"It's all about what you're doing, isn't it, son?" Eron asked calmly.
"Not really, but Jenna is important enough to protect. Don't you think so?"
"Don't be impertinent, or I'll whip you, boy," Elke said harshly.
"If you could touch me, I'd be worried, mother," he said dismissively. "I have to go now, I can't hold this any longer. Just keep Jenna safe. I'll contact her in a few days, to explain things to her in more detail. Just be safe," he told them urgently as he felt the illusion unravel.
"Tarrin? Tarrin!" he heard his mother scream, but he was already losing his connection to his projected image. In the blink of an eye, his consciousness raced back to himself, and he felt and smelled and heard from his own body again.
The feel of it was bitter. He was right there in the same room with his family! Right there, and he couldn't touch them! He desperately wanted to go back, to look into their eyes, to hold them in his arms, but he was too exhausted to try. And even then, he wasn't sure if he could find his way back there. Jenna's power had drawn him to her, and without her to guide him, he may not be able to return. All he could do now was speak to her through her amulet, where hers would be the only voice he could hear. It wasn't enough. Seeing his family again had made him realize just how much he missed them, just how much he wanted to be with them.
But he couldn't. He didn't hate the Goddess for what she had done to bring him out to the desert, but he hated the need for it. He had to be there, he had to do what he was doing, for the safety of his family if anything else. They were depending on him, as were all the other members of his rather large, unusual family, depending on him to find the Firestaff and keep it out of the hands of those who would use it. His mother and father and sister, Allia and Keritanima, Triana and Jesmind, Mist and Janette, Sarraya, Dolanna, Phandebrass, Dar, Azakar, Miranda, Binter, Sisska, even Shiika, they were all depending on him. He couldn't fail them, not now, not after coming so far. No matter how much he hated it, he had to go on.
"Tarrin?" Sarraya called tentatively. Tarrin sat up, wiping at a bit of moisture in the corner of his eye with the furred back of a paw. He was exhausted, and just moving felt like an effort.
"I'm alright, Sarraya," he said. "I saw my parents."
"I'm sure they were glad to see you, if only for a moment," she said gently. "To see you were well if anything. How is Jenna?"
"She'll be alright," he replied. "She made the transition, but I'm sure you know that it wasn't easy on her. Now she'll be like me, without her powers until she learns how to use them again. Well, more like her body reattunes itself to the change in her ability."
"And then she'll be a Weavespinner," Sarraya said, her voice a bit strange. "Two of you, and brother and sister! It's a sign."
"It is," he said grimly. "I told you once before, Sarraya, the Goddess explained it to me some time ago. The old powers are reawakening in the world. Me and Jenna, we're just symbols of it, the return of the old powers of the Sorcerers. We won't be the last, either. The Goddess hinted that there would be others. But the only one she told me about for certain was Jenna."
"It's more than that, isn't it?" she asked with a sharp look. "I know how Sorcery really works, Tarrin. The old powers couldn't come back unless there were Weavespinners. The magical limits of Wizardry and Priest magic are dependent on the Weave, and the Weave is dependent on the Sorcerers."
He gave her a penetrating look. "You're right," he told her. "It's strange to think that my presence is fueling the powers of those who are trying to stop me."
She laughed ruefully. "That's one way of looking at it, I guess," she admitted. "You feel like moving? I rebuilt the lean-to while you were out. Want to move back into the shade, or do you want to stay here?" She hovered over him. "Need something to eat or drink? Want a pillow?"
He pulled himself up to his feet, but he could feel his bone-weariness. Using his magic as he had had literally sucked all the strength right out of him. He never dreamed that it could be so tiring. But then again, what he had done would have been considered impossible. "I'm fine, Sarraya," he said. "Just let me take a nap and get something to drink, and I'll be fine. I don't think we'll be moving until tomorrow, though. I need to rest."
"We can't stay up here," she said with a fret. "You sit down and rest and let me go find a good campsite that's close enough for you to reach. Then we'll move and make a good camp, instead of this ramshackle rush job here."
"Sounds like a plan to me," he said, moving over to the lean-to. He flopped down in the shade and rolled over on his belly. He was so tired that his tail simply laid limply across his leg, when it usually would have been swishing over him. "Just come and get me when it's time to move."
"Sure thing."
"Sarraya."
"What is it?"
"Thanks for caring," he said in a weary voice, then he lowered his head, closed his eyes, and immediately fell asleep. A deep, dreamless sleep, uninterrupted by stray thoughts. A sleep of recovery.
Sarraya had found a good campsite, in a shallow valley between two flattened hills, a rambling little dell that concentrated the light of the campfire and gave them a great deal of warning should something come over the hilltops and attack. It required a herculean effort for Sarraya to rouse him from his sleep once she returned, having to resort to Druidic magic to shock him back into some sense of consciousness with ice-cold water. It was only about a longspan from where he had been sleeping, and it took him nearly an hour to trudge over to the rather elaborate campsite that Sarraya had erected before coming back for him. Three large tents, one of them filled with all kinds of foods, even meat, kept chilled by conjured ice. A tent for sleeping, complete with enough blankets to raise the top some span off the desert floor, so soft that he very nearly sank into them. She wouldn't explain why she raised the third tent, and he was too tired to care when he dragged himself past the large fire pit that she had excavated and crawled into the tent she had said was his. He fell asleep as soon as he was inside, and slept all the way until nearly noontime the next day, in a nearly comatose slumber that would have been impossible for him to awaken from, should he be needed.
He finally did stir at the smell of cooking bacon, and the sound of it sizzling in a skillet. He felt as if his head had been stuffed with wool, but his body felt much better. He still felt tired, but he knew that that was an effect of sleeping for such a long time. The brightness outside told him that it had to be well into morning, at the very least, and he realized that he'd been sleeping almost non-stop since noon the prior day. He sat up and realized that he'd been laying on his tail all that time, rendering the limb numb and paralyzed from lack of blood from about a longspan from the base down. It hung limply behind him as he stood up and stretched carefully so as not to bring down the tent, then it dragged on the ground behind him as he left the tent to see what was going on.
Sarraya was hovering near a skillet that was itself hovering over the fire, a large slab of bacon sizzling merrily within it. The Faerie was sweating profusely, between the desert heat and the radiance of the fire. He looked down at her with both amusement and gratitude. It took a great deal to make Sarraya bend to such manual labor.
"Morning," she said with a smile. "Sleep well?"
"I have no idea," he grunted, stretching again. His back popped in several places, making Sarraya cringe.
"What's wrong with your tail?"
"I slept on it," he replied. "It's numb."
"Well, it should start buzzing like mad in just a moment," she said with a laugh.
"I know," he replied, squatting down by the fire. "I'm surprised that you lowered yourself to cooking on my account."