For a moment, the world seemed to stop.

Iliana's fingers clutched the downy feather to her palm. Heat seared her skin. It burned hotter than boiling water, yet duller than the sharp memory of death.

Gods, she'd forgotten the feathers were death.

Something foreign rolled through her. It started at her neck, sparking beneath the skin, before consuming her like a fever. And then, the song.

The melody spoke of everything, and nothing.

It consumed her, tearing out the pieces that mattered, and feeding them to magic flooding her soul.

The melody was everything that suffocated her. The need to protect, the need to run. The desire to live, the hatred of even the idea of a life lived without those she could have protected. The fear of a future guided by the gods, the desperate, all-consuming need for a life with meaning. A life where she was seen. Grief. Gods, a grief so strong she'd buried it beneath everything.

Her fear.

Iliana trembled, and the world she knew trembled with her.

Words left her lips. Instinctively, she knew it was a language not meant for humans. It was old, unfamiliar. Her throat burned as the ethereal song stole her voice piercing the silence that had fallen around her.

No, not silence.

Their voices were there, behind hers. Dull calls that trailed off as her voice reached them. A certain, foreign awareness, mixed with numbness and disinterest, swept through her. She saw their faces, felt what she was giving them with this song, but it was all... set apart. As if she were watching strangers, not her friends and kidnappers.

Even the beast's roar felt lifeless in her ears.

The wyvern lowered its wings, claws digging into the stone. Its gaze met hers, and she knew. The song would work, but not for long. Sirens weren't meant to bewitch nightmares as legendary as this. Provoke emotions in them, certainly, but not control them. She had no evidence for this conclusion. But, every part of her recognized the warning in the wyvern's eyes.

The moment this song ended, and the world returned to as it should be, Iliana would die.

For a moment, just a moment, she considered that a fair trade. As long as the others didn't try to be heroic--she knew Kain would, but the rest might actually use their brains--they could escape while the wyvern was focused on her. Her life for theirs felt insignificant in the grand scheme of things.

What was one newly born siren weighed against Rhode, who led them all, Melitta who had a heart of gold, Abiel who was too young to have really experienced life, or Natia who had just won her freedom? What of Eumelia and her power to heal? Or Kain, who she had already risked everything for once before? Fates, there was even Lykos who--for all his faults--made a life of rescuing slaves.

She could see them all from her perch.

Kain had run halfway up the path, Melitta at his side. Rhode was a few feet behind them, bow drawn, but not aimed, given Iliana's song. Callias was closer to them, than Iliana. A faint vein of relief flooded through her as she realized she was right--he had chosen his sister over chasing her.

From the way the group stood, Iliana could only guess that when the last bit of lightning struck, Kain had sheltered Melitta against the wall of the pass; the other two had been far enough away to be somewhat safe. The back of Kain's armor and what little skin she could see was charred, but he stood strong. When she'd begun to sing, they, like others, had been distracted by her. They stared with awestruck eyes, Kain still standing somewhat in front of Melitta.

Eumelia stood further up the pass, Abiel clutched in her arms. The child's head was tucked into his mother's chest, the witch's own eyes focused on Iliana. Lykos stood a dozen feet in front of them, sword drawn but hanging limply at his side. The crew was mixed, some further, some obviously having been running for Natia and Heron.

Was it a fair trade, letting them escape in the chaos that would follow her song?

Then, reality crashed in and that moment dissipated.

No one was running. Not from what she saw. And beyond that...

Iliana wanted to live.

She'd experienced death once. It'd hurt. And all the stories said she'd exist in that nothing once again, then after, she would be washed clean in the Lake of Souls, before reborn as someone else. Not her. She would end, having never truly claimed a place for herself that wasn't preordained. How was that fair?

It took every ounce of willpower that existed in her trembling body to raise the hand that clutched the feather. Without releasing it, she pulled yet another arrow from her quiver. Even as she sang, as the words fell from her lips with frightening detachment, she nocked the arrow. It was hard, splitting her attention.

Iliana couldn't fumble the song, but she couldn't stand still. She couldn't take a breath to steady her shot. She couldn't steady her shaking hands, or help how her mind momentarily focused on the heat searing her palm as she awkwardly kept the feather pressed to her skin with a single finger, the rest used to draw the string back.

The arrowhead wouldn't still. Her aim--Gods, aiming was impossible. She would have to trust in that ever-present instinct.

She closed her eyes and tilted the bow. In her mind, she saw the wyvern's face. The darkness that dwelled behind the nightmare's pitch-black eyes. That instinct brushed the back of her mind. The song would end soon. It wasn't meant to last forever. Not with so much of her power draining by the second to give the notes life.

She loosed the arrow, and with it, chaos.

The wyvern shrieked, and the pain nearly sent Iliana tumbling from the cart. As it was, her bow flew from her hands as she clutched her ears. Her eyes were still shut. Her lips were still moving. But, Iliana could barely hear the song. Instead, a harsh, echoing ring filled her head, continuing even after the nightmare's cry ended.

Bleeding fates, was that supposed to happen? Was that a power of wyverns?

The second Iliana could control herself--well, with the exclusion of the song--she turned her gaze to the path. With the wyvern towering above them, she needed her bow. A blade wouldn't cut it.

There. She practically threw herself off the cart in her haste to reach where it'd tumbled, a short distance up the pass. The second her hands closed around the wood, Iliana looked up. The next seconds seemed to contain years.

Her arrow had met its mark. Now, only one grim eye stared down at her. That damned ringing continued to haunt her ears, and she realized in that second it had hidden the sound of the wyvern's movement. It'd dug the claws of its hide legs into the rock along one side, the rest of its body now angled down into the pass.

Above her.

'The second feather, the Song of Desire, enchants every person that can hear it.'

As the wyvern's clawed wing tore through the air towards Iliana, Eumelia's words echoed in her mind. It was funny, almost, the realization that if she couldn't hear herself beyond the ringing in her ears from the wyvern's cry...

How could the nightmare?

The talons tore through Iliana's side, the force of the blow sending her flying into the wall of the pass. Something cracked, and her song cut off with a harsh cough. Pain consumed her. It flooded her side, her arm, pierced her chest, and stole the breath from her lungs. The bow was gone again, and she didn't have it in her to peel herself off of the pass to search for it.

She blinked, attempting to cast off the shadows threatening her vision. She would have laughed at the irony if it were possible. Just as she decided she wouldn't sacrifice herself for the others, the choice very well might've been stolen from her hands.

No. Even as the pain made it nearly impossible, Iliana shoved her rapidly numbing hand beneath her skirt. Her trembling fingers found the siren's blade, and she pulled it out with will alone. The blood was everywhere. It coated her cloak, turning it a frightening, near-black shade of green. The fabric was matted to her where it wasn't torn. The gashes almost seemed to shimmer to Iliana's eyes, and she blinked in an attempt to clear what was no doubt a trick of her sluggish mind.

When the nightmare swiped again, she aimed high.

Even as it tossed her through the air, she felt her blade tear through the leathery wing. Blood coated her fingers. Somehow, that was what her mind focused on as she hit the ground with a thud of her head to the earth. It wasn't how her vision shuddered for a full moment, blackness invading the growing sunlight seeping between the pass walls. It wasn't the screaming of her body, or how each breath felt shallow, barely filling her lungs.

No. Her mind instead zero'd in on the acidic sting of the wyvern's blood. It hurts. Why does blood hurt?

A shot broke the air. It was muffled, barely audible beyond the ringing, but it was there. A call. Another shot.

Iliana flexed her fingers around the hilt of the siren's blade. Funny. She didn't think she had enough strength to keep from losing it to the wing.

A muffled cry rang out. Was that her name?

She needed to look, to see who was calling. She blinked away the blackspots. It took a moment, but she managed to raise a hand to rub at them as well. Sitting up. That was the next step. A crash of lightning seared the air further up the pass. Someone else had stolen the wyvern's attention for a moment.

She looked up as if to confirm the idea, and found herself once again looking into its gaze. Somehow, the wyvern had wedged it's body further between the stones. Both winged claws dug into the opposing sides, sending cracks from the base of the walls to the top. Her arrow was still buried through one of its eyes, piercing the eyelid and ruining what laid behind. The other was focussed on her, even as lightning cracked across the air. Gods.

Well, she had said, 'look at this idiot.'

Something unfurled in her chest. Something hot, and angry, and... terrified. And she swore the feeling was punctuated by the faint jingle of a charm as it forced Iliana to find her voice, and her feet. It took everything she had, every ounce of rebellious will to drag herself from the dirt.

"W-what're you... playing... w-with the others for, huh?" The words were barely audible to her own ears, but they existed. Honestly, she found that impressive given how few threads tied her to consciousness. "I'm... I'm the one, t-to... blind you."

Well, she tried to at least.

Whether the beast had the intelligence to understand her, or merely understood the taunt in her feeble words, it curled back it's lips and snarled. Iliana laughed. It was a harsh, breathy sound that filled her mouth with copper.

The wyvern tore it's claws through the rock as it lunged.

"Iliana!"

The feminine voice filled her ears seconds before she was sent flying again.

Only, this time it wasn't because of the wyvern. It was because of the soft, pale hands that shoved her away even as claws tore through the air she'd occupied only seconds before. She crashed into the ground, and jerked around as quick as her abused body could manage.

Melitta screamed as the talons mangled her back.

Another shot rang out. The wyvern shrieked. Rocks fell as it tore away from the pass, something about the situation finally causing it to withdraw. Something rumbled in the distance, audible even with her injured ears.

Iliana only had eyes for the mermaid who'd collapsed in a pool of blood.

She needed to move.

She needed to help her.

But, her legs wouldn't listen. And, as a hand closed around the top of her shoulder, pulling a cry of pain from her lips even as she was pulled into their arms, her eyes never left Melitta. Which was why she saw Kain reach her side, and pick her up in a panic as rock began to fall. Callias was at his side, shoving them forward, looking bloody and burnt, but safe.

"We have to--"

"--leave th--"

"--pointless, if she--!"

Scraps and pieces of conversation met her buzzing ears as Iliana's vision spotted and blurred with each jostle of her body. Her hands burned. The world around them seemed to be falling apart, stone and ice shattering and filling what little of the pass she could see.

A single, dark word filled her ears as the black stole her.

"--Avalanche!"