Of all the terrors Ditan expected, being left alone was not one of them. He marked the passage of days and the sleeplessness of nights. The wagon rumbled on, then stopped, starting again the next morning. A Sentinel would bring meager food and small servings of water.

Eilic vanished from his life, as did Sariam. Not even Modius checked him. The moment he’d had with Trynneia remained the only time he’d seen her or Ylane again. His confinement and the lack of any information filled him with dread. Either they were deliberately kept from him, or the Sentinels had murdered them and proceeded to take him to Praxen for whatever reason Modius might still have.

I don’t know anymore what’s going on, he thought as he drifted in and out of sleep. No one hung him upside down. No one injured him like Eilic would. A short length of chain bound him to a wall, long enough to reach the small pot they’d given him to relieve himself. It restricted him from climbing any of the crates, so causing more damage to the warding sigils remained out of reach. Probably for the best, he lamented.

He could tell by the dry air that they’d entered the desert. The magic of the sigils maintained temperature for him, but he’d get a blast of air from a gust of wind that left him gasping as it sapped the moisture from his nostrils. Ditan drank more when he could, never sparing a drop.

Clothing stayed the one constant he’d been denied. With only rare visits from people he barely knew as well as the unchanging temperature, he no longer cared about his modesty or comfort. If they brought him some, he honestly didn’t know if he’d bother to wear them.

Ditan spent his days struggling to think. He knew the Grimcell was wearing him down with the fuzzy, thick feeling that stuffed his head and buzzed in his ears. The night he’d gotten free and made contact became a fading memory, and he languished as malnutrition set in.

Night came again, another in a meaningless repetition he no longer tracked. No light came through his solitary window save starlight. He heard no one once the horses had been uncoupled to graze on whatever stores the Sentinels had brought with them.

“Psst. Hey,” someone whispered through the window. Ditan didn’t know if he felt the man stand up on the rear of the wagon, or if he was just that tall. More pointedly, he didn’t care.

“Come on. Hsst.” The man sounded urgent, remaining quiet enough to not attract attention, but loud enough for Ditan to get annoyed.

“What do ya want, comin’ to bother me? I’m just tryin’ to get some rest here,” he said after a moment to collect his thoughts.

“Giving you a warning, gob. He’s not happy with you.”

“Who…what? I haven’t done anything. Don’t know who ya are, but thanks for nothing. I’ll take my chances.” He grumbled and rolled onto his side to face one of the crates. No point looking around. Faces in the darkness with cryptic messages can piss off, he thought.

“Suit yourself. Just thought you should know. We may hunt your kind, but we’re not all your enemy,” the man said. “Shit. Gotta go.”

He did notice the wagon shake this time as the man jumped down. Fancy that, someone thinking they’re bein’ helpful and callin’ themselves a friend. Didn’t even try to get me out. Some friend, Ditan thought.

Tracing another of the sigils, he tried again to find its harmonic point. Each momentary pulse came in a routine pattern. For the last few days he’d tried to memorize the time to try and catch it. If he waited for it, the pulse passed him by as if anticipating him. His focus drifted when he was unsuccessful, and it took a greater sense of will to keep him on task than he possessed.

Another shimmer avoided him, the familiar tingle missing. Frustrated, he pounded the floor with his fist. Quit it. You’ll just draw attention to yerself, he told himself.

-Beware-

Yeah, I know. Wait. Yer here again?

-It changes.-

What changes? Don’t be cryptic now. I need to know. Spill it. A few specks of color appeared where his fist had struck the floor. They hovered up and down, purple and amber, shifting with the pattern of the sigils. Up once the wave shimmered past, down as it approached.

I can time this. They’re showing me what to do. When the next pass approached,, he slapped his hand down, sliding it with the motion of the pattern as it flowed around him. There! It shifted color, changing from silver to brown at his touch. The feel of it changed as well, losing the wood grain texture and taking on a liquid feel, like a slime or mucus coated the wood.

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He watched the hues bobbing up and down, their speed slowing. The subsequent wave tried splitting around him, but he reacted to the change, catching it again. It resisted him, tugging out from under his hand. Ditan hesitated. The wave slowed, keeping time with the hues that guided him.

-Harmony-

What do ya think I’m tryin’ to do? I’m not exactly chasing bundies around here. Despite his harsh attitude, he understood what the elements wanted. Work with it, not against it, he told himself. As it came around again he placed his good hand and his other wrist on the ground just behind him and shut his eyes.

The hues had served as a guide, but they couldn’t lead him to the harmony they desired. He took the sensation and flowed with it, dragging his arms to his front, gliding over the wood with the wave. Ditan allowed it to carry his limbs not through strength of his conviction but by the purpose of the sigils.

Pulses of energy caressed him with an etheric, ecstatic release as the wave slowed to a crawl. He could feel it make its way around the wagon, its shimmer caressing his skin, compressing it on its journey, massaging weak muscles. As it crested again, he reached back and slid forward until it stopped between his hand and wrist.

Ditan knew he’d done something right. Echoes of whispers flooded his head, unmistakably elemental but foreign, their way of talking unfamiliar. He overlapped his hand onto his left wrist, feeling a warm vibration growing, shaking its way up his arms to his chest, struggling to break free.

Shifting his seating position, he held his hand and wrist together on the ground in front of him. The sigils directly beneath them writhed, unable to continue their pattern. The wood bucked and rebelled, creaking as it deformed in an attempt to release the warding Ditan had trapped.

I’ve caught ya, but what do I do with ya? It jerked his arms apart, violently trying to escape him, but he fought it. Brown and orange spots of light flooded his vision, spouting up from the sigils beneath him, a geyser of elemental defiance. Ditan circled his hand and wrist together, following the flow of the colors. Through their direction, he acted.

His hand began to warm, then glow a dull green. The same reaction occurred to his left wrist, becoming painful as he rejected the ward’s need to escape. You’ve held me too long. I’m not letting you go, he thought. “Not today,” he whispered out loud.

The pain spiked to agony, and every sigil in the wagon turned red. Outside, someone shouted and he heard footsteps start running. The skin on his fingers and forearms blistered and cracked, the power feeding back overwhelming him. Ditan screamed his frustration as his strength gave out, the power releasing itself into a violent cascade that flung him back and rocked the entire wagon repeatedly. Warding waves rippled uncontrollably, its pattern broken.

Ditan cradled his hand and wrist, tucking them each under the other arm. So much for drawing attention to myself, he thought. The hues vanished, abandoning him once the sigils corrected the disturbance. He heard the door unlock and open. Refusing to look, he sat with his head bowed.

The wagon shook several times. He focused on the vibrations, feeling them through the floor, trying to distract himself from the pain he felt. Three people - no, four - entered. The wagon wasn’t large. Their presence loomed over him. One of them had a lantern; he could feel its radiant heat upon his face.

“What did you think that would accomplish, Ditan?” The Warden’s voice, closer than the others he felt. He could smell the man’s musky scent. They all reeked now, a week or so outside of civilized lands. Stuck in the desert.

“You should have listened earlier,” someone whispered. Not as close, but just as audible, at least to him. Finding this moment of harmony, even as it waned, had its small advantages.

Ditan opened his eyes, lazily looking up to the Warden. “I just wanted to see your pretty face again,” he said. “I’ve been so lonely.”

“Charming,” Modius said. “I gave you time. You think we don’t watch you every moment of every day?”

“Sorry I couldn’t see that. If ya had been more present, I wouldn’t have asked for attention,” Ditan said. “I didn’t mind the quiet though.”

“Well, I think that’s come to an end. You couldn’t just accept our neglect and die in here on your own. I would have been fine taking back a shaman’s corpse and blame it on faulty warding. But I’ve thought about it these last few days. No, you’re worth more to me still alive, more's the pity.”

“I thought you had grown a conscience. You should have just told me to die. Or sent Eilic. He’s rather fond of that sort of thing.”

“I see why he gets excessive with you,” Modius said. “I’ll let you get reacquainted.”

“Thankya. I missed him,” Ditan replied. “He’s always good for conversation.”

“He and I have had a few conversations that may or may not benefit you. I”ll let you decide,” the Warden said. “Bring him outside,” he instructed the other Sentinels.

They unclasped the shackle and led him out by a rope around his waist. His short legs sunk in sand that retained the day’s warmth but the night’s chill hadn’t quite touched. The others struggled as they approached a short cliff fronted by small jagged outcroppings covered with cacti. Several wagon’s worth of people gathered around a central fire. Trynneia and Ylane sat among them, looking tense.

“Our prisoner has decided he needs a lesson in humility,” Modius said, laughing. Ditan laughed mockingly with him. “Haul him up.”

Ditan expected the girls to speak out in his defense. They said nothing as Sentinels fastened ropes around his ankles. Ylane turned away, burying her face against Trynneia’s shoulder. His friend watched stoically, trying to comfort the girl.

Modius directed his Sentinels to turn him upside down. Ah this again, he mused glumly. Ditan couldn’t bring himself to care. His friends didn't move to stop anything. Why won’t they help? Another Sentinel brought the Warden a whip. I see where this is going.

“I didn’t do anything wrong. Just for the record,” Ditan said.

They yanked him up against the cliff face, the rocks cutting into his back as the cacti embedded their barbs into his flesh. He arched his back, trying to get away from them. That’s when the whip began to strike, forcing him against the cliff once more.