One by one my friends and brother sat down to join us. Bijarki was the only one who remained standing, pacing up and down as if he was unbothered by the heat of the day and preferred to remain active.
“This heat is intolerable,” Aida grumbled, holding her hair up off the back of her neck. Her cheeks and nose were already growing pink, and both Jovi and Field shoved over to give her more space in the shade.
I started to look around in concern.
“Hang on. We have water, right?” I couldn’t see any other way of getting it unless we’d brought it along, and neither Bijarki nor Draven looked like they had any provisions.
“We do,” Draven replied.
I looked at him questioningly, and the others followed suit. Mentioning ‘water’ had been a mistake—my throat suddenly felt as dry as the land we were sitting on. Draven removed something from his pocket. He opened up his hand to reveal a small blue crystal. It glimmered in the light.
Right. Magic, of course.
I should have been used to stuff like this, having lived in The Shade, but as I didn’t have any of the skills myself, I often assumed a rational state of mind, forgetting that others had access to a completely different kind of reality.
“What’s that?” Vita asked, leaning over me and eyeing the crystal with curiosity.
“A form of the hemimorphite crystal,” he replied. “It’s known as a ‘throat healer’ in some Earth cultures, I believe.”
He rolled the crystal along the ground and it came to a stop about two meters away from where we were sitting. I watched as the crystal started to morph, spreading out as if the earth was melting it, until it became a smooth pool of water. I was about to exclaim that it was unlikely to be enough for all of us when the water started to move more forcefully—a jet reaching up into the air and falling back down when it reached its apex, like a water fountain.
“How long will it last?” I asked, already getting up, transfixed by the cool, clear water.
“Long enough,” Draven replied. “Just take your fill.”
I greedily drank from the fountain, letting the water run down my chin and drench the front of my already sweat-soaked clothing. The others moved to stand behind me, everyone but Draven and the incubus forming an orderly queue for the water.
“Come on, Serena,” my brother growled, “I’m dying here.”
I took another gulp and stood aside, making my way back to the rock. I felt a million times better having drunk something, and started to wonder if the Druid had a way of getting us food as well.
“What’s the longest time you’ve ever had to wait for them?” I asked, my impatient nature wanting to work out how long, roughly, we’d be stuck under the punishing heat.
“A day and a night,” he replied.
Damn. This was going to be longer than I thought. I looked across the shelter of the rock into the distance, seeing if I could see anything that might be considered more suitable shelter, but there didn’t seem to be much—a few rocks, but none much larger than this one.
I settled back down on the ground, resigned to our fate.
It didn’t help matters that none of us wanted to talk much. It looked like everyone was still shell-shocked from their experience in the mists—some more than others. Field, I thought, must have had a particularly tough time of it—I’d never seen him look so shaken. Aida was the same. To make matters worse, we seemed particularly skittish around one another—Aida hadn’t so much as glanced at Field since we emerged, and I jumped to the logical conclusion that the voices might have been taunting her about a seemingly unrequited love. I hoped not. I imagined that her situation was bad enough as it was, without her worst fears exposed by the shape-shifters.
Once we all reconvened back at the rock, Draven spoke.
“When the Daughters arrive, none of you say a word. Let me do the talking. Remember what I said about them. They are fickle and merciless, and even if you don’t like what I’m saying, you are to remain silent.”
His last words were directed at the incubus, who rolled his eyes.
“Trust me, I’m not in any hurry to talk to them,” Bijarki replied emphatically. I wondered if he’d had dealings himself with the Daughters—was that why he’d been so reluctant before?
“Why not?” I asked, hoping he’d enlighten us.
“The Daughters aren’t fans of my species,” he replied, shrugging as if it didn’t bother him much either way. “Long ago—we’re talking centuries here, which will tell you a little bit about how long they can hold a grudge—one of the Daughters fell in love with an incubus. She foolishly renounced her guardianship of Eritopia to be with him. He didn’t love her back, and left her to be with another woman of his own species—a succubus. The Daughter was purposeless and alone—she wouldn’t be accepted back by the Daughters, they felt that their sister had betrayed them and wanted nothing more to do with her. She wandered the lands of the Eritopian galaxy till she died, some say of a broken heart. Dying is something that the Daughters aren’t meant to be able to do, but somehow—whether it was because she was out of the fold of their protection and magic, I don’t know—this one did. Hypocritically, the Daughters mourned her, and since then have even less love for our species than they do for the rest of the creatures in Eritopia.”