To Fly the Soaring Tides

“Why are there so many people here?” Cira asked, “I thought you were evacuating.”

The dumbstruck mayor stammered over his words, “W-we can only evacuate so many at a time!” He desperately explained the situation at the elevators and his efforts to carry the weak.

“Typical Earth Vein, I guess.” The witch shrugged, putting Rudo at a loss for words, “I got rid of most the nymphs out here but it’s still too arid to bring everyone back yet.”

“You—what? Wait, b-but what about their work? We need to send the second shift down or we’ll miss our quota.”

The man gulped as Cira stared at him with disdain, nestled in mist and pouring a river onto the ground at her feet, “Does it look like I care about your salt?”

Rudo froze. Is this a test…? I wouldn’t put it past them, “Umm… Yes?”

“Wrong!” Slap!

“Gah! I’m sorry, madam witch!” He fell again to his knees as Nanri and Lomp finally caught up.

“Cira, why are you abusing the mayor?” Nanri asked with sincere curiosity. “Is it because second shift hasn’t started yet?”

The people yet to board an elevator and healthy enough to stand had all gathered to watch the poor mayor get reprimanded by the two witches at once. Some of them were covering their eyes or those of their children as if to shield them from the violent, but certain outcome.

“Second shift has been postponed until the climate in the cave has stabilized,” Cira said in a voice loud enough for everyone to hear, “Anyone too weak, continue to evacuate. Otherwise go help those left in the city. Mayor.”

He went cold as her gaze turned to him. He was unable to discern the meaning behind her outlandish words, “Yes?!”

“Lives are worth more than salt. I should think a mayor would know that.” He winced. Dammit, who is this witch?! You don’t have to tell me that!

“Heal.” The witch’s words were filled with power and all the aches and pains that accumulated over the last twenty minutes of mayhem disappeared. When she spoke again his dry skin overflowed with a soothing feeling and his eyes stopped burning. She looked at him like a fly before waving him off with a hand and continuing, “Now off you go.”

He ran away without another word, and she sighed, “What an unsavory man. Lomp, how long was I asleep?”

“Er- a whole day… It’s morning again.”

The sorcerer nodded with faint gratification, “That is… adequate.”

“Um, Cira… Are you sure about this? They have very strict quotas and Salina won’t be happy—”

“My job isn’t to make Salina happy. If she has something to say I’m sure I’ll deal with it later.”

Nanri let out a bated breath, “Wow… Well, whatever you say, Cira!” She brought a hand to her forehead in a dramatic salute. Lomp had a look in his eyes like his stomach hurt and something had gotten dangerously out of hand.

Cira conjured a large pool of stone and filled it with water. The citizens of Nymphus all swarmed, lapping it up like wild animals.

“Thank you, madam witch!” One man called out with reverence.

“My gratitude to Earth Vein!”

“It was all thanks to the Water Witch!” The people had started to clamor.

“No, it’s the Salty Mist Witch!”

“Fools! Do you have eyes? She is obviously the Shimmering Nymph Queen Spring Witch!”

“Okay, we can leave.” Cira groaned, walking away. She pursed her lips and tried to avoid locking eyes with the real witch who thoroughly enjoyed the suggestions.

They returned to the gates and entered, trudging through the salty mud that now coated the city streets. Looking up, ceaseless lights gave the impression that nothing had happened at all. The nymphs didn’t cause damage as they ignored physical obstacles, so the city was fine, save for the mud at their feet. The cloud cover even made for a picturesque scene of the fantastical city skyline.

But look down and you saw the dried up children and elderly laying on the ground, catatonic with half-closed eyes and bloody fingernails, clawing at the bricks with weak hands in a failed effort to escape the passed threat. Cira healed anyone she saw in passing and the other citizens had begun to pour in to help with the relief, carrying them back to the elevators. Cira locked eyes with Rudo slathered in salt-mud and carrying a paling child on either shoulder. She gave him a thumbs up and he flinched before picking his pace up.

“You’re really something, Cira. You know I had to come up with my own nickname,” The Titan Witch said, “And you can even heal! How’d you ever learn so many types of witchcraft?”

“My father had a saying. ‘The sorcerer incapable of wielding any one sorcery is yet incomplete.’” It wasn’t very fair, since he also told her there was sorcery she wasn’t allowed to learn yet stowed away in the forbidden archive. Haven’t thought about that in years… hm.

“Amazing…” Nanri trailed off, but Cira didn’t hear her through the reminiscence. Far too young to be on her own up here, she was in denial after Gazen passed and tried opening Breeze Haven’s forbidden archive looking for him. The attempt left her bereft of mana and bedridden for rest of the day.

Nanri led the two back to the entrance of the New Shore District and they skirted along the wall for another ten minutes or so before they reached another door. She opened it up and then paused, looking at Cira and gesturing behind her, “So… What are you going to do about those?”

Cira looked back to see a few handfuls of salt nymphs gliding back and forth in her wake, not sparing them so much as a glance. “They should probably come with us, no? Don’t want them bothering the good folk of Nymphus.”

The witch gave the creatures an uncertain look, then shrugged, leading the way. Once they entered, the staircase was carved right into the salt and wide enough that the nymphs didn’t have to cluster up, though they still kept a distance, tottering along in the air. Cira, of course, had stopped pouring water and making fog since they entered the stairwell. The city had clouds and muddy puddles now, so the climate would work itself out.

One flight of stairs turned into two and before Cira knew it, they had been descending for an hour. Her feet were starting to get sore from the hard steps by the time they reached the next door. It opened to a large chamber full of people wearing bizarre full-body outfits. That must be their protective gear. I bet those tanks on their back are full of air.

Most of them had heavy-duty brooms with wide heads on them strapped to their back, “They call ‘em prima sweepers.” Nanri noticed her looking at the workers.

“Strange… Did the nymph stampede not affect them down here?”

“They never stampede in their own territory, though I guess that used to include the whole Nymphus stratum too. These people probably don’t even know what happened.”

Cira saw some of them taking their gear off and getting ready to leave for the day. They’d been working through the night only to return to a disaster.

“Well, Gear up, now! No time to waste.” Nanri was half-inside a jumpsuit, adjusting the straps on a mask in her hands.

Cira looked at the dull orange color and bulky material they were made from. She watched Nanri put her hat in a locker and zip it up, covering her robes before attaching the mask and pulling the suit over her head. If Cira didn’t know any better, she’d think the witch were setting out to explore the sky beyond.

The workers inside were starting to take their distance as they saw a flock of nymphs enter the chamber then coalesce above the witches. One man, who nobody but Lomp knew was the supervisor, shivered in fear—wanting to rebuke the witches for somehow bringing nymphs in but too scared to say anything. Lomp exchanged a pained and regretful look with him.

“No thanks. Not my style.” Cira refreshed her Hydro Barrier and pumped a bit more mana into Aquon.

This whole time, nestled in the tip of Cira’s staff like a lounge chair, Nina watched the large orange people she knew shed their skin and take the form of regular people. This was an interesting puzzle for the little nymph whose eyes shined with wonder—a similar expression some of the workers had at seeing the new witch with a pet nymph or twenty and no need for protective gear.

Nanri’s muffled voice came through her respirator, “Guess it doesn’t make a difference to you, huh Cira?”

Lomp had hastily donned his own suit and was ready to go. They were walking to the back of the room when an older man without his mask approached them, “Excuse me, madam witch. Did you say there was a stampede? In Nymphus?!”

It was a wonder that there hadn’t been one before, which was to Cira a sign that something was going on down here at the lowest level.

“You shouldn’t worry. I drove them off and the mayor is heading off relief efforts—”

“You did what?!”

Let’s not do this… “If you’re done with work for the day maybe you should go help.”

The man knelt in a hurry, “Yes, madam witch!” Cira sighed.

“You sure are popular,” Nanri stuck out her tongue. “I’m jealous!”

“Jealousy is unbecoming of a sorcerer, as is pride.” Cira said matter-of-factly, as if she were quoting someone.

Nanri looked downtrodden. “But I’m—I’m a witch…”

“You must ask yourself. Is witch your identity… or your shackles?” Cira tried to sound like a wise old witch and could see Lomp’s exasperated gaze through the window of his mask in which only his eyes showed. Nanri, however, took it to heart and fell into deep thought as they exited the personnel chamber.

It led into another hallway with a door at the end that wouldn’t open until the first was shut. A kind of quarantine chamber to keep the air in the nymph lair from mixing with the previous room as it could turn lethal.

“And here we are!” Nanri’s cutesy gestures in the thick jumpsuit as she opened the final door made Cira laugh.

“I kind of expected to see some Earth Vein people. What happened to the checkpoint?” She asked lomp but the Nanri replied instead.

“You’re a witch, silly. When have you ever had to fill out entry permits? Or—wait… I guess sorcerers probably don’t have to either, do they?” Cira thought about it and then nodded.

The cave beyond was very dim, lit only with the occasional blue light artifact on the wall. Nanri explained that since they were the color of water mana, it didn’t bother the nymphs for the lights to stay on constantly. Cira cast Lamplight and made it a soft blue tone following them. She was urged to just make Aquon light up, but it was more efficient to cast a light spell than discharge mana just for the pretty colors. Now that she could see better, the tunnel they walked through looked carved out a very long time ago with pickaxes, like that other place.

Salt nymphs danced in the air without a bother, some gliding along while others listlessly spun in place with a few lazy flaps. None of them looked tired or strained like those from the stampede and only some even bothered to look Cira’s way. They weren’t packed in as dense either, as she counted more in her entourage than in any one place she looked. That said, they did pass a few areas where they were clumped up. They seemed to repel each other and eventually drift apart.

The smell here was much more like the spring and was pleasant, almost like the sea when she’d drop to go fishing. A gentle stream came out of the rock and poured into its channel that was slowly dug through centuries of flowing water, if not more. They followed that stream for a while listening to the peaceful trickle and quietly watching the salt nymphs.

“Cira, you brought those creatures down here to bring them home, yes?” Nanri asked out of the blue.

“Um, yeah… Why?” The witch just pointed behind. Cira counted them. Then counted again. “Theres… more?”

Soon, they reached a fork where another stream came from a different direction, and both were diverted into a canal made of a familiar metal.

“Well, no matter. You’ve already done half the work!” Her innocent smile betrayed none of the dubious intentions behind her masters.

The two streams flowed on either side of a hallway, which eventually became lined with the same metal, leading to a set of stairs that Cira swore she’d seen before. They reached a large titanium doorway and both the canals disappeared beneath it.

“We’re finally here,” Nanri clenched her padded fists, “Ohhh, I’m so excited! I didn’t know what I was going to do before you showed up.”