[quote]"Lady of the Pond, it is I, Anise the new Lady of Light. I understand what you said about the previous Lady of Light. I know that she was killed, and that you were on opposing sides. Even so, I can't imagine that it was easy for any of you to lose a sister." She cleared her throat as her emotions grew high. "I would... We would like to have a conversation. Your mother is quite upset at everything that has happened while she has been sealed away. You can see for yourself that everything is withering away and that the whole balance of the forest is a mess. Don't you think that's sad? Don't you think it is all sad? Don't we all have a responsibility to make everything right?"[/quote]

For awhile there was only silence, and the gentle lap of glistening water against the gravelly shore.

Peck stood to one side, staring nervously out over the lake, and he very pointedly ignored the presence of the Kith -- who were dangling from the branches of the broken tree-in-the-ship, staring quietly at that curious lady who was talking to the lake.

The water rippled out from the circle Anise had made; the rune glowed on the back of her hand, and the golden specks throughout the water multiplied and glowed brighter throughout the lake. The Kith yipped and clambered higher in the tree; the cat-masked one pointed out over the golden lake while the mousey one squealed with delight.

Anise would know, instinctively, that she had the power to raise the water -- to call the healing waters of the lake and the grottos, and to call the deadly waves of the ocean surrounding them. She was tapping into the balance of power that belonged to the Lady of the Pond.

She stepped seamlessly out of the air, walking toward Anise along the surface of the golden water. She was as beautiful as before, and just as expressionless.

Peck swallowed hard and stumbled backward, clinging to a tree for balance and protection from the presence of the Lady of the Pond.

The Lady stopped in front of Anise and stared through her.

"What is right?" she asked quietly, but with a hint of sarcasm that suggested she thought of Anise as merely a child. "I gave you my rune because I'm curious that you might succeed where my sister had failed -- to return the light, return balance, to a time when the dead were allowed to pass on and greed did not exist."

A cruel smile crawled up her porcelain face. "The Lord of Shadow is accepting of me, now that I'm free. I raise and rush my waters freely in the darkness, but only as long as he allows it. I tolerate his egomaniacal actions, and he leaves me alone. I prefer this to the return of the Dragon you seem to love so dear."

She stared at the Spirit Egg for a moment. She did not step any closer. "There is something you should know, Lady of Light. We the Lords and Ladies of the elements are purposely holding the sun hostage. That will not change unless and until we are certain the Dragon will never return. There is only one thing to which we all agree: the Dragon's return would mean the death of all of us. The Dragon is not [i]she[/i], is not our [i]mother[/i], as you so offensively put it. The Dragon is merely [i]it[/i] -- an entity that decided to create life because [i]it[/i] was bored. When we became self-aware, when we ceased to obey, the Dragon would have devoured us. [i]We[/i] sealed it, with the pirates' assistance. We gave the Lord of Shadow the balance of power so that he might prevent the Dragon from devouring the souls of the dead from beyond its prison."

She lifted her chin and stood calm upon the water. "So, Lady of Light, how do you intend to return the balance of power? Return the sunlight? Shall we sacrifice ourselves for the greater good? Can you assure me the Dragon will not continue its thirst for all-encompassing power?" Her blue eyes narrowed. "Ask it, then, how it gained enough power to bring you here, when it was trapped and weak. Ask the Dragon what it has done in order to summon the Children of the Sun, and you will know why we have done what has been done."

[hr]

[quote]And then there was this one, the Lord of Flame, being ever so informative and helpful. Why was that? Because he was interested in her? Because he wanted to use her? Because she was an entertaining outsider in an otherwise closed environment he'd been living in for the past few centuries? She had made quite the show of herself, screaming and flailing into the earth like an ungainly comet. Maybe he was hoping for a second viewing.

"And how exactly do the Lords and Ladies work into all of this?"[/quote]

Oseely watched with an interested eye everything Artemis did -- her interactions with the gryphon, her execution of ideas and slapdash runes. No, he didn't rest any high hopes on her -- not like Pirates might semi-worship the Sun Children, hopeful for heroes and an easy solution to problems they were too weak or scared to solve themselves -- but this was a strange and curious thing in front of him; he simply looked forward to what it would do next. Everything was bound to get more interesting from here.

A curious, easy smile grew on his face. "You mean, what the hell are we even good for, if all the power's between the runewriters and the masked ones? Or ya mean, what do we do, exactly, that the runes can't do?"

He lazed back, and for a moment he thought carefully. "Well, think of it like this. When you write a rune, ya tap into the power that's flowing all over the island. My siblings and me, we're a part of that power. We're the regulators of balance. If there's a push on the power flow, we push back. Except, right now the whole balance is tipped in favor of mister Lord of Shadow. The Lady of Light's not around to tip that balance back. But as I said, there's a reason for it. As long as it's dark, Shadow's got all the power. As long as Shadow's got all the power, he can keep control of the spirits of the dead -- and as long as he's got those spirits locked up, the Dragon can't feed off them. As long as the Dragon's weak, it'll stay sealed up -- and as long as it's sealed up, we're safe from being devoured."

He drew a circle in the air with his finger. "So it all always comes around to balance and power. If I got lax, Pond-Lady might decide to flood the place, turn it all to ocean. Maybe I could make the whole island a volcano, if she didn't keep me doused. Reckley could turn gravity upside-down if he had a mind to -- but the Lady of Stone wouldn't have it. So that's what we do. We play tug-of-war." He nodded toward Artemis' wrapped feet. "And what'll you do with your lightning-stick and sneaky-feet? No plans? Well, good. I like people without a plan."