“No time for that just yet,” he muttered and dived through a wall of clinging shadow, the smoky black mist enveloping him for a single, chilling heartbeatenough time for a well-aimed javelin of darkness to cut deeply into his injured shoulder.
He winced in pain and lost his footing, one leg slipping out from beneath him as he tumbled forward into the dirt and rolled onto his back. Blood pulsed from the wound as he raised his blade blindly, struggling to find his bearings and push himself up on one arm. Pain flared through his shoulder, and a thundering buzz filled his ears as a dark figure bore down on him.
Rain crashed into Uthalion’s eyes as he swung his sword, its edge catching on something he could not determine. Lightning sizzled through the clouds, and thunder matched the pulse pounding in his ears as he imagined himself, prone and helpless before his enemies. There would be no funeral, no missive sent to his estranged family, only a little death in the mud, a body never found nor cared about save by the flies and flowers.
“Blood and bloom,” he muttered.
Shrieks broke through the storm, and a strong arm lifted him from behind. Regaining his footing and favoring his injured shoulder, he stepped back as Brindani loosed two more arrows. A shaedling lay twitching on the ground with an arrow in its chest, its broken wings fluttering madly to a sudden stop. Its companions backed off, seeking refuge from the half-elfs range and shrieking unintelligible curses.
Brindani turned without a word and continued on, the cliff and a dangling rope in sight. The shaedlings gave chase, closing again, but the quick release of a snapping bowstring from above scattered the dark fey back into hiding.
“Go!” Uthalion yelled over the thunder, clapping Brindani on the shoulder and swinging the rope into the half-elfs hands.
“No, I’ll stay!”
“You’ll do me more good up there!” Uthalion yelled, cutting him off and gesturing to his shoulder.
Brindani nodded reluctantly and pulled himself up, hand over hand toward the others.
Uthalion ignored the hidden shaedlings as he waited, leaning against the rocks and watching. In between arcing crackles of light, the undulating cloud of sickly vapor that flooded the valley rolled inexorably toward him. The misty river of the wyrmwinds crashed in slow motion against the walls, breaking like waves through the silent tide. Uthalion raised an eye to the cloudy heavens, considering all the gods to which he had once prayed.
“If any of you give a damn,” he muttered, “Here’s your chance to give me a sign.” j
He took the slack rope and gritted his teeth, pulling the first measure of his weight with his wounded shoulder. He pressed on, the pain numbing only slightly, pushing with his legs when he could and quietly swearing with each gained length of rope. With every breath he expected the” shaedlings te attack again, ready for the crude javelins that would pierce his back, wounds full of shadow-stuff one moment, then spilling blood the next. The two bows covering his ascent meant they never came. Near the top he could smell the grass, hear the swift whoosh of arrows leaving Vaasurri’s bow, though the beating of shaedling wings was distant.
Then, in a sudden hush, his vision blurred again, and what little he could see turned a sickly shade of yellow, like old bones drying in the sun. The misty river of wyrmwind broke against the wall, surrounding him. His lungs burned with a last held breath, and his shoulder ached anew as he pulled himself up another length. His eyes watered and felt as if they were on fire; he clenched them shut, focusing on the rough rope and the numbness in his hands. Four times his hands passed one another before the pressure in his chest grew too great, and in a panic, he gasped for air.
Thick, chalky pollen coated his throat, filling his mouth with the bittersweet taste of flowers as burning tears streamed from his eyes. One of his hands slipped on the rope, and somewhere he could hear distant voices calling his name as his vision narrowed to fine points of flashing light surrounded by inky darkness.
Ghaelya pulled at Uthalion’s arm, yelling with the effort as the human became a dead weight in her grip. Brindani reached down, securing a hand on the man’s bleeding shoulder, and the pair dragged him into the grass and away from the edge of the Wash. Turning him over, Ghaelya paled at the sight of his face covered in pollen, eyes swollen shut and nose running. Vaasurri knelt quickly, letting the rain wash away the poisonous wyrmwind as he raised his waterskin and forced the human to drink. Uthalion coughed and spat most of it up, but remained among the living, and for that at least Ghaelya was grateful.
She decided she would wait and yell at him later for his foolishness.
The shaedlings had scattered when the wyrmwind drew near, but Vaasurri warned that they’d not gone far and would likely follow. Heeding that, she and Brindani hauled the human to his feet and began a slow stumbling through the grass, the killoren wielding Brindani’s bow and watching their backs. Brindani’s eyes guided her, and Uthalion was able to manage almost one step for their every two as the half-elf pulled them slowly toward the east.
The thin trees they passed seemed fragile, their green-skinned bark twisted like free-standing vines and clinging only to the air for support. They seemed harmless at first glance, but Ghaelya cursed loudly as her shoulder brushed against a low branch, causing it to swiftly whip its sharp thorns into her skin. She crouched as low as she could with the human’s weight at her side, though several more of the vine-trees caught her with their stings as she passed.
With each needling pain, with each slowed step away from the Wash, the old spark within her grew hotter and brighter, unaffected by the cooling sensation of the rain across, her skin.
A low section of broken wall stood in a clearing among the thin trees, a surviving remnant of some ancient village or town. They hauled Uthalion into the wall’s single northern corner and laid him down beneath a glassless window. The human mumbled unintelligibly, raising his voice and gesturing emphatically in a weakened delirium. Ghaelya held him still, even as she tried to get him to drink water again, producing another bout of choking and hacking.
Vaasurri knelt beside him as Brindani took over the watch. The killoren reached for Uthalion’s hand, his fingers hovering over the silver ring for long moments. Before Ghaelya could ask what the ring was for, Vaasurri pulled away and laid the hand down, patting it softly.
“No, that might be all that’s keeping him conscious,” he said quietly. “Leave it for now.”
“Will he live?” she asked, brushing a stuck thorn from her neck.
“Yes,” Vaasurri said without hesitation, “I believe so. We’ll need to keep giving him water whether he wants it or not, but he’ll live. The pollen of the wyrmwind can kill swiftly and painfully, but only with several breaths’ worth. More than one breath, and we’d be exchanging our swords for shovels.”
“Idiot,” she whispered under her breath, though a tenuous-relief tempered her anger at Uthalion’s foolish heroism.
The rain grew stronger, pouring down in intermittent sheets blown by the wind. Ghaelya joined Brindani by the wall, watching the half-elf and waiting for his eyes to see what she could not. He shivered slightly in the rain, and occasionally his breath would come in a wheezing gasp, but each time he mastered himself and maintained his vigil, his bow at the ready.
“They’re out there,” he said at length, squinting through the rain. “Not sure how many, but a few at least haven’t given up, despite the storm.”
“Damn it all,”-Ghaelya muttered as she peered over the wall, seeking movement in each flash of lightning or the buzzing of wings behind every bolt of thunder. A small glow drew her gaze to Vaasurri, who had produced his small lantern of moss. Its green light revealed the trembling form of Uthalion, muttering and shaking, lost somewhere between dream and hallucination.