Mythic [Everlight Part 3]

A fascinating revelation awaits our heroes at the top of the world!

With re-lit torches in hand and the horrors of the nightbeast all too fresh in their minds’ eyes, the wanderfolk departed with all due haste towards the encampment on the other side of the pass.

Meanwhile, Dagran, Zura, and Avanessa had regrouped, pressing on deeper into the darkness.

They located the path to the old site easily. It was part of the pass carved by Bandalari terramancers, and marked by a stone — ancient and worn — but the design carved into it was simple and stood the test of time: a singular mountain peak, with waving lines above it.

They took this turn, half-climbing the steep dirt and rock pathway.

Silence only lasted so long in Avanessa’s company. It was a storyteller’s curse, Zura imagined, to fill the void with noise. Hard to blame her.

She told stories of nightbeasts from lands near and far, and how she’d never seen one this close.

She spoke of stories she’d heard of the Ashborne Mountains. Tales from Solitoreans, tales from the Duura, even Godborn fables. Many of them were cautionary. Reminders not to stray off the path or too far into the darkness, especially not alone.

There were no trees here. Like most of So’litore, the mountains had been barren of such things for a long, long time. Ever since the Godborn had come to these lands and attempted to take them for their own.

It was an age-old pain, an ache for a history lost that coursed through her body with every beat of her heart. They said it was something every Solitorean Bandalari was cursed with — Nostalgia for a home they had never seen.

Could someone be trying to destroy what was left of it?

Zura pulled ahead of the other two, her brows furrowed deeply at the path before her and trying to concentrate on the present.

Behind her, she could hear Dagran speaking to Avanessa. “That was brave of you, what you did with the pitchmud. Smart too.”

“Oh. Thank you.”

“Zura?” The old warrior prompted. “What do you think?”

Mazzurak took a deep breath to shake herself from her thoughts, agreeing, “It was quite brave.” She paused before looking back over her shoulder, “…How did you know that would work?”

Avanessa blinked at her, her face wreathed in the bright teal-green of the pitchmud torch. The storyteller rubbed the back of her neck with one hand, shrugging sheepishly. “Well… I didn’t. The logic was sound, but I’d only heard of people doing it in stories.”

“More of your ‘cautionary tales’, I imagine.”

“Some of them,” she nodded, “but not all of them. Some are about heroes, out there bringing the fight to the beasts. …Others are more of a reminder that the stunt we pulled probably only worked because the pitchmud here is so concentrated.”

Zura nodded to herself, mulling this information over. The thought that there were humans out there hunting the creatures was baffling, really. To challenge such beasts without magic… she could only wonder if they dug their own graves before leaving for such a venture, assuming there were any bodies left to bury.

And yet, there were humans like Avanessa, magicless, ill-equipped for combat, but willing to throw pitchmud at a nightbeast.

In either case, they continued up.

Higher and higher they climbed on this path, out and away from the pass and the ravine and along the rising spiral of the tallest peak of the Ashborne Mountains. When it began to plateau before the final ascent, Zura picked up the pace, a spot of firelight pulling ahead of the other two.

Just as she’d heard described so many times before, the stone path led them to a singular, massive boulder sitting alone in a stretch of level grassland. Wind flowed over the mountain like water, weaving through the grass and past her. Her wings twitched, catching the breeze. She folded them in.

Zura’s tail lashed back and forth, drawing her blade, approaching the rock, and walking all around it, but the area was clear. No one was here.

“Are you sure you saw it coming from this direction?” Zura asked, looking at Avanessa.

The young storyteller had stayed back, allowing the guards to make sure the area was safe before she approached. “I… there’s another stretch of the ravine on the other side of this peak, I think. But…”

Zura finished the sentence for her. “But the only thing of significance in this direction is… this.”

Avanessa nodded. “Maybe we scared them off?”

Dagran shook his head, “No… there would be signs, prints, something we could track. Or firelight. No one would dare be out here in the dark.”

“Maybe we can wait for another flash of light?” Avanessa offered, but it wasn’t hard to see why this wasn’t a foolproof idea. “…Who knows how long that’ll take, though.”

Frowns were exchanged all around before Avanessa locked her eyes on the boulder, approaching it with all the determination of a human on a mission. She knelt down in the grass, running her fingers along indentations in the stone too old to make out. “There must be something causing the light. What are these sigils? Are they in your language?”

Dagran stepped towards the rock, but Zura didn’t need to get a closer look to know what she was talking about. “Those aren’t sigils, they’re names of people who came to the site.”

Avanessa’s frown deepened. “Oh. Okay.” She continued to run her hand over the letters for several seconds before getting frustrated, trying to piece this all together. “Okay, think. If someone was here, trying to desecrate it, why? And how? Why was this place holy?”

Zura paused, looking at the boulder, then up in the direction of the peak. “…I admit, I don’t expect a human to understand.”

“If we put our heads together, maybe we can figure out why this is happening. So… humor me?”

Zura pursed her lips, looking at Dagran for the go-ahead. He smiled softly with a shake of his head, passing the decision back to her. “This is your people’s history, not mine.”

After a long sigh, Zura nodded to herself. She returned to the rock, placing a hand on it and memorizing the texture it imprinted onto her palm. “Bandalari… generally don’t worship Her Lady of the Light. The Sun Goddess. Whatever other titles they have for her. Not the way most people do. We do not derive our magic from her — we never have. It has… given us little reason to worship.”

“Which I imagine the Godborn aren’t too happy about.”

“Our lands were enemies long before the war,” Zura confirmed. “Worship of the Divine Beast of the Night is not so rare, generally. But my ancestors — the Solitorean Bandalari — believed in something a little different.”

Avanessa paused, awe and fear-stricken by this idea. “They believed in something other than the Goddesses?”

“No,” Zura clarified, walking in a slow circle and dragging her hand across the rock face as she did. “Unity. Between Day and Night. They believed in an ancient world where the sun and moon chased each other in a regular dance across the sky.”

This didn’t seem to be so much of a stretch for the storyteller. She nodded quickly, “My grandmother — the way she taught me to tell the Everlight myth, we always mention that we hope for a time when the Sun Goddess is powerful enough to defeat the Divine Beast forever.”

“That isn’t the same thing,” Zura snapped out of impulse, pulling back a moment later knowing she had taken that sentence too harshly. “I just mean…”

“Unity. Not defeat.” Dagran had knelt down in the grass, resting. He’d clearly expended a significant amount of his magic just getting the human caravan back up and on their way, and the subsequent hike hadn’t done wonders in revitalizing his energy.

“Exactly. Not a world where the Divine Beast was defeated. A world where the Goddesses didn’t fight for dominion over the skies. It would have been long, long ago. Ancient, even in the time of those who are ancient to us.”

“Oh.” Avanessa blinked, mulling this over. “…but… what does that have to do with this site?”

Zura looked up, into the ever-present darkness above them. The glow of the torches made it even darker, near starless, torchlight reflecting off her eyes as she stared into the sky — unfathomably black and deep as the mountains were tall.

“It was said that long ago, colorful lights would dance across the Night sky, as a reminder that their coexistence could create beauty and wonder untold. It was believed that to stand at the tallest peak of the Ashborne Mountains was to be as close to Divinity as one could be. Surrounded by Darkness, but bathed in Light. Unity, inches from touching the sky. This site was never the destination, only the final checkpoint for travelers looking to make the journey. They would chisel in their names when they returned from the peak.”

When she looked back down, it seemed something she’d said had caught Avanessa’s interest. “That’s strange…”

“…Strange?” Part of her bristled, ready to defend what she’d said, but that didn’t seem to be quite the implication.

“The lights, in the sky. Do you know what they were?”

Zura shook her head, passing the question to Dagran, who gave an unsure gesture with his hand. “They’re only mentioned in very old stories around here. From before we lost So’litore.”

“Or… maybe a little longer?” Avanessa prompted.

“What are you getting at?”

“Look, I — hear me out.” Avanessa put her hands in front of her, bouncing them gently as she arranged her thoughts, eyes darting to and fro. “Maybe... Maybe I was right.”

The two Bandalari raised their eyebrows.

The words came like a flood, quick and falling over each other to get out. “I’ve heard so many stories. So many. The only stories that consistently mention light in the Night sky are stories about the forges. Maybe the light isn’t coming from here — it’s coming from wherever that dragon forge is!”

Avanessa looked between them both for a reaction, but they both remained skeptical. Dagran sighed, reluctant to rain on her parade but obligated to restate the obvious. “People have scoured these mountains the same as all the others for years. If there was something at the peak, we’d know by now.”

“That’s… accurate. But maybe things have changed! We have no idea what’s causing that light or the earthquakes. Maybe it has something to do with the forge.”

It wasn’t out of the question. The peak was still in the same direction Avanessa had seen the light coming from back in the ravine, but at the same time, the forges had been lost for ages. What made them really think one would suddenly emerge now of all times?

“We shouldn’t be shouting up here,” Zura murmured. “We have no idea where that nightbeast went — much less whether there are more nearby.”

“At least— can we at least follow the path up to the top of the peak? Just to check?”

It was hard to agree to stay out here any longer than they had to. Still, they had come this far. Even if there was no chance of anything being there — they still had to check, right? If nothing else, Avanessa was right that they still didn’t know what was causing the flashes and the quakes. If not a forge, there still might be an answer further up.

And for Zura specifically, she couldn’t deny a pull towards the peak. Even if it hadn’t been a tradition for more years than she could imagine, something still beckoned her upwards, urged her to stand at the peak and experience what it was like being so close to Divinity. Or, rather, half of it.

“I think… it’s worth checking out.” Mazzurak finally pulled her hand from the rock, reaching out to help Dagran back to his hooves.

From the look in his eyes, she could tell Dagran didn’t want to continue. They had already tested their luck once with the beast, and there was no escaping if another attacked them — especially not here, on the open mountainside.

Still, he seemed to understand that this was about more than just the possibility of the mythical dragon forge.

So they turned their sights further up, to a long-abandoned path of overgrown stones leading into the darkness.

Step by step they ascended, but they were not walking for long before they had to stop once again.

The end of the path was not marked, not by a stone or monument of any kind.

It just… ended, not even at the peak.

The path led directly to a steep drop-off into the Blackriver Ravine.

They all stared off this cliff for only a few seconds before Avanessa reasoned that the path must continue somewhere further up the mountain.

Whether that was likely or not, Dagran planted his torch in the ground where the rocks ended, giving them a marker of light to return to.

They left the path to continue higher still, never encountering the trail again. It was a steep trek, but nothing any of the three couldn’t handle.

And finally, they reached the peak.

“Watch your step,” Dagran cautioned, helping Avanessa up the last few steps.

It was a precarious thing, the peak, like standing on the spine of a large animal — there was barely enough footing for them all to stand, peering around at an impossibly vast view of their surrounding Night.

Dagran whistled softly. “Would you look at that…”

“Huh… we can see Bandoska from here. And my people.” Avanessa pointed out over a sea of darkness to where moonlight glittered off of the shifting waves. Sure enough, lit against the Night was the little encampment the wanderfolk had set up just off the bridge, and further back, the island of Bandoska — a purple glow emanating from its thickly-forested territory and from the spires of a monumental structure near the coastline.

“It looks so small from here,” Zura murmured softly.

“No forge, though. No monument. No lights anywhere on this mountain,” Avanessa commented.

She breathed a slow, disappointed sigh that stretched into a heavy silence.

When her voice returned, it was sweeter, the day not entirely lost. “Still, this view might be worth it. This whole day… I never thought I’d see or do anything like this, you know. Not myself, at least. It’s the kind of thing you only ever hear about people doing. Teaming up with a couple of strangers to rescue people, fight beasts, climb mountains, solve a mystery… Try to solve a mystery. Even if there isn’t a forge here, maybe this was worth it anyway.”

Zura was only half-listening, though she did agree. Her gaze had turned skyward, drinking in the vastness of the Night sky. She reached a hand up, feeling the wind move through her fingers. No light graced her — none other than the torch in her own hand.

An imperfect Divinity, but still divine.

---

For as long as they stayed there, they all knew it couldn’t last forever. It was Dagran that made the call, gathering Zura and Avanessa to begin their descent all the way back to the wanderfolk encampment outside the Southern Bridge.

It was troubling, not finding at least something that might have caused the light and quakes, even if it wasn’t a forge. As euphoric as being so close to the sky had been… it hadn’t left them with any answers.

They carefully made their way back down to the pitchmud torch Dagran had left. Zura was the last to arrive, the last to pull herself from the top of the world and return to everything below.

When she made it there, Dagran picked up the torch and he and Avanessa began walking. Still, Zura couldn’t shake the feeling that they were so close to something. Her eyes traced the path leading to the cliff’s edge again, and suddenly it hit her.

“Zura? Everything alright?” Dagran asked, returning to retrieve her from the edge. Avanessa was close behind, unwilling to stray far from either of them.

“…maybe we’ve been thinking about this all wrong.”

Dagran stared at her, confused. “…what do you mean?”

Zura turned quickly to Avanessa. “How did the old legend go again? The part where the dragons destroyed the forges.”

The storyteller blinked at her a few times before searching her memories and reciting the phrase as she had learned it, “‘The dragons destroyed their forges. The nine beams of light that had marked their locations had vanished from the horizon, along with any other evidence of their existence.’ That one?”

“Yes, but— the part about the skyline?”

“Their countryside was left charred and their skyline irreparably changed?”

“That— exactly. Think about it. For millennia upon millennia, people have been looking for the dragon forges. They’ve searched every tallest peak and every second-tallest and every third too, I’m sure. And what have they found?”

“Nothing?” Dagran asked, frowning as he waited to see what trail of thought Zura was following.

“Nothing!” Zura agreed, looking between both of them, “So what I’m saying is… maybe that line means more than we think it does. Maybe Avanessa is right and there was a forge here. Maybe that was the other half of Divinity the travelers would come here to see. But maybe that line in the story wasn’t talking about the light disappearing from the sky, but that—”

It was finally dawning on Avanessa where Zura was going with this. She was breathless as she finished the sentence. “—but that the entire mountain was gone! That would mean — Zura, people haven’t found the forges at the tallest peaks because the forges aren’t there!”

“People have spent so long searching the top of the world, they never considered to start looking down!”

Zura’s words hung in the air, carried off on a cold mountain breeze and reverberating in every rock and plant they touched along the way. The entire world seemed to breathe a sigh of relief, finally letting go of a secret thought long lost to time.

But this could only mean one thing.

All this time, they had been going the wrong way. There was indeed a dragon forge here, or there had been. There was every chance that it was behind the light and quakes.

But it wasn’t here, not at the top of the world.

Following their newfound revelation to its logical conclusion, their eyes panned down, down the precarious dropoff, down each rocky outcropping.

All the way down to where it sloped into the wide darkness of the Blackriver Ravine, cut like a terrible scar long-healed through the Ashborne Mountains.

How much larger had the peak been in the time of the dragons? How much closer had travelers been to touching the sky? How much of the mountain had been carved away?

The scale of wrath that wrought such devastation upon the land was unfathomable — a show of might and power the likes of which this region of the world had never seen in over a millennium since.

It was fascinating.

Terrifying.

A living testament to history.

And somewhere within that ravine, a long-lost dragon forge awaited discovery.