Melting Stones

Melting

O nce I explained about the crack in the world some miles beyond the hollow chamber, Flare and Carnelian rushed off to tell the others. Luvo had terrified them. They wanted to get away from him, now.

Me, I took hardly a moment to feel smug. For one thing, they might yet wake up and guess I could be lying like an emperor. They weren't stupid, after all, only not very experienced.

For another, I wanted to have a word with Luvo. I sensed him in the earth hundreds of yards above me. He must have reached down as close to the volcano kids as he dared. As quick as mercury on a warm dish, I rose through stone and packed clay. I stopped, drifting, when I felt Luvo's power around me.

LUVO! I shrieked. He wasn't the only one who could bellow.

Evumeimei? He was confused and worried. Why have you left Carnelian and Flare? Are you hurt? Did they escape you?

They're convincing their idiot friends to come with us. You said you couldn't do anything down there! Thanks for saving my life, but you lied to me!

He was quiet for a moment. When he answered, he sounded even more puzzled, though less worried. I cannot do anything so far from myself.

Then what was that? You nearly blew us all apart! You—you almost made us into fish paste, only we weren't fish!

Now he waited even longer. This time, when he spoke, he spoke as he'd heard Lark talk when she handled the very stupid, or the crazy. I was talking.

Talking! You pounded with your voice! They were cowering! Flare was ready to turn to drops again! Who else do you talk to like that? I asked.

Other mountains. Glaciers. Faults in the earth. Things that vex me.

I shook my head. Possibly Luvo didn't know the voice he uses with the great, ancient parts of the world might overpower younger ones. Finally, I said, It was something. Maybe it was talk to you, but it had weight. You helped me out of a very bad spot. Um. Thank you, again. You convinced Carnelian and Flare they want to try the underwater volcano. They'll do anything to get away from you.

You are welcome, Evumeimei. That is good news.

The earth beneath us slammed upward, as if a giant punched it. Stone, clay, and water shot through us. I sent part of my magic out. Way down I felt a huge fist of melted stone push up. Flare and Carnelian's friends jammed in the thousands into the huge chamber under Mount Grace. The walls were melting, making the thing expand. Far over my head stones cried out as they split. Chunks broke away to fall and shatter after rolling for hundreds of feet.

I'd better go! I shouted to Luvo. I flew through the ground. I collected strength and fashioned spells as I went, adding pieces of granite for good measure. Then I pulled power and granite alike around me into a thick, tight ball.

WHAM! The slam happened again. It shoved my ball into a pancake. I was mixed in with the magic, spells, and granite. I yanked myself together into one central ball. Quickly I dragged my protection spells into a thick shell around that. Finally I added the granite shell once more. While I worked, the world shook. I felt cracks open in stone and dirt up where open air touched the ground. Bits of stone shot into that air, thrown from new chimneys in the mountainside. A few more jumps like that and the volcano spirits would spill through cracks in Mount Grace.

Let's go, I thought. I put a lot of magic behind it.

My granite ball slammed through the earth, into a tunnel that led down. It dropped, and so did I. I clung to every particle of the stone. If I'd had a real mouth, a real throat, and real lungs, I'd have been screaming as I dropped straight into a chimney full of magma.

Volcano spirits grabbed my stone sphere. They passed me down the pipe. Even granite has limits. My shell began to melt. The heat from the volcano spirits sizzled along my magical skin. It burned.

I was spreading out. My granite shield dissolved. My muscles felt like warm honey, my bones like melting butter. I fought to stay whole, but it was so hard.

I drifted in the heat. I thought I smelled power burning. That was silly, because magic doesn't burn. Slowly I descended into the birth chamber of stones. Evumeimei Dingzai was turning to smoke. My life was sizzling out. Any memory of what I did there melted. I wanted to hang on to the memories of my life as they dissolved, but I couldn't think why. Instead I gave them up, happiness by happiness. I floated in the great power of the earth…

She's flowing into the river! That sounded like a girl. I ought to know her voice, I thought in a dreamy way.

A boy said, I have her head—you grab her tail. Who knew she could get all liquid like us?

I ought to know the boy's voice, too.

Don't let her drip! the girl ordered.

Blue and carnelian-colored hands dragged me along, out of the heat and the power. Legs, or tails, or something, wrapped around parts of me. They pulled me along.

Carnelian and Flare yanked me into cold stuff. It had hard lumps in it. They rolled me up, shoving my liquid pieces into a tighter shape. I squirmed and wriggled, fighting to get back to that hot river. I was going to float in the heart of everything. I would be reborn with the stones.

A chunk of diamond dug into my side.

Diamond. I curled myself up around it. How could I forget diamonds? Diamonds were so hard it was almost impossible to cut them, impossible to break or crush them. I could only ask one to break for me. It would do so only if it wanted to. I'd never find a diamond in all that molten stone. I'd never find any rocks in it. And I'd never find a single crystal.

What had I been thinking?

I uncurled myself and looked around. Flare and Carnelian, shaped like they wore clothes, sat on either side of me in the earth. They had saved me. They had pulled me out of there.

The others said they had a rock that acted like one of us, Flare told me. You're lucky we thought that sounded weird enough to be you.

They say they'll go, Carnelian said. They say they'll follow us out. They were so excited they shook the earth. Are you fit to take us there now?

I wanted to be melted some more… The warmth pulled on me. I shook it off and ran my magical fingers through the diamond, soaking up its strength. I can do it, I replied. I was thinking, You saved my life. And now I'm going to lead you out into the cold, cold ocean to die.

It's either the ocean or the open air, Evumeimei, I told myself. Slowly I pulled every last bit of me back into my normal shape. They're going to die anyway, because they want to get out of the earth. And if they get into the air here, they're going to kill a lot of people and animals, too. They maybe did already, them and their friends.

What about my friends in the air above? That scared me. The last shake was such a bad one, and it had cracked the surface in so many places. How much ash, underground water, mud flow, and flying rock was set in motion? I had to get the volcano spirits out to sea, before they split the island like a melon.

We'd have to take the fault that lay under the Makray River. And we'd have to go deep, really deep. So deep the refugees on the road next to it would be safe.

I didn't even know if I could bear traveling so deep under the earth, but I would have to. Fat lot of good it would be, for me to lure the volcano spirits away from the quartz trap and Mount Grace, and have them escape right under everyone I wanted to protect.

I can show you the way, through the deepest cracks of the earth, I told Carnelian and Flare. But I'm afraid to travel with your friends. I'm afraid I'll melt again. I have to stay away from them.

Of course you're staying away from them! Flare got larger for a moment. We're leading them, not you!

Which way is the crack you want to travel? Carnelian watched me, waiting. I had a feeling she would wait forever. Her patience scared me a lot more than Flare's temper. If I ran away, I had a feeling that wherever I went, Carnelian would find me and take revenge.

I sent out a tiny burst of magic. It was nothing like what I'd entered the earth with. It showed me the chamber under Mount Grace. I described the part of it that opened onto the fault under the Makray River to Flare and Carnelian.

Gather the others, Flare, said Carnelian. Tell them to assemble at that entrance. I will take Evvy there around the room of the melting together, outside, so there is no danger. She leads us, and we lead them.

That's a good plan. Flare sounded happy. We'll get away from Evvy's monster. And the ones who stay behind when we go? They can tell all the ones who haven't come up from the core yet that we led everyone to glory!

He raced away through the crack in the ground. Stones melted in his path.

This way. Carnelian pointed down. If you're feeling strong enough.

No, but I have a way to fix that. I pulled my magical fingers through the diamond again. All of its inner surfaces vibrated, passing their power to me. When I had drawn every bit of magic from it that I could, I looked around. There was another diamond, a smaller one. Quickly I gathered its power. This was real luck. With these two stones I was nearly at full strength. I needed to be.

Carnelian dropped through the earth, straight down. I followed her. So do you like mashing all together like that and losing yourself? It doesn't sound very good to me. No wonder you want to go out so bad. I lied. It was good. When I'd turned into a ribbon of hot syrup, it had felt wonderful. I had been the essence of every rock in the world, free of my meat body. I'd been all the other volcano spirits, and they had been me. Evvy was lost. Instead I had just been a glorious part of everything. I wondered if I had felt like that before I was born, inside my mother.

I don't know, Carnelian replied carelessly. Once we grow that little kernel that says we are one creature, separate from the others, we can't ignore it. We can't forget ourselves all the way. We can't stop being curious about things, either. We keep leaving the pool to look for new things, things that don't melt away when we come close. We dropped through the biggest chunk of basalt I had ever seen. Sometimes we go back to the pool and join it, Flare and me, because it makes us happy. We can't lose ourselves, but it's still fun. What do you do for fun?

I was trying to describe eating and walking—I wasn't doing very well—when we popped into a huge crack in the ground. Far above I sensed the wet coldness of the stones at the bottom of the Makray River. Just above, far off, I saw and felt the volcano spirits. I had never entered the chamber under Mount Grace this way. I turned to inspect the heavy rock sides of the fault. They opened out down below. They shivered from the pressure of the earth and all the shocks that had come through. I hoped the fault would hold steady as we traveled, but I was out of choices. We had to go this way. More people could live through earthquakes than the mess caused by volcanoes: fire, mudslides, floods, moving lava, and falling ash so thick it suffocated. And I was truly impressed by how deep down the fault ran into the earth. I could keep the spirits well away from the river, that was certain.

I glanced at the chamber's entrance again. At first it was a small orange circle. Suddenly I realized the circle was getting bigger.

Flare raced down the fault toward us. Go! Go! They're coming. Evvy, if they catch up, you'll melt again. Show us the way!

I turned and dropped down the side of the fault, plunging into the earth. I was thrilled to find magic along those sides, left over from the power of the earth shocks and the passage of the volcano spirits. It fizzed and popped inside my skin, mixed with fire and the strength of stones. My magic belonged here, and it didn't belong. I didn't belong, unless I melted.

Don't think about melting, I ordered myself. Don't think about trading your meat life for this liquid one!

The lower I dropped, the slower I went. I had to draw the volcano spirits down, away from the surface and my human friends. I knew that. But I was starting to feel a little… smooshed. There was so much weight on top of me. True, I could draw on the magic in the stone for strength. But the water, the soil, and the clay were dull, and sullen. I had never had so much weight on me. It didn't matter that my body was magic, a thing of power, that could pass through it all. The island had its own great substance. It rested on me.

Come on! Flare shouted in my ear. The others will see you. They'll think you're showing us the way!

I glared at him. Don't yell at me. Doesn't the weight bother you?

What weight? Flare asked.

The island, I said. The whole island is pressing down on us. Doesn't it make you feel crushed?

Carnelian laughed. That tiny bit of pressure? You've never been in the core. All the world presses on you there. It's why so few of us make it this close to the skin. Most can't fight the core.

If Evvy meant pressure, she should have said so, Flare announced. And I don't feel any.

Flare's not sensitive to pressure like me, Carnelian explained. He's one of the ones that's more sensitive to heat.

Since you melted so fast, you must be sensitive to both. Don't ever go to the core, that's my advice.

Has the monster ever been to the core? asked Flare. Does the weight bother him?

I looked at Flare and smiled. He was still afraid of Luvo. He thought Luvo might be watching. The core parts and lets him pass through, I bragged.

Flare sped up until he was beside me. He wanted me to protect him from Luvo.

I never saw the core do anything like that, Carnelian said as we moved on.

The core's a big place, isn't it? You couldn't see everything at once. I tried to sound strong, but the earth was so heavy. I pulled magic from the walls of the fault. I couldn't even take the time to gather a new granite shell. The volcano spirits would catch up and swamp me again if I did. Don't worry about Luvo. Just stick to leading your friends out into the open, and you'll be fine.

She's right, Flare, Carnelian told him. The others depend on us to bring them out. Carnelian and Flare looked back. Far behind us came the other volcano spirits in a billow of heat that toasted my toes. I didn't want them any closer. Carnelian reassured Flare, She's just showing us a way past her monster friend.

And I know an easier way than through the top of the mountain. I didn't want them forgetting that my way was easy. I was scared they would get bored and try to find another way out.

On we flew, far below Starns Island. If I'd had lungs I would have been panting, the island was so crushing. The fault was huge, but it felt tiny. Worse, I felt like it was getting smaller all the time. The walls trembled with all those tons of cliffs, fields, rivers, hills, and lakes on top of them. If they slipped, how much of the earth's might would they release? Enough to split the island? The fault was the seam. This one was set to rip…

Slowly, so slowly I didn't notice at first, the weight changed. It eased. The fault was rising. I knew I ought to sink deeper into it, but the change felt so good. Suddenly a huge amount of pressure vanished. I sent power up, enough to feel the shape of the world overhead. We were three miles deep, no more. We had passed out from under tall cliffs. The fault had entered the shallows of the sea.

Stop! I heard a volcano spirit cry. Where do we go?

We came this way before! someone else called. While we searched for you!

Be quiet! Carnelian shouted back to them. Are we your leaders or not? We told you, we know a way out! A way that will leave us the strength to fly when we have broken through!

More of us will fly free this way! Flare whirled in a circle before the distant spirits, a fiery beacon. You said you trusted us, so trust us! He told me softly, And we had better be able to trust you, Evvy. If not, we will twine around you until you are nothing but smoke.

Don't threaten me, Flare, I warned him. I'll tell Luvo on you.

He glared at me for a moment. Then he blazed white-hot, sending heat clean through me. It felt… nasty. I pulled away from him.

Carnelian rammed him from the side. Steamhead! Do you want her friend to come for us?

The others were roiling where they waited a hundred yards back. They were getting restless. Come on, you two. Stop frisking, I ordered. We have a long way to go still. Your friends will come to see what's going on if you don't move. Do you want them to find out you're listening to a whosawhatsit like me?

That was enough to calm them. We went forward. I led them along the quivering fault. We were away from the river, after all. My friends were out of the way if steam or even ash and stone escaped the ocean floor. And I was free of the weight of Starns.

It never occurred to me that the sea might be even worse.