”Might as well,” Tymythy said, after trying to recall just where they had passages still unchecked. ”There’s a couple routes back there we need to check, just as there are a couple up here before we took all these stairs. And as we have no way of knowing which route leads to the exit…” The less time wasted planning with no intelligence to do so, the better. ”So, who wants to go down first? I’ll hold the rope and help you descend, then follow after you.”
The Black Birds made it down person-by-person. Using the hand looped rope each climbed down like they were using a ladder.
"This way is a dead end, but that way we're back to our trail. Might as well come down here and we can try a different branch."
Cairee's heart sank. How big was this maze? She was supposed to lead them, but she had no idea what to do next. She was exhausted, frustrated, and since the vision of Flyson, not fully herself. Something was missing.
With effort, she pulled herself off the wall and forced a smile onto her face and into her voice. "Great idea, Dounia. We're getting close to the end, I'm sure of it." She could imagine the titters of laughter coming from the spectators in the arena. Well, as Dounia would say, they could kick rocks. She wasn't doing this for them.
She clung to the rope as Tymythy slowly lowered her down. As they waited for the others, Cairee followed Dounia back down the hallway to see the chalk marks, trying to get her bearings and determine their path forward.
”There’s one corridor we didn’t fully check just right from the next intersection, isn’t there?” Tymyhty suggested. ”Let’s start from there and go for the next closest one after that.” The visions had seemed to reach their peak the last round – at least Tymythy was at a loss imagining what could possibly top what he had just experienced – so perhaps there would be no more of those and it was only a matter of lucking out and finding the right way out… not that one should get too complacent in a place like this.
The Black Birds found frustration after frustration as again and again the came to a seemingly endless series of dead ends. The blue chalk lines crossed over themselves and became rapidly useless. In all of their hustling through the headache of mirrors they found no visions, no traps, no secret stashes, and no clues that pointed to new information.
After several minutes they found themselves back at the base of the staircase hall. There were only east and south left for choices.
Finally, something new. The southern hall bent west, then south, and ended in a small triangular room. The room's walls had no mirrors. One person could fit in the room easily. Two could fit uncomfortably. Otherwise, the room was a dead end.
”Finally, something new,” Tymythy grunted as the latest corridor opened into a small room. ”And no mirrors?” He was becoming sick of seeing his own image every time his gaze strayed to one side, this was nice variety. ”Dounia, do you want to give it a look first?”
Dounia looked around the tiny room; it certainly wouldn't take long. But it was different, and surely that had to mean something. She looked carefully for secret doors, making sure not to forget the ceiling.
Dounia stepped into the room and could immediately see a seam between the wall's edge and the hallway. She looked up and there, quite clearly now, was a plastered over seam in the ceiling.
Oh, and the floor. The ceiling and the floor!
The seams cracked and the entire room slid to one side rotating on the southern most corner. A wall passed in front of Cairee (who was still in the hallway) only to reveal a new room. It was identical to the old one, except this one had no Dounia.
Zahra heard a commotion from further up but couldn't see much around Tymythy and E'gama. "Everything good up there?", she inquired loudly.
”What was that sound?” Tymythy asked a breath after Zahra, let go of the rope and began moving forward to the head of the column, where Cairee awaited. He took a peek around the corner, saw a small room with Dounia nowhere in sight.
”What happened?” he asked, for the moment more puzzled than alarmed but that might soon change. ”Where did she vanish? Did some magic sweep her away?” Tymythy poked his head through the threshold and proceeded to step through to investigate.
Cairee watched as it happened again. The floor and ceiling began to grind and the entire small room pivoted on its' southern corner. Tymythy disappeared.
’Well, now I know what happened to Dounia… but she isn’t here,’ Tymythy thought sheepishly as he fell prey to the same trap that had claimed Dounia. But more surprisingly, they hadn’t ended up in the same place, for even as light faded he had seen enough to grasp the size of the small chamber – walls pretty much close enough to reach with arms spread wide. No way for him to have not noticed her here.
So, the room moved. For the moment, Tymythy made a point in standing still. He was still facing the way he had when stepping into the room… so that meant the door had been behind him. That was as good a place to start as any, he thought, as he did an about-face on the spot, closed his eyes so his eyes that saw only darkness couldn’t deceive him, drew a knife and began feeling the edges of the wall that had only moments ago been an opening. Were there any seams between the “walls that had been wall” and the “wall that had been the doorway”?
”Dounia! Cairee!” he called out, testing the waters more than expecting responses. ”Can you hear me?!”
Tymythy's call flooded her with relief.
She looked at the doorway, "Cyn, E'gama, are either of you mechanically minded? Can you tell me anything about how this room works? Can it be reversed? Will it take us all to the same location?"
She understood the trap immediately (or assumed she did). IF somebody else went into the room, the trap would spin again, and then two of them would be trapped. If they kept doing it, eventually Dounia would pop out again, but in the mean time, the others would be trapped. She needed to find a way to reverse it, or trigger it without the others going in. So stupid that she was the one that was trapped! Would the others be able to figure it out?
She couldn't see, but she felt carefully along the walls and floor, hoping there would be some way to move the room back.
Then the room moved again, and she realized somebody had stepped through. "No! No! Dammit! Who's in there! Tymythy?" She shouted through the wall.
Dounia couldn't find a mechanism. It was lodged somewhere behind stone and the sound the room made when it moved gave some clue to there being rollers above the ceiling and beneath the floor. It was confirmed when the room turned a second time. Dounia could hear it and feel the vibration. When she felt about she could get the sense of a seam between the outside wall (which had a slight curve) and the two side walls.
Then she could hear Tymythy and she called back.
Tymythy could hear Dounia's shouted reply, "No! No! Dammit! Who's in there! Tymythy?"
Tymythy could hear Dounia's shouted reply, "No! No! Dammit! Who's in there! Tymythy?"
”Yes, I’m here! Trapped much like you are, I assume!” Tymythy hollered. ”Can you hear what Cairee and the others are saying? If you are too far, I can try to repeat their words, and yours to them!”
”I’m in a small room – like the one I stepped into! But there’s a wall where the doorway was!” He shouted. ”The room… moved? Turned? I was too surprised to pay much attention! There’s no light here, so it’ll take time to see if there are any triggers or mechanisms here! I’ll try to search by feeling alone!” He put his own words into action, and began to slowly and methodically running his fingers along the walls of his small prison, seeking for any irregularities that might suggest some button or latch or something.
Tymythy felt about the room and all he could discern was a fine seam where the side walls met the slightly curved outside wall. The seam was very tight ... maybe nearly airtight.
’… nearly airtight? That can’t be good,’ Tymythy mused as realization dawned.
”We might not have air for very long! The wall seals pretty tight!” he shouted, sharing what he had realized then fell silent, considering as he conserved air. The room had moved pretty much the moment he had stepped into it. So the trigger had to be either on the floor below his feet or at the threshold. If the latter, it had to be magical of nature since he certainly hadn’t felt the tug of a tripwire – if that was the case, he at least could do very little to help. But if the trigger was on the floor…
Tymythy backed into the corner of his room where the adjacent walls were close… close enough for him to wedge his feet by the walls and take as much weight off the floor as possible. He took a moment to settle into place and then reached out with his usriev, poking the floor near the wall that had been the doorway into the room, trying to determine if there was some kind of a pressure plate he had stepped on.
She looked at the doorway, "Cyn, E'gama, are either of you mechanically minded? Can you tell me anything about how this room works? Can it be reversed? Will it take us all to the same location?"
E'gama ventured to open his right eye. He looked around and then opened both eyes fully. He looked at the room and shrugged. He put his big hand on Cyn's shoulder. Cyn looked unfocused. She tried to concentrate and seemed to get the gist of what Cairee was saying.
E'gama, "Cyn here is always the one to disarm some of the simple snares the raiders set. If she can figure out a basic pit trap trip wire how much more difficult could it be to work a magic cult tower room-moving mechanism." He gave it a beat and then winked at Cairee.
Cyn gave E'gama a cross side glance, "He's right. I know simple mechanisms." She came to the edge of the hall without moving into the room. "There doesn't seem to be a trigger. Maybe the entire thing registers new weight? There's no way to tell where the room goes. The arc in the floor seem implies it spins around a centre but I can't be sure. E'gama? Lean into the room and give this wall a push. Maybe there isn't a locking mechanism."
Cyn and E'gama traded places and he braced himself between the walls to attempt to push the room backwards. The room didn't budge.
Cyn looked at Cairee, "Honestly. It's all I got."
Things quickly went from somewhat boring to complicated in the span of a couple heartbeats. Zahra moved up beside Cairee, concern for Tymythy and Dounia etched on her face.
She shifted her weight from one foot to the other while E'gama and Cyn looked at the room. When they were done, the sorceress spoke the incantation needed to see magical auras. "I may not know mechanisms like Dounia or Cyn but I can tell you if this room is magical."
After the room let her know the presence or absence of magic, Zahra raised her voice to address Dounia and Tymythy.
Zahra could immediately discern that there were no magical auras coming from the room. Zahra then looked about to see there was nothing about them, just a hallway of mirrors. All they had was what they brought with them.
Cyn, "I'm pretty quick." E'gama nodded modestly as confirmation. "What if I ran in tagged the wall and ran out again?"
Zahra looked slightly alarmed at Cyn's suggestion before turning to Cairee. "You saw what happened when both Dounia and Tymythy disappeared. Do you think Cyn could run in and run out? How fast did the room move when they disappeared?"
The sorceress frantically rummaged through her bag looking for something heavy to use as an alternative. The best she could find was pieces from the climbing kit. She held up the bag, "Otherwise, I think this is the heaviest thing I have."
"I can hear her! It's dark in here, I can't see anything. I don't know if this will just keep going around, or if I'll fall in a hole or something. But if they can't figure it out, we'll have to just keep moving the trap."
Zahra carefully tossed the climbing equipment onto the floor of the exposed room. Nothing happened.
Zahra looked slightly alarmed at Cyn's suggestion before turning to Cairee. "You saw what happened when both Dounia and Tymythy disappeared. Do you think Cyn could run in and run out? How fast did the room move when they disappeared?"
Cairee looked doubtful. "It started to move only a second or two after they stepped in. And if it started to move while Cyn was still in it, she could get caught..." She shivered at the thought.
"What are the walls and floor made of? Can we break them? Quick Zahra, pass me my staff." If only Tymythy and his muscles were here! She would try to make do. Cairee held out her staff like she'd seen Tymythy hold his spear and thrust it towards the wall to the right, being sure to keep her body on the hall side of the doorway.
The floors were the same dark, mirror-like marble that lined the floor of the entire maze. It had no seams (save for the one where the hall and room met).
The wall was a melded stone and was, likewise, seamless.
Zahra drew Cairee's staff from the small pouch and Cyn watched, confused, as the staff kept revealing itself from the six inch pouch.
Cyn, "Yeah, ok."
E'gama, "You must be a hit at gatherings."
Cairee pushed against the wall on the right. With a good purchase on the hall and a surprising show of strength nothing moved. She thrust her staff at the stone and it left a meagar scrape on the wall. When she pulled back she could see the end of her staff was slightly cracked.
”We are in darkness!” Tymythy shounted in answer to Zahra’s earlier question. ”And unless you can cast your spell through the walls to where you can’t see, I don’t know if more light where you are will help! There is barely any crack for light to shine through!”
Abandoning his attempts to keep his weight off the floor and try to manipulate what he thought had to be a floor trigger he took the handy magical item he had been trusted with and imagined it shaping itself into a pickaxe. He could not see it change, but could feel it growing heavier in his hands, and not being able to see it with his eyes made it easier to concentrate on the image he wanted. He tested the tool’s new shape with by running his arms all over it and nodded in satisfaction. He had no idea just how sturdy the trap room’s walls were, but he was about to find out... and perhaps its designers hadn’t assumed challengers arrived with mining equipment in tow!
”I’ll give it a try from my end!” he shouted, then set his feet and hit the wall separating him from those waiting back in the hallway with all his might.
Tymythy could see sparks fly in the dark as the blows sent shock waves up the handle of the improvised pick. A few blows later Tymythy felt the wall. He could barely feel a mark.
"A pickaxe barely mars the stone!" Tymythy shouted as he ran his fingers over the wall after a few ringing blows with a pick. "So we can forget about that idea!"
Cyn, ”That climbing equipment doesn’t look very heavy. Maybe five pounds. What if we added more weight? They would probably weight it for a smallish person. How much does a gnome weigh? Like a skinny short-ish gnome?”
"That's a great idea. What do we have that's heavy? Zahra, do you have anything in your bag? I think we'd need 30 or so pounds."
While Zahra searched, Cairee stepped as close to the doorway as she dared. She placed the end of her staff on the floor of the room. It was at roughly a 70 degree angle. Already breathless from her attempt to hit the wall, the cleric doubted she had the strength to add much weight to the floor. She turned to the others.
"E'gama, Cyn, grab hold and press down as hard as you can. We'll start slow, and brace it so it doesn't slip away from us. If the room starts to move, pull back as fast as you can."
Zahra's face showed a mixture of dismay and dread. If they couldn't figure out how to get the room to move, something horrible could happen to her friends. "That was the heaviest thing I could find when digging through my bag. When I packed for the party I was expecting more party and less...this."
The sorceress wasn't surprised that she wasn't seriously considered when it came to strong-arming Cairee's staff. "I'm stronger than I look. I can help."
Zahra planted her feet and then pressed as hard as she could when the others were ready.
Zahra went to Cairee's left side and grabbed the lower part of her staff with both hands. Zahra intoned one of her spells and a spectral hand appeared, placing itself in the middle of the space. It didn't take much pressure, maybe twenty-five pounds before the room moved.
Dounia and Tymythy could feel their spaces begin to revolve.
Cairee and Zahra pulled away quickly and the room stopped, rotated backwards, and slid back into its' original position as their hearts fell.
E'gama put his hand on Cairee's shoulder. His big hand was warm. "Try again."
It took some practice. Press down. After a heartbeat the room began to move. Wait until the turn was halfway past the turning point. Pull back.
A new room appeared. Empty.
Again. They started over. Another empty room ... but they could hear Dounia! This time her voice was coming from the wall on their left.
Again.
The room revolved and there was Dounia. In a few seconds they released Tymythy. As some anticipated, the entire trap was just a turnstile, another time-waster.
-
There was only one way left to go. The Black Birds turned back. Another long path lined with mirrors as they couldn't escape endless images of themselves. Some looked fatigued. Some looked confused and frustrated. Some both. They plodded on.
They found themselves at the same room at the base of the stairs and turned right. The new hall has only turnings. There were no side paths, no choices to make, and no option but to see themselves with their emotions clear as day on their copies faces.
Then an opening.
The mirrors stopped. The dark marble stopped.
The hall opened into a great cavern of stone. Halfway across the room, six mirrors 5'w x 10'h stood suspended by some magic. Across the room was a door. The door looked like the arena door they first entered the maze by.
Dounia did a quick search. No traps! Except the obvious.
Cairee was silently sobbing with exhaustion and worry as the group worked to rotate the rooms. When Dounia finally appeared Cairee reached in and pulled her into a hug. She did the same with Tymythy. Then she slumped against the wall and let the others rotate the room one more time to retrieve the climbing gear.
Once the gear was back in Zahra's bag and everyone was re-attached to their rope, Cairee guided the group in silence, avoiding looking in the mirrors as best she could.
They finally came to a great cavern with the arena door! Cairee kept her eyes on the ground and led the team forward. She'd had enough of the mirrors. It was time to get her friends to safety.
”Thank the spirits!” Tymythy gasped as light assaulted his now darkness-attuned eyes. It had been getting hard to breath in his small cell... it might have been he had merely imagined it, as he couldn’t have been trapped there for nearly as long as it had felt like to him, but fear of suffocation had had time to creep up on him. That, he had quickly decided, was not a proper way for a warrior to meet his end.
”And thank you,” he added, giving the others a quick bow. ”I doubt we could have got the thing moving without you, already trapped as we were.” And how easily he had followed Dounia into harm’s embrace. He had merely been reacting, not thinking, but it had all seemed to clear and simple at the time... it was strange. He liked to think he wasn’t usually so quick to leap without looking... perhaps the stress of the strange visions and this unnatural maze were getting to him?
***
The way out... and another set of mirrors. To him, after what he had already been shown, the choice seemed obvious, despite the risks. He squared his shoulders, leaned into his usriev and boldly locked his gaze with his mirror image.
As Cairee tried to lead the Black Birds past the mirrors she found resistance on the rope-line. Tymythy had moved to stand in front of one of the mirrors and his gaze was frozen, his body locked up.
The mirror frame widened until reflection was all that could be seen.
Sand blew wildly around the King. The dust of the now destroyed city wasn't settling. The winds had risen but, still, in the tumult, the furious beating of a dragon's wings could be felt.
Silimiel had risen after being tossed into a distant tower. The miraculous creature had pulled the king and his protector, Usur, from the worst and was now rushing back into battle with the stranger. The young silver dragon pushed up from the ground not far from where Ku'bara'sigi stood.
The king couldn't help but push to see, couldn't help but move from the swirling sands to a place where he could get a glimps of the attacker. Despite Usur's pleading, Ku'bara'sigi climbed a ruin at the outskirts of the city but still couldn't espy the attacker.
Silimiel was battling the air.
Wait. No. Ku'bara'sigi squinted. A speck. A black pebble darting about the air! Not a pebble a bird.
Silimiel gnashed and breathed his icy breath. He clawed in the air. He used his magics and disappeared in a shower of sparks to reappear behind the attacker. He used every trick and power at his disposal.
The crow radiated a blackness that stretched out a hundred feet. The sands froze in mid-air. Ku'bara'sigi could feel him being pulled forward into the blackness. The pressure released in a ring of force. Everything that could, fell to the earth. The dust in the air was gone and the skies became clear. Silimiel tumbled downward but caught himself.
The dragon rose up again and swallowed the crow whole. He writhed unable to control his flight. Silimiel's stomach burst open and the small bird flew free.
The dragon collapsed to the ground, not quite dead.
The crow flew over the devastated city. It hovered as no crow should be able to do. A glass like bubble began to form over the centre of the ruins with the king and his now refugee peoples just on the outside. Ku'bara'sigi could hear the distant screams of the few who remained, unable to get clear. The bubble rose up into the air seemingly at the crow's command leaving a smooth circular crater.
A hole opened up in the sky, engulfed the city, and disappeared.
The crow was nowhere to be seen.
Cyn and E'gama fought.
Cyn, "No! I want to look! I can handle it!"
E'gama, "I'm not going to lose you now! Not after escaping the front, trying to break into this place, prison, release! No, you think you can manage it but you're already weak!"
They wrestled as he pulled her past the mirrors and towards the door.
Cyn, "But they were working together. I have to know."
E'gama, "What good is knowing these lies."
Cyn, "You haven't looked! They aren't lies!"
He pulled her backwards as her heals dragged.
Dounia threw her weight against the door as the others pushed, and together they managed to break them out. Chagrined, she thanked the others. "Sorry, that was really dumb. I know better."
She was thirsty, and wasn't sure if she was hungry or not, or just a bit nauseous. How long had they been in here? Her vision as Cyra had been hours and hours of travelling, but how long had it really been? Had she actually left? Or just been standing, transfixed and hypnotized?
When they arrived at the exit chamber, she let out an involuntary cheer. Then she groaned. "We never found the second secret!" She wondered what they'd missed. What she'd missed. But then, Tymythy had pulled the key part from the mirror. Maybe she'd missed an important clue because of her cowardice at the first mirror challenge.
Well, not this time. Not this close to the exit. She steeled herself, then walked up and looked in the mirror.
Zahra sagged in relief when first Dounia and then Tymythy emerged. She had practically forgotten about the climbing gear but was grateful to Cairee that the cleric had remembered to collect their gear.
She walked quietly behind the others while her body recovered from the strain. She massaged her arm muscles a few times before they arrived at what seemed to be the final room.
Confronted by more mirrors, Zahra didn't have the fortitude to fight against their draw. She still wanted to know if what she had seen about her father was true. Although she wasn't sure she could bear it if it was. Not even if he thought he was doing it for the right reasons.
Zahra was waivering between looking and not-looking and then made the misstep of just glancing and was soon drawn in to what she saw.
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Ku'bara'sigi coughed and did what he could to shield his eyes and mouth with one hand while the other clung to Kizu'gina for support. All around him, the ruins of a once-great city, already in the process of being reclaimed by the wing-swept sands. The king looked around, hoping to spot trails of evacuating citizens but it was no use – there was only an ochre veil cast over everything further than a stone’s throw.
The war was lost, but the battle was still being fought, it would seem, as his straining eyes saw the magnificent bulk of Silimiel flying around, dodging and weaving in a way that belied his bulk and spoke volumes about the force of magic that enabled his flight. Yet what was he fighting? The king couldn’t see...
There! A tiny black speck, insignificant against the titanic dragon, yet Silimiel was clearly taking his foe seriously. Ku'bara'sigi could see black fabric flapping in the wind – the dark-robed foe Silimiel had dueled before? No... that was not the form of a man... but a bird? A raven... or crow?
He watched in growing horror as the wyrm swallowed his tiny enemy whole... only for it to burst out of the dragon’s stomach in a shower of gore, its nimbus of black light not even flickering. A cry of echoed pain escaped his lips as the dragon fell from the heavens, grievously wounded but still clinging to life... until his tiny foe chose to end it all. Yet... it chose to do no such thing.
Not knowing what to think, Ku'bara'sigi watched the creature circle around the ruins of his city until it simply... stopped. As if nailed to the sky.
It started with a second sun...
Power burst from the tiny figure, growing like a ripple in a still pond where a stone was dropped. Grew to encompass the ruined city.
In the band another sky...
Ku'bara'sigi clutched his head against the sudden stab of a fierce headache as memories that were not his rose to his mind. The ground trembled beneath his feet, driving him to his knees. Through watering eyes he saw the city – now completely encased in a transparent shell like the finest blown glass – rising into the air, saw a ripple in the fabric of the world as the sphere touched... some mystical threshold.
Inside the ring appeared the land...
Slowly, gracefully, the sphere passed into the ripple – a portal of truly immense proportions! – and vanished with a small gasp of displaced air.
We could hear faint shouts and screams... The land it then began to fall...
Groaning as pain stabbed into his head like red-hot knives, the king collapsed, tears streaming from his eyes, partly from the pain, but mostly from a ruler’s grief of a people he had failed to protect.
It drove deep into the ground... The ring shrunk down 'til it was gone...
No. Not him. Ku'bara'sigi. The king from the past. A shadow of Kizu'gina’s past master, whose life had somehow got entangled with his own. With the realization the vision shattered like a broken mirror. Leaving Tymythy standing in darkness.
But we survived and thrived again, as before so we again...
The Fey! They had known! The ruins in the first challenge... the very caldera-like depression, ringed by sharp cliff faces... was that where Ku'bara'sigi’s city, or a part of it, had been cast? For what purpose? There had been no way of knowing... but now Tymythy regretted them not taking the time to inspect the ruins.
E'gama had managed to drag Cyn past the mirrors. Tymythy, Zahra and Dounia, however, had stopped to look. The three were transfixed.
The visions came in flashes and the flashes began to go faster and faster. It bagan to hurt, building like some explosion in the blood vessels of the brain.
Flash - four days later
The refugees walked the hard clay road from the mining town of Ciriyanakaram to alKibiri. It was a long dry road and the procession of people who had so little, carried everything they could, which weighed so much. A trip that a wagon could do in six days would take nine.
Flash - ten days later
Cyra bargained for what she could. She trusted strangers with Dounia while she worked. She got a little food. She made friends with other children ... until that friendship was strained by need. She turned into a half-adult. She and Dounia had been in alKibiri for only a day.
Flash - three weeks later
Again and again she found resources from a middle-aged couple who had gathered around them orphans. They seemed nice. The other kids were ok, even if they seemed a little ferrel.
Flash - five weeks
She was in a circle around a fire. The man with the orphans was teaching the children how to pick pockets. The woman was holding Dounia and it felt half-motherly and half-threatening.
Flash - eight weeks
Cyra wept while she stole from another family. She had to bring back enough to the man and the woman. The more she brought the more they would eat. Even so, on the way back she hid some money behind a loose stone at the base of a statue of a soldier riding an elephant just next to the muddy Mas'darum river.
Flash - a year
She was stabbing the man in the thigh. She waved the knife at the woman. Dounia could walk fast now and the two backed away from the family of thieves. She took Dounia east.
Flash - a year and three days
They were so hungry. Cyra had Dounia's hand and kept reminding herself that her 'sister' was just three, or was it four. It wasn't her fault that she was tired and cranky and hungry. Cyra was so tired. She turned into the desert like she was in a trance and kept walking. They would never have made it to Asghar'sinan.
Flash - a year and four days
She was carrying Dounia over a dune. She felt like she was hallucinating. There was a lake next to a stoney outcropping. The lake was frozen???
The outcropping had a cave. On the other side of the lake was an old woman wearing a grey-silver burnoose. She was shrivelled and old like an apple-doll. Impossibly, over the woman's shoulder she carried a massive fruit tree by the trunk. The old woman lifted it off her shoulder and shoved it into the ground near the icy lake.
She turned to see Cyra and, although it seemed like a whisper, her voice carried over the lake, "Sorry. I'd meant be be finished before you came. The lake will thaw. It is fed by an underground cache." She smiled grimly and walked over the next dune. It must have been a mirage.
There were other trees with other fruit. The cave was deep and manageable. Even comfortable.
Cyra fainted.
When she woke she found Dounia eating a pear quietly.