«I’ll have to drive it out myself. Step back, shei’tani.» Rain struggled to his feet. A spasm of racking, fluid-filled coughs nearly felled him, but he managed to remain upright. He drew a shallow breath, summoned his strength, and drove his shoulder down, towards the ground. Pain exploded as the bottom of the spear slammed into the ground and the spearhead tore a path through muscle, sinew, and bone and pierced through the skin of his back.

For one long, breathless moment, nothing existed but the blinding agony, but even that was a relief from the crippling mass of sel’dor. He rose to his feet and rubbed against a nearby tree until the barbed spearhead caught and he could pull himself free of the bolt’s thick shaft. He shook himself as if he could shake off the pain like water clinging to his fur.

“Some of the barbs have broken off inside you,” Ellysetta said.

«I know.» The dark metal’s presence was impossible to miss, burning like acid within his Fey flesh. Rain cast a grim eye at the approaching Eld. He couldn’t fly in his current condition, and even if he could, the Eld and their bowcannon would be waiting for him.

He and Ellysetta were vastly outnumbered. They must run and hide, which they could not do while he remained tairen.

«I need your strength to help me Change. It will be painful, and I will not be able to shield you from it.» All of his energy would have to be directed to completing the Change while the sel’dor shrapnel turned his own magic against him.

“Rain, stop talking. Do what you must. I’ll be fine.”

Pride surged through him. She was so fierce. She had become a warrior of the Fey… nei, a Tairen Soul, strong and brave.

«Ke vo san, kem’san.» He nuzzled her gently, rubbing his face against her, then stepped back.

He drew within himself, marshaling his strength and focusing his energies inward. The sel’dor was there, a distracting, discordant energy, but he did his best to block it.

He had Changed when riddled with sel’dor barbs before, as had all of the Feyreisen during the Mage Wars. Most had survived. Some had not. When he Changed, the sel’dor would not Change with him. It would remain in his flesh, at its current size and general location, but hopefully not piercing any vital organs.

He summoned his magic.

Instead of the usual, intense pleasure of the Change, the sel’dor twisted the sensations. His nerves registered the horrible agony of flesh tearing from bones and liquefying, skin splitting and burning, magic simultaneously crushing him and tearing him apart. Beside him, Ellysetta shrieked and fell to her knees in pain, and her torment nearly drove his tairen to madness.

He held the weave and fed it power, forcing his magic into the familiar lines it now rebelled against. The webs of his magic bucked and writhed, fighting their natural paths.

For one desperate, frightening moment, he thought he would fail, that he would die, and Ellysetta would be left alone and unprotected to face the approaching Eld.

But even as that unimaginable horror seized his mind, she crawled across the ground on her knees and reached a shaking hand out towards the wildly undulating cloud of gray mist swirling around him. She touched the mist. The bright strength of her power poured through him. He grasped her offering gratefully, weaving her strength to his own dwindling supply. She was there with him, in his consciousness, every thread of their nearly completed bond vibrating with harmonic energies. She was a bright, shining presence in his soul, a vast and endless warmth, stealing his fear and transforming it into confidence and strength enough to force the unruly weaves to his command and complete the Change.

The howling pain of sel’dor quieted. The tairen shrank, folding in upon itself, condensing, until once again it was the invisible sentience mingled inside his body with his own soul.

Rain fell to his knees in the dirt, Fey once more and weak beyond belief, his body afire with the barbs of sel’dor buried in his flesh. The ones so large they now protruded from his flesh, he plucked out. The others he left where they were. He would not completely heal, nor regain his full strength until the sel’dor in his body was removed. Until then, working magic would be painful at best, which gave the Eld a powerful advantage.

Breathing raggedly, Ellysetta knelt beside him and spun what healing she could as she grabbed his arm. “I’m sorry, Rain, I know you’re hurt, but we have to go. We have to go now.”

“Aiyah.” He forced himself to rise and swayed dizzily on his feet. One hand reached out, weaving a Spirit illusion, nothing particularly intricate or strong, but hopefully enough to fool the approaching Eld and give Ellysetta and him a brief head start. “Run. That way.” He pointed to the east.

The Eld would expect them to go south, towards the river and towards Celieria, but clearly one or more of the Border lords had either been overrun by the Eld or surrendered himself and his lands to their service.

Rain didn’t know how much of the borders had been compromised, but he couldn’t afford a river crossing into enemy territory any more than he could afford to take wing here in Eld. They’d have to backtrack towards Lord Barrial’s land and cross the river at nightfall. The moons were both on the wane, and for once, he hoped darkness would be their ally.

Eld ~ Boura Fell

Melliandra lay on her thin pallet in the umagi den. The sconce lights were low, as they always were, emitting the barest of orange glows. Just enough for eyes accustomed to the dark to navigate the rows of sleeping racks that lined the room from floor to ceiling.

Sleep, in Boura Fell, was a carefully rationed luxury… a brief respite in a lifetime of toil granted only because umagi couldn’t function without it. Each skrant was allowed only a few bells per day in a bunk shared in shifts by four other umagi. There were no days and nights in Boura Fell. Only work and sleeping. And punishment when you slept too much or worked too little.