Tsia awoke briefly in the night to every fiber of her body aching. The healing potions she had taken forced the body to heal at a rapidly accelerated rate, but the backlash was never pleasant. She lay there on the ground listening to the crackling of the fire. A cold breeze ran its soft fingers down her back, and she shivered, but Tsia was too tired to even open her eyes, let alone contemplate moving. A heavy weight settled over her, gentle hands tucking the corners of a blanket around her, and bathed in new warmth, she slipped again into unconsciousness.

The savory smell of bacon woke her the second time. She moved slowly beneath the heavy blanket, her body still incredibly sore, as she forced herself to sit up, prying her eyes open a slit.

“Nēs̆u?” she croaked.

“Vāya’s blessings, you’re finally awake.” Hopping up from the other side of the fire, Nēs̆u loomed over her seconds later, his face a mix of concern and anger. “What happened down there? When you flew above the cliff, you were barely even conscious. If I hadn’t decided to follow you, you might have tumbled into the sea and drowned.”

His words tumbled out one after another, too quick for her still exhausted brain to comprehend, so she just ignored him. She was too tired to argue, and right now the only thing she cared about was the delicious scent tormenting her starving stomach. Stretching out her hands, she beseeched him with just one word. “Bacon?”

Tsia finished off three heaping plates before she finally felt up to talking. Nēs̆u listened quietly to her story, asking a few pointed questions as she described her fight in the caverns below. She did her best to gloss over her capture, but the old warrior sussed out that she was hiding something, and made her tell him the truth.

“You are lucky to be alive,” he concluded. “Selene only knows what they might have done to you.” He shook his head. “The mountain tribes have a bad reputation and as a young woman, by yourself..." He shook his head. "If only you would listen to Vāya when he talks to you, then maybe-"

But he isn’t talking to me - Selene herself said as much, but she let Nēs̆u babble on, trying to ignore the anger that pulsed through her veins. He's only pushing me so hard because he wants me to be safe, she told herself.

Forcing a smile, Tsia cut him off. “There’s no point in worrying about what might have happened. It didn’t. I survived. I’m fine. And now we just need to turn the quest into Neqelmû.”

Nēs̆u looked unconvinced, but he let the matter drop, and as soon as breakfast was finished, he packed up and they returned to town.

Neqelmû face held a hint of annoyance when she strode into the office, but he hid it well, greeting her respectively. "Did you decide you wanted a different mission, my lady? I'm sure we can arrange-" He trailed off as Tsia pulled one box after another from her bag of holding, piling them up around his desk, along with a few severed heads as proof the ne'er-do-wellers had been punished. With an incredulous shake of his head, he turned back to her with newfound respect gleaming in his eyes. “I must admit, my lady, I wasn’t exactly expecting to see you again.”

“Why not? I signed a contract, didn't I?” Tsia frowned.

The Djinn had the grace to look ashamed. “Taking on a whole base by yourself is a tall task for all but the most advanced mages; when you accepted the contract, I assumed you were just saving face, but would head down to the docks and take a boat.”

“You will honor the contract,” she began aggressively, her voice rising stridently, and he quickly raised both hands to mollify her.

“Of course, of course, my lady. I’m merely impressed. You went above and beyond my expectations.”

Tsia's eyes sharpened, as gold coins danced before her vision. “Enough for a bonus?”

The steward smiled wryly. “I’m afraid not. Your formidable negotiating skills already squeezed out every last ounce of profit from this transaction in the first place.”

For a moment, Tsia consider pressing the issue, but her heart just wasn’t in it. Despite what she had told Nēs̆u, she was more shaken by the encounter than she wanted to admit. She couldn’t be certain what the Djinn mage had intended to do to her, but in some ways that made it worse, as her imagination ran wild with one horrific possibility after another.

“My lady?”

She blinked, suddenly feeling a bit woozy. “What?”

“Are you alright, my lady?”

“Yes, I’m fine,” Tsia snapped. “What were you asking?”

The steward looked like he wanted to say more, but he held his tongue. “Just wondering when you are wanting to leave. We have five caravans leaving today if you wish to join one. Some of the men say it looks like a storm is brewing, so if you’d prefer to wait to another day...” he trailed off.

Tsia shrugged. “No, today’s fine. The sooner the better.”

The weather was still quite pleasant when they headed out to the fields where the Tsussîm were kept. As she stood in the sunny meadow, with the breeze warm blowing gently against her face, Tsia’s spirits began to lift, and her excitement at finally riding a Tsussîm returned.

The creatures proved to be a strange mix of neurotic friendliness. They were easily spooked, darting away from her when she and Nēs̆u approached with the rest of the company’s workers, but once their handlers had soothed the nervous creatures, they warmed up to her surprisingly quickly, licking at her face like a dog as they rubbed against her shoulders. But the real fun came when they finally lifted off the ground - her mounts safely scarfed away in the company’s special bag of holding - and soared into the sky.

The constant winds that raged over the lake now prevailed against them, and the wind’s fury only stiffened as they ascended higher into the heavens. Her hair blew like crazy, rippling behind her like a banner on a battlefield, but Tsia was ecstatic, waving her arms and there and swirling her essence as the tsussîm bravely labored against the winds.

Nēs̆u was a bit less enthusiastic. His face was as pale as a ghost, and his hands clutched the reins with the grip of death, despite the fact that he had insisted on tying himself down. Still, whenever she looked in his direction, he flashed his ward the best mimicry of a smile he could manage.

Their trip was only supposed to take a couple hours, but the storm Nekelmû had warned her off arrived faster than anticipated. Soon gathering clouds, pregnant with the threat of rain, blotted the sun from the heavens, as the winds whipped themselves into a frenzy, howling like a pack of wolves driven mad with bloodlust. And then the storm arrived.

Lightning and thunder preceded the rain, great bolts arching back and forth between the clouds with such frequency that the group was forced to dive closer to the surface of the lake. But there was no sanctuary to be found there, either. Whipped into a fury by the winds, huge waves rolled across the water, smashing into the many small islands that dotted the lake with such force that columns of spray were sent flying hundreds of feet into the sky, drenching the group before the rain even began.

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Yet the weather held no terror for Tsia. The winds that spoke of death and terror to those around her only whispered in her ears, the voices muttering a chorus that grew louder and louder with every beat of the Tsussîm’s wings.

Imḫullu. Imḫullu. Imḫullu.

The world lit up as bright as day as a tremendous bolt of lightning cleaved the sky in twain, aimed straight at her group. And, completely unbidden by her, her essence surged forward. Latching on, it pulled the lightning into her, a torrent of heat and light.

There was a moment of searing pain, and then nothing. The pain vanished, the rain ceased - even the comforting warmth of the Tsussîm between her legs disappeared.

I’m…standing? Did I - did I die? Slowly, Tsia cracked an eye open, surveying her surroundings.

She wasn’t in the void.

Tsia stood in a large, dimly lit room. Her feet sank into the floor every so slightly, and when she bent down to touch it, she realized that a strange spongy black substance covered the floor as far as the eye could see. The walls were even more curious, covered in large black metallic panels whose surface was lit up by thin strands of warm, yellow lights. On her left side, there was no wall at all, or rather, as Tsia realized once her brain finally made sense of what lay before her, there was the most enormous window she had ever seen. The unbroken glass pane must have stretched at least a hundred feet in both directions, and the view it offered her was utterly alien.

What the hell? The building she stood in was dizzyingly high up in the air, the ground below hidden by the darkness of the night. Hundreds of smaller black towers surrounded hers, their shiny exteriors twinkling faintly from dim lights that glowed in their windows. There was no other source of light though, save in the heavens above.

Tsia’s mouth dropped open as she looked up at the source of light. It was the moon. No, her corpse, she corrected herself. Still glowing softly with the faint red light of the Blood Moon, the shattered shards of the goddess watched over the silent city.

“It’s quite something, isn’t it?”

Like a mouse trapped before a viper, she froze as a voice echoed behind her. A deep rumble accompanied by a faint rasp, her soul quailed at the power that emanated from the unknown speaker. A god?

The footsteps were muffled by the strange floor as the being came to stand beside her and, somehow, slowly, she forced herself to look.

Terror flooded her veins as she saw who stood beside her. Ten feet tall, with skin as pale as the first snows of winter, eyes as blue as the darkest seas, and his long blonde hair tied neatly behind his perfectly rounded ears - Tsia knew immediately what she was looking at it. A Sidhe. Her knees trembled, and she was forced to place a hand against the window as she struggled to remain standing. The bitter cold of the glass bit her hands, and she yanked it away with a yelp.

The Sidhe stared down at her impassively, only the slightest crinkling at the corner of his eyes suggesting any emotion. “There’s no need to be afraid,” he said.

Tsia fought to keep the wavers out of her voice, as every fiber of her being screamed for her to run - but to where? She didn't even know how she had gotten there, let alone how to escape. “Why am I here, my lord?”

A bemused smile flit across his lips. “You called me.”

“I did?” She started to speak, but her words trailed off as the realization hit her. No…

“I’ve had many names over the eons. Meḫû. Ilrādu. Igibru.” His voice softened, “Even once, long, long ago, Ivan. But you know me as Imḫullu.”

Why would Selene give me the name of a dark god? Tsia’s mind swam as she looked up at the giant beside her.

“She didn’t.” It took Tsia a second to realize he had responded to her thoughts, but as soon as she did, she shrunk back against the glass, her body shaking like a leaf. Bending down, the Sidhe took her hand in his. It felt like the hand of a corpse, the pale hand's grip cold and slightly clammy, but he held her gently.

“I told you already, there’s no need to be afraid, little one. My kin and I split long ago.”

A soothing calm emanated from his hand, and her thoughts began to clear. There are a few Sidhe who aren’t evil, a few whose worship isn't banned. Is Imḫulllu one of them? She couldn't remember.

The god smiled, but there was a sadness lurking in his eyes. “I cannot claim to be good, but I am no enemy of your gods these days.” His eyes drifted to the destroyed moon floating above the silent city. He reached out his other hand and pressed it gently on her forehead. She stiffened, fear again surging through her, but nothing happened except a brief flash of heat. Removing his hand, he stood up again, peering out the window.

Silence stretched between them, as the god was apparently in no rush to continue speaking to her. Finally, Tsia simply couldn’t stand it any longer. She needed to say something, anything to fill the void, and she spoke the first words that came to her.

“Why won’t Vāya respond to me?” Crap, why did I ask that? She moaned to herself.

Imḫullu frowned. “You know why, child.” His deep blue eyes fixed on her. “You are my descendant, not his.”

Despair flooded her heart. So the Djinn really wasn’t lying to me.

“He wasn’t,” the god replied to her thoughts mildly, apparently not taking offense from her poorly hidden distress at discovering she really was descended from a Sidhe.

She twisted her hands awkwardly. “Why didn’t my parents tell me? Do they know?”

“Your mother has long suspected it, but your father refused to consider the possibility. Our kind has few fans amongst your empire, and your father’s throne is unstable enough as it is. Admitting he had Sidhe heritage would only serve to hand ammunition to his enemies.”

Tsia's eyes drifted back to the enormous city that stretched beneath. “And this place? What is it?”

“It was my home once, the crown jewel of our kind.”

“Was?”

“Do you see any signs of life?”

She looked across the expanse of the shiny, black towers. “There are lights?” she offered.

“Mere relics, ghosts of a long-dead past,” he rumbled.

“And the moon?”

“Another casualty of the war.” He looked down at her wryly. “You doubtless think it is night, do you not?” She nodded uncertainly. “There is no night, for there is no day. It was not just your goddess that was destroyed during the Mwryanni’s attack.”

“What-?”

The Sidhe placed a finger against her lips, shushing her. “But enough of this. It is time for you to return."

She refused to be silenced. "But what about my magic? Can you help me, like Vāya?"

For the first time true displeasure crossed his face. "I can do everything better than that fickle trickster. Remember this when you call on my powers, little one: yours is not the wind that fills the merchant’s sails or dances across the open plains. Yours is the wind that scours the frozen wastes, that drags ships down to the depths of the abyss with all their crew intact. It is the storm that ever fills the heart of man and threatens to spill forth.” He touched her on the forehead again, and the world around her faded.

The sound of screaming filled the air and, as searing pain coursed through her body, Tsia dimly realized she was the one screaming. A second later, the pain disappeared as the lightning bolt withdrew into the heavens.

“Tsia!” She blinked rapidly, her eyes struggling to adjust to the darkness, and her ears rang like a bell, but she could still hear Nēs̆u’s panicked screams over the maelstrom. “Tsia!”

“I’m-“ her voice cracked, her mouth suddenly as dry as the southern deserts, but she tried again. “I’m alright,” she screamed back, with as much force as she could muster.

“I’m alright,” she repeated to herself, "Aren't I?" Her heart beat rapidly as a ferocious gust of wind slammed into her mount, tossing the Tsussîm head over heels, but with a mere thought, she stilled the wind and steadied the beast. That was...easy. The winds swirled around her, their voices so loud they drowned out all other signs, but she suddenly knew they would listen to her.

“I’m alright,” Tsia laughed, and she reached out to the storm. Essence flooded out of her, more than she had ever spent before, more than she had ever had to spend. The essence and wind clashed, a brief fight for dominance, and then, as suddenly as it had come, the storm around the group stilled. The winds calmed, the lightning ceased, even the rain did not dare to touch them. The storm continued to rage above the lacker, but wherever they flew it stilled, and they made their way to S̆addānu in peace.

But the peaceful weather was a poor reflection of her inner state. No matter how hard Tsia tried, she couldn't shake the image of the ominous Sidhe from her mind, nor could she escape the worried glances Nēs̆u continually sent her away.

Damn it. Why does life never go easy?