I had always thought being buried would be a terrible way to die. Surely something quick would be better. A beheading maybe. Or poison, if it were the right sort. But slipping into unconsciousness wrapped in Schulas arms beneath the rocks, it was hard to argue with the dark and comfortable sleep that beckoned.

~

I was floating in the dark.

It was like meditating, but I wasn't in my cabin.

Wherever I was, it was definitely magic. It wasn't water, because I could breathe just fine.

I was in my body. Or maybe I wasn't. Whatever I was, was purple. And I glowed.

I giggled.

It occurred to me that my thoughts were jumbled, and I was having a hard time keeping them straight. If Bryn heard my thoughts right now he would think I was mad with fever.

A white glow next to me drew my attention. It wasn't shaped like anything, it was just there.

I wanted to reach toward it, and I pushed myself that direction. Apparently the white glow wanted to come to me too, so it did.

We floated slowly to each other, and as we finally touched it all came rushing back.

The fight. Our last stand. The soldiers. The gauntlet.

The ceiling crumbling down around us as Schula elated in it's destruction.

I wrapped myself around Schula, and she wrapped herself around me.

I tried to speak, but no words came out.

She squeezed me tighter, and I relaxed into her embrace. At least we had each other.

But where exactly were we?

I tried to look around. Everything was slow, as if I was wading through a thick mud only there was no mud, it was just nothing. Empty. Darkness.

Then I felt it. A light brush against us. I stiffened, Schula shivered.

We faced the direction it came from, and that's when I felt it again.

Smooth and warm, and old. A consciousness that spanned an impossible distance to reach us.

I shuddered. It was overwhelming.

It was the black spark. The one I had first seen from a great distance away when I met Nassir. I now knew the white spark I saw at that time was none other than Schula. But who or what the black spark was, I still didn't know, and I wasn't sure if I wanted to.

It reached out again, firmer this time. It seemed curious, inspecting us.

I held Schula tighter.

Then, it suddenly drew back. I wasn't sure what to think. A part of me was glad the overwhelming presence was gone, but another part of me was saddened by it.

I gently reached out, but fell much to short to reach it.

Schula added herself to me, and we both reached out again. This time it was much farther, but still impossibly far from the presence. But our actions didn't go unnoticed, as the black glow came back to meet us again.

I was a little happy to feel it again. I didn't have a particular reason to be, I just was.

And then, it did what we hadn't been able to do yet. Communicate.

I felt the intentions more than I heard anything, but the message was clear.

Wake up.

Find me.

Find me? But how? As far as I knew, I wasn't even alive anymore. We had put our everything into toppling the parts of Icehold that were a danger to others. A permanent reminder to DuVarick that he wasn't invincible. An act to shake up the city and hopefully alert the other courts.

We had done it, but at the cost of our lives.

Right?

But the presence didn't like my thoughts on the matter. It just pressed into us harder.

WAKE UP.

FIND ME.

This time it was almost painful. I clung to Schula's white glow as the presence receded once more, but not before sending us a final parting thought.

WAKE UP.

Air was forced into my lungs. My real lungs. Lungs I hadn't realized weren't being used until this very moment. My eyes flew open but were met with only darkness. I thought I was back in that place again, but everything hurt far too much for that to be the case. Surely if I were dead I wouldn't hurt, right?

I tried to move, and immediately regretted it. My leg was either pinned or broken. The rest of my body was in agony. One big throbbing injury with no discernible parts. A groan next to me caught my ears and I tried to turn my head.

"Schula?" I asked softly. I noticed the sound in my left ear was muffled. I tried to reach it to scratch at the irritating feeling but I couldn't move my arms far before they ran into rock.

"W... Wren?" she whispered.

"We aren't dead?" I asked.

"I suppose we aren't," she said.

We lay there quietly for a moment before Schula spoke again. "Can you move any?"

"My arms somehow," I said. "Everything else feels useless. We're under the rocks, aren't we?"

"I think so," she said. "Light?"

I tried to call up some fire. Even a flicker. Nothing.

"I'm spent," I let out a breathy laugh. Then it turned into a full blown fit of giggles.

"What is so funny?" Schula asked tiredly.

"We-" I laughed a little more until it ended in a coughing fit. "Ow. Um, we survived DuVarick's soldiers, Asher, the training grounds, pulling Icehold down around us, and we're going to die from hunger under these rocks."

Schula giggled too. "You're right."

"We might be delusional," I added.

"We might have concussions," Schula said.

Then we were quiet again. In the distance I heard more rock fall. There would probably be a lot of that over the next couple days.

"Hey, Wren?" Schula broke the silence again.

"Mm?" I sighed.

"Do you think we're alive because of that black thing?" she asked.

My body shivered.

"Maybe," I said. "What do you think that was?"

"Nothing of the Wyldes," she said. "Not even close. It was... old. And strong."

Crash.

A loud clattering of rock and iron, grating against each other and screeching in my ears. Schula winced, and I was thankful for the muffled hearing in at least one ear.

"Where is she?" The boom of a terrible voice echoed around us, shaking the ground.

"No..." Schula whispered.

I took in a sharp breath realizing too late who it was that boomed over us.

DuVarick.

"Find her!" he demanded, and dozens of feet obeyed.

The rock must have settled enough that the Winter court could investigate. I heard them now, overhead. They moved rock and pulled bodies from the wreckage. The problem was, from the sounds of it, that there was a lot of wreckage. It would take days, even for the fae creatures, to move it all.

And we definitely didn't want to be found. Not like this. We had no magic, no strength, and no fight left in us.

Then I realized that he was looking for 'her' and not 'them'. Who was her? My first thought was Schula, but then I remembered his obsession with my mother and I wondered if it was actually me.

All I knew, was that I didn't want him to get a hold of either of us.

"Schula," I whispered, barely loud enough for her fae ears to pick up on it. "They're going to find us eventually, alive or dead. What's our next move?"

"They aren't close yet," she said. "It sounds like they are still way over by the kitchens where this all started. It's going to take time to get here."

"Are you suggesting we could possibly get away?" I asked.

She laughed. "Stars no. I can't move at all and you're little better."

"I don't want them taking you alive," I said sadly.

"And I don't want that for you either," Schula sighed. "Maybe if they take long enough we can get enough magic back to... to..."

Silence.

"Schula?" I asked.

"What is that? Who is that?" she asked.

"Who?" I asked, but she didn't need to answer. A familiar magic brushed my mind. I sank down into my head, into the magic place, and found him again.

"Nassir!" I hissed.

"Who?" Schula asked.

"Shh, let me talk to him. A friend."

I reached out to him with my mind. It shocked me to see how little reach I had right now, but it was probably due to my empty magic reserves.

Nassir's yellow form reached out to me from... below?

'Stay, I will get you down.'

'How?' I asked.

But Nassir didn't reply.

Instead, I felt a shifting of the earth under me. Rocks broke and rolled away, soil shifted around me, and I sucked in a breath, my eyes probably popped open as wide as they had ever been in surprise when I felt my whole body sink as though I was in a pond and not a crumbled mountain. It was excruciating.

"Ooh!" Schula squealed next to me.

Down and down we sank, eventually falling out of the rocks and into open air as we dropped into an open cavern beneath the ruins of the gauntlet.

I sucked in a breath as soon as I hit the air, my heart pounding as I fell into nothingness. I clenched my jaw, trying to hold in the scream and readying myself for impact.

But the floor never came.

Instead, strong arms caught me as I sank into a deep blue embrace.

I blinked and looked into Thain's silver eyes. They swirled with emotion as he searched me for signs of injury.

"Thain, you're alive," I whispered.

Those silver eyes locked on mine and promptly my mouth was covered by his. His lips pressed against mine, his arms pulled me in close to him as he gently set me on the ground. He noticed my leg and was careful to set it down as painlessly as he could. I slid my arms around his neck getting as close to him as I could. My eyes fluttered shut as his warmth encompassed me. I felt the tear slip from my face, I didn't realize what almost losing each other would do to me. I was not ready to let go of Thain, I realized. There had been a lot of unspoken words between us since he found me. Maybe I should start changing that.

He drew back from the kiss, and I was breathing hard as I looked up at him. The gash on his forehead was ugly and swollen. I wasn't sure how he caught me without hurting himself, he looked pretty bad and favored his left leg and left arm over the other side of his body. I was glad he wasn't near us at the center of the collapse.

A gasp from the ceiling was what finally turned my eyes away from Thain as Schula fell from the rock above and was caught by Nassir, who was standing next to us this whole time.

I blushed at the realization that, though he didn't see it, he definitely heard our kiss.

"Wren!" Schula squealed, then upon looking around and seeing Thain she calmed down. "Thain?"

She turned to Nassir with a weary look.

"Schula," I said. "Let me introduce you to Nassir."

"You feel... familiar?" she said hesitantly.

"You as well," Nassir said, then his lips parted in awe as he took in a sharp breath. "You are, the child of DuVarick?"

"Well that answers that age old debate," Thain muttered.

"You're an earth-shaper?" Schula asked, still looking at Nassir.

"I suppose I am," he answered. "I didn't know that was a common term now."

Thain went over to take Schula from Nassir and set her down by me. I wrapped my arms around her, taking in the arrow wound, the gash on her neck, a wrist that must be broken, an ankle that was swollen, and a pile of bruises and cuts. She moved like I did, as though everything hurt.

I was little better off, and a pain in my lower side told me I probably had problems inside that couldn't be seen on the surface.

"You see, Wren, this is why I argued for you to bring me with you," Nassir chided.

"I see you didn't listen," I sighed, laying my head back onto the ground.

"Good for you that I didn't," he said.

"What in the Stars is going on?" Schula asked.

"There is a lot to discuss," Thain said. "But not here."

"Where are we?" Schula asked.

"Some caverns, far below the city," Nassir said. "I had always meant to put some rooms down here, but never got to them. I'm glad to see they were of use."

"I can't believe we're alive," I sighed.

"Neither can I," Thain said softly. "I thought you had... I felt it when you caved in those floors."

I looked over Thain's shoulder to Schula. We were both thinking about the same thing, the black presence. She shook her head slightly. A clear 'don't mention it' look in her eyes.

I nodded. This would require some investigation later. For now, we had to get out of here.

"I seem to be the only one who can walk," Nassir said. "Which does pose a problem as a blind fae can't carry three injured warriors by himself."

"Eventually DuVarick is going to move his search out from the wreckage and find us," Schula said softly. "We can't stay here."

"It would take a very long time for me to move you one by one," Nassir said. "But if we cannot find another way, that is what I will do."

We sat quietly a moment, trying to think of a plan. A difficult act, through the distraction of the pain I might add.

Then, the high and soft note of a bird echoed lightly. Not loud at all, but for three fae and a half elf it was enough.

"What bird is that in the middle of the night?" Nassir asked.

"It can't be..." I whispered.

"Puko?" Schula and Thain ask.

I watched Thain's silver eyes grow wide as he murmured. "He's here."

My heart shot into my throat, and I turned to the exit of the caverns expecting to see our enemy. I heard several footsteps bounce lightly off the walls.

But instead I saw a face that had me melting in relief.

"Stars, there you are!" Eberon rounded a corner with a torch in hand. He had a set of three Autumn fae with him.

He ran to Thain and immediately embraced him. Then he bared his fangs and hissed at him. "Don't you ever pull this shit again!"

"I missed you too, Eberon," Thain smiled tiredly before laying back down to rest.

"You're going to tell me what in the hells happened here," Eberon chided. "But first, let's get out of here."

He turned to me and his eyes wrinkled in concern. "So it's true."

I looked down at the ground, I didn't know what to say. Now that I had survived, I had a long string of explanations to give. Everyone I had met in Thanantholl could very well feel betrayed by my existence.

"Listen, little bird," Eberon took my chin gently, lifting my eyes to his. "You are still under our protection, I won't let anything happen to you. I don't give a damn who your sire was, or your mother. I care about you, and Schula, and this great brute here."

He jerked his head to Thain and I gave a small smile.

"Mina!" Eberon called one of the fae over. A female with soft violet eyes and a gentle smile took a knee next to where I sat on the ground.

"Mina, can you do a little something about Wren here before we meet up with the others?" Eb asked.

She nodded and began moving her fingers through the air in an intricate pattern.

"Mina here is an expert at illusion," Eberon explained. "She's going to fix you up like a fae, at least until we can sort this out. These three are sworn to keep your secret right now, so don't worry about that. It would do no good to draw that kind of attention to yourself before we clear the air with the courts."

My heart lifted. I looked down at my body, still battered and bruised, but now with a more fae-like glow to it. My ears probably looked different too, though I couldn't see them. My scent lost the sharpness of the witch's blood and the musk of the elves.

"Thank you," I whispered.

Eberon just smiled and stood up, brushing the dust off his pants. "Alright then, let's get you four moved to a safe location. We need to move quickly, and we have a long way to go."