Mystery looked poleaxed. She stared at Rhapsody with wide eyes as her mouth moved but no sound came out.
"I thought you had to transition from a star before you could become a magical being," Harmony said, furrowing her brows. "Is there another way for us to become world trees?"
"Yes," Rhapsody nodded, eying them thoughtfully. "I was really angry after my sisters were killed. I know revenge is petty, but I was also concerned for other worlds and their world trees, so I tracked down the spirit walker who was responsible. He put up a good fight but was no match for me in the end. I extracted the magic he had stolen and brought it back to earth. It is useless without vessels to channel it, however. I was planning to use you as the new vessels."
"He was no match for you?" Harmony squinted at Rhapsody suspiciously. "Hadn't he just drained a ton of magic from the other world trees here on earth? Wouldn't that have made him a lot more powerful?"
"He was powerful," Rhapsody admitted with a shrug. "Just not powerful enough."
"Just how powerful are you?" Harmony asked curiously.
"She's a god tier entity," Taxti told them with a wink at the suddenly scowling Rhapsody. "The fact that she managed to save this world after every other world tree was lost is an insane display of power. This world was extremely fortunate that Rhapsody was here."
"Is there really a tiered rating system?" Harmony's mother asked Taxti doubtfully.
"Of course," Taxti shrugged, staring back at Harmony's mother through heavily lidded eyes. "We need a method to measure threats by, since protecting this world is one of our responsibilities."
"What are the tiers?" her mother asked.
"Scrub, human, lion, dragon, demon, chaos lord, archangel, and god," Taxti replied with another shrug that was slightly distracting.
"I always knew Rhapsody was the strongest," Aurora informed them matter-of-factly.
Rhapsody smiled indulgently, absently pulling Aurora in for a quick hug.
"Now what?" Harmony asked anxiously. "When do we begin?"
Rhapsody and Taxti both laughed at her eagerness. Harmony's mother was just as eager, her hands clasped tightly as she watched them keenly.
"It's not an instant process," Rhapsody informed them apologetically. "It will take years for your souls to transition and merge with the new roles. We'll start here with an initiation. It rewrites the blueprints on your soul. Once the new blueprint is in place, it is just a matter of time for your minds to expand and learn how to use the new powers. There is an enormous amount of knowledge that will need to be instilled, but the bandwidth in your consciousness will increase significantly as well. During this time as a seed, you should just continue your normal lives until you reach your first growth spurt. Once that occurs, I will need to be with you at all times to prevent any mistakes. You will have a great deal of power that could hurt others around you unintentionally. I will teach you how to use this power safely and prevent any mistakes from hurting others."
"Do we get to become fairies too?" Serenity asked hopefully.
"That is a choice that will need to wait a few more years before you and Aurora can make it," Rhapsody told them gently. "You will also need Harmony's permission. However, we can unlock your ability to use magic, which will help to prepare you for this role if you decide you want to when the time comes."
Aurora and Serentiy had looked crestfallen, but when they heard they were going to be able to use magic, their eyes lit up again.
"Um…" Mystery stuttered, not meeting anyone's eyes. "I think I might need more time to decide."
"Of course, Mystery," Rhapsody agreed immediately. "This is a lot to take in, and I wouldn't want to rush you into a decision of this magnitude without time to consider it thoroughly."
"I'm sorry; I understand that you're trying to save the world," Mystery said apologetically. "I'm just not sure I have what it takes. I need to do some soul-searching first."
"I completely understand, Mystery," Rhapsody smiled warmly. "We'll return you to the other side of the circle. Should you decide you wish to go forward with the transition, pay Harmony a visit."
"It was nice to meet you, Mystery," Harmony grinned at the beautiful woman. "I'll be waiting to hear from you."
"Thank you," Mystery said with a grateful smile. She turned to Rhapsody, suddenly looking uncertain. Rhapsody snorted a laugh and floated up to her height, before pulling her into a hug.
"I won't bite," Rhapsody told her teasingly.
"I can't thank you enough for restoring my leg," Mystery said, her voice thick with emotion.
"You are very welcome," Rhapsody told her gently. "Goodbye for now, Mystery."
As Rhapsody finished saying her name, Mystery shimmered like a heatwave and vanished.
"Where did she go?" Aurora asked in shock.
"She'll awake outside of the wall near the road in the morning," Rhapsody told her reassuringly. "I've arranged for Eileen to pick her up."
"I wonder what her hangup was," Harmony wondered aloud.
"She has some unfinished lessons to learn in life before she's ready to move on," Rhapsody answered with a sigh. "I think she'll be ready before too long though. She's not as quick as you four, but she's pretty smart."
"How long have you known Mystery?" Harmony's mother asked curiously. "I'm assuming you wouldn't offer this opportunity to a person without certain qualifying character traits for such an important role."
"It's your souls that made me choose you," Rhapsody answered affectionately. "I know you don't remember your other lives or the things you have done that have shaped your character to who you are now. Someday you will also be able to analyze and interact with a person's soul. The four of you are very special souls, which is why so many dark forces in this world have attempted to destroy you. If you could see the state of your soul and how brightly you shine, you would better understand why I have chosen you. Mystery is also very special. I've been watching her since she first entered this world, just as I've watched the four of you. There are certain rules that beings like us have to follow, limits we must obey. I had hoped to have Melody with us today. I'm sorry that I was unable to protect her."
"You've protected us many times though?" Aurora pointed out, a note of pain in her voice. "Why weren't you able to protect my mom?"
Rhapsody sighed, and Harmony felt soul-deep sadness emanate away from the beautiful fairy in waves. "I'm only allowed to act within a certain sphere of influence. If I overstep that influence, other entities as powerful as me will be allowed to ignore the governing limits we've all agreed upon as well. The result would be complete devastation if we removed our limits. There is an exception to the rule of limiting our protection. If we bond with another spirit, we are entitled to protect them with our full power. That can only happen when a spirit has fully matured in the body they inhabit and is consciously capable of accepting that bond."
Aurora frowned as she struggled to understand Rhapsody's words. "So did you bond with Aunt Harmony's spirit, and that's why you can protect us?"
Harmony blinked in surprise, then looked over at Rhapsody questioningly. Rhapsody stared back at her with love in her eyes.
"Yes, Aurora," Rhapsody answered softly. "I chose Harmony. She didn't have to fully accept me in order to receive my protection -- she just had to show interest. That gave me the ability to act on her behalf as well, since she is a mortal. A lot of restrictions I was subject to were removed for a short time."
"How long is a short time?" Harmony's mother asked warily.
"Tonight's the deadline," Rhapsody answered with a grin. "If she chose to remain mortal, I would have to relinquish my claim to bond her."
Harmony felt a chill as she realized how much had been depending on her to make the right choice. If she had somehow rebuffed Rhapsody's advances, all her protection would have vanished. Now that she could see her recent past through new eyes, she realized just how many times she would have died without Rhapsody's protection. If she had left the Circle of Dominion as a mortal at the end of the night, she would almost certainly have died before morning. She marveled at how skillfully Rhapsody had handled their relationship. Harmony knew herself well enough to know that anyone besides Rhapsody would have failed to win her heart. The beautiful fairy had handled Harmony's psychological profile with such precision that she still had trouble believing she was in an actual relationship with a real person. The probability of breaking through all of Harmony's walls and getting the keys to her heart had to be astronomical. She realized that Rhapsody had bet the future of this entire world on Harmony accepting her.
"What was plan B?" Harmony heard herself ask faintly.
Rhapsody watched her with a complex expression. There was pain, determination, and love in that expression. "I would have ignored my limits and exercised my power without restraint," Rhapsody answered in a regretful voice. "It would have invited conflict from other entities and would have resulted in the destruction of civilization again. Humans would have survived, but only barely. I would have taken direct control of the other world trees and fused them to my own roots. There wouldn't be very many survivors."
Harmony swallowed as she shared a look with her mother and nieces. "Do you know that feeling when there's a comet on a direct course for Earth and you find out that a little asteroid smacked into it and knocked it off course just enough to miss the planet?" Harmony asked ruefully.
"Well, I didn't until tonight," Harmony's mother responded dryly.
"Okay, enough beating around the bush, let's make some fairies," Taxti said eagerly. "I'm so tired of waiting to find some new friends who live longer than a century."
Rhapsody rolled her eyes, which looked particularly dramatic with her larger-than-life eyes. "Fine. Is everyone ready?"
Excited nods were her only response. With a smile, she raised her hand and the beam of light in the center of the chasm suddenly became blindingly incandescent. "Let's do this."
XXXXX
Harmony tried to survey her surroundings, but all she could see was brilliant white light. She couldn't even see her hands through the radiance.
She felt a strange sensation along the base of her spine that slowly moved up to her neck. It felt like someone was poking her lightly with a needle thousands of times a second, except that it didn't hurt. The sensation spread out to all of the bones in her body until she felt like she was vibrating constantly. Her initial reaction was overpowering fear, as the sensations reminded her of the time she spent in captivity. Just as the fear began to overwhelm her, she felt her mind disassociate with her body, the sensations becoming no more than a buzz. There was a sensation of movement and then a sudden connection to something white hot and buzzing like high voltage. The heat didn't affect her, but the buzzing made her feel like she was losing her mind. A moment later the buzzing was diminished to a whisper as some kind of limiter was placed between her and the burning energy.
She knew that the physical sensations she was feeling were the effects of a kind of soul surgery that was complex beyond her imagining. Her mind was fabricating sensory feedback for something that was non-physical. As the thought occurred to her, she suddenly wondered how she had made the connection. Is this part of the expansion of my consciousness?Making intuitive connections of much greater complexity?
Abruptly, her dissociative state ended, and she was back in her body. She gasped at the wealth of new sensations bombarding her mind. The blinding white light was no longer blinding. She had acquired a second sense of sight that viewed the world like a spectrograph. The wavelengths of light, sound, microwaves, and even higher frequency waves were suddenly visible to her. It was a distinctly different visual experience in her mind than normal sight, as if she was now using a multi-threading processor in a computer. She blinked as that thought occurred to her. Since when do I know anything about computers?
Her tactile senses were enhanced so much that when she touched her shirt she could identify each of the fibers and sense all the way down to the chemical bonds that bound their molecular structure together.
She suddenly became aware of the way she smelled. It was like her senses were coming online one at a time. She marveled at the rich flavor of information her mind was able to extract from something as basic as smell. She could tell what kind of soap she used, even what ingredients the soap was made from.
"Just about done," she heard Rhapsody murmur. The words were the same as ever, but suddenly she could hear every decibel, as well as the precise pitch and timbre of Rhapsody's voice. No wonder she can play every instrument! This is so cheating!
The brilliant light of the chasm suddenly winked out, leaving the mellow pulsing light of the walls. With her enhanced senses, Harmony could now see that the walls were made up of strands of fibrous cells and neurons. The entire thing was part of Rhapsody's brain. She's a giant freaking brain!
"I'm not a giant freaking brain," Rhapsody told her tartly. "That's just gross."
Harmony laughed as she suddenly realized the visual it must have generated. "Okay, how about a planet sized thinking machine?"
"Now I'm a machine?" Rhapsody asked in an injured tone, her large eyes wide with hurt.
"Stop looking at me like that," Harmony demanded, shielding her eyes. "It makes me feel like I've kicked a puppy."
"How would you know what kicking a puppy feels like?" Rhapsody asked her suspiciously.
"Come on, Rhapsody, you're killing me here," Harmony laughed helplessly.
"So now I'm a murderer?" Rhapsody demanded in mock outrage.
"I think you better just stop talking, Harmony," her mother advised in an amused tone. "You're just digging yourself in deeper."
Harmony tried to glare at her mother but gasped when she saw her. "Who are you, and what have you done with my mom?" Harmony demanded in amazement.
"What are you talking about?" her mother asked with a frown.
"Is that really Grandma?" Aurora asked doubtfully.
"I don't suppose you have a mirror around here somewhere?" Harmony asked Rhapsody expectantly.
There were suddenly two standing mirrors in front of them. Her mother gasped as she saw the youthful face looking back at her. She looked like she could be Harmony's sister. She was a lot shorter, but there were so many similarities that they could almost have been twins.
Harmony's eyes widened when she saw her own image in the mirror. She had always felt comfortable with her appearance before, but now she was on another level. Her jawline had softened, her eyes were slightly larger, and her nose had shrunk. Her ears were slightly smaller too, which surprised her. Not only were her eyes larger, but they were also now a brilliant shade of lavender, just like Rhapsody's. She didn't have the same strange symbols around the inner part of her iris, just smooth, rich lavender.
"Shouldn't I have fairy ears now?" Harmony asked as she admired herself.
"That will come in time," Rhapsody informed her with an appreciative look. "But you are still a seed right now."
"Do we have magic now?" Serenity asked hesitantly.
"Hold your hand out in front of you," Rhapsody told her, demonstrating with her own hand. "You too, Aurora."
"Okay," Serenity complied, watching Rhapsody hopefully.
"Now think of a bright orb burning brightly in your hand," Rhapsody instructed them. "Once the image is in your mind, you need to will it into existence. That means you need to make yourself believe it is there."
Aurora and Serenity both stared at their hand, their brows creased in concentration. Serenity was the first one to have a bright ball of light appear in her hand. She gasped in amazement, her eyes wide and filled with delight.
As if triggered by Serenity's success, Aurora suddenly had a matching ball of light in her hand. She giggled ecstatically as she moved it around.
"Nice work, both of you," Rhapsody congratulated them with an encouraging smile. "You're going to need to show some discretion when using magic. No showing off at school or in front of friends. You'll need to keep your abilities secret until you are older."
"Do we have those abilities too?" Harmony asked curiously.
"Yes and no," Rhapsody replied cryptically. "You are seeds right now, and any power you use will deplete your growth factor. If you have something critical that requires magic, you could certainly do it, but otherwise I would suggest abstaining until you have sprouted."
Harmony felt her lips twitch at the term "sprouted". Rhapsody's large eyes stared into hers, daring her to say something about the terminology.
"Welcome to the club," Taxti told them with a radiant smile. She walked up and hugged each of them warmly.
Harmony couldn't stop staring at Rhapsody. Now that she had these upgraded eyes, she could see so much more of what Rhapsody was. The avatar Rhapsody used to pilot her lesser consciousness was a thing of such beauty and power that it was mesmerizing. Watching Rhapsody with her second-sight showed the fairy glowing brilliantly, dwarfing the bright light emanating off Taxti. More than that, Harmony could sense what she felt sure was Rhapsody's spirit. It was a thing of such majesty and glory that she could see why other entities like elves would want to worship her. It was like the hottest part of a star had been condensed down until only the purest of its light remained, contained within the glorious fairy.
As she tried to continue comparing Rhapsody to similes of power and beauty, the fairy zipped over to her in a flash, wrapping her arms around her neck and her legs around Harmony's waist. She was surprised to feel her synesthesia kick in, mirroring the sensations Rhapsody was feeling. She had thought the overhaul of her soul and body would remove her synesthesia.
"No worshipping allowed," Rhapsody told her in a seductive whisper, her nose nearly touching Harmony's as she stared into Harmony's lavender eyes. Her large eyes flickered down to Harmony's lips, then back to her eyes. Slowly, she put her lips against Harmony's and gave her a kiss more sensual than she would have believed possible. She quivered with sudden need as the synesthesia triggered a feedback loop.
Rhapsody pulled back, staring back at Harmony with desire-filled eyes. "I think it's time to put that giant bed of yours to good use."
Harmony was too wound up to make an intelligent response. She just quivered as she held Rhapsody in her arms, never wanting to let her go.
"Taxti, we'll be back tomorrow," Rhapsody told the faun in a distracted voice. "Can you give Serenity and Aurora some magic lessons and keep Joline company?"
"I think I could handle that," Taxti purred eagerly, her eyes staring at Harmony's mother appreciatively.
"Can you also have them meet with Declan to learn some of the guidelines of magical law?" Rhapsody asked, her eyes never leaving Harmony's own eyes.
"Consider it done," Taxti grinned eagerly. "Now get out of here."
Rhapsody smiled as the two of them rippled like a heatwave and vanished.