The siblings never stopped talking. Neither one showed any fear as we walked through the woods. They had probably roamed pack lands most of their lives. Thomas would smell any of the remaining predators with ease. Their rambling became background noise while I considered the connections between the number of stars in the sky and trees in this forest.

Building a link to Candy and Evan was growing increasingly easy. Both multicolored cords snapped together without an ounce of effort. Each had differences in how they presented. Evan's thread was weak and barely pulsed. Candy's thrummed with irritation and panic.

The female elf was far, far ahead of us. Each attempt at connection would result in her pausing. These connections weren't just a tentative thing. They were providing intense amounts of feedback.

I felt a tiny hand grip over her chest. A sharp rock dug into Candy’s palm. Weight pressed against the object as she barely avoided buckling. Moments later the elf splashed water over her face. The chill of liquid sent shivers all over that I had no way of explaining to Julianne.

An hour later we found a stream. We were catching up. Nearby was a boulder that had been drug up the earth’s depths to sit alone in the riverbed. I had felt both the water and rock long before seeing them. My palm pressed into the same position that Candy’s had from my tracking sensations.

"She's been through here," I said.

"How do you know?" Thomas asked behind me. He sniffed the air while looking around.

"I told you, he's my own personal tracker," Julianne grunted as she stepped across the stream.

"Yeah, I heard he'd flaked out and left too." Thomas was still shirtless but all human right now.

"Shush, there's some stuff there you don't want to get mixed up in." The tiny bartender said.

"Drama? How bad? I don't need details, just a number, on a scale of Ricky’s wife to Little Bob’s high school reunion."

"At least a seven, maybe an eight." She sounded thoughtful about it. Her face wasn’t visible right now as the tiny Indian woman was behind me.

"So no contender for Drew's Sudden Countdown embarrassment." Thomas continued his banter with an entertained grin. He was parallel with me as we stalked towards Evan’s hide away.

"Not quite." Julianne laughed.

I walked on and ignored them. My brain was only half in the now anyway. Everything was strangely out of focus. A fog had settled over my perceptions. Moments became hard to pick out. There was a wall of sensations pouring back from both elves.

My thoughts circled through the same pattern constantly since returning home weeks ago. Answers would be within reach regarding who or what I was. My mind would compare the current Jay to the prior. An itch would happen on my arm and I would end up distracted.

Feet moved forward with an absent-minded hustle. My senses that split across the miles to Evan were reporting small changes. Occasionally he shook and thrashed. Other times he lay there barely breathing. The older silver-haired elf that had been caring for him was somewhere else.

More tactile feedback came in. Candy had halted up ahead. She was very close to Evan now. We, the siblings and I, were very close now too.

Near nightfall, during that brief dance between a parting sun and the horizon's edge, a tree branch appeared in front of my face. Unlike other branches, this one was new. My senses snapped back together with a rush of panic.

Julianne was shouting. Thomas growled and ran past. Another chunk of wood sunk into the trunk right in front of the brother. He showed better senses than I and took cover behind a tree.

"Hold it right there." The voice sounded almost like a cowboy. There was certainly far more than a hint of western to it. "Close enough for you all, I think."

My eyes slowly focused on the shaft of wood I had nearly been penetrated by. The item itself was firmly lodged into the main trunk and oddly shaped. I tried to comprehend the details. There was a feathered end attached to the thin carved shaft. Its angle was odd as it jutted from the tree.

Hell. Someone or something had actually shot at me with an arrow. I had nearly been shafted and still barely returned to my senses.

"Jay, for the love of God, back up." Julianne’s hiss made it through my addled brain. I looked around trying to figure out if the voice and the arrow had come from the silver-haired elf.

"Are you with Evan? The one feeding him liquid from a leaf? One sip at a time?" I shouted. My eyes weren’t focusing very well. The last few hours had been spent staggering forward while seeing and feeling a completely different place from my body.

There was silence.

"Is your hair silver?" I tried again. Maybe by announcing what I had seen while tracking Evan, things would be smoother.

"Who are you? Wolves here to steal my boy away again?" The other man yelled. His voice seemed to echo through the trees.

"I need to speak to Evan!" I couldn’t tell if all this shouting was going in the right direction. The person who shot at us had to be the other elf. It had to be.

"It ain’t happening. He's come back from you all nearly broken not once, but twice now.” The elves accent was intense. “You all can scoot back to where ever you came from."

Going home wasn't an option. Shouting that I was a Lord was too dangerous. Candy stated rather clearly that mentioning a Lord around elves was tied to being sacrificed. That advice seemed sound even though she was dead set on getting to Evan before I did.

"Julie, help out here." Thomas motioned.

"I don't know what to do." Julianne was keeping her head firmly planted behind the tree she'd picked to huddle at.

"Didn't the pack find him out here?" I asked.

"Yeah, but they slipped past this guy. Might not have been a good idea." Julianne said.

"You all can just turn about those heels and head home." The western sounding elf yelled. "Go on, get!"

"Not without answers!" Julianne yelled back at him. "Tell us where Arnold Regious is and I'll happily go away."

Three arrows sprouted on a tree near us. Each one was further to the right. The man must be running around to get a better angle on us. I shoved Julianne further around the edge of the tree just in time to see another shaft embed itself where she had been.

"Don't ask about Arnold." I tried to keep my voice low.

"Your buddy there has the right idea." The unknown person was closer and had definitely switched locations.

"Ask Evan who I am, he'll vouch for us!" I roared back. Evan wanted us out here, me anyway. The first few shots had the feeling of warning shots.

"I don't like this." Thomas was behind another tree nearby.

"Feel free to charge out there." Julianne responded.

"And get shot in the eye? I've read the history books, during the civil war elves just shot wolves through the eye sockets." I could see his hands waving about from here. "Then while they were down and blind, finished them with silver."

My eyes shut while they complained at each other about their limited choices. Thomas was right, charging out there wouldn't work. Elves at range had always held the advantage. This one also had the home court. This was a bad scene all the way around.

Evan had to wake up. He was able to sense if I called for him and that might solve our problem. Tactile senses barely started to expand out when my body automatically dodged another shaft.

"I can wait here all night." He said. I could almost hear the chewing tobacco in his thick accent.

"Jay, what's the call?" Julianne asked.

"Shush." I closed my eyes tight and pressed my head to the tree as I hugged what little cover we had. Julianne hunkered nearby, hiding behind me.

"Jay?" Her words crawled at me from miles away. My senses had reached out to Evan, who lay on the ground completely still. Mats of forest debris were piled around him. One young tree was nearby, dirt freshly disturbed.

I could feel Evan muttering to himself. Words sunk into plants and trees swaddled the sound. Mother? Picking up words in a new environment was tough.

"Evan!" My voice gave an odd double echo, one inside my head, once in the forest where my body and Julianne huddled.

"Evan answer me!" I demanded.

The elf stirred a bit. His eyes were unfocused and bloodshot.

"Evan wake up!"

I concentrated on him. Part of me tried to reach across the distance to shake him. Evan had said I was his Lord, Candy had said I should be able to call him back. Neither one explained what that meant. Could I pull at him like I had with the rabbit? If I was a Lord, did that make him a vassal?

"Evan! I command you to wake up!" I tried shouting at him. His Elven name might have gained a reaction. Wait, Evan had said that an awakening was needed. Blood had worked the first time.

"Listen you kin stealing igit, the next shot won't be a warning!" In the background the older elf yelled.

My eyesight snapped back to reality. It took an act of will to keep my head still and try to focus quickly. Evan was a ways north, but if I ran, maybe I could make it to him. A little bit of blood and a few seconds, then he'd come back to again.

"Dear god, he's going to kill us." Julianne was muttering next to me.

"What?"

"I should have never come out here." She wasn't paying attention. "I should have stayed at home where it was quiet."

"Julie, it'll be okay. We just need to back out, we can call pack in for the rest of it." Thomas was nodding quickly while talking.

"We won't get away, didn't you hear him? He's not firing warning shots anymore, and he's just waiting there for us to stick our heads out." Julianne was huddled against the side of the tree, her knees pulled up to her chest.

"Thomas?" I whispered.

"You back from your fucking trip?" The brother said.

"I know where Evan is."

"That's fantastic. Did you learn the magic password to get past the gatekeeper over here?" Thomas stuck his head out a little too far and another shaft of carved wood flew past. He swallowed and both eyebrows pinched together. "Because we could really use a secret code, or handshake, or something."

"Do you think he and Evan have a secret code?" Julianne had recovered quickly in the light of her brother's playful commentary.

"An all clear call sign?" Julianne was sweating. I could feel her heart speeding along compared to the normal, calm woman behind a bar counter.

"We could tie a white flag to one of the arrows." Thomas was slowly gaining composure. The lingering sensations of my tracking abilities were providing all sorts of extra details.

"Wave it in the air." She said.

"Thomas." I tried to interrupt them.

"You got your underwear on still?" He was caught up with his banter.

"Not white anymore," Julianne said. She wiped at her forehead and wasn’t making eye contact with either of us.

"I'll settle for red." The elf called out from a distance.

"Thomas!" I was trying to keep quiet. Elves had different ears, but their hearing wasn't too exceptional. Thomas should be able to hear me if I could just get a word in.

"Just talk, he's listening," Julianne whispered next to me. Her head shook and then nodded.

"Don't have red yet!" Thomas yelled back. He motioned his hands at me to get on with it. I could see him staring at Julianne with a worried expression. His back rolled as he stayed behind his tree.

"I know where Evan is. I'll run. I just need a distraction." My voice was hushed.

"You really want to risk our lives on Evan pulling through?" Thomas stared at me and shook his head.

"Not a risk, Thomas can heal right?" I protested.

"So do you. Doesn't mean it won't hurt." Julianne whispered back to me. She sounded offended at me using her brother as a defensive screen for arrows.

"Got other choices?" I glared at her. The siblings shared a glance and Thomas shrugged.

"No." He said.

Julianne took a deep breath. "Countdown?" Thomas nodded back. "From three, break on zero.” She put a hand on my back and looked up. “I'll cover my brother as much as I can."

"With what?" I asked.

Julianne pulled out a small handgun. I whistled.

"Only a few shots, short range, but might scare him."

"When did you get that?"

"When I stopped by the bar." She'd picked up the handgun after dealing with Daniel.

"Who wants the next shot? I'm open to requests, legs, arms, lungs, tell me where you poachers want 'em."

"I'd prefer you air ball all of them!" Thomas yelled back. He was looking directly at me, though. One hand was held up with three fingers.

"Wait." I lifted my shirt and displayed the makeshift belt. Even after changing clothes at Kahina’s the chain loops had stayed with me. "Cold iron." It took a few seconds to unwind and hand the metal over to Thomas.

Thomas nodded and wound the links around one hand. Julianne nodded. They both started a countdown. I closed both eyes and tried to extend my senses. Their fingers started with three.

There was the vaguest sense of leaves being brushed aside. Fingers scraping past each other as one slowly closed. We were down to two.

Julianne tensed near me and lifted her gun up with both hands. The metal was warm and lightweight. Her breath came in short gulps and there was a rapid rate to her pulse. Another of Thomas' fingers closed to reach one.

I opened my eyes and looked right at Thomas. His back twitched once, twice, then the final finger closed downwards. It was go time.

Thomas shot out from behind the tree. Julianne came out at the same time, knowing her brother’s speed better than I. There was a bang from her gun that startled me into motion. My feet launched off towards Evan.

Everything went wild. My head pulsed with a rush that was either excitement or fear. Everything felt alive in flashes. Like static on a scrambled television channel, everything came in clear bursts embedded in madness.

I felt an arrow flung through the air towards Thomas. It connected with a huge amount of force, firmly lodging itself into Thomas' chest. My brain didn't have enough time to figure out if it was a lung or heart. Hopefully neither. Wolves healed, but that kind of shot was risky for any species.

Another swivel of motion betrayed the bow's change in targets. The string jerked as another shaft hurled through the air. Julianne dodged behind a tree and an arrow chipped away at the bark. Her gun felt lighter than before. Her scream of outrage rattled the woods.

"Hide!" I yelled.

A thoughtful hum of noise bounced off fabric. The bow and guiding arms shifted towards me with a lead for speed and direction. I pumped both legs trying for extra speed to outdistance his range.

Time slowed as the old elf's fingers loosed. My hands flew out to brace while I dived forward to the next tree. The face first slide was too soon and Evan’s pal was skilled enough in adjusting his shot. It zipped right over while I twisted to the side and slammed into the ground. My teeth hurt and head rattled, but I managed to scramble back to my feet and keep running.

The next arrow, one I was too dazed to feel coming, implanted into my arm. I noticed the new addition as the pain caught up. Both eyes started to water.

I had to escape. More arrows would be coming soon. Gunfire echoed repeatedly, each one violating the entire area. Julianne was emptying her entire clip. By the screaming, she'd gone mad. By the footsteps, she was headed towards Thomas.

More arrows flew in my direction. Each one slightly off the mark. Distance and Julianne’s wild shots were helping. Chains rang out and slammed into each other. I felt bodies slam into the ground and someone cried out. Candy was too close. There was no time to go back and check on the siblings. The scent of almonds permeated the air.

Half blind fumbling and bouts of adrenaline helped me reach Evan. He was right where my tracking had pointed. The elf was sitting up and looked absolutely lost. Both his ears drooped and the arms were listless.

I searched for a blade to draw blood forth. Another thought occurred to me. Pained cries ground out between my clenched teeth. The arrow lodged into my arm was quickly snapped and yanked out.

There was now more than enough blood for Evan. My arm hovered over Evan’s mouth and I tried not to shove his face into my pit. With the free hand, I tilted Evan’s head back and said a prayer.

Footsteps carefully tread the ground behind me. Not fast paced. Calmer. Softer. Almond scent carried with them.

"Candy?" I looked up. Where was the old cowboy with his bow? She stood in the distance. Her face was twisted.

"Jeff." She said flatly. It was easy to forget that for her beauty, Candy was probably closer to one hundred years old. That was decades of experience and resolution that I didn’t have. All of it shone in her face.

"Why, Candy?" Why had she planted those illusions? I kept ahold of Evan and tried to get a few more drops of blood into him.

"You can't know." She didn’t even shake her head. As if we had moved beyond a simple ‘no’.

"Can't know what?" I set Evan’s head down carefully and stood. My eyes were set on full angry bouncer mode. This was the face I used when collecting from low lives and thugs. Five years ago I could break weaker men with this glare alone.

"What you are." Candy actually looked away first. I tried not to grin happily.

"Why can't I know what I am, Candy? Why does that matter? Do you need another fucking" I emphasized that part. "favor so I can get a real answer?"

"No amount of fucking" She returned the snide tone, but her voice sounded distorted, "would make me tell you. It's too dangerous."

"Does this have to do with Arnold?" Was there a link?

"Who is Arnold?" She actually pulled her head back in confusion. That threw me off. Quickly my mind put things together. If she wasn’t here about Arnold than it was my fault, like always, causing issues.

"Then it's me, why can't I know?" I said.

She shook her head but kept her lips buttoned. Part of me couldn't help but to admire how cute it looked. Every other ounce of her stance screamed anger and desperation.

"Why, Candy?" I'd gotten extremely close by now. She never once showed a sign of backing up, or looking at me. Her focus passed right through my body. "Why can't I know?"

Candy stayed silent. Damn it, Julianne, you said to try asking. I had asked the elf three times and still got nothing. No one else was here to help me and Evan. Julianne and her brother were still missing in action.

The silence broke when Evan shouted. Candy's form fell apart like shattering glass. I turned to look at Evan. Candy straddled his chest, with both hands covering his eyes. Her lips moved in a silent whisper while small sparks of light shot out of her own orbs.

"No!" He yelled again, bucking weakly under Candy. It sounded distorted again like Candy had earlier. "No! Lord, help me!" Evan’s voice came out again in a cry for help. My help.

I ran at her. My dive met with empty air and I face planted into the dirt. These were more illusions.

"Evan!" I yelled, trying to find the source of his cries. Drumbeats started in my head. Their pounding demanded I defend what had been claimed.

"Answer me!" I fumbled about, swinging both arms as if wading through a pool. Hopefully, one of these wild swings would connect with anything. Evan’s voice grew further away while his words slurred together.

Auditory senses weren't enough. I had another way to solve this. A single moment of concentration was needed. There, he was to the right against a tree base. I dove, trusting what I could feel instead of what was seen and connected. For a second time today Candy screamed my name but for a much different reason.

The illusions hiding her from vision shattered. Candy spilled to the ground under me, she raised one hand and ground dirt into my eyes. Her knee followed up with a switch kick to my pelvis.

Winded, blinded, I curled into a fetal position and tried to suck in air. Evan was yelling out again and I was unable to concentrate on feeling, or seeing anything. Blurred flickers of color proceeded brighter bursts like fireworks.

I managed to stand up by using the tree trunk. The landscape looked like two rainbows were fornicating five feet away. Wondrous pain occupied my thoughts. Both ears rang, gut clenched spastically, and nothing was in focus.

Candy was yelling at Evan. I could hear the words being shouted like waves breaking on a shore. A roaring sound of anger and frustration answered back. Evan’s voice was the sound of trees groaning in a thunderstorm. They spoke in with wild words that almost made sense.

Candy was denying me an answer from Evan as well, by taking away something? His eyes? Why did that make sense?

Another set of colors popped into existence. This time streaked with an angry red tint overlaying what would have been a bright rainbow. Evan’s voice yelled back, his words sounding harsher but no less wild than Candy's. I gained enough control to rip off the jacket and mop my face.

When I could see again, the world had gone mad. Colors kept popping like little bombs of paint going off. There were false copies of Evan and Candy both running around. Yelling saturated the area so intensely I could feel the vibrations of the landscape.

An image of Candy ran towards me with a large tree branch. Yelling echoed as I tried to block the swinging branch. The actual attack came from a completely different direction, connecting firmly with my exposed ribcage.

"You can't know!" An invisible female voice screamed. Candy’s words were still tainted by the waterfall accent. I was bewildered and kept one hand in front of my face, the other over my wounded side. Her earlier blow had certainly cracked a rib.

"Lord!" Evan yelled out. More colors flared up obscuring him from vision.

None of the history books or documentaries had ever shown a scene quite like this. Elven abilities had never been described beyond a mastery over the visual spectrum. Even the few actual elves I had seen use their abilities didn't come out like this. This was a master with a paintbrush compared to children and their chalk.

One Evan leaped onto a distracted image of Candy. The projections both collapsed. Another two dozen were dodging through trees. Each so visually real that it was difficult to separate what I felt from what I saw.

I pressed my back to a tree and tried to figure out what to do. Wading in there wouldn't work out. There was no telling where the real elves were amid the madness. Not without cutting out some senses.

Both eyes shut to assist concentration by ignoring their illusions. Evan’s distracting cries almost immediately shifted to background noise. My fingers were grasping at tree bark. The simple sensation of rough wood against my skin served as a starting point.

The two were struggling nearby. I opened my eyes again and the assault wasn't as bad. Both elves' illusions had dwindled. Those standing around wore slack-jawed faces devoid of real emotion.

One wasn't standing. Candy pinned Evan down with a knee in his back. Both her hands cupped the male's eyes as a scream came forth. Her voice was loud enough that I could hear it. They were still speaking in their elven tongue, elemental, primal, inhuman.

I limped over and tried to help.

Evan’s face dripped with sweat. Blurred images of the elf trying to escape spun out in desperation. Both Evan’s and Candy’s other illusions were collapsing.

"No!" I closed the last bit of distance and weakly tackled the female elf.

My assault connected, and probably hurt me more than her. Candy was laughing, a delirious rush of excitement on her features as she grinned wildly beneath me. No dirt to my face, no knee to the balls.

"It's over, Jeff, it's over. I've protected us all!" She said.

"I will tell him." Evan’s voice came from behind me. I turned to look up at him. He looked even more battered than normal. His body was covered in forest debris and both eyes were a milky white.

"You can't! You're bound." Candy said.

"What did you do?" I growled at her. She didn't even flinch in response.

"I bound him!" Candy yelled. Her voice was no longer under me. She had scrambled to a new location behind me and left an illusion behind. "He can't tell you what you are."

"Why?" The version of Candy under me was a fake. An illusion like so much had been. Her helping me. Evan’s answers.

"She fears what our kind will do if they know." Evan gasped in the middle of his sentence.

"What?" I said.

"If they knew that you were a..." A flash of light in his eyes sent Evan backward with a cry.

"A what? What, damn it? Elf, wolf, human, vampire? What am I?" None of the above? He had been a few syllables away from telling me. Once I knew, once I had that under control I could better understand my abilities, right?

"He can't tell you. I've bound him to save all our lives." Candy said.

"Nonsense. His knowledge alone will not hurt anyone. In a year and a day, I will tell him." Evan had recovered enough to protest.

"We will see. This battle is mine, though." Her voice sounded amused by the phrasing. The image of Candy vanished into the trees. I could feel her getting further and further away. She had left me in the middle of the woods with an elf that couldn't answer the primary question I came for.

"Oh shit. Julianne." I tried to scramble to the siblings. Multiple face plants into the dirt, an arrow, a tree branch to the ribs and being kneed in the balls outmatched me.

"What is going on?" Evan asked.

"Other elf was shooting at us." I ground the words out. It took every ounce of concentration I had to stay on my feet. My entire body was drooping.

"I will take care of it." The male elf nodded and started walking off. He kept one hand pressed out in front to carefully feel a way through the woods. Evan walked like a blind man in the familiar territory.

I leaned back near the younger tree. The same one Evan himself had rested at in my vision. Once again I had failed. My arm itched and there wasn’t any strength to scratch it. Slowly one foot gave way, followed by the other and my body slumped to the ground.