My heart began pounding in anticipation, as if it hadn't been working hard enough through the uphill climb. The trek had been painfully vertical since we'd taken the path to Whispermere from a split the day before. The constant blizzards from days past had calmed. I wasn't sure what I would see when I reached where Theron stood, but when the peak of a mountain came into view, with an open cavern of sorts tunneling through it, I found I was disappointed.
“It is a cave,” I said, my voice deflated.
“No,” Cerin replied, his voice thick with labor as he came up to stand beside me. “The cave is the entrance.”
The group of us continued forward, approaching the cave with caution. The peak of the mountain stretched into the sky to our left and before us. To our right, the mid-day sun glistened off the fog of the clouds that dotted the skies as far as the eye could see. It was of little wonder why the blizzards had stopped. We had traveled above them. Land was not visible from here. Perhaps it would have been, had the sky been clearer. But no, as far as we were concerned, we were walking on a piece of floating mountain.
Once we'd come over the crest of the path, the temperature warmed, as if we had somehow broken through the freezing weather to enter the sun's own territory. It was still chilly, but within the direct rays of the sun at this height, the mind was tricked into believing otherwise.
The temperature cooled again when we entered the shadow of the cave. Once we were inside the rock's embrace, it became obvious that it was more of a tunnel than a cave. I could see straight through it to the other side, where nothing but a rope bridge led from the tunnel to the next mountain peak over. Long ago, during our first few days in the mountains, we'd had to cross many bridges like that. Now, at this height, just the idea terrified me all over again.
Even before the rope bridge, however, there was a gate. Built into the rock of the tunnel itself, it encompassed the entire opening. It was made out of metal bars, to allow vision through to either side, but it was solid gold. I assumed the gate had been painted, for I knew that gold was far too soft a metal to be trusted as such a structure.
At the center of this gate, where the two doors of it would open, stood two guards, one on our side of the gate, the other waiting just inside. Both were men dressed similarly to the messenger from Whispermere half of a year ago, and their skin was a golden hue. The men did not look up as we approached, casting their eyes downward to the rock floor beneath their feet. It made me remember that even the messenger avoided eye contact back in Sera. The two guards before us couldn't have known who I was, and even they avoided my eyes. I found that odd.
The men also did not speak as we came to a stop before them. I finally greeted them first. “Hello,” I began. “I am Kai Sera. My presence was requested by my mother.”
The guard on our side of the gate nodded. “Yes, Miss Sera. Thank you for coming. You must come in alone. Your friends may wait at the gate.”
I watched the man, suspicious of his words and unable to intimidate him via eye contact. “My friends will enter with me, or I will turn around and leave the same way I came.”
The guard stiffened, before he turned to the other from through the gate. I heard them speak through rushed whispering, before the guard closest to Whispermere began to hurry away, across the rope bridge. On the other side, I could see golden structures and the tops of plants, but little else before the other mountain peak rose up across the pass.
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“Forgive us, Miss Sera. We must request permission.”
“Very well.” I turned toward the others. It seemed I was not the only one taken aback by the workings of this place.
We waited for quite a number of minutes for the other man to return. All the while, we did not speak, but I let my eyes rest on the next mountain peak over. Somewhere, over there, was the woman who had birthed me. What was she like? Would she be proud of all I had accomplished? I had fantasized over the past weeks of our reunion. Perhaps we would embrace, and she would tell me the story of how we had been forced to part. Perhaps we would have much in common. Maybe I would find that some of my hobbies or interests or mannerisms had come from her, when I would have never otherwise have known. I wondered if she had my hair, or my golden eyes. And what of my father? What would she tell me of him?
“You may enter.” The guard's words broke me out of my thoughts. I hadn't even noticed that the other guard had come back.
“Thank you.”
The guards before us did not answer, but did begin to push open the heavy gate with just as heavy of a creak. When the gates were open, we walked through, my friends leading the way. I didn't want to risk them closing the gate behind me to separate us, though I hoped they would never do something so shady.
The rope bridge crossing the gap between the two mountain peaks was also painted gold. I wondered about the obsession with gold here, but was unable to really focus on my questions as I took the first step on the bridge.
Up this high, the air was pretty still, so the bridge did not move by any means other than those who stepped upon it. Even still, it was frightening to begin the trek over the long bridge, as it trembled beneath our weight. A direct stare downward showed nothing but clouds beneath us, too thick to allow any view of the ground or the mountains below. Perhaps that was for the best. I doubted I wanted to see how far we would fall with one false move.
I didn't look up at Whispermere until I was back on solid rock. On this mountain, it appeared as if the builders of Whispermere had carved half of the mountain peak itself out of existence, leaving the rock flat as a floor under our feet. The carvers had even left a barrier of rock standing about three feet high along the edges to prevent accidents. Up ahead, the mountain peak had been carved in half, the side facing us vertically flat, leaving the village below in direct view of the sun.
As for the village, it was entirely out in the open. Tables, chairs, and gardens alike were all in full view of the sun. There were no walls with which to shade or separate them. The village still had its designated areas, but it was mostly due to set up of furniture or hedge bushes that one could tell where one area started and ended.
I wondered how so much plant life could exist when the village was higher than the clouds that could give them rain. Finally, I saw my answer, in the form of a man who was retrieving water via a pulley on the side of the mountain. That was an immense amount of effort to go through just to live here. It gave me the impression that the people here were hiding from something.
Speaking of Whispermere's people, they were all the same golden hue. I also noticed that there was a distinct difference between the men and women here. All of the men were in the midst of physical labor, and none of them held their eyes level with the others. The women, however, all were in a state of leisure. Some drank and laughed at cafe tables, or relaxed in the gardens. All of them were capable of eye contact. I tried to find one—just one—man or woman in the opposite position, and I could not.
From past the village where the other half of the peak rose above us, another tunnel had been carved into the lower rock. Given its relative darkness to the first tunnel we had left behind, I supposed this one did not lead all the way through.
One of the men hurried over to us, and nodded toward me. I wasn't sure how they could tell which one I was, given they could probably only see our feet.
“Miss Sera, please follow me. You are hungry from your journey, yes?”
“Yes,” I admitted, glancing back toward the others. We had been eating nothing but berries and dried meat Theron had prepared earlier in the Seran Forest since ascending the mountain.
The man led us through the village. The women watched us carefully from all directions, chatting amongst themselves. The scent of flowers hung pleasantly in the air, the lack of winds keeping the scent strong.
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