Still Time

Still Time
The earth, cleansed and protected now, exhaled beneath her feet. The stone of the city glowed fiery gold as Draevir dropped to his knees, sighing with the earth. 
“Well, fuck…”

Ruhkaal gasped. It hit him a beat after the tower's light had finished settling and dragged him to lie flat on the ground. 
He stammered something that wasn't quite words, his hands shaking faintly though he barely had the strength to breathe. 
He was cold. 
That couldn’t be good.
Draevir was laughing, loud and loopy, like he was drunk. 
It was fucking unfair.
"Did you feel that," Draevir asked no one in particular, gesturing at the gold-lit sky. "Did you see that. Your city’s made out of gold!” He snickered. “Super wealthy, don’t say you can’t afford to feed me.”
He laughed again, delighted, clapping his hands together.
"It's like the whole continent took a bath… or… something.”
"He's drunk," Ruhkaal managed, slurring into the grass.
"He's high on his own power," Isorai said, stretching out a glowing scroll. The thousands of strange, glowing gems flowed up into the scroll. “He'll crash hard in about twenty minutes."
"Should we—"
"I’ll put him in the southern gardens," Isorai said. "Where the fruit trees are before he crashes somewhere less soft." She closed the scroll and it vanished. “Then, I’ll come back for you.”
Ruhkaal shook his head. “I can take him.”
He pushed up, arms shaking, but holding his weight. The warmth was starting to come back. 
“Okay…” She said, though she sounded skeptical. “Then, I’ll see you later.”
“Where are you going?”
“To get Celari…” She floated in the air. “It’s time she met her father.”
How was he supposed to argue with that?
Isorai took off and Draevir giggled, leaning over him. He pat his head a little roughly. 
“I’m gonna walk myself there. You get to bed, okay?”
Ruhkaal glowered at him, but it was taking all of his energy to stay upright, so he couldn’t be upset.
Draevir stumbled away, humming to himself, seemingly far more in control of his faculties than he had the right to be. Ruhkaal pushed onto his feet soon after Draevir had already disappeared around the back of the palace. 
He stumbled between benches and statues to get to the right set of gardens. He didn’t even need to see Draevir to know he’d made it. The green glow washing over the gardens was enough of a confirmation.
He grumbled and turned back to drag himself to bed, wishing it was as easy for him.

Isorai found Celari in the royal's wing, sitting on the floor beside the bed where Rangiora and Asha had finally fallen asleep. The baby slept in her bassinet nearby, undisturbed by any of it.
Celari looked up the moment Isorai entered.
"Everything okay?”
"Yes." Isorai crossed the room and crouched beside her. "And it's time to wake your father.”
Her eyes widened. “Tonight? That easy?”
“Currency can buy anything. Are you ready?”
Celari looked once more at the sleeping girls, brushed a hand gently over Rangiora's hair, and stood.
"I'm ready."
Isorai draped her in a Irongrave cloak and told her to hold on before taking off into the night air. They flew north leaving the balmy gold for the frigid white and sparkling opal light of the Fountain pouring from the Laeryos mountains. The closer they drew, the more she could feel the mountains reaching out to her, over full with the Fountain’s water and struggling to find a way to release it. 
She also caught the beginning of a warning that she would need a lot more of it that she had, or that was currently produces soon.
The High Matron of Irongrave was already waiting at the entrance when they landed. She stood very still, one hand pressed against the stone beside her, and her expression incredulous. She stared blankly toward the south. 
"You are certainly not wasting time, are you?”
Isorai grinned. “I don’t like to leave things half finished when I don’t have to.”
“You never have. Come on. You sure you have enough?”
“It should be.”
The High Matron looked at Celari, who stood very straight as she fidgeted with the hem of the cloak she wore.
"Then let's bring your father home properly," she said, and turned toward the mountain's depths, leading them down into the cold dark where Aldric’s iron coffin had been placed to keep it irrigated.
Celari stood off to the side to watch, and Isorai felt bad since this resurrection ritual would be so anticlimatic as a young Irongrave to watch. 
She knelt beside the iron coffin and called the scales. One side filled with fire. She poured currency into the other until it balanced. 
The fire overflowed and dripped into the coffin. When it was empty, Isorai removed the extra currency. The scales vanished, and Isorai stepped back. 
The chains fell away and the coffin's lid lifted on its own.
Aldric sat up slowly, blinking against torchlight, holding Celari’s feather against his chest, his hands flexing against the coffin's edge as though testing whether his body still belonged to him.
He found Celari immediately.
"Celari," he said, his voice rough but clear, as he reached for her. “You really are okay?”
Celari was already crossing the room. She wrapped her arms around him and he held her with both arms, fully present, fully himself, and the sound that came out of him was not quite a sob and not quite a laugh but something that contained both.
"I have so many questions," he said into her hair.
"Me too," she said.
“You’ll have some other to answer,” the High Matron said. “The Cavenstone family wants to see you.”

He looked up as a group of people came into the room, sniffling and joining the hug with sharp, watery laughs. There were a dozen of them, cousins and nephews and one elderly aunt who wept openly and refused to let go of his hand through the entire meal that followed. 
The Irongraves were hosting a feast for the first time in ages in his honor. Celari sat beside her father and was introduced to the family she hadn't known she had. Isorai watched her try to hold on to name after name and fall into their eager warmth, like she’d been despearte for it her whole life. 
They ate well into the morning. With them all telling and listening to what they’d been doing in all these years. 
By the time they prepared to fly back, Aldric was dozing off, half supported by a cousin. 
"I'll come to Vuldra," he said. "Properly. Once I've made myself presentable." He looked at Isorai with reverence and bowed his head. "High Matron Moongrove, I owe you a debt I don't think I can ever fully repay, but I will do my best to be useful to you.”
She nodded. “Rest. Be with your family. There is still time.”
How much time, she had no idea, but she was sure it would be enough for Aldric to at least get used to breathing again.