Make your own way

You send a swift hiss, calling her back. Alina looks annoyed as you question her.. insisting the swiftest way is in the direction she took. Something nags at your senses as she talks.. something not right about how she acts.. or perhaps what she has said. Her words are urgent, her elfin features show desperation.. not surprising given the hunting party closing on your position. But there seems a strain around her big green green eyes.. a tension that seems focussed on you as much as the pursuit.

You quickly pull rank, there is no time to waste with this.

“Sister, we move, now!”

Your words silence her and she nods meekly. Moving to follow your lead as you head up toward a small ridge ahead, swamped with ivy. The sounds of more running water come to you as you rise higher, another possibility to lose your trail you hope. You climb higher with renewed vigour, urgency rising again at the thought of your precious intelligence salvaging at least something from the slaughter you have escaped.

Intelligence.. The thought bobs at the back of your mind as the pair of you scale the ridge and push on through the trees towards the moving water. The news of these metal monsters and strange sorcery must go to the queen and her council. And yet.. perhaps they already have heard this news? Alina referred to the insectoid flyers as if she knew of them.. A coil of dismaying suspicion begins to flutter around your heart as the stream comes into sight. Silently willing your power to hand, you pause a moment as if winded, scooping a little water from the flow to drink.

Your poised ears pick up Alina’s rush the instant she moves and you whirl to see her charging you with a carved cudgel raised. Even prepared you barely have time to sweep your hand forward, her speed astounding. In the end it is her undoing however, carrying her into the deadly shards of magic you blast at her. Your attack twists her off her feet, catching her side, shoulder and porcelain like face. The cudgel spins away as she hits the forest floor heavily. Even so she is twisting back to her feet swiftly, knife whipped out by her non withered arm, face distorted in terrifying rage and by pain. Your follow up turns one side of her face to ash. She stumbles, a moment, her one remaining emerald eye flashing with determination then going slowly vacant. She slumps to the ground and doesn’t move again, one red coil of hair standing out sharply against the deep green. The other side is burnt skin and ash.

You feel sick to your stomach but you know you did what you had you do. Gathering yourself you turn and unleash **** at the ground, flinging yourself across the wide stream. You land lightly and conceal your path to the west side of the tree line ahead if you before resuming your journey back to your people.