Time, Roona

[Santinka]

 

[Santinka]

Time, Roona
By Santinka





Lurin

The cold wind burned her cheeks as she moved steadily forward, cutting the water like a solitary current. This was her element, the sheer, thrilling joy in life that kept her on the edge. Roona held her eyes wide open, watching the banks rush by with perilous steadiness, moving with it. Soon, soon, she would fly…
The river thundered to the end of the world and stopped in glorious emptiness. With a great whoop like a war cry, Roona dropped with the river toward the nothing below. She closed her eyes in bliss at the rush of fear that made her heart pound and savored the brief seconds of panic as she fell to her death.
I know I shouldn’t do that.
With a roar of defiance she snapped open her wings and soared at an achingly breakneck pace into the never-ending twilight that lit the sky. Heart pounding like a drum of fate, she pulled her wings in to herself and dropped again, faster than a falling star. Red fire gathered at her edges, streamed out behind her like the tail of a comet, set her burning in the fierce glories of the two suns that had not been seen for a thousand years.
Watch her like this.
Roona would be angry.
The instant before she crashed to her death she flung her wings out, scattering water-like sparks that turned to an icy blue as they fled away, and she rolled in the air, landing softly on her feet.
She tumbled forward into the tall grass, laying flat, chin tucked toward her shoulder. Her ebony hair sprawled around her like wild strands of tangled weeds woven with feathers, like a nest, her thin body slack where it was. Unconscious again.
I touched my fingers softly to her hair, trying to ignore the twisting dagger in my chest that dug a little deeper each time I saw her still form. “Roona,” I murmured. “Why do you keep doing this?”
Her back and shoulders were bruised dark purple. She gave no thought to the aftershock of her actions, only the thrill of each brief rush, each moment lived as if time were real instead of frozen, as it had been for so long. Death shuns us, life escapes us. Our entire world is frozen in the endless torment of each day that should pass and does not. There is no catching time, and yet here we are, held captive by it. No moving forward, no going back.
For a time, that was not time, Roona did not move but to breathe. A sigh of deep regret floated from her lips when she finally opened her eyes.
“I had a dream,” she murmured, laying as still as stone. “I died.”
I tried to hold back the baying storm of feelings this stirred in me. “Don’t think like that!” I ordered immediately. She turned her big, twilight eyes on me.
“It was beautiful,” she whispered fiercely, challenging me to deny her this one pleasure she had.
Once, Roona was glad that she would be forever young, but as time did not pass, the glory, the revelry, faded, and she began to tempt death. First only tentatively, then with greater, more perilous and self-destructive folly, Roona began to crave the thrill from what once were near-death experiences.
She asked me not to watch. She doesn’t like to make me upset, but her guilt drives her farther and farther. Yes, guilt…because on Roona’s seventeenth birthday, time stopped for everyone. Her father lingers on the edge of death, but cannot die. The world hangs at the edge of the balance, but can neither topple, nor rise. It is an unspoken curse cast upon all.
When I don’t reply, her face softens. “Lurin?” she asks, timidly now, instead of fierce. “Will you go somewhere with me?”

~*~*~*~
I__I__I

Roona

“We can’t get in. Do you have any idea how many guards there are?!”
“I’m the princess, Lurin. They’ll let us in,” I reply as we land in the street.
“Listen Roona,” he begins, glancing over his shoulder. “After what I’ve heard…I don’t think they would even let the king through those gates. The Keepers hold everything—power over everyone who cares about time, and that includes you!”
I can’t help but snort, even though it’s unladylike, as my governess would have said. He really has no idea! Poor Lurin. I glance sidelong at the face that I’d once thought was beautiful and smile to my self, thinking of the memories from long ago when we were children. He had always been the more cautious of the two of us and slower to think outside the proverbial box. “I never said anything about using the door,” I reply, and see in his eyes the uh-oh expression that is so familiar.
Oh yes.
I’m amazed at how calm he is, although I know he is sorely afraid. I can’t blame him. I’m afraid too. I have heard the stories of the Keepers as well as he has, and they are not the sort of rumors that one expects to continue for so long…unless they’re true. Murder, torture, treachery—all from the top of the tower where they reside forever.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” he asks, worry deep in his eyes. He is trying to be strong, I can tell, but it’s hard for him.
“Yes,” I say firmly. Somewhere up there, the three candles, those that mark the passage of time (or not), are burning, and the Keepers are watching them with endlessly open eyes. I cannot help but pause for a moment, to wonder what their lives are like. Sad? Lonely? Beyond emotion? It makes me shudder to think of.
“If you’re sure then,” Lurin says, nodding to himself. “I guess I don’t have a choice.”
“You can always leave,” I whisper, afraid that he will. “You don’t have to come.”
He nods again, but doesn’t go anywhere. I sigh with relief and turn to look at the Keep. The nearest window is almost a hundred feet up, barely big enough to slip into if we land just right. I take a deep breath and launch into the air.
The sense of urgency that suddenly washes over me is like an ocean wave, drowning out my joy in flight. I can’t wait any longer. Time must go on!
With reckless precision I dove into the window feet first, barely folding my wings in time. Where I had expected even ground I found instead a staircase and stumbled backward, missing the next step down. With a sickening lurch I fell head first down the flight and hit the landing flat on my back, the breath crushed from my lungs.
Lurin flies subtly in with barely a sound, landing cautiously on the steps and looking around. When he sees me, laying on the floor several steps below, his face turns with striking quickness from worry to panic. “Roona!” he yelps, leaping after me.
I fight to suck in breath while the world spins and Lurin helps me to my feet. I finally gasp, concentrating so hard on the air that I never even think to look at my friend. I stand, wincing at a bruise, and start up the stairs with the knowledge that they are the beginning of a tower.
The tower.
“Shouldn’t we rest for just a—”
“I’m fine!” I snap, trying to ignore the twinge of regret this triggers. The concern in his voice is so clear that it hurts to disregard, but I can’t seem to help it, and my pride won’t let me apologize. I run up the stairs as quickly as I can, trying to outrun the shame this brings on and wishing he hadn’t seen me fall at all.
Just like all the loyal friends in the stories that the bards used to tell, he follows behind me, going extra fast to catch up. There is a sword strapped to his hip that he loosens in its scabbard, one hand wrapping around the hilt so tightly that his knuckles turn white. His face is drawn and pale, and I know that I am to blame, but the urgency in my veins is screaming at me and I can’t stop. We are so close!
We travel on and on, meeting no one, for who dares to climb the Keepers’ Tower? No one.
Except me.

~*~*~*~
I__I__I

The Storyteller

Together they walked up ten thousand stairs, having to stop and rest many times before they finally reached the top, where they were truly confronted by a choice. Enter the tower, or be lost to time forever?
The final door was small and made of wood. To an outsider it would seem an ordinary door, but to both Princess Roona and Lurin, it glowed faintly with runes of power. Should they touch it, they could die. Enter? Worse!
…And yet for Roona, the choice was already made, for she knew that she must do something inside. Memories that she had forgotten began to come back to her in a thin, trickling stream. The box on her birthday, the lights of the great hall…
A wall of smoke rose behind her eyes and she could remember no more of that day, but what she had already seen nagged at her. What was it that she had forgotten? As she stared at the runes she became certain that it was important, some trifling detail perhaps that she had overlooked. Her determination more solid than ever, she struck out her hand, and, before Lurin could stop her, pushed open the door.
The three Keepers turned toward them, staring with opaque eyes at the intruders. As if they had been expected, one of the Keepers seemed to float forward in a night-black robe.
“What is it you desire?” it hissed.
“Riches?” asked the second, it’s voice a mirror of the first.
“Power?” hissed the third, whose voice was like the others.
The stillness of the Three Keepers unsettled Lurin. He didn’t like their fixed, staring gaze. Surely they should have blinked by now? They seemed more dragon than man, a grotesque sort of in between stage that made his spine crawl. What was wrong with them? They had once been like everyone else, a human that could change into two forms, cat and dragon. Being a Keeper was not supposed to change that!
“What is it you desire?” the first Keeper said again.
Roona was silent, scared in spite of herself though she dare not show it. What would happen when she told them what she really wanted? What price would they demand in return? Finally she summoned her courage and answered in a faint whisper, like a breath of wind on a spring day.
“Time.”
“Alas, for that is the one thing we cannot give,” the second hissed flatly, its voice void of emotion.
“Only one can bring back true Time,” rattled the third.
“Who?!” Roona demanded breathlessly, trying somehow to stop the surge of hope the Keeper’s words caused.
“It is she who gave the flame life,” said the first.
“And she who must take it away.”
"The dragon princess."
“What would happen if I tried?” Roona asked, caution suddenly coming back to her after a long absence. She stole a glance at Lurin to see his clenched teeth and untrusting eyes as he stared at the Keepers.
Please don’t say anything, she begged silently.
“You would die.”
Roona turned back to the Keeper, thinking hard. Trying to gather her thoughts, to make a decision, she searched the room with her eyes. Why didn’t she tell them that she was the princess? That she was the one who could finally bring back time? Some instinct? But who could truly know?
In the center of the room, a great pentacle framed a cast-iron holder with three arms, each holding a candle. Two burned in yellow ivory colors, as did the third, but this candle was somehow different from the others. Roona couldn’t tell what it might be that set this candle apart, for each burned evenly, set in a triangle that made them equal in height.
All of a sudden, she remembered. Long ago, on her last birthday, that candle had been in the box.
Every princess since the dawn of the Draconii Era had lit a candle on her seventeenth birthday. It would be carried, still lit, to the top of the Keepers’ Tower, where it would stand and burn for one year, for such candles were always magic. At the end of that year, when the candles went out, the princess would be free to choose her next step in life, whether to leave the court, or to remain, but the choice was hers. The dragon girl had lit the candle just like every princess before her had always done, but Time had never come for Roona ver Draconii...or anyone else.
“Is it worth your life?” the second Keeper asked.
Was it?
She paused, trying to gather thoughts that wouldn’t be clear, and turned to Lurin, who watched her, the dim light casting shadows across his face as the reality of what the Keeper had said sunk in. Without a word Roona kissed him softly and turned her back on him, taking a deep breath. “I am going to try,” she said, and stepped forward.
“Then tempt your death, fool child. We will not mourn you.”
One of them slithered forward on loathsome feet and pointed a dry, twisted finger. “Snuff the flame with your life-breath and die, girl,” it hissed, never taking its eyes from her.
Roona felt an icy finger run down her spine and looked at the despicable creatures before her in disgust. There was something wrong about them, a twisted atmosphere of darkness that sucked on the air. That bony finger pointed to the wrong candle, one of the twins, one that she had never seen before. She would not blow out that candle!
…But was it worth her life to be wrong? Am I really ready to die? Anger kindled behind her eyes as she began to understand that the strangeness of the third candle was linked with the Keepers’ darkness, like a thread that connected them. Her sight grew stronger and she realized that the whole room was filled with wire-thin threads that went through the walls and out into the world, her world. As if they were all just puppets in the hands of vile half-creatures that had sworn to protect them, to mark vigilantly the passage of time.
Time, she thought, and Roona took a deep breath, for it could be her last, and leaned forward.

~*~*~*~
I__I__I

Lurin gasped as her lips touched his, shocked into stillness. Without so much as looking him in the eye, she turned away to face the certain death that the Keepers had promised.
Roona! He cried in tormented silence. No!
He had always loved her, since long before the loss of time. Always! What if she really did die, here and now? But, he realized painfully, that’s what she wants. Hadn’t she said so?
‘It was beautiful.’
She stood in solitude, swaying it seemed, until all of a sudden the air around her turned sharp and precise and she straightened, seeming to gather herself and all of the brightness in the room. She strode forward, stooping toward the candles.
A curved blade glimmered, high in the air above her head, held in the hand of one of the watching monsters.
“Traitors!” Lurin shouted, startling them all as he broke from a trance that he hadn’t known he was in. Roona jumped and looked back as he charged forward and the blade flashed down as she lunged toward the center candle.
“It’s her! It is the princess!” shrieked the first Keeper, leaping in front of Lurin and spreading vast, scaled wings that seemed to appear from beneath the black shroud of a cloak.
“You dirty back stabbing traitors!” Lurin bellowed, trying to change. Nothing happened. With a shout of outrage he threw himself at the Keeper as the room was filled with clattering and darkness.

~*~*~*~
I__I__I

What happens when Time truly stops? Does everything die? Does it live? Does it just exist? But how is that possible?
Is this what it feels like to die? Roona wondered. At once on fire, and achingly cold, she could not breathe or move. I didn't expect this. What had she thought it would be like? She didn’t really know.
She hung in the air, pensive and frozen. The candles were poised inches from the floor, smoke stilled in the air, like a solid thing. Across the room Lurin was caught in the midst of drawing his sword, a Keeper raised a slashing tail. Above her a dagger was frozen in the hand of another Keeper. Where was the third traitor?
One second passed. With every fiber of her being Roona felt the change as Time began again for the first time in a thousand years.
She dropped to the floor, slamming her shoulder on unforgiving stone and scrambled up, dodging away as the knife fell where she had been. The Keeper screamed and gave chase as Time began for them too, and Roona found her self backed into a corner as Lurin’s fight continued, too far away to help her.
This was about power, Roona thought with a rush of hot fury. They stopped Time for power. They would have killed me anyway, just because they could. But when they realized who I was, they would kill me to keep it.
“It’s too late,” she whispered fiercely. “Time has begun again, and you can’t take it from me!”
“Stupid girl!” snarled the third Keeper. “You could have lived forever!”
“I don’t want to!” she snapped back, and lunged forward to strike the dagger from the Keeper’s hand. The creature seemed amazed at this and was too astonished to move when she shoved past, feeling for an icy moment the cold touch of sickly skin. She bowled through the Keeper fighting Lurin and grabbed his hand, pulling him down the stairs behind her. He didn’t resist but ran with her wholeheartedly.
“Window!” Lurin cried, tugging her back. Without hesitation she jerked him up onto the sill and threw herself out.
The ground rushed to meet them as it had so many times when Roona had tempted it, but unlike then, if she got her timing wrong, she would die, and so would Lurin.
“Now!” she cried, what seemed only feet from the ground, and the transformation was startling as they took dragon form. They spread their wings, and their muscles screamed in protest as they were caught up, shooting into the sky like spears form a harpoon.
A dark shadow rose from the ground and chased after them, trailing an aura of broken black threads.
“Go faster!” Lurin gasped desperately as he tried to pump his wings faster.
He’s too slow, Roona thought. If it catches up to him he’ll die!
With a roar she folded one wing and spun in a crazy circle, turning completely about and launching toward the third traitor that had dared follow them into the sky. A breath of flame scoured from the dragon princess’s maw and into the misshapen face of the keeper.
It fell back with an agonized wail as its face burned and smoked. Roona returned to Lurin’s side and urged him on.
“Hurry, hurry!” she gasped, breathing hard.
“The village—we’ll—lose him—there—”
Beneath them the small township was covered in dotted lights that had never been extinguished, guiding them down to the earth. “Time!” Roona cried as they sped over it. “Time as returned!”
The people that were in the streets hardly listened. So often had this been said that they had given up such hope. Had they not felt it as she did, when Time had returned just moments ago?
“Look!” she roared. “The moon! The moon is rising!”
At this there arose an amazed exclamation, for it was true! In the sky the moon was already rising, whole and silver as the long put off night began. Several figures rose immediately to the sky in celebration, but not far off, the Keeper still gave chase.
Roona’s war cry rose over the multitude and all attention turned to her.
“Stop the traitor!” she commanded as the monster flew toward them. As if they had been waiting in preparation for that moment, the dragons all turned with their own battle cries and attacked.
In that moment, the Keepers were defeated, Roona knew, but she could not stop to celebrate or fight. Already she had turned toward the castle, flying as fast as she could. Lurin fought to keep up, until at last the princess fell to the balcony on two feet and collapsed, shaking.
So tired was the dragon boy that he fell as he was, taking fast breaths that did not give him enough air. When at last he managed to change, he rolled over onto his back, still trying to breathe. For what could have been hours the only thing he could hear was the sound of his heart beating like a drum in his ears.
At long last, Roona managed to crawl over to him and shook his shoulder feebly. “Lurin,” she rasped, her throat raw with shouting. “Please get up...”
Lurin stirred and opened his eyes. He was tired, but Roona looked half dead with fatigue and pain. He could see the dark bruises on her shoulders from when they’d dived out of the window. “I’m....hhh...all right,” he mumbled, trying to sit up. He only succeeded in rolling onto his stomach. Beside him Roona’s arms trembled and she fell again.
“I have to....Father...”
“Cat,” Lurin whispered. She nodded. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes and began to shrink, growing fur that was as black as midnight, but with tips as silver as the moon. Lurin himself changed, turning into a lanky orange tabby cat with long fur.
Saving the energy that words would have cost her, Roona rose to her feet and began to run, racing along the corridors and around corners. Stairs, hallways, rooms, more stairs, they all passed in a blur as they challenged themselves forward, refusing to stop when they were so close. There would be time for that later.
They leapt up on two feet as they reached at long last the great hall, where the sound of hushed voices fell to complete quiet as the two of them took human form. Everyone had knelt on one knee at the sight of the king slumped over on his throne, and Roona ran forward, stumbling to a halt beside him.
“Father?” she whispered, hardly daring to breath.
The king opened his eyes, focusing for only a brief moment on his daughter. He smiled childishly and reached out a hand. Roona held it gently and felt something fall into her palm, but she didn’t look yet. Tears coursed down her cheeks as she saw a final black thread break in his aura and he breathed a last, quiet breath and closed his eyes.
“Goodbye,” she sobbed in a whisper. His hand loosened from hers and she laid it gently in his lap, looking for the first time at what he had given her.
The Draconii seal glimmered golden in the light of the chandelier, sparkling over a sapphire gem. The signet ring felt heavy in her hand as she turned to look at Lurin.
“The king...” a man murmured.
Lurin met her eyes and slowly, as if in reverence, and with solemnity, he knelt on one knee and bowed his head. “Long live the queen.”  

[Santinka]

About the Author

Santinka is seventeen years old and has been writing ever since she learned how at the age of six or seven. Her hobbies include writing, art of all forms, and hanging out with her friends. Her favorite soda on any given day is Sasparilla or Sioux City rootbeer. She loves animals and has a dog, three fish and three rabbits(at the moment), and has written two and many half books, although none are yet published, but she plans to write as her career. Her favorite authors include Robin McKinley, Tamora Pierce, Stephanie Meyer and Brian Jacques.