Page 7 of The Shadow Wand

But...the most pathetic, easily broken barrier Thierren has ever seen.

Bewilderment whips through him. He’s seen pictures of Dryads, horrific beings dripping with rotted vegetation. Crazed eyes, pointed teeth. Demonic and dangerous.

These Fae don’t look anything like those pictures.

Yes, they’re intensely green, their skin glimmering deep green more strongly than Gardnerian skin, their hair black, their green eyes wide, and their ears sharply pointed. And they’re dressed in garments that appear to be formed from leaves melted together.

But the similarities to the monstrous pictures end there.

An old Dryad woman, her hair white as snow, has her hands pressed together as if in prayer. She’s fallen to her knees, pleading in a long stream of unintelligible words. A young boy clings to her, sobbing, his face pressed into her garments. And a girl of no more than ten stands beside them both, wielding a large stone in her fist, her face a mask of hatred, her breathing labored. Sharp, hostile syllables burst from her mouth. She hurls the stone across the meadow toward the long line of Mages, but her throw is weak and the stone falls short.

Women, old people, children, teens.

And all of them appear to be covered in a black soot, the dark grains sprinkled over their skin, their clothing, as if it’s been rained down on them. They’re breathing heavily, their bodies slouched, as if they’re tethered to the ground by some invisible force.

“What’s wrong with them?” Thierren asks no one in particular.

“Tried to attack us with wind.”

Thierren turns to the bearded soldier beside him.

The man throws him a jaded glance. “That young one there.” He points to a boy who’s perhaps all of twelve years old, shirtless and covered with the dark specks as he yells out a stream of what sounds like vicious curses at the Mages. “He threw two Mages about twenty span with a waterspout he sent out from a branch. Broke Kerlin’s leg against a tree. So we covered them in iron dust. That calmed them down. Stripped them of their cursed powers.”

Thierren turns back to the line of Fae, his mind storming.

There’s a baby. With round cheeks. Covered in iron and screaming. Being cradled by a lovely young woman. The baby throws the Mages a look of pure horror as he tries to claw at his face with tiny hands. The young woman is desperately trying to calm the child, tears coursing down her cheeks as she attempts to both gently pry his fingers away from his skin and brush off the iron.

“And did you subdue the kelpies that were found?” Commander Bane asks the lieutenant beside him. Commander Bane’s tone is bored as he looks through some papers, ignoring the pleading, threatening, crying band of Fae.

“We’ve poisoned them, Mage. Set down iron bolts in all the waterways.”

Commander Bane nods, seeming pleased, then rolls up his parchment and thrusts it into his shoulder bag. He looks over the line of Fae, as if both resigned and satisfied.

“Pure-blooded Tree Fae,” Commander Bane marvels as the children sob and the old woman keeps up her ceaseless pleading. He glances back at the lieutenant. “Good work flushing them out.”

Thierren’s gaze is riveted to the children, bile rising in his throat. The ones old enough to talk are speaking what must be Dryadin, but if he closes his eyes, their crying sounds unsettlingly the same as Gardnerian children’s.

And their appearance is so close toGardnerian.

Thierren’s stomach clenches and a sense of vertigo makes him unsteady on his feet. He looks up and sees a brief flash of white in the tree limbs above the Dryads.

White birds. Translucent as mist. Watching.

Hatred pours from the trees in a staggering wave, adding to Thierren’s vertigo. He feels a sharp tug on his affinity lines, as if the trees are making a play for his magery. Trying to rip the power from his very center. He struggles to set up an internal shield, whipping up air until there’s a dense wall of it around his lines. He fortifies it layer upon layer, but he still feels the relentless attack of the trees, the sensation of branches slapping against the shield. Trying to pierce through it.

His mind spins as the baby cries and cries and cries.

Thierren thinks back to his unit’s training. How he half listened to what seemed, at the time, like the obvious. Advice for foolish, sentimental Mages.

They may give you the illusion of being human. It’s the way the Great Shadow tricks our minds. You must see through it. And follow the Blessed Will of theBook.

But he never expected there to be a baby. Or this lovely young woman. And Thierren senses, deep in his soul, that this is no illusion.

The young woman rocks the baby, and her movements are like a swaying branch, all smoothness and grace. Thierren’s affinity power gives a hard lurch toward her.

The young woman looks up, straight into Thierren’s eyes.

A rush of overwhelming shock flows through Thierren as their gazes lock, her eyes green as summer leaves, tears pooling inside them. Her deep-green lips fall open, and her misery rocks through Thierren, straight into his heart.

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