Chapter Five: Disrupting Changes

Raimie

Raimie from the line of Audish kings…

Had I heard that right? I couldn’t have. It was…

A burst of hysterical laughter jolted me back into working order, and I stooped to retrieve Shadowsteal from the ground. I didn’t know what was going on, but right now, that didn’t matter. I had monsters trailing me, and our cottage was the best refuge from them.

When I entered it, my father was shoving provisions into packs, much like we did when visiting Fissid, with Eledis helping him.

“Raimie, can you gather anything you want to keep?” he asked.

“Why would I do that?” I said.

Setting Shadowsteal on the table, I leaned on it.

“Listen. I saw something in the woods-”

“We don’t have time for this,” Eledis snapped.

Snatching a knapsack from my father’s bed, he thrust it at me.

“Pack,” he growled.

He spun for the cottage’s small kitchen, and I decided I’d had enough. I dropped what I’d been given, balling my hands into fists.

“No!” I shouted. “Someone, tell me what’s happening and why my world has become a string of crazy since this morning.”

Activity in the cottage paused with my family looking at me as if just now registering my presence. After a moment, Eledis shoved what he was holding at my father.

“Keep at it,” he said. “I’ve got this.”

My father pulled his lips thin, but he followed instructions while Eledis faced me from across the table.

“We’ve waited a long time for you. Three hundred years or so in fact,” he said. “You read the book I gave you, right? That means you’ve read some of your family history, grandson. As I said, you’re of the Audish royal line-”

“What?” I interrupted. “Come on. You don’t seriously expect me to believe that, do you?”

Eledis just fixed me with an unwavering stare, and as he moved about the cottage, my father kept shooting inscrutable glances my way.

“That… doesn’t make sense,” I said. “If we’re royalty, why are we living in the middle of nowhere? Why barely survive out here when we could…?”

When we could what?

Cocking his head, Eledis asked, “What better place to hide?”

A chill swirled to rest in my gut, and despite how much I might wish otherwise, I found myself detaching.

“Hide?” I asked. “From what?”

“Who, actually,” Eledis said. “The man who stole our kingdom from us. Doldimar.”

“Doldimar,” I repeated.

A cackle followed the name, spewing long and loud from me until I doubled over on myself with one hand gripping the table. Alouin, this had to be a joke. They couldn’t be serious. They couldn’t…

But as I examined my family—Eledis’ face, pinched with annoyance, and my father refusing to look at me—the same sense of familiarity, of knowing, that I’d experienced while reading about Auden settled over me. I didn’t know why or how, but I believed this story.

Which left only one question.

“Why would you keep this from me?” I shouted.

Implacable as always, Eledis turned to my father, who cringed as he tied off a pack.

“The floor’s yours,” he said.

Turning, my father faced me and swallowed.

“It was your mother’s dying wish,” he said. “She wanted us to leave our history in the past.”

Almost, the mention of my mother stopped me in my tracks. Almost.

“And the nine years before she died?” I growled. “You didn’t think sharing this insignificant facet of my life was a good idea?”

Flinching, my father asked, “Would you worry a child with the threat our family faces?”

“What threat?” I screamed through my teeth.

With a sigh, Eledis slammed his hands on the table, leaning over it.

“Again, your answer is Doldimar,” he said. “He wants the Audish royal line dead but not because we pose a threat to his reign’s legitimacy. I doubt he cares about that. No, he doesn’t want the foretelling about our family to come true, as it has with you. Now, we need to-”

“But I read the foretellings about Shadowsteal,” I said. “Nowhere did they mention Auden or its royal family.”

“Are you sure about that?” Eledis said. “Shadowsteal’s rightful bearer shall destroy destruction’s epitome, returning our land to peace and prosperity, right? Stupidly convoluted, as usual, but that’s clearly a reference to our current situation.”

I knew my mouth was hanging open, but I couldn’t seem to close it. They believed this supposed foretelling, one I wasn’t convinced had anything to do with us. They expected me to defeat an evil overlord? Had my family… had the world gone insane overnight?

“I need a minute,” I squeaked.

As I ran for escape, Eledis called, “Raimie, we need to leave!”

“Let him-” my father started.

A closing door cut him off. I desperately wanted to sprint into the forest, letting rain and trees surround me, but I didn’t know if those creepy figures from before had left or not. Instead, I circled the cottage before slamming my back into a wall and sliding down it.

With my knees up and my hands to my head, I shoved everything that had happened since waking up aside. I focused on breathing, in and out. In and out.

When roaring denial stopped threatening to drown my thoughts, I picked at recent events, shrinking as I did so.

A foretelling. I was the subject of some long-ago seer’s vision of the future. That couldn’t be right. I wasn’t…. I just wasn’t. Anything.

But if I was, should I worry about the foretelling that Eledis had mentioned alone, or should I take the others seriously as well? Alouin, what if I should? How he soars, how he falls, how he will suffer? That couldn’t- couldn’t-

“Stop before you faint,” I breathed.

Say my family was right. Say we were royalty.

Snorting, I said, “Alouin, that’s crazy.”

If it wasn’t, though, what would I do about it? Eledis and my father thought we faced some unknown peril, and I had no reason to doubt them. Given that, the best course of action, for the moment at least, was to follow their lead and see what happened. I could do that. It was what I’d done for my whole life, after all.

No way would I touch that damn sword again, though, not until I knew why the world had shifted when I’d last done that. Someone else could take responsibility of it until then.

“Ok,” I breathed. “Ok, ok, ok.”

With my decision made, I opened my eyes and scrambled backward, trying to merge with the wall.

The figures from the forest, one of light and one of shadow, were standing on either side of me, bending over to peer at me with cocked heads. With my breath stolen, I couldn’t scream while slits peeled open where their faces should be, and buzzing was pushed from them in spurts.

A moment of silence followed, one where they seemed to be waiting for a response. If they were, I didn’t have one for them. I pulled as much of my body away from them as possible, and soon enough, the figure of light hummed once more. The shadowed figure straightened, crossed its arms, and hissed back.

Between blinks, they faced one another while the buzzing between them was punctuated with screeches and whines. The shadowed figure’s hissing claimed dominance, and it jerked forward, throwing its fist toward the other one’s face.

Halfway through its swing, however, it stopped short, turning the scene into a motionless painting. Both figures released a shrill screech before spinning toward the forest.

I didn’t know what could have distracted such incomprehensible anomalies. At the moment, though, I didn’t care.

Mounting pressure was threatening to crack my head, spilling my brains over the grass and fallen leaves, but I couldn’t find the will to press my hands to my skull and hold that bone together.

Something terrible had found a home in the seat of who I was, and a shrieking child sprinted circuits inside while tears wept from his white-drowned eyes. It was unnatural, but I couldn’t fight it. I sat as though made from stone while gibbering questions filled my thoughts. While a specter-like form peeled away from the forest’s shadows, much like the primeancers of old were said to have done.

All of which was impossible.

It strode toward me, becoming merely a man with a hooded cloak to shroud his features, but rather than lessening my panic, this revelation sent my internal screaming up in pitch, a state that wasn’t helped when the figures of light and shadow stepped between this new stranger and me.

One of them raised a hand in warning while the other one’s shadows conglomerated in its hand. That figure tried to throw the resulting ball at the stranger, but the bolt dissipated when it lost contact with its creator.

Were they… protecting me?

Their efforts didn’t make a difference. The hooded stranger advanced on me as if they were invisible, passing through them without pause. He came to a stop in front of me, looking down on my still form.

“Can’t even resist my battle magic,” came a voice from the hood’s confines. “How are you…?”

Shaking his head, he drew a dagger from beneath his cloak before crouching to graze its edge along my cheek.

“I should make sure you’re the right one first.”

With my throat working, I tried to speak while the stranger reversed his grip on the dagger, but my voice failed me. As the stranger raised his weapon overhead, I caught movement on the edge of my vision.

“Raim-!”

Then, steel cracked into my temple and-

“Shiiiiiit!”

I screamed my numbing fear into the confines of my nightmare realm. I’d love to thrash and punch and kick and in general, throw a tantrum as well, but as always, damn incorporeal bonds arrested any movement I might make.

Which meant that after my cursing fell silent, I had to consider what had happened. What had that been? A blow to the head hard enough for me to lose consciousness would have been bad enough. I was looking at a concussion at the least when I woke up.

If I woke up.

But the rest? Terror crashing over me so strongly that I couldn’t lift a finger while a threat casually strolled forward to do me harm? It was too much.

“It’s too much. Do you hear me?” I shouted. “Magic swords and a life-altering revelation? Alouin, my family’s kept this secret from me for years. What else have they kept hidden?”

Panting, I sightlessly stared at swirling black. I couldn’t dwell on the possibility of additional lies, not when more pressing concerns required my attention.

The stranger, whoever he was, obviously wasn’t friendly. A friend didn’t pin one in place or knock one unconscious, and I was in the hands of someone who’d done both. Which meant.

“I need to wake up,” I said under my breath. “I need to get out of here.”

But how-?

“I can help with that.”

For a moment, all I could do was shudder with my eyes fighting against what was holding them open.

That voice. I knew it, didn’t I? It-

The hooded wraith from my last nightmare peeked into view, and I frowned.

“You’re talking to me now?” I asked.

The wraith cocked his head.

“Wait. You can actually hear me this time?” he whispered.

“Of course I can. Why wouldn’t I be able to?” I asked. “And what do you mean you can help?”

Shooting to his full height, the wraith lifted fingers to his mouth.

“Oh, my gods, he hears me,” he said. “Does that mean we…? No. Still blocked.”

I narrowed my eyes.

“Who are you?” I asked.

Stiffening, the wraith bent over me, clasping his hands behind his back. Almost, a fierce smirk could be seen beneath that hood’s all-consuming black.

“At the moment, my designated identifier will mean nothing to you,” he said. “Perhaps later, I will share it, but for now, you have mentioned a desire to leave this place?”

For a long moment, I simply stared, and not once in that examination did the wraith move, not even to breathe. Not visibly at least.

“I don’t understand any of what’s happened this morning,” I eventually said. “I’m not sure I can handle another mystery on top of everything else, but if you get me to the waking world before someone hurts me, I’ll try to ignore that.”

The wraith turned my silence back on me; his previous motionlessness frenetic when compared to the appearance of a man absent his essence. The nightmare turned chilly with ice filling my lungs.

“I have a price for my assistance,” the wraith said.

Of course he did. Nothing in life came for free.

“What is it?” I asked through gritted teeth.

An arm shot out of the wraith’s cloak while a knife slipped into his hand. That blade, in all of this nightmare’s dark landscape, shone. If I could, I’d recoil from it, but immobilized as I was, I could only stare with my breath quickening.

“Cease your fear. This is not meant for you,” the wraith said, “but I shall require it for my price. If you want me to help you, heart of-

“If you want help, I require your permission to free you.”

…What?

“How is that a price? I’ve wanted my freedom for years,” I said. “Also, you can do that?”

Again, the hood cocked.

“Yes,” the wraith said, “but only if you give me permission.”

I wasn’t a fan of a stranger with a knife, especially one as disturbing as the wraith, standing anywhere near me while I couldn’t defend myself. I couldn’t, however, do much to change my circumstances, and leaving my fate in this relatively benign man’s hands seemed wiser than doing the same for the stranger in the waking world.

“Do as you like,” I said. “Free me.”

A convulsion ran over the wraith, and when he threw his head back, the hood started slipping off of it.

“Finally,” he said.

His rough voice filled the nightmare, sending fingers of unease sliding over my skin. The wraith dropped to his knees with his knife clattering beside him, and cold hands rested on either side of my face.

“I will begin immediately,” he said, “but in the meantime, you must WAKE UP.”

Something tugged between my shoulder blades, making my nightmare narrow to a point, and a voice chased me as I fell away from it.

“Do not leave me alone again. Return to me. Please.”

Water cascaded over me, and sputtering, I tried to escape from the stream. This proved quite impossible, considering my hands had been bound behind my back. Instead, all I did was scrape myself against something with a rough texture.

What had happened? The last thing I remembered was fear. Fear of… something. A stranger? My father had skidded around the cottage’s corner with a bow in hand, and… that was it.

Squinting, I shook my head, hoping to clear clouded memory.

Only clouded memory. No headache. Why didn't I...?

Not important. First, where was I? The sun could never shine this brightly on a homestead shaded by a forest’s canopy. I peered through my half-lowered lids while my eyes adjusted, and what I saw petrified me.

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I knew this empty square, bordered by a tavern and a stable. I knew the road I was facing, leading toward the woods that hid my home. I knew the people who were frozen around me—something wrong there—and that meant I knew the town’s name.

Fissid.

It also meant that I knew what I was resting against.

Even with my mind begging me not to do it, I craned my neck until I could see a small roof covering a well. It had been here. Here, my mother-

Water closes over my head before I can think to breathe. My arm dangles from its slaps against stone, and when I use it to swim, I nearly faint. Blinking at stars, I kick, managing to surface.

Someone stares at me from the hole overhead, and I scream before water sucks me under again. Thrashing my legs, I struggle to keep my head aloft.

“Mama!” I shout. “I can’t-”

Water claims me once more, and when I fight free of it, I cough and sputter, sobbing.

“Mama, help!”

The tail end of a rope splashes beside me, and my mother climbs over the edge. She hurries to come down, but at the pace she’s taking, she’ll never reach me before I sink to the well’s floor. I grab the rope with my good arm, and a shiver speeds up it. It jostles my mother off of the wall, jerking the rope out of her hands. Shrieking, she falls, and her head smacks the wall before she flops on top of me.

A cry drew me out of my memories, and addled, I sought the noise’s source. I found it in Arabella, the daughter of Fissid’s baker. Also, the first girl I’d ever fancied.

She was standing perfectly still in front of a man cloaked in cloth and shadow, and he was holding a sword to her throat. I met the girl’s eyes, saw the tears trembling in them, and abruptly realized what I’d missed before.

Twisting, I scanned the square, and indeed, everyone who called Fissid home had been crowded into it, lying or kneeling or crouching in the dirt. No one moved, even with twitching muscles betraying their desire to flee, but nothing restrained them. No chains or ropes were wrapped around their limbs. They just… didn’t move.

“It’s my battle magic, so rare in this day and age. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that I’m the last to claim it.”

All of me had become stone: my head swinging to the stranger, my wrists burdened with shackles, my shoulders bowing as I realized how much danger I was in.

So, it was with some surprise that I heard my voice emerge smooth and hard, like polished marble.

“What do you want?”

The stranger—monster really—continued as if I hadn’t spoken.

“These good people around you feel it, the same as what I directed at you earlier. They are weak, never to overcome their fear. For a time, I’ve withdrawn it from you, not only because you appear to be as weak as them but because I require answers. These innocents will serve as hostages. I will kill one for every time you defy me. Do we understand one another?”

I had no doubt that he’d fulfill his threat. There was nothing empty about it, so I slowly nodded my acceptance.

“Good,” the monster said. “You, the old man closest to him. Release his shackles.”

He tossed a key so that it thumped on cracked earth, and Vincelten, Fissid’s blacksmith, scrambled to retrieve it. He wouldn’t look at me as he maneuvered the key in its lock.

The shackles dropped to the dirt, but I didn’t move, save for curling my fingers around their chain. I didn’t know what I’d do with this makeshift weapon, but with the weight of my hunting knife gone from my side, I was grateful to have any possible means of defense.

“What did you do to my family?” I asked.

As he hummed, the monster’s sword twitched on Arabella’s neck, and I shrunk against the well.

“I’ll be asking the questions, thank you,” he said. “First, your name. What is it?”

Why did he care?

“I’m called Raimie.”

With a snort, the monster shook his head.

“You shouldn’t lie to me,” he said, “or if you must, at least make it believable. Don’t give me an Eselan name when you’re clearly human.”

Eselan? As in the race long vanished from the world? Why would he bring-?

“Let me remind you that your actions have consequences, child,” the monster said.

His sword flashed with an arc of red flying from its tip, and Arabella, released from the monster’s clutches, folded to the ground, feebly pawing at the gash in her neck. I couldn’t take my eyes off of her as she shuddered and fell still.

This couldn’t be happening. Who killed someone over a perceived lie? That just… didn’t happen, not in this world. Not in Ada’ir.

But there lay proof that perhaps my perception of the world was false, and I should be burning with anger or babbling with fear. I shouldn’t have cold frosting my insides and numbing my mind.

Lifting my gaze, I found the monster already holding another person captive.

“Why would you do that? I told you the truth. Why would you punish me for it?” I asked. “Do you want me to lie? I’ll do or be whatever you want if it will keep these people safe, but you have to tell me what that is.”

The monster cocked his hood while the man he was holding visibly shook.

“You’re quite strange,” he said, “but I suppose that doesn’t matter, much like your name won’t. I don’t know why I asked about it. Tell me about Shadowsteal instead.”

Of course this strange and hostile exchange had something to do with that.

“What do you want to know?” I asked. “I can’t share much. I only found it yesterday.”

The monster nodded.

“I figured as much. Its ringing started this morning, and anyone with a cautious bone in their body would take time to decide whether to accept its burden,” he said. “I want to know what happened when you touched it.”

But I didn’t know how to describe that. I had yet to wrap my mind around what had happened this… morning…

Why was it only midday? Earlier, I’d noticed the sun beating down on me, but the implication of that hadn’t hit until now.

The trip from my home to Fissid took several hours. It should be evening, not an hour or so since the monster had stolen me from my family. Had I lain unconscious for a full day?

A wet gurgle snapped my attention to the monster as he switched victims once more.

“I’m not a patient man, child,” he said. “Quickly answer my questions, or we’ll create a corpse pile much more quickly that I’d like.”

For a moment, a flash of heat seared through my numbness, and I fought to push words into the world, words that might have saved a man.

“I touched Shadowsteal and… I don’t know what to tell you. What happened involved a lot of light, but that’s about all I can give you. I couldn’t understand the rest.”

Hissing, the monster retreated, almost unintentionally murdering the woman in his arms.

“It’s come,” he said. “Shadowsteal has emerged into our world once more, and you are him, in truth. What do I do?”

Was- was that all he’d wanted from me? Two questions answered? Why couldn’t he have done that in the forest? Why had he brought me to Fissid?

“Gods, I made a mistake, not seizing the damn sword when I had the chance, no matter how much doing so would have hurt,” the monster said. “Being near it was bad enough but touching it…”

Sickened coughing interrupted his spiel.

Ah. Yes, that might explain his haste to leave my home.

“Still, it must be done, my mistake rectified. My master will tolerate no less,” the monster said, as if to himself. “That should be easy enough. If I lure the upstart family here, they’ll bring Shadowsteal with them.”

Stiffening, the monster turned to me.

“But what to do with you?”

I said not a word. Pleading would do me no good. Instead, I clenched my fingers around a chain with my body winding like a spring.

Which only made the monster laugh.

“Oh, you are tenacious, aren’t you?” he asked. “Very well. I’ll give you a chance to escape. If you can, my master should find you plenty entertaining.”

Releasing his captive, he shoved her away from him before raising a hand.

“But for now, submit.”

He flicked his fingers, and I fell to a throb in my head, one that turned my vision white, and terror strong enough to trip my thoughts over themselves. For a time, these were all I knew, but gradually, they retreated from me, although each slow step away was a taunt about how easily they could conquer me once more.

When my head was filled with only a dull ache, I blinked at a once more changed scene. I recognized Ytrella’s waystation from the many times my family and I had spent the night here. The illumination coming through its windows seemed wrong, though, changed from sunlight, and when I tried to stand, I nearly tumbled myself and the chair attached to me sideways.

Glancing down, I tugged at the rope holding my wrists and ankles to wood. Damn, that was tight. How was I supposed to escape this? Could I?

After several minutes of squirming, I fell still, gasping with sweat soaking into my clothes. Why was it so hot in here?

Awkwardly, I dried my face on my shoulder, and something outside the waystation’s windows caught my eye. Frowning, I scooted closer, and perplexity was etched into me when a black sky was revealed. If night had fallen, what was lighting this room? I saw no candles or lanterns here.

Or people. Duh. Why hadn’t I tried the easiest solution to my predicament?

“If anyone’s out there, I need help,” I shouted. “I know you probably hate me now but…”

But what? How could I excuse what my mere presence had done to interrupt these people’s lives? For all I knew, they’d been the ones who’d tied me to this chair.

Shaking my head, I inched toward the windows. Maybe if I got a better view of what lay outside, I could… decide…

Well. That clarified the heat and strange lighting. It explained the smell and the faint roar filling the air too, now that I thought about it.

Fissid was in flames, great tongues of fire licking at the air above its buildings. The conflagration hadn’t reached Ytrella’s waystation yet, not that I can see at least. In fact, all of town square seemed peaceful, but it wouldn’t be long before the blaze spread to engulf it.

Thrumming my boot tip beneath the rope, I twisted to examine it, and on seeing knots that made my eyes cross, I didn’t think I’d have much luck with untying myself. In addition, the tension from it already had my fingers tingling. No way was I squirming free of this without getting hurt.

Was that what the monster had meant when he’d said that he’d give me a chance to escape? Was I expected to hurt myself?

I almost missed the rope’s weakness. Along the inside of one portion, a small slash was indented into the fiber around it, as if intentionally nicked. Considering how shallow it was and how little I could move, I almost forwent this given opportunity, but gritting my teeth, I rubbed the slice against a rough corner, all while watching the inferno grow outside.

By the time the rope snapped, fire had begun its feast on the far side of town square. With no time to shake out my hand, I bent for an ankle and was stopped just short of reaching it. Making a face, I tried for my offhand wrist instead.

Ever so slowly, I worked the rope’s end through one tie, but by the time that was done, fire had claimed dominance across the square. I’d never free myself doing it this way, and a quick scan of the room revealed no sharp edges within my reach. I’d have to make my own.

Or break what I was bound to.

“Shit.”

This was a terrible idea, but when one’s choices were definite immolation while staying upright or a likely chance while lying on one’s side…

Hopefully, this chair had been shoddily crafted. Tipping it, I braced, hoping the impact wouldn’t break my ankle as well as the chair.

The sound of splintering wood masked my hiss. Ignoring the pain shooting up my leg, I further destroyed the chair, tearing the backrest off of its seat. Friction burns and splinters were the price of my other hand’s freeing, and while cloth shielded my ankles from the same, the one that I’d landed on throbbed. When I prodded it, nothing screamed at me, so I cautiously decided it must be sprained rather than broken.

That made it no less painful to walk on, although my personal hell was nothing compared to what lay outside.

In my efforts to extricate myself from the chair, the fire had surrounded me. What I’d seen from the window—the peril that had sped me to reckless lengths—had met an inferno, coming from behind the waystation. They converged on either side of the town, right where a road pierced through Fissid.

“Alouin damn it all,” I said.

How was I supposed to survive this?

I took a step outside, one that landed on something squishy, and on finding what had caused the noise, I leapt back, slapping my hand to my mouth. Shuddering gasps barely kept me from losing control of my stomach.

For outside of her waystation, Ytrella lay still, and more lumps were sprawled across the square. Hell, so many blank eyes were staring at me.

Doubling over, I coughed, which sent acid pouring from between my fingers. A town full of people. The monster had massacred a town.

Because of me.

Stepping over Ytrella, I dazedly wandered into the square’s center. Bending to retrieve a set of shackles, I tucked them into my waistband and closed my eyes.

This confusing mishmash of ice and fire, screaming and weeping inside of me? It must wait for a time. I needed to escape the tinderbox that Fissid had become before this fire braved the dirt sprawl of town square.

Maybe I could wait it out in the well?

Fluttering my eyes open, I forced them to land on that stone structure-

I keep mama aloft with my broken arm, clinging to the rope with the other. The clumsy curses I mutter help drive pain away, letting me stay conscious. If I see Bryruned again, I should thank the blacksmith’s apprentice for teaching them to me.

“Help!” I call. “Mama, please wake up.”

My whisper echoes alongside the slosh of water.

As time passes, light creeps up the well’s wall, and a visible patch of sky turns orange and purple. By the time stars emerge, cursing can’t retain my pain any longer, and I float, holding to consciousness for the sole purpose of maintaining my grip.

“Why did you chase me?” I ask. “Did you want to play Flee too? You should’ve said something. We would have let you join us.”

Mama says nothing, and I swallow a lump in my throat. Voices shout in the dark, but I can’t summon the energy to call for help. Doing so changed nothing earlier. Why should it help now? Instead, I hum a lullaby, indulging in the illusion that I’m putting mama to bed for once.

Her weight is lifted off of my arm, and it screams at that release of pressure. Mumbling my own protests, I slap at the water, searching for her.

From behind, something wraps around my stomach. I twist, flailing at what’s holding me, but even still, it lifts me into the air. I dangle until it pulls me over the well’s lip, and when I’m released, I flop to the ground.

“Raimie!”

A rough hand touches my cheek, and I grab it.

“Mama?” I ask.

When my eyes clear, my father’s worried face crystallizes into something recognizable.

“She’s fine. Waking up now. What happened?”

Closing my eyes, I surrender to sleep.

Why the hell was I dwelling on the past when my future looked shaky at best? Alouin, what had I been doing before descending into memories?

Snapping and cracking sounds spun me in place while one of the taller buildings nearby collapsed.

Right. I’d been escaping a fire.

If I got in the well, it might help with the flames, but it wouldn’t stop smoke from smothering me. It wouldn’t work, which means I’d have to choose a riskier solution.

Turning in place, I looked for the weakest section of the fire, but my initial inspection left me frozen. Too many options! Which would work best?

Right when hyperventilation was threatening to set in, I spotted something that I’d missed in the hazy darkness of this burning night. A shadowed figure was standing beside a building, frantically beckoning for me to follow.

I didn’t take the time to consider my fear of the figure or whether it could be an ally or not. Something deep inside, almost below my awareness, instinctively trusted it, and so, I took off for the apothecary.

Bursting into the shop, I threw an arm over my face with my eyes watering. Again, the shadowed figure guided me, standing beside a door along the back wall. Coughing, I avoided what flames I could, giving chase to an anomaly that I’d recoiled from that very morning.

Once I was on the other side of the apothecary, I dissolved into wet coughs, all while watching a shadowed figure shuffle in place.

I’d made it out of town square. Now to escape Fissid.

Again, the figure took the lead, although its jittering form now warped in unnerving ways. With its path weaving, it seemed drunk, but even so, I never considered going my own way. Later, I’d examine why doing that felt unnecessary, but for now, the figure had proven itself reliable, and I couldn’t find my way through this maze of death by myself.

But then, the figure led me into a dead end. Cottages crowded around the fringe of town, and to this point, we’d threaded through them with little problem. Now, I could see the creek that bordered Fissid through flickering orange and yellow, and beyond that lay a plain, lit only by the moon and stars.

Unfortunately, a collapsed cottage was blocking my path to it.

Turning to the darkened figure, I hissed, “Really? There’s no other way?”

It shook its head, soon followed by the rest of its form. A halting series of screeches contested the roar of destruction around us, and I lifted a hand to stop the figure.

“I understand,” I said. “Thank you for getting me this far. I don’t suppose you know how to get around that.”

When I waved at the collapsed beams, the shadowed figure faced them, cocking its head. It shrugged with another jumble of high-pitched noises spilling from it, and making a face, I waved for quiet.

After examining the mess, I had to agree with the figure. I saw no good way through it. Several acceptable paths lay there, but all of them would hurt me. So, which one would hurt the least?

As if summoned, the shadowed figure’s companion, all blazing light, stepped through the conflagration. It pointed at a smoldering plank, one that was perched above a reduced spread of flame. Could I even reach that?

Swallowing hard, I glanced over my shoulder, not so much from distrust but to alleviate the part of my brain that was screaming for another option. Unfortunately, manically cracking flames had already filled the path I’d taken to get here, making Fissid a beacon sure to be seen as far as the Fractured Peaks.

Cursing, I tested my weight on my sprained ankle, wincing when my leg nearly buckled. Hell, this would be fun.

With a growl, I sprinted for the plank, making the figures of light and shadow vanish as I came near. I jumped, reaching for something that I should never touch, and when I caught hold, a piercing scream fought the flare shooting from my palms with both begging for my attention.

I gave it to neither. I focused only on dragging my body over the wobbly plank and into the creak beyond.

Its icy water came as a blissful release, and I took a moment to enjoy it before pushing to my feet. Before I could take a breath, however, a white flash of agony sent me splashing below the surface again. With my air depleting, I thrashed in the water until something in my uncontrolled scramble moved me forward, and soon, I was dragging myself out of the creek by my elbows.

Collapsing on the creek’s bank, I reluctantly lifted my shaking hands, and on viewing them, it felt like someone had gut punched me. A black stripe ran across my palm with bone peeking through it in spots, and that same awful color was dotted across my fingertips. The skin between them was ruby red with blisters already forming, and I had to curl my hands into claws if I wanted to think clearly.

Ruined. They were utterly and completely ruined. Flopping my arms to either side, I burst into laughter while tears spilled from my eyes. Alouin, what would I do?

And how could I agonize over my woes when Fissid would soon become a graveyard? Why did I think I was more important than everyone who’d been murdered? How could this be real?

As if knowing how badly I needed the distraction, a roar split the night, one of a human’s making, and I tensed.

I knew that voice.

As fast as I could, I clambered to my feet, racing toward the noise. A distant part of my mind wondered where my helpful figures from before had gone, but mostly, a constant scan of my surroundings occupied me.

There wasn’t much to see. With its soil too rocky for farming and no other resources of value found here, the grasslands around Fissid had always lain empty. The only reason a town existed in such barren land was to serve as a gateway to Ratchav, the isolationist kingdom on Ada’ir’s western border.

I darted across this emptiness, running low enough that tall grass slapped my face. After several minutes, I’d begun to wonder whether I’d imagined the shout, but before I could give up, two silhouettes popped into view on my right. One was chasing the other away from Fissid.

Veering toward them, I slowed down. I knew one of these people, and I had my suspicions about the other one too, but considering all that this day had gifted me with, staying cautious seemed wise.

That conviction flew out the window as the man furthest from me paused to lift a bow. Its string twanged, sending an arrow speeding for his opponent’s head, and he took off again, never checking if his attack had landed.

It didn’t hit, but that wasn’t due to poor aim. The archer’s opponent swiped at the arrow while continuing forward, but the flutter of that cloak as he batted the projectile down chilled me. It made the sword wielder the monster from Fissid, and the only person I knew who had such skill with archery was my father.

Too much distance was separating me from the fight. I sprinted toward it anyway. My only weapon was a set of shackles, but I could do nothing else. I’d have helped even if the monster’s victim had been a stranger, but despite my determination, I wouldn’t reach this fight before it was over.

It didn’t matter how many arrows my father shot—and he was firing plenty—or how fast he ran… it just didn’t matter. The monster would win.

Maybe that was the bastard’s battle magic speaking, but if it was, my father felt it too. Dropping his bow, he raced for the monster. At the last second, he snatched an arrow from his quiver, jamming it toward his enemy’s neck.

The monster caught my father’s descending wrist. With a jerk, he spun my father before planting his foot in the man’s back. I watched him bend around that boot before he went flying, tumbling end over end.

Biting off my scream, I increased my pace. I made so much noise while flying through the grass, but the monster didn’t seem to notice, merely stalking to stand over where my father had fallen.

“-don’t want to kill him,” the bastard said. “He could lead us to Shadowsteal.”

Who was he speaking to? My father? There was no one else here.

“Yes, I suppose that damn ringing could serve as a beacon just as well,” the monster said, “but you know I don’t like unnecessary killi- AGH! Fine! You don’t have to do that.”

He lifted a boot to stomp on my father’s head, and I leapt on his back, looping my shackles’ chain around the bastard’s neck. My hands screamed snarling protests as I applied pressure to them. I bit my tongue to counter that until the taste of blood filled my mouth.

Off balance, the monster wavered before falling to his back, pinning me between him and the ground, but even stunned, I pulled on the chain with all of my strength.

The monster didn’t seem to care. One moment, blurry stars were revolving overhead, and the next, the monster shot to his feet, which had my forehead clunking into his skull. The bastard drove his elbow into my side with impossible force, and something snapped, leaving a jagged end tickling at my lung.

I couldn’t breathe! Couldn’t- couldn’t-

The chain I was clinging to was torn out of my hands, and I fell like a limp doll from the monster’s back, barely keeping myself upright.

I didn’t notice my impact with the ground. All I could focus on were my sips of air and the click produced by each of them.

Something slammed into my head, and reeling, I awkwardly fell on an arm. I should do something, should get up and- and- what else? What must I do?

“I’ve revised my opinion of you, foreseen child,” a voice said.

Why did it spawn such fear and hatred?

“You’re too dangerous,” it said. “So, despite my initial reservations, I must kill you, but please know, I looked for any reasonable excuse not to end your life.”

A vortex of black towered over me with a smaller twin at its side. A length of something shiny rose in the air, hovering, and a voice I knew and loved shouted angry, unkind things.

“Sh, sh,” I mumbled to it. “You’ll scare Volatility away.”

The glint, flashing for my chest, faltered, and a new person, someone with white light streaking over them, barreled into the vortex, knocking it to the side. What… what… what…?

“Raimie!”

I heard love. Something I… I should… how to…?

Between blinks of the world, the ground and I reversed positions with my hands…

Oh, my hands…

Light and dark were clashing somewhere, a display that would have taken my breath away if I’d had any to give. Why were they…?

Didn’t matter. I’d reach… reach…

I looked upon familiar, drab hair and blue eyes.

“Raimie,” this mash of colors breathed.

Such relief… Why?

With my goal achieved, I stopped resisting my body’s call. I fell face-first into flattened grass and stayed down, gone to wherever the mind fled when its body failed.

“This place again?” I sighed. “I thought I died.”

Inky black swirled above me, and the temptation to scream at my immobility struck me once more. Hard.

But I wasn’t totally restrained. Wonder began a slow seep into me as I flexed my hand, now free.

“It doesn’t hurt,” I said. “Injuries don’t transfer here?”

“Why would they? We are in o- your head.”

The wraith sat beside me, yet another man hidden beneath copious amounts of fabric, but this one was different. I thought. I didn’t know how I’d missed his presence until now.

For a while, I watched as the wraith sawed at something I couldn’t see. This man disturbed me, and yet, I trusted him, much like I had with the figures of light and shadow. Could they be connected?

“You have returned,” the wraith said. “I am glad.”

“I didn’t get a choice in the matter,” I said. “Kind of hard to stay conscious when your body’s taken as much damage as mine.”

The wraith stopped drawing his jagged knife along my invisible bonds, jerking his head to face me.

“That sounds… bad,” he said.

“It’ll be fine,” I said. “I’m not dead, I don’t think. I suppose this could be the afterlife.”

Resuming his work, the wraith said, “You are alive.”

“How do you know that?” I asked.

“I know it because I live,” the wraith said.

He glanced up at the sky.

“I must retreat for a moment,” he said. “You will wake up soon. Do not descend too far into panic before that happens. Your screaming… I do not like hearing it.”

Rising, the wraith flicked his knife up a sleeve before stalking out of view. For a moment, I merely flexed my hand, marveling at the motion.

“Even my dreams have turned topsy-turvy,” I said.

Stretching an unmarred palm toward the sky, I waited to leave my nightmare.