Shadesorrow was enraged to be put back in chains and to have the thorny vines of Hrulinar bind her was an insult she could not abide. She had tasted so little freedom, and even the sip she had been given had been hampered by a mortal form. The mad goddess threw her power against Hrulinar and Alira, but the trauma of her release had desecrated the separation of the two: their energies were bound together irrevocably, the seam between them intangible. What flowed through Alira was picked up and illuminated by Hrulinar.

Alira let the unnerving energy of the Light pulse around her, the shared form that now housed three souls. She felt Hrulinar wince as she let the waves wash over their flesh but to combat his discomfort, he merely pulsed his own nature magic, twin energies flowing inside. Her daggers, left in the sand, beat in time, their purple glow chased by golden light. She bent to pick them up, her long fingered, clawed hands extended, and noticed she was still in the goddess’s horrific form.

Alira held out a hand and willed the flesh to change, forcing the claws to retract. Her skin flushed, but remained mostly pale, a shade fuller than the pallor of death. Her vision slowly dimmed, becoming more human than divine, but she retained a hint of the night vision.

Similarly, as her ears shrank, her hearing faded to just better than before, picking up sounds that she would never have noticed before. She touched her ears and noted they were still pointed, but not in the same grotesquely excessive way they had been.

Her hair remained long but darkened to a dull grey-brown, the ephemeral glow of moonlight dimmed to drab silver-laced fawn. Her shirt, she noticed, was in tatters from the transformation. And the wings…

The most noticeable change that she could not diminish were the wings. She tried, pulling against them with the Light, allowing Hrulinar to aid her, but the wings remained. She stretched and folded them, flexing them to feel their structure. They felt natural, as though she could use them if she wished. But they unnerved her, made her something she was not meant to be, and she tucked them tightly to her back, a long cloak of leathery flesh.

She retrieved the daggers and sheathed them, noticing how she moved differently now, as though the hesitation she had before, the indecisiveness she wavered with was gone. There was something new about her. Something had been missing and was now returned to her, a right that she had been denied.

Shadesorrow railed against her bonds, threatening escape. Without discussing it, Alira and Hrulinar, in tandem, slipped their power around the goddess even tighter. It was as though they shared a single purpose, a homogenous drive.

It is how it should have always been. Hrulinar said, his voice dreamy and sated.

You were not meant to be kept. Alira disagreed but his warming caress thanked her and she smiled. As she did, she felt the too-long teeth in her mouth and reduced them. They remained predatory and sharp, reminders of Shadesorrow’s true purpose.

You cannot chain me forever. Shadesorrow promised the Son and Daughter. The darkness inside Alira now had a name, a face, a voice. It threatened to overtake, just as before, but now she held the key to keeping it at bay, at least for now. The wash of the black rage gave her some insight as to what power Erin had been seeking.

I don’t need to keep you forever. Just long enough to destroy the Morinn.

The icy cold depths of Shadesorrow’s need for retribution was undeniably heady. The pull to let her free, to let her take her anger out on the whole of man was an intoxicating whisper. Alira fought it, though, her Light blazing strong and brilliant within. Hrulinar wound around her, covering her spirit with the protective leaves, shielding Alira from Shadesorrow.

Alira swept her eyes around the grave, finally landing on the discarded book at her feet. She picked it up and felt a deep, resonant calling. A welcome from the past, a shout down the linear march of time.

Shadesorrow Unmakes All.

Not now. She replied and tucked the book into the waist of her pants.

In the grave there was also the chest that the remains of Galvyn had shattered. The lock remained but the chains binding the top were gone and the lid itself was smashed.

Want to see a trick? Hrulinar asked her suddenly. She waited, bemused, as the Princeling flowed into their shared flesh and touched the lock with a single beam of sunlight. The lock fell away, reclosing as it hit the sandy ground.

Impressive. She said truthfully.

She lifted the ruined lid and with the waning moonlight looked inside the chest.

It appeared to house similar burial things as the grave she had robbed not that long ago, two hundred feet above her. A jar of uncut gems, packets of poisons, bottles of dangerous herbs.

A Witch’s burial for a Paladin? She asked Hrulinar. Perhaps it was Erin’s way of apologising. She added.

Or her final insult. His angered silence fell between them.

Beneath the Witch's burial gifts were her father’s tabard and his holy book of prayers. As she shook out the wrinkled velvet, the silver and gold thread sparkled. On a whim, she opened the two halves of the tabard and, tucking her new wings in tightly against her back, she slipped the garment over her, then flared her wings out again, settling the back of the tabard between the black sheets of leathery flesh.

Her father had been a tall man, taller than Therin who stood over six feet, and she was diminutive. The tabard, which should have reached to just above her knees, fell nearly to mid calf. It was heavy velvet and the weight reminded her of the chainmail she had worn with Therin.

With the right belt…Hrulinar said with a touch of his former flippancy. It would almost suit you. Ignoring him, she removed the tabard and used it to bundle the valuable things from her father’s grave. She made her way back to the small camp she had set up, checked on the mare, and returned to her father’s remains.

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“I can’t leave him like this,” her voice was hushed in the waning night. Hrulinar felt her weariness, the tiredness that threatened to pull her down. Before she could object, indeed before she had thought to even ask, Hrulinar bled into her, reinvigorating her body. She gave him her thanks and set to work interring her father’s last earthly remains.

Time had caught up to Galvyn at last, and he was but bones dressed in his armour by the time she bent to inspect him. His withered flesh had gone, perhaps burned by the Light that had seemed to keep him animated. Looking about her, Alira’s eyes found the ruined chest and she gently lifted each bone, gingerly and tenderly laying them in the box.

Using her hands, she dug a hole in the sand, the moon nearly gone by the time she had finished. Sweat and dirt clung to her, her breath coming in ragged gasps as she lifted and placed the broken box into the small hole at the bottom of the grave.

Are you taking his hammer? Hrulinar asked as she dusted her hands, standing.

Yes. She said succinctly and Alira felt his gladness. She bent and lifted the mace, its gilt head flanged, like a star.

“Like the sun,” she said, watching the dim glow of the Light dance across the gold-chased edges.

Traditionally, Witches named their blades. I’m sure the Paladins name their maces. Hrulinar said and she wondered if Devan would know what her father had called his weapon.

Close up his grave. Hrulinar said as she climbed from the grave, her hands on her hips, sweat trickling down her neck and back. Hesitating, Alira merely stared into the open earth.

Like this. The Princeling said and showed her. She grasped the concept immediately.

She drew her blade, the blind one, and pointed it to a huge boulder resting beside the grave. Sweat beading on her lip, dripping down her temple, the enormous piece of red stone rolled and ponderously tipped into the hole, filling most of the emptiness.

Grow. Hrulinar whispered inside her and she nodded.

With her legs braced apart, she lifted her empty hand and greenery grew to fill the void. Grasses and weeds, vines and small shrubs burst into life in the rectangular hole around the boulder, filling the gaps.

And… Hrulinar said before filling their shared flesh with his magic. Enormous white flowers burst open, gorgeous and fragrant. Without a single tear shed, Alira had given her father’s body a beautiful place to rest. She hoped his soul was equally at peace.

On their walk back to the camp, Hrulinar asked Alira how she was feeling.

“Can’t you tell?” she asked, confused. The separation between them was nonexistent.

It’s polite to ask.

“I feel…” but the words weren’t there. Either she didn’t know how she was feeling or she had cut herself off from her emotions to protect her own sanity.

Perhaps, said the spirit. You feel a little more free? A little…less restricted?

She had to agree that she didn’t feel the need to keep herself so tightly bound, to keep him pushed to his half of her mind. How they flowed together felt natural, like she had been avoiding something that would give her some degree of peace.

“But…” she said and hesitated to say the goddess’s name, who had not stopped writhing and screaming and cursing since she had been bound.

She is tiresome. Hrulinar agreed.

“I can think of two people who may have the answers for us. But neither is an option I’m very happy to entertain,” she said with a sigh.

With a glance at Shadesorrow’s bound form, Hrulinar flowed from Alira’s body, taking shape before her.

“Is that safe?” she asked, but felt the tethers he kept rooted inside her. One wound tightly around the goddess, one intertwined with her own soul. He bowed his head to her, acknowledging his bonds.

Alira looked up into his eyes, their ghostly green light fading in the coming dawn. Something had changed about him. Something…

He now wore his crown of flowers and leaves, the one she had seen in Shadesorrow’s memories. He raised a curved brow as she stared and he lifted his arms, holding them out, allowing her to inspect him.

“Still the same sardonic jerk,” he said with a wink. “Still Henry.” But Alira shook her head and in a moment of impulse, she knelt. She sat on her heels and then bowed, her forehead to the ground at his feet. His shocked silence echoed the awe inside her and she lifted her head and stood.

“I can say your name now.” And she did, letting the hr roll off her tongue the way Shadesorrow and Aethra had done. He inclined his head, his arms at his sides, and gave her a thankful smile.

“Thank you,” she said. “For keeping me safe.” The Prince of Beasts, glowing green, lifted a hand and slipped it under her chin. His spirit flesh was cool, like running water.

“You are the one who kept me safe,” he said and pressed a blessing of a kiss to her forehead. “Because you understood the dangers of our combined powers better than I did.”

She smiled sadly at him and sighed.

“We have to decide…” she said as she sat beside the dead fire. “What to do now. I can’t live like this.” She gestured weakly to her head, to him.

“You could, you know,” he said and silently sat beside her. “Together, we can keep her bound.”

“Not indefinitely,” she disagreed. “Even now, I feel the strain she puts on me, how she drains me of energy.” Hrulinar reached out a hand and touched her cheek, letting his gifts fill her, lighten her load. She shrugged him off, not ungratefully.

“I can help,” he insisted and she frowned, staring past the cold ring of stones before them.

“I think we need to see Devan,” she said finally. “We need to warn him…about Noran, about Shadesorrow…The Morinn will be looking for me–us. They will think…” and she waved a hand at her changed appearance.

“Yes,” Hrulinar agreed but he offered no suggestions nor did he agree to her plan to seek out the High Lord.

“Maybe he could–”

“An exorcism would destroy us. All of us,” he warned. “You’re less blood and flesh than spirit now. Unfortunately, my dear aunt and I outweigh you.” He flashed her his grin, hoping to nudge a smile of her own out. She merely frowned deeper, shaking her head.

“I can do like you did for me, shield you in Light,”

“Alira,” Hrulinar said, and the hard-edged voice he took told her he was frightened. “It would kill me.”

“Then we’ll find a way,” she said flatly. “The Morinn might know.”

The sun broke from the horizon, diluting Hrulinar’s light and he seemed to dim.

“They will never let you go. They will free Shadesorrow.”

“But my mother had planned to capture her. She had something in mind.” Alira turned to the spirit and waited.

“She kept everything so very secret from me,” he said and he was no longer angry. The betrayal had faded from the bright, white, hot anger to a dull sad hurt.

“Then we find her soulstones, revive her, and make her help us.” Alira felt the tears welling before she could stop them. “We make her tell us how to banish Shadesorrow.” The tears spilled over her cheeks, washing clean tracks down her dirty face.

Hrulinar looked into the rising sun, his arms resting on his knees. The light caught the gold and red in his hair, flickering so realistically that he seemed tangible for a moment. Slowly he nodded.

“We will need something to bargain with,” he said and as he looked at Alira she realised what had looked so different about him.

“Your eyes,” she whispered. And their emerald light flashed, no longer black.

“You should see yours,” he said and gave her a brilliant, wide smile.