Abandoned (Born From Shadows #2)

Nylif paced back and forth as Tatianna waited for Tyrion to return. She was quickly growing bored but understood he needed some time to be left alone with his fused. The other Fae woke up, not fifteen minutes ago and she decided it was best for her to remove herself from the situation.

She sighed and sat down on a fallen branch, brushing off the snow before taking a seat. Nylif immediately came over and placed her giant head on Tatianna’s lap. “Just a little longer. Then we will get going,” she told the wolf just as her stomach grumbled as if it were the ground shaking. “Do you want to go hunt in the meantime?” she asked the creature. To her surprise, Nylif removed herself from Tatianna’s lap and started to creep further into the woods.

Tatianna stared up at the star-filled night sky and decided to do something she hadn’t done in years. Not since she was a child.

“Sereline, may you grant me the wisdom to survive. Sive may you give me the strength to carry on. Lilyean please don’t let me stray from my path. Ayvios, would you kindly ensure the food is plentiful. Daynos, please place my life under your protection. Nyra may you bring down your wrath on my enemies,” she prayed staring at the sky above. “Please help me.”

Snow began to fall upon her head as if it were leaves coming off a tree, and she liked to think it was Ayvios’s reply. A confirmation that they were out there, even if she felt utterly alone deep down.

“Tatianna!” a male voice called. She sighed and walked back to the clearing that the two Fae stood in.

“Are we ready to go?” she asked, looking towards the other Fae’s now open eyes. They were grey, a soft sort of grey that swirled with a hint of darkness in them. Pain. His stare was as if she were being slapped in the face by beauty and sadness at the same time.

“Tatianna, this is Kaycion. Kaycion this is Tatianna,” Tyrion formally introduced the two of them. She didn’t quite know what to say so she ignored the male’s presence, and he did the same to her.

“Nylif went hunting for food. There won’t be anything if we go through the Waste Lands, maybe if we swing by the Hollow Plains and go around, that way there are villages and things,” she spoke.

Tyrion shook his head. “That would take too long. We won’t die of dehydration or starvation so we are going straight through.”

“A month without food?” she asked.

“More than a month, we don’t have horses. Anyway, you went four months without it and you are still here.”

“But I was practically a vegetable,” she replied remembering the ordeal all too well. The voices still haunted her in her sleep, she spent most nights just stroking Nylif’s fur.

“We will be fine,” Tyrion replied.

“Nylif won’t be,” she counted thinking of the mortal wolf. Starvation would set in after a couple of weeks, however, the wolf would surely die of thirst before then, that’s at least what she thought.

“The wolf will be fine, she is not quite fused, but still bonded to you. Your strengths are hers, as are your weaknesses,” Tyrion stated. “Let’s get going.” Tyrion started to walk through the forest, using the mountains as a guide. She glanced at the wolf in confusion and debated whether she should take his word for it. If he was lying, Nylif would die.

“Perhaps you are just placing your trust into the hands of the wrong people.”

He had no reason to think he would lie about this. She wasn’t trusting him, she was being cautious. She would go, but one hint of betrayal and she would run. Tatianna took one last glance around the clearing before following behind him.

<><><><><><><><><><><><><><><>

Tatianna releases the last of the wood onto the place that they had designated for their fire. They had no need to clear out any grass, as the land was already dead. Tyrion looked over at her, as if in expectation of something. “So are you going to light it or what?” he asked.

Tatianna crouched down near the wood. I’ve done this before, I can do this again, she thought. She raised her hands and closed her eyes repeating the word fire over and over in her head. Still not even a spark to glide from her fingertips.

“Have you done this before?” Tyrion questioned to her embarrassment. She nodded her head and continued to try. The last time she had done this was at least seven months ago, maybe more.

“So much for being a dangerous powerful Elf monster, I can’t even light a fucking fire,” she growls in frustration.

“Kaycion…you don’t suppose you can still use your magic do you?” Tyrion asked the other Fae who sat idly by and watched her struggle. Kaycion did not reply, as she expected. He hadn’t said a word this entire time. “Then Queen, I will have to teach you,” Tyrion said and looked over at her. His words caused excitement to flourish within her soul and bring hope to her heart, however dangerous such hope may be.

“Really?” she replied in doubt, just to make sure he wasn’t speaking in a joking mannerism.

“Yes,” he said. “Sit down.”

Tatianna looked at him in confusion, but did not object to his demand, She sat cross-legged on the floor, dirt sticking to her clothes. Tyrion does the same in front of her, having a bit more difficulty due to his wings that were now outstretched to avoid colliding with the hard floor.

“Before I can teach you anything, you have to understand what magic actually is. Unlike what most human’s believe, it isn’t some mystical force. It isn’t something that we create and produce ourselves. It is just pure energy.”

“What is energy?” she asked completely clueless.

“It is something that has the ability to do work on something else, or the potential to. It is the electricity flowing into the houses in Avalla, the gravity pushing you to the ground. Energy can not be created nor destroyed.”

“Then how do Elves do shit with it?” she wondered.

“Energy can be transferred, manipulated. This is where the uncertainty comes in, somehow Elves have the ability to move and shape the energy from the nature surrounding them into something else. It is slightly different for Fae, more complicated and less scientific, it has to do with the energy already within ourselves, in our bloodstream as well as genetics. The Dwarves can manipulate it as well, but only for inanimate objects. And the creature of the Dark Lands…well they are different again, their energy source being one from light. They take that light, suck the energy out of it, place it into their body and release it. That is why the dark lands are so devoid of light, they have sucked it away.”

“Would I have the ability to do both, take energy from nature as well as light?” Tatianna questioned thinking about her heritage.

“I don’t know. There has never lived someone with your…state of being. I don’t even know if a Kaddeian blade will kill you. Elven heart’s and other organs would normally close up before any damage can affect us. However, the blade absorbs our own energy that we draw upon to heal ourselves, so when we are stabbed, we would bleed and die like a normal human being. Most creatures from the Dark Lands that we have stumbled across, can live without their heart. They are like a pest or cockroach. Chop off its head and it still walks around. If you get stabbed by a Kaddeian steel blade, it may damage you. But I don’t know if that damage will affect you.”

She pondered on his words for a moment. Deep down she knew what it meant, but she couldn’t admit it. She couldn’t accept it without any sort of confirmation. “So what are you telling me?” she asked.

“I don’t think you can die. At least not through any normal physical means. Perhaps through over-exhausting your magic or there may be creatures in the Dark Lands, not much is known about that place. Look, I don’t know and I don’t want to experiment on this matter.”

She didn’t say anything, at least not for a few minutes. She just stared at the ground, dirt that she would see shift and change as centuries drift past. It was just a theory, she still had a chance of…dying. After so many years of thinking, she was on the brink of death, fighting to survive only to find out she can’t die. To some that may sound like a blessing, immortality at its finest. To her, it was a chain pulling her down to the earth and the keys were just a foot out of reach. It was overwhelming, it was…unbelievable.

“Teach me to use this energy,” she finally replied, staring back up at Tyrion.