It happened so suddenly. One moment, Roakev was lunging for her, the next he was flying backward.

“Roakev!” Lyssia flung herself toward the cliff edge, her hands grasping for him. His coat sleeve slipped through her right hand just as her left hand caught hold of his hand.

Her stomach did a flip-flop as she swung him around, back toward solid ground. She tried to release him and let the momentum carry him away from the edge, but he refused to let her go.

One of her heels caught against the stone. Roakev tried to yank her toward him, but it was too late to do anything but slow her descent. She went over the edge, and Roakev went to his knees.

Lyssia dug her nails into his wrist in a death grip, her feet scrambling to find any purchase.

“Ahhh!” Roakev released the shout that he had been holding in. “Help! Help!”

He was holding her steady for now, but Lyssia didn’t have to ask if he could pull her up. He would have already rescued her, placed her on her horse, and escorted her back to his father if he could.

“Roakev, it’s alright!”

“Help! Help!”

Everyone else was busy with the hunt. Azerian wouldn’t get to them in time. There was no one to answer his shouts.

“Roakev, stop! It’s alright! Just...don't...”

“Heeeelp!”

“Roakev? Lyssia? Hold on! They’re over here!”

Tears sprang to Lyssia’s eyes at Azerian’s shout. The sound of running feet preceded the cascade of stones that clattered down onto her head.

“Sorry! Sorry! I’ve got you!”

Warm fingers clasped her hand that rested uselessly against the cliff face. Lyssia glanced up, expecting to see Azerian grimacing down at her. Instead, she locked eyes with Tirne.

Her eyes danced sideways, refusing to hold his for more than a polite moment, and fell on the last thing she expected to see.

One little bush - brown and scraggly and barely a hand width in length - had defied the Thivness and taken root. It sat just above their clasped hands. How Tirne had managed to avoid the thorn when he reached for her, she didn’t know.

"You got her?” Azerian asked from his hidden position.

“Yeah, we got her,” Tirne answered.

“We’ll anchor. You pull. On three.”

“Got it!”

“Roakev, Tirne, listen...to me…” Lyssia said, struggling to gather enough breath to speak.

“One!”

“You can’t...you can’t pull me up...”

“It’s alright, Drottine. We’re not going to let you fall.”

“Two!”

“That’s great. But you can’t... There’s a thorn...there’s a bush...Please don’t...”

“Three!”

Ignoring her plea, the boys kneeling above her squeezed her wrists tighter and yanked on her arms.

“Ah! What the---?” The thorn scraped across the back of Tirne’s hand and lodged itself in Lyssia’s arm.

“Gaaaaa!”

The movement above her ceased at the sound of her blood-curdling scream.

Roakev eased himself another inch forward, peering down at her. “Lyssia, what happened? Oh no...It’s ban-maudr! It’s got her!"

“Me too,” Tirne said through clenched teeth.

“Don’t let her go!”

“I won’t!”

Tirne’s hand was like a chafing rope around Lyssia’s arm. He worked it back and forth trying to relieve the pain of the cut, but he held on. Even when Lyssia’s vision began to swim, and her arms went numb, and her eyes began to drift closed, he held on.

Finally, she heard voices approaching, stampeding hooves, a sound like a bjurn’s roar.

“Lyssia!”

“No, Dizean. You can’t.”

It sounded like Einder was having to physically restrain her father.

“Lyssia!” he roared. “My daughter! Who is responsible for this?”

“What does it matter? I’ll go! Lyssia!”

“Carryn, stay back.”

“Get out of my way, Eindre. Lyssia! Azerian! I’m coming!”

"No, you’re not! I will get them."

Eindre sidled up next to Tirne on his knees and used his longer reach to grab ahold of Lyssia’s arm.

“Get behind me,” Eindre commanded as he took Lyssia’s weight. He paused at her whimper of pain, but then his grip on her arm tightened and he slid back, pulling her with him.

The thorn fought to stay attached to the bush, but it finally gave way, and Eindre was able to haul both it and her over the cliff edge. Roakev, whose whole body was shaking now, just seemed to hold on as his father dragged them all to safety.

Hot tears escaped Lyssia’s eyes, blinding her. Her ragged breath made it impossible to speak. She could not feel the grip of Eindre’s hand or the rock as it scraped against her skin. All she could do was hang there limp and listen to Roakev’s pants and the sound of the hungry waves below, roaring at the loss of their meal.

And then Carryn’s arms were around her, rubbing feeling back into her limbs, and her voice was in Lyssia's ear.

“Lyssia-ami, Lyssia-ami,” she whispered over and over and sobbed tears of relief.

Someone else offered to carry her away from the cliff, but Carryn refused to let her go. She gathered Lyssia up like a bundle of firewood and carried her back under the cool shelter of the trees.

Lyssia had assumed they would take her back to their camp, but they didn’t go far before she felt herself being lowered to the ground.

“Water…” she murmured, and a waterskin was brought to her lips. The liquid made it easier to breathe, but it did little to revive her mind.

She heard her father call for Seaka to be brought to them at once and heard Magnor and Tirne dragged away by their father. She thought to call out after them and ask that Tirne be allowed to stay and receive treatment for his cut, but she couldn’t get the words out before she slipped into unconsciousness.

**********

Her thoughts broke apart like a calm lake interrupted by a thrown stone. She held out a hand, trying to contain the images that showered down on her head and slipped through her fingers.

She caught one and brought it close to examine it.

“My lord Aturnel, are you following me?”

Laughter bubbled up in her chest at the sight of the tiny mountain in her hand, but there was no way for the laughter to escape. There was something very, very wrong here. She should be able to laugh.

Aturnel.

Thivness.

Mountains without eyes, without claws, without hearts.

Who gave them names?

Who set the one to protect and the other to destroy?

“Listen, Drottine, and you will learn,

that words have the power to heal and burn.

Names have power as nothing else does:

the power of what is and what was.

Listen, well, and you will find,

the echo that names leave behind.

History is the song of life -

filled to the brim with victory and strife…”

“Not now, Bjarke!” she barked at the interrupting voice.

Her boldness came from the echoing feeling in her head that told her the Skald was not really here, and she was not really sitting beside him on a fine spring morning beneath the evergreen in the performer’s courtyard preparing to receive another lesson.

“If names are power...then who named the mountains and gave them their power?”

His answer had been infuriatingly boring.

“It is said the mountains borrowed their names from the guardians that once resided over Ilvana. Aturnel, was a mighty beast, and so our grandfathers called the mighty mountain ‘Aturnel’, and they said ‘Aturnr’ means ‘a guardian’. It meant nothing at first, but now it means everything. The power does not reside in the mountain. The power resides in the name.”

“But...Seaka says that power resides in the mountains.”

“She does, does she? Interesting...Seaka is wise, but she is not a scholar. You should not believe everything she says. Here, I will read to you about the construction of your father’s stead from the texts of the son of Rilken, the last Kongr who held court at the foot of the guardian mountain."

How badly Lyssia had wanted to stick her tongue out at him and walk away. Just because he was a keeper of history did not mean he knew everything. If names had power, then “Bjarke” had to mean “petty one” or “boring one” or “big-headed, petty, boring one.”

"He’s a boring one, a snoring one, a deploring one!"

It was pleasant to feel the trapped laughter tickling her throat.

"Aturnel, kinda smells, in the east he dwells!"

"Thivness…"

What rhymed with Thivness?

"Thivness, the wilderness, a sorceress!"

Maybe that's who she was named after. Bjarke didn't know everything. She had been a sorceress. Not one of Ilvana’s vanished monsters.

But no, remember, Lyssia chided herself. Guardians are not monsters.

She had met one. A beautiful, living, breathing guardian.

"Thisska, has tiny paws and no flaws, fly to see me I wish-a you would!"

Now that wasn't funny, but it would make a good song. A powerful one, too, to call on the name of a Drakun. Not that she believed anything would come from singing it. She would be just as alone as she was now.

Alone with her thoughts in all this...space.

She peered around at the darkness and threw her arms around herself as if that alone would protect her against the cold.

This was no dream. If it was a dream, she wouldn't be alone.

Is this why her dreams were so crowded? So she could avoid this feeling that was suffocating her now?

"No. I don't want to think about that. I want to laugh. I want to listen. I want to learn."

"Idle thoughts lead to idle chatter.

Idle chatter to idle hands.

Idle hands to idle minds.

Then the cycle begins again."

"Hello, Bjarke. I must be losing my mind. But that's fine...as long as I'm not alone."

She looked down at Aturnel, still cradled in her hand. She pricked a finger on its peak and stroked its rough side. "I know what your name means. Or, at least, what we say it means. But I don't know what my name means. Lyssia, I see a…lie."

"Drottine...Drottine…"

"Oh hello, Seaka. What rhymes with Drottine?"

"Drottine, can you hear me? Here, hold her arm. I need to see how deep the wound is. If I can feel the prickers…"

**********

Lyssia came to when she felt a red hot iron poking at her arm. She jerked against the hands holding her down and screamed in shock at the rude awakening.

“She’s conscious.”

“Keep her still!”

Lyssia grabbed for the hot iron and was surprised to feel a perfectly ordinary hand in her grasp. The heat belonged to her skin. She trailed her fingers up her arm, searching for the source of the heat, but another hand clamped around hers and brought it to rest at her side.

“Drottine, can you hear me?”

“Seaka?”

Lyssia’s eyes blinked open. The Lach was frowning down at her. She had taken off the mask Lyssia had seen her wearing earlier. Her face was a series of hard lines, all furrowed in worry.

“Let her go,” Seaka said, and the hands holding her retreated. Only the restraint on her burning arm remained. “How are you feeling? Can you move your fingers?”

Lyssia wiggled the fingers on each hand. Emboldened by her success and Seaka’s murmured, “Good,” she checked her other limbs. Her face remained pinched in a permanent wince, but she was able to control everything except for the arm that remained caught in her aunt’s grip.

“Good, good. Does anything hurt?”

“My arm is on fire.”

“I know. Is there anything else? Did you hit your head?”

“I don’t...I don’t think so.”

“It was all my fault.”

Lyssia tilted her head to the side to peer up at Roakev, who sat hunched between his father and Azerian.

“No, it was my fault,” Azerian said.

Roakev leaned back on his heels and glared down at Azerian. “You’re right. It is.”

“Well, I mean...I know what I did. But what we all want to know is, what did you do?”

“What did I do?”

“Yeah, what did you do?”

“Boys,” Carryn hissed, her grip on Lyssia's arm tightening. “We’ll discuss this later. Right now, we need to focus on your cousin.”

“Please don't. Don't fight. I’m fine,” Lyssia said, reaching out to touch Azerian’s knee. He scooped her hand up and gripped it tight in both of his.

“No, you’re not. You won’t be until I get this thorn out of you." Seaka waved to someone Lyssia couldn't see. "We need to get her back to my hut. I’ll ride ahead and prepare a sedative. It will put her to sleep while I take out the thorn. I should prepare a numbing salve as well…unless you…”

Lyssia heard the rest of her unasked question.

…unless you have any with you?

She did. It was sitting in the bottom of her saddle pack. But she couldn’t offer it to Seaka, because then there would be other questions to answer.

“No, you wouldn’t. Of course not. The sooner you can get her on a cart the better. Don’t take too much time to get to me, but don’t rush. Don’t jostle her side, and try to keep her arm level until she’s—"

Seaka started to leverage herself back to her feet, but she was stopped in her tracks by the Kongr’s growl.

“No.”

“No?” Seaka asked, grimacing as she fell back onto her swollen knees.

Lyssia's father had been sitting at her head, not touching her but staring down at her face, his vigilance unwavering. A gasp had escaped his lips when her eyes opened, but he had kept his own counsel. Until now.

He stood and crossed his arms, turning his back on everyone but the Lach. “You’re not moving her. You’re treating her here. Now.”

“But, my Kongr, the pain—"

“Do you have the tools you need?”

Seaka cocked her head as she glanced from Dizean to Lyssia, who was starting to drift off again. “I could make do. If you will have one of your hunters start a fire, I will clean my equipment and prepare a sedative. It won't be as effective, but---”

“No sedative. I want that thorn out quickly. You will remove it now, and you will make sure there's no scar.”

The Lach stared at him, mouth agape. Her lips were moving as if she wished to speak but could not think of what to say. It was Carryn who spoke up.

“Dizean, you cannot be serious. You would deny your daughter medicine to ease her pain? She won’t be able to hold still. Seaka’s knife will slip, and then who are you going to blame?”

“Yes, she will. She will lie still.” His hand bore down on Lyssia’s shoulder. “There will be no scar.”

Carryn shook her head. “Dizean, that doesn’t make any sense. You cannot—”

“I grow weary, lady Carryn, of you telling me what I can and cannot do in regards to my own daughter. If you do not learn to keep your ‘cannot’s to yourself, you will be removed from my daughter’s side and my stead. Seaka!”

Carryn stared at the ground. She didn’t say another word, and she didn’t remove her hand from Lyssia’s arm. Dizean retreated but not from defeat.

Seaka watched all this with a hard expression. “I insist on having my instruments cleansed with fire and the wound cleansed with spirits. You possess the nearest flask, my lord. If you would be so kind…”

She held out her hand. With an exaggerated sigh as if the action pained him, Dizean untied the knot that secured the flask of mead to his belt and dropped it into her waiting hand. “Very well…but be quick.”

Seaka passed the flask to Carryn. “Douse the injury. We don’t want it to become infected. It may help soften the skin as well. I’ll have to make a horizontal cut along the length of the thorn. It won’t be pleasant, but that’ll be the fastest way to remove it. Anything that can help…”

She glanced at Dizean and then back at Carryn, a slight smirk playing at the corners of her mouth. “Use it all. And you there! Start a fire and bring me my supplies!”

Seaka struggled to her feet and retreated a few paces to oversee the unloading of her equipment. Carryn sat for a moment, flask hanging limp in her hand, before glancing over at Dizean. He nodded.

Carryn motioned for Azerian to switch sides and hold Lyssia’s arm down. She paused to lay a hand on Lyssia’s cheek, smiling sadly when her eyes fluttered open.

“I love you. It’s going to be alright,” Carryn whispered, then biting her lip, she poured the entire contents of the Kongr’s flask over Lyssia's forearm.

Lyssia’s body jumped off the ground. Azerian gasped at her strength, and he uttered a growled plea to Roakev and Eindre to help him.

“Lyssia!"

Hidden beneath her father's calm voice, Lyssia heard his fear. He dropped back onto his knees above her. Her eyes, wide with pain and masked by a blur of tears, found his face. “Lyssia, you have to—”

He interrupted himself with a gasp, glancing down at her arm and back at her eyes. “We will celebrate the hunt tomorrow night with a feast and a dance. I will serve the Elke felled by your arrow to the Dunival Kongr and his sons, and you will tell us all the story of your first hunt.”

With visible effort, Lyssia took enough breath to ask, “Which one?”

“Which one?”

Something akin to pride crept into his voice, but he captured that emotion and buried it alongside his fear.

“Kongr Rijek keeps asking after your singing voice. I told him that he would have the opportunity to hear you before his party leaves. It should be a strong song. A song full of pride for Ilvana and for the hunt, but dignified…”

His eyes strayed to Seaka when the elderly Lach shooed Azerian out of the way and took up position over her wounded arm. Lyssia caught a glimpse of the knife in Seaka’s hand and clenched her eyes shut.

“Lyssia…” Her father’s voice begged her to open her eyes and look at him. “What song will you sing?”

“I…I don’t…”

Seaka’s fingers clamped around her bruised wrist and lifted her arm. Lyssia tensed, every muscle in her body shifting away from Seaka’s knife hand.

“I’m sorry, Drottine,” Seaka said in a voice devoid of emotion. She was fixated on the wound, and the problems it presented. She would offer no comfort until the job was done. “I’m sorry. But you must remain still.”

“Lyssia!” Lyssia’s father placed his hands on either side of her head. “What song will you sing? Perhaps…perhaps a historical lay? Your studies will prove useful. It would be good practice for you.”

A gasp escaped Lyssia. She pretended it was a laugh and turned her grimace into a pained smile. “No…not a…a historical…”

“Perhaps you will write a new song?” Carryn offered. She was bent nearly double over Lyssia, blocking her view of Seaka’s knife.

“Y-Yes. I could…write about…my first hunt.”

Dizean’s mouth compressed into a thin line. Then his face lost its stormy expression, and he nodded at Carryn with grateful eyes. “What words would you sing? What tune would you compose?”

Lying there with Seaka’s knife biting into her flesh and the thorn’s poison coursing through her body, Lyssia’s mind went blank. She opened her mouth to scream, and a song unlike any she'd heard before escaped her lips.

She was unconscious of those listening to her. All she could feel was pain and the need to release it.

She would not remember the song when the pain left her, but as Azerian would assure her later, those gathered to pay witness would never forget it.