CHAPTER TWENTY

Chereal

 

Chereal meandered up the hillside, stopping occasionally to stoop and run his fingers through the closely manicured grass and purple flowers stuck in the act of opening their buds to the perpetual mid-afternoon day. At the top he looked down at the silver waters of the Trisbel River, which had not moved an inch in over three hundred years. It wound through the countryside before spilling over the edge of a thousand-foot drop.

World’s End waterfall had been a spectacular sight centuries earlier when the waters still flowed. Now, droplets of water hung suspended in the air, destined never to find the bottom. The river, frozen by time, brought a tear to the engineer’s eye. Beauty and perfection were hollow imitations if not allowed to live and breathe. Chereal pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed the moisture from his cheek.

The warm air was not stale despite the lack of wind or movement. He grunted slightly as he took a seat on the thin metal bench beside the living statue of a woman he still loved.

“Another year,” he said to the woman and to the world. “It’s been a busy year. We’ve acquired three new worlds into the Alliance. They are young, but possess much potential. You would approve.”

Chereal folded his hands in his lap and waited for a response he knew would never come. He sighed heavily before continuing.

“We have yet to find another world with Eitr. I wish you would have let us use Earth.” Chereal looked into Falia’s frozen eyes. They caught the sunset at the perfect angle, making them appear to twinkle. The weak simulation of life and thought hiding beneath her frozen exterior made his heart ache with nostalgia.

“But I understand why you refused. I do not argue it anymore. If nothing else, according to your predictions, the humans have another six hundred and twenty-three years before they are ready to join the Alliance. Perhaps then we can pull you from this Temporal Freeze.”

The bench creaked beneath Chereal’s weight as he shifted to look at the high-reaching glass towers to his right. The sprawling city of Estria. The sleeping city. So different than the craggy buildings built into the cliff sides of Oleid. He wanted to return home. Home to the quiet city.

“I know you’ll be sad to hear of planet Graes’ collapse. It was inevitable, I suppose. Little good their stolen Lenorean technology did them without Eitr. It’s absurd to think they succeeded in killing you in another Dimension. I’m glad that is no place I have ever seen. I don’t know what I would do in a Universe without you, Faliana.” Chereal placed a hand atop the woman’s. He felt the ambient warmth of her flesh beneath his.

“Even if you are just sleeping. You look peaceful here, living in your mind with memories of Ryol. They’re every bit as real as this, I imagine. I envy that. Part of me dreads the day we find the solution to pull you from this stasis and return the Lenoreans to their rightful place amongst the Universe.” Chereal dabbed a second tear which was forming.

“Then she truly will be gone. Living only in your dreams. I wonder if you’ll even want to return. I hope you do. The Universe shines a little less brightly without you in it.

“Oh, but don’t listen to me. I’m a lonely old man appreciating the days of his youth now that it’s too late to do anything with them.” Chereal sighed. The weight of his years pressed upon him. “It is beautiful here. A perfect place to spend eternity if need be. Perhaps someday when Oleid’s sun dies, I’ll come join you.”

Chereal hoisted his large frame from the bench and bent slightly to place a kiss on the frozen woman’s brow.

“Until then, dream well, Madam Leader.”