Aylem, at the Crystal and Healing Shrines, five days before, on the day of the attack on the shrines

Around 200 mounted silverhairs and halfhairs either circled the dome on the Crystal Shrine or were dismounted and attacking the gate.

I mindcasted Foyuna and told her to move all the residents in the shrine to the southern half of the ancient building. I also told her why. Knowing what I intended, she was the picture of motivation. To give her a little more time, I landed in front of the shrine gate, placing myself between the shrine and the attackers on the ground.

“You think you can steal the crystals that the gods gave us?” I teased the soldiers.

“Witch!”

“Necromancer!”

“Coyn lover!”

I had to laugh at the last one, “given that the Blessed Emily is a Coyn, I will take that as a compliment.”

Someone shot a crossbow quarrel at me. That was annoying. I had already cast a barrier designed to slow and then stop projectiles. I watched the quarrel travel slower and slower until it stopped a hand-width from my throat. I plucked it out of the air and sent it back to the soldier who shot it.

“You have violated the Convention of Surd by attacking a shrine," I warned. "According to Foskan law, your lives are now forfeit.”

“You and what army, douche bottle?”

Whoever had said that should not have said that. In anger, I dropped all of the restraints on my power. The shrine’s walls and its protective barrier would protect those inside. The soldiers on the outside did not fare well. Some were already unconscious. Others were vomiting. Still more stumbled around, holding their heads and groaning. A few fell off their flying mounts.

“What you now feel is my true power,” I smiled sweetly. “I do not need an army. I intended to grant you a painless death,” I remarked, “but given your lack of manners just now, I have changed my mind. You will die by fire, one that will burn inside you until it reaches your skin and you shall remain conscious until you turn to ash.”

I snapped my fingers and amplified the sound. Those still standing or flying fell to the ground screaming. It was over in just a few moments.

By the time Katsa arrived on her eagle, only burning bodies on the ground remained. When she landed, she struggled to stay on her eagle. “Great One,” Katsa managed to say, “please restore the restraints on your power.”

It took a moment to focus and then the world was safe from me once again. “My apologies, Lord Gunndit,” I walked over to her. “You landed a little too close. Are you and your eagle alright?”

“We are now, thank you,” she drooped a little. “I see you took care of the problem here already.”

“Only because I used my full power. Otherwise, I would still be fending off combatants. Where is the Holy Kamagishi?”

“We need to return to Aybhas immediately. The Healing Shrine is now under attack.”

“Go ahead without me. I need to have a brief word with the Holy Foyuna first.”

Lord Gunndit nodded and then she and her eagle were in the air.

* Foyuna, did you hear what Lord Gunndit said? *

* Yes. Go. Stop wasting time. *

* Are the residents of the shrine alright? I seldom drop my restraints. *

* No one took lasting harm. Some will have aching heads. *

I could tell from the nuance shading her response that poor sensitive Foyuna was one of those with head pain. She was sensitive enough that she seldom left her shrine, poor girl. It was a trait that showed up in the haup Foskos bloodline.

* I’m sorry, dear heart, * I sighed. * I knew it was a bit close but there were too many attackers to handle one at a time. *

* Quit apologizing, fog brain, and get back to Aybhas. * Foyuna added a mental shove to get me moving.

I caught up with Lord Gunndit by the time I was level with Manse Esso. She pointed to her right. I followed her gesture and saw multiple mounts in the distance.

* They are from the Esso garrison. You can fly faster so don’t slow down for me. I will join up with the fliers from Esso. * Lord Gunndit was firm. I cupped my hand to signal yes and increased my speed.

When Aybhas was more than a smudge in the distance, I could see two different attacks. The larger of the two looked like it had penetrated past the greeting table at the north entrance into the shrine.

The smaller attack appeared to be around 50 mounted soldiers concentrating on one location in the north market. Soon I could make out magic attacks, mostly fireballs, spreading and dissipating against a domed barrier in the market. Outside the barrier, several of the surrounding shops were on fire. Unlike the attack on the shrine, I could not see any troops responding to the altercation in the north market. I decided to start there.

The first thing I did was to put out all of the fires. I managed that from about a thousand hands away. That alerted several of the attackers that active opposition was approaching. It took them a moment to spot me. Then five of them landed and attempted to cast a group compulsion on me.

I neutralized the compulsion and allowed the magic force to pass into me so I could absorb it and replenish my own reserves. It was strange but as the compulsion unraveled, I caught brief glimpses of other possible timelines spinning off and vanishing, not as if they were destroyed, but rather as they were shunted to some other place.

Since Emily started speculating on how magic changes time and its effects on mass and energy, I’ve been trying to sense those effects when major spells and charms are cast. As I unraveled the compulsion spell cast by the five mages, a thought not my own spoke in my head, saying, “The waveforms in the time field collapsed into a timeline after observation of the magic force.”

I needed to ask Emily what that meant. In the meantime, I cast instant death on the five and moved on to the rest of the attackers.

Unfortunately, the market was full of non-combatants, fleeing the market or hiding under store and workshop furniture, hoping to survive. I could kill the attackers one by one with instant death but then their bodies would fall out of the air and onto non-combatants in the market. I decided to incinerate them to ash instead. At least ash falling out of the air wasn’t going to kill anyone.

It took a few moments of fending off projectiles, fireballs, and the odd spell. I tried not to think of the lives I extinguished and the families who would grieve. I didn’t want to forget that the attackers were also human; however, I could dispatch them much faster if I thought of them as vermin that needed to be exterminated for the good of my home.

When the charm gems on their beaks broke, many happy eagles and griffins left the battle and flew for the mountains as fast as possible. There were a handful of eagles who came to land wherever their talons touched, regardless of landing on a roof or the street or in the middle of a burnt-out shop. I noted they all were hooded.

What sort of person flew into battle with a heavy leather hood over a mount’s eyes? I walked up to one and unstrapped the hood.

“Why do you wear a hood into battle?” I asked a scared-looking eagle.

“So I won’t run away or disobey my flier,” the eagle stepped from one talon to the next in a nervous manner. “There are no more control gems.”

“Ah! That’s why,” I nodded. “So all of you need to have these hoods removed.” I closed my eyes, focused, and undid all the straps on the other three hoods. “If you fly northeast into the highest mountains, that is eagle territory. If you don’t remember your original aerie, the eagles there should help you.” With that, I turned my attention to the barrier.

The barrier shielded the shop of Wolkayrs’ family, as I suspected. The attackers in the market were after Raoleer and Huhoti. Half the roof was torn off. Wolkayrs and his father Hopushe were dragging the body of a decapitated eagle out of the shop and into the alley. The body of a flier was pushed out of the way under a table. As I walked in the door, I was treated to the sight of Huhoti, who was covered in blood, tying a splint onto Raoleer.

“Is any of that blood yours?” I asked Huhoti.

“Just a cut on my back,” Huhoti looked up and then went back to the splint. “Most of it is Uxthados’. She’s in the store room with her mother.”

I started walking there but Huhoti’s voice stopped me, “she is in the storeroom because she is dead, Great One.”

I opened the door into the storeroom and looked in on Haddados, Wolkayrs’ mother, silently weeping over her daughter’s still body. Uxthados’ abdomen was slashed. Some of her intestines were visible and the blood from the wound was still wet. I looked at the wet blood and knew she had not been dead for long. If the soul still lingered, there was a chance. I knelt and put my hand on her head and probed. She had not been lifeless for very long. I opened an eyelid and it was not yet clouded. It might be possible to revive her.

“Haddados, can I get you to step back? I am going to cast deep stasis,” I helped the woman to her feet. Then I cast the spell. Imstay’s words from Black Fall followed me: cast stasis during battle and then return to the fight.

“Haddados, Huhoti, as soon as you can, soak some clean linen in water and lay it over the wound. Keep that area moist and take her to the shrine. Tell the people who meet you that Uxthados should stay in stasis. There is a chance we can save her, but I must caution you that it is only a chance, and only if I or Usruldes do the healing. I must leave now."

I flew into the fray above the north entrance of the shrine. I lost track of how many vermin I exterminated. When I finished outside, Lord Esso arrived with the fighting silverhairs of his household and the fighting mages of the Esso garrison. Lord Gunndit was with them. But I was already entering the shrine. There were bodies, both dead and alive, lining the main corridor that led to the Well of Mugash.

The noise of fighting under the atrium dome echoed down the corridor at me. I entered the atrium at a run. Most of the attackers were already cornered. The sight of attackers dying from wounds delivered by invisible wraiths was unworldly. The sight of the visible Usruldes fighting with just two steel daggers was mesmerizing. I had never seen anyone move like that. No matter how he was attacked, he would make a small step or dodge and then use his attacker's motion to drive home his own assault. It was like deadly poetry in motion.

He spotted me looking at him. “Fourth floor, south wing, hurry,” he directed me. The location sent a chill down my spine. I flew up the open atrium to the fourth floor and discovered a dead wraith at the door into the south wing. There were four dead attackers in street clothes in the hallway, one dead wraith, and one wounded wraith holding her hands over a wound in her side.

“The Holy Kamagishi took out the last of the attackers, Great One,” the wraith informed me. “She is in the study trying to keep her mother alive.”

I ran into Lisaykos’ study. Three dead wraiths and nine dead men in everyday clothes were on the floor. Kamagishi was feeding magic power to Twipdray who was maintaining the movement necessary to keep Lyappis alive: breathing in and out and keeping the heart beating. Twipdray was also leaning into the cloth she was pressing against Lyappis' neck. I knew immediately from this that Lyappis had lost too much blood.

I knew Twipdray could cast deep stasis, which is one of the hardest healing spells. So why didn’t she? I knelt next to Lyappis and tapped Twipdray, “you can stop, Revered One. I will cast stasis and then we need to find Kayseo, who knows how to do transfusions.”

Twipdray nodded and leaned back on her knees. I cast deep stasis. I was relieved that my probe found just one wound at the base of Lyappis’ neck next to her right shoulder.

“I spent too much making a barrier around your daughter earlier,” an exhausted Twipdray put a hand on my shoulder, not to be familiar but to hold herself up.

I caught her in my arms as she toppled over and laid her on the carpet, "you have nothing left in you, woman. Let me take over here. You need to rest," I did not let any of my worry for my daughter stain my words of confidence and reassurance.

“Great One,” Twipdray smiled weakly, “do not worry, your daughter is safe and the Holy Senlyosart is her savior. Opa’s wraith and I shielded her from her attackers and Senlyosart took them down. It was an amazing feat of magic. I can understand why she is the High Priestess of Sassoo. What a windshaper.” She closed her eyes and passed out.

I looked around the room and at a distraught Kamagishi.

“Where’s Emily?”

“She’s gone, Aylem,” Kamagishi said in a lifeless voice, numb with shock, “they took her.”