The sound of thunder broke across the evening sky above the Liminal Woods. It swelled out of the east, rose like the sun toward the vault of heaven, and finally drifted westward over Bright Moon. It faded for a moment, lost as the wind shifted or the layers of the atmosphere conspired to reflect it back into space, then returned with a vengeance. Louder, closer, back toward the Liminal Woods, completing a great circle around the middle kingdoms.

Razz squinted at the sky. Though it was cloudless and the stars had not yet emerged to confuse her rheumy eyes, she couldn’t spot the intruder. “I don’t see it.”

The Eternian guard posted by Razz’s door looked up from her tablet. Her feline ears twitched, and those golden eyes scanned the twilight. Finally, she raised a paw and pointed. “There. About to cross above that peak. Two finger-widths above the horizon.” 

“Huh.” Razz followed the claw, found the mountain, and waited. Sure enough, a few seconds later a dark dot crossed her view. It sparkled occasionally as the flat panes in its sails caught the setting sun and scattered its rays all across the world below. “How’d you find it?”

The guard was already back to reading her tablet. Red flashing text scrolled across the glass to the beat of panic. “It’s a scout craft. They travel almost the speed of sound. You have to look ahead of the thunder to see them.”

Ah. “Such magic they have.”

“Not magic.” The guard didn’t even look up. “Technology.”

Razz had heard that word before. It seemed a useless distinction – if magic and technology could both give life to metal and set it flying through the air, what was the difference? She’d grown old enough now to understand that small-but-glaring differences could mask enormous but subtle similarities. In the past she might’ve launched into such a lecture for the young guard, but the poor thing seemed busy enough with her tablet. And exhausted. And hungry. Razz wondered if there was much left in the pantry to share.

A new sound intruded before she could go check the larder. A high-pitched whine that shook her teeth; a discordant brassy peal of wounded trumpets heralding the arrival of something new, greater and filled with malice. She and the guard looked up at the sky, where a pair of crescent moon silhouettes cut across the stratosphere. They passed directly above the Liminal Woods, their course bending slowly toward Bright Moon.

“Condor-class bombers,” the guard said. “Too low, though. They must not know we repaired the lances. They’ll hit the engagement zone in a few—”

Whatever else she had to say was lost in an explosion of light. The sky turned bright as day. A rainbow-colored flash cut a straight line from the horizon to the bombers, leaving Razz blind and blinking away spotted afterimages. They danced in her vision, bleeding through all the colors of a bruise. When she looked back at the sky there was only one silhouette, standing on edge as it turned back east. A rain of debris was all that remained of the other. The larger pieces glowed all the way to the ground.

“How many people are in those?” Razz asked.

The guard shrugged. “Ten, maybe? Sometimes it’s just robots. Either way, good riddance.”

The casual cruelty cut deep. Razz closed her eyes. “Such a loss.”

A snort. “For the Horde. More losses like that and we might’ve won the war.”

“We will win yet. You must have faith, young friend.”

“I had faith. It got me here.” The guard glanced down at her tablet, tapped something out, and walked out onto the terrace. She might’ve been graceful once, but her prosthetic legs allowed only a hobbled, stuttering gait now. Another loss, so small in the course of things that it scarcely merited notice, especially as the cremated remains of ten souls fell like snow onto the woods.

“The Queen will be here soon,” the guard said. “Wait inside, please.”

It was phrased like a request, but it really wasn’t. Razz gave the sky a final look and retreated back into her home to await Bright Moon’s master.

[hr]

There was no way Queen Angella could fit through the door of Razz’s house without stooping. Razz was a small woman, bent with age, and the queen was a titan even before one factored her wings and armor into the equation. Really, it was a miracle she could pass the threshold without crawling. 

Specifically, the Queen was in possession of the miracle known as power. She grasped the lintel with a single hand and [i]lifted[/i], cracking the the oak beams as casually as one might brush aside a shower curtain. Her shoulder struck the doorframe a passing blow and left a shoulder-shaped hole. Dust rained down from the ceiling. The floorboards shook with each gentle kiss of her silver boots.

She approached the table without preamble, pulled out a chair, and sat. Something cracked, and for a tense moment it looked like the chair might surrender to gravity. But the First Ones smiled on Razz (or, rather, her furniture), and with a final creak of protest, it held.

In all the kingdoms of Eternia, the bards sang, there was not a woman so fair as Queen Angella, whose voice could charm a thousand suitors and whose face inspire a thousand sculptors. Never had so rare and radiant a maiden graced the world but that when she was born the First Ones themselves were struck dumb with awe, and they touched Angella with their power, choosing her as one of the new world’s immortal lords. A love-struck angel begged her to take his wings. The sun itself blessed her hair to shine with its own light. The birds fell silent in her wake, ashamed of the feeble worthlessness of their song.

The last time Razz had seen her, the Queen was wearing a comfortable silk robe faintly adorned with the crest of Bright Moon. Fit for a queen, but not a warrior – now she wore the famed and terrible [i]Cota de Plata de la Luna[/i], a suit of silver armor that paid tribute only to power. It was brutal and stark and beautiful in the way a well-crafted knife or drop of blood could be beautiful. It cared nothing for the queen’s femininity; its solid, blank breast obliterated any sense of sexuality. A man could have worn it just as easily, or even one of those magical robots the guard spoke of.

Part of the armor near the Queen’s right shoulder was melted. Streaks of black carbon graced the rest. Razz wondered if they would buff out easily or need to be painted over.

The Queen set her helm on the table. It was large enough that Razz couldn’t have lifted it with both arms. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and didn’t move.

Razz waited. She looked at the guard, who just shrugged.

No help there, then. She cleared her throat, and when that got nothing, she spoke. “Your majesty?”

Angella woke with a start. The chair creaked again and sank a few inches. They stared at each other.

Finally, “I’m sorry. Razz, is it? Thank you for welcoming me.”

Welcoming? It took all of Razz’s willpower not to look at her battered door. “Anything for Bright Moon’s Queen.”

“It’s funny you should say that.” The Queen held out her hand, and the guard passed her a tablet. She flipped through a few virtual pages. “You’re ignoring my order to evacuate the Liminal Woods.”

“Well, almost anything, then.”

“Why?”

“Aside from the fact that it is my home and people, as a general rule, are attached to their homes? Perhaps that it is a queen’s duty to protect their subjects, not force them into retreat?”

“I am protecting you. Everything I have done these past four years has been to protect Bright Moon. It does not please me to ask this of my people, but I [i]must[/i]. No one can stay in these woods.”

Razz tutted. She stood and gestured for the queen to remain seated. For a few minutes they were silent as Razz went through the ritual motions of setting out tea for her guest, and a bowl of sugar, and a tourene of honey, and a plate of tiny crumpets seasoned with wild ginger plucked from her lawn. She boiled the water and steeped the leaves and added only a bit of sugar, because she suspected the Queen was not a woman who needed much of that, and when everything was properly done she sat again.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I should’ve had that ready when you arrived. You were saying?”

The Queen ignored the tea. “I said you’re leaving. Today.”

“And why should I do that?”

“Because the Horde is coming.” The queen put the tablet on the table and waved her hand in the air above it. A map appeared, floating serene as you please above the tea. “The Liminal Woods lie on Hordak’s path to Bright Moon. All our attempts to stall them have failed, and—”

“They’ve come before.” It was impolite to interrupt a queen, but it was also impolite to try and kick someone out of their own house, so Razz figured they were even. “They fight, they lose, they leave. So it was, so it will be again.”

“We won’t be here to fight them this time. Bright Moon can’t afford to match the horde soldier for soldier. They eat their losses like a rich meal, while we mourn every single death. Facing them on even terrain is a fool’s errand.”

“We outnumber them. The other princesses will send—”

Now the Queen interrupted. “The other princesses will do nothing. The Alliance is broken. Bright Moon is alone.”

Razz froze. A cold shock passed through her. “But… Plumeria?”

“Gone. Perfuma has sealed them within the forest. They are hiding with their precious trees and planning new peace celebrations.”

“Salineas, then?” Mermista was the first to join the Rebellion. She pledged every drop of water to King Micah. “She couldn’t abandon us.”

“She could. She has.” The Queen stood and took up her helm. The crown of her head nearly brushed Razz’s ceiling, so she refrained from putting it on just yet, but she made her way to the door. The guard stepped aside for them, and Razz followed her out.

Night had fallen in the Liminal Woods. Stars intruded on the eastern sky, thought not near the horizon, where the sickly glow of the Horde’s capital chased away darkness at all hours. The trees whispered their evening song as the wind danced through them.

“Mermista has closed the gate to her kingdom.” The Queen’s voice had lost its anger, its edge. She recited the turns against Bright Moon with all the emotion of an accountant summing figures. “So too Dryl, and the Kingdom of Snows. They’ve all forsworn their oaths to King Micah, for he is dead. He fell in battle three days past.”

The breath fled from Razz’s lungs. She closed her eyes. When she could finally speak, it was only to whisper, “I’m sorry.”

No answer. The queen stared at the eastern horizon for long minutes. She might have been a statue – Razz couldn’t even see her breathe.

A faint, distant thunder broke the silence. They all turned to follow it. The same scout aircraft from before, perhaps, invisible now in the dark of night.

“Do not mourn for him,” Angella said. Each word sounded ripped from her heart. “He died as he would have wanted, fighting for the freedom of all Eternians. He is the luckiest of us.”

Razz was an old woman. Not as old as the immortal Queen, of course, but old still. She felt the centuries creaking in her bones on cold mornings; she sifted through memories like a librarian through a catalogue of books. Some days it took her hours to remember what had happened the day before, so preoccupied was she with events decades ago. And those years had given her the wisdom necessary to see a lie so plainly spoken. And also the wisdom to let it pass unchallenged.

“He is,” Razz said. The words tasted like sawdust. “But we cannot stop fighting now. That will invite the Horde to chase us to the ends of the world.”

“We won’t have to fight them. These woods will become our shield. An impenetrable barrier keeping out our foes.”

Razz looked around at the woods. It was dark, but not so dark she couldn’t make out the tall, stately trunks of each tree. They were beech and maple and ash and there were sycamores in the low areas that filled with water after the rain and atop the hills there were groves of cedar. The most threatening thing about the Liminal Woods was the wild rose bushes that grew in places. A child could walk from one end of the woods to the other in a day.

“I’m not sure they can do all that,” she said.

“Not yet. But they will.”

“What do you mean?” A faint sense of alarm grew within her, crowding out the shock of King Micah’s death. “What are you doing, Angella?”

“I’m doing what I have to.” She reached into her armor, and when she pulled out her hand light leaked from her closed fist, like she had caught a falling star. Its cold glow cast giant shadows on the trees around them. A true fragment of the Moonstone. With it, Angella could wield powers matched only by a handful of beings on all of Eternia.

“Just as you will,” Angella continued. “You will leave the Liminal Woods and let me transform them. They will become our wall, an impregnable barrier behind which Bright Moon may thrive unmolested. And woe to our enemies who trespass within them.”

“Your majesty, no.” Razz laid a hand on the Queen’s arm – it was the highest point she could reach. “This is a mistake. We cannot defeat Hordak by hiding from him. Go back to the other princesses, rally them. They fought for Micah and they will fight for you as well. They just need someone who will lead them. Otherwise the horde will devour us one by one!”

Angella shrugged her off. “My duty is to defend Bright Moon. The other kingdoms must protect themselves. We’ve learned the cost of fighting Hordak, and it is too high to bear. Better this… stalemate, than to constantly bleed.”

“You don’t understand what you’re doing, Angella.” Razz ignored the glare from the guard and stepped in front of the Queen. “These woods aren’t just trees. They are a living part of Eternia, as much its spirit as you or I! There are First One archives here, just waiting the Hero’s return! You would pervert that? Destroy it, twist it into something unnatural? Risk our best chance at defeating the Horde?”

“The Hero.” Angella closed her eyes. “You know, Razz, I once thought Micah might be the one? His spirit seemed so pure. So brave. So kind. Who else could deserve it more? I asked myself that, and the answer is: no one. There is no one left in this fallen world who deserves the Hero’s power.”

“They will come—”

“Then they will be [i]too late![/i]” The Queen’s eyes snapped open and pinned Razz on the spot. “I know you, Razz. I know you are more than just some old woman living in the woods. Don’t think you can deceive me with platitudes and promises of a hero to come. If they were going to save us, they should have appeared by now, before so many died!”

“I…” Razz swallowed. “I am just an old woman, your majesty. Maybe I know something of magic, maybe I do not. But I know for certain that we must have faith that the Hero will return. Not in our time, but in hers. Until then, we must endure. We must fight. We need someone to make the hard choices that—”

“Hard choices?” The Queen barked out a hollow, joyless laugh. “You speak to me of hard choices? I sent my husband to his death! And what have we gained? The loss of our allies, the destruction of our army, and the enemy at our doorstep. I am sick of making hard choices! I only have one left, and it is very easy, and if you will not leave, you will be a part of it!”

The Queen opened her hand. The true fragment of the Moonstone filled the woods with light like the dawn, but it was a cold dawn, silver and empty and cruel. It floated there, contemptuous of gravity, rising higher with each heartbeat, and with each heartbeat its light grew in strength. Soon Razz could not stare straight at it, and she held up a hand to shield her eyes.

“Angella, please!” The air was filled with a roaring whisper, as if all the people in the world were muttering in her ears. The sound swept out from the clearing into the woods. “This is what Hordak wants! To divide us! He wants us to build walls, not just against him, but against each other! These are his tools!”

Angella couldn’t have heard her, not over the cacophony, over the billion whispers pouring out of the Moonstone fragment. But the Queen turned to her nevertheless, and she spoke, and somehow Razz heard.

“Then he is wise.”

And then the time for speech was over, and the time of whispers began. They spilled out from the moonstone without end, a torrent that soaked into the trees, filling them, growing them, twisting them. Making them something greater than they were, something no longer of nature but out of nature, and the woods a wound in the world, a vast, bleeding maw that chattered and whispered and seduced and whispered and rumored and whispered and whispered and whispered until nothing remained in Razz’s mind but whispers and the promise given by Queen Regent Angella, Master of Bright Moon, First of the Immortals and the world’s last, best hope against the Horde. And that promise came true.

She became a part of the woods.