With Kelly’s magically transferred vision gone from the scene, Sepha’s view switched to an eye that floated to the side in Caina’s hall, somehow. This is what she and her council allies saw on a similar round sheet in her meeting chambers. Of course, she could see via her visor if need be, but for the sake of the others, and theatre, this was the chosen display. She also had tertiary sights given to her alone. Images played upon floating phantasmal screens before her that only she could see, curated expertly by Min.

To be actively on the inside of one of Kelly’s schemes was alarming. The crazed genius manipulated the laws of reality like playthings. Only these playthings were deadly. On second thought, he had already used paint and a game of chase to lethal effect.

Correction: not even toys and games are safe in the man’s hands.

As of this moment, they were her hands too. She brought forward the simple box held behind her back. White with a lacquered sheen, it was light, and in the centre was a glass-like cover over a red button. The cover was open, and the switch had been pressed earlier when Caina refused to yield. The deed was done, and only 30 seconds remained on the countdown. Numbers inexorably spun by in the upper centre of her sight.

Sepha’s false spectre yet remained in Caina’s hall, so she entertained him a little more.

“You cannot begin to imagine what approaches, Elnaril.”

“You! You two-faced entitled little wench! You side with humans,” he spat the word, “over your kind! I will break all your limbs inch wise until you beg for death. You... treasonous whore!” Caina approached the screen while his guards busied themselves, searching the hall pointlessly. She saw him and them from a higher vantage. More guards were mustering by the second. The lord sneered, “Look me in the eyes, you coward!”

It was regrettably something she could not do. The image she saw and the visage he entertained were not aligned. It was quite disorienting; she suppressed the queasy sensations as best she could. To Caina it must seem she cast her gaze down in shame.

“You have killed untold elves in your insidious reign, and yet I am the treasonous one. I see.”

‘Twas then that the first stones punched through the roof. More and then more, starting at the entrance, they cascaded brutally upon the hall. Tearing gouges out of the ceiling and going on to pummel guards or the ground alike. Caina registered the impending destruction and retreated to nearby comrades as it came.

Her audience too screamed and gasped at the display. The onrush of falling stone and dust engulfed the hall and Sepha could see Caina no more.

The destruction paused, and another view was shown. It flitted far beyond and above the castle, like a bird perched on a branch, or on the wing. The roof was heavily perforated, and sections were falling in, pulverized dust rising in the aftermath.

Mercilessly, a second strafing volley began, the stones were swift grey specks that pelted the building from above. This time they started at the throne and rained back toward the entrance.

It was efficient, cold, and vicious. With the single push of a button and not a single soldier, I have rained down death. This day her immaculate hands were bloodied.

“Min, might I review the release of the stones?”

“Okay, Shay.”

A moving picture showed a musty room, some store area of Kelly’s mysterious lair or lairs. How many places or spaces he commanded was unknown to her. Their existence was an open secret; Sepha caught glimpses of otherworldly destinations beyond the rings, as the beings flitted in and out of her presence. In time, I might see more, far more than any elf before me.

In the storage room, upon round disks, lay the old mill house bricks from Kay’s deeded land. A hundred or so a piece piled on each of eight portals. Sequentially the rifts opened, and the blocks fell into a sunny world below, my world.

Returning to the view of the outer castle, the image peered up, and the bulbous profile of Kelly’s flying ship could be made out some four thousand yards above.

“I merely dropped some stones. Is killing supposed to be this easy?” She spoke to no one in particular, but Min answered.

“Shay my precious silver princess, he meant you harm and would not back down. You gave fair warning.”

‘Twas the triviality and distance from the act that struck her. Here she stood in her meeting chamber, lightly clothed in a white gown with comfortable Outworld undergarments, and satin slippers. In this garb, she had orchestrated death.

“He had no idea.”

“He would not have believed you even if you told him. We minimize casualties this way and avoid a civil war.”

“It doesn’t feel like winning.”

“No, killing should never feel like that. That’s how I know you’re a good person, Shay. Good guys don’t revel in their honour and heroism, they doubt and wonder at their morality. When you are certain, that’s when you need to be most vigilant. Warn me when you’re certain, Shay, I’ll be there to doubt for you. In exchange, please do the same for me and all Outworlders. None of us are perfect, even the Alphas.”

How was it that Sepha felt consoled by this young human girl. She could not deny her heart, however.

“‘Tis a pledge then Min. We doubt for each other should we fail ourselves.”

“It’s a promise, Shay.”