James Davis - The Restless Shore

She fell back from the others though they didn’t seem to notice or care, still forging the path onward to the southwest. Uthalion kept the lead with the much-changed Vaasurri at his side. There was a predatory look in his deep black eyes where once she had seen curiosity and understanding, but at least he was on their side. The human remained a mystery to her, personable one moment and cold the next, though it seemed he was getting colder as time passed.

Brindani, once constantly at her side, had grown distant since Uthalion had joined them, spending more time alone, lost in his own inscrutable thoughts. Ghaelya was curious about what had passed between him and the human and the secret they shared about Tohrepur, but she had not broached the subject with either of them just yet. She had hoped once they were closer to the place, one or the other might speak up, unburden himself of their past together. But the more she observed their silence, the more she suspected their secret would be tightly kept.

Her steps slowed as a deep droning buzz echoed through the shadowed valleys on her right. When the sound came again, starting and stopping quickly, a chill ran down her spine, bringing to mind the spring-beetles from her dream. She imagined them swarming over the rocks, building little houses with the empty shells of their dead among long ropes of pulsing red flowers.

When she finally caught up to the others it seemed the day had passed her by in a blur lengthening shadows and half-heard, furtive noises, leaving her to find yet another evening encroaching on the precious light. The winding path of the cliffs lay at her back and before her descended a long slope that led into what Uthalion called the wash. The sky was darkening, fading from red to purple in the west and casting the ravine below into rusty shadow. In the east, a second sunset seemed to mirror the true one, flashing red and splitting the sky into two identical halves.

“Long twilight,” Vaasurri muttered, turning his dark gaze east and west. “The Glass Mesa in the east reflecting day’s end. A bad omen.”

Ghaelya had heard tales of the Mesa, a massive plateau of translucent quartz left over from the days of Blue Fire. Though no one knew from where or why it had appeared on the Akana, it was a forbidden place, and those who dared approach it faced execution in Airspur.

“I don’t think signs or omens are needed to doom this little journey,” Uthalion replied and gestured to the end of the slope. “We can use the extra light though, make some headway across the Wash before-”

“We should cross at dawn,” Vaasurri interrupted, his black eyes flashing in the twin sunsets with little red flames that sparked Ghaelya’s memory-so much like the fire in Tessaeril’s eyes.

“There’s no need,” Uthalion replied. “The Wash isn’t very wide at this point, we just-”

“Listen to me, Uthalion,” Vaasurri said, his voice deeper, insistent, and soon drowned out by a thunderous wave of buzzing from the south that silenced all argument. Ghaelya wandered closer to the slope’s edge and stared into the shadows at the edge of the ravine below with ominous realization. The buzzing faded, and Vaasurri continued, “We should-”

“Cross at dawn. Fine,” Uthalion said quickly, though an edge of anger had crept into his voice. “But we’ll need shelter. The dreamers will catch up, likely find us out in the open this time, even if we set a fool’s fire.”

“It’s settled then,” Ghaelya said, surprising them both. She strode past them down the slope, the seemingly shapeless shadow at the edge of the ravine coming into focus as she neared. Each step felt like a forced march as the shape of a dilapidated old farmhouse came into view, a hollowed out and overgrown windmill, almost reclaimed by the tenacious grassland, standing at its side. She tried to hide her shaking hands as she stared down the dark, eyelike windows of the upper floor and spoke over her shoulder, “We’ll rest here.”

“Careful,” Uthalion said and drew his sword. “We don’t know what might be holed up in there.”

Vaasurri prowled closer, sniffing the air and crouching in the grass, his bone-sword half drawn from its sheath. Brindani simply stared, his dark-ringed eyes blearily taking in the house and mill as Ghaelya tentatively took the first step on the creaking porch.

“Nobody’s home,” she said, not quite knowing how she knew, but trusting to the dream to prove her right. A single spring-beetle beat its wings mercilessly on the front windowsill, righting itself and rolling on its back over and over again as she turned to Uthalion. “Not yet,” she added.

She climbed the stairs to the porch and looked into the deep shadows of the house. The front door had been torn from its hinges long ago. Motes of dust swirled in the crimson rays of sunset that illuminated the jagged edges of broken furniture and patches of dirty walls. She set her jaw and lifted her chin almost challengingly, daring the madness of the dream to be real, until a faint scent of wildflowers drew her gaze to a split floorboard, where tall spiky blooms of lavender had broken through.

She crossed the porch with a whispered curse and entered the farmhouse, letting shadows and beetles and sweet lavender take her into the unfolding vision of her dream.

Brindani let night fall upon him like a thin shroud, dark and cold. Only then could he hide the trembling anxiety that crawled beneath his skin. He sat on the floor of the farmhouse’s common room and waited for a quiet moment alone, staring out the window as the green grasses dulled to rusty reds and deep purples. Shiny brown beetles crawled over the walls and buzzed through the open door, bouncing in lazy arcs against the ceiling, looking for a way out.

Uthalion had paced the house up and down cautiously, searching for any sign of habitation, but found nothing save insects and the occasional spider. Ghaelya had walked the house as well, but more slowly, her long footsteps measuring the creaking floorboards as though she were touring a gallery of fine art and not the crumbling remains of someone’s home. Neither of them had paid much attention to the half-elf, leaving him to sit and stare in silence. But the other one, the fey, had kept close watch upon him since sundown.

The killoren was barely more than a crouched lump, wrapped in his cloak outside the house, refusing to come inside. But the black eyes, ever watchful, never strayed far from the window where the half-elf sat. Brindani avoided the ebony eyes and the humorless, tigerlike grin of Vaasurri, fearing that the fey hunter might somehow prowl into his mind and track down the secrets hidden in that dark, cloudy realm. Brindani scratched his arms absently, comforted by the sensation of flesh growing numb as his stomach slowly tightened into a tight knot of needling pain.

“Can’t sleep?” Uthalion said as he strode into the room. His heavy footsteps on the old wood startled the half-elf. “You should get some rest while you can. You’re not looking as well as you did last night.”

The human spoke casually enough, but Brindani detected the barest edge of accusation in Uthalion’s voice, and felt the passive air of suspicion that surrounded his old friend leaning close to the open door. Brindani cursed quietly, feeling two sets of eyes upon him, and thought frantically as to how he could escape their scrutiny. Laying his head back against the wall, he managed a brief grin, and made himself appear as comfortably casual as possible. The pins of pain in his stomach complained as his back straightened, but the ache subsided when he was still again.

“I’m usually not an easy sleeper,” he said at length, sighing. “And out here …”

Uthalion nodded as if in agreement, but his stare was out the window and lost somewhere else far beyond the Akana. Brindani pulled his pack close and raised his right knee nonchalantly, prepared to make good his escape to a more secluded spot when the time was right. The human seemed not to notice the motion at all.