Chapter Eighteen #3
“I’m going to see if I can tell where it’s coming from.” She pulled her hand from Rain’s and resolutely approached the tairen
eggs. As she drew near, a cold chill ran up her spine, making her flesh pebble. Her knees quivered with sudden weakness. She
reached out to the nearest egg to steady herself.
The moment her hand made contact with the leathery shell, the tairen kitling within lurched towards her.
The egg rocked, and a frightened cry mewed in her mind.
The kitling’s consciousness reached for her as a tiny babe reaches for its mother, blindly grasping, instinctively seeking the security and warmth of her presence.
Tears filled her eyes. She wanted to tear away the outer walls of the egg and gather the frightened tairen infant in her arms. This was a baby, just like any Fey or Celierian baby, small and vulnerable and innocent.
And some dark, horrible hand of death stalked it as if it were prey to be captured and consumed.
She touched the other eggs, receiving the same frightened, lurching response from each of the unborn kits. Worse, each time
she lifted a hand from one egg so she could reach out to another, she could hear the little kitling cry out in fear, could
feel its desperate, too-weak attempt to cling to her.
“Oh, Rain, they’re so frightened.”
In two long strides, he was at her side. “Tell me what I can do to help.”
“Touch them. Talk to them. Let them know they aren’t alone. Sing to them.”
He began to murmur, hesitantly at first, but the hesitance quickly faded as Rain, too, sensed the kitlings’ frantic fear.
The murmur became a purring croon and then a deep baritone song, strong and comforting. Marissya’s voice joined his, and the
tairen moved closer, lowering their great heads and adding the breathtaking gold and silver beauty of tairen song to the mix.
Ellysetta opened her senses, trying to find the source of the attack. She could feel the whispering chill dancing at the periphery
of her senses, everywhere and nowhere all at once. Dark, cold, its voice was a hissing iciness that battered against the melodious
warmth of the songs sung by Rain and the tairen. The thing’s presence was so strong she could almost see it, but every time
she tried to focus on it, the attacker faded like mist, insubstantial and elusive. Present, but always just beyond her reach,
taunting her.
“Marissya, try healing the kitlings again. Maybe whatever it is goes dormant except when it attacks.”
The shei’dalin stepped forward. Green Earth and lavender Spirit, both shining with golden hues, looped and swirled in glistening flows above
her palms as she gathered and shaped her power, then released it upon the nearest egg.
Her brow furrowed as she sent the magic into the egg-bound kitling.
“I still can’t find any sign of physical illness, Ellysetta, but I can feel them dying.
It’s almost as if something’s draining their lives away.
” She looked up, her face wan, deep blue eyes filled with concern.
“I can try to hold them to life, to give you time to find and stop what’s killing them. ”
“Do it.” Ellysetta moved from egg to egg, singing, soothing. She spun the healing weaves just as Venarra had taught her, but
she had no more success than Marissya. Frustration coiled inside her. The infant tairen were sobbing, their little bodies
shivering in fear despite the welcoming tairen song that flowed around them. Each time she laid hands on one egg, soothing
the infant within, another would cry out. And each time she turned to comfort that one, a third would start to whimper. Almost
as if . . . as if . . .
“Bright Lord save them,” Ellysetta breathed, horror washing over her in an icy wave. “They’re being hunted.”
As soon as she said it, she knew she was right. Except the kitlings’ hunter—whatever it was—wasn’t making an outright attack.
It was testing the kitlings’ defenses, weakening them like a pack of thistlewolves driving a herd of sheep to exhaustion before
moving in for the kill.
Rain stopped singing. His spine straightened. His face hardened to a mask of etched stone. “Mage?”
“I don’t think so. It doesn’t feel familiar.”
“Ellysetta. Rain.” They both turned at the sound of Marissya’s voice. The shei’dalin’s face was pale, her mouth pulled back in a grimace of pain. “Something’s wrong.” Suddenly, she gave a cry and stumbled back
away from the eggs, falling to her knees in the black sands. She hunched over, curling up into a ball, her arms wrapped around
her waist.
“Marissya!” Ellysetta rushed to the shei’dalin’s side and dropped down beside her in the sand.
Fear stripped Ellie’s mind of all Venarra’s careful instructions about how to choose the threads and weave them in specific, controlled patterns.
Instead, pure, desperate instinct took over as she reached for Marissya.
Dear gods, help me. Let me heal her. The magic roared up in response, potent and vast. It poured into Marissya without caution or restraint, connecting the two
of them with powerful, unchecked flows.
In that instant of unfettered connection, Ellysetta sensed a familiar, frightening consciousness, a distant, dark awareness
that turned with sudden interest in her direction.
The skin over her heart went suddenly and icily cold. Horror coated her mouth with a bitter metallic tang. Oh, gods. Oh, gods, no.
Power inside her shifted with a swift, hard lunge, eager and fierce and furious. Magic fountained in a shocking response.
It filled her in an instant, then billowed out in a blinding cloud before she could slam her shields tight.
The force flung her backwards, sprawling against Rain’s legs.
“Ellysetta!” He grasped her arms and helped her right herself. “What is it? What just happened?
Before she could answer, the tairen screamed.
“Oh, no!” Ellysetta whirled back to the nest of tairen eggs, gathering her magic to fight, but the moment she peeled back
her barriers, she knew she was already too late.
The enemy was gone, but he had not left in defeat.
Just moments ago, five tairen kitlings had shivered in their eggs. Now only four did so.
“No . . . oh, no . . .” Ellysetta ran to the motionless egg that belonged to Forrahl, the sweet little tairen whose egg rocked
with joy when she sang to him. “Gods, please, teska. Don’t do this.” Summoning her power with desperate hope, she laid her hands upon the egg and spun the brightest healing
weave she could summon.
This time, she sensed nothing. No whispering voices. No familiar evil. Just a dead, empty silence where before a precious
kitling’s voice had sung.
Eld ~ Boura Fell
Vadim Maur clutched the edges of the birthing table in a fierce grip as his servants carried the child to the cleansing pool.
His hands and legs were trembling so hard he didn’t dare release the table for fear of falling.
For the second time, Ellysetta Baristani had caught him by surprise. He’d sensed her presence mere instants before she’d sensed
his, and if not for that brief advantage, her furious blast of power might have scorched him as it had once before. As it
was, she’d sapped the strength from his limbs and forced him to flee to avoid serious injury.
She’d forced him to flee. Him. The High Mage of Eld.
The mere thought was an abomination.
The only consolation from tonight’s near-disaster was the prize now held in his servants’ arms. He turned his head to watch
his umagi bathe the newborn infant. The child was another boy. Despite Ellysetta Baristani’s interference and his abrupt departure
from the Well, the binding had gone smoothly, without the violent battle he’d fought for Tyrkomel. Unfortunately, Vadim was
also not nearly as certain of his success this time. The baby’s eyes had not swirled with radiance as Tyrkomel’s had when
he emerged from his mother’s womb.
Of course, this child had not torn his mother apart during his birth either. Fania was unconscious but unharmed. That was
a victory of sorts. Even if the boy was not the fierce triumph Shia’s son was, Fania would live to breed again.
“Bring him to me,” he barked, and a servant hurried over to hold out the baby for his inspection.
At least the infant appeared Fey rather than mortal.
His eyes were a clear, vibrant green with slightly elongated pupils, and though scarcely a quarter bell had passed since his birth, his skin had already assumed the pearlescent paleness of the Fey.
He did not cry and flail about, nor object to the servants’ careful yet brisk handling of him.
Instead, he lay quietly, his bright eyes scanning the room with seeming intent.
Vadim bent closer. Deep within the pupils of the child’s green eyes, Vadim glimpsed the shimmer of latent magic. He lifted
one hand and summoned a small ball of Mage Fire. The child grew still, and his eyes focused on the concentrated glow of blue-white
magic. Now the shimmer in the child’s eyes grew more pronounced, magic rising in response to the presence of Mage Fire.
Satisfied, Vadim dissolved the glowing ball. Such a swift and unmistakable response bespoke substantial power. This child
was gifted, considerably so. Fania had done well.
“He shall be called Coros.” The name meant potential, not a certainty but a possibility. “Take him to the nursery and lay
him beside Tyrkomel.”
As the servants carried the child away, sudden weariness fell upon the High Mage like hundredweights. He sagged and only kept
from falling by grabbing hold of the nearest servant.
Vadim fought back a wave of dizziness and nausea. He thought he’d escaped the searing lash of Ellysetta Baristani’s magic,
but apparently he hadn’t evaded it all.
The servant helped him to a cushioned chaise in the next room and began to tend him, washing the blood from his hands. He
allowed their assistance without protest. Only his own umagi, the ones he owned utterly, were allowed to enter this room and tend him when he was at his most vulnerable. There was no