Callista awoke to the sound of someone pounding on the front door. Her sleepy eyes fluttered open, noting the complete darkness in her room. She heard muffled voices, and the pounding was replaced by softer rapping soon after. Callista sat up and swung her body to the side of her bed, her feet dangled over the side. Heedless of the danger, she slid off onto the cold wooden floor. A shocked hiss escaped her lips as, first, her bare feet touched and then her tail.

Callista shivered now that she was away from the warmth of her bed and started to her bedroom door. Before she reached it, she heard her parent’s door open as her father stomped out, muttering loudly, “The sun ain’t even up yet if this isn’t important…”. The rest of his words trailed off as she heard him walk farther down the hall towards the front door. Callista stood at the door for a moment, struggling on whether to go out, her curiosity eventually superseded her caution, and she cracked the door. As she slowly opened the door, she could finally hear her father reach the main entrance.

“Shhh shhh, Orin mommy is here. Your father is just angry someone woke you,” Callista poked her head through the door, looking right, and saw her mother walk from her room. Her deep crimson skin contrasting with her blue robes, and her tail swishing with agitation. Orin was cradled in her arms and seemed to be calming down after crying for a short while. Her mother looked up from her brother and saw Callista standing in her doorway, “Callista, sweetie, did your father wake you too?” Callista shook her head before replying softly, “No, the knocking did, do I need to go back to bed?” Her mother smiled softly at her, “No, sweetheart, you are already up. So, let us go see who it is.”

She strode forward and gently took Callista’s hand, guiding her down the hall to the kitchen. Finally, Callista’s father opened the door, “Alright, what the fu……” his voice trailed off, causing her mother to grasp her hand tightly. “Marca, is everything alright?” Callista had to increase her stride to keep pace with her worried mother. A chill ran down Callista’s spine as she heard a hissing voice speak, “They are here. We must see them!” Her mother stopped cold in her tracks, “Marca… Who is it?” in a lower voice, she whispered to Callista, “Get behind me and hold your brother.”

Callista did as she was told and carefully took Orin from her mother’s arms, noticing that she drew her Focus before continuing down the hall. Callista heard a much deeper and irritated voice come from the front of the house, “You must excuse my companions, they don’t deal in matters like this usually.” Marca finally found his voice, “My lords, what exactly do we owe the pleasure this evening?” Callista could tell he was both afraid and worried about their answer. “You need not call us lords, but we are here to recruit one of your family members to the Emissaries.” The deep voice replied as her mother rounded the corner.

Callista heard her father become startled and turn towards the encroaching footsteps, “Oh Carmilla, it's only you.” Callista saw her mother drop her hand to stop her advance. She saw it was trembling, “Callista sweetie, take your brother and go back to bed.” Callista was confused at her mother’s words, looked back at the hall, and then to her mother. She was gone, she looked in her arms, Orin was gone. Callista turned the corner to look towards the door, she saw two figures standing in the doorway. The only distinguishing features for both of them were their eyes. Blood red stared at her. She screamed as she turned to run, and promptly collided with a tall figure. She looked up and saw warm golden eyes staring back at her. Callista saw their hand reach towards her but was blinded by a bright light appearing behind them.

Lissa sat up abruptly as she awoke from her fevered dream to Garza peaking in her tent flap. “Rise and shine sleeping beauty. Food is done, and you may want to put some clothes on.” Lissa noticed he kept his eyes locked up towards the top of the tent the entire time. “Thank you, Garza, I appreciate it.” As Garza shut the tent flap, Lissa stood and let her covers fall. While stretching, she looked around to see if the twins had put her clothes back. Callista found them above her bedroll and dressed quickly, her armor wasn’t there though. “They must still be cleaning it,” Callista muttered to herself as she finished putting on her shirt.

Once Callista was sure everything was in place, she went to join the others. Immediately noticing that Saida was not with everyone, “Where is she?” Lissa asked while grabbing porridge and sitting next to Almios. “She wasn’t in our tent when we woke up this morning, and she wasn’t in hers either,” Mera replied before taking a too-hot bite of food. “She will be alright, just needs to blow off steam,” everyone turned to look at him as he spoke. Darvick continued whittling while everyone looked at him. “I have known her for...” he rolled his head in thought, not missing a whittle during it. “Since we were kids, she ain’t upset at anything or anyone.”

“Then why isn’t she here? If she isn’t upset, why didn’t she stick around?” Micah asked somewhat sheepishly. Darvick shrugged, “Your guess is as good as mine.” With that, Darvick focussed entirely back on his hands, ignoring any further prompting. Lissa sat thinking while eating her breakfast, the ambient conversation around her becoming unintelligible. What exactly was that dream she had? Lissa knew it was partially her memory of when the Seekers came for her. However, it was different. She didn’t remember two voices that night. She also didn’t remember the fear in both her Mother and Father’s voices.

As she thought about it, a cold shiver went from her tail to the base of her skull as she thought about those eyes. They reminded her of those that ruled the Deadlands. They were said to have piercing red eyes, though they did not glow. Were they related to the pair of glowing red eyes she saw the other night? It was possible, but more than likely coincidence. Lissa’s train of thought came around to her family again, and a bit of pain pricked at her heart.

How long had it been since she had seen them in person? Wracking her brain, she only was able to remember seeing them years ago at the confirmation ceremony. Lissa held herself tight for a moment once the realization hit her, “I really should see them,” she muttered out loud. “Did ya say something, Lis?” Mera’s cheery voice broke Lissa from her introspective contemplation. “I didn’t mean to say that out loud, but yes, I did. I had just realized I hadn’t seen my family in a few years since our confirmation.” Lissa stood and stretched, not immediately noticing the beaming smile on Mera’s face.

“Oh, my goodness! Are we going to see them, or are you going to have them come to us?” Mera gleefully exclaimed while dancing on the spot, almost throwing the pot she had in her hand away from her. “Wait, I never said anything about seeing them” Lissa knelt and put her hands on Mera’s shoulders so that she could look her in the eyes. Lissa looked into the purple and blue orbs that were Mera’s eyes and found herself completely unable to deny Mera’s request to see her family. With a sigh, Lissa broke the stare “Damn it, Mera, you win after this, I will arrange for us to visit my family.”

Mera let out a squee and hugged Lissa before running off to find her sister and tell her the good news undoubtedly. “So, you are going to see your family soon, huh?” Saida’s soft voice came from behind Lissa, causing her to whip around and inadvertently smack her tail against the nearby fallen tree. Before Lissa could even say a word, Saida held up her hand, “Don’t even think about it. We both got a bit carried away, and you have nothing to apologize for.” The apology quickly died within Lissa, and an awkward silence grew between them for a moment.

“I have to ask, why did you kiss me?” Lissa said after working up the courage to break the silence. Saida chuckled for a moment before replying, “Honestly, a few reasons, the two big ones were. I figured it would unnerve you and let me get an advantage, and I really just couldn’t help myself. You looked cute when you were that angry.” Lissa cocked her head in confusion, “I am cute when I am angry? Just cute? I would have thought I would be beautiful.”

Saida smirked and started walking to her tent, “No, only I am beautiful when angry, you are just cute. Besides, we need to break camp at this point; we are just burning daylight.” Lissa rolled her eyes, “Debatable, but you make a good point.” Lissa quickly set about the grueling task of getting everyone to strike their tents. Finding Mera and Mela were the easiest. They were giddily talking about Mera forcing Lissa to cave to their request. “You know we wouldn’t have pressured you so much if you didn’t have the closest family. Everyone else has family scattered across the Dominion. Yours is only a week and a half down-river.” Mela matter of factly told Lissa as she walked towards Almios and Garza.

She knew they were right, and it didn’t make her feel any better about not seeing them more often. Lissa always justified it with various reasons, training, assignments, classes, and general busy-work. No real excuses not to have seen them sooner, which caused the pain in her chest to return. Lissa finally reached the tree they were hanging from and looked up at them; they were at least three meters from the ground. “Why are you doing situps right now? Especially hanging situps,” Lissa did not expect a good reason from either of them. “Initially, this turned into who could climb the tree fastest. But after breaking a few less than sturdy branches. We decided to do a few of these instead,” Almios sounded very much out of breath as he spoke.

“Don’t worry, Lissa, we are almost done and will then be down to pack up. Garza replied, sounding equally out of breath. Lissa sighed and went to find Micah and Darvick. It didn’t take long to locate either of them as they both strode out of their respective tents carrying their packed belongings. “We saw you and Saida talking and figured now that she was back. It was best to start packing up. Darvick and I will ready the horses after we finish. You just get your stuff taken care of,” Micah headed off her obvious question before it even left her mind. After they set down their packs outside their tents, they began tearing them down.

Lissa smiled and at least thought today was going well, while she headed to her tent. While she walked into her tent, she pinned the flaps open so that more light flooded in. “Time to get to work.” Lissa quickly packed away her sleeping necessities and strewn about clothing. It seems in the twins haste to get her robe. They didn’t care about attempting to keep her belongings organized. The cleanup was relaxing to her, and as she was physically packing. She did so with her emotions, as well. No more lingering doubts or pain were left when she finished putting it all away. Just happiness was left in their place.

In all her packing, Lissa had not seen a trace of her armor. Leading her to believe the twins either forgot to give it back or were still working on it. She decided that them forgetting about it was what more than likely happened and went towards the remains of their tent. As Lissa closed the distance, she saw that Mera was gone, and Mela was rolling up their tent. Lissa cleared her throat as she stopped behind Mela. “If you are wondering where your armor is, I am not going to lie. We forgot we had left it to dry by the pond last night,” Mela turned her head slightly to look at Lissa while speaking. “I am not surprised I will…” before Lissa could finish her sentence, she heard someone rushing towards the clearing. “Actually, never mind, that is probably her now,” she concluded after a moment while Mela only shrugged.

“Go meet her then, Darvick, Micah, and Saida already finished. They are getting the horses ready.” Mela turned back to her task intent to finish before Garza and Almios. Meanwhile, both of them seemed to be rushing to finish tearing down and packing everything up before the other does. Lissa sighed and headed to the edge of the clearing to meet Mera, who was still making quite the ruckus coming into the campsite. “Mera, why are you so loud. I know my armor is more than a handful for you, but still, it is a little much.” Lissa said this as she saw Mera’s head poke through a bush smiling, “Oh Lis! Can you give me a hand? I found a plant I figured Mela and I should look at!” The joy was evident on her face as Lissa approached.

“All this noise for a plant? What about my armor?” She asked, approaching Mera, whose shoulders now were poking through the bush as well. “Oh, your armor is strapped to my back, and I couldn’t just take a sample of the plant. I had to take the whole thing,” Lissa raised her eyebrow, and since she was close enough, peered through the bushes. It wasn’t just a meer plant like a flower. She was dragging, but what appeared to be a sapling at least as tall as she was. The dirt was still caked and held together with the roots.

“You know when you say the word plant, I expect a flower or maybe a small bush. Not a sapling, and if you wanted this intact, I am surprised you aren’t carrying it.” Lissa stepped through the bush behind Mera, whom she now observed was coated in a thin film of sweat. “Well, that’s the thing,” Mera hushed her voice slightly, “I am pretty sure this is an Ironwood tree.” Lissa whistled and inspected the bark for a moment and tapped it with her knuckle. The bark was indeed felt metallic to her touch, and she saw the typically barely perceptible silver like flecks embedded in the bark. “I thought this only grew near the tops of the Silver Peaks?” Lissa asked while Mera rested for a moment as she got into a position to carry the sapling.

“Yeah, you aren’t wrong, which is why I felt like we should study it. I don’t think this is the actual tree, though, but some offshoot. Why this is the only one in this out of the way clearing, I have no idea.” Mera rested the sapling on her knee while she spoke. “Why don’t we just leave it here then and come back for it? Clearly, this isn’t going to be easy to carry on the horses if you can’t lift it by yourself.” Lissa finally was in an excellent position to pick up the tree and gripped it to begin lifting. Once her grip settled on the sapling, she felt an immense shock like she tried to attune to something. Lissa dropped her grip and looked at Mera, “Mera, do you realize this thing is probably draining you of Aether, right? I am pretty sure that is why you couldn’t carry it.” Mera stepped away from the sapling, “I did not realize that, but then again, I am not as sensitive to that kind of stuff as you or Garza.”

Lissa grabbed her gloves from Mera’s back and put them on, “You said this was by the pond, right?” Mera nodded, taking steady breaths now, “Yeah, it was in the big hole about two meters away from the pond itself.” Lissa nodded and started dragging the surprisingly stout sapling. As she went, her curiosity got the better of her, and she decided to attune her eyes to see the surrounding Aether. Lissa took a deep breath and closed her eyes, bracing for the inevitable excruciating pain that came with doing this. Like someone pouring boiling oil on her eyes, she gritted her teeth and gripped the sapling tightly as it washed over her. Once Lissa was used to the pain, she opened her eyes and looked at the tree. Her suspicions were immediately confirmed Lissa saw the tree slowly drawing in Aether from both her and the plants it was touching.

“You are a fascinating plant,” Lissa grunted out sarcastically as she continued dragging the sapling. Lissa kept her eyes low to the ground, trying to avoid seeing the Aether around her. As Lissa trudged ever closer to the pond, she noticed that the sapling in her hands was now drawing Aether only through its roots. She stopped and carefully inspected her hands, confirming that nothing was being pulled from her. “How strange, is it the area around the pond, perhaps? Or maybe you just wanted to be home.” Lissa chuckled slightly after saying that, and finally reached the pond.

She was expecting to see signs of Aether build-up, but nothing was evident. What was apparent was a rather large hole in the ground where Mera undoubtedly ripped the tree from, “She wasn’t subtle, was she?” Lissa said to the sapling as she carried it over, she did notice it got lighter the closer they came to the pond. A bit of careful maneuvering allowed her to place it into the hole. After quickly attuning to her Focus, she began packing it back with dirt. Lissa found the work soothing, and with a quick but steady rhythm, the sapling was back in its place. Thankfully by the time she was finished, her vision returned to normal.

Lissa put away her Focus and observed her work, “I hope you are happy now, little tree.” She patted the top of the tree and jogged back to the camp to find it all packed away with Meriweather calmly eating some grass near where her tent was previously. Lissa finished her journey with a sprint and rubbed Meriweather’s snout. “Give me a moment to get ready, girl, and we will be on our way,” Lissa said while unpacking her armor from Meriweather’s saddle and donning. Due to having done this very thing innumerable times, she had everything in its proper place within a few minutes.

Lissa hopped onto Meriweather, who protested with a small whinny, and settled into the saddle. “Oh come now, we both know I am not that heavy,” Lissa bent low to whisper into Meriweather’s ear. “At least you aren’t Alsra, she has to deal with Garza hopping onto her,” Lissa was satisfied with the little stomp she got from Meriweather. She looked around and now noticed a very conspicuously placed hole in the tree line that looked roughly horse and rider-sized. “One stomp for Garza, two for Almios,” Lissa asked while directing Merriweather to the hole. Merriweather stomped three times while trotting to the break in the trees, “It wasn’t either of them? Well, that is a first, was it Saida?” Merriweather gave an affirmative nod while speeding up to just below a canter.

While passing through the tree line, Lissa pat and rubbed Merriweather’s neck and behind her ears, thanks to the convenient hole left in the trees, she was out within a minute of setting off. Lissa smiled as her first sight was of Garza and Almios ribbing on Micah, who was trying in vain to fend them off. Darvick meanwhile was inspecting his whittling and finding it satisfactory, put it away, and took out his sketchbook. Saida and the twins were the farthest away on the opposite side of the road and noticed Lissa first. Mela waved her over while Mera was animatedly talking to Saida, showing her the palms of her hands.

It did not take long for Lissa to reach them, “And then Lissa let me know that stupid sapling was draining me of my Aether and took it from me!” With explosive energy, Mera shot her arms wide, nearly hitting Mela in the head. “Watch the arms, Mera, though I have some news with that sapling,” Lissa intentionally cut herself to gain all their attention. It worked wonders with Mera and Mela both snapping to look at her and waiting for her to continue. “I looked at how it was drawing in Aether and confirmed it was drawing it in from everything it touched, including the air around it.” Lissa stopped Mera, who was about to interject, “One moment, please, Mera.”

Mera begrudgingly bit her tongue even though it seemed like questions were about to burst out of her.”I also noticed that the closer we came to the pond, the less it drew Aether from everywhere but the roots. And once I had put it back in the rather large hole, you managed to make. I couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary. I then scanned the pond to see if the area was particularly rich in Aether. Still, I could not find anything remarkable around it.” The moment Lissa finished, the twins turned to each other giddy with excitement. “We need to come back to this place when we are done!” Mera quickly squealed out while clasping Mela’s hands. “We need to bring equipment to study this area, Aether scopes especially.”

As they rambled on, Saida whistled sharply to gather everyone's attention. The twins ignored her completely, but Lissa knew they were the targets for the whistle anyway. Lissa watched Garza and Almios barely flinch at the noise, Micah was startled enough to jump a bit. At the same time, Darvick didn’t even noticeably react. Saida cleared her throat before speaking, “Alright, boys, at this point, we are burning daylight and need to head out now. We still have nearly two weeks on the road before we reach Fortwin.” Garza and Almios rolled their eyes and went entirely onto the road, Darvick gingerly nudged Mahogany with his heels to follow them.

Micah looked at them all for a moment before following close behind. Lissa winked at Saida and continued with some encouragement. “Now, I don’t know about anyone else, but I think we can make it to Fortwin in under two weeks, and if we do, I will pay for everyone’s much-needed baths.” Lissa brought out her coin purse and jingled its contents for further encouragement. The noise caused Mera and Mela to end their conversation immediately and without another word set off down the road. “Oh no, you aren’t beating us!” Almios quickly charged after them with Garza hot on his heels. Lissa and Saida looked to Darvick and Micah. Darvick barely had to touch Mahogany before he raced after them. At the same time, Micah sighed, patted Tyta on the neck while saying, “Don’t worry, we won’t be overdoing it now and end up sore by tonight.”

Tyta neighed in affirmation and went after them, though not at the breakneck pace the others were going. “You know they will get the most expensive baths since you are paying, right?” Saida said while turning to Lissa, who had just finished putting her coin purse aside. “Oh, I know that, and can easily afford it. Besides, after not having a proper shower or bath after this long on the road, it will feel amazing, along with an actual bed.” Lissa’s reply caused Saida to smile, “Fair enough, though I am going to beat you there!” She took off, leaving Lissa shocked for a moment. Laughing Lissa set off after them all.