image [https://i.imgur.com/36HL5Cc.jpeg]

When Dahn awoke, the light that let her know she wasn’t in her room at the ranch house. The mattress beneath her was filled with straw. The walls were plain and white, just like hers. And the room was small enough for her sleepy mind to confuse it with home. It was the steady glow of crystals in the ceiling instead of the flicker of an oil lamp that told her immediately she was elsewhere. When she closed her eyes, Dahn could hear the high-pitched hum the white crystals made, undetectable to most people. She could also smell alcohol and strange herbs that were definitely unhomelike, but not entirely unpleasant. Without warning, the events of the previous day flooded through her mind. They washed over her like a sudden tide—swift, cold and overwhelming. Her heart skipped a beat, and her breath caught in her throat.

“It’s alright,” Xahn said in a calming, familiar voice beside her. “We’re safe.” He took her hand in his and she immediately relaxed. Dahn had forgotten he was lying next to her in the large bed. She found she was able to breathe again.

“For now,” she said, her stomach going cold in the pit. Dahn wrinkled her nose. “It stinks in here.”

“It would help if Wyll would stop farting in his sleep!” Xahn whispered. Dahn giggled and her brother put a finger to his lips, then pointed to the corner where Wyll had been laid out on a small cot. He was snoring gently, and the young woman stifled her laughter. She didn’t want to wake Wyll. He’d had a difficult day, as well. Still, she wished he wouldn’t snore—that noise always set her teeth on edge, like fingernails on slate.

“There’s a strong smell of alcohol in here,” Xahn noticed, distracting her. “Whiskey maybe? I noticed that Jayn and Myria wipe everything down with rags soaked in it. I’ve been wondering why.”

“I didn’t think you were awake enough to notice,” Dahn told him quietly, a bit surprised.

“I kept awaking then sleeping again a few moments later,” her brother told her, softly. “I think I’ve been able to piece together what happened. Still, it doesn’t really make any sense.”

“No,” Dahn agreed. “We both fainted at the same time, I think.”

“Yes.” Xahn nodded. “It seems that way. At least I fell on some carpets. Looks like you hit your head pretty hard.”

“It’s quite sore,” Dahn agreed, touching the wound lightly with her free hand. Xahn winced and touched his own head in the exact spot of his sister’s injury. This had happened so often between them over their fourteen years together, that Dahn didn’t think it unusual.

“Jayn and Myria tell me it’s going to be fine,” she told Xahn. “They didn’t let me sleep until after dark. Myria said something about head wounds and sleep not mixing well. Scared me enough that I couldn’t go to sleep, anyway.” She stared at the ceiling, her mind unable to focus.

“Do you ever wish Father would let us light the ranch house with crystals like these?” Dahn asked.

“He’s protecting you,” Xahn said. Dahn thought she could hear a bit of regret in his voice, and she could feel his frustration and fear. “Father has always believed that crystals are the cause of the Sadness.”

“I know,” Dahn said, forlornly. “But they’re so pretty and steady and you don’t have to refill crystal lamps with that smelly oil.”

In the corner of the room, Wyll rolled over on his cot and make a high-pitched squealing noise.

“Speaking of smelly,” Xahn joked. “I swear it sounds like he’s strangling a goose!” Dahn covered her mouth with both hands to stop her from screaming with laughter. Her eyes began to water as Xahn also tried to stifle his howls. As the giggles began to subside, Dahn wondered how they could laugh in such terrible circumstance. The humor between them faded quickly. Dahn was still filled with anxiety, She looked over at her brother with concern, grabbed his hand again and asked, “How are you feeling?”

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He sighed and said, “I’m not sure. I didn’t do much more than strain my back and twist my ankle when the food cart got away from us. But that incident with Ekatern that … that was unlike anything that’s ever happened to me.”

“Me too,” Dahn agreed, the sites and dreamlike feelings from the Crossroads returning to her.

“What?” Xahn said a bit too loudly, sitting up quickly. He immediately regretted that decision and winced, putting a hand to his back. After a momentary pause, the pain on his face subsided and he looked down at his sister. “You weren’t there. They told me you were in the great hall.”

“I was, but when I passed out, I … I dreamed.” Dahn told her brother about going to a place with lightning and a bright path and woman dressed in green. “Myria called it something,” she said, “I can’t remember what.”

“The Crossroads,” Xahn breathed.

“That’s it. I don’t remember much about it, but I do remember it was very frightening. I felt like something was …”

“Chasing you?” her brother asked.

“Yes! Chasing me!” Another memory poured over her mind, cold and terrifying. It was the sound of a voice and the image of two glowing red eyes. “I remember a man in black talking to me, but I was too afraid to answer him.”

Xahn paused and the concerned look on his face turned to fear. “Large, dark figure, wearing a robe?” Xahn asked. “Glowing eyes?”

Dahn nodded. “Yes, that’s him,” she said quietly. “Myria called him ‘The Entity.’”

“Tern told me never to get close to him—to it,” Xahn said, absently, his eyes unfocused. “She said that the people who do … they don’t return.” Dahn was uncomfortable with her brother’s look—it was as if he were simultaneously here and somewhere else, both relieved and terrified. Suddenly, his head whipped toward her, his eyes alive and attentive again. “How did you...?”

“A red-haired woman with a green crystal on her forehead pulled me away and set me on a bright path the led me back here.”

“Tern,” said Xahn, nodding.

“Who?” This was second time he had used that name; the first time, Dahn had supposed her brother was a bit delirious.

“I think it’s short for Ekatern,” he said. “I’m pretty sure that’s how the crystal witch looked when she was young.” Dahn was shocked; she had never seen Ekatern in person, but the beautiful woman from her dreams didn’t fit her mental image of the witch. Xahn’s brow creased, and his eyes grew wide. “She exchanged herself for you!” He was still whispering, but his tone was like a shout. “She must still be there with that dark figure—with the Entity!”

“Myria said something like that before she left with Father. When they returned, they brought you with them and Myria told us Ekatern was lost. She brought a silver crown with a green crystal in it, just like the one I saw the woman wear in my dream.”

“It wasn’t a dream,” Xahn told her, drifting again, as if his mind were elsewhere. “It was a place. And Ekatern’s mind—her soul—is still there! But, what about her body?” Dahn noticed her brother’s hand begin to sweat as she held it.

She shook her head, put her other hand over the top of her brother’s and said, “Xahn, she is dead.” Dahn watched with sadness as her brother’s face grew pale and tears welled up in his eyes.

“No,” he whispered. “No!” Xahn breathed heavily and Dahn could feel his heart racing as whispered so low that only she could hear it, “She can’t be.”

Gooseflesh rose on the backs of Dahn’s arms and behind her neck at her brother’s words. It wasn’t what he said, it was how he said it. She’d heard that kind of desperate whisper before. Recently. In the Crossroads.

“Release me!” the Entity had demanded in a reverberating voice. It was thick and dark, sexless and ageless. As it had reached its impossibly thin arms to grab her, the woman with the green crystal appeared suddenly and had thrown herself between them, pushing Dahn harshly toward the bright path. Dahn shivered with fear as she remembered how the black figure had grabbed hold of the red-haired woman with its long, skeletal fingers, its eyes glowing a bright red as it pulled her into itself. The woman had seemed impossibly calm as she disappeared within the Entity’s black shrouds. Just before she vanished, the woman shouted Dahn to run, to follow the bright path home.

“Dahn, what’s wrong?” Xahn asked, his sadness turning to concern—her skin, she knew had grown ice cold. She was frozen, shivering even though the room was warm. Dahn couldn’t answer her brother, couldn’t open her mouth, couldn’t even scream, though she desperately wanted to. That cold, frenetic feeling kept washing over her as the sickening voice of the Entity repeated those horrible, whispered words again and again in her mind growing louder each time.

Release me. Release me! YOU MUST RELEASE ME!

image [https://i.imgur.com/QP2emMp.jpeg]