The Butterfly Effect

{-Hayze-}

A part of her simply wanted to return to her fairy size, flee into the forest, and leave the boys to deal with the mess that they, by all rights, were the ones to cause. She could easily allow them to be a distraction, while she found the final enchanted object and destroyed it. But, unfortunately, they were a team.

And she wasn’t about to abandon her teammates.

Didn’t mean she had to be nice about it, though.

“You better have a real plan, plant boy,” she hissed. “Because ‘get there before she does’ isn’t really one of them.”

Tevie flicked his hand to cause more plants to move in behind them, allowing for a bigger gap between them and Talia. “She’s just an Ilethera, right? Not a dreamer?”

“Anyone with any capacity to control Skiá is going to need a more substantial distraction than bushes.”

“Could you actually answer the question, please?”

“She has the Saint’s Curse. No Messenger is a dreamer.”

“And only dreamers can have the same level of control over Skiá that Eldrianna does, right?”

“Yes. Ilethera don’t have the kind of connection to the shadows as dreamers do.”

Kaius gave that annoying smirk of his. “I see where you’re going, Tevie. She might act in control now, but she’s bound to lose control at some point, right?”

“Maybe not bound to,” Hayze remarked. “It’s just more likely. It’s like trying to tame wild animals instead of domesticated ones.” As much as she hated to, she felt she had to ask, “Your whole plan doesn’t revolve around that, does it..?”

“My plan is to stall long enough that she’s either forced to leave or we get what we’re looking for. The Skiá thing just means one might come sooner than the other.”

Hayze hated these “plans.” But, unfortunately, there was nothing she could do than to go with it—they didn’t exactly have any better options.

“I think this is it,” she announced after another couple of minutes, slowing to a stop. “I’m sensing some kind of magical presence here that isn’t just the Skiá, so this has to be where the last enchanted object is. Can I trust the two of you to keep Talia and the Skiá away from me?”

Tevie nodded. “I’ll keep Talia distracted—she still has to worry about physical obstructions. I’ll try to force her to take another path.”

“And I’ll take care of the Skiá,” Kaius said with a smirk. It took a rather harsh glare from Tevie to add, “Without the prevalent use of Fire magic. Fire would, of course, be far too obvious.” The glare persisted, so he continued, “And would ruin the local ecosystem.”

“You know we don’t exactly have time for this, right?” Hayze prompted. “Go on, get to it! Talia and the Skiá are going to end up getting too close if the two of you don’t get a move on.”

It was clear that Talia was already getting too close for comfort, because her voice echoed throughout the trees saying, “You cannot ruin what she made! I—I can’t let you!”

And the time to be sorry for her would have to come later because, at this moment, they all had their mission to complete.

Kaius and Tevie both went in more or less the same direction, though she could tell they diverted after a moment. Hayze, then, was left trying to focus hard enough to determine exactly where this last object was.

It couldn’t have been something that would cause another projection; if it was, then the illusion would’ve started by now. It had to simply be an enchanted object, though… that only made things more difficult and a bit more confusing. She supposed the time to consider what it was doing here wasn’t now, however, and simply tried her best to do her part.

Hayze first looked around the river, since that’s where every other enchanted object had ended up being near. As far as she could tell, though, there wasn’t anything there—just a couple of Skiá on the other side, but she was focused enough to quickly take care of them before they became a bigger problem. Eventually, she decided that she shouldn’t just focus on what she could sense, but what the Skiá were doing, too. With any luck, they understood that their presence interfered with her ability to find the enchanted object… which meant that, the closer she got, the more of them there would be.

And eventually, it wasn’t just the Skiá that she could use as an indicator of how close she was getting. Talia ended up getting close enough to notice what Hayze was doing, too, and certainly tried everything in her power to stop it.

“Stay away from this!” Talia tried, no longer bothering to hide her desperation. “This was all things that she made, and the only memories she has left of him. I can’t let you ruin this. I can’t…”

“If you haven’t already noticed,” Hayze remarked, taking the risk that she was on the right track, “Eldrianna already ruined this. She was the one that caused all these Skiá to be here—the Skiá that you’re controlling right now, and the countless others that have come to this forest. It’s because of her that no one else will be able to enjoy the things that Achadus had set up. Don’t you think it’s better, then, to let this whole place fade into memory? I’m almost certain he would’ve preferred it that way.”

“You know nothing,” Talia hissed. “And I’d advise that, unless you want to cause even more trouble for yourself and your gods, you step away from all of this right now.”

“Oh, so you’re saying I’m in the right spot? Thanks, it was getting a little hard to focus with all of the Skiá surrounding me. I must admit that it was a nice try, though.”

Before Talia could get close enough to try to stop her physically, Hayze darted towards a part of a tree’s roots that were sticking out of the ground. There was just enough room to be able to tuck something inside and, if her hunch was right, she’d find something there.

And she was right—nestled just below a layer of dirt was a locket. Its apparent age didn’t faze her; she already knew that most of the things here were far older than what they first predicted. It seemed to just have the faintest bit of magic attached to it, though she couldn’t quite tell what the enchantment was supposed to do.

“Get away from that,” Talia said. “Step away from all of this. This is your last chance.”

“Well, thank you for reassuring me that this is what I needed,” Hayze remarked. “I can’t imagine this thing is going to be too hard to get rid of…”

Several Skiá came up to her as she gripped it more firmly, but Kaius took care of them before they got too close. Talia attempted something, too, before Tevie likewise occupied her. Hayze likely only had a moment to do what she needed to do.

And that was exactly how long it took for her to destroy the locket, getting rid of all of the remaining magical energy. The only thing left were the Skiá, and she was almost certain those would all be leaving soon enough.

Talia still fought out of the foliage Tevie had trapped her in, darting over to the spot where Hayze was. She willingly moved out of the way for the other Messenger, just so that Talia could be sure that all of it was gone.

“How could you do this?” she whispered. “This meant something to somebody, and you just got rid of it. Now the only thing that remains is memory.”

“There are some things that should stay only within memory,” Kaius remarked. “You know that we were only completing our mission, the same as you. I don’t believe you should keep Darkness waiting.”

Tevie nodded. “You can at least say you put up a good fight. You were a lot more persistent than I thought you were going to be.”

Hayze stood up, brushing the dirt off of her robes. “Our mission here is complete. Perhaps we’ll see each other again soon, but… I do hope it’s as those on the same side. I’m sure I speak for all of us when I say there’s no hard feelings between us, if we do end up seeing each other again.”

“Just go, if you’re leaving,” Talia muttered. “There’s no place for you here anymore. All that remains here are unfulfilled promises and broken futures. You have better things to be doing than lingering here.”

With a shared nod between the three, they turned around and left.