Under the Crab-Apple Trees
Gükonük

“All that is gold does not glitter, not all that wander are lost; the old that is strong does not wither, deep roots are not reached by the frost.” - J.R.R Tolkien

“He has been in human hands for most of his life, how should he know the agreement?” the Queen said grudgingly. The crowd nodded. “Erindel the Great is declared free,” the Queen concluded. Erin was untied from the post, and the crowd parted so that the queen could escort him.

“This is Gükonük,” she said, and Erin could tell that she had told this to many a wandering traveler, “The pride of Dwarves, the last dwarven city.”

“It’s beautiful,” Erin said, noticing for the first time the streaks of gold in the stony walls, and the gem-encrusted plates that the dwarves were eating from.

“I will show you a place you might enjoy,” the Queen said. She clapped her hands and a silver horse with wings like a bird swooped down from the far reaches of the roof.

“This is Ardor,” she said, pointing to the Pegasus. “He will take you.”

Erin hesitantly mounted the Pegasus and found that its feathers were quite comfortable. Sitting on the winged horse felt like sitting on his mother’s best Persian rug back at home. Then suddenly, the Pegasus kicked off the ground. They were soaring over the dwarven hall and up into the cavernous roof of gems. The Pegasus’s flight was much more jerky than the graceful flight of a phoenix, yet Erin enjoyed being up in the air again. He began to notice more Pegasai, swooping through the air around him. He also noticed little windows in the mountain and occasionally a landing pad, where some of the many Pegasai would be grooming itself, or prancing around like some large eagle with hooves and a mane.

Finally, they came upon a large golden platform protruding the inside of the cavern. Erin guessed that five average houses from the above world could have rested on the platform. As he dismounted, Erin found a large open doorway like a gaping mouth in front of the platform. He walked towards it and cautiously entered.

Inside was a long passageway made of a rough stone, lined by doors that Erin assumed led to dwarven apartments. He walked down the tunnel of granite until he came upon an ending. It was a golden cage with a door. An elevator, Erin realized as he stepped inside. Automatically, it started moving. He found himself being lowered into a large courtyard, its edges were lined by balconies that stretched all around the courtyard. It was as light as day and a small stream with fish swimming in it ran through the fields on the floor. Plants grew by its edges and dwarven children who were done feasting walked the cobbled pathways around it. Erin could hear bird calls from a small oak, and the laughs of the children playing. He could see a dwarf walking to a small greenhouse in the middle of a small green field.

The elevator stopped at a level of the balcony that stretched around the perimeter of the courtyard. He walked down the balcony path, enjoying the sense of freedom that the courtyard gave him. There were granite panels above the doors reading names like; Bruno Gold-hammer, or Sylvan Family. Surprised, Erin came to a halt at a plaque reading Erindel Finn.

Cautiously, he opened the wooden door. Inside he found a small room, with a window overlooking the feasting hall. By the window was a small bedstead lain with fresh sheets. By the bed was a wooden chest, to the right of which was a granite desk. In the middle of the room was a golden table with a bronze stool carefully tucked under it.

A fire was flickering in a stone hearth and by the hearth was a cabinet that smelled of food. Erin opened it and found a small box attached to a string containing food inside. A dumbwaiter, he realized with glee. The plate inside contained a few buns, some sort of meat, and corn. Erin gladly grabbed the plate from the dumbwaiter and it whizzed down the stone tunnel behind the cabinet. Erin smiled. It was almost like being back in Ysterra. Erin did regret leaving Ysterra. He would have liked to linger, play with Wren, practice archery, continue school, and drink Fizz Juice. Yet the memories he received had given him a restlessness that he had never felt before. An urge to finish what had to be done before it was too late.

Erin tried to think. How had he gotten here? He asked himself. It was a question that had been worming its way into Erin’s mind. He had left the others. Erin especially guilty of leaving his sister.

Aria? he asked hopelessly, but it was as if he was on the other side of the world. He could not reach her. Little did he know, he was only across the field of Erindel, that they had crossed to go to Ysterra, inside the tallest mountain of the mountain range of Dwarves.

Now it was Aria’s turn to feel like kicking a stone. She had told the others that they shouldn’t leave, that they should stay put so that Erin could replace them, but here she was on the back of the Lady’s horse Jerdenyl, Mist Rider. They had to keep moving, that brat Fox had said, they couldn’t be caught by the elves. But why couldn’t they? Aria longed to turn back, and continue magic lessons and be whisked away by the carefree homeliness of Ysterra. But no, she couldn’t. Erin had wanted them to go ahead, and so they would.

The horses trudged along in the deep snow, ducking under heavy branches. Aria was focusing on keeping them warm with magic. She reached down inside her, searching the depths of her mind until she found her well of magic. She used it to make warm sensations and thrust them into the horses’ minds. The horses started going faster, snow spraying out from around their hooves. The snow fell harder, and faster. White flurries surrounded them, covering the horses’ hoof prints so that no sign remained of the quartet’s trail.

Erin stepped out of his room and into the courtyard. He smelled lotus flowers and spotted a tree in full blossom by the small creek. Erin walked down the balcony path and to the elevator. He opened its latticed golden door and stepped inside. It started lowering like an odd golden piñata. It came to a halt on one of the cobbled paths, and Erin opened the latch on the door and stepped outside. He walked down the path and over to the lotus tree. He picked up a fallen flower and breathed in.

It smelled sweet, and it reminded him of Ysterra. He felt a pang of loneliness. He longed to feel the openness of the tree houses, and zoom down the zip-lines again. He yearned. Putting down the flower, he walked over a stone bridge that led across the stream. The field was over the bridge, and he stepped onto its grassy surface. He took off his boots and felt the grass tickle his feet, just as it did long ago in the normal world.

He walked through the field, enjoying the gentle touch of the grass. He found a dandelion growing in the grass, and he picked it. I wish someone would show me the way out, he wished, and then blew the seeds away. He watched them scatter away across the field like a thousand shards of a star.

Getting back up, he walked over to his boots. He put them on and crossed the cobbled pathways that wound around the courtyard like a bizarre stone snake. He saw children playing in a second field and approached.

They had laid out a very large blanket, with crude drawings across it. As Erin looked closer, he could see two castles facing each other. The castles were nearly twenty feet away from each other, and in between the castles, there was a drawing of a pond and a willow tree.

Each castle contained one child, who was giving orders in dwarvish to the children in front of his or her castle. Then the children sprang into battle, clashing with small wooden swords. Erin could see that the army of the castle on the left was winning, but then a tall dwarven girl snuck out of the battle. She ran into the opposing castle and pointed her sword at the dwarf in the castle’s throat. The dwarve put his hands up in surrender, “Luovutan!” he said, and the armies ceased battling.

The girl flicked her black hair, and her tan-brown face was full of smiles as she assumed her position at the taken castle. Erin watched in awe as she commanded her army with matchless force. It overtook the other castle and the children in the army fought over the position of commander. Erin walked past them and to a pool of water where the stream collected. Fish of remarkable colors swam in the pond, weaving their way in and out of the reeds that sprang up from the bottom of the pond like a porcupine’s spines.

The caravan had stopped for dinner. There was no sign of Erin anywhere. Wren didn’t know what to think of the scowling Aria and the smirking Fox. Ardrieth had been kind to him, yet Wren still felt alone. Stroking Genervan, he contemplated the day as he ruffled the phoenix’s silky feathers. He was tired, extremely so, and his mind had no time to untangle the complexity of Lark’s betrayal. She had been more dark and secretive at home in the days leading up to the battle— but why?

Inyelen was another story. Didn’t Erin say that he had been captured by giants recently? Wren decided that Inyelen acted under false pretenses. But he didn’t know about Lark. It pained him to think of her. He missed her, though he would admit it to no one. Wren felt the cold finger its way into his thick jacket. He moved closer to the flickering blue fire and warmed his hands.

Arletem and Elaminla landed behind Wren.They had more trouble than usual brushing the snow off the ground. They arched their wings and rested them on the ground to form tents. Wren walked over and ducked under Ela’s left wing. It was warm, and he quickly fell asleep.

Lark was shivering in the wind. When the wisp was killed, she had to flee. It infested her mind and forced her to take down the walls of magic that guarded Ysterra. It made her hide and now it was gone. The taste of freedom, however, was soured by the thought of what she had done. Hundreds had died because of her. Now she was huddled in shame around a magical fire flaring green.

Inyelen had gone a different way than her. Lark hated Inyelen. She tried to blame her wrongdoings on him, she told herself it was all his fault.

She put her face in her hands. How could everything go wrong in a few days? She had no food. She had her golden phoenix the size of a songbird, and her magic. No food, no shelter, no water. She was alone.

“Erindel,” a voice interrupted his thoughts. Erin quickly turned to see a girl with a dark brown face and black hair in braids that were clamped by circlets of gold. She was the dwarf had won the game Erin had seen them play. She was wearing a simple leather tunic and trousers like a boy’s. She wore gold circlets at the cuffs of her tunic, and a sash that was woven of tiny golden strings thinner than the threads on a spider web. There was something unfeminine about her- an air of boyishness that defied her gender.

“Are you going to answer me? Or should go back to playing Igra?” she asked, annoyed, uttering the last word in dwarvish.

“Sorry,” Erin said, fumbling with his words. “What do you need?”

“That was what I was going to ask you,” she smirked. “But somehow the dandelions told me.”

Erin gazed at her in awe.

“It is too bad that you want to go,” she continued. “I was going to ask you to play with us.” She motioned to the dwarves continuing to play behind her. “Oh, and by the way, my name is Ingrid,”

“I’ll play,” Erin said. “But after, if you show me the way out, I’d be really grateful.” “Now, it is time for me to steal your castle.”

Erin raced over to the field with Ingrid. She looked of merely twelve orbits, but she had the strength of an elven warrior.

She shouted commands in dwarvish to her army, and Erin barely had time to step into the two-dimensional castle.

“Forward!” Erin said, thrusting his arm into the air. For a moment his army of four hesitated, but then it thrust itself into battle. The two armies clashed in the middle of the cloth, but eventually, Ingrid’s army overtook Erin’s. Erin found himself with his hands up, and a young dwarf’s wooden dagger at his throat.
 “Luovutan!” he said, surrendering to the younger dwarf.

“Heikko ihminen!” the Dwarf said, smirking. The other dwarves broke out laughing. Ingrid did not laugh.

“It is you who is weak, Pahalle,” she said, addressing the boy with distaste. Pahalle cowered from Ingrid’s glowering stare.

“You are banished from my army,” Ingrid said. One by one, the dwarves in Ingrid’s army turned their backs on Pahalle.

“Ennel, pack up the blanket and leave it on the doorstep of my quarters,” Ingrid snapped at a small dwarf.

“Don’t you have parents?” Erin asked, as Ennel rolled the weapons inside the blanket, and started carrying it like a bizarre carpet on his shoulder. Ingrid recoiled, staring at him with her brown eyes frozen over with an icy hate.

“I have no parents,” she said coldly, “I am, and always will be, the queen’s adopted daughter. I am Ingrid Tyttövoa.” She turned her back on, and walked away, over the bridge and to the golden cage, ascending solemnly, rising away forever.

The caravan was plodding through the forest again. This day it was not snowing, and the horses found it easier going. Aria looked up in the clear blue sky. She could see Arletem’s shadow, but where was Elaminla?

Arletem, where is Ela? she asked, her voice touched with a hint of concern.