Legend XXXVI – The Flying Islands of Epydos

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Beneath the skies of Epydos, where clouds drift like soft continents and the air is fragrant with moonlight, the ancients tell of a time when the islands rested firmly in the sea. But one night, a tremor arose that shook not the earth, but dreams themselves. That night, entire landmasses silently detached themselves from the ground and rose like sleep-deprived giants into the sky. Since then, they have floated between wind and stars, carried by ancient runes burned deep within the rock. On one of these islands, the luminous cliff of Aeram, lived a young girl named Eryndis, who heard the call of the heights more clearly than the sound of her own footsteps. Her village rested on a broad rock above an endless sea of clouds, and the water cascading from the rocks formed a silver veil that vanished into infinity. At night, when the two moons hung above the battlements, the rooftops shimmered like lanterns in a wandering dream. Eryndis loved those nights. But for the past few weeks, something had been happening that worried even the elders: the island had begun to sink. At first, it was perceptible only as a heavy breath, then as the steady yielding of a weary heart. Imperceptible, yet inexorable. The runes that bore it were losing their power, and no scholar could explain why. Eryndis, however, had a hunch. For a long time, she had heard a whisper in the rocks, a cool, sleepy rustling, as if something in the depths were pleading for help. On the night of the double moon, she mustered her courage. While the village slept, she descended to the edge of the central root tree that towered over the island like an ancient guardian. Its branches bore lanterns that never went out, and its roots gripped the rock like hands holding onto a memory. Where the rock had split open, a crack shimmered with warm gold. Eryndis laid her hand on the stone, and immediately a voice filled her, soft as a fading dream. "Child of the sky... our power is dying. The runes are starving." "Starving of what?" asked Eryndis. "Of faith," the voice whispered. "People no longer believe that the islands must be held. They take the sky for granted. But without wonder, without gratitude, without remembering the powers that sustain us... we fall." Eryndis knew what she had to do. She ran back to the village, woke the people despite their weariness, despite their disbelief. And then, beneath the two moons, she told them everything. Of the runes, the voices, the waning power. At first they laughed. Then one fell silent. Then another. Finally, an old woman raised her hands to the sky and began to speak: words no one knew anymore, songs that slumbered only in the roots of the great tree. The people joined in.