Silver winced as three of the Fae voices lifted in a dissonant chord. Another shout arose as the lemon-skinned man beside him joined the chaotic chorus. Seconds later, everyone else on the platform was yelling, and Silver’s head began to spin.
He reached out to steady himself, but the only purchase his searching hand found was Fiona’s arm. She frowned at him, snapping her mouth shut mid-bellow and narrowing her emerald eyes in his direction, and he shrank back away. He wrapped his arms around himself and stumbled backward into one of Devon’s wings. His friend barely glanced at him, deep in debate with his aunt.
Silver’s breath hitched, and the discord surrounding him took shape in his mind, words forming streaks of angry red and livid orange, clashing with poisonous neon green and interspersed with a slowly oozing pustulous yellow.
The colors spiraled tightly, a sinister ever-tightening noose of noise. His eyes darted from Fae to Fae, his throat and lungs seizing up.
Gasping for air, Silver’s shoulders hunched as he tucked his chin into his crossed elbows, his hands clutching at his shoulders. He inched instinctively backward, desperate to shelter against a wall, seeking solidity and protection.
A tiny part of his mind screamed at him that he was standing on a wall-less platform. This lone sensible voice in his head broke off into a helplessly wailing fragment as his body took yet another involuntary step back. The shard spun in a sea of sound, just one piece of his psyche clinging desperately to the driftwood of sanity lest it drown and die.
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His attention was wrenched into focus as Fiona grabbed his hand, hissing, “What are you doing? You’re going to fall!”
Silver opened his mouth to explain, but only a gasping sob emerged. His heart pounded, his chest tightening painfully as the maelstrom of panic swallowed him up once more. He swayed, dizziness overtaking him, his mind fragmenting again and again.
Fiona’s brow furrowed as she stared at him. Finally, her expression cleared as understanding dawned.
A safe space opened up before him as Fiona gently guided his body into a seated position on the floor. He brought his knees up, squeezing himself into the bubble of clarity, even as the arguments raged on beyond it.
Devon loomed in front of him, a palisade between Silver and the tempest, his voice clear but distant, as though he was shouting across a serene forest glade. “What’s going on?”
“Too much chaos,” said Fiona, her arms still wrapped loosely around Silver’s shoulders.
He focused on her clear, calm voice beside him.
“Humans can’t always handle it. My little sister gets this way too sometimes. We have to get him out of here.”
Devon disappeared from sight, and Silver whimpered as the cacophony whooshed back into the space in front of him.
“It’s okay,” soothed Fiona. “You’re going to be okay. We’re going to go back to your realm. We’ll get you help, and you’ll be a mage before you know it.”
Devon re-appeared, Aganya with him. The feline warrior cocked her head as she regarded Silver.
“Let’s go,” she said. She held up her left hand, outstretched in front of her, palm up. Then she flipped it over.
And the world disappeared.