Chapter 9

There were no harp strings carrying melodies, no songs being sung. There were no pittering feet nor beating wings inside the palace that was once filled with these sounds.

Silence was a strange sound to a fairy who lived her entire immortal life within these confines; never once straying out of the safety past the river's edge. Never once even once even having the hidden urge or curiosity to cross over into that land beyond. Not once....

Until today.

Today of all days, for Mariemaia to choose to disobey the age-old rules of fairies and wander off to play with some frolicsome elves. Today of all days for Cathrine to chase after her and in so doing, meeting a "god" in the forest with green eyes...

No! He was just a human man...I could feel my wings trembling with every flap I went closer to him. I mustn't have anything to do with him! "Humans are trouble! They'll burst your happy bubble!"

Cathrine hears the rhymes of her sisterhood's rules. The sweet, dear fairies had laid down the law of trespassers and crossing the river, sung in song and rhymes, over and over, for so long, that she could hear them berating her even now at this moment as she flutters her guilty wings back into the palace.

She half expected to see Middie and Iria shaking their heads at her foolishness...

"Humans are strangers, they'll only bring you dangers!"

Strange....Cathrine couldn't stop these thoughts circling through her brain. The pounding beat of her immortal heart was within her all the way home. She squeeze Mariemaia's hand tightly the whole way back. Back into the safety of the palace of fairies in Eixip--away from all mischievous elves and...dangerous, handsome men.

But in the moment her wings flutter through the strangely opened palace doors, Cathrine realizes that the danger signals going up in her head, like big red flags, were not due to the elves or even to the mysterious human she had just fled from.

They were caused instead by the danger within Eixip. There, on what once was the welcoming round table of the throne room where all the fairies gathered to talk and hold council, a strange woman sat alone.

A woman Cathrine had never laid eyes on before. A woman who, after taking one look at her burning eyes, could hold the magic of nothing good nor pure--only death--and the fire written in her eyes as she looks up at the two unfortunate fairies returning home.

"Mariemaia..." Cathrine was not as ditzy as she may first seem. The protection of her adored little friend turns this hapless girl fairy into a responsible "fairy godmother." Leaning low, her lips almost unmoving, Cathrine whispers into the child's frightened ear, as the fire temptress was walking (more like slinking in her fire red gown) towards them at the front entrance.

"Fly to him!" Cathrine screams out, releasing Mariemaia's clenched hand and giving her a sending push flying back out the cracked open doors, even as the evil Fire Nymph was already mystically shutting the vast doors to seal the last of her victims inside.

The trembling fear in her tiny fairy body was almost too overwhelming for this orange-haired seven year old sprite. But there was something more driving her lightning fast retreat and escape--her love for the pretty aunt who had always been there to care and play with her. Cathrine had taken her in as her own when her own fairy mother had died....

Him?! Him?!

Mariemaia's little mind reels, but her spirit was certain of whom her aunty was speaking of.

Cathrine only could have meant that kind archer who aided them just moments ago. The handsome man she was going to thank before remembering the laws of fairies and humans mixing together.

But that doesn't count for me!

Mariemaia was never verbally told of her mystical conceivement--of the forbidden encounter her mother had with the human man who was her father. It was a hushed topic, never spoken of, in fairy land.

But Mariemaia knew, somehow inside, she knew she was not entirely fairy--that the other half of her always longed to explore, seek out adventures--and be able to face dangerous times with a bravery no fairy could deal with. But surely, a human could!

Mariemaia's wings take her across the river faster than ever before. Her focus on her hero standing on the other side was so complete that never did she look upon the roiling, reddish-black depths of the once still waters below...

~~~~~~~~~~

"I SAID, LEAVE MY FAIRIES BE!!!"

The deep sea tidal wave threat in her voice echoed loudly to every corner of the riverbed depths she was the ruler of.

But right now, Sallie didn't feel the ruler of anything grand and peaceful and calm. In fact, sealed in by a powerful magic far greater than her own, her waters were invaded and her enemies attacks were fierce and unforgiving. Sallie was feeling destructive and angry.

Both emotions with which she sends in a sudden, fearsome blast of torrential waters. The sheer power of which her attacker had obviously taken too lightly.

BAMMMMMM!!!
Sallie lets the hot waters permeate her mystic body. The now translucent Water Nymph readies her defenses for a counter-attack move by her opponent. He treated this whole affair as if it were nothing more than a chess match.

Back and forth, attack and counter-attack--but Sallie knew the stakes were higher than a mere sparring match of wills. Her fairies were crying up there. The fairies whose fairy-dusted wings could prove a valuable treasure in the wrong hands of a sorcerer--or his little trained minions.

The counter-attack does not come in the form of his Shenlong dragon's repeated scaly tail sending a strong wave in her general direction. Though neither dragon nor Master seemed to care what lay in the path of destruction. The peaceful fish and mammals of the water were paying dearly for that whim with their fragile lives.

But no, this time he deems the Water Nymph he was attacking worthy enough to be spoken to---or more like, laughed at.

"Ha ha ha ha. Do you truly think you could defeat my dragon, water wench?" His voice was as scaly as the monstrous aqua green dragon's neck he sat upon. He caressed the dragon with the touch of a friend more than a master, Sallie noted absently.

But before she had the chance to answer his blatantly male discriminatory and deflammatory remark, no to mention that ear-splitting cackle, with some well-chosen words of her own, a thunderous crash breaks through the river's "glass" ceiling above.

Yet another monstrous dragon appears. This one was of a darker, more putrid green shade, and comes smashing through into the waters below.

She didn't seem to care that she had, in so doing, just reopened the escape route for the Water Nymph, now no longer held back from her precious fairies by evil magic.

"Woman! Why did you do that?! She will escape, you stupid fool!" Not wanting his prey to get away so easily, Wufei, a Dragon Master, orders his Shenlong to breathe fire. (Yes, underwater. Magic beings such as dragons can do that, you know. ^.~)

With one final powerful wave he simultaneously sends the Water Nymph flying backwards into the underwater cavern Wufei had taken notice of.

His dragon's fire broke down the sediment walls, bringing rock and sand crashing around Sallie's ears, knocking her out, if not killing her.

But her water-filled ears could still hear every word uttered under her river's currents. She groggily listened in on the argued conversation between these two male and female Dragon master warriors.

"It was unnecessary for you to keep her down here. We could more easily dispose of the Water Nymph when she reveals herself on land, because out of her element she would be weaker!" Meiran shakes her head at the male partner who never seemed to use his own. He always wanted to use his battle brawn than his brain, and Meiran always believed herself to be superior in both.

"I thought we agreed to vanquish her down here, for fear she might have some magic link with those pathetic fairies." Wufei nearly spits out this, never liking to be bested by one of the female variety. Not even from his own partner---especially not his own partner.

"Oh, there's no worry of that, Wufei. Unlike you, I accomplished my mission. There's not a fairy left on this world." Meiran can't help but boast to her chauvinistic compatriot. "At least, not one with her wings still attached!! Ha ha ha!!!" It was the dragon mistress' evil boasting laugh that awakened Sallie from her nearly unconscious slumber and her words seared a hole in the calm chest of the Water Nymph's peaceful heart, the floodgates coming down....