Like The Wind... (Closed)

[Mordelain]

“Where is here exactly?” Mordelain mumbled. Her lip quivered with both trepidation and fever. The blood in her tired limbs was poisoned – Suresh’s fiery ammunition beautiful yet bane of the living.

Coradan stepped out of light and waved at the portal. Cocksure and demure, his tattoos came to life resplendent. The glow illuminated his piercing eyes, rugged skin, and sandworm platitudes. Like all the Tama, his presence in the room was god-like. Commanding armies of unseen with his voice the man brought Mordelain to her senses. She stood without the need for words. Spirits plucked her up on strings.

“Be wary, daughter,” Suresh warned. He erred on the side of caution even though he found himself easing from his troubles and warming to the man so presumed to be their enemy. “Snakes slither even when dead.”

The proverb of old wives and haggard bazaar merchants put the il’Jhain ill at ease. With shaky steps, Mordelain advanced. Out into the corridor illuminated she wavered. Immediately, her eyes narrowed, focussed, and flickered with realisation. She knew exactly where she was.

“Jihta!”

Her exclamation was undoubtable heard for miles, despite its entombment in the depths of Jya’s Keep. The word bitterly bounced buoyantly along the boardwalk and out into the great hall beyond. Like a scared pup, she scuttled make into the cell with strength renewed.

“What is it?” Suresh rose despite his bondage. “Mordelain!”

Sweating fear itself, the il’Jhain tried to calm her nerves. She balled her fists, wrapped in bandages bloodied and brittle. Coradan clapped and lit the room, sand flames dancing from torches in long rusted brackets. The fire was grainy, but warm and nourishing.

“We’re in the Keep.” Coarse words cut deep.

“When your colleague shot you I had to bring you to the one place in Fallien equipped to contend with such wounds.” Coradan circled Mordelain, inspecting her recovery in the light of half-formed day. He had done the best he could with the guidance of his spies in the ranks of the priestesses. “To keep you safe whilst I sourced the lightning stone, I had to disguise you as enemies of state.” Enemies of state were not gifted death as a reprieve from their crimes.

“So unchain me,” the merchant spat.

“Gladly.”

Coradan did not look at Suresh. He raised a fist, conjured a staff, and drove its end into the dirt. A lash of soil given structure shot across the chamber. It darted behind the merchant, entered the lock like a thief in the night and undid the chains. They fell to the floor like the severed heads of a fallen hydra.

“The stone?” Mordelain heard whispers in the recesses of her mind. The Void, the space between worlds was reaching out to her. Like the wind, like the sand, and like the seas of Fallien…this seemed right. This seemed natural. This seemed like an alliance forged of necessity, good, and fate.

“You’re not considering listening to this madman?” Suresh armed himself with a cocked pistol.