To Fly the Soaring Tides

Cira hopped down from the third story window and landed with a splash, startling the fleeing citizens of Nymphus. The orbs of light were increasing in number, coming out of the ground and through buildings. They seemed to ignore any obstacle. Some flew lower and Cira could finally get a good look at them, having shaken off most of the sleep.

They had thin white wings to keep them aloft and they flew erratically without apparent aim, only stopping occasionally to look at the light artifacts adorning the buildings. They had arms and legs on stark white bodies, but their human features were dulled.

One stopped to look at her and she saw a face that looked sculpted out of clay—or salt. It had a faint expression of curiosity, but she felt that more in its beady eyes than any movement from its uncanny face. The orb of light was just a shroud of prima salt, a fine powder that clung to the air around them being lit up by the innumerable lights.

The people running past her were all heading in the direction of the gates. She figured there was some kind of evacuation procedure but noticed some were lagging behind. They were short of breath and looked pale. One was a child with cracked lips whose eyes were turning red. Many of the same symptoms the desiccated patients from the infirmary showed and it seemed mostly the young and elderly were affected.

“Hydrate! Hydrate! Annnnd Hydrate!” Cira threw the spell around to any nearby that looked like they needed it and soon they had cleared the area, only a few trickling in from behind. That said, it was hardly effective given the size of the city. Cira needed a better solution. “Aquon!”

The Staff of Springs burst into her hand and water started to flow at her feet. This was originally going to be Breeze Haven’s spring, but Gazen could never get it to work by itself indefinitely. Giving up, it turned into Cira’s thirteenth birthday present. Water can be conjured when you’re thirsty anyhow.

Cira couldn’t flood the streets too much or people would drown. There was an old man near her that collapsed and started sucking water out of the cracks in the pavement.

“What in the cursed clouds are you doing?!” Cira turned around to see Lomp pulling his hair out, “You’re supposed to stop the floods not cause them!”

“What else am I supposed to do? What even are these things?” She was genuinely curious.

“Salt nymphs, you dolt! Now run, before they kill us both!”

Cira could even feel her skin drying past the shield. When it comes to altering the environment, magical protection didn’t help much. The flooding was a temporary solution, of course, but it would help keep the humidity from hitting zero.

“They don’t attack, right? They just steal any moisture around them, regardless of the source?”

“That’s right. Apparently people don’t have enough for them to go after. Even now, they’re just flying around mad, so we have to get out of here before more appear!” The man had one foot out the city, but his muscles couldn’t move from Cira’s utter lack of urgency, “What are you doing?!”

“And they just ignore walls, floating through the mine without a care in the world… Fascinating. I guess these guys are why I couldn’t see into the elevator.” The salt nymphs brought a quick close to the mystery of what the old builders had against spatial sorcery. They weren’t just secretive and overly-cautious, they were preventing their artifacts from the salt nymphs. “Hmmm… Hydro Barrier! That should do it.”

It was her Hydration spell but set to shield her body for an hour give or take, in normal conditions. It wouldn’t keep the nymphs out and she was mildly worried what would happen if one passed through her, but she wouldn’t shrivel up just standing there.

“What are you doing?! We need to leave!”

“And a Hydro Barrier for you.” Another blue flash came from Cira’s ring and a thin mist shrouded Lomp as well. “Now you’ll be fine, so stop complaining. People are dying. Hydration.”

She cast it on a passerby trying to run away. Lomp looked at them longingly, “So what do you plan to do about it? There are thousands of people in this city. Do you mean to lay this spell on them all?”

Casting her spell on everyone would be exhausting and take well over an hour, then she’d just have to start over again. It would be a fool’s errand. “I can’t cast it on everyone… But perhaps I could cast it on the whole city.”

Lomp covered his mouth like he was in danger of giving her an even worse idea. Cira pondered for a minute as the water gently flowed out from her feet, then he chose his next words very carefully, “And… how will you do that?”

She had one thing going for her in this endeavor. Being at the bottom of a mine in a sealed chamber—the only one outside her clinic that was lined with stone instead of salt. Anywhere else on the island there was no way it could work, but she had a shot here.

“Aquon, fifth form!” Of course, she could not cast the spell on the whole city. Instead, she aimed to change the city’s conditions to match with a new technique, “Misty spring!”

The staff took on a more apt form for spellcasting, with a watery gem at the top. The hidden jewel of Aquon, which allowed her to cast again independently of her ring. From it a thin mist started to seep out, falling to the ground and clinging to the water that still flowed. The streams that crept through the streets carried it through the city. Through the shroud, the rich blue glow of water magic gleamed out from Aquon like a lighthouse in the fog.

Lomp’s shoulder’s slumped, “I guess really you will… Is that going to be enough though—“ He clamped his mouth shut.

“You’re right, I’ll need to—”

“Cira!” Nanri ran up panting and out of breath, her skin cracked and complexion pallid. “Thank goodness you’re alright. I didn’t realize you were such a versatile witch!”

Cira looked at the witch who seemed ready to crumble away and blow off into the wind. The witch was nice, but she couldn’t say be sure if she liked her yet. She was at least somewhat important to Earth Vein and the projects she was in charge of were shaping up to be less than ethical, regardless of her ignorance. Still, this was a crisis situation. If it came to down it, she would fight her, so no harm in giving her a hand today. That was her excuse, though she couldn’t see how she’d end up fighting this witch specifically.

“Lesser Hydration. Hydro Barrier.” Cira threw a couple spells out to help the shriveling witch, “There, that should keep you from dying. Where have you been? Evacuating the citizens?”

“Thanks, I feel amazing! You sure are nice to have around. I was in the New Shore District. I just came back and the whole city’s in chaos. I followed the water and here you are.” She shrugged, “I won’t tell, but you can be sure the bigwigs will hear about this. Make sure to clean it up or Salina will have something to say, I’m certain.”

Salina sounded like an even more important member of Earth Vein. Probably a witch. They wouldn’t care about all the people Cira saved. All they’d hear is water near the prima. Cira didn’t care about her though. She wasn’t really one of their witches.

“She can say what she will. Do you at least know the status of the evacuation? Does anyone need help?”

Nanri’s eyes widened for a moment and her evaluation of Cira raised a little bit, she who would speak such things with no fear of this ‘Salina’, “I ran into Mayor Rudo on his way to the gates not long ago. They’ve been ready for this day for a long time so most should be on their way to the emergency elevators by now. How long ago did the stampede begin?”

Cira looked blankly at Lomp who scoffed, “Ten or fifteen minutes.”

“Fast response. So, we just need to focus on getting the nymphs out of here.” Things that ignored walls were notoriously difficult to herd, so she was hoping to rely on her colleague to achieve this.

“How are we suppose we do that?!” The witch blurted out.

“What do they usually do about the stampedes?”

By now the salt nymphs dominated the air like an endless flock of doves. Cira could hardly see the ceiling anymore.

“Wait it out, of course. They’ll have moved on by next week.” That was an awfully long time for Cira. The people were safe, and this city wasn’t her problem, so she was well within her rights to ignore it and head down another level. She couldn’t just leave like this though.

No, she had barely begun to learn about the salt nymphs, let alone understand why they were going mad. Their stampedes were technically her job to fix, so she didn’t think this needed a week.

“It never hurts to try,” She held out her offhand and a staff appeared from a flash of light, carved from something pearlescent and bone-like, adorned at the top with a geometrically carved crystal. In her right, water and fog continued to pour out, but in her left a golden glow appeared from the prism on top. She sent it up above the rooftops into the swarm of nymphs and in an instant raised the intensity enough to burn her own eyes, flashing between different colors too rapidly to keep track of.

“Gah!” Nanri reeled back and turned away, “What are you doing?!”

The salt nymphs, Cira noticed, were interested in the light artifacts earlier. Only for an instant though. So, if she created a flashy light and made it change faster than they could lose interest, what would happen? Just as she hoped, a small group of nymphs began coalescing around it, their papery wings formed silhouettes.

At the same time, Aquon was surging with power, splashing water off of its form as Cira pushed her control to the limit. She was concurrently casting three spells, each larger than the last. Light meshed well with most other kinds of sorcery so it wouldn’t be much strain on its own, but she was already flooding the city and changing the climate.

“I call this spell Nymph Beacon.” Cira said seriously, “I may be able to get them to leave.”

She fired off one after the next, only pausing to down her last elixir, until the entire cavern was illuminated with strobing light as her beacons spread throughout the city. More and more of the nymphs rose up from the city and started fluttering around them like moths.

“Y-you can control the nymphs?!” Nanri was gob smacked, then she smiled and her eyes glazed over with the sparkle of a hundred beacons, “Zero Stratum is going to be a breeze with you around!”

Cira didn’t hear the witch, for she was focused on her spells. She bobbed the lights around to keep them entertained and soon the air above the city was like a massive shining cloud of salt nymphs.

To test the next phase of her plan she let one fall. It flashed a thousand different colors as it descended to the pavement, dragging with it a billowing flock of nymphs. It reached the ground with a puff of prima salt and kept going. Cira cancelled the spell once it was fully through both stone and salt, but the nymphs kept going. Their interest had been pointed in a direction and with any luck, once they got down to the bottom and couldn’t find the beacon, they’d forget all about the city up here and find somewhere else to buzz around.

There were a few stragglers, so her spell wasn’t a hundred percent effective at holding their attention, but it worked. Following this, she ordered the other beacons to fall one by one. Soon, thousands of salt nymphs were racing into the ground trying to follow the light. After a couple minutes of this, only a few stray nymphs still hung in the air. Their vaguely human bodies dangled as if they didn’t really have a purpose and their wings carried them listlessly in circles.

The nymphs left were still flying but the flapping of their wings continued relentlessly, filling the air with their. They looked strained, as if something was compelling them to continue or they were truly crazed. Their movements looked exhausted and even their ambiguous faces now seemed in pain. Maybe they really have gone mad.

“Well, that’s the best I can do for now,” Cira said, “Shall we go check on the evac—”

“Cira, your staff!” Nanri pointed at it like there was a big juicy bug crawling all over it.

When Cira looked, she saw a salt nymph casually sitting on top of the liquid gem of Aquon. It looked at her and blinked—though it was more like its obsidian black eyes disappeared for a brief moment—appearing to not know it was doing anything wrong.

Is it doing anything wrong? One’s not going to hurt anybody. “Hey there little guy… or girl… Say, Nanri, do salt nymphs have genders?”

“How should I know?!” She took a couple steps away.

“I was thinking nympho for a boy, but if it’s a girl, maybe… Nina.”

Lomp had an awkward look on his face that Cira couldn’t discern, “let’s just say it’s a girl. I think Nina sounds better.”

“I’m going to have to agree with your servant.” Nanri agreed quickly, “But don’t tell me you plan on keeping that thing.”

“Of course not. I would never enslave this creature, but she’s welcome to hang out for as long as she likes.” They really shot that name down fast. It was so cute though…

Like all the others, this small creature stood no taller than her ankles, if it were on the ground. They all had vaguely female bodies without clear enough features to really be able to determine. Their faces were all like a beautiful but poorly molded doll, but there were slight variations between individuals. They looked to her like a half-finished work. She thought if they were molded from clay, one could put them in an oven they may come out as fairies.

They fit the description to a tee, but Gazen had introduced Cira to a real fairy once before. Their human features were perfect while their wings were intricate and transparent. They were also capable of speech. Fairies could even sling magic around that made Cira look like she was still a little girl holding a stick.

Nina and the rest hadn’t showed much cognizance though, and there was no sign of mana coming from them either. Just ambient salt, however that worked. Their appearance was very similar, what with the wings and small bodies, but Cira just got an altogether different feeling from these creatures. It was either incomplete or somehow incorrect.

“Well, Nina, what do you say?” It stared at her blankly, so she took the silence as an answer and cast a little spell to help her fit in.

Now the salt nymph had a little blue hat similar to Cira’s but made entirely of magical water. She raised two tiny hands and grasped the brim, which reacted as a hat instead of water because it was actually Aquon. She spent a few seconds pulling the brim down and flexing it while Cira smiled at her with innocent curiosity.

“Well, this is a boon,” Nanri said, “No wonder they sent you if you can control the nymphs. We should head downstairs already. I can’t wait to get started!”

“Not yet. We need to make sure all the evacuees are safe.” Cira swiftly denied her as water and fog once again started to flow, “And I need to make sure the city returns to a safe humidity first.”

Nanri looked at her inquisitively, as if puzzle pieces were falling into place, “You’re no new recruit… You’re not just any witch now, are you?” She sounded impressed.

“You’re exactly right.” Cira sure wasn’t a new recruit. She wasn’t any witch at all, in fact. “Now come, there are people in trouble and nymphs to quell.”

Cira’s blue lighthouse shined again, and water gurgled at her feet, lifting her off the ground and above the rooftops. She was too high to hear Nanri whisper with bated breath and starstruck eyes, “Just like that… The high coven is incredible.”

Cira’s mist spread out over and between buildings as she glided across the effulgent city on her way to the gate on a conjured wave. It caught the light of the city’s artifacts and transformed into a luminous tidal wave that radiated in every direction, highlighting the trail of mist behind her and thin clouds that had started to form at the ceiling.

Nanri and Lomp both ran, trying to keep up after realizing the water wasn’t going to spill out of her wave and flood them out along with the whole of Nymphus. All the prima salts left over from the stampede’s dusty exit had soaked up her gentle streams of water and turned into a muddy white paste that they had to be careful not to slip in. They watched the stray salt nymphs all wander over and start trailing behind the lofty sorcerer at a distance, their pace through the air noticeably slowing as if returning to their senses.

Between the gate and the passage out of Nymphus Stratum there was a herd of citizens trying to escape. The emergency elevators went five levels up, but there were only so many. With thousands of people, there were thousands more drying to a crisp just waiting for their turn.

___

Mayor Rudo was a surprisingly young man, and he was currently limping to the elevators with an elderly man slung over his shoulders. This old timer was half-passed out and bleeding from the nose—just one of many he’d found collapsed on the ground. He knew a scant few were still stuck in the city, but there was only so much he could do before his body gave out.

Rudo left the man at the elevator with the shortest line, where his staff directed the citizens aboard. Those assholes never mentioned we could only evacuate a hundred people at a time! They sure are real shiny though. “Tch. This is just like them…” His words trailed off.

Minutes ago, the nymphs were blotted out the city, then something strange happened with the city’s lights when he found the old man. Now shining clouds hung like Nymphus had been transported to the surface and the heavens had blessed them with rain. But he knew that wasn’t it.

Rudo had caught a glance of that new witch for only a moment when she entered yesterday morning, but now she appeared again over his city riding a shimmering golden wave, shrouded in a bright mist that trailed behind her spreading out over the rooftops and into the clouds. The countless nymphs were now a mere handful, and they leisurely floated behind her like they would the nymph queen.

The witch descended as the glistening wave she stood on broke right outside the gates. Water flowed from her hand like a spring seemingly at will, and strangely, there was a single salt nymph nestled within. Fog still billowed and dispersed into the air as she approached Rudo, who got nervous and shrank back when he noticed she was making a beeline straight for him.

“You the mayor?” She asked.

“Huh?” He was taken off guard. They hadn’t met yet. “How did you know?”

The witch pointed at her uncharacteristically folded over hat, “You may be young but you have the tallest hat. Works every time.”

“Wha—?!” Now young Rudo was speechless before dropping to the ground with a start, “Madam witch, I thank you for your gracious assistance!”

When he heard nothing and looked up the witch had a face like she had just smelled something most unpleasant, “Get up. What the hell is wrong with you? This is a crisis.”

“…huh?” Somethings not right about this witch.