Chapter VI ~ The Diamond Swan

 Casey was not so accustomed to being surrounded by so much support. From loving words from Ida, and constant shadowing by Dorothea, Eleonor held up her end of remaining as the flock's protector aside from the lingering presence of the Dwarfs. Antoinette joined her on an exploration about the waters, after a restful time beneath a willow. They worried for Jiminy's return, yet they were comfortable with each other. The world around them was so beautiful, it was difficult to fathom Jiminy's stories of what he had seen just beyond those snowy mountains.

It was a new beginning, to say the very least because remaining in this way forever due to fear was not ideal in Casey's mind. It was a blessing to begin to get used to their wings~ it was a tough change to consider but she had to look to where they were at now. They were closer to the rivers, the woodland trees began to take on a more autumn color of deep red and gold…

During the beauty of the day, the flock stuck close to one another as to explore their new surroundings while they waited for the brave men's return. During their silent paddle, Casey's thoughts swam all over the place with a certain paranoia, alongside the thought of the Blue Fairy staying idle for so long. She did not have the heart to put her stress even more into her words in front of Jiminy, because she knew he was close to the Fairy. Depending on where respect was due, she dared not provide an insult in front of him when he had gone out of his way for them.

It seemed as the more her thoughts would swim, the more the water beneath all of them began to take on this strange glimmer. A strange light appeared from beneath the depths as it grew around them. It was full on day, so returning to their natural forms, made no sense… however, it turned out to belong to a presence of whom Casey had personally encountered before two years long passed. It startled her and the others and they tore at every which way as this came to be.

It was no transformation, but only a visit from one who was so silent and subtle, yet her arm was extended to this flock, all along the way. Her wand was over them, just as she vowed right before this evil spell was ever cast. Cassandra was so full of hope despite her fear, which inspired the Fairy's personal favor. As if she were a mother desperate to help her child, the time of waiting was over.

The Swans were greatly surprised yet Casey was the only one among them who did not stray away from the enchantment touched waters.

"Is that who I think it is?" Ida exclaimed with pure hope before a miracle happened before them all.

"Open your eyes and you will see the path drawn for you…" came the lovely, warm tone as if from the waters around them. "I had never gone away…"

At first glance, Cassandra wished to merely paddle away from it but those words stirred something within her that gave her courage enough to question. With a flap of her wings, she fought the will to cry out…

"You…" the others overheard Casey beginning to cry. Her cries came out as mere hisses to the untrained ear. "Is it truly you? This isn't another one of those tricks…"

Eleonor was slightly taken aback yet she and Ida both came beside her once again. All the while that golden locked form appeared as a reflection nearside them. At one moment, Eleonor fairly wished to bat the reflection away but it was a fruitless gesture. "Best we fly off, ladies before this gets the worst of us~ where is that blasted cricket!?"

"Do wait, please!" Antionette begged, oddly enough. "Could this be the hope we have been in wait for? Eleonor!"

"Behold, do I see a glimmer in your eyes, child?" the Fairy began to speak. "Anything your heart desires, will come to you~ after what your father had implimented in you," she began to sing, so tenderly and with hardly enough sorrow. However, that ditty brought the flock back together.

"My absence, my dears, was due to a great trouble laying beyond those snowy mounts. Two years have passed, that much I know. Yet never had my eye ever leave either of you, Cassandra." she spoke as a mother would to her child.

Casey was over emotional, shaking her head and fluttering her white wings all the while, unable to keep still.

"Jiminy had told us so much~ and I was afraid it was all for naught before you brought him to us," Casey expressed. "… as a dove, he said."

"You had taken his words to heart as he is among my most trusted of friends. As he now speaks on your behalf beneath the sun." the beautiful Fairy spoke. "Your reservations towards me are far understood, dear ones. I have kept my eyes here, soothed with the truth that the precious men had kept you safely kept along Mondfall's boundaries. This curse that has trembled the lot of us has reached the far regions of this world. That was why you were in wait for such time; out of great sorrow, it had to be done."

Cassandra's emotions were traveling all over so much that she shook her head and wagged with anxiety whilst listening. Her fellow swans did not have the desire to stay too close to this reflection, even as Eleonor wanted to take a nip at it yet she held her ground hard.

"Why invite this, 'Ette? She was the one who had the power, and yet she left us. I say we shove her aside after all this poppycock~" Eleonor countered with as much conviction Casey once had. Yet, in this moment, she was beside herself over the fact that the Fairy had shown herself again. "I say we gather the men, head out on our own accord~"

"Be still, ladies~ Be still…" the Fairy remained as patient as could be. "The will of Queen Grimhilde had called dark powers at her disposal. To whomever bidding she indulges, they had unleashed this spell with a sole purpose of inner imprisonment, in the guise of beauty. The very thing she desired from her selfish, cold heart, had brought so much anguish to those suffering beneath her thumb. The courage of the Seven Dwarfs, and of now my personally annointed holder of right and wrong, this cannot go any other way. While these villainous sorts continue to wreck their havoc upon our lives, we must do our own by loving and trusting in one another… Both of these you have shown towards them, Cassandra… in my absence."

"Was it planned all along, this?" Mary asked, as though wistfully.

"Planned? More so in the prophetic sense… An eye has seen and heard of a grand falling out of the foul hearted… as well as the union of the pure hearted. This remains as the mere beginning, my dears, and I promise it will not be long before all of you will be given your humanity ~ followed by the world's healing… to all of those who would fight righteously."

"What you say… the pure hearted, that will turn out all right…?" Casey found herself asking.

"As I vowed to you, my dear, you are never to be alone."

"… because I felt so angry. So angry at what you said to me the first time and then the spell was cast during our escape… That you didn't return then to help us." Casey truthfully told the fairy, indeed still feeling upset about the matter in question.

"Had the Seven Men had not found you, mourned with you, and had led you to this untouched land? They guard you, adore you, more than the treasures they dig."

"Oh~ Oh, I love them, ma'am… I love them, we all love them. We owe them our lives for what they have done for us." Casey praised, spreading her wings wide as her diamond glimmered in the sunlight.

"And Sir Jiminy. My kind friend, his heart bled when he saw you transform. His heart, his voice~ the moment he touched the diamond I gifted you, it had opened a door for you to follow. I cast my spell on him so you could have a voice when no one else can hear. As I had spoken that you must endure with us all, you are given everything you need for your journey. Strong hearts beat as one…"

The flock, altogether were fairly cowed at the brilliant Star Fairy's words. "And so, there is a way…" Antoinette's voice wept along.

"Strong hearts will always beat as one… Cassandra, the wearer of my Diamond, seek out the eyes of the Seine. Show your truth before him, and your path shall open further…"

"The eyes of the Siene… What does that even mean? Him…? You speak of someone." Casey asked with more hope than before.

"Your heart will tell you once you see him.

His beauty, as you will see, shines within his eyes and voice, and from the work of his hands."

The look in the Fairy's blue eyes were so loving that it just began to melt all of her worries away. She grew confident, so much so that she arched her wings.

"We are one in this, altogether… strength and love shall survive."

"We are in this together… I will do as you say, your Grace… I-I am sorry for doubting…" she saddened and humbled even more. "It was foolish of me…"

"No, my dear. Natural it is to feel as trouble arises. This Curse over you is currently under an enemy's control… A strong one. The only way of breaking it entirely relies on Undying Love. It must be strong, and it must be unbreakable… as strong as they."

As to what that may entail, at least they were all fully in the know now and the Fairy's absence had a reason… Great evil abounded just beyond, they could all feel it… hence the anxiety of it all, and all that resentment they felt after all that waiting.

"I will be among you, within your Diamond, and listen closely to my whispers during your travels. Sir Jiminy, trust him as I do, as you have done to the Seven. He will speak for you and guide you. Go back to them, for they are to come to you with fearful news. A spry little robin shall find you in short time. Don't you question it should it prod you to follow it."

As soon as the Blue Fairy said this, she held her dazzling wand high and merely touched the tip of it to Casey's diamond before entirely disappearing in the water again, leaving the rest of the flock deeply moved by what they were told. Full of hope once again, despite Eleonor's reluctance towards the whole idea.

"Supposedly she rests inside this blasted diamond?" she slickly pecked at Casey's jewel. "As to whom she was blabbering about~ this one with the eyes of the Seine?"

"She speaking about someone. A man." Dorothea pointed out, and she clearly listened to everything.

"His beauty, within his eyes, his voice and the work of his hands…" Casey repeated to herself, with her stomach dropping further as she pondered. Was this a specific hero she was referring to… and that she would know once she would see him for herself. She had a newly found trust in that. This would be someone she would meet herself, so she had to keep her eyes on the horizon… That thought healed her heart - all of their hearts - after so long. Now it only inspired them to go and find their brave friends who were still unravelling the mystery in the forest. They all had more than what they have bargained for~ At least they had answers… and she had the Diamond.

The Magistrate of Paris, 1488

With faith restored in the mysterious forest, along the foot there seemed to be those who had their own faith restored. There laid spread before these soldiers, a great rocky grassland was ultimately destroyed by flame and mire by one of the rarest of enemies. As some of the men searched for their injured and their dead, some took their helmets off for an honest take of breath. Despite magic being in the air, their means of keeping this enemy at bay was becoming more difficult by the day.

Just as the vision within the Quartz predicted, they wore crimson, dark blue and gold, with fleur de lis insigias upon their breast plates, and their helmets were silver and covered the entire frame of their faces as if to hide their true identity, nonetheless, they were loyal to their Magistrate. Of whom that was, three men addressed them as they revealed themselves to them out of the rubble…

"Your Honor. We have lost another fifteen of our brethren to the Born before another retreat~!" one young soldier spoke to him who stepped out before them, grim.

Nearside them all, a brilliantly powerful Fresian stallion stood by, loyally nuzzling at the hand of the old Magistrate whom they were relaying their findings to. He stood over the spoils of fallen and shattered limbs of skeletal remains, and their apparent shedding armor, an aging man with a long severe, yet careworn face as pale as the moon with hair as graying as the dying grass about his feet. Deeply set olive colored eyes were overcome with a complexity of sorrow and a deep hatred. Leather gloved, shrewn over with the blood of his own men, and his deep armored boots dug deep into the murky ground as he soon faced who was left of his men.

"As we well know, their relentless vigor shall never falter." the honorable leader spoke, his voice matching with the stark blood red sky as night drew dangerously near. "… for as long their accursed ruler shall wish~ damned Lich…"

His voice boomed like looming thunder, with such a deep baritone that it cowed the men before him as he stepped forth with his horse loyally beside him. With a head hung as his master spoke, the loyal beast kept vigil. His master's armor was the only one that was nearly entirely black for the sake of remaining unrecognizable among his own men beneath this enemy's eye. The High Honor, Dom Claude Frollo, the firm and strict Magistrate of Paris, France within this enchanted realm.

Entrusted by his King, after all the tribulation endured for a single decade, the medievel city capital of France was given to him due to survival and trial. Once driven to madness through fear and natural lust, confliction of the highest degree had come deathly close to outright murder of the only adopted son he endured for twenty years, next to the Roma woman whom was simply choosing to do right for others and her people. A people he, Frollo, had deemed abominations of this realm.

His own heart was an enigma. There was so much to test and mold through Fate's eyes. Kept Claude thoroughly blessed despite his apparent blindness to the truth, even to the loved ones he was so given in his life. First was a younger brother, due to good intent to help the lad, the lad was led astray to a sinful which then had cost his life. Years on had come a second chance, in the form of a deformed foundling. That foundling became more of a man than what anyone thought possible… although once believed to be a legendary monster through out all of Paris. Although, the Heaven's had bestowed a heart golden strong within the boy.

Frollo himself was once overpowered by the one son he vowed to raise in walls of stone, as an act of fear for his own damnation… Perhaps it was merely a sign then, as much as he desired cold murder for the boy at one point~ an argument he had would take to the grave remained that he loved the Bell ringer, more than anyone would ever dare to know. Said son was sent away on a pardon from the dangers of this battlefield, set to find safer pastures for his ranks, however… it had been terribly too long of a wait. Quasimodo, formerly, a bell ringer, then a graduate from Torch… turned a woodsman due to the horrible sacking of Paris.

As to how this came to be from the rubble of outright animosity, a series of events had followed the Judge, as form of judgement upon his own hypocrisy. One that nearly cost the demise of the very own capital he was in charge of protecting… His own demise came upon his own head while at the mercy of the cathedral of Notre Dame herself. As though Fate had her eye closely on the son an ailing old Judge whose mind had been broken again and again… Once thought of a tyrant, the Regent saw otherwise when scores of witches and magical being alike were clambering close in for the kill… and then even, that had left them all in a bad way.

One thing was for certain~ when it came to matters about magic from then on… Claude was never one to tolerate it, as much as he once was with the Roma people. However, there was a time among the Fae at one point.

~ It had been a perillous journey for these men, upon the path of virtue and forgiveness, there came a judgement day. Not in the way Claude had expected. When he thought death and flame was at his door, he only found water about him as if enveloping him in undeserved mercy. It ultimately made no logical sense to him, to have that and then there came the struggle that involved the deformed boy he took in by obligation.

An animosity remained for sometime between them, one of utter betrayal on each side. Claude however was lesser so upon the fact that nearly murdered his own adopted over a woman he lusted and loathed, yet it struck him at one point that Quasimodo was unlike anyone he had ever known. He never strayed from his beliefs that any life was precious, and held no biase or prejudice against anyone —Not ever in his young life.

Meanwhile, despite some of that remaining, through time and time again, this anger Quasimodo harbored in return may have been a Heavenly sign of the toll Frollo's own sins had taken. For he truly did have profound love for the boy, despite how callous he was. His own self righteousness often led Frollo down multiple directions then on, all of which were nasty ends. As ventures were endured, it was not only Quasimodo's devotion becoming the most prominent, but Frollo's own pride was diminishing since his life was miraculously spared on that Fateful Day. That much was known that should anything fall upon Quasimodo ever again, he would see all possibilities to keep anything from happening to him ~ as his duty was as a father.

"Search for any of those left behind. In any case, to discover any weakness or means of an end for these demons…" Frollo ordered his men, rushing a thin hand through his white grey hair which remained completely disheveled, for one. "Marc,"

"Yes, your Honor…" spoke a younger man, a survivor no less, who bent knee before him.

"Has word arrived from my son?" Frollo asked, despite this may not have been the time for it.

"The robin of which he had sent beforehand has brought forth a letter… We have it netted~"

"Speak of when it was captured!"

"This morn, sir!"

Toward one of the last hidden carraiges, Marc led his master inside to reveal a small fenced cage that held an orange little bird inside it. Around one of its legs was a tiny rolled up parchment… Frollo stood still as he seemed to sharply eye the bird as it hopped to the sides of its prison, in a worry. However, once he waved Marc away and proceeded to remove his cloak, Frollo shut himself into the carraige. Moments before he approached the tiny cage, he drew in a breath and soon sat. With a hand, gentle and graceful, he unraveled the wire and reached in to cup the bird into his hand before softly pulling it out.

"… Faer, you simply know me." he dully hummed to it after calming him. "Seeing you after a raid is a Heaven's gaze. You bring fine news, I hope…"

At the bird's ruffling, it helped him feel much less anxious as he took the note from around his leg. Without so much as wasting a second, he opened it and read it quickly~

Father,

I have reached the farthest end of the Eastern wind. Faer and I had come upon a land unmapped… There is an air of power in this place that I cannot further explain. Please, be confident that I am well and this place can be our next marker. No enemy can enter this place for I haven't had a run in with any Born ever since Fidele and I stepped in here. Faer can lead you~ He knows exactly where it is.

~ Quasimodo

As soon as the Magistrate had finished reading, he soon felt faint enough to ease back into the chair. Quasimodo was safe… however, this unmapped land that was mentioned gave Frollo a sense of unease yet. When it came to magical endeavors, only few times ever came kindly… save for one. Frollo gazed at the small bird on the panel as he curled the note once more with a sort of sullen gaze.