Rizzlin's Dream
By Oscar S. Cisneros [Author Info]
Molten glass burning white in the night and the heat of the kiln bathing everything in an orange glow. A woman's face began to emerge from the floating the mass of searing liquid. But something was wrong. Rizzlin looked at his hands and saw indecipherable symbols moving there. He could not read them. It was a dream.
"No!" he shouted as he awoke in a start. "NO!"
The fine webbing of the hammock-bed bounced from his jolt, settling slowly as the silence grew around his fast panting breath.
"Rizzlin, what’s wrong," Iliana asked, her white eyebrows pressed flat above her amber-red eyes.
"Her face. It shattered. It just fell to the grounds and broke into thousands of pieces. I could feel the flecks in my eyes. I could almost see her -- her face -- she was so..."
"What face? Rizzlin, you were just dreaming. Lie down and rest. You whole body is drenched," Iliana said. She turned his taught body over and began to massage the stiffness from his shoulders and neck. Slowly, he gave in to her touch.
"She was so beautiful, Illiana. I saw the outline of her face crest in the glass and then..." His tears fell through the webbing of the bed. The infrared heat of the drops flashed on the floor and then cooled to nothingness before his blurry eyes. "...and then it became brackish and stiff. I was so close, so close."
Iliana felt the tension rise again in his body. Her long black fingers rubbed the stress away. "Ssshhh, my love, ssshhh," she whispered in his ear.
"You have been working too hard. Your art requires patience and a peaceful heart. If you force things you will no longer be blowing glass but only the shapes of nightmares into your dreams."
Rizzlin heard but did not listen. All he could think of was the woman’s face -- the legend -- and the shattering of glass.
"I love you, Iliana. I want to make beautiful things with you."
"And I love you, my gentle darkelf. We will again mix your glass and my metal into dark sculptures of beauty, but for now, let us sleep. Tomorrow I will tell you of the new commission I have received from Lucentio of the Arcanorum."
* * *
Two flit-cycles flew like graceful moths illumed in the darkness of night. Their canvas wings did not beat, but were pushed aloft by the steady updrafts that blew through this cave. In a lazy, upward spiral the two drow pedaled upon the cycles. It was a massive cavern, a vertical shaft whose blackened space was filled only by the slow, up-blowing wind and the delicate whir of their gears and propellers.
"I feel like I'm dreaming, Kofi. This is wonderful," said Seema, a young drow who pedaled behind Kofi's craft. "Thank you so much for bringing me here."
"Few drow know the freedom of flight, my love" Kofi said. "I wanted to show you how this is better than a dream, to show you how my heart soars for you. This is my life, Seema. This is who I am."
"I am not your love yet, my passionate pilot," Seema laughed. Her onyx black skin glistened with perspiration and a deep red hue -- her natural tone -- could be seen below her skin.
"All in good time, my love -- I mean, Seema -- I mean, my love," Kofi playfully stuttered. The young drow was a flit-cycle pilot and his thin frame was veined with the muscles one who pedaled his way through the skies of Underworld's caves. "My tongue is not as quick as my pedaling, nor is it as quick as my eye spies your beauty in the night."
Seema did not reply. Unlike her dark maroon skin, Kofi's hue had the blue sheen of a crow's feathers. They hailed from different quadrants of the Underworld and for centuries their people -- blue-skinned drow and red-skinned drow -- had fought bitter wars for the precious resources of this realm: minerals, metals, water and caves untouched by the fractures of earthquakes. History claimed the days of open war between them; Today's battle was fought on economic and cultural grounds.
"We're almost there, Seema," said Kofi with tinge of uncertainty in his voice. "Quit pedaling for a moment. We'll rise slowly if you follow my arc."
"But what of the giant span spiders?" she asked. "How common are they in this sector of the quadrant?"
"There's nothing to fear. I cycled through these lanes only yesterday," he said. "I stole some incendiary bolts from an alchemist -- Three clicks of my windbow, three dead spiders"
"I thought you said you were training."
"I lied," Kofi said, smiling.
"Some spiders are sacred, you know."
Kofi had heard of the Flower Queen but had never seen her. The young drow understood his lover's ardent faith but believed only in the beauty of her belief and the truth of their love.
"I have not forgotten the teachings you have shared, my. . . Seema," he said. "I often wonder what kind of creature calls a flower her home and hunting ground. The Flower Queen must be a spectacular arachnid."
"She is more than just a creature," Seema said.
A glowing mote of light marked the entrance to the down-sweeping tunnel Kofi was looking for. He had discovered the long, wide passageway during his early days of patrolling the sector. It led to a place few drow dared to behold.
"Get ready, Seema. Follow my lead closely. We're going to dive for a long while and then level off before we get to the cave," he said. "Be careful. This passage is much smaller than our ample trade routes."
Kofi circled the cavern once more and then angled his cycle into the gaping maw of the tunnel. He began to dive and Seema followed. It was dark at first, but then they began to dive past the floating way-marker motes Kofi had placed a few days before. Although he did not need them, they illumed the path of his young friend. It was her first time on a flit-cycle.
The pair wizzed passed the glowing motes and though Seema had never seen a shooting star -- or any star other star for that matter -- she would soon compare the way-marker motes to those falling stars so familiar to surface-born eyes.
The wind rushed faster and faster past her face and just the motes seemed a blur of streaking light Kofi cried "Pull Up!" Yanking the handle bar close to her chest, she felt the flit-cycle lurch upward. A strange scent was in the air and it quickly grew cold in the tunnel. She had never smelled grass before or felt the chill of a winter wind.
"Wooooooohooooo!!!" shouted Kofi.
The ground disappeared as Seema blasted into the largest cave she had ever entered. There was no ceiling, only the sky and the first full moon this beautiful elf had ever seen. They flew over a moonlit valley huddled peacefully among ice-capped mountains. Seema saw the moon's face reflected in a majestic lake far below the rushing wind that carried them aloft.
* * *
Rizzlin toyed with a small steel rod, twiddling it twixt his fingers and hands. From the outer edge of his infravision he could see that heat of the kiln was dead. No inspiration had come to him, despite the fires of the night before. Kofi walked into the room.
"I dreamt her again, Kofi."
"Iliana?" asked the drow youth.
"No."
"The legend? Rizzlin, not again," Kofi said. "Why are you so fixated on that tale spun so long ago? She’s nothing more than a fable. She never existed."
"She did exist. I know she did because Lucentio told me so. And I have a glow-book illumed three centuries ago that records the telling of her tale."
"Rizzlin, just because the fanatics of yesterday told this story to scare young drow from mixing blue and red blood doesn’t mean it ever took place."
The blue-skinned glass blower went to a shelf and pulled a heavy tome from its clutter. He flipped its pages, gently exposing their glow to Kofi’s eyes.
Kofi focused on the slowly moving images. They told the tale of a young drow not quite his age -- a youth who became enamored of a lost legend, the legend of Lakshni, a blue-skinned drow who spurned the love of her red-skinned captor.
Kofi quit reading; he had heard the legend before. The fabled Lakshni refused the affection of a mage whose name was lost to antiquity. She escaped from his bounds and ran through the Underworld, a fugitive chased not by anger, but by love. Her fate -- to be turned to stone by an anguished lover -- was set down by the angry Gods that kept the blue- and red-skinned drow from becoming one . . . or so the legend goes. Kofi had long since grown deaf to the teachings that kept drow apart and for a reason: Seema was all he had ever wanted and though society and religions stood between them, Kofi's love was undeterred.
"Can I turn the page," Rizzlin asked. Kofi did not answer.
"Kofi?"
"Yes?"
"You seem distracted," Rizzlin said. "'Love' may be a dwarven word, but you have it written all over your dark elven face. A fool for love, eh?"
"Don't mock me, Rizzlin," Kofi said with the youth gone from his eyes. "You're the fool. You spend all your time dreaming of the cursed legend of Lakshni when you already have a beautiful drow by your side. Where is she now? Where is Iliana? Does she know about your dreams?"
"I told her about my dreams last night," he said. "She is at the Arcanorum with Lucentio. We have a new commission to fulfill."
"What have your centuries taught you? How many drow can say that they sleep on a lover's web and create things of beauty with their mate? You're squandering her love with your romantic dreams about the past."
Kofi turned away. He crossed his arms and levitated to a web-perch on the ceiling.
"Look, I can't ignore these dreams I keep having," Rizzlin said. "Kofi, they are so beautiful. Last night I saw Lakshni's countenance rise from a globe of molten glass. I’ve tried to capture her face but she appears only in my dreams, not my creations."
The young drow did not reply.
"What’s wrong with you?" Rizzlin asked. "Have you been having dreams of your own?"
"What do you mean?"
"Have you been shaking the edges of Seema’s web again?" the glassblower asked.
There was a long pause. "Let me guess," Rizzlin said, "you had a late night excursion with the red-skin." Kofi did not answer.
"Kofi, the Arcanorum is charged with her care. If her family learns of your love it might not bode well for either of you. Keep to your kind -- it is easiest and wisest to do so. Think of the pain you will cause yourselves," he said. "The Arcanorum has opened its doors to red-skinned drow in peace, not as an invitation to war."
Kofi dropped from his perch. "I'll not take love advice from a drow too blind to see his own fortune. Well met, Rizzlin, and good bye."
"Centuries teach patience, Kofi, and that young love knows not society's reins," Rizzlin said. The young drow had already left the room. The glassblower turned again to his book.
* * *
An adolescent drow crept carefully into the cave. His spidery black hands clawed at the dials of a makeshift harp. It was strung with garrote wire and marionette's strings and its polished frame was a yoke taken from the back of a goblin slave. The boy tuned his harp and all around him he heard the feint tinkle of growing crystals, like wind chimes blowing softly in the distance.
This cave, this garden of crystals and gems, was the fabled resting place of Lakshni. No one but the boy knew of its existence. The child came here to escape the back-stabbing wars of his people, armed only with an instrument of slavery turned into an instrument of beauty. And on it, he struck a haunting tune.
Something strange happened that night. Fat buds of quartz sighed deeply while a shrill whistle vibrated from mineral formations in harmony with his harp. The room was a-glow when he heard the first blip.
It was a tear that took forever to fall. It fell from a face weathered by time and cursed by the Gods long, long ago. Tucked in an alcove above the cave's floor, Lakshni's stone body seemed like nothing more than a coarse stalagmite. She stood above a small pool of water -- a puddle filled with her tears. A rhythm emerged as the tears cascaded into the pools below Lakshni's resting place. Their resonance blended with the boy's harp and the sigh of crystals all around.
For one moment, a moment long in coming, Lakshni's face appeared youthful and corporeal. The boy wept freely as he played a sad lament about the acrid pain of love that can never be.
* * *
"Rizzlin, wake up," shouted Iliana.
"Huh?"
"Where were you? Lucentio and I waited by the Arcanorum's fountain but not even the eight eyes of a spider could find you."
"I'm sorry, Iliana. I fell asleep at the kiln," Rizzlin said groggily. "I think I had a dream, but -- it's all very fuzzy."
"I don’t care about your dream," she said. "Lucentio was very upset. He is designing mechanical spider of marvelous complexity and needs my metal and your glass to complete it. But your slumber may have cost us the commission."
Rizzlin stood up and tossed his glass-blowing rods aside. His apron glistened with the shards of shattered and abandoned projects. Suddenly, he remembered his dream.
"Iliana, I need your help with something else. Have you ever made a harp?"
She stared at him incredulously. "I don't think you understand. Lucentio's creation will live forever. We have a chance to be part of something great. When an artisan invites you to help him create life -- mechanical life -- you don’t ignore the opportunity to make his construct a thing of beauty. What's wrong with you?"
"I'm sorry, I'm a little distracted."
"You used to be so ready to touch your glass to my metal and now you hardly take interest in what I want to do."
The blue-skinned darkelf turned her back to her mate and strode over to the glow-book on the table. She leafed absentmindedly through its pages. Before her, the pictorial tale of a young drow and his harp unfolded. Rizzlin stood in silence.
"You want me to help you make Lakshni's harp, don't you?" she asked, turning to face him. "I think you'll have better luck looking for it in the vacant caves of the Underworld than asking me to do it. Perhaps a lonely walk is best fitting a now lonely drow."
"Iliana. . ."
"I hope you find the woman in your dreams, Rizzlin, just don't come home to my web anymore."
* * *
Kofi pedaled fast on empty stomach. He was strung out and delirious. It had been days since Seema had left the quadrant. Patrol duty had kept him away from the graduation ceremony where she had received praise from the Arcanorum's archmage. While he had pedaled his way through a forlorn patrol route, she -- and her family -- were bid adieu with great diplomatic fanfare. The red-skinned drow had completed her training and would go back to her quadrant, never to return.
Taut with anger, he flicked the switch to his flit-cycle's engine. Muscles alone powered his personal craft, but this patrol cycle came equipped with a magical engine. He was headed for Cairm's Glowing Fall, his favorite spot to think.
Kofi heard the sound of rushing water as his flit-cycle whirred along inside the massive cave. He saw the feint glow of algae on the banks of the river flowing below him. The stream ran from a giant waterfall surrounded by glowing patches of algae and mushrooms. Bioluminescence was common in the Underworld. The glowing life of the realm was no less beautiful than the sun-loving flowers of the surface. Cairm's Glowing Fall roared over a cliff almost a mile in height. The waters were pure and their gentle radiance soothed his troubled soul.
After diving down through the waterfall's outer mists, Kofi and his flit-cycle rose up toward the cave's ceiling. He fired the craft's tether, which shot out and clamped to a large stalagmite. The engine died down and the cycle swung from a thin metallic line. Kofi collapsed the craft into a platform and, satisfied that there were no span spiders about, settled down for nap.
It was a fitful slumber, filled with dreams of accosting Seema's family and begging her hand from the elders. He was about to kiss her, but bleeding eyes appeared all around them, staring in reproach. Their lips were stopped by a cacophony of shouts and jeers. But one of the shouts was not in his dream. It was a cry for help. It was real.
He shook off his slumber. Far below him on the banks of the glowing falls, a figure moved. Kofi pulled a pair of magnigoggles from his pack. It was Rizzlin. Kofi saw the drow choking and gasping by the water's edge. A cloud of spores enveloped his thin form and Kofi thought he could see the familiar formations of deadly gas fungi surrounding the darkelf.
He had to act fast. Quickly, he reassembled the cycle and let it drop after releasing the tether. The flit-cycle floated down in tight, controlled spiral as Kofi donned his leather fungi mask. When he was close to the ground, the expert pilot lifted the nose and jumped from the craft. He levitated to the floor while the flit-cycle buoyed inertly in midair.
Touching down on the slippery banks, he cast a simple cantrip spell: he lifted the mask and blew a mild breeze from his lips as if blowing a kiss across his palm. The gentle wind pushed the spores away. Kofi was not a wizard, but all flit-cycle pilots learned basic magic as part of their survival training.
"Rizzlin!"
The pilot studied the mushroom caps all about him. It appeared that most had expended themselves when Rizzlin wandered into this patch. He drew a pinch of purple spores from a pouch in his pack and sprinkled them upon Rizzlin's face.
"Breath deeply, Rizzlin, these spores will counter the fungi's attack." Rizzlin inhaled and began to cough violently. His eyes were swollen and the drow soon curled up on the wet moss. "Thank you," he whispered.
"Rest for now, Rizzlin. There will be time for gratitude later."
As the glassblower slept, Kofi made camp. A quick flame cantrip lit the dried husks of some wood fungi and it did not take long for Kofi's net to snare a bushel of blind cave trout. Hours later, Rizzlin awoke.
"'Yellow and brown, we're safe all around'," he croaked.
"No, the proper phrase is 'yellow and brown, death all around'," Kofi replied. "The yellow and brown splotches on those mushroom caps means that they spew deadly gas spores."
"I think I've learned that lesson."
"You spend too much time by that kiln of yours and not enough time wandering the caves that make dark elves dark. What are you doing out here?"
"It's Iliana. She's left me."
Kofi poured his friend a bowl of trout and mushroom gumbo. Rizzlin smiled weakly. The soup would warm his cold bones.
"I wanted to surprise her and I knew I could only find the right type of algae here by the falls."
"What do you need with that glowing muck?"
"It's part of the specification for Lucentio's new chrome spider. It needs a pair of glowing eyes and Lucentio said that, in the right medium, this algae will glow forever without need for sustenance," he said.
"So you risked your life to make a pair of glowing glass eyeballs out of this goop?" he asked, dipping his hands into a patch of algae by the banks.
"I wanted to surprise Iliana. She was so upset that I missed an appointment with Lucentio that she tossed me out of her web," Rizzlin paused. "She also found out about Lakshni."
Kofi laughed as Rizzlin looked at his soup. "Now who's the fool for love?"
"Look, I'm desperate. I don't know what I was thinking before. Our society breeds us to be the crueler than Hades' demons, but yet our relationships demand the gentle strides of a spider crawling on a web," he said. "A darkelf has too many evil imps whispering in his ear."
"And besides," he continued. "My passion for Lakshni is pure, not the baseness of physical desire. I wish I could share the dreams I've dreamt."
"Right," Kofi said. "And that must make Iliana feel really great about your dark elven dreams involving another woman."
Rizzlin ate in silence. Kofi wondered if he had hurt his friend. "Look, misery loves company."
"What do you mean?"
"Seema's gone. She left with her family for their quadrant a few days ago. There's an entire Underworld between us now -- not to mention the flames of racial hatred."
"It's more than just the color of your skin, Kofi. Faith is not hatred."
It was Kofi's turn to be silent. He heard the words and knew their meaning, but all he could think of was Seema's smile and her rapier's wit and the way her long, lithe form lay in his web-hammock.
"Run to her, Rizzlin. At least you don't have the bounds that keep me from my love. Run to her."
The dejected pair ate in silence. They took turns on watch that night, with each man thinking of his love while the falls fell and the fungi glowed all about.
* * *
Two glowing emerald eyes flickered in the darkness. Iliana drew her wind-musket and dagger. There had been no signs entry into her home, but that did not mean much in the deadly world of the drow.
"I think you'll find that they're a perfect fit," a voice said.
Rizzlin stepped from the shadows holding the metal inlays Iliana had created only yesterday. He walked over to her web-hammock clicked his crafted eyes into her titanium frame.
"What are you doing here?!"
"I've come to make amends, Iliana. I want to make beautiful things with you again."
"That's what you said last time -- moments before you asked me to string a harp for your legendary lover." She did not return her weapons to their sheaths.
"I almost died blowing this glass for you!"
Iliana studied the eyes. They fit Lucentio's specifications perfectly and, strangely, their glow was emanated no magical aura. She looked up at Rizzlin.
"I want to make beautiful things with you," he said again softly. "I love you."
* * *
The svelte magical engine purred, pleasing Kofi's ears. His flit-cycle soared through cave's sky and although he flew far ahead and above the caravan, his heart soared higher still. At the bottom of a tunnel cleared of stalagmites, the convoy slowly plodded toward Seema's quadrant. Lucentio's spider was complete and the blue-skinned dignitaries were delivering the arachnid construct as one of many peace offerings to their red-skinned brethren.
Kofi acted as a scout during the mission, flying far ahead and watching for Orc or goblin raiders. His newly married friends had used their political pull with Lucentio to arrange for the boy to join the procession. And though she warned him not to, Seema already knew he was coming.
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Copyright © 1999 by Oscar S. Cisneros. This material may be distributed only subject to the terms and conditions set forth in the Open Publication License, v.04 1998 or later (the latest version is presently available at http://www.opencontent.org/openpub/).
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