The Elders (Sky: Children of the Light)

~Chapter Eight~

SUNNY'S POV

"So, fun. Doesn't seem to be doing much else than change my eyes, I also don't trust you, so I'm going to do nothing." Sunny replied.

"It does much more than that," Sage said, "It's the very thing that created the Guardians from Cloth Creatures. It makes you soulless. Emotionless. A blank slate."

"Very reassuring. How do you fix it? Assuming I let you do whatever it is."

"You need some sort of... anchor, so your soul is never fully gone, no matter what. Yours would be the one from Floare, and his anchor would be you."

Sunny made a face.

"Hey! I'm not that bad!" Ace protested.

"Yes, you are," she reassured. "I most definitely do not want my soul tied to yours. Can you connect mine to Zaira's or something?"

Sage shook her head. "The process is too dangerous to repeat more than once, even for experienced healers."

"You're saying that you aren't experienced?!"

Sage didn't say anything.

Sunny backed away a step. "Ok, that's it, I don't trust you about this."

Sunny tensed, ready to fly away. She made an extra effort to use some of her Elder power to fly faster when suddenly all the energy drained out of her.

What? She thought she had good control over- her eyelids drooped, and she was suddenly overwhelmed with exhaustion, almost falling over.

"This makes things easier." She heard Sage say, but her voice was muffled. Then the world unfocused and she slumped over onto the ground.

✧

Sunny stood on the precipice of a cliff over rolling black waves. Even when they crashed against the stone, the spray was the color of charcoal. Sharp winds tore at her like cold shards of ice.

All of the sudden, the sky was awash with stars, glittering like gems in constellations she recognized, and some she did not.

She backed away from the edge. Looking backward, she saw nothing but blackness, and blobby shapes that could be mountains.

Reaching for her staff, she found her piano instead. Taking it out, she ran her fingers over the polished keys and the gold embellishments. It had a scratch running down one side, from the one-time Zaira had thought it was funny to throw rocks at her when she was playing the piano.

Opening the top, she found all the sheet music that she loved to play, and a few duets that Zaira sometimes played with her. Rifling through it, she found one and set it on the ground.

Then she began to play, the notes echoing like she was in a cavernous room, not outside. She played a few more songs and then stopped, bored, and ready to be out of the strange void. With nothing better to do, she looked over the precipice. An unnaturally strong wind suddenly blew her forward, and she lost her balance, plummeting towards the wild waves below.

✧

Sunny sat upright and immediately crashed into a hard surface. She expected it to hurt, but it was more like she was gently bumping into something. She looked down at herself, but all she saw was a swirling mass of petals. She jerked out of drowsiness and looked around frantically.

She was floating near the ceiling of a small room, with stone bricks painted with decorative lines like the ones she saw around the Sky Kingdom. An archway led out into a hallway to who knows where.

Sunny tried to float forwards, but her momentum sent her shooting out the door. Halfway there, her body condensed, and the flower petals disappeared as she hit the wall across from the door. This time, it did hurt, like it normally did.