only played with a Keeper, but you fell in love with a Master Mage! I didn't serve my sentence, but he served his well enough. His ended two years ago and everyone rejoiced. Why serve a sentence when I can have you now? No pillar, no sentence."

"That's not the way it works Silvius. Emeraude didn't deal out the sentences, Mokona did, the same as he dealt her fate that was sealed years before," Clef looked at Umi who looked on the verge of memory.

"Come here," Silvius whispered a spell and pulled Umi toward him.

"Umi-chan!" Hikaru's eyes were frantic.

Umi's eyes snapped open, as if remembering, and she pulled away from the magic, needing to be near Hikaru, "Hikaru!" she sliced through the magic with her sword and ran to Hikaru while Clef and Ferio tried to fend him off.

"Be gone Silvius," Clef sounded very tired as he spoke.

"Not without," he lunged forward and ripped Umi into his arms, "my prize," he let his fingers trail down her cheeks. "Who do you call for?" he kissed her neck.

"Clef," tears streamed down Umi's cheeks, "I'm scared."

"Umi," he reached for her, but Silvius merely waved and disappeared. Clef turned back to the other two; anger flared in his eyes, "I'm going after her. Get Fuu, and take Hikaru to the mountains. Meet me back at the palace in four days."

They bowed and agreed. Clef gripped his staff and said a spell, and a line of dark purple magic appeared in front of him. He clapped, and his staff vanished. He mounted his Horse and took off after Umi and Silvius.

§§§~~~

The walls in this place were smooth and cool under her fingers. The marble pillars were tinted green, and her shoes made echoing thumps around her. She moved her head from one side of the enormous room to the other in amazement. Then her eyes found something that made them stare fixedly, unblinkingly. There were two huge oak doors with vividly colored images seemingly etched into the wood. Fuu knew this had to be an act of magic.

On the left door were her sword and a green Phoenix swooping in on it from the right-hand side. Its wings faded over the sword and seemed to bleed into the door. On the right door was a large, gray feather that was surrounded by smaller green feathers and swirls of air. The feathers fell into a swirling gray and green cloud at the bottom. Etched above the feather, in a delicate cursive, were the words, "I tried to kill the pain, but only bred more. So much more. I lay dying, and I'm pouring. Crimson regret and betrayal. I'm dying and praying. Bleeding and screaming. Am I too lost, to be saved? Am I too lost…?"

Her eyes welled with tears. Wishing to free whatever was inside the mournful doors, she pushed on the gold and green 'W' connecting the two doors and surged inside.

Once inside, she saw a painting of a girl warrior that resembled her, staring at the sky. Tears were falling down her ivory cheeks, and her mouth was open, as if screaming. She was looking into the sky, and Fuu looked to the image of a light green Phoenix spirit that seemed to look back at her wistfully.

Fuu reached up and touched the face of the girl, then was instantly transported to the back of her Horse, next to Ferio. Tears were in her eyes, "Windam…you left me…"

§§§~~~

Clef tracked Silvius' magic deep into the Forest and then out into a small village just outside the Forest, then, the trail ended. Clef tried to make sense of it; then realized where he was. This wasn't an ordinary village; it was the village of the Keepers. He wouldn't be able to go in there without a very persuasive defense. He rode up to the small gates that protected the village and was almost thrown back with the magic that was screaming from them. He closed his eyes and called up to the Gate Keeper.

"I want access to your Sacred Village," Clef told him.

"What is your purpose here?" the man called back, his voice was full of power and suspicion.

"To claim that which was stolen from me," he responded.

"The Magic Knight of Water will remain Master Mage," he spat back. "You have no right to enter and soil our Sacred Village."

"I have every right," Clef responded coolly. "My duty is to protect the Water Knight and the rest of Cephiro, and I will die doing just that."

"Then death is your choice?" the Gate Keeper asked just as calmly.

"If it must be," Clef dismounted and waited for the man to come out and face him, but a young woman stopped them both.

"Stop it Porta, he's a Master Mage," she scolded, and the man bowed and went back to his post, watching the gates. "Grant me access," she instructed, and he grumbled but did so.

Clef walked with the strange woman, holding the reins of his Horse tightly in his hands. Everyone stared and whispered as they walked through the town.

"He takes his job much too seriously," she told Clef cheerfully, "but he's new. He was just brought here when his powers broke out in his town. He's still being taught, but he's strong. He would have lost though, and we would have needed to find a new Gate Keeper."

Clef didn't know how to respond. He was being taken in the Sacred Village willingly by a woman who was obviously a Keeper, yet…she was taking him to Silvius, or was she?

"You're looking for the Water Knight? Silvius brought her to us not two hours ago. He didn't think you would be able to find her here. Very clever Tracking Spell, but I wouldn't expect any less," she babbled, and Clef studied her. Her long blond hair fell freely down her back, and her blue eyes shimmered though she smiled. Her body was very small and frail, almost as if she would break if someone touched her. When she walked it was almost as if she were a ghost, swaying and whipping in and out on the wind. "My name is Quies, I'm the Keeper of Dreams."

And that explained it, and suddenly he felt a deep desire to apologize, "I'm sorry," he whispered, and she turned and smiled at him.

"As am I sometimes, solitary life isn't easy, but…one gets used to it. It comes with great power," she smiled, and Clef looked into her shimmering eyes that always looked on the verge of tears. The job of the Dream Keeper was a hard one. She held every dream and every nightmare, she saw into the future and was destined to live a life alone, loving everything and everyone from afar. She was beautiful, but none could touch her. Her life was as solitary as the Pillar of Cephiro, only…her life was forever and there was no suicide.

"Why are you…" Clef began.

"Helping you?" she grinned and shook her head so that her long blond hair fell around her shoulders. "Silvius didn't take either of his punishments four hundred years ago Clef. He was exiled from the Sacred Village. As the Keeper of Magic, he was strictly forbidden to fall in love with a Magic Knight, and knowing this, he sought them out. He sought out what could not be his. He betrayed the Keepers, and his title and powers were stripped. He was still powerful, as all Keepers are, but losing his status and his rights was too much. All the magic that was left in him, was what you had taught him, and it made him resentful. He disappeared, and for two hundred years we did not hear of him. Then, he came back, and we shunned him again. He became resentful to us as well; he turned on his own people, and his heart became black. We pushed him from the city, all of us were too many for him, but he vowed to be back. He came back a few hours ago, and Porta let him in. Porta is young, he did not know, and so Silvius came to us once more, with a dark intent."

§§§~~~

They rode hard toward the mountains, and the voice was steadily growing stronger in Hikaru's mind. The crackling fire backed it, and the warmth provided her strength. Soon, she was forcing the Horse harder and faster toward the voice, the others were barely able to keep up, but they did their best and soon they saw a huge mountain coming up, and then…Hikaru vanished.

§§§~~~

"What did he do to Umi?" Clef's voice was raised.

"He took her to the new Keeper of Magic, and her beauty…he tried to stop himself. But…I believe he has fallen in love Clef," Quies finished her story, and Clef looked up to a large palace at the end of the village, a palace and a city that had been blocked by magic. This was not the village he had seen outside, this was an enormous city, full of Mages and protected by their magic.

"What can I do?" Clef demanded.

"You must go to Veneficus, you must get Umi back. If he truly has fallen in love we must shun him or cleanse him. Cleansing is possible, if the love is young and not returned. Veneficus is young as well, we trained him just after Silvius left, but his wisdom does not run as deep. He is foolish; you must convince him of Silivus' lies and trickery. You must do this, for Umi, and for the Keepers."

§§§~~~

She stepped inside the doors to the Lion Shrine and gasped as she stared at the beauty of the red marble pillars. How could this be possible? The room was huge but empty, and as Hikaru walked along the smooth obsidian floor, she began to get edgy. Then, everything melted away when her fiery red eyes met the doors to the Lion's Lair. The doors themselves were wood, what looked like oak, but carved into them were images so alive with color that Hikaru was sure they were going to jump out at her and become real. On the left door was a huge replica of her sword. Near the top, a huge fiery Lion appeared over the sword; its yellow eyes were staring ahead, into the black nothingness of the room. The left-hand corner of the right door held a blazing red, orange and yellow sun; its fiery arms reached out toward a line of snow-capped mountains. The sun cast a light orange glow onto the snow, like early morning sunrise. Then Hikaru noticed the words, the words that were written in cursive through the sun and almost reached the tops of the mountains, "Distruth drives me into madness. I know I can stop the pain, if I Will it all away. Don't turn away, don't give into it. Don't try to hide, don't close your eyes. God knows what lies behind them. I'm frightened, by what I see. But somehow…I know that there's much more to come. Immobilized by my fear, I seem to be…blinded by tears…"

Hikaru stared up at the words as the pain within in them sunk in fully. She closed her eyes and held back tears as she pushed on the engraved 'R' between the two doors and opened the door to the room.

Inside, she found almost a life size clay model, only, it was art, not something that children make. It was painted as vividly as the doors, and it held a wistful scene just as the elegantly carved words. There was a girl that looked like her, dressed in armor. She was reaching out her hands; tears were glistening in the sun on her cheeks. She was standing atop a snow-capped mountain, and then Hikaru's eyes fell to what she was reaching for. On a mountain nearby, was a large fiery Lion; its head was turned, looking toward the girl, but its body was facing the slope of the mountain, heading the other way. One of its paws was raised, taking a step toward the bottom of the mountain where it would be gone forever. Hikaru could almost see it vanish though it remained still. She reached out and stroked the hair of the girl, trying to comfort her, then vanished. When she opened her eyes, she was sitting next to Lantis, at the base of the mountain; they were all getting ready for supper it seemed. A tear fell down her cheek, "Rayearth…"

*I actually drew those doors, they turned out pretty cool, but Selece on Umi's sword doesn't look quite right. Anyway, the words on the door are Evanesence's not mine, don't sue yadda yadda. I wrote this whole chapter on a train coming back from vacation, so if the lyrics are wrong it's because I was doing it by what I heard on the CD and I didn't have the little booky thing. Right now it's upstairs and my computer is slow and won't download anything, so I'm too lazy to find out if I was right or not. So gomen if anything is wrong, until next chapter!*