Hungry children come to rest,

  Hither at thy mum’s request.

  Nestle under wing and breast,

  Buried in our feathered nest.

  Gather, children! Hear my fright:

  Mourning song through season bright

  Of many slain before my sight;

  Yet chicklings cry in starving plight.

  Comfort me;

  Ease my lonely heart!

  Satiate;

  Pick your bones apart!

  -The Morboran's Song

  “It’s as though I don’t even know you!” With those words, Gale ran to her tent–the only one erected in Krid’s camp–and disappeared.

  You don’t, Gale, or you wouldn’t have thought you loved me. Fenn pulled his arms close around him and glanced at Syrdin. Zhe was staring. Zhe clamped zheir jaw and gave him a firm nod. He’d done the right thing in defending zhem. Other than an attitude, Syrdin had given no sign of enmity. In fact, zhe had saved them all on multiple occasions. Maybe it was an act, but it wasn’t too late to discover that either. Not when they could all die any day.

  He forced his legs to move past the syrup of confused emotions, carrying him over to the silvery bow Gale had abandoned to greet him. He held it gently, running his fingers over the fine engravings. It was outwardly delicate, yet strong and filled with magic; an appropriate weapon for Gale. He snuck it to the entrance of her tent and left it there. Angry or not, she would need it in the coming days. He’d just have to borrow it from time to time to study.

  He began to turn, but found his feet hesitant to leave her behind as his mind reached for anything else he could say. There was nothing but I’m sorry and I assumed you wouldn’t follow me at all. Vague “I’m sorry’s” like that never seemed to satisfy. And the other ran the risk of upsetting her more.

  Fenn shook himself. He’d determined to do better for everyone, and moping wouldn’t do that. So, on a seat of some gnarled roots, he got to work. At his request, Krid gave him one of the dead logs to work with. So while Krid drooled over the roasting cladafrum chunks, Fenn carved long, careful strokes into the grain for a new crossbow stock. Insects hummed into harmony with the shoth-songs before they dissolved again into discord. Chaos could not truly be appreciated without moments of order to contrast it. He wished he could find some order in his life to contrast the present.

  Though Mell went quickly to bed after Gale, Syrdin still watched the shoth battle over the last scraps. Krid glared at the little creatures, obviously unconvinced they weren’t dangerous. Whether or not they posed a threat, they were certainly threatening Fenn’s concentration. Their constant squabbling accosted his ears. He wondered at how Mell and Gale could sleep through it, no matter how deprived of rest they were.

  “I wonder if you could train these. Carry messages. Spy on people. Stuff like that.” Syrdin’s question cut through the screeches of two shoth tugging a chunk of something that Fenn dared not scrutinize.

  He perked up from his dull task; this was a query to which he knew the answer. “Actually, I suspect Ferngal already uses them that way. Moreover, they were used to drive out pixies in an old folk tale. So, I’d say yes, they are trainable. By the look of it, food would be the motivation, though perhaps they can be made docile with–”

  “So she really is spying on us. Guess you were right about her not caring for the pigs, Krid.”

  Krid only grunted in agreement.

  Fenn squinted at the wood he worked. He’d known that Syrdin and he had come to an understanding, but this was the first time a conversation between them had occurred outside of his notebook. He wasn’t sure what to think of it. What zhe mentioned, he had already noted. “They’re called cladafrum, if you’re interested, and I imagine Ferngal is accustomed to those dying. Some of the scars on them appeared to be cuts from panthrae attacks as well as their own kin. And Ferngal never scolded us for killing panthrae either, only for the flobotymus.”

  “But why?”

  Fenn lifted his knife from the wood and considered. “She said it was her pet.”

  “Is that all?” Syrdin pushed.

  He stared at zhem for a moment, meeting zheir shimmering pink eyes. He tried not to be unnerved, but soon found his gaze flickered back to his work. “Wouldn’t that be all? A Watcher could have favorites. Besides, all of the creatures here seem rather… fickle. The pixies changed moods all too swiftly, as did Ferngal. And those cladafrum will attack anything that moves.”

  Krid huffed from the spits. He had never enjoyed theoretical conversations. Fenn glanced at him. Or maybe he is just tired of waiting for his food. Fenn had decided the moment he’d smelled it he would be eating some, even if it repulsed Gale. Their rations were short, and better that she’d be repulsed anyway. She needed to realize that, indeed, she didn’t know him. Not the way she thought she had. Then she would move on for good.

  “You know, they train ink bats in the Darkcarverns.”

  Fenn blinked in surprise. Now zhe mentions zheir homeland? The information was novel to him. The Brikhvarnni colonists had never mentioned it. ”Really? You train them?”

  Zhe nodded. “We use them as an early alarm system.”

  Krid looked up from the stick-spit he’d been turning and squinted at Syrdin. “So now you speak of your homeland where I thought it was private to you. Was Fair Gale the reason?”

  Fenn jolted. Belatedly, he realized how strange it was that Krid had never mentioned Syrdin’s ethnicity, even when Gale had directly asked about zhem days before.

  Syrdin waved a hand dismissively. “Yeah. Didn’t want to deal with her racism.” Then zhe flicked a hand toward Fenn. “But he and Mell knew the whole time. It was going to come out eventually.”

  Krid whipped his tail and crossed his thick arms over his chest. “Then why keep it secret at all?”

  Syrdin snorted and tossed out another scrap of guts. “Because I knew she’d wish me dead. Though, now that I think about it, I think she already did. My race is just an excuse.” Syrdin shrugged. “Quick to judge, those soft-handed money types.”

  Fenn’s head sagged. Syrdin’s words stung, but he couldn’t deny there was truth in them. Those who lived their whole lives limited to a small circle of influence struggled to accept things outside of that. Gale only knew Ar-Etnfrandia, and primarily the upper tier at that. It was both the smallest and the most sheltered social circle he could think of.

  Krid didn’t share this knowledge. “Why assume she will hate always? We are a team. We should know one another’s strengths and weaknesses, our knowledge and resources. She will get used to you–especially if she trusts Fenn.”

  “It’s not assuming. It’s knowing. A highland elf born and raised in nobility? Krid, she can barely bring herself to kill a beast. I kill people. For a living. She is going to hate me, and it will be for always.”

  Kill people for a living. The tremor that ran through Fenn squashed the appetite that had been building in his stomach. He had known Syrdin was a mercenary. Even if he had let himself pretend zhe was only a thief, he knew better by now. Still, it frightened him to hear zhem say it plainly, unabashedly.

  That only proved zheir prior point.

  “I still think–” Krid began.

  “Think, drakeman? That little flower knows only three things about my people: that we are warlike, violent, and we slaughtered them, once–more than once if you’re talking about the Wood Elves. And she’s not wrong. The Night Elf clans are her opposites, her enemy.”

  Zheir expression was even as zhe spoke, but their tone betrayed a sour ire, as if the words tasted bitter in zheir mouth.

  Krid was silent and still. It was rare that he considered something so long before he spoke. When he did, he was quiet, yet firm. “If you both were forthright from the beginning, she might have given you a chance.”

  “No.” Fenn’s own whispered admission surprised even him. When the others turned to him, he committed to it. “She has no concept of a colony, or of various cultures. She’s trying, somewhat,” he glanced at Krid, “but she doesn’t. Etnfrandia is almost homogenous, certainly monocultural, despite its roots in multiple tribes. She can’t understand. At least, not yet.”

  Fenn plucked up a little clump of dirt like a pebble, feeling it between his fingers, gritty and almost solid. “Her understanding of the world is shattered, and it’s only natural to resist. She must pick apart her own understanding one piece at a time.” He threw the dirt clump at a tree. It fell short of the knot he aimed for and broke apart, granules catching on the rough bark. He could remember all too well the challenges of culture shock–the loneliness and fear–and he’d been a malleable youth back then. He’d be lucky if Gale found any peace in the coming days.

  “That was almost inspiring,” Syrdin finally turned away rom the shoth frenzy zhe had created.

  If that was meant to be a compliment, he didn’t understand. He had only stated a fact. By doing so, he admitted to a crushing reminder: the former Fyr-Ceann Galendria was on a journey she was not prepared for, and it was up to him–mostly–to look after her.

  And he was failing miserably.

  The author's narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Krid’s voice lost its rumble when he spoke softly.” You doubt your flower that much?”

  Fenn stiffened. It was one thing for the ever-mocking Syrdin to throw out fake titles. “Don’t call her that, please,” he whispered from between a clamped jaw.

  “Then why does Syrdin call her that?” Krid glared a silent accusation zheir way.

  Syrdin flashed a grin. “Fenn called her the Flower of Etnfrandia to her father. I thought it suited her; she’s so delicate and prim.”

  Fenn’s fists clenched, his ink-stained nails digging into his palms. So that’s why. “She’s not delicate, and neither is Etnfrandia’s flower.” He plucked up the wood he’d been carving from against the roots that supported him and set his knife to it again. “The galendria only blooms after a summer seastorm, letting its seeds carry on the tailwind.”

  He felt their stares on him as he continued his knife strokes. After what they’d all been through, he couldn’t think of Gale that way. As naive and unprepared–and especially unaccepting–but not delicate. She’d been nothing but courageous and resilient, her background considered. She was, at least, braver than him. If not for his responsibility to the group, he’d have already given up on survival in the storm.

  Then a woman’s voice floated through the forest, tickling his ears. She was grieved and lonesome. For a panicked moment, Fenn knew he was meant to do something when he heard that voice. Comfort her. Yes, though he did not know her, he knew she was lonely. He rose, his project clattering to the ground, forgotten, and followed the sound.

  Gather. Come.

  Someone shook Mell’s shoulder. She groaned and rolled over, pinching her eyes closed. The thing she hated most about that cursed sun was that she could never tell how much sleep she got. Never enough. It occurred to her that it was Syrdin, not Fenn, who hissed in her ear for her to “Get up.” I guess we got third watch.

  A gentle melody wafted through the canvas. She bolted upright. The shoth-song. The notes lingered in her mind, and she felt them tug at her emotions. No. She squeezed her eyes shut as she closed her mind to the sound. No, no, no! A deep loneliness washed over her. Then it ebbed away, leaving her in her right mind.

  She sighed in relief. She had resisted the spell again.

  “Good, you’re awake. Now hurry! Krid and Fenn both fell for it,” Syrdin hissed from beside her.

  “What?” She launched herself from the tent. A quick glance at the dense trees and ferns around confirmed that Fenn and Krid weren’t in the circle of camp. She reached for her pouch of spell materials and tied it hurriedly around her waist. “Where?”

  Syrdin gestured out of camp and began to stalk the same way. Staff in hand, Mell hesitated at the tent door. Maybe we should all go… At that moment, Gale charged out, knocking her head into Mell and she tripped over the bow Fenn had left by the entrance.

  “Oof!” The girl rubbed her forehead, recovering her feet. “Mell! It’s that creature again!”

  She, too, had kept her mind. Mell grabbed Gale’s wrist and pulled her after Syrdin. “Come on, Fenn and Krid have been taken in by it.”

  Gale snatched up the bow and followed, biting her lip. Fear hovered over them in an unspoken question: What if this voice is leading the boys to their deaths?

  As they left the tents behind for the bright forest, less dense at this juncture, Mell noticed Fenn’s crossbow pieces lying on the ground, dropped carelessly. The same failure to resist had occurred with the pixie charm. I guess he really doesn’t have a fae conduit–or can’t access it. Fenn would need to confront this fact–if he survived. She shuddered.

  It only took them a minute of following Syrdin’s swift trot to find them. The two men trod steadily, heads turned toward the distance in a daze. Mell jogged in front of them and waved her hands before their faces. “Fenn, hey there. Hey, you need to wake yourself!” She hoped he was still slightly more resistant than Krid.

  “Fenn!” Gale dashed to him, grabbed his arm, and pulled back. Without so much as turning his head, Fenn pried at her hand, still trying to step forward. The girl’s feet scrambled over the red dirt and fingery grass as she cried out his name in panic. He jerked his arm out of her grasp and kept walking. His face was uncharacteristically blank, an eerie sight on someone usually pensive.

  Mell rounded him again and raised her staff like a bat, aiming for his stomach. Fenn once said a little shock was a good remedy for a charm–that attacks wake the mind.

  “I already tried that.” Syrdin tapped on zheir forehead. “I thought he’d come to for a second.”

  Mell glanced over Fenn’s glasses and found a little red welt swelling on his brow. She lowered her weapon. Gale’s fearful gaze bored into her back, so she raised her staff again. “Well, I’ll try again for Gale’s sake.” She swung true. Not as hard as she could, but hard enough to hitch his breath. And it did. He bent, his steps hesitating as he regained his balance. She could see his pupils contract behind his glasses, then dilate again as he righted. He walked on.

  “Don’t hurt him!” Gale’s distress peaked the timbre of her voice.

  She glared at the girl, despite herself. “I’m just trying to wake him.”

  “Hey, maybe Gale should try a true love’s kiss.”

  Mell turned her glare toward Syrdin’s mocking grin. “Now’s not–”

  “Could that work?” Gale had gone stiff, red in the cheeks.

  “–Not the time for mean jokes, Syrdin! This is serious.”

  Syrdin sighed and muttered in another language but didn’t press the issue.

  In front of Fenn, Krid stomped carelessly on a fern, kicking up a wailing breeze and an angry buzz of insects.

  “We could just knock them both unconscious,” Syrdin suggested when it stilled.

  “NO!” Gale gasped. “We can’t hurt them!”

  Mell hesitated. It might work, but she didn’t know how well they could control the damage.

  Syrdin turned to the drakeman. “Fine. I’ll try to whack him awake, then. If he’s sane, he can just hold back Fenn until it stops.”

  “Wait.” Mell fished an iron bracelet out of her pouch and approached Krid. “Let me set a spell to give him resistance.” She held the bracelet to his elbow, making the sign of Lorthen in her other hand. Krid didn’t notice. “Deon.” Her circlet flashed and the iron glowed as though molten. It stretched and slithered around his arm, up his shoulder, and onto his head, resting there like a thin, thread-like circlet.

  She stayed back as he walked on. “Now try it.”

  “Will that free him?” Gale waited with her bow in hand.

  “It should help.”

  Syrdin slid in front of Krid, crouched into a lunge, then charged. Mell thought zhe would leap high. Apparently so did Krid, because at the moment of truth he swiped the air while Syrdin dove low, pulling Krid’s leg out from under him. The drakemen tumbled forward, slamming into the ground. Syrdin jabbed the back of his head with the hilt of a dagger and spun out of reach.

  Krid huffed, lashing after zhem with his claws. For a moment, he lay on the ground simply breathing heaving breaths. Slowly, he rose to kneeling. Mell held her breath, hoping against hope. He held a clawed hand to his face.

  That wasn’t characteristic of the bewitched. “Krid?” she ventured.

  He stood, rolled his shoulders back, and kept walking forward. It had almost worked.

  “Should we try to restrain them ourselves?” Syrdin asked.

  Gale didn’t wait for Mell’s affirmation. Bow slung across her back, she rounded Fenn and pushed against him with both hands. “Please Fenn, you have to stop following the voice. Come back to camp with me. I-I’ll talk to you about the fae and Syrdin and everything! Please just come back!”

  Mell was almost embarrassed by the desperation in that plea. Though her own chest had tightened with worry, she wasn’t panicking like Gale. “I don’t think that will work.”

  “But we can’t let it get them!” Bracing herself, Gale wrapped her arms around Fenn as if she would tackle him. He stumbled over her, but kept moving, trying to sidestep around her. “Fenn, please!”

  Mell felt a pang of compassion. “Gale, he’s not going to stop.”

  Fenn worked an arm between Gale and himself and shoved her aside. The girl whimpered, her feelings likely hurt more than her body by the rough treatment.

  “Mocharad!”

  Mell flinched at hearing Gale’s charm spell aloud. They didn’t need to be spoken. The she-elf’s eyes glimmered as her focus for the spell set on Fenn, attempting, no doubt, to overcome the bewitchment with one of her own. After an instant, Gale flinched back, placing a hand on her head. Her betrothed trod on as though nothing had occurred.

  Well, it was a clever idea. “Are you okay?” Mell put a hand on her shoulder. If this was a bad day for Mell, it was much worse for Gale, her cherished love withholding secrets only to fall into danger.

  “It repelled the spell back at me.” Her voice was small with defeat.

  Mell rubbed her shoulder. “Don’t worry, if we can’t wake them, we’ll just have to protect them.”

  Gale nodded, and they followed behind the boys. Mell kept a brave face for Gale’s sake as they traversed knotty roots and winding shadows, but fear kept her alert.

  “Mell, where did Syrdin go?”

  Mell glanced around, but was not surprised to find zhem gone. “Based on past experience, I’d say zhe’s in the shadows watching over us.”

  “I hope zhe didn’t leave us for dead,” Gale said, bitter.

  Mell knew better than that.

  Her heart hammered as they walked on. She felt as though every rustling in the bush would pounce at them and try to devour their minds. Worries edged their way between fears. All clerics learned battle support magic, but that did not mean she enjoyed the prospect. And she wasn’t trained to fight on her own. If they came upon too powerful a creature, she barely hoped she could protect herself. But if she had to choose between her own life and one of theirs, she didn’t know what she would choose. She wasn’t prepared to die.

  In particular, she wanted the satisfaction of telling her clergy she’d told them so: that she could find the fae. And knowing all her sacrifices over the years–family, relationships, sleepless nights of study–had been worth it.

  At last, they came to a place where the underbrush grew in a large-leafed thicket beneath the trees. The song drifted through the cracks.

  “This will be the source,” Mell whispered, “be ready.”

  Fenn and Krid circled the tangled ferns and trees until they came to an opening just large enough for Krid to squeeze through.

  She pushed through behind Krid. The thicket was hollow and she thought less than ten meters across. At the back of it stood a creature with bright feathers. It was roughly like a snake-tailed fowl, only this creature was twice her height. Most of that height was found in the two scaly legs which supported its round body. That a body tapered into a long, thin neck topped with a beaked face.

  The beak was where the similarity to a bird stopped. Its eyes were front-facing and strangely human while the pinkish face was naked except for feathers draping down the neck like a mane. It fanned itself with a slithering tail ending in a splay of long, bright feathers.

  When they entered, it sang by whistling out of what would be its nose, its throat visibly bobbing with the effort. She felt uncanny admiration trickle over her mind, pooling pleasant feelings. Mell shuddered, draining them from herself in a moment. A sense of disgust took their place. Disgust and fear.

  “What in the tar pits is that?” Krid growled next to her, his eyes slitting into focus. The threat of a large creature must have stirred him to waking at last–with the help of her spell.

  “A trap,” she answered, feeling less anxious with the drakeman awake by her side.

  He pulled out his sword. “Can we kill it?”

  Before she could answer, a rustling escaped from the brush behind her. A much smaller, fluffier version of the same creature zoomed out of the underbrush, its open mouth revealing tiny needle-teeth, and ran for her leg. She let out a surprised yelp and jumped back. It shot past her and turned, scrabbling over the ground. More chirps followed this hatchling out from the brush. This mother had a full nest, and every one of them was hungry.

  Mell gripped her makeshift staff. Her magic was not intended for close-range fights. Things were about to get messy.