dust, stretching out until the two met at the horizon. She turned around slowly, looking in all directions, but one direction seemed much like another.
She began walking. Her footfalls sent little puffs of dust spurting into the still air. Oddly, she could not tell if she was actually moving forward, even though she watched herself place one foot before the other. She had no way of knowing how long she walked; time did not exist in this strange, gray world.
The sensation started as a dull ache in her chest that rapidly grew into something far more intense. She stopped walking and looked down to see that, beneath her skin, where her living heart should be, a bright light now burned. Its color was bluish white, and so intense that it hurt her to look upon it. Instinctively, she knew that this was the source of the magic that she carried within her-powerful, wonderful, and dangerous. As she stared at the light, it began to pulsate in a steady rhythm, just as her own heart would have, had it still been a part of her.
She covered the light with her hands, but its rays bled through her fingers.
Then, she knew.
Someone, or some
She took a step forward and in the space of an eye blink, found herself standing at the edge of an impossibly high cliff. A wine-dark, restless sea heaved and sighed below. In the strange logic of dreams, only one course of action made sense. She spread out her arms like the wings of a gull and jumped, hurtling down toward the hungry waves. She pierced the surface of the water like an arrow and was immediately seized by a powerful current that tugged her relentlessly downward. Fiercely, she fought against it, stroking hard towards the surface, exploding upward at last with a cry…and awakened to find herself being rocked along on the back of a horse.
“
… and awakened again, this time on her back, lying in a nest of blankets. She felt uncomfortably warm, and her body hurt with incredible ferocity. She struggled, but was too weak to free herself. Just as she decided to give up, exhausted, the angel appeared.
It was the same one who had come to her the first time, when she lay dying on the riverbank. She stared up helplessly into the whirling green depths of its eyes, unable to look away. It was breathtakingly beautiful-all gold, emerald, and alabaster. It reached down and laid a hand on her burning forehead, and she sighed at the blessed coolness of its touch. She closed her eyes and waited for it to carry her up to the gods on its mighty wings.
Jelena awoke, clear-headed, to the sound of birdsong. She lay quietly for a few moments and took a mental inventory of her body, relieved to find that all parts were still present and more or less intact.
She opened her eyes and scanned her surroundings. She found herself lying in a very large, comfortable bed in a dimly lit chamber. Sunlight filtered in through the partly opened shutters of a window next to the bed. She sat up and pushed the covers away. A fine, sheer gown of white cotton clothed her body. A tight bandage encircled her torso, just beneath her breasts, and a sling held her splinted left arm tight against her side. She was clean and dry, and a quick check of her hair told her that it had been combed recently. She blushed in embarrassment, contemplating her absolute dependency on her as yet unknown benefactors.
The urgent need to relieve herself drove her to seek a chamber pot. She swung her legs over the side of the bed to the mat-covered floor and attempted to stand, but she was too weak. Her legs buckled, and she fell. Jolts of pain shot through her arm and chest, wringing a scream from her tightly clenched jaws. A warm flood of urine gushed down from between her legs, soaking the gown and the mats upon which she lay sprawled and helpless.
She heard a door fly open and then the sound of footsteps rapidly approaching. A voice-female-gasped, then exclaimed in words Jelena could not understand. She felt hands, strong but gentle, lift her up into a sitting position.
Jelena gaped.
The woman who crouched before her was in late middle age, with a handsome, kind face and soft brown eyes. Her high cheekbones, the upward sweep of her eyebrows, the ears that tapered to delicate points-all were more pronounced versions of the features that Jelena had seen in her own mirror her entire life. “You…you’re an elf,” she whispered. The fact that an elf woman knelt here meant only one thing.
She and Magnes had reached the Western Lands.
The woman spoke gently, indicating with gestures that Jelena should remain where she sat. Jelena was only too happy to comply. She felt woozy and slightly sick to her stomach. The woman left and returned shortly with a pitcher, basin, a stack of cloths, and a fresh gown, and proceeded to get Jelena cleaned up and back into bed. When she had finished and Jelena was settled, she rolled up the urine-soaked mats and carried them with her out of the room, closing the door softly behind her. Jelena sighed and sank back into the cloud of pillows.
She closed her eyes.
She must have dozed off for a while, for suddenly, Magnes was there, sitting by the bed, and she had no memory of him entering the chamber. “Magnes!” she cried, reaching for him with her good arm. They embraced and held each other in silence for a time.
At last, Magnes spoke. “Jelena my dear, dear cousin! I’ve been frantic with worry. You’ve been in and out for days. Your fever broke only last night. The doctor wasn’t sure you would live.”
“ Magnes, are we in the Western Lands? I saw an elf woman… here! She helped me…I think she’s been taking care of me. Magnes, did we…”
“ Whoa! Slow down, Cousin… You’ve only just awakened. Yes, we made it. We are in Alasiri. How much of what happened do you remember?”
Jelena shook her head. “Not much. Things are pretty confused and jumbled up.” She reclined back against the pillows and tried to think. “I remember bandits, and running, and being chased by someone on a horse, then it all becomes a big blur.”
“ You don’t remember telling me about the angel you saw?” Magnes asked with a sly grin.
“ I…I do remember something like that… a beautiful face bending over me. I thought it was an angel and I was dying. I saw it twice.” Magnes smiled again, enigmatically, and Jelena regarded him with a quizzical expression. “I know now that it wasn’t an angel, Magnes. But I saw something, or someone… didn’t I?”
Magnes laughed. “Yes, Cousin, you did. Your angel is the son of the lord of this place. His name’s Ashinji Sakehera, and his father is Sen Sakehera, Lord of Kerala. We are guests in Kerala Castle. Ashinji brought you here to save your life. It was he who accidentally trampled you with his horse. He was chasing you because he thought you were one of the bandits. You tripped and fell, and he couldn’t stop in time.” He gently tapped the splint bracing Jelena’s broken arm. “The doctor here is amazing. Elven medicine is far more advanced than anything the quacks and leeches can do back home. You had a punctured lung, but he fixed it without killing you. No human doctor would be capable of that.”
Suddenly, Jelena remembered her father’s ring. She groped for it at her neck but it, and the chain that it hung on, was gone. “Magnes… my ring! Where is it?” she asked urgently.
Magnes patted her shoulder reassuringly. “Don’t worry. It’s safe. I have it here.” He pulled aside the neck of his tunic to show the ring hanging securely over his heart. “I showed it to Ashinji, and he’s promised to take it to his father when you’re ready.”
“ Magnes, there’s something else I remember. The blue fire…It came, right when the bandits were about to
