Tamy's brow scrunched in frustration. Dase watched in rapt curiousity. He wanted to know what she was seeing. Had she even made contact? Did she see her? Were they talking? Airy's subtle shimmerings beside him grew still. His fingers groped for her current and clasped around Tamy's outstretched hand instead. No, she grasped his. And tight. In a moment he understood why as a force unlike Airy, unlike anything he'd ever confronted before, assaulted his consciousness. His mind fell, plummeted, away from the tangent world that was solid and real. He fought against it, frightened, panicked. The claws of his awareness scrambled for purchase against the vastness that was this overwhelming world.
In the chaos, a voice. It wasn't so much heard as it was felt. Dase recognized it instantly and was relieved to know he wasn't lost in this space alone. He stumbled toward it, blindly. It echoed all around him but at the same time came from one place. He felt a motion akin opening his eyes, only deeper. And then the world suddenly became clear again. Only it wasn't his world. He was still surrounded by forest, but it looked thin, gauzy, as if his feet should fall through it rather than stand atop. He took another step to be sure, then glanced up at Tamy.
She was beside him and at the same time leagues away. She held his hand so he reasoned she couldn't be too far but he squeezed her fingers anyway, just in case. She gave a gentle squeeze back and looked ahead. Dase's blue eyes followed. There was Airy, before them, in all her luminosity. She hovered in the atmosphere, a tiny, fragile being, no larger than his palm. Light draped around her like a gown, it's tendrils streaming, same as her hair, flowing through the air as if it were water. They stared at eachother, awestruck.
His vision went through her, to the trees opposite. She was translucent and solid at the same time, seeming to take up the entire cavity of this realm with the mere inches of her presence. She floated forth. Dase was so surprised he almost stepped back. Then she spoke and his limbs and heart stopped, frozen in motion. He was hearing her, resonant and sure to his ears, not just a passing murmur through his head.
"She did it!" The sprite bounded so near him he had but to hold out a hand and touch her but he only managed to gaze. She was unbothered by this though and her exuberance continued. "She really did it! I can see you!" She bounced in the air, up and down. "I can't believe it! You're so beautiful, and I can talk to you!" she clapped her tiny hands.
"Airy?" Dase was so dumbfounded it was all he could think of to say. His hand slowly raised until his fingers met with her etheral body. She felt pulsing and warm.
"Yes, yes, it's me!" She hugged the tip of his finger. "And I can see you and touch you and feel you too, isn't it great?"
He finally relaxed enough to laugh. "It is! I can't believe it. I've always wanted to know why I couldn't see you, why you chose me to talk to."
"Don't you know?"
Dase shook his head wordlessly. Should he?
"That day, we were playing. My mother... my mother, she-" tears of light sparkled in Airy's eyes, "she got trapped by the big bully earth element and I had to go. I had to go help her. But I couldn't. That dirty old meanie trapped her in a tree and I couldn't get her out. Then I came back, to find you, but you were gone. You left me too and I was so, so sad. But then I felt you. I felt you coming out of that cave and I knew you. I knew it was you so I followed you, and here I am! And here you are! And just oh, aren't you so happy?"
She changed so fast between joyful to tearful and mourning to happy again he almost couldn't believe it. But he did remember that day. They were in a small patch of secluded grass, not quite big enough to be a meadow. He was far away from his house, farther than he was supposed to be. There were wildflowers all around and growing up the trees. Airy was bouncing him up in the air and he was plucking blooms from the branches, every lift trying to pick more than the last one. He had heard a gasp of panic in his mind then she was gone, vanished in a hurry. He waited till the sun began to set then as he was walking home, feeling dejected, the ogres had trode by and snatched him up.
"I remember." He couldn't have been more than five years old when he was taken and he had never remembered his life before then but he was recalling it now, at least this part of it. He looked at her, all of a sudden guilty for not being able to help her that day. "Your mom. Is she-"
"No, she didn't die. But she is lost, trapped in a tree because he was so very jealous and she knew, she knew she couldn't bind to him for life so she told him to leave her alone, that he couldn't be her mate. But he just said he was keeping her with him forever, even if he never saw daylight again and then he bound her there in that tree and they can never get out." Her glimmer faded to a pale, forlorn flicker. "I don't miss her so much anymore. I talk to her sometimes, at the tree, but I don't know if she hears me."
There was water in Dase's eyes, her despair was so acute in his mind. "I'm sorry."
She wasn't listening, lost in a memory that was now making her angry. "If I had only got there sooner, if I was older. If I had known I would grow to be this strong.." He watched, wide-eyed, as she grew to a being his size then kept going. Currents flared up. Her glow became brighter, stronger, almost solid. Streams of hair and light whipped in the air. She grew. "If I had the strength now I had then I would have CRUSHED HIM, I WOULD'VE-"
"Airy, stop! You're scaring us!" Dase was hunched over the ground, holding Tamy to his chest. Wind ripped through their hair and their clothes and both were clinging to patches of grass as if to save themselves from being swept up but there was nothing substantially solid in this world and they were losing the battle. The clearing was brittle as glass in the boy's grasp.
At once, the winds began to die. Vengeance faded from Airy's eyes and she began to shrink back to her size but it was already too late. Tamy was breaking the connection. The sprite watched them flicker away. "Wait, no! I'm sorry!" She sped through the air.
"Go back, go back!" Dase screamed at Tamy but the words were silent in the air. They returned to the mortal world; the impact sent Dase reeling from his seat and into a strong pair of arms placed to stop his tumble. He stared at Tamy, who remained upright but clearly was jolted. Feminine hands checked his pulse, wiped his tears. He hadn't even known he'd been crying. He stared at Tamy through hurtful blue eyes. "Why did you do that? I wanted to stay."
Her lower lip quivered and immediately he was regretful. "No, wait. I'm sorry." He scrambled to her and took her hand. "What you did was great, really. Thank you. Are you alright?"
