Gliding on ethereal winds over changeless trees, they rose up the high walls of their gilded cage to their secret sanctuary: a tiny cave, hidden from the frozen flame of eternity, and the prying eyes of its thralls.

“I cannot take this any longer,” said Dacie, when they were safely inside. “It is time for us to make our escape. I will not have our child become one of them.”

Nuvias sighed. “Then tonight we will make our move. But we must be careful. You know what he can do. If he even suspects…”

Dacie shivered. “I am well aware of the risks. If we wait until our child is born, we will never get away from here.” She frowned for a moment, then snapped a finger, sending a sharp gust of air into his face. “What about Dougan?”

“Dougan cannot fly, as we can,” said Nuvias. “He will only hold us back.”

“Yes, but he may be sympathetic to our situation. If he could provide a distraction…”

Nuvias put his hand to his stubbled chin. “It is worth considering. He knows nothing of the world outside, but I sense a great restlessness within him. If anyone in this godsforsaken place can help us, he can. I will speak with him—see if he is receptive to the idea. Until then, perhaps you should wait here, lest the eternals grow suspicious. I will return.”

Descending from the sanctuary, Nuvias flew back toward the village; the place that had been their home for three long years. Ondite stood at the village centre, more statue than trow. Her eyes followed him up the path, and he felt goosebumps form on the back of his neck.

Dougan sat on a ledge with his face in one of the books Dacie had given him; the ones that told of distant people and places he would never see. Nuvias strode toward him—and came to a halt, as the sound of a cleared throat drew his attention.

“A word, we will have,” said Tulpa, stepping out of the shadows.

“Can this not wait?” he said. “I must speak with Dougan.”

“Wait, it cannot,” said Tulpa. “Follow.”

He glided after the gebling, feeling a surge of irritation rising from within. What was it this time? Did she have some vile tonic to shove down Dacie’s throat? Or would she waste his time with unsolicited advice?

She led him across the village to her cabin, and ushered him inside.

“You couldn’t just accept the gift that was offered,” a voice spoke from the shadows. Ice trickled down Nuvias’s spine at the sound of that voice. “It was bad enough that you sought to deny your child his memories. Now you would corrupt young Dougan’s mind as well? This, I cannot abide.”

The door swung shut behind him.

 

Garrain returned to the waking world with a bundle of alvesse thrashing in his arms. Moments later, Nuille’s eyes snapped open. Slowly, she sagged against him.

“What the fuck was that?” she said.

“A rather disturbing dream,” said Garrain. “I suspect Nuvias did not walk out of Tulpa’s hut that day.”

“Tulpa’s hut?” She frowned at him. “Perhaps we didn’t share quite the same dream this time.”

“What happened in your dream?”

She tilted her head at him. “I dreamt I was Nuvias’s lifemate, Dacie. They were preparing to escape the Hall of Eternity. She waited for him to come for her, but he never did. When she came down from their hiding place, she found Nuvias had been killed in a terrible accident. Dacie was so broken-hearted, she died soon after, in childbirth. It was…” She shuddered. “…harrowing.”

Now it was his turn to frown. “I suppose that confirms my suspicions. In my dream, I was Nuvias. And his death was no accident. The eternals killed him.”

“Are you certain Nuvias and Dacie were real? We’ve had our share of dream fantasies before…” She gave him a knowing smile. He remembered those dreams vividly. They generally had much happier endings.

“This one was different,” he said. “It certainly felt real. Saskia’s oracle magic has been bleeding into us for some time now, so it’s no surprise that we would dream true.”

“I don’t like the sound of this,” she said. “If they turned on Nuvias, they could easily do the same to you. If they hurt you, I’d…” She hissed. “Well, let’s just say, we’d find out just how eternal these eternals can be with their insides on the outside.”

“Calm yourself, my light,” he said. “We can’t leave until our transport arrives. Let’s not rush to make enemies of our hosts, unless they give us cause.”

“They’ve given me cause enough already,” said Nuille. “I swear, if I have to swallow another one of Tulpa’s so-called remedies…”

Garrain smiled in sympathy. Pressing his hand gently against Nuille’s belly, he thought he felt a little flutter of movement, but that was probably just his imagination. It was far too soon for that—or for her to be showing a bulge.

The fluttering against his hand became a rumble.

“Oh fuck,” said Nuille. Almost throwing him out of the sleepsack, she lurched to her feet and stumbled out the door. Seeing her double over, he dashed forward and held her hair out of the way as she vomited into a nearby bushes.

“The plants will love that,” said Garrain.

She groaned. “I thought, perhaps, as a tender, I might be able to avoid the nesting barfs. But it comes and goes of its own accord, and my healing magic has little effect.”

“Your condition is no ailment,” said Garrain. “It is entirely normal, or so I’m told.”

Nuille scowled up at him, then went pale, and heaved into the bushes a second time. “Would that I could give you a taste of ‘normal.’” She turned back to him, a sinister smile on her lips. “Perhaps I can.”

He backed away hurriedly, splaying his hands in surrender. “Now there’s no need for that. Have mercy on your doting lifemurf—”

As her lips locked around his, a vile taste spread across his tongue. The inside of his mouth was one of the few parts of his body that had not been altered in any significant way by the symbiotes that had taken root in him. His sense of taste remained largely as it had always been. He was, however, immune to poison, so even though it tasted like a kiss of death, he wouldn’t actually die from it.

“Oh deus that’s—eurgh!” he gasped.

“And now I’m suddenly feeling a lot better,” she said.

They made their way to the pool in the stream where they liked to bathe—only to beat a hasty retreat when they discovered Rover Dog and several she-trows had already claimed the water. He recognised the sky trow queen, Vask, among the thrashing bodies, flailing claws and angry teeth. The pool was stained crimson, and by the sounds the she-trows were making, they liked it that way. Of late, Garrain had been learning more than he cared to about trow mating habits. Saskia had been far more discreet.

“I wonder what Saskia thinks of her erstwhile mate’s proclivities,” he mused as they settled into a different pool, further upstream.

“Oh, she knows Rover Dog’s extremely popular with other she-trows,” said Nuille. “I can’t say she approves, but she knows she can’t change him.”

Garrain looked at his lifemate, surprised the demon had confided in her about such things. Then again, Nuille was a tender. She probably discovered all kinds of things about her patients that she never revealed to him.

Returning to the village, they were met by Tulpa, the gebling eternal. Meeting her had been one of many surprises they’d encountered in this place. Tulpa wasn’t much like the frightful geblings described in the old tales. She was…considerably shorter. But from the way she moved, he could tell she was far from harmless.

Tulpa gave Nuille an appraising look, before announcing, “Spawning sickness, you have.”

“That’s not what we call it, but yes,” said Nuille.

“Just the thing, I have, for you,” said Tulpa, holding up a bowl of wriggling yellow grubs. “A natural remedy.”

Nuille looked at the bowl for a long moment, and he could see that she was struggling not to gag. “Oh fuck off. I mean…thank you, Tulpa. But no thank you.”

“Eat,” insisted Tulpa. “Eat. Good for your unborn child, the slink grubs are.”

Nuille bristled. “I think we know better than you what is good for our own nestling.”

“Oh, you think so, hmm?” said Tulpa. “Answer me this, then. Give birth, you will, how soon?”

“Nine seasons from now, we’ll be welcoming her into the waking world,” said Nuille.

Thinking forward to that day evoked in Garrain a feeling of nervous anticipation. Nestlings may not be so rare to alvari as they were to the eternals, but they were still precious. Doubly so, now there were so few of his people left.

“Seasons, we do not have, in the Hall of Eternity,” said Tulpa.

“A little over a year,” translated Garrain.

Tulpa clicked her tongue. “Sorry, I am, to disappoint.” Her expression told him she was anything but apologetic. “Slowly, an eternal grows. Three years or more, this child you will carry in your belly.”

The blood drained from Nuille’s face. “I’m going to be pregnant for…oh deus. You can’t be serious!”

Garrain frowned. “If it takes thrice as long to birth our nestling, will we have to wait thrice as long for her fledging—her passage into adulthood?”

Tulpa looked at him with a trace of pity in her huge brown eyes, and this time, he could tell it wasn’t feigned. “Slower and slower, she will grow, until time, for her, stands still. Dead and gone, you both shall be, before she reaches adult height.”

Nuille scowled. “That’s just—you’re lying!”

“What need have I for lies?” said Tulpa. “Care for your child, we will, long after you are gone.”

“No,” said Nuille. “No. You can’t have her.”

Tulpa seemed taken aback by her refusal. “Away from the eternal flame, you would try to raise her? What then, when you are dead? Alone she will be. Lost and alone.”

Nuille looked about ready to slap the gebling. “I’ll not have you trying to shame me into abandoning my own daughter.”

“Clearly, we will have a long time to think about this,” said Garrain. “But we won’t be staying here our whole lives, and neither will our nestling. If she wishes it, we can bring her back here in our twilight years.” Although, in all likelihood, we won’t live that long, he added silently.

Tulpa opened her mouth to speak, but at that moment, a large, clawed hand reached down and plucked the bowl of grubs out of her hand.

“For me?” said Rover Dog. Before she could answer, the wriggling larvae went straight into his gullet. He chewed and swallowed, and smacked his belly contentedly. “Plump and juicy. I like.”

Tulpa smacked him on the leg. “Not for you! For the mother-to-be, they were!”

Rover Dog grinned at her. “Squishy said she did not want. Not waste good food.” Ignoring Tulpa’s furious glares, he and his entourage of she-trows sauntered off, heading for the trow encampment just outside the village.

“I would have words with the two of you, if I may,” said the drengar, Ithanius, coming up behind them.

“Certainly,” said Garrain, eager for the chance to get away from Tulpa.

In that moment, it occurred to Garrain that Nuvias and Dacie must have been Ithanius’s parents. He hadn’t gotten a look at Nuvias’s face—the dream had been from his perspective—but he saw a hint of Dacie in the youthful-looking drengar.

“Thank you, Ithanius,” said Garrain, after they were out of the gebling’s earshot. “For a moment there, I thought she was going to try to throw us in a cage.”

“This place is already a cage,” said Ithanius, gazing up at the frozen flame of the seed of eternity. “You know the other eternals don’t want you to leave?”

“We have surmised as much,” said Garrain. “But once our transport gets here, they won’t have the power to keep us here against our will.”

“Don’t be so sure,” said Ithanius. “The eldest among us have had many greatspans to hone their skills. One does not need gaudy magic to defeat an opponent.”

On that, they were in agreement. If Thiachrin had taught him one thing, it was that magic was not all there was to combat, and a sufficiently skilled mundane could still be a dangerous opponent. And these eternals were not mundanes, were they? If they’d had greatspans to practice the fighting arts, what might they be capable of? He would do well not to underestimate their hosts.

“Noted,” said Garrain. “Even so, we will leave as soon as we are able, and if they try to stop us…”

“I don’t doubt your determination to be free,” said Ithanius. “That’s why I’m here. When you leave, I wish to join you.”

Garrain gave him a long, appraising look. Truth be told, he wasn’t surprised the drengar would be less than content to spend the rest of eternity here. The real question was: why didn’t all the eternals feel this way?

“Very well,” said Garrain. “You may join us.”

“Then I suggest we make haste,” said Ithanius. “Tulpa has been making noises about waking Xonroth from his slumber. Believe me when I say: if the Primordial awakens while you are here, you might never get to leave.”

“He is that powerful, simply by virtue of his age?” said Garrain.

“It is more than that. Xonroth is not like the rest of us. He is…” Ithanius’s mouth worked, as if searching for the right words.

“We could leave right now if I could just return to my dracken form,” said Nuille, without waiting for him to finish. “But I dare not risk it. I don’t know what the transformation might do to the nestling inside of me.”

The two of them had shared a few nightmares about that very eventuality. While there was no telling what would happen unless she tried it, it was a gamble neither of them would willingly take.

“It won’t come to that,” said Garrain. “Let’s see what Saskia has to say on the matter.”

“We have our hands full at the moment.” Saskia’s voice spoke into their minds. “I kinda-sorta…accidentally conquered the capital of Lumium.”

“You what?” said Nuille.

“Yeah, long story short, Ambiellar has surrendered to us, and Imperator Jecham is now our prisoner,” said Saskia. “It’s going to take a while for the dust to settle, but it looks like we might have some new allies. Which is good! But also kind of a pain. The airship repairs are going well, but there aren’t enough of them to transport any high alvari who decide to join us. We’ll need more of them.”

“Could you send an airship to collect us?” asked Garrain. “We need to leave as soon as possible.” He relayed what Ithanius had told them, and spoke briefly about their dream.

“So that’s how Nuvias died,” said Saskia. “I did wonder if it was an accident…”

“You know of him?” said Garrain.

“Yeah,” she said. “Anyhow, that doesn’t sound good. You’re right, we should get you out of there. And I need to see you, too. I’ve been infected with…well, it’s slowly killing me, and you might be the only ones who can stop it.”

“Stop what?” asked Garrain.

“It’s some kind of magical poison designed to kill demons,” said Saskia.

“I’ve heard of no such thing,” he said.

“Nor had I until it crawled into my skin,” she said. “Anyhow it’ll be a few more days to get an airship ready. I’ll send Zarie and Ruhildi with Iscaragraithe instead. It can fly faster than an airship, but as you know, we can’t squeeze all those trows onboard. Maybe if they rode on top? Oh no, then they’d probably be fried. Bad idea. Uh…let me think about it. We could take two trips…”

Regardless, it was going to be days before Iscaragraithe arrived. They went to the trow encampment to discuss their next move.

“We ready to leave any time,” said Rover Dog.

“I will not be sad to see the last of this place,” said Queen Vask. “It is so boring here. Nothing to do but…” She flicked a sidelong glance at Rover Dog, and a sly smile crept onto her face.

“Let’s just go now,” said Nuille. “We can wait in the hollow outside, until our transport gets here.”

Garrain considered the idea. “We could. The sooner we’re away from here, the better. But won’t the eternals come after us there?”

“Not beyond the Hall of Eternity,” said Ithanius. “They’re afraid to leave.”

“Good,” said Garrain. “Then I see no reason to stay any longer. Gather your things. We depart immediately.”

“You expect us to simply let you walk out of here?” The low voice sounded behind him, making him flinch.

Ithanius suddenly went very pale. “The Primordial,” he whispered.

Garrain turned to face the newcomer: a dark-skinned figure, tall as an alvar or drengar, but with the small ears and beard of a dwarrow. A human.

Rover Dog tilted his head. “Not just walk. Climb. Fly.”

The Primordial’s eyes bored into the trow. “I didn’t expect to find you here when I awoke, young Dougan. Frankly, I’m astonished you survived out there, after all this time. And I’m not easily astonished. But I really must insist you stay.”

He raised his hand, and Garrain felt the familiar gathering of magic on the air. Dark roots shot up out of the ground all around the encampment.

Garrain felt his mouth drop open. This human…this eternal…was also a greenhand?

Xonroth raised his other hand, and a black cloud swirled overhead, crackling with unreleased potential. Great coils of winged beasts swarmed down from the cavern walls. The campfire flared, roaring up into a great column of heat and light.

What on all the arbor was happening? Was he a demon, like Saskia? It was the only explanation Garrain could think of. But not even Saskia had the magic of multiple worldseeds, did she?

Whatever this eternal truly was, some of his magic could be countered. Garrain sensed the essence flowing into the fence of roots, and it was not as much as he himself could bring to bear, as Saskia’s vassal.

Forcing himself to shut out the chaos roiling about him, he concentrated on the one small thing he could change. There was one spell he’d used on more than one occasion to lull Nuille’s binding roots to sleep when they dueled with one another. It was this spell he invoked today.

Pressure mounted behind his eyes, as his magic drove into his foe’s. Then, with a whisper and a soft sigh, the ring of writhing roots sagged and subsided.

The Primordial’s eyes narrowed, and he stared intently at Garrain. Essence gathered at the eternals fingertip’s. Garrain didn’t know what form the spell would take, but he knew it would probably be the end of him.

Nuille stepped between them, spreading her arms wide.

Nuille, no! What are you…?

With a jerk of his hand, the eternal stifled his spell.

Of course. Xonroth didn’t want to hurt the nestling. Nuille had known this, and had used it against him. That wasn’t all she’d done, though. Nuille had been drawing essence for her own spell: some form of cruorgy, no doubt.

The Primordial stood unmoved by her magic, his blood still pumping, his bones unbroken, his flesh unblemished.

Garrain didn’t wait to see what their foe did next. He may be a match for this eternal when it came to the magic of the seed of life, but he was under no illusions any of them could stand for long against the sheer breadth of power on display. Snatching up Nuille’s hand, he dashed out of the encampment, shouting for Ithanius and the trows to do likewise.

Some of the trows ignored his call, and turned claws and crossbows against the eternal. Whether to prove themselves or to buy time for the rest of them, he couldn’t say.

The result was swift and final. When Garrain spared a glanced back, he winced at the sight of charred and torn bodies crashing to the ground. There were no screams; no growls. Only gathering storm, and a swift demise.

With an explosion of effort, Garrain awoke the trees of the forest, and willed them to turn against the Primordial and anyone else who came after them. They coiled greedy branches around the eternal, holding him in place.

Meanwhile, he and Nuille channelled swift stride spells for a tremendous short-term boost of speed. The trows could keep pace when they ran on all fours, though they were hampered somewhat by the undergrowth. Ithanius stood high on Rover Dog’s shoulders, balancing effortlessly, and occasionally leaping and ducking to avoid passing branches.

Approaching the tunnel that led out of the Hall of Eternity, Garrain felt a moment of relief. That relief faded the moment he caught sight of the three eternals waiting for them there. To the sides stood Tulpa the gebling and Burinold the dwarrow. In the middle, the vast stone bulk of Ondite the trow.

“We offer sanctuary, and this how you show gratitude?” said Ondite in a voice like rolling boulders. She turned to Ithanius. “You. We are family. Why betray us so?”

“It isn’t betrayal!” said Ithanius, stepping lightly off Rover Dog’s back. “I wish only to leave; to see the world. If you see that as a betrayal, that’s your problem, not mine.”

Ondite let out a rumbling sigh. “If just you, we might allow it. But you try to steal our newest child from us.” She looked hungrily at Nuille. “This we will not stand for.”

Putting her hands over her belly, Nuille glared up at the trow. “Oh fuck you to the ends of the arbor! Our nestling is not yours, and I won’t have her raised by dusty old hermits in a deusdamned cave!”

Ignoring her, Ondite gave Rover Dog an almost apologetic smile. “Xonroth also requires your presence. I not know why.”

Rover Dog stepped toward the towering trow, and ran a clawed finger down the side of her face. She shivered at his touch. Her lips parted.

Then he drove his forehead into her face.

Ondite reeled backward. At her sides, Tulpa and Burinold sprang into action. Tulpa became a whirling maelstrom of tiny fists and feet, pummelling one of the trows into the dirt in an instant. Burinold brought up a long metal barrel, and pointed it at Garrain. The fronds on the back of Garrain’s neck stood on end as a glowing red line appeared in the air, passing through his chest.

He sprang to the side just as a deafening crack split the air. The tree behind him shook, showering him with leaves. A gaping hole as wide as his fist had been torn out of its trunk.

Beside him, Ithanius sprang forward, his foot lashing out at Tulpa’s throat. She deflected it with her hands, and the two of them began a frenzied exchange of punches and kicks, both combatants moving almost too quickly for Garrain to perceive.

Rover Dog, Queen Vask and several other trows, meanwhile, were laying into Ondite with their claws, spraying bright blood across the cavern walls. Whether the blood was hers or theirs, Garrain couldn’t tell.

On his map, Garrain could see that the Primordial had gotten free of the awakened trees, and was approaching fast. A few hundred heartbeats, and he’d be upon them. This had to end.

Garrain drew on the vast bounty of essence Saskia availed to him, summoning a spell that would—

He halted, frowning, as he realised their three foes were lying on the ground, twitching. Their faces were slowly turning purple. Nuille stood at his side, her face a mask of fury, as she turned the full power of her cruorgy against their foes.

“We’re leaving,” she said. “Try to stop us, and I’ll pop you like balloons.” She glanced at Ithanius and the trows, who were looking at her as one might regard a swarm of furious swamp wivorns. “Well don’t just stand there. Get moving!”

On a whim, Garrain snatched up the long-barrelled weapon from the dwarrow’s twitching fingers. Saskia would want to see this. As they stepped into the tunnel, he heard the three eternals groaning and gasping and retching, as Nuille released her magical hold on their bodies.

“Remind me never to enrage her,” muttered Queen Vask to Rover Dog.

“Not want to get squished by angry squishy,” said Rover Dog, bobbing his head in agreement.

They raced through the tunnel, emerging on a wide shelf of stone. From here, it was a near-vertical descent down into the tree-covered hollow. He conjured vines for himself and Nuille and Ithanius to climb down, while the trows relied upon their claws and natural climbing ability.

Once under the cover of trees, they descended the steep slope to the lip of the hollow, looking out across the vastness of the sky. There, they made camp, and awaited the arrival of Saskia’s dracken.

It was an entirely different flock of drackens that reached them first.

Garrain awoke to a shout of alarm from one of the trow sentries. He looked up at the dark shapes in the sky, and let out a curse.

“Have they spotted us?” he asked.

“Not yet, but they will,” said Queen Vask. “Trows are not easy to hide.”

“Then what? We can’t fight them. Could we get back to the tunnel in time?”

Rising beside him, Nuille sighed. “Not a chance. And even if we could, I wouldn’t. No, I’m going to have to risk it.”

She spread her arms wide. In a few brief heartbeats, they stretched and shifted into red-gold wings. Her body elongated and enlarged, until the form of a great dracken loomed over them.

“Deus, what have you done?” he whispered. But he already knew the answer. She had done what she had to do, to save all of their lives. Even if it cost them more than he could bear to pay.

Perched on Nuille’s scaly back, he and his fellow passengers held on for dear life as she dove down the trunk of the world tree. Far above, the drackens swarmed into the hollow. He felt a brief surge of relief at the realisation that they weren’t being followed. But that relief turned to a tingle of dread as he considered what it meant.

The Chosen sitting astride those drackens sought a prize far greater than he or Nuille or any of the trows. They sought the eternals. They sought the Primordial.

Abellion would claim the Primordial as his own.