Chapter 2

The song came again…

From her place deep in the archives of the Castle of the Crystal, Aughra raised her horned head from the tome she'd been reading. Dust had settled into her shaggy gray hair, and she brushed it away with a frown.

Third time since the unum began, she thought to herself. It's coming more often now.

The Keeper of Secrets hauled herself to her feet, and shoved the book away with a huff. The tome, A Catalogue of the Great Races of Thra, had proved to be a waste of time. What wasn't outright lies, or fabrications to glorify the Skeksis and smear their enemies (an unbiased recorder, the Scroll-Keeper was not), had been hundreds of trine out of date. There was nothing in its pages that she, the living eyes and ears of Thra, had not by now learned for herself.

The Gruenaks were gone, the last of them slaughtered generations ago, after they refused to give up their way of life and bow to the Emperor. The Arathim had been decimated, reduced to a handful of survivors after being harvested as raw materials for the Garthim. The Makraks were still few in number, and unlikely to ever leave their fiery home on the far side of Thra - not when Aughra's own son had given his life to bring them there.

The Podlings were better off than most. The Skeksis hadn't considered them a threat, and had preferred to keep them alive as slaves when possible. They'd suffered their own cruelties, yes, and many had still lost their lives, but they were in no immediate danger of dying out.

And the Gelfling…

"Ama Aughra!"

The low-pitched, slightly eerie voice belonged to a Podling woman. She was thin by Podling standards, her blonde hair threaded with white, and she wore a colorful scarf wrapped around her throat in spite of the late spring warmth.

The healing of the Crystal had restored the minds and vitality of the surviving Podling slaves, but it couldn't heal all their wounds. Teba had been one of the many victims selected for the Ritual-Master's choir, subjected to terrible surgeries to reshape her vocal cords until they could produce what the Skeksis considered sacred music. Mercifully, she remembered almost nothing after her essence had first been drained, but her voice would never be hers again.

"Ama Aughra," Teba called again, hurrying down the winding glass-like ramp. "The Crystal, the Crystal is -"

"Yes, yes, I hear it too." Aughra marched her way past the Podling, nearly knocking her off the ramp. I feelit, in every old bone.

No part of the Castle was ever truly dark anymore; the intricately faceted crystalline structure shone by day and night, reflecting light into every deep corner and crevice. But the light grew brighter and warmer as Aughra made her way up to the Crystal Chamber, and with it came the smell of flowers.

Not all of the surviving Podlings had had homes to return to. Some had been small children when they were stolen, too young and traumatized to remember where they had come from, while others had returned to find their homes leveled, their families either taken or fled to other villages. It was these lost ones, together with Ydra and some of her braver kin, who had founded a new Podling settlement in the Bah-Lem Valley - and who had taken on the task of cleansing the Castle of the Skeksis' touch.

Some things, like the library, had been left intact, for they might still be of use to the Castle's new residents. Others, like the banquet table and the ruins of the Emperor's throne, had been dismantled, wood and metal shaped into tools and rags woven into rope and cloth for the new village. The remains of the Garthim had been laid to rest, returned to Thra out of respect for the creatures whose bodies they had been built from.

And the day when the Scientist's laboratory had been demolished, and a team of former slaves had pushed the terrible draining-chairs down into the fiery shaft, was still remembered with joy.

The greatest change, though, had been saved for the Crystal Chamber itself. The ceiling hatches that had once been closed except at ceremonies were always open now, letting in sun and rain and clean, free air. Vines crept up the walls, coaxed by Podling gardeners, filling the angular white chamber with blossoms of every shape and color.

In some future Age, Aughra supposed, the vines might grow strong enough to pull down the Castle itself. And perhaps that will be no bad thing, she thought, to set the Crystal free.

The song came again…

"What are you trying to tell me?"

Aughra faced her own reflection in the Crystal of Truth. She knew the Crystal like she knew her own heart (as well she should, for they were nearly the same thing), and she knew that the voice the Castle residents had been hearing for the past trine was not the Crystal's own.

For one thing, it was too soft. Even when it had been damaged, the Crystal had been able to make its call heard, but this voice had started as barely more than an echo in the air. It was only in the last few unum that it had grown strong enough for Aughra to recognize it was a voice.

It seemed to be coming through the Crystal. Inside the glowing white stone, Aughra could see a mote of golden light, pulsing in time with the notes of the song.

Or … was it two motes?

Aughra rubbed her remaining eye, and the motes and notes were one again. And the song was stronger.

Two voices, she understood now. Two voices becoming one, and calling out.

Did she recognize them?

… No, not quite. The song was still too faint, as if it were coming from somewhere deep and distant…

… And familiar.

Aughra drew back from the Crystal. "Whoever you are, you've got to speak up! Can't help you if I can't hear what you're asking!"

Out of the corner of her good eye, she saw Teba approaching, accompanied by a few of the Castle's other Podling residents. " Ama Aughra, you … understand?" The Podling woman gestured to the Crystal, where the song was fading to a soft hum.

"Hm, not entirely. But I understand a little better now."

Teba, having decided her knowledge of Gelfling still wasn't strong enough to express what she wanted, switched to her native tongue. {"Do you think we should summon them back?"}

"What for? Aughra can find her own answers! You know the Gelfling have their own task to take care of right now. They'll come back soon enough."

And maybe, she dared to hope, they won't be alone this time.

Far away to the northwest, two small figures lay curled together in the shelter of a shallow cave. The limestone walls smelled of salt and dry lichen, and carried the imprints of ancient creatures. At the mouth of the cave, a driftwood fire kept the cold ocean wind at bay.

It was delightfully cozy, and Jen felt no great urge to leave the cave - or to let go of the warm Gelfling woman in his arms. But all three suns were in the sky now, which meant the outside air would lose some of its chill. Enough to continue the next step of their journey, at least.

"Kira?" Jen pulled one arm away, and the sleepy Kira made a noise that reminded him of her favorite fizzgig when his dinner was late. "The suns are up, we should try calling it again-"

"No." Still half-asleep, she grabbed his arm and pulled it back over her like a blanket. "You stay. Keep me warm."

Jen laughed softly, and pressed a kiss to her cheek. As he did, his hand came to rest on her stomach, and gently stroked the firm curve that hadn't been there when they started this journey.

"Come on, you were the one who wanted us to keep going." When that didn't move her, he went on, "If we can get to the island today, I'm sure we'll find some fresh food. Maybe even some ruva nuts…"

Kira's ears perked at the mention of her latest craving. "All right, all right, I'm up."

As they dressed in the heavy mounder-wool clothes they'd brought for this journey, Jen reflected that moments like these had been among his greatest joys over the past seven trine. He and Kira did their best to honor their responsibility as keepers of the Crystal, but all the same, it was a responsibility they'd never asked for. Young and in love, and eager to see more of their world, they had decided to spend a few unum each trine traveling across Thra; partly to enjoy each other's company, but far more importantly, to search for other surviving Gelfling.

Their efforts hadn't been completely fruitless. On their second journey, northeast to the Mountains of Grot, they'd found what remained of the Arathim Ascendancy; the survivors were wary (and Jen and Kira could hardly blame them), but the Gelfling hoped a friendship could be built in time. And every journey had brought them to the ruins of Gelfling towns and cities, full of stories to be gleaned about the culture the two of them had come from.

But they had found no sign of any living Gelfling.

When they had realized, partway through their latest journey, that Kira's bouts of nausea and soreness weren't from eating some poisonous new food, Jen had wanted to turn around and go straight back to the Castle. A new Gelfling child, the first to be born in their healed world, was something precious beyond words. Kira needed to be kept safe, he'd said, with Ydra and the best Podling midwives to tend to her. And, he'd freely admitted, the thought of being a father both delighted and terrified him - he couldn't do it alone.

But Kira - wise, practical Kira - had pointed out that the baby made their quest more important than ever. Two Gelfling were not enough to repopulate their kind, she'd explained; even if they had dozens of children, those children would have no one to breed with but their brothers and sisters. In a few generations, their line would grow barren and sickly, and the Gelfling race would end all the same.

Breeding with other races was also not an option. Growing up, when she had believed she'd never meet another Gelfling, Kira had briefly been lovers with a Podling boy from her village. Curious, she had asked her mother about the possibility of raising a family with him, and Ydra had sadly told her the truth: on the rare past occasions when Gelfling and Podling had coupled, the unions had never produced children.

Their only hope was to find other Gelfling. If they did not, they and their child would be no more than the final verse of the song.

The Tel-Ataq lighthouse had been the northernmost Gelfling settlement Jen could find mentioned in any of the Castle's records. Even at the height of the Skeksis' empire, it had been considered remote, and barely more than a legend. To his and Kira's minds, it sounded just like the kind of place refugees from the Garthim might flee to, which made it worth finding a way to cross the icy Silver Sea.

"There!"

The two of them had climbed out onto the end of a rocky arm of land. Where Kira pointed, they could see waves breaking over a dark surface, and a plume of steamy breath as a young sea-tortle surfaced.

Kira's gift for soul-speaking was powerful, but her voice could only carry so far. When she'd tried to call the creature yesterday, it hadn't heard her over the crashing waves and rising wind. So that night, after they made camp, they'd come up with a new plan.

As the behemoth rested at the surface, drawing in air for another deep dive, Kira began to call a series of rolling notes - first high, then low, like the turning of the tides. Jen took his beloved firca from his parka, and played to match her. Voice and music joined as one, strengthening each other as they carried across the water…

The creature's eyes widened, and it turned its massive head to watch them.

Kira took a moment to breathe "It's working!", and then continued her call. The tortle cut smoothly through the water in spite of its size, and obediently drew itself onto the gravel shallows below them.

Quickly, but cautiously, the two Gelfling climbed down. The behemoth's night-blue shell was as wet as they'd expected, but their wool clothes sopped up the worst of it, and the many large spikes and bumps made it easy to hang on.

"That was clever, using the music to call it," Kira said as she steered their new steed north. "You never did tell me where you got the idea."

"From the library." Jen sounded hesitant. "The records said one of the Skeksis tamed a creature like this one, long ago. She had some sort of flute or whistle to call it with."

Kira frowned. While she knew in her head that the Skeksis' books could sometimes be useful (especially now that Jen had taught her to read), she still hated the thought of being grateful to them for something.

"That must have been very long ago. I can't imagine any of those ones at the Castle going seafaring."

Which made her all the more hopeful for what they might find.

Days were long in the far north this time of year. The suns continued to climb as the sea-tortle swam on, taking care to keep its passengers above the surface. Jen and Kira rode in silence most of the time - to talk was to invite a mouthful of salt spray. Their hair and clothes were already splashed with it, and it began to itch on their skin as the day went on.

Yet the journey was not without beauty. The three suns glittered in rose and gold on the water, and mixed with blue and green in the icebergs they passed. Now and then, schools of hooyim fish danced above the waves; if Jen remembered correctly, these had once been the totem of the lost Sifa clan, who had kept the lighthouse.

Finally, as the first of the suns started to dip below the horizon, he glimpsed it…

And his heart sank.

The Tel-Ataq lighthouse had clearly not been maintained for many years. Wind and ice had stripped away the colorful scale-like tiles that once covered it, and had eroded cracks in the iron-gray stone underneath. The great rounded crystal that had once served as its beacon had been torn away in some long-ago storm, leaving only a few shards still glinting in the sunset.

As the behemoth swam them to the remains of a stone pier, Jen tried (and failed) to hide his disappointment. "Maybe we shouldn't have come. It looks so lifeless…"

"We can still take a look around," Kira reassured him. "Maybe it's a trick. The Podlings used to do things like that - make a village look abandoned so the Garthim wouldn't bother coming. If someone's watching, and they see we're Gelfling too, they might come out."

Once they were on shore, the barren island did not look any more inviting. They found the remains of what might have been a greenhouse, but whatever plants had managed to grow this far north had not lasted without a gardener to care for them. Even the lichen that had been so common along the northern coast was gone.

And yet … why did they still feel there was life here?

Why did they feel they were being watched?

Once Jen and Kira were sure there was nothing to be found on the rest of the island (which did not take long, as empty as it was), they approached the huddle of small ruins around the lighthouse tower. These, they guessed, had once been temporary houses and places of trade for the seafarers who visited; when Kira touched the carvings on an ancient, weather-beaten plank, she could almost smell spices she had never tasted and had no name for.

But the spices, and the ones who had brought them, were gone.

"It'll be dark soon," she whispered, her heart heavy. They had made this journey, their longest one yet, and come up empty-handed again. "We can camp in the lighthouse, it should protect us from the wind."

A wooden door, broken but still heavy, lay across the tower's entrance. It took both of them to shove it out of the way. They stepped into the darkened chamber, waited a moment to catch their breath -

There was the sound of metal on stone, the sound of feet shuffling. A heartbeat later, heavy clawed hands seized them from all sides.

"JEN!"

"KIR-"

Before he could finish, a thick cloth bag was yanked over his head, and he knew only darkness.

To Be Continued...