NEXT SHE KNEW, HER sparkle-being splodged across Jhoranyal’s left knee. Inelegant. Squidgy. Much more a bellyflop than a peppy sparkly-me sort of effect. Allory’s every particle groaned. They groaned even though she was not sure they were particles at all and so should not be hurting quite so badly. Her colours felt bleached out. Weird and wonky and worrying.

Her companions exclaimed in shock.

Aye. She had travelled further than even she could fathom and, not to split any whiskers Felidragon-style over the matter, she felt ghastly.

Garobixi sped forward upon his flotilla of pixels. “Dust emergency! With me, Chenixipi!”

“Wranglus anglus surplus saturus lifterus!” Chenixipi cried, gesticulating so wildly that her pixels had to perform a swift save or she would have landed on her head.

Turquoise dust exploded not only around her, but all over her companions too.

Jhoranyal briefly gained a straggling blue dust beard. He coughed in consternation before the dust flowed off him and raised Allory gently into its powdery embrace. The pair of Pixies crowded up to her, yelling conflicting magical commands that somehow combined to do a great deal of good. The Dark Elf decided that now was the moment to beat an ignominious retreat.

“Sustus mustus refusterous dustus!” Garobixi cried, getting his hand tangled in his hair, which had turned into a ten-headed mushroom. “And … kerflooey!”

“Kerflumpus!” Chenixipi inserted deftly.

Somehow, their duet of dust-shots combined to fill her being with all the restless, madcap energy of Pixie pixels.

Dust-pampered to within an inch of her elemental life by the two combative Pixie healers, recovered enough to rise into the air once more and having been questioned several times meantime by Jhoranyal – Yaarah intervened to demand she be given time to recover from her ordeal – Allory shook herself back into some semblance of order, whatever that meant. Less chaos. So many memories dragging her in different directions. It was becoming hard to be fully mindful in the present.

Jhoranyal was still glaring at her in stiff disbelief.

She said, “I’m sorry about your eye. It appears to be unhurt.”

“Having an Elemental Faerie squeezing herself in and out through my eyeball is not an experience I care to repeat often!” he growled. “I trust the excursion was worthwhile?”

Not exactly a holiday, Mister Dark Elf! Trying to fix this mess he had signed his name to, actually.

She glowered at him. Extra-sparky sparkles. “I fear I shall be apologising a great deal more in the future, Jhoranyal. My powers are whimsical at best. I was trying to fetch help, is all. Now, how’s the contract coming along?”

“Miserable!” he snarled. Right. Take it out in the runt.

So done with being a target for men!

Before she could reply, Yaarah stalked up, saying, “Ten minutes more, Allory, and I shall let these fine warriors rest. Lie down. You look dreadful.”

Allory collected a guarded stare from Ashueli. Was the Elf aware of her inward seething? Elementals could see things – suggids!

She shrugged and made a shooing motion with her sparkles – more accurately, another flopping about like a limp fish moment. Great. Off she went to be thoroughly dusted on full repeat. Garobixi and Chenixipi acted most exercised by her alleged antics and made it very clear to the ‘twinkletoes’ that they had their orders from the Healer Sage and they would be following them to the verimost pixel. Grumble. Yaarah clearly did not know the time of day, because his ten minutes turned into two hours before everyone got up with a range of disgruntled groans, exclamations and stretches. Most marched off to cool off.

Clearly, a contract loathed by everyone.

Dissenting voices made her head their playground, dissecting how she feared authoritarian men, how Miss Sensitive Materials was really being oversensitive, how she must have invited Jhoranyal’s thorny reaction. Maybe the runts of the world were destined to be picked on and bullied, put down and abused as they deserved … no. Never again.

Not while this girlfae drew breath. She clenched her little blue fists – mentally, anyways. Rather difficult to clench her mobile sparkles in the same way.

Varzune popped over to deliver his verdict on matters. “Beautiful, sunny late afternoon in the Deepwoods, eh? In summary, Durc’s a snake and our Dark Elf friends are neck-deep in the filthiest swamp you ever – oh. What’s going on over there?”

The Scintillant decided to stage a miraculous recovery.

That, or she’d drown in Pixie dust.

Jhoranyal’s warriors snapped to attention, roaring, “MASTER BARAKUNAL!”

Suggids! He’d tracked her down already?

Impressive.

Plus, one could cut the respect around him with a knife. The Dark Elves evidently knew Barakunal by sight and by reputation; for his part, the Master acted unselfconscious, as if he accepted their reaction and chose not to make anything of it. Was humbleness ingrained in his character, or was it a recent arrival given the news she had just delivered?

Putting enough leaves together to make a whole bush, Ashueli made a sound like a Scintillant cocoon sagging off its moorings. “Allory Fae, how could you?”

White as a cocoon, too.

“Ash –”

“I am so not speaking to you!”

Wince. Ash’s sap had to be boiling in there.

Tough medicine. The proof would soon be in the nectar – was it the right medicine?

Barakunal gave the war band a critical once-over before he snapped, “At ease, warriors! Ula-Sali’karm Jhoranyal, it has been a while since we last sparred, I believe?”

He offered his forearm. The giant Elf gripped it as though he sought to rip a tree from its roots. For a moment the two men tested their strength, before they suddenly guffawed and slapped each other’s shoulders as if they had a great deal of dust to beat out of one another.

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Allory wanted to blink at their behaviour. Males. Truly perplexing.

Jhoranyal said, “Thank you for coming, Master.”

If Ashueli sounded bad, he sounded worse. Voice like rocks gargling in the back of his throat. Allory quivered at the sudden advent of tension, aware of many different and competing magical, emotional and physical responses. Had she and the Harpist done right? How else could the crux of this matter be resolved with honour?

Where was Hansanori, anyways? For such a gleaming specimen of Faerie manliness, he sure had a knack for disappearing into the background when he wanted to. Oh. He was chatting to the other Scintillants and now reaching over to adjust Zzuriel’s pouch, alias the Allory-carrier. She tried not to think of it as a corpse sling. Nor to be jealous of her disconnected body being the object of his tender concern. How peculiar was it to be jealous of her own person? Ugh!

Pretending to glance about without particular interest, Barakunal’s pulse danced and his aural colours went crazy as his gaze passed over Ashueli. How he struggled to hold it all together!

Seen in close proximity to the Elemental Dark Elf, Ashueli did indeed bear a resemblance to Barakunal. Subtle but unmistakable. Was there not some quality in the tilt of her head, the sinewy musculature, even in the symmetrical beauty of her face, a feminine rendering of his striking features? Did ancestral sap sing to sap?

He even tried to hide his feelings in a mirror-image of her reaction.

No-one missed the body language, surely?

To Jhoranyal, he said, “A little bird twittering amongst the treetops tells me you’ve found me a worthy apprentice?”

“Indeed, Master.” His white teeth flashed briefly in a grin. “May I introduce you to Princess Ashueli, daughter of Zinueli Sylvanchild? It is she who dealt the Ula-Sali’karm a fierce lesson today.”

The Master turned slowly. “Princess Ashueli? A mighty achievement by all accounts.”

“Master,” she rasped, honouring him with a deep bow. Wobbly knees. Actually, for a second there, Allory thought her friend might be physically sick.

“May I request the honour of a demonstration? Hand to hand.”

“Master. Aye.”

“Guard yourself!”

He vanished. Ashueli shifted in a blur. His fist appeared out of a ghostly puff of smoke, tearing through where she had been half a blink before, but was no longer. At first, the warrior Princess could not control her power, choosing to anticipate or react his attacks rather than attack. Perhaps this was proof enough, since she appeared to track precisely where he was or would appear despite his best invisibility tricks? How did that even work? As the combat master pressed her harder and faster, she switched speeds so smoothly, it was only when Varzune and Xiximay wheezed and pointed together that Allory recognised the difference. Location-shifting. There she went! In a blink, two disembodied whirlwinds tore into one another. Martial arts explosion! Allory was neither certain which elbow nor which foot belonged to whom, nor if they were actually attached to a particular body at the time, but it was all very violent and fairly much incomprehensible to her.

What she did know was that another Elemental did not beat her friend instantly. It was like watching smoke fight shadows in the middle of a jungle storm.

“It’s uncanny, mrrr-hrrrm, like watching a person fighting their own shadow,” Sabline purred, clearly deep in the same pot of thought-nectar as her Faerie friend. “Even beating their own shadow to the punch, moreover. That’s unbelievable.”

“Never seen anything like it,” Xiximay agreed.

The Ahlumviar observed the clash with that unblinking focus they brought to everything, clearly enthralled by the match. No shouting of catcalls or bets. Just pure concentration.

At last, Master Barakunal broke through and the pair separated as if smacked apart by a Giant’s fist. Ash clutched her sternum, wheezing from the impact of a one-fingered jab, if Allory had it right. Probably like being punched by a tree branch, given as he probably split his firewood with that finger, or some other warrior craziness.

Barakunal dabbed at a cut beneath his eye. “You scored first! How?”

The Dark Elves sprang to their feet as one body, shouting, “Tar-hoyi mar oxinat!”

Approbation.

Their respect for the Princess had not been insubstantial before. Now, it touched Centresky.

Kneeling, Ashueli made the traditional bow. “I deflected your fist with a crossing elbow, Master. You hit yourself.”

“Ha!” He gave a great bark of laughter. “That’s a revelation.” He knelt and prostrated himself before her. “Excellent fight, warrior Ashueli. As is now clear to all by observation of our skills and gifts, I knew your mother – I knew her very well indeed.” His voice hitched sharply before he continued in a hoarse undertone, “I treated Zinueli Sylvanchild shamefully and with the most dishonourable intentions. Until today, that was the single greatest regret of my life. Now, I have learned I treated you abominably as well.”

“You did not know?” she whispered, mirroring his bow.

There. How could that be mistaken?

“I wish I had.”

“Do Elementals have children?”

“Princess Ashueli, I am neither worthy to be your Master nor to make any claim of fatherhood, despite that, as you can see and would stand incontestable in any Elven court of law, our Elemental powers are of one sap sprung. I would also fully understand if you’d want nothing to do with me. Ever.” Struggling, racked with anguish, he could barely force the words out. “I came here today to try … to begin to set this wrong to rights. To confess what a matchless fool I have been, for my regrets are wider and deeper than these very Deepwoods. That is why –”

“Father?”

One word, yet it struck him like a whiplash. Silenced him.

Allory wished she could take a deep, calming breath herself. Instead, she had to wait like everyone else for the awfulness of this moment to be broken.

Barakunal’s head dropped toward his chest. He could not bear the tension; the low moan he made sounded as if it tore free from a place of unspeakable remorse.

“I came to hate Durc,” Ash whispered, yet her words carried around the quiet clearing. “He gave me everything a girl – or a Princess – could ever have asked for, but only on condition that I lived in the cage he built for me. A cage built of lies and broken promises, I discovered. This has been a life-changing journey for me in so many ways. It was Allory Fae who first offered me the chance to break out. That day, I swore I would never go back, nor even look back. My mother equipped me for the journey and sent me on my way with her sehrish-mar-tiloyi blessing. Now, I wish only to forge forward with my face set as to Middlesun. I respect your courage in coming to find me the moment you found out the truth. It means a great deal to me, more than I can ever convey. Allory, thank you for taking the initiative to find Barakunal.”

She bobbed in the air. “Of course.”

You’re my friend. I’d move Middlesun for you.

Raising his gaze at last, the Master watched his daughter with dignified mien. So grave. So bereft of hope.

Tears tracked freely down Ash’s cheeks. “Frankly, I don’t want a Master, even though I’d give my left arm to train with a warrior of your unique capabilities and experience. A chance to have a real father – now that’s worth ten thousand contract prices and more. In all fairness, I’d have to warn you that I’m not the easiest character at times –“ she produced a ravaged chuckle “– and there’s a matter of a degree of determination that most clearly springs from the sap of both family lines, but if you were willing to have me, will you promise to be there for me, heart, soul and sap, until the end of time?”

“I … promise.” His throat worked. Dark runnels streaked the planes of his cheeks, unheeded. “For time and beyond, my daughter. By unbreakable word bound upon my soul’s own sap, I swear I will love you with all my heart and strength.”

Ash made to speak but found she could not. For the longest time, father and daughter knelt opposite each other, silent tears speaking more than words could ever convey.

Heartrending. Miraculous. Healing.

Frozen crystal tears plinked from Zzuriel’s eyes. Varzune itched at his eyelids surreptitiously; the tone of Sabline’s purring betrayed her heart’s response. Allory sensed herself squeezing together into a tiny, pulsating knot, almost like her throat used to close at times of high emotion.

In a blink, Ashueli smoked into a kneeling position right in front of him. In fact, she surrounded her father with her arms. Softly, shakily, she murmured, “We Forest Elves are huggers, I’m afraid. Permission?”

“No need to even ask,” said he, wrapping his arms about her shoulders as he began to weep uncontrollably.

“Oh, father, father, father … I missed you.”

“Me too, my precious daughter.”

Cheers rang throughout the forest glade, punctuated by a Scintillant Faerie literally exploding for joy. One second all she knew was an extreme compression of elation; the next, the glade shimmered with millions of ethereal sapphire motes, shimmering and frolicking as they drifted through the air.

There. What under Middlesun was that skill useful for?

People drifted away in different directions to give father and daughter a years-overdue private moment together.