The air was impossibly clear, the winter wildflowers were impossibly alive on the hill slopes, and the girls’ ears were still impossibly pointed.

Niamh was staring again. She’d originally counted eight rings in the princess’ ears but this afternoon had caught a glimpse of a tiny stud hidden in her left helix. A violet gem just below the delicate arch of her ears that identified her as Fae. A people from this side of the mountains who were as much a myth as Niamh was herself.

“We need to find a healer, Kerrick” the female - not girl - snapped. “You must rest.” She didn’t turn to her knight as she led their strange trio further along the narrow road. A too-empty pack bounced on her woollen coat with each straight-backed stride she made.

“We need to push on, avoid the crowds who would recognise you, and travel to the library,” Kerrick argued from beside Niamh, limping against his make-shift crutch. A husky cough between laboured breaths betrayed his attempt at a strong defence against his mistress. The cooling alpine air did nothing to dry the sweat beads on his brow. “Please, Princess Thaya.”

Thaya stopped at the use of her heavy title. With a gloved hand gripping her rapier hilt, she turned and stomped straight to glare up at the Fae male who still amassed almost twice her size. “You. Are sick.”

Niamh watched each fixed on the other, unrelenting.

Loosening a shuddering breath, Thaya lowered her gaze to his leg. “The blade was poisoned,” she whispered. “Lady Niamh has already done more than I thought possible. You must rest.”

Kerrick’s eyes softened at Thaya’s concern and as she reached up for him Niamh wandered along, feigning the sudden urge to be very interested in a flower poking up through the gravel road.

They assured her that the road was rarely used, if at all. The southern trading hub at the bottom of the goat track was where all roads crossed in this part of their country, none interested in passing the ominous mountains now behind them. She scoffed to herself. After all her eternal years she was deciding to become part of the world again. Tucking her nose into her scarf she placed a hand on her chest and looked ahead to the mid-afternoon sun.

They were running out of time.

“I’ll go,” she announced and spun to face them. “We get to the end of the foothills by nightfall, correct? I’ll sneak in as the town sleeps.”

Thaya shook her head. “The Market trades through the night. Our light,” she demonstrated their purely magical ability with an outstretched gloved palm glowing brightly despite the sun, “and our sight keeps our activities extended. And you…” she trailed off as her eyes slid to Niamh’s round ears.

Niamh waved her off. “What’s one more traveller with a hood drawn in the cold? I’ll go and meet you in the east by dawn.” Before they had the chance to argue she spun on her heels, gravel crunching under her boots, and headed further along the unfamiliar road.

They continued north in silence until the sun hung low in the sky. As they finally reached the top of a rocky crest, one Kerrick struggled to climb, the world dropped away and opened before them.

Niamh didn't know where to look first. The valley that stretched below was a forest of fire. The orange sun set red and gold leaves burning. The bare mountains curved around the trees to the west, continuing alongside the wilderness as far as she could see. At the base of where they stood was a huge clearing. Trade roads emerged from the trees and hills from each direction to converge through a bazaar made of stone buildings and thick canvases covering many of the walkways.

The Southern Market.

Niamh had been to trade towns and marketplaces, cities and ports of all the continents, and even with the distance she could feel the hum of the crowds on her skin. Her body yearned to be amongst a new culture, to discover the hidden alleyways and story houses, despite her efforts to distance herself from life.

But it was the smoke that nullified her wanderlust. A pillar of grey stained the far eastern sky. She knew by the size that it came from a large army, one unbothered by the attention such bonfires would create. Her companions finally came alongside and stared out to the shadow.

“Annergard. We cannot detour,” Kerrick said gravely.

Thaya pulled her eyes from the smoke and the town in the army’s path to look up at him. She took his hand between hers and a conversation unspoken passed between them. She nodded.

It wasn’t that Niamh owed these Fae anything, on the contrary, she ended up saving them. But with that simple movement she decided.

“Don’t worry, Princess,” she said, looking into their deceptively youthful faces. “I will heal him proper.” Once again Niamh turned from their confusion and took the lead down the last leg of the winding track, hand to her chest. She had forgotten the pull of a town on the crossroads to new places. Of the promise of hot meals and warm beds they greatly needed.

She stepped down and told herself that it was the weight she knew the princess felt of this country depending on her, a weight she knew too well, that led her to break the rule she already broke too often. That it was this burden that pushed her to action and not the sight of a lover's sacrifice that touched the hollow spot in her chest.

Their progress downward was slower than Niamh would have liked but the distance shorter than she expected. The steep decline meant they skidded along flat sections, needing to reach the base before sundown. As soon as flat ground appeared they all but ran east, Niamh under Kerrick’s arm urging him on. They followed the common road into the forest as far as they dared while knowing the army lay ahead. The brisk movement kept them warm against the chill of a winter’s night and when Niamh began to carry Kerrick more than he was himself, she veered them into the trees and finally to a stop.

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“We need a fire, Princess,” she said as she balanced Kerrick against a tree. She pulled the bedroll from his back, flattened it and laid the male onto it. The filtered moonlight showed the strain the movement caused him.

Thaya shuffled around and created a measly collection of twigs, more than she ever actually needed, before removing her gloves and setting them alight with fingertips of purple flame. No flint or further wood needed if she so wished it. She came up to Kerrick’s side, the fire reflected the sweat continuing to roll down his contorted features.

“His fever’s worsened. He won’t survive without a healer.” The choke in Thaya’s voice held back her unshed tears. She pulled her pack around and extracted a rag to dab his face.

“I need a cup and the wine.” Niamh pulled off her own pack and unsheathed the knife at her hip. The princess hadn’t moved. Niamh lowered herself and softly squeezed the female’s shoulder. “Thaya,” she pressed lightly. “The wine.”

Snapping to action Thaya rustled in the bag as Niamh pulled up her coat and tunic sleeve. Goosebumps spread over her exposed forearm. Thaya held out the travel-worn cup and flask of wine, eyes widening at the sight of Niamh hovering the knife over her arm.

“Pour it,” Niamh instructed and Thaya followed. As the liquid hit the cup Niamh pulled the blade across the edge of her arm. She hissed at the sting and nodded to the cup of wine. Thaya held it out again and Niamh hovered the cut above it. Blood trickled into the red liquid. “Mix it and make him drink.”

Thaya didn’t question the order. She tilted Kerrick’s head, brought the rim to his lips and tipped its strange contents. Niamh wrapped a rag of her own around the cut, secured it enough for now, and pulled her warm fabrics back down.

Long minutes passed as the last of the liquid was poured and drunk, colour already beginning to seep into Kerrick’s face. The strain lifted from his breaths as he sighed and fell asleep. 

“I trust you understand why I don’t make a habit of this healing method.” Niamh let the slightest of threatening tones into her voice.

Thaya nodded. She moved to feed the fire with fallen wood and when caught, the purple tinge of the flames faded to gold as she withdrew her power. She finally relaxed now that Kerrick slept peacefully for the first time in days. Taking up her spot by the fire across from Niamh, she warmed her hands. The metal in her ears caught the light and shone like tiny stars.

High above, the leaves rustled with a chilled breeze as silence stretched between them.

“Her soul will darken when she consumes the stars,” Thaya recited, stone faced, staring into the burning wood. “The stone of Syfren will hold her until his blood is spilled.”

“Not terribly exciting as far as prophecies go.” Niamh stretched her arms and legs more than needed and placed a hand to her chest where the Syfren Stone hung from a necklace beneath her clothes. “I tend not to dwell on it too much.”

“Yours is a story told around many campfires, Lady Niamh. Along the roads across many lands. I asked you to lend me your power in exchange for those words, and more. To read the chronicles that extend your legend. Would you like to hear them now?”

Niamh contemplated the offer, struck by the largeness of it. “No,” she answered.

Thaya nodded. And with that, they rested.

- - - - - - - - - -

The dawn was strikingly still. The kind of stillness that Niamh knew too well and was never fully prepared for. She felt the coming conflict like a bug on her skin or itch in her mind that she could not scratch. She woke Thaya and Kerrick. They too felt the shift in the air and packed quickly, quietly, and followed Niamh without instruction.

They moved through the trees, easier now that Kerrick could carry himself. Though still limping heavily, he no longer required the crutch and stood tall without the poison through his veins. They walked remarkably silent through the scrub, each having lived long enough to learn the skill.

It wasn’t long until the noise began and grew. The steady beating of thousands of feet on the ground. The clanging of metal bodies and indisputable sound of war horses on the march. The trio had hoped that Annergard’s army would wait until the shrill of winter had passed before bearing down on the Southern Market and taking the resources they needed to pass across the mountains.

They had been wrong.

They were running. The eastern road they had travelled the night before came into view and they burst through the trees. Niamh knew they were all that stood between the army and the city of travellers. From their last correspondence, the princess surmised that her men were still a day north . Too far to come to the city’s aid.

Black banners came into view.

Niamh watched as Thaya and Kerrick removed their packs and heavier cloaks, discarding them amongst some trees. They drew their swords, a purple glow sheathing them as the princess rallied her power. She would go down here, killed before the real fight had even begun, to save one town. Niamh watched in honest surprise as they moved to take up stand in front of her.

In front of her.

The black-clad soldiers and horses crested infront of them, unwavering at the strange trio standing before them. Cries began to sound and their own swords began to appear. The first arrows flew toward them but embedded into tree trunks on a purple-tinged wind.

Niamh calmly stepped between and beyond her friends. For she would call them that, and this was her place. In the middle of the road in an unknown country, between a power-hungry army and a town of travellers. No longer would she stand on the sides of history and watch the world evolve and live beyond her reach.

A commander had been called, riding to the front of the force on a dirty grey stallion. He yelled at his men, trying to find reason for their sudden halt. He gazed out towards the woman moving towards him, no fear in her face.

He was not stupid, Niamh discovered. Recognition flared in his eyes of the princess, the hulking knight by her side, and the woman who had been their mission to the southern lands. He only cried out one last time to his men, steering his stallion back into the front lines.

And when the stones started to lift from the road and the tips of her dark hair began to hover and stream around her; when the glow of her yet-to-darken soul spread to her upturned palms, and she smiled.

They ran.