"You don't understand. You are not the threat, Ellysetta Erimea. You are the gift the gods sent to combat it. A powerful Light born of terrible Darkness. You are the sword that cuts both ways, forged in a crucible of pain and suffering, hammered on the anvil of dark magic, and tempered by the love and sacrifice of both mortal and immortal parents, of your shei'tan, and every child of Light offered the chance to serve and protect you. If they prove worthy, you will not fall to Darkness. That is the test of this world—and specifically of the Fey—and that is the price the gods demanded for your birth,"

Hawksheart met the hostile gazes of the Fey warriors gathered protectively around her. His eyes burned like green flames in the graven image of his face. "You think I am a monster to have allowed this. Perhaps I am, but I assure you it was no easy thing to stand by and watch one I love suffer as Elfeya has. To know that if I tried to help her, I would condemn the world to Darkness."

"Some things should never be sacrificed, no matter what the risk," Rain interjected. "If you had told us, Elf, every man, woman, and child in the Fading Lands would have fought to the death before allowing a single Fey woman to suffer at the hands of the Mages as Elfeya has done."

"That is exactly why I said nothing." Hawksheart glared at Rain. "If your truemate had never been born, there would have been no hope for this world. That was a truth I Saw plain as the Light of the Great Sun two thousand years ago. The Fey are the gods' chosen champions of Light, yet your race has been in decline much longer than you ever suspected. Ellysetta was born to save the Fey, and by saving them, to save this world."

"She has already saved us," Rain said. The tairen kitlings are hatched and half a dozen Fey women are with child for the first time in over a thousand years."

"A temporary reprieve only."

"Then what is left to do!" Ellysetta asked. "If saving the tairen and bringing fertility back to the Fey is not enough, what more must I do?"

The Elf's shapely lips compressed. "That, I do not know. No matter how deeply I look, that answer is hidden from me. Even Grandfather—if he knows—will not speak of it. I know only that the future of this world hangs in the balance, and you will tip the scales one way or the other."

In Ellysetta's arms, Tajik began to stir. Instantly solicitous, she bent over his prone form and ran a hand lightly over the bleeding tracks he'd raked in his own cheeks and the swelling lump where Gaelen had hit him. Warm healing magic spilled from her fingertips and sank into his skin, eradicating all signs of the wounds and the blow.

Tajik's eyes fluttered open, hazy at first, then sharpening to full alertness as he focused on her face. Blue as the sky and filled with wonder, those eyes gazed up at her. His hand lifted to her face, but stopped a scant fingerspan from touching her. "Kem'jita'nessa. My sister's daughter. How could I not have known?”

Tears gathered at the edges of Ellysetta's lashes and a smile trembled on her lips. She caught his hand and pressed a kiss into the palm before holding it against her cheek. "How are you feeling . .. Uncle?"

Tajik's blue eyes went cloudy, then cold as he rose to his feet and turned a wintry gaze on his cousin, Galad Hawksheart. "I will not rest until I see you dead. This I do swear on—"

"Parei!" Ellysetta leapt to her feet and pressed her hand over Tajik's mouth, silencing the vow before he could complete it. "You will not swear vengeance against him. I forbid it."

Tajik gently removed himself from her grip. "Ajiana, you are my beloved sister's child and holder of my lute'asheiva bond, but this does not concern you."

"If you swear vengeance against him, then you must also swear it against me, for what he did, he did so I could be born."

Tajik's brows plummeted. Scowling, he regarded his brother Fey and found confirmation in their set jaws and brooding gazes.

Ellysetta laid her hand on Tajik's wrist. «He has suffered,» she told him privately. «Every day since before your sister's captivity, he has suffered more than he would ever want anyone to know. He has taken no wife, sired no children, allowed himself no pleasure or joy in his own life since the day he Saw her fate.» All that had come from the brief moment of unguarded communion when she'd met his Elvish eyes and, intentionally or not, he'd dropped the veil of secrecy he kept wrapped so securely about his private thoughts.

"We will find her, Tajik." Bel stepped forward and laid his hand on his friend's shoulder. "I swear to you, we will find Elfeya, and we will set her free."

"Assuming she and Shan still live," Gil muttered.

Ellysetta turned to Hawksheart. "Do they?"

His lashes fell to shutter the drowning sorrow that filled his eyes. The Elf king was far from the cold, unfeeling observer he appeared. He was simply expert at hiding his emotions. But somehow—perhaps through the communion of their souls when he'd joined her to explore the variations of her Songs—he could no longer hide so well from her.

"Bayas," he admitted. "They still live."

"Show me."

"Child..."

Her jaw set. Her chin came up. "Show me," she insisted.

Hawksheart muttered something in Elvish, then closed his eyes briefly and gestured towards the mirror pool with one hand.

The shimmering veil of water rising up from the pool dimmed once more, shadow creeping in from the edges while the center swirled with colors that slowly coalesced into a final, grim vision of Ellysetta's parents, both still alive, but bloodied and broken, their bodies little more than oozing masses of cuts, burns, and mottled bruises.