Rebirth and Second Chances

Chapter 277: Earth Veins

The changes my sacrifice had affected were mostly geared towards those who would scry my movements and spy on my actions. None of those gathered here and had witnessed my sacrifice noticed a difference. Instead, most were confused at my spilling of so much blood.

The changes that had been made occurred in the Divine Realm. The Gods had not manifested; they had simply loaned me a small mantle of their [Power], enough to block the [Sight] or ability to use [Prophecy] against me or anyone that would interact with me.

It might take eons before the Sidhe of this world understood what the benevolence of the Tuatha de Danaan meant unless I could find a conduit and reason for them to [Manifest].

The changes to the world, the return of [Fairy] and the opening of the Summerlands needed the fullness of time to become part of who the Sidhe were. And the Sidhe of this world would have to be guided, taught the rituals, the sacrifices, and the benefits of devotion to Gods they had never met.

It would be harder for these Sidhe who had never met the Gods, because they constrained the Tuatha de Danaan from direct intervention while in [Sleep]. But they would need to remember or learn that ritual sacrifice of blood and sex could gain the attention of Gods even in [Sleep].

And that those sacrifices could be answered.

The Tuatha de Danann could act.

The Tuatha de Danann and Fairy were masters of dream. Dreams made real the only recourse they had against the proscriptions they had agreed to while in [Sleep]. I could help the Sidhe here, know the Gods, and I would. Tales of their deeds could be shared, glamour and illusion of my meeting with Danu, Beleros, and Cyronax could allow these people to experience what I had. But finding a place to anchor a Sithern and restoring a connection to the World Tree was my first priority.

Without that step, the return of [Fairy] and the Summerlands was a stop-gap measure, at best. I could return the gift to Sidhe of this world their birthright, but it would take real action to keep that birthright from being severed from them again.

The Sithern required a place of power to grow to its full potential. A nexus of magic that the Sithern could draw on. A place where deep roots could grow protected from the scheming intervention of Asgard or Olympus. The more powerful the nexus, the more powerful the Sithern. If I could find a place where the main tributaries of the planet's ley-lines intersected, that would be even better.

Healing my slashed wrists had signaled the end of the [Ritual]. A [Ritual] that had accomplished more than I ever thought possible. I probably shouldn't have been surprised, [Ritual], in the end, was nothing more than Sidhe sacrifice of blood and sex. The power of life and creation, the essence of what made Sidhe unique.

Blood and sex the qualities that forged a bond between the Sidhe and the natural world. The Tuatha de Danaan did not demand, or desire lives be sacrificed in their name, they celebrated life and the living. They were more carnal in nature, and a good round of frenzied sex that came with a bit of blood was the most powerful [Ritual] of all.

[Ritual] finished. [Fairy] restored. The Dead laid to rest. And the Tuatha de Danaan's mantle extended to cloak me and mine across this world. I paused long enough to enjoy the sense of accomplishment. The birth of the Dochas-fey, perhaps the greatest occurrence of this day's events. Everything that would come from this point would be anchored from that spark of magic.

The rekindling of [Fairy], the presence of the Wild Magic, the connection with the Tuatha de Danaan, each needed the hope those diminutive fey represented to gain purchase in this world. The Dochas-fey would be the spark to ignite a universal change, a change to begin to set right what had gone so wrong with the Sidhe of this world.

As I took the time to savor this moment, I could already feel the difference. The changes to the taste and flavor of magic as [Fairy] began to seep into the weave and fabric of that magic. The magic had become more nuanced, deeper, and more profound. I enjoyed the sensations, the changes to magic, the complexity that would awaken spell craft for the Sidhe.

The sensations were heady, but not so inebriating that I missed the actions of the Dochas-fey. I watched as the diminutive glimmers of [Fairy] began to take their first tentative flights. As they began to explore the world around them. As they began to move, their wings stirring to catch the air currents for the first time.

There was a beauty to their movement. Not entirely unexpected, the Sidhe in all their forms possessed some type of beauty. But as they began to take on coloring and form, they did so in a synchronized progression of color. A rippling wave of magic using the spectrum of light to dazzle and beguile those without the protection of [Fairy].

They changed from small balls of light to take on the coloring of every butterfly and moth I had ever encountered. The grew wings that resembled those butterflies and moths as their coloring emulated, providing them an additional camouflage to their already impressive abilities at illusion and glamour.

Mortals would see them as the butterflies and moths they emulated. Only those with [Fairy Sight] would know them for what they were.

These weren't the gossamer winged Volar-fey. These fey were more robust, more suited to a world lost to war. Even if both species enjoyed the same type of explosion of colors that borrowed from across the spectrum of light, there was a sturdiness to the Dochas-fey other Demi-fey lacked.

The Dochas-fey came with antennae, an added evolution to disguise what and who they were. They were few, these first new people of the Sidhe, and would need to rely on that native camouflage as well as glamour and illusion to remain hidden. At least until they had increased their population enough that there was little chance of them going extinct.

That so much of the magic that formed them went into camouflage could probably be directly attributed to this second chance. The fey on this world had all been wiped out, hunted, or trapped by Man in their greed or fear. These reborn fey would be more secretive, more capable of hiding and protecting themselves. They would eventually spread across the planet, but they would be more subtle than their cousins.

[Fairy] had learned the lesson of Man's deprivation and greed and had made changes to these fey that would anchor it to this reality. These fey were still beautiful, still filled with the wonder and majesty of Fairy, but for those that would hunt or destroy, they would see none of that wonder.

The best place for them to establish a colony and increase their numbers would be in the Sithern I planned to establish. That realization had me waking from my contemplation of events and striding briskly into the command tent.

I didn't command anyone to follow, but I knew Sergeant-at-arms Rhea would, if no one else. The other Sidhe might still be too lost to euphoria and wonder at today's events to respond for a while longer, but Rhea was a woman of duty. She would allow herself to reflect on what she had seen privately, when she had time, and a means to avoid those that might take advantage of a perceived weakness.

"Do you have a map of the territory the Sidhe control?" I asked as soon as Rhea entered the tent. "One with ley-lines depicted?"

"We have a map that shows the lands the Sidhe controlled, but that is sure to have changed with this last push by the Fomorians," Rhea warned as she pulled a map out of storage and unrolled for me. "We will regain the losses from this latest incursion, we always do, but until we do, you need to consider that the map is not as accurate as it should be.

"I'm not sure what ley-lines are. They have never been discussed as a land feature in any discussion of topography or mapping that I've been a part of," she apologized.

I sent a pulse of magic out to examine the surrounding area worried that this world might lack that feature. I was able to detect the presence of a small ley-line not far away, thankfully. If this planet had been formed without that basic magic adaption, then all of my plans would have come to an end.

I could nurture a Sithern Seed even without a ley-line. There were rituals I could use to encourage it to sprout, but it would grow stunted and deformed without the magic a ley-line could provide, or a nexus to tap into. I refused to disrespect the lifeform the Sithern would become by planting it on a world where it would never have the chance to blossom and reach its full potential.

Without a ley-line, the Sithern would be unable to produce additional seedstock, there would be no seeds gifted to the Sidhe to expand. It would force the Sithern to experience a life of loneliness with no other Sithern for it to reach out to or establish a network of shared thoughts. It would be too cruel to engender the life of a sentient creature in a world where it could not flourish.

"Maybe you call them something else?" I said thoughtfully, now that I knew they existed. "Ley-lines are flowing streams and rivers of magic, they crisscross the entire planet, and serve as the pulse of the planet. Those that intersect can create a nexus of pooled energy, a type of magical lake. These nexuses become places of power; places where everything seems more intense."

"Ley-lines?" She replied. " Do they carry magic?

"We call those earth veins, and the places where they pool earth hearts, because they thrum with the heartbeat of the planet," Rhea said, understanding what I was describing. It took her a moment to search through a chest that was filled with documents, ledgers, and a few books to find what I was hoping for.

What she came up with was a transparency, a film that when placed on top of the map she'd already provided allowed me to see traces and details of the earth veins the Sidhe had mapped. It was exhaustively done, with even the smallest branching tributary included, but more importantly, it eased my concerns.

There were a number of places I could choose from, the most obvious a nexus where a bastion had been built along the coast. The Queen was using it as a staging area to launch offensive attacks against the Fomorians, so it was heavily defended. The nexus was large, and if it weren't in danger of constantly being overrun, I would have selected it.

But I wanted something more easily defended. A place that would be safe from attack at least long enough for the Sithern to become well established and deploy effective countermeasures against attack. I decided I also need an area with access to the coast. I had some experience with creating a Sithern where the sea and land met and thought this experience would be make it easier to replicate that success.

I found the perfect location. A place where the river flowed into an ocean bay that had been channeled deep within the island. It would give the Selkie and Kelpie of this world access to the Sithern, something that a few other spots that I might have chosen from lacked. The more Sidhe that could be protected and had access to the Sithern, the better and faster the Sithern would grow and adapt.

These people were used to passage Underhill, they understood what those places offered, but the Sithern was an entirely different creature. Underhill was a shaped construct, a building or castle that was only accessed by fairy rings. A Sithern was a dimensional pocket world and could grow in size and complexity to meet the needs of the Sidhe that inhabited it. The longer it was allowed to flourish, the more detailed and responsive this pocket world became.

The only problem I might encounter was one of settings and permissions. I wouldn't have the System interface to select the options and parameters that would guide the Sithern's growth, and I hoped that the growth of the Sithern would be more responsive to those living within, without those limits. It should develop holistically, growing to become what the people needed, instead of what I thought they needed.