Work Text:
She wandered the shore, amongst the bones and tattered flesh of gods.
There were no directions in that place. She put one foot forward, then another. She did not know where she had come from nor where she was going, only that she was continuing on. Every step swept open a curtain before her in the world of fog, and closed another behind.
Every once in a while, a towering shape would rise before her, appearing just beyond her circle of sight. It always filled her with sorrow to see it, as it slowly turned from dark shadow to hillock to the burnt remnants of a dragon.
I should be with them, she thought, running her hands along the crumbling hide and watching it dissolve into stardust. She had once touched it when it had been glossy and full of life, she knew, even though she could not remember when.
The gods had gone away, and she had selfishly stayed behind.
I must go as well, she thought, but she did not know where to.
Sometimes there were voices on the shore. They were sharp in a way that nothing else in this place was, even when the voices were whispering amidst the thundering waves. When she focused on them, some of the fog seemed to float away, so that the world around her began to take shape.
That was a dangerous thing, she knew, though she could not explain why. It was only a feeling in her bones, a knowledge that terrible things would be happen if she let the shape of her body emerge from the fog.
Even still, she always felt an urge to follow them. A selfish desire to follow the warmth to the fire despite knowing it was the peace of the gods she should seek.
And so she stood undeciding, hovering just within the embrace of the fog. Just close enough to be aware of the voices, and just far enough so that their cadence drifted over and through her, their meaning lost.
Sometimes it was harder than others to keep the distance. Sometimes a voice sank fish hooks into her heart and dragged it close. Loud and urgent or quiet and low, it didn’t matter — she would find herself approaching much too close.
The last time, she was close enough to see a figure, huddled at the bottom of a blurry cliff. It looked so small, so weary that she had to stop herself from reaching out to comfort. The voice was so soft as to be almost inaudible, even in this place where all other sounds flowed around her like a stream around a rock.
She stood there, untethered but somehow held. Wondering. Waiting.
Then the figure spoke one phrase clear enough to be heard. She heard, and finally, understood.
“I won’t forget our dream, Noziken pa Dumai.”
Dumai found herself in the forest. The trees stood tall around her, even as a sheet of fog permeated the woods.
Haunted, she remembered. This place was haunted by souls who could not reach the sea. But Dumai had come from the sea, and still here she was, wandering.
The forest was deserted. She could comprehend the loneliness now, rather than just the fact of being alone. She followed the paths through the underbrush, entered caves and exited them again. Sometimes the surroundings felt familiar, but she could never remember the next turn to take.
Dumai did not know how long she roamed amongst the branches. The forest seemed endless, like it covered all the world. She stayed long enough that she thought she might lose herself again, that perhaps it was what she was meant to do.
Then she found it, though she had not known she was looking. A small puddle partway along an outcrop, then widening into a pool. The water warmed the woods around it, and a strand of her hair stuck to her cheek from the heat and moisture.
The sensation was a shock. Suddenly she could feel the stickiness of her skin, the uneven ground through the soles of her shoes, the scrape of branches against her arm. She looked back at the hot spring, at the steam rising and mixing into the surrounding fog, indistinguishable.
Heat and water, Dumai remembered, coming together.
She was not searching for a thing or a place, but a person.
“Dumai!” Came the sound of a laughing voice, and Dumai turned around to catch its source. “You’re here, Dumai!”
“Suzu!” The name returned to her at the sight of the smiling face. Suzumai was running along the forest path, waving.
“Come, Dumai, Father is waiting!”
Between one step and the next, Dumai found herself treading on the cobblestones of Antuma.
The street around her was busy, loud and hectic after the peace of the forest. Merchants set out wares on the sides of the roads, and workers wheeled carts of wood and stone. The rooflines around her clearly showed the signs of the city’s rebuilding — fallen roofs covered temporarily with canvas and boards, skeletons of structures bared in the slow process of repair.
And between all of it, children ran and played. Suzu darted amongst them and Dumai followed, both of them weaving through the crowds, unseen.
As they made their way up the grand avenue, the mass of people thinned. Some of the estates lining each side stood proud and shining, the way they had for centuries, while others laid in pieces, the crumbled walls of their courtyards revealing sunken buildings and scorched gardens.
Suzumai didn’t pay mind to any of them. Her feet were light as they skipped along the path. It was a long way from the palace gates to the inner courtyards, but here and now the distance was nothing. Dumai followed Suzu down marble boulevards and past silent palaces until they reached the Floating Gardens, where the rocky islands and the charred trunks of trees grew like anthills from the dusty bottom of the lake.
On one of the islands, Emperor Jorodu sat within the husk of a once-ornate pavilion. He beckoned to them as they approached. “Come, my daughters.” Suzumai did not hesitate. She danced over to kneel at their father’s side and he smiled down at her with affection.
With only affection, Dumai realized as she watched the unfamiliar creases forming at the corners of his eyes, and no sadness or resentment lurking underneath. It was the first time she had seen him look at his children and see only themselves.
Then he raised his head and met Dumai’s gaze. “Come join us, Dumai.” He gestured at the space in front of him. That was when Dumai realized he did not see the cracks in the floor beneath him. Splintered, with the bare dirt underneath showing where polished bleached wood had been, and only a ribbon of snagged cloth remaining from the soft mats. Her father and sister sat serenely amongst the detritus, as if waiting for tea to be served.
Dumai understood then that she could not stay. She would not. Not yet.
She turned away, and instead lifted her head towards the jagged peaks of Mount Ipyeda.
The climb was long and steep, the wind cutting as it always was this time of year. Dumai felt this, even though her footsteps left no prints in the snow.
That did not make the homecoming any less sweet. As she summitted the first peak towards Mount Ipyeda, the temple was revealed like a pearl from its shell. With all those years spent cradled within these mountains, greeting climbers near the end of their journeys, Dumai had not had the occasion to make this crossing herself. Even after her departure she had only returned from above, on the borrowed wings of gods.
It felt fitting that she was finally making this pilgrimage now, step by honest step.
Eventually she made her way to the small plateau on which the High Temple of Kwiriki sat. It felt strange to approach it like this, as if she were an outsider. Slowly she stepped onto the long porch and turned to look back out at the landscape she had just crossed. She thought of that day years ago when she had stood in this spot as she watched a visitor emerge from the snow and her life was changed forever.
The thought also brought the memory of the one who had stood beside her. That was a sharp pain, immediate like few things have been since she had awoken. Kanifa had followed her on the peaks and off of them, until he couldn’t any longer. Until she had abandoned him. Even now, when by all rights they should be headed towards a reunion, she was again taking her own stubborn path.
Dumai stood there for a long time, alone and staring out at the empty vista. No figure appeared through the blustering winds nor stepped up to her side. She stood there until the sun sank below the lowest dip of the valley.
Eventually, one of the godsingers came out from the temple to light the lanterns. Dumai called out his name as he passed and he looked around as if having heard, but his eyes swept past unseeing.
She followed him inside anyway.
Days at the temple beat out the same familiar rhythm of Dumai’s childhood. The morning song of awakening and breakfasting at the refectory. The choreography of rituals at Ipyeda’s third peak and the climb to the Queen Bell, now undertaken by someone else but the care as meticulous as it always was even as the Bell hung unneeded with the gods awake.
Sometimes Dumai followed along with the other godsingers and it felt almost as if she was still one of them. A space opened for her in processions and the water in the ice pools filled and invigorated her as it always did. But when she stepped away from the rituals another would fill her space without noticing, and no one paid her any mind when she stood unmoving amidst the rush of daily chores. There were hours when she would quietly follow her mother through the halls, watching her grey mourning robes smudged against the wooden walls. Sometimes Unora would pause as if sensing a presence, but not once did she turn her head or speak.
One evening Dumai was standing on the front porch, returning to it as she did from time to time. The blizzards of winter were slowly calming, though the softness of spring had not quite yet arrived. It was still early in the season for climbers, but somehow Dumai was unsurprised to see a dark spot against the horizon, growing steadily as it drew closer and closer.
A painful sweetness blossomed in Dumai’s heart as she watched and waited. Every icy breath was a knife to her chest, spilling warmth that wrapped her in a tight embrace. Even from far away, even without a clear view of the silhouette, Dumai knew the person who was approaching. She watched as the figure turned from a blur to an outline, to a weary-faced woman who slid to a kneel and stared up with devotion and sorrow.
“Nikeya,” Dumai whispered, rushing forward and falling to her knees as well. “I’ve been looking for you.” She looked into her love’s eyes and laid her hands atop her mittened ones. Even through the thick layers she could feel their heat.
“Nikeya.” Another voice sounded behind Dumai.
Before her, Nikeya stood. It took a moment for Dumai to gather her emotions back inside her body, and she started to stand as well. But before she was fully upright again Nikeya took a step. A step forward, and through.
“Maiden Officiant.” The usual tinkle of Nikeya’s voice was cracked with cold and grief. “May I come in?”
Unora made a noise of assent.
Dumai stood frozen as the two women entered the temple, leaving only the cold wind blowing through her.
That night, Dumai summitted the third peak of Mount Ipyeda alone. In the moonlight, the iron scales of the statue of Kwiriki shone. She had come to sing to the gods, to seek their wisdom on her state of half-being, but now the melody was trapped in the cage of her chest.
Instead, she stared up at the image of Kwiriki and felt her tears streak warm paths down her frozen cheeks.
“Why do you keep me here?” She cried. “Why let me stay in this realm, when I will never be seen by those I love?” She called out in her mind for an answer, into the space where her bond with Furtia used to fill, but where now was only an echoing void.
That emptiness only summoned more tears to her eyes. For long moments Dumai stood before the statue, salt from her body dripping into the ground before it like an offering.
Then there was a sound, a great swoop and gust in the air above. At first it blended indistinguishably with the usual howls of mountain winds, but soon its growing intensity became hard to ignore. Dumai looked up and saw a familiar sinuous shape, dark against the moonlit sky. Her heart took on a sudden, quick beat.
As it drew closer Dumai saw that it was not, of course, Furtia Stormcaller. Even closer, and Dumai realized that she knew the sihouette after all.
Great Nayimathun.
The dragon landed before her and lifted her snout in greeting.
You are not forsaken, earth child. The voice in Dumai’s head was a pain and a comfort. Discover who you have become and find your strength. The night is still young, and there is time yet to dream.
Later, when Dumai made her way back to the temple, she turned around and saw a single set of footsteps, heading home.