A Realm of Shadows

Dierdre felt her lungs being crushed as she tumbled end over end, deep underwater, desperate for air. She tried to get her bearings but was unable, thrown around by the massive waves of water, her world turning upside down again and again. She wanted more than anything to take a deep breath, her entire body screaming for oxygen, yet she knew that to do so would certainly mean her death.

She closed her eyes and cried, her tears merging with the water, wondering if this hell would ever end. Her only solace came in thinking of Marco. She had seen him, with her, tumbling in the waters, had felt him holding her hand, and she turned and searched for him. Yet as she looked, she saw nothing, nothing but blackness and waves of foaming, crushing water driving her down. Marco, she assumed, was long dead.

Dierdre wanted to cry, yet the pain knocked any thoughts of self-pity from her mind, made her think only of survival. For just when she thought the wave could not get any stronger, it smashed her down into the ground, again and again, pinning her down with such force that she felt as if the entire weight of the world were atop her. She knew she would not survive.

How ironic, she thought, to die here, in her home city, crushed beneath a tidal wave created by Pandesians’ cannon fire. She would rather have died any other way. She could, she thought, handle almost any form of death – except for drowning. She couldn’t take this awful pain, the flailing, being unable to open her mouth and take that one breath that every ounce of her body so desperately craved.

She felt herself getting weaker, giving in to the pain – and then, just as she felt her eyes about to close, just as she knew she could not stand it one second longer, she suddenly felt herself turning, spinning rapidly upward, the wave shooting her up with the same force that it had used to crush her. She rose upward with the momentum of a catapult, racing for the surface, the sunlight visible, the pressure killing her ears.

To her shock, a moment later she surfaced. She gasped, taking huge gulps of air, more grateful than she had ever been in her life. She gasped, sucking it in, and then a moment later, to her terror, she was sucked back down underwater. This time, though, she had enough oxygen to survive a little longer, and this time the water didn’t push her down as far.

She soon rose back up again, surfacing, taking another gasp of air, before being driven down yet again. It was different each time, the wave weakening, and as she surfaced again, she sensed the wave was reaching the end of the city and petering out.

Dierdre soon found herself past the city limits, past all the great buildings, all of them now underwater. She was driven back underwater, yet slow enough to be able to finally open her eyes underwater and see all the grand buildings beneath that had once stood. She saw scores of corpses floating in the water past her, like fish, bodies whose death expressions she already tried to drive from her mind.

Finally, she did not know how much later, Dierdre surfaced, this time for good. She was strong enough to fight the final, weak wave as it tried to suck her back down, and with one last kick, she stayed afloat. The water from the harbor had traveled too far inland, and there was nowhere left for it to go, and Dierdre soon felt herself washed up onto a grassy field somewhere as the waters receded, rushing back out to sea, leaving her alone.

Dierdre lay there on her stomach, face planted in the soggy grass, moaning from the pain. She was still gasping, her lungs aching, breathing deep and savoring every breath. She managed to turn her head weakly, to look back over her shoulder, and she was horrified to see that what had once been a great city was now nothing but sea. She spotted only the highest part of the bell tower, sticking out a few feet, and marveled that it once stood hundreds of feet in the air.

Beyond exhausted, Dierdre finally let herself go. Her face fell to the ground as she lay there, letting the pain of what had happened overcome her. She couldn’t move if she tried.

Moments later she was fast asleep, barely alive on a remote field in a corner of the world. Yet somehow, she was alive.

* * *

“Dierdre,” came a voice, and a gentle nudge.

Dierdre peeled open her eyes, dazed to see it was sunset. Icy cold, her clothes still wet, she tried to get her bearings, wondering how long she had been lying here, wondering if she were alive or dead. Then the hand came again, nudging her shoulder.

Dierdre looked up and there, to her immense relief, was Marco. He was alive, she was overjoyed to see. He looked beaten up, haggard, too pale, and he looked as if he had aged a hundred years. Yet he was alive. Somehow, he had managed to survive.

Marco knelt beside her, smiling yet looking down at her with sad eyes, eyes not shining with the life they once held.

“Marco,” she answered weakly, startled at how raspy her own voice was.

She noticed a gash on the side of his face and, concerned, reached out to touch it.

“You look as bad as I feel,” she said.

He helped her up and she rose to her feet, her body wracked with pain from all the aches and bruises, scratches and cuts all up and down her arms and legs. Yet as she tested each limb, at least nothing was broken.

Dierdre took a deep breath and steeled herself as she turned and looked behind her. As she feared, it was a nightmare: her beloved city was gone, now nothing but a part of the sea, the only thing sticking up a small part of the bell tower. On the horizon beyond it she saw a fleet of black Pandesian ships, making their way deeper and deeper inland.

“We can’t stay here,” Marco said with urgency. “They’re coming.”

“Where can we go?” she asked, feeling hopeless.

Marco stared back, blank, clearly not knowing either.

Dierdre stared out at the sunset, trying to think, blood pounding in her ears. Everyone she knew and loved was dead. She felt she had nothing left to live for, nowhere left to go. Where could you go when your home city was destroyed? When the weight of the world was bearing down on you?

Dierdre closed her eyes and shook her head in grief, wishing it all away. Her father, she knew, was back there, dead. His soldiers were all dead. People she had known and loved all her life, all of them dead, all thanks to these Pandesian monsters. Now there was no one left to stop them. What cause was there to go on?

Dierdre, despite herself, broke down weeping. Thinking of her father, she dropped to her knees, feeling devastated. She wept and wept, wanting to die here herself, wishing she had died, cursing the heavens for allowing her to live. Why couldn’t she have just drowned in that wave? Why couldn’t she just have been killed with the others? Why had she been cursed with life?

She felt a soothing hand on her shoulder.

“It’s okay, Dierdre,” Marco said softly.

Dierdre flinched, embarrassed.

“I’m sorry,” she finally said, weeping. “It’s just that… my father… Now I have nothing.”

“You’ve lost everything,” Marco said, his voice heavy, too. “I have, too. I don’t want to go on, either. But we have to. We can’t lie here and die. It would dishonor them. It would dishonor everything they lived and fought for.”

In the long silence that followed, Dierdre slowly pulled herself upright, realizing he was right. Besides, as she looked up at Marco’s brown eyes, staring back at her with compassion, she realized she did have someone. She had Marco. She also had the spirit of her father, looking down, watching over her, wishing her to be strong.

She forced herself to shake out of it. She had to be strong. Her father would want her to be strong. Self-pity, she realized, would help no one. And neither would her death.

She stared back at Marco, and she could see more than compassion – she could also see the love in his eyes for her.

Not even fully aware of what she was doing, Dierdre, her heart pounding, leaned in and met Marco’s lips in an unexpected kiss. For a moment, she felt herself transported to another world, and all her worries disappeared.

She slowly pulled back, staring at him, shocked. Marco looked equally surprised. He took her hand.

As he did, encouraged, filled with hope, she was able to think clearly again – and a thought came to her. There was someone else, a place to go, a person to turn to.

Kyra.

Dierdre felt a sudden rush of hope.

“I know where we must go,” she said excitedly, in a rush.

Marco looked at her, wondering.

“Kyra,” she said. “We can find her. She will help us. Wherever she is, she is fighting. We can join her.”

“But how do you know she is alive?” he asked.

Dierdre shook her head.

“I don’t,” she replied. “But Kyra always survives. She is the strongest person I have ever met.”

“Where is she?” he asked.

Dierdre thought, and she recalled the last time she had seen Kyra, forking north, for the Tower.

“The Tower of Ur,” she said.