We ran through the darkness, trusting still that Morgana knew where she was going, although our primary direction right now was ‘away from the noise’, ideally as quickly as possible. The rumbling under our feet grew larger as creatures we couldn’t make out in the darkness sprinted past us, slamming into the trees around us in a panic. We recognised some of the noises made by the creatures around us, but many more were completely alien, and my imagination ran wild with the kind of monsters that made the guttural screeching noises. I realized that our lights were probably the only thing keeping us from being trampled by creatures who might never have even seen the light, or none as bright.

Everyone kept an eye on each other. Tilly’s lantern on a stick wobbled precariously back and forth, but she seemed to be able to keep up. Looking behind, I saw that we hadn’t lost anyone. As we barreled between the trees, I saw light reflected off creatures that ran past, and I wondered where they’d all been before. Had they been just outside the periphery of our lights the entire time?

As I looked to our left, something having caught my eye, I suddenly realized that we didn’t have the time to consider the creatures in the trees. Between the trees I saw a flash of light, orange and bright, and immediately afterwards, the ground shook with the noise of what was unmistakably an explosion. The shockwave had been tempered by the trees, but the noise bounced through the forest, deafening us all. We all froze for a second and looked in the direction of the fading light.

“Run!” Morgana hissed, and we doubled our efforts, not stopping. I heard Erza’s sure tread behind me, her heavy armor not seeming to slow her down in the slightest. There was no time anymore to wonder about the creatures and the skittering in the dark, the lights reflected off carapaces the size of cars; all we could do was focus on the person in front of us and try not to lose them. I felt my heart drum in my ears as the feeling of urgency rose. I did notice, for a brief moment, that we seemed to slowly be going downhill. I hadn’t noticed us climbing before, so the feeling was abrupt and strange.

I tried to pace my breathing to match my run, so as not to lose my balance on the increasingly steep slope we were running down, but was interrupted when a second explosion hit the woods, this one louder and closer, from our right. The light between the trees illuminated the forest, and I couldn’t help but notice the trees seeming to be less wide, less massive, and I wondered if we were approaching the edge of woods.

Another explosion shook the ground underneath us just as I was putting my foot down, and I lost my balance, though I clearly wasn’t the only one. We were sprinting downhill and most of us had too much momentum to stop in our tracks; the ground was too steep. It came up to meet me, and I managed to turn the fall into a roll. Or rather, I would have, if my shoulder hadn’t met the small of Sally’s back, who was also flung forward. It wasn’t long before we were all tumbling downhill in the dark, our lanterns smashing on the ground. As I bounced off the ground I was grateful for my constitution, as some of the roots and stumps and rocks sticking out would likely have broken something.

As we fell, I noticed that I became more aware of my surroundings, and realized that what I could see was blessed daylight. The trees around us were no longer just the giants of the Redwood, but other, smaller trees as well. Not that I had a lot of time to appreciate them as I pinballed down the hill, slamming into trees with loud crashes that would have worried me if they’d happened to anyone else. I crashed face first into what I surmised was an oak, based on the smell. Not that I had a lot of time to appreciate it as my momentum carried me forward and around the tree.

Finally, the terrain flattened out a bit and I hit grass, dirt and sand. I groaned. I hadn’t broken anything but I still felt like I’d been in a tumble drier for half an hour. The world was spinning and everything hurt. I looked around. We had made it to the edge of the Redwood, albeit slightly less dignified than we’d originally intended. It seemed that we’d reached a steep not-quite-cliffside that led to the banks of the Dergow. It stretched out half a mile wide and whirled fast and hard. On the other side of the river were flat plains and tundra. I heard sounds of protest around me as people dusted themselves off. One by one, we came to our senses and turned to the forest, alert. Mellie and Erza came running out of the treeline, miraculously upright. Sabine hit the floor next to me with a soft ‘oof’ but she got up quickly and seemed to be okay.

Mellie and Morgana had both drawn their bows and scanned the treeline. We heard a rustling for a second, and wondered what had caused the explosion, what we would see coming out of the forest. The rustling turned out to be a deer, and I was impressed by both of our archers’ self control. I would have fired an arrow out of pure anxiety and surprise. But it wasn’t just the one. More animals sprinted out of the forest. Most of them were pale, with blind eyes, not used to being this far out of the core of the Redwood. A boar the size of a horse crashed through the trees, its three sets of tusks tearing wood and brush apart as it squealed in panic, ran past us, and barreled into the river. I didn’t have the time to see if it was going to be okay, when stranger and stranger creatures began to emerge out of the forest. Insects of kinds and sizes I’d never seen before, beetles the size of hounds and bees as large as a fist all flew out from between the trees.

The noise around us was cacophonous and became louder every second as more and more creatures burst out from the treeline and then began to run one way or the other when they encountered the unknown depth of the Dergow. It was because of that noise that we didn’t hear the danger when it was finally on us. It was only by luck that I was the closest to the attackers, standing slightly away from the others, my pachinko-ball descent down the hill having deposited me a little more upstream.

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Blind luck caused the explosion to slam into me and not any of the others. I didn’t know what was happening. The fire and light and the sheer noise of the explosion rocked me to my core. I had only the sensation of floating weightlessness, my head ringing like a gong. I felt like I was flying. In a sense, I was, though I could only tell when I stopped, my face making contact with the sandy banks of the river. Immediately, my mouth was full of mud and I couldn’t open my eyes, let alone see anything. I felt strong hands pick me up and completely failed to hear them say something. There was a high-pitched noise in my ears that drowned out all other sound.

I managed to wipe my face on my sleeve and finally saw what had tried to blow up my head. Or rather, who. There was a man on the shore, a hundred feet away. He was dressed in what I figured were mage robes, but the colours were all weird. Instead of the usual black or red robes, these were blue and white. Not only that, but the mage, rather than being scrawny and bookish, looked almost like a linebacker, broad-shouldered, and I wondered if he was wearing some kind of armour underneath his robes. I realized after a moment what his stance and clothing reminded me of. The white and blue, the aggressive determination, reminded me of the uniform of a riot cop.

He carved a signal in the air and a white hot flare of blue light fired upwards from his fingers. I’d hoped we’d run into a particularly savvy and powerful bounty hunter of sorts, but we had no such luck. As if folded like paper, reality crumpled around him and four more mages, dressed and built like him, stepped out of thin air.

It seemed, sooner than we’d expected, the military had found us.

Sabine looked at me with worry, but realized that she had no time to lose and threw up a barrier, large enough to shield all of us. She was just in time for the next two explosions to shatter against it, and I saw her shoulders jerk from the effort.

“What do we do?” Tilly asked, her sword ready. It was clear she wanted to run forward and fight the attackers, but Lillian held her back, retrieving her own shield from her back.

“We can’t fight them,” she yelled at the rest of us.

“Like hell we can’t,” Morgana hissed and loosed an arrow. It fizzled out against the invisible shield thrown up by the mages themselves.

“They’ll keep calling for reinforcements,” Lillian said. “Trust me. We have to run.”

“Have you noticed that distance is barely an inconvenience to them?” Tilly mumbled. “They’ll be on us in no time.”

Sally looked at Sabine. “Why the fuck can’t we teleport?! Why are we walking all this way?”

Sabine shook her head, trying to both focus on keeping us all from dying while having a conversation. “I can teleport away alone. Or take all of you with me and probably die.”

“Oh,” Sally said. “Why?”

“Maybe now is not the best time,” Erza said, her large sword drawn, “for a lesson in applied metaphysics, yes?”

“Agreed,” Lillian said.

I was trying to take stock of the situation. We wouldn’t be able to run, and we couldn’t fight them head on without risking even more of them showing up. I looked to the river. And then to the other side. Then something Kazumi had taught me came to mind. I ran over to her, still unsteady on my legs, and motioned to the steppes. She seemed to debate something internally, and finally nodded.

“Sabine!” I yelled. “If I hold the barrier long enough, can you freeze us a path across?”

I heard an affirmative grunt. She was clearly being worn down by the barrage against her defenses. I got up and stood next to her. “Without collapsing?” I smiled.

She grimaced. “Yes, dear. I won’t be channeling as long. A burst is much easier to do.”

I nodded. “Ready?”

“As ever,” she said.

I raised my hands and focused, focused the entire core of my being, on the desire to keep her, to keep my loved ones, my friends, my allies safe. Something in my chest stirred and protested and I realized what I had to do. I flexed my shoulders, stretched, and felt two giant wings protrude from my back as I stood up to my full height, towering over everyone else, my skin its normal purple hue, my horns curving up and back, and I felt like a dragon again. The power inside me whirled and squirmed with anticipation. ‘We can do this’, it seemed to say, and I raised my hands.

The shield, giant and red, stood in stark contrast to Sabine’s blue one. She dropped hers, and ran to the riverside. I felt the air behind me grew colder already as she gathered her strength, but soon, all my attention was required in front of me. When the first fireball hit, I’d expected a physical response, like a stabbing pain in my chest or head. What followed was arguably worse. Every hit against the shield was like a bad memory, a loss remembered and a loved one let go. It stung, not in my head or my body. I realized now why Sabine wouldn’t have been able to hold on for much longer. Every explosion against the shield was an assault on the soul. I felt tears run down my face from memories that weren’t mine, pain and loss I’d never experienced, until I heard the sound of ice freezing behind me, cracking like an ice cube being thrown into a hot drink.

“Everybody go,” Erza said. “Hurry across.”

I walked backwards, keeping the shield up in front of me. I took my first unsteady step on the ice as the barrage continued. I felt my mental barriers beginning to drop as I cried uncontrollably now, until finally I felt a soft hand on my arm, and saw Sabine stand next to me. She raised her hands, and she raised her shield in front of me. I smiled in gratitude and together we carried the burden of protection as we walked across the river. Despite their grim resolution, the mages were unable to penetrate our barriers, and seemed wholly unwilling to set foot on the ice bridge. When we were halfway across, they shifted their attacks from us to our walkway, and as soon as we realized what they were doing, we dropped our defenses and ran across. Despite the rumbling underneath us, they were unable to do enough damage fast enough, and I felt solid ground under my feet again.

Sabine was right behind me, and triumphantly I turned to the mages across the river who’d given up their pursuit. Then I looked at Sabine, knelt down, and hugged her as we both cried. When I finally pulled away, we’d both already begun healing from the emotional toll defending had taken on us.

“We did it,” I said, smiling softly, wiping away a tear.

She smiled back. “We d--” she began, and stopped. The glowing tip of an arrow was sticking out of her chest.

“Oh,” she said, and the light in her eyes went out.