Searching for the Silent Lady by Adelise M Cullens
At first, the labyrinth seems to just weave backwards and forwards, straight down, no corridors or long pathways at all. We have only made it five ledges down when we hear it, a loud crack from above, like the rumble of a thunderstorm. A scattering of stones skips past us. We both look up to see the first ledge we landed on, break off from the wall. We look at one another and rush to get down the next slab.
The large block of stone, a good five foot long and two foot thick comes tumbling down, crashing into the one below it, like immense dominoes. It only takes a moment, but now the next one is also hurtling down towards us.
We jump down, from ledge to ledge, trying to find an escape. The sound is a deafening roar and closing in. Rocks spray and spill all around us. I hold my hand on the wall to steady myself for the next decent and I can feel the vibration of the avalanche as it comes closer.
I feel the explosion as the debris hits the rung above, the shock rips through my body and I feel Raven’s arms wrap around me, completely enclosing me in darkness.
Chapter 6
We are falling. Backwards, forwards, tumbling round and round. I can no longer tell which way is what. Then I realise that the crashing sound of the avalanche is getting further and further away. But it is not the thing I notice the most.
Despite Raven’s protection, I feel my knees and elbows scrape on sharp edges as we fall together. Then the falling stops. We land with a loud crunch and I hear things scatter and echo across the cavern floor. Then I feel everything.
Raven unfurls his arms and I pour out on to the ground. It is so dark I cannot see a thing besides the distant pin prick of light from which we fell from. Like a single star in a night sky, it twinkles with still falling debris.
I try to breathe, but I cannot. The air is so dry, so acrid and fetid down here that it hurts my chest with every breath. I sit up, gasping. My entire body aches and I feel bad for Raven, he must really be hurting. ‘Are you ok?’ I ask.
‘I’m fine. Are you ok?’ says Raven.
‘I don’t know,’ I say.
‘I saw an opening,’ Raven says, taking a look round. ‘I figured that whatever was down here had to be better than being crushed to death out there.’ He pointed up to the false star in our sky. As I turn my head towards it, I can still hear the distant rumbling and some rocks continue to spill down the cliff.
I try to stand up, but agony burns through my leg and I drop back to the ground with a pained cry. Bright spots cloud my vision from the pain and I feel Raven beside me in a moment.
‘What is it M’lady?’ he asks frantically.
‘My knee,’ I say, gripping the top of my leg.
Raven grabs my Sword of Waves and its glow illuminates my leg. He starts to peel back my torn up jeans. I can see the blue material stained with my blood. He reveals a gash in my leg that stretches over my knee and appears the reveal my knee cap below. I look away from the ghastly sight, wondering where I left the missing skin. Raven strokes the unharmed portions of skin on my tiny leg.
‘I can fix it M’lady?’ says Raven. I do not believe him. It is far too deep and I can feel the blood oozing out of it. ‘Trust me,’ he says and I realise I really have no other choice.
He holds my sword vertically above my knee and I look away preparing for pain. ‘You should watch Ellie. I told you, I remember you over everything else,’ says Raven.
It’s the first time I have heard Raven use my name, so I open my eyes and watch as a single drop of the glowing blue water gathers at the end of the sword. It wavers there a moment then drops onto my leg.
Immediately, the water cools the burning in my knee and I watch as my leg mends itself right in front of my eyes. The pain and even the blood completely disappears, washes away in the water.
Raven rubs a hand over my healed flesh, I feel every scale on his palm on my new skin. ‘There you go little Ellie, all fixed.’ he says to me, as if I am a child and I don’t like it.
‘Thank you,’ I say as I take my sword from him. His face is frightening in the blue rippling light of my sword and he quickly turns away. ‘Ok. Now what?’ I ask.
‘You are the Captain,’ says Raven.
I shine my sword around the cavern, but I can see nothing. It is as if the darkness down here has a life of its own. As if it purposefully trying to snuff out the light. I take a cautious step in one direction and feel my foot kick something. I move again and find that the ground is covered in hard objects.
I kneel down and shine my sword on the ground. Raven bends down beside me. ‘What is it M’lady?’ he asks.
‘I’m not sure,’ I say as I pass my sword over a strange spherical thing. It still rolls around from me kicking it. The hollow noise it makes bounces off the walls. As it comes to a stop its shape becomes clear. The empty holes of eyes stare at me through the blackness. By the shape of the skull I know that it is one of the merfolk.
I gasp and stumble backwards, causing another scatter of bones along the floor. I begin to panic and breathe quickly. Raven follows me and scoops me up in his arms as I begin to sob. I now realise why it is so hard to breathe down here as the violent scent of old death threatens to suffocate me.
I get a vision of how this place used to look. Through my tears I see the Merchildren playing and their mothers watching over them. I remember the merfolk and their tunnels, like ants with chambers to keep them safe. This had been a safe place once.
‘Put me down Raven,’ I say through my tears.
‘But M’lady?’ Raven starts, but I cut him off.
‘I said put me down!’ I demand and struggle to get free of him.
Once he has dropped me, I take off. I hold my sword close to the ground and I look. I need to see how many there are. I pick up pace, skipping over the tops of the skeletons. I cannot stop my tears and I cannot find the end of the graveyard.
I drop to my knees on the cold ground and I scream. The pain of the loss is too much and my anger is even more so. ‘This is no longer just a quest, Raven,’ I say through my sobs. ‘This is a fight. That Lady of Dirt has to pay for all that she has done. She is a thief and a murderer!’
Raven stands beside me and I expect him to rouse on me, but he does not. I hold my sword up to his face and I can see the smile in his eyes.
I rest my sword back down and the light catches on something strange. I scan my sword over to see something that tears up my insides. A mother mermaid clutches at her baby, their skeletons so undisturbed, their heads are still touching, their hands still entwined. But inside them are eggs, two big black eggs.
I feel sick to my stomach and all I can do is pray that the eggs were put their after their deaths.
I reach through their rib cages and pull out the eggs and I place them before Raven and myself. Unceremoniously, they crack open, oozing their flesh smoke as before. Their black tentacles rise to us.
As the smoke chokes off my air I welcome it, I drink in its blackness. I feel the smoke squirm within me. The water rises up around us and I close my eyes. I reach out for Raven’s hand and I take it.
The water swirls and carries us away, and I smile as my body begins to grow.
Chapter 7
The pain. As my body changes, the pain rips through me. My muscles stretch and tear and reform. And I know now how painful it must have been for Raven. My grip tightens on his hand and I feel him pull me into his body, protecting me from the onslaught of debris being carried with us in the waves.
The water churns around us. We turn with its currents. We are tossed around like seaweed in the waves, but I smile throughout all of this because I can feel myself becoming whole.
Raven holds me to his body and I feel not scales and feathers, but soft skin and flesh.
I do not need to hold my breath under water. I can breathe it in like it was air and then I realise, what if Raven is not the same. I remember holding his little body in my hands. I see him cough and splutter, the water a poison to his lungs. I know I must get him to the surface.
I come up with him and look at his face. I can see his face has changed structure. It is more human than before, but I cannot see enough definition. I wait for him to gasp for air but he does not.
‘Raven!’ I yell, but I cannot hear my own voice of the roar of the water rushing through the chasm. I am forced back under the surface, but under here I can see shafts of light filtering through the water.
We pour out the side of the cliff face. The water fall is gigantic, spraying water into the dry air. I can smell it, taste it. The smell of the water mixing with the salt crystals below. My ocean is filling back up. A tsunami racing along the crystal lake.
We hit the water hard, but it is my turn to protect Raven. I make us rise above the water, floating on top like it was land. I hold my hand over his mouth. I can feel the water inside him, feel his body rejecting it. I focus on it and pull it out. It flows out of his mouth as if he has sprung a leak. But he still does not move.
I look at him. His face is beautiful, peaceful in the most deadly of ways. His body is marked with tattoos, patterns just like on his wings before.
I shake him. ‘Raven!’ I know he needs air in his lungs, like a bird needs it under his wings. I touch my mouth to his and breathe. I breathe life into his chest, I feel it rise and then fall as I take my lips away. I breathe into him again and again and then finally a splutter, a cough. ‘Raven!’
‘M’lady?’ He reaches out to me, touching my face and taking a piece of my hair in between his fingertips. I now notice that it is the colour of coral, pink and glistening. I notice my clothes made of seaweed, swaying in unseen sea currents. I am tall and womanly. I notice Raven’s eyes, those stormy grey eyes, staring at me. They sparkle with lightning.
We float along on my new sea. The waves crash violently on the rocky shore and the sky swells with fat rain clouds. The wind picks up around us, stirring up the salty brine. We kiss and we are home.
***
I can hear her calling to me. Feel the creaking of her deck, the arthritic bones of an old woman. My Silent Lady is calling me. I call back to her and she is coming.
***
When the Lady of Dirt comes for us, we are ready. We watch from the sea as the earth splits and she rises from within.
‘Well, well, my little Ellie Pirate. I would like to say that is good to see you this way, but I think I much preferred you as a pitiful child with no voice or home,’ she says in her booming voice.
‘You cannot exist without me Lady,’ I say. A wall of water rises up behind me and I float on its surface. Raven is to my side. I look at him, he is draped in a black cloak made of feathers and his skin is tanned and tattooed. Inside me I know he can still fly. I know it because I can remember it.
‘Find the Silent Lady, bring her back to me!’ I order.
He kisses me. ‘Aye, aye, Captain!’ In a flash and a flurry of wings he is transformed from man to bird. He soars away from me on the wind, up and over the waves. He disappears into the dark clouds with a crackle of lightning that splits the sky with bright blue shards.
The Lady begins to roar. Her lava eyes burn bright and heat radiates from her. ‘I will always exist little Ellie!’ Boiling lava spills from her hands and from her mouth. It cascades towards me. Steam bellows into the sky as my water boils under her touch.
I force my waves down upon her. I engulf her, but it is not enough. She rises above it, creating mountains where there were none before. I surge upwards on my wave and lash out at her, chasing her.
‘You have killed entire species!’ I slam a tidal wave at her. She falls down the mountain she has made. ‘You are a murderer!’
She comes at me again. Rocks and earth collide with me, but sink to the bottom of my waves.
I laugh at her. ‘How did I ever let you take me?’ I send her another flood. It smashes into her, eroding her. I rise higher with my water. And come down upon her. I draw my sword.
The water subsides around us, creating a tunnel that swirls up into the sky. My fury is immense.
The Lady splutters for breath and backs away from me. ‘Naaww, what’s the matter Lady of Dirt? Too much to drink?’ I pick her up with one hand. My strength is back tenfold. I slam her into the wall of water and hold my sword to her throat. ‘Why?’ I find myself screaming at her. ‘Why did you do it?’ She looks scared and I find myself liking it. I push her into the water where I can see her gurgling and struggling for breath.
I pull her out and ask her again. ‘WHY?’
She smiles her cruel cracked-earth grin. ‘Why not?’
‘Aaaarrrggh.’ I scream at her and hold her back in the water. I pull her back out and hold my Sword of Waves to her throat.
‘Do it! Eye for an eye!’ she says, spitting water out of her mouth.
I clench my teeth and bring her closer to me. I hold the hilt of my sword tightly and prepare to take her. For she has taken so much from me. Then I remember something the fairies said to me. They called me ‘Queen of the Tides, Giver of Earth Blood.’ If I am a Queen, is this the sort of Queen I want to be. The Lady of the Land needs me to survive.
‘No,’ I say and drop her. ‘But know this, you cannot fool me twice.’
I can see the relief on her face as I ride up the wall of the whirlpool. ‘Can you at least take me back to land?’ she pleads.
I smile. ‘No. Make yourself an island.’ I dive into the side of the whirlpool as it comes crashing down on top of her. I swim, through the cool churning water. I taste its salt on my lips. I feel its pull through my long hair. I no longer feel dry. I no longer feel out of place.
Then I see it. A shadow atop the waves. My Silent Lady.
I race to the surface and leap out as if I were a dolphin. I catch onto the side of the ship and climb up a ladder that already hangs. I climb up each rung with purpose. A queen reclaiming her throne. Water drips from my body and I am in heaven. I look up her brown wooden hull and caress her.
I see Raven flying overhead. He caws and comes in to land on my shoulder as I jump onto the deck.
It is silent but the creaking of The Silent Lady’s hull. Her sails are full, but there is no crew to be seen.
Raven is back by my side, once again a man. ‘Where are they?’ I ask and look at his face, but I already know the answer.
‘But they are still here M’lady. Eager to serve their Captain,’ he says, with sorrow in his eyes.
The rigging swings and the anchor is hoisted in response. ‘They are …’
‘Yes M’lady. Ghosts,’ my first mate answers me.
I stick out my chest and breathe in deep. From an orphan who could not speak to a captain of a ship with a ghost crew within a few days … why not?
‘Weigh anchor and hoist the mizzen!’ I say running to the helm and taking the wheel.
‘Aye, aye Captain!’ says Raven as he runs up the rigging to his crow’s nest. The ship responds as if there was a crew. And in deed I must be one, they are just not to alive!
The moon shines brightly above us and the sea sprays off the side of my Silent Lady. We set sail to god knows where. Off to find someone still living. Off to find adventure. Off to find life.
‘Yo ho ho,’ I say, with the wind in my hair and my ship below my feet.