Characters: Kendira, Master Luna
Location: The Tower of Azure
Time: Day 4 - 4:23 PM
Kendira and Master Luna galloped through the wild plains of Ellewyn with the wind blasting at their faces like a continuous wave of water. They rode over golden hills that stretched for miles and shallow streams that trickled by as slow as passing clouds. Beating hooves echoed in their ears, but the sound only came from Kendira’s chocolate-painted pinto. Master Luna’s horse was a ghost, a spirit horse twice the size of an Amazon, and it made the wind blow when it charged forward. Unlike Kendira’s horse, it never seemed to tire. It just blew and galloped and become one with the wind. A whisper, a song, an endless breath in the nothing.
But that was the power of Master Luna—the power to summon creatures from other planes, other times. Her spirit horse had died over three hundred years ago. It died with her mother. But she rode it now. And it flew, uncaged, untamed, never touching the ground that could slow it down. It raced like the thunder and the rain.
They rode in silence until the Tower of Azure came into sight. It wasn’t really a tower—just a jagged blue crystal that rose from the rock and earth—but it looked like one, with doors and windows and balconies carved into its many sides. Despite being completely natural, the crystal tower was at least eleven stories high, with winding stairs and floors built into its interior.
Kendira slowed her horse down to a trot and circled the tower once before dismounting. “I haven’t been here in years…”
Master Luna was waiting for her by the emerald doorway. Her horse was gone, lost and dancing in the wind, and she opened the door with a simple wave of her hand. “Child, you never left this place. Wherever you go, you leave yourself behind. It is the law of our Nature.”
“I know…”
“Come inside.”
“As you wish,” Kendira said, bowing her head in respect. She tied her horse to the nearest tree and then followed her master into the crystal tower. Inside, it was like a hollow tree, with shelves and tables lining the walls. There were books and potions of alchemy everywhere, filling the room with such a fragrance that Master Luna had to crack open a window to let out the rainbow-colored fumes. Kendira ran her little fingers along the wall, leaving a trail of dust and dye. She scanned the room, the stairs that wound forever upward, the open books in forgotten languages, the jars full of various animal body parts, and she felt like she was back at the Abbey. Back home.
“I hope to give this to you someday,” Master Luna said, setting the cage of Men down on the biggest desk in the room. “Of all the girls I have mentored, of all the apprentices who have come to me for the answers, you have caught my eye like no other. The promise you have shown from the beginning… It is overwhelming, Kendira. You have broken my every doubt. You have become like a daughter to me.”
“Thank you, Master Luna.”
“Then you would like this tower someday?”
“I…could never take your place, Master Luna. I could never do the things you have done.”
Master Luna laughed, but it was a polite, amiable laugh. “You won’t be an apprentice forever, Kendira. In time, you will learn all there is to learn from me. Then you will make your own path.”
“That day is a long way away. I have much to learn.”
“Yes… Yes, I suppose you do.”
There was a moment of awkward silence. Kendira fidgeted, shuffling her feet slightly, and stared at the glittering sunbeam coming in from the window. “…You’re probably wondering why I wanted to speak with you.”
Realizing her apprentice was ready to get down to business, Master Luna pulled out a chair and sat down at her desk. “I am more interested in why you left the Abbey and why you are not carrying the sacred beetle on your person. Those are the two things I warned you never to do.”
Kendira remained standing, shuffling, fidgeting. “It’s a terribly long story, Master…” But when that didn’t get a response, she knew she had to continue. “It all started the day before yesterday, when some travelers, mostly Men but also some Women, showed up at the Abbey. I talked with some of them and they seemed to be looking for classes. I told them you weren’t around, but they didn’t leave. …And soon after that, a Forsaken Necromancer and a Black Knight invaded the Abbey and attacked the travelers. I don’t know why. I thought they had come for the sacred beetle, but all they took was one of the Men. A little boy, really, but he meant something to one of the Women. I didn’t know what to do, so I decided to seek you out.”
“And what of the sacred beetle? Why are you not carrying it?”
“I gave it to one of the Men. There was something about him… Something I could feel. The feeling you taught me. I knew he could find the four body pieces of the beetle.”
Master Luna clasped her hands under her chin and nodded. “I see…”
“He managed to obtain the Scarab of Earth already.”
“So he beat Terragolem then, did he?”
“Yes.”
“Without your help?”
“Yes. I was with a few of the other travelers, on my way to Felwinter.”
“Fascinating.”
Kendira paused. She couldn’t read Master Luna’s face and it made her shake. “…But I don’t know where the other three pieces are at. I thought if we…if I could find you, that you could help us.”
“Help you what?”
“Locate the rest of the pieces. Prevent Sorena’s resurrection. Save the—”
“Ahhh… So that is why. You are worried about the Dark Lady Sorena?”
“…Well, yes. We think the Forsaken may be making their attack on Ellewyn now in order to clear the way for Sorena’s revival.”
Nodding slowly, Master Luna lowered her hands and drummed her fingers against the cage of Men. “…I have felt things too. Sorena is coming. By the light of the third dawn, she will rise. There is no stopping it.”
“I know there’s a way. Master Luna, with your help—”
“There is no power, no magic, that can match the Dark Lady. Not from me and not from the sacred beetle. We will fall to her, Kendira.” She paused and the room suddenly seemed to grow darker. The sunbeam disappeared and was replaced by a cold and bitter wind that gave goosebumps to the walls. “I have felt it. She will bring us to our knees.”
Kendira shook her head wildly. “No, Master… We can beat her! I believe in you.”
“I know you do,” Master Luna laughed, but this time it was a hopeless, doomed laugh—the kind a dead man makes. “Sometimes I think you are the only one who still believes in me.”
“That’s not true… There are many others like me.”
“There are no others like you, Kendira. You are the only one who will still stand beside me. You are the only one…” She repeated it, at least twice more, and then unlatched the cage of Men. One by one, they stepped out onto the wooden desk and looked up at their savior. They didn’t know what else to do. They wanted to bow, wanted to say something, but their muscle became frozen and stiff in her presence.
“It’s amazing…” Master Luna said, under a dreamlike trance, and picked up one of the Men with the care of a mother to her child. “I’ve never noticed how really small they are.”
“They are small…” Kendira agreed, but she wasn’t sure why she had spoken at all.
“Too small, maybe.”
“Too small for what?”
Master Luna turned the Man over, setting his face down in her palm, and stroked his back with her forefinger. “Too small to cause all this trouble. If it weren’t for Men, Sorena would have no reason to return to this life. Perhaps keeping them alive for this long was a mistake. Perhaps some things should have died before.”
“…Perhaps,” Kendira said. “But we cannot try to correct the past. We must look to the future now. Like you’ve always said, Master Luna, we must keep our heads to the stars and our eyes to the earth to know where we’re stepping. Our footsteps guide us. We cannot retrace them.”
“No… Perhaps not.” Master Luna overturned her hand and watched the naked Man fall, screaming, screaming until he hit the floor. Then he was silent. The only sound after that was Master Luna’s foot landing on top of him with a final thwack and then a slow grinding across the floorboards. “…But sometimes our footsteps can leave the bloodiest of trails. It is those that we must correct.”
Kendira swallowed her heart. She fell back, knocking down a shelf of books, and shook her head. “M-Master Luna… You killed him…”
But Master Luna’s face reflected no emotion. She stared down at the bloody stain with no color in her eyes, now as dark as her dress, and did the same thing to the next Man in line.
“Something so small,” she whispered as she twisted her heel, turning the Man into a memory, “should not change our future. We must look out for ourselves or we will perish.”
“Master Luna…” Kendira said in disbelief. She wanted to do something, but her arms and legs were as numb as winter. All she could was watch each Man fall and vanish under Master Luna’s slipper until it haunted her with its never-ending story. All the falling. All the vanishing. All the emptiness and pools of blood. All the nothing.
Then she felt dizzy. The colors began to spin. Kendira shook her head, regained balance, and staggered forward. “Why? Why are you doing this!?”
The last Man vanished and Master Luna stood, over top of them all, with the coldest face Kendira had ever seen.
“I have seen the Light,” she said and her voice was haunting.
Giantess World
