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Chapter 5 - Trinity

A sequel to Shamanic Princess, and an attempt to explain the mysteries that go unexplained in the anime. Three little girls, curious about the fate of the Neutralizer Sarah Mikadzuki, make a pact to find out--and get in way over their heads.

Chapter 5 - Trinity

Chapter 5 - Trinity

 

   They were standing on a small island in the middle of a vast and lovely forest. The island was on the face of a small, glassy pool, vaguely eye-shaped. Oddly enough, the forest was very quiet. There were no bird calls; no insect clicks or clacks; in fact, no sounds at all. The pool was unruffled; there was no wind.
   Three figures stood opposite to the three little girls, about twenty feet away, hovering over the lake’s glassy surface. The girls looked at them and shrank closer together. One was tall, voluptuous, her skin black as ebony. Her eyes glowed brilliantly amber in her black face. Spiders crawled in her flowing hair, the color of reddest, deepest blood. Another was slender and petite, with long golden curls framing a pale, heart-shaped face. Her eyes, however, were more terrifying than the black figure’s, for although they were the color of beautiful sapphires, there was a look of terrible power in those eyes. The last was a sensuous and curvaceous figure, with white hair that cascaded down her golden-tan back and exotic amethyst eyes. She was dancing lightly on the lake, but the dance contained magic, angry magic struggling to be let out, and the look on her face showed that she was dying to let it free.
   But standing between the girls and the women was Sarah, and her face was no longer kind and sweet but cold and sharp, and her ribbons were beaded with golden droplets.
   “You shall leave them be,” Sarah commanded. “Their power is new and uncontrolled, and they have no chance against you as they are now. It is entirely unfair.”
   The black-skinned woman spoke, and in her voice was the flowing of blood, the screams of battle, the clicks of spiders. “What is that to us? All is fair in love and war. Their magic called us, and we have answered its call. It wants us to take it, and we want it!”
   “If we take the time and the risk to answer it,” said the petite one with golden hair, “it is our right to take it at any time and any place we choose.” Her voice was slow and measured, betraying no more anger than her expressionless face, but the anger was there.
   “The stage has been set,” added the dancing one. “It is not quite what we would have chosen, but I will fight for the power now, if this is where you want them to be.” Her voice sounded like horrifying music, sharp and metallic.
   “You shall not stand in our way,” the black one said softly. “You know, you more than anyone, that if you stop us here, we will follow them, and we will strike when our time is ripe. We have no need of food or sleep. As long as their lives shine, they will lead us to them, and we will take their power. We can wait for years if necessary. Only here can you protect them, but here they will never become ready for us. For millennia it has been so. You may not interrupt it.”
   Sarah seemed to be considering. Lirael met the amber eyes of the black woman and gulped.
   Then the forest around them rumbled, and the lake rippled. A wind blew gently for a minute, and Sarah listened to it. Alanis listened as well, but heard nothing in it.
   Abruptly Sarah threw her hand up and pointed her open palm at the three figures.
   White lightning streaked up from the lake and smashed into all three women, forming a ball, a cage of light. The lightning streamed away from them and into Sarah’s hand. Then Sarah turned and pointed her fingers at the little girls.
   A blast of white lightning hit each one, and suddenly it was as if a door had been opened in their minds. Lirael felt her power inside of her, and realized that she had never found it because she had been looking for a shining light of magic, when her power was darkness; subtle and deceptive, but a power that could strike and destroy with fire and venom. Rana saw her own power, and understood that until now it had been a closed bud, which had now bloomed into the magic of flowers, of vines, of thorns and wood. Alanis heard her power, which she had been looking for for four years, but had never found, because it was wind; invisible, immaterial, thereby impossible to see or touch, but just as powerful as any other force in the universe.
   Then three familiar objects appeared; Lirael’s comb, Rana’s spindle, and Alanis’ round mirror. The girls grabbed them, bemused. What were these for? They weren’t…they couldn’t be…their very own objects of power? These familiar, friendly old things?
   There was another flash of silver light. And then the forest was gone. They were in a cathedral, with a golden floor and walls and ceiling. They were standing on a raised dais, beneath a massive stained glass window of the Eye of Yord. Sarah was in front of them on the steps of the dais, and the three women were on the cathedral floor, looking a little windswept, but little else.
   “I cannot stop you from fighting them,” Sarah said. “But I can take your power to strengthen them, and believe me, I will. You will fight now, where I am strongest, and where their power is strengthened by Yord’s ambience.”
   “I believe this is cheating,” said the blonde, her voice still as expressionless as her face. “It is, as you say, most unfair.”
   “All is fair in love and war,” Sarah said.
   The redhead shrugged. “You have us there. We must accept.”
   The exotic one did a quick dance, and sparks flashed at her heels. “This is going to be fun.”
   Sarah smiled wryly. “I doubt it will be, for you.”
   Then she stepped out of the way.
 
   Immediately the dancer whirled around, clapped her hands twice, whirled counterclockwise, clapped her hands twice again, pirouetted, flung her head back, and struck a pose. Bright sparks flashed up from her feet, and she repeated the routine. The sparks were twice as big, about two inches of flying fire. Then she began to spin around and around—and the flying sparks turned into knives and flew at the girls.
   Alanis screamed.
   The air around them shivered and began to spin. A shield of spinning wind formed around them, and not a second too soon; the knives hit the air and were knocked away. Alanis stared, entranced. “Cool!”
   The redhead snorted. “Child’s play.” She clapped her own hands and flung her hair back. A large black spider fell out of her blood-red tresses and began to scuttle towards the girls.
   Then the redhead opened her mouth. A jet of red liquid—surely not blood?—squirted out and hit the spider, which suddenly began to grow. It was soon about twelve feet tall and twice that long. It hit the wind barrier and glanced off. Then it slammed it again, and began to push through. It was only air; the spider’s mass was too much for it to repulse.
   “Brace me!” Lirael screamed. Rana and Alanis grabbed her shoulders.
   “Why?” Rana shouted back over the spider’s clacking pincers, the whirling of Alanis’ barrier, and the laughs of the women.
   Lirael didn’t answer. She was busy remembering when she had touched the stove and burned her finger. She brought the feeling of flaring pain to the front of her mind, and let her magic grab it.
   A fireball exploded from Lirael’s hands and hit the spider, burning its many legs and sending it reeling backwards with a shrill, screaming clack. Lirael reached for her magic, remembered the burn again, and threw another fireball at the spider.
   “We need a stronger barrier!” Rana shouted.
   Then Sarah’s voice resounded in her mind. Look for experiences inside yourself. Take your memories and let your magic work them.
   Let my magic work them? Rana thought frantically. Alanis had formed a barrier with her scream; Lirael continued to throw fire from her hands. How did it work? Her logical mind could not understand how they had done it without incantations, without ceremonies, without…
   Then, unbidden, a memory of a story her mother used to tell her came to mind. In it, a lovely princess was cursed by an evil fairy, but her fairy godmothers managed to protect her, and to stop the fairy from coming back and killing the princess, they had put a wall of briars around the castle.
   Then her magic was there, eagerly grabbing this idea and taking off with it.
   “Wait!” Rana cried uselessly.
   A thread unwound from her spindle and snaked along the ground. The thread glowed green and gold for a moment, then began to inflate into a vine. No, a stem. No, a branch. A thorny branch of brambles wove around them, a dome of heavy wood and thorns. Roses blossomed on the dome, and the thorns grew to a foot in length.
   The air wall Alanis had put up was now displaced and destroyed, but they now had more solid protection. They were surrounded by a wall of briar roses.
   Outside, they could hear the blonde’s voice. “Do they think that will stop us?”
   A blinding light shone through the cracks in the briar hedge. Lirael put her eye to a peephole, minding the thorns, and saw that the blonde was effused in a blinding white light. Then the light faded away, and her eyes had gone rose-red.
   Suddenly the blonde leapt at the briars and preformed a mighty back-flipping kick.
   The briars exploded. Rose petals redder than blood showered them. The blonde landed on the ground, and was rushing them again in a second. Before Rana could react, she had been punched in the stomach and the chest and her legs had been kicked out from beneath her.
   Lirael just had time to see Rana disappear beneath a shower of lightning-fast blows from the blonde when the redhead launched herself at her. She flew without wings or support, and her nails glowed bloody red and grew a foot in length. She dived down at Lirael with a shout.
   Lirael screamed and skipped backwards. The redhead landed softly, like a cat, and lunged forward, her nails reaching for Lirael. Lirael continued to run backwards, and suddenly collided with the stained glass window with a bang.
   “Are you supposed to be comic relief?” the redhead demanded in disbelief.
   The dancer had her sights on Alanis. She began to dance, faster and faster, and the stone floor beneath her cracked and shattered upwards, forming huge spears that pushed up beneath Alanis, a forest of spears. Alanis screamed again as the spears of rock and earth exploded around her—but no wind in the world could save her now.
   When the dust had cleared, the dancer stopped dancing and looked proudly at Alanis’ stony tomb.
   “By the skin of my teeth!” Alanis said weakly from within.
   The dancer stared disbelievingly at her stone spears. Alanis had let her magic help at the last moment, and she had stretched like rubber. Spears rubbed uncomfortably close on all sides, but not one had touched her.
   “All right…” The dancer whirled into another dance. “Let’s see you dodge that again!”
   Spears exploded up at Alanis.
   Alanis stretched impossibly thin with a yelp, and impossibly short with a squeak. Then she turned momentarily into a ballerina and preformed an impossible twirl to escape another batch of spears. “Voila!” she cried from her pink tutu.
   The dancer made an extremely weird face. “Now you’re starting to scare me…”
   Sarah groaned. “This is ridiculous.” She concentrated on each girl in turn. Without her help, they would surely die.
 
      *  *  *
 
   A voice sounded in Rana’s mind as she choked for breath. The blonde had her by the throat with one hand and continued to bludgeon her with the other. Blackness was swimming before her vision when a small silver light said to her, Choke. Spindle. Grab.
   Choke spindle? Use her spindle to…
   Rana thought fiercely of a flower growing from one place to another and grabbed at her magic. It wasn’t sure it liked this idea—it wanted to take the image literally, not figuratively—but Rana commanded it with the strength of desperation and it obeyed. The thread on her spindle curled up and around the blonde’s neck, stretching down into Rana’s other hand. The blonde was too busy pounding Rana to notice.
   Then Rana jerked on her thread.
   It was the blonde’s turn to choke. She dropped Rana and scrabbled at the thread, but this turned out to be a mistake. As Rana dropped, the thread dragged the blonde down with her. Rana gasped for breath and yanked on her thread. But in the relief of being able to breathe again, she lost control of her magic. Immediately, the image Rana had given it became literal—the thread thickened into the stem of a flower, sending tendrils into the blonde’s neck, beneath her skin. The blonde abruptly found their positions reversed. Now she was the one choking, at the mercy of her enemy.
   Make her tell you her name!
   “What is your name?” Rana demanded, her voice ragged. She jerked on the thread like reins and the blonde collapsed onto the floor, her breath coming short. “What is your name?!”
   “Ceres!” the blonde gasped. “Ceres Hi Kirame!”
   Say it to her. Bind her. Make her promise to serve you.
   “Ceres Hi Kirame!” Rana called, coughing and gasping, but spitting the words out regardless. “Have I defeated you?”
   “Yes!” Ceres wheezed. Her eyes had reverted to their original sapphire shade, and her previous speed and power seemed to have disappeared. Perhaps, Rana thought dizzily, the roots sprouting from her thread-turned-flower had sucked it all away.
   “Then I command you to serve me! You are my power! Forever!” Rana shouted.
   The blonde glowed green and gold for a moment, and suddenly she became translucent. The thread dropped to the floor. Ceres stood and reached out to Rana. Rana stood as well, and the woman melted into the girl. There was a sparkling flash.
 
   The redhead was now advancing on Lirael, her nails sharp as razors. I’m dead, Lirael thought crazily. I’m going to die and I don’t even know what’s killing me!
   Then another voice spoke in her head, one that was not her own. Stop. Fall. Trip.
   Fall? Trip?
   Trip!
   Lirael threw dozens of memories into her magic—tripping over a rock, a wall, Alanis, a rug, a shoe, a cat…
   A thin black thread stretched out in front of the redhead.
   “Is that the most you can do?” the redhead demanded. She began to step over it.
   And the thread reached up and grabbed her foot.
   The redhead fell to the ground with a satisfying crack. Lirael jumped up and sat on her head.
   “Mmf? Umf!” said the redhead most articulately. “UMF!! GUMF OMF!! UMF DGOMF!!”
   Lirael shook her head and bounced a little on the redhead’s head. The redhead said something that was fortunately stifled by the ground. “FUMF OMF!!”
   Grab her neck!
   Lirael knew who was telling her this, and followed this directive without a second thought. She slid around, tackled the redhead, and fastened her hands around her throat. The redhead protested vehemently and tried to rake at Lirael’s face with her nails, but as she lost her breath, she lost her power, and her nails reverted to normal.
   Make her tell you her name! If you have her name, you have her power! Bind her to you! Make her serve you!
   “Tell me!” Lirael shouted as the redhead struggled, her black bosom heaving. “Your name! Tell me!”
   “I’ll die first,” the redhead snarled.
   “That can be arranged,” Sarah said from above, smiling sweetly and yet menacingly. “Lirael, I think your magic needs something new to play with.”
   Lirael took the hint, focused very hard on her burned finger, and showed her magic a new way to play with it. Her magic seized the idea joyfully and plunged ahead with it, reveling in its newfound freedom.
   The redhead’s black skin began to heat and blister. Heat surrounded the two, concentrated on the woman. Her hair began to smoke, and her body twisted in agony as fire roiled in her.
   “Erian Pyr Umbra!” she screamed suddenly. “Erian Pyr Umbra!”
   Lirael released the spell with relief. She wasn’t sure she could have caused much more pain to Erian, even if the woman had tried to kill her. “Erian Pyr Umbra, I beat you with my magic, and you told me your name, so you’re mine. Join my power. I command you.”
   Erian glowed black and burgundy for a moment, then went transparent and sank into Lirael’s body. A globe of darkness surrounded the young girl.
 
   The dancer danced in place, furiously angry. “You brat! You’re really getting on my nerves!” She began to twirl. “I’ll destroy you this time!” Her feet began to glow like fire.
   Light. Coming. Mirror. Wind.
   Alanis knew this wasn’t her own thought. There was a silver glow of different magic behind it, and she was pretty sure she knew who it was coming from.
   Light coming. Mirror wind.
   Mirror wind?
   If light was going to come at her, and it could hurt her (how could light hurt her?) she would be able to deflect it with a mirror.
   Deflect. Reflect.
   Could she use her mirror to reflect the light back at the dancer and defeat her? She glanced at her mirror and knew she couldn’t. It was barely a half-foot wide. The dancer was sure to attack with something bigger than that.
   Mirror wind.
   Could wind form a mirror?
   Alanis didn’t have much time to think. The dancer’s feet had gone from reddish yellow to greeny blue, and were advancing to white. She had to cast a spell now.
   She thought of a huge, round mirror, bigger than she was, and dropped it into the tempest of her magic. The idea blew out around her, and the air began to swirl into a recognizable shape.
   Lightning exploded from the dancer’s feet just as a huge mirror leapt into reality.
   The dancer’s amethyst eyes widened, and she had just enough time to shriek before her own lightning ricocheted back and surrounded her. She dropped to the ground, her hair sizzled, her exotic eyes half-shut, her body burned.
   Grab her around the neck! Get her name! Bind her to you! Command her!
   Alanis walked up to the dancer, paused, knelt down, and hesitantly placed her hand on the dancer’s neck. She applied almost no pressure, but the dancer still flinched as if she had smacked her with a splintered ruler.
   “Er…what’s your name?” Alanis inquired.
   “Myre…Myre Baara Ka…Kaze…” the dancer gasped out, too dazed to protest.
   “Um…Myre Baara Kaze…I really didn’t mean to hurt you this badly, but…er…I…um…command you to…help me, I guess? I don’t know…”
   Myre stirred feebly. “Yes,” she breathed. “Anything, but hurry, or I will expire.”
   Alanis thought this was just a fancy word for ‘die’, but that really wasn’t too comforting. “All right…I command you, Myre Baara Kaze, to help me.”
   Myre glowed like fire and ice, and faded halfway out. Alanis panicked, thinking that the woman really had died and now she’d gone and done it, but Myre’s transparent form stood and fell forward into Alanis. The two forms melted together.
 
   Sarah stepped forward, applauding softly.
   Lirael looked down. The ground was a lot farther away than she remembered. What had happened? Erian had disappeared. But now that she looked around, Rana and Alanis were gone as well. Had they lost? The blonde and the dancer were picking themselves up now, and each one suddenly noticed the others.
   “What did you do to Rana and Alanis?” Lirael demanded.
   The blonde and the dancer jumped backwards in astonishment. “Lirael?” the blonde asked disbelievingly.
   Lirael’s jaw dropped. “You sound like Rana!”
   “I am Rana!” the blonde cried.
   “You don’t look like her,” the dancer chimed in.
   Lirael and Rana/ blonde turned to stare at the dancer. “Alanis?”
   “Of course!” the dancer said, looking a little uncomfortable. “Who else would I be?”
   “None of you are quite yourselves at the moment,” Sarah said. “You’ve…er…changed a little.”
   “What do you mean?” all three asked at once.
   Sarah walked over to the huge mirror Alanis had made, and turned it to a better angle. The three walked up to the mirror and stood there, riveted, completely amazed.
   Lirael was not Lirael. She was Erian Pyr Umbra. Her skin was jet-black, her flowing hair blood-red, her nails long and burgundy. A bright red, leather, strapless halter-top covered her ample bosom, and a short, slit, red leather skirt was belted around her waist with a black belt. Thigh-high red boots glittering with jet shards hid most of her legs, and her arms were covered by tight scarlet leather bracers.
   Rana was just as not Rana. She had become Ceres Hi Kirame. The short golden curls, the heart-shaped face, the light sapphire eyes; none of these were Rana’s traits. Long white ribbons streamed from a forest green choker, and stripes of green silk wrapped diagonally across her chest. Her skirt was a puffy white silken bell, like a white blossom, and her dark green high-heeled boots had small white flowers on them. The green silk of her top tied into a large bow on her back, and white ribbons were wrapped around her arms, from her shoulders to her wrists, where they tied off into smaller bows.
   Alanis was certainly not Alanis. She was Myre Baara Kaze. Exotic, tilted amethyst eyes stared back at lush, honey-colored curves and long, silvery hair. Golden necklaces and chokers ringed her throat, and bracelets and anklets chimed lightly on her wrists and ankles. Puffy rose-colored silk “sleeves” danced from her forearms, bordered by golden bracelets. More rosy silk trimmed with gold outlined a heart-shaped strapless halter top and poofy gypsy pants. A long stripe of white silk trimmed with yet more gold hung from her waist. Delicate golden slippers completed the outfit.
   “I’m impressed,” Sarah said softly, coming up to them. “Even with all of the advantages I managed to give you, I was worried up until the very end. I’ve never seen four-year olds handle magic that well before.”
   “The question is,” Erian/ Lirael said, “have you ever seen four-year olds handle magic?” Then she clapped her hands to her mouth. “Did I say that?”
   “No, I did,” Erian/ Lirael said.
   “You’re confusing me,” Alanis/ Myre complained.
   “It’s quite simple,” Ceres/ Rana explained. “We are part of you, so when you use our forms, we can talk through you.”
   “I’m not sure I like this,” Lirael/ Erian said. “Erian has so many dark thoughts…”
   “I certainly do like this,” Rana/ Ceres said. “Ceres knows so much. It’s fascinating.”
   “Can we talk to you when we’re not using these forms?” Alanis/ Myre asked. And then, immediately afterwards, Myre/ Alanis said, “Yes, but we can’t talk through you then. Only now.”
   “When Princesses get older, they can control their other sides more, and eventually can control them completely,” Sarah said, trying not to smile at this unusual exchange and failing. “Perhaps you could introduce your new selves to each other? I’ll just plug my ears.”
   Sarah promptly turned around and did so.
   “Why does she do that?” Lirael/ Erian asked. “She told me not to tell her my name, either.”
   “It’s obvious,” said Ceres/ Rana. “If she can’t hear us, neither can the Throne of Yord.”
   “Why does that matter?” Alanis/ Myre asked.
   “Oh, do use your common sense,” Erian/ Lirael snapped. “The Throne’s one and only friend is Sarah. If it thought you were stealing her attention away from it—and you clearly are—it would get angry. Veeery angry.”
   “My name is Myre Baara Kaze.”
   “I’m Erian Pyr Umbra.”
   “I am called Ceres Hi Kirame.”
   “Really?” Rana/ Ceres asked. “Interesting names. Er…how can we go back to ourselves? Just will it,” Ceres/ Rana said, “and call us when you wish to use our bodies and powers again.”
   Abruptly the three women melted down into three little girls. Lirael sighed and grabbed her hair. “I’m so glad I’m not a redhead.”
   Alanis was looking pensive. “I wish I could stay like Myre for a while longer. She’s so much more impressive than I am.”
   “Thinking of the boys, are we?” Rana joked.
   Alanis went furiously red. “N…no! Of course not!”
   Lirael walked up to Sarah as Rana continued to tease Alanis. She tapped Sarah on the back, which was as far as she could reach. “Miss Sarah? We’re do—”
   The cathedral exploded into darkness. A huge red eye opened up above them. A howling wind began to blow.
   Sarah unplugged her ears and shouted, “She was only telling me they were done! She wasn’t—”
   But Sarah never got to finish her sentence. Because her voice was suddenly drowned out by a truly monumental sound. It was like nothing they had ever heard before, and judging from the bewilderment they could feel inside of them, Erian, Ceres, and Myre had never heard anything like it either. It was a mind-blowing sound, a kind of cosmic scream. It sounded again, and this time the girls could hear words in the roaring sound.
 
Mine!! Mine!! Mine!!
My friend!! Mine!! Mine!!
Stay away!! Mine!! Mine!!
MY FRIEND!!!!!
SARAH IS MY FRIEND!!!!!
GO AWAY!!!!!

 
   Sarah turned around and threw her hand out at the three girls. Her mouth moved, but they couldn’t hear her over the Throne of Yord. It was clear what she had done, however, because a moment later there was a flash of light, and the darkness was gone. They were back in the woods, with five spilled goblets, a lot of spilled rose petal essence and dissolved crystal dust, and the remnants of Lirael’s mother’s brooch.
 


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omiyage_umi on April 23, 2006, 9:43:08 AM

omiyage_umi on
omiyage_umiIt's confusing when you're a four year old schizoprhreniac(did I spell that right) in Xianghua's voice:Just Kidding! These chapters just keep getting better.