The wind picked up, whipping Morrigan's hair about her face like a writhing halo. Sobs shook through her thin body; Ronan wrapped his arms around her to keep her from falling. Concern and fear lined his face as he studied the shifting mists around us.

"I'm so sorry," she said hoarsely. "He broke through my—I must've removed the curse too late—" The words faded into a jumbled mess as blood continued to seep from her eyes. I didn't know what she was seeing, and was rather glad for it. We couldn't afford more than one breakdown at a time.

"Don't cry, Morrigan." The voice was smooth, filled with false concern. A man materialised from the mist before us—I hadn't sensed his presence until he spoke, nor seen any trace of him. He wore his blond hair long, braided back in some uselessly complex fashion. While not as bejewelled as Morri, he wore several golden trinkets and his clothes were as fine as I'd imagine any nobleman's to be. By all means, he was young and handsome, with the right angles and figure: he was even tall for a sídhe, which really just meant that he wasn't embarrassingly tiny compared to Ronan. With the man's ridiculous choice in clothing and the narcissism radiating off of him, he'd make a perfect prince.

I hated princes.

"I'm not here to harm you," he continued, still addressing Morrigan. The sharpness in his eyes contradicted his soft tone. "So what death are you seeing?"

She pressed her lips together, those bleeding eyes wandering about sightlessly. "Shayne," she whispered. "Don't."

"Must I repeat myself? I'm not seeking a fight." Now he sounded annoyed. Grand.

There was no reply besides her shuddering gasps. Ronan shifted in front of her, drawing his knife with his free hand. Disgust flickered through me at the sting of iron in the air, stronger than usual—every instinct told me it did not belong in this realm. It was foreign. I shoved the feeling aside, grinding my teeth together. Flames itched the inside of my palms.

"It shall remain a mystery, then," Shayne sighed, as if impending death was of no consequence. "Aeden. Come with me."

"No." Aeden remained where he was, a few paces to my left. His voice was flat, devoid of any emotion. I'd never seen him so still. Power steadily gathered in the air around him; his eyes flared pure gold.

"I know you want to kill me, but let us not start." The man tsked and gestured with his left hand.

A spear shot from the mist, followed by a man dressed in the garb of a soldier—he had armour and everything. Aeden moved as if he'd expected it, grasping the human's arm and twisting. There was a sharp snap; the man barely had time to cry out before Aeden hooked an arm around his neck and broke it.

Morrigan wailed, cringing into Ronan, and I resisted the urge to march over and clap a hand over her mouth. She was horribly loud, and her voice never failed to strike a deep chord of annoyance within me. All that raw horror itched at my heart. I couldn't focus.

Aeden kicked the body aside, though pain creased his face. There were red marks on his forearm—he must have had to touch the armour to get as close as he had. "These ambushes of yours are growing predictable," he said, his tone easing into something more casual. Still, the words were wound tight.

"It does feel repetitive," I muttered, peering deeper into the mist. It took enough focus to make my head spin, but I could faintly detect threads of energy around us, obscuring my senses and making it difficult to focus. Some tugged at my mind, subtle enough that I could have missed it. Cael. Sure enough, I spotted him lingering beyond Shayne's shoulder. His dull eyes were unfocused as he returned my stare, as if drunk or simply uninterested. A few more figures blurred in and out of sight in a loose circle around us.

"These humans were tracking you, you know." Shayne pursed his lips. "They would have attacked you far sooner if I hadn't stopped them."

"Right," Aeden said dryly. "This is so much better."

"I'm here to help you. You aren't safe. I came to have you with me, not to fight you or your... whoever your companions are." Shayne inhaled deeply and pinched his nose, his pale green eyes flitting to Ronan and I for the first time. They widened as they settled on me; a subtle flinch rippled through his demeanour. Then his expression flattened. "But you never do listen. I'm afraid I must make an exception."

Aeden bristled, baring his teeth. His relaxed facade was crumbling swiftly. It was a wonder he hadn't launched himself at the man already, but there was a certain caution in his eyes amidst all the barely-concealed anger. Perhaps even fear. "What do you—"

"Kill her," Shayne said dismissively, flicking his fingers in my direction. "Only her. Subdue the rest."

I didn't notice one of the men had snuck behind me until it was too late. An arm snaked around my chest and yanked back, throwing me off balance. Pain exploded across my back and where his forearm pressed into my shirt. I shrieked as my vision blurred, distracting me for one precious second. Iron. The damn iron armour. There was too much of it on him. I could almost taste the metal on my tongue, bitter and painful.

In that second, he threw me to the ground and kicked my side. More agony speared through me, but I managed to roll backwards to avoid a second strike. A curse tangled in my throat. Cael's powers were making it difficult to keep track of the enemies we faced, even with all the iron they carried.

A small, dark shape crashed into the man as he made to follow me. He choked on his scream as the wolf found a gap and sliced open his neck. Aeden tumbled to the ground with a sharp yelp, shaking out his fur. His gold eyes met mine for a bare second before he lunged at another man shrouded in the mist, reduced to a blur of fur and teeth as he tore through the soldiers.

Flicking my wrists, I drew fire from more core and staggered to my feet. It was difficult to keep track of everything, but I focused upon finding Ronan first. He was still with Morrigan, his knife held out as his eyes blindly swept our surroundings.

Shayne wasn't far, though the man's eyes were upon Aeden. He was the root of this mess: killing him seemed the best option. I limped forward, using my staff to knock aside a soldier that stumbled into my path. His chestplate crumpled inwards like paper, and he fell. I wondered if the glorified stick could be considered a weapon. It worked well enough as one, so long as I didn't use too much force and snap it.

Shayne turned, sight of me, frowned. He gestured at Cael, who still stood obediently at his side. Darkness swept my vision before I could get much closer. I stumbled as it pressed in on me, foreign and underlined with a biting cold. Cael's power. Definitely some sort of illusion, pulled about my eyes to keep me blind. Anger sparked in my chest, and I summoned a burst of fire to cut through it. I didn't care if he was older and stronger or if his power was stronger in Natír. So was mine. He had no right to mess with my mind.

The light of my flames splintered through the dark, and I caught a glimpse of Cael's slim figure. My head was aching, my leg wasn't in the best shape, and the burning pain from the iron lingered on my skin. I wasn't in a particularly graceful mood, so I threw my staff at him. It struck his left arm and clattered to the grass. He blinked, incredulity flickering across his face just before I followed suit and tackled him.

The tall grass swallowed us, blocking out everything except the green-haired man before me. I struck him across the jaw once, twice, flames licking my palm. He shifted into the shape of a wildcat; it was hard, trying to hold him down as his body changed, and he nearly wriggled free. Claws swiped across my forearm, leaving a sticky trail of pain.

"No you don't, you little shit," I snarled, fumbling to catch his paws and hold them down. He wasn't exceptionally strong, as it turned out. Perhaps his little mind games did the work for him. I earned several more scratches, but managed to pin the wildcat to the damp earth. "I have better things to do than deal with you crazy bastards."

Cael's sides heaved as he stared back at me. His pupils were mere slits in a sea of murky green, a far less pleasant tone than Aeden's eyes. I grimaced and pressed my knee into one of his back legs, forcing a whine from the cat sí. With him distracted, I summoned all my strength and released one paw to grasp his head and slam it into the dirt. I wasn't sure how to knock out an overgrown animal, but that seemed to do the trick. He went limp. Some of the cloudiness in my vision receded as his power released me.

Another one of Morrigan's cries pierced through my concentration. I stood and whipped around to see her and Ronan with one of the soldiers—apparently, Cael's power hadn't relinquished its grasp over them. She shoved my brother away; the man's spear narrowly missed his chest, slicing a jagged, deep path across her arm instead. She stumbled into Ronan, trembling slightly. Her eyes were twin pools of red still, and her face contorted with something like pain, grief, or a mix of the two. For once, she didn't scream.

Subdue them, my ass. I raced over, twisting my fingers to send a wave of white fire tumbling over the man. He screamed and stumbled away, his skin blistering and sloughing off from the heat. I left him to burn, grabbing Morrigan's shoulders. Blood slicked her delicate skin, clinging to my fingers. She seemed dazed from pain and whatever her vision revealed to her, but not in mortal danger. A glance at Ronan proved he wasn't harmed.

"Will you be alright?" I demanded, vividly aware that Aeden was still fighting off the soldiers with his back to us. Shayne was also there, having left me to Cael. I had a bad feeling Aeden was bearing the brunt of the attack.

"Go," Morrigan whispered, blood seeping down her cheeks. "I won't let us die."

She did save Ronan. I stared at her. More words lingered on my tongue, but there wasn't time to use them. I settled for a sharp nod and darted away, ignoring the protesting agony in my leg. I'd healed enough to run. That was all that mattered.

Aeden wasn't faring as well as he had during the first ambush. He'd taken the form of a bear, facing three men and Shayne. If there were any other humans left, I couldn't see them. The blonde watched silently, though power rippled in the air around him, strong enough to make it hard to breathe even from the distance I stood at. Buried beneath it was the cold I'd learned to tie to the Kaelte. He certainly wasn't in his right mind.

Shayne tilted his hand downwards, his eyes narrowed in thought. The ground trembled, and a rift tore through the soft ground. For a moment, I remembered a short conversation Ronan and I had forced from Aeden. Shayne is tied to the earth, and he's able to manipulate it, he'd relented, swinging his legs from a tree branch. Like you're tied to the sun, Mae. You both have very close connections to your parts of nature.

What about you? Ronan had asked, his curiosity tangible.

I'm also bound to the earth. Aeden's laugh was quiet. Why else would I be able to shift into the creatures that tread it?

He staggered now, caught off balance as the ground opened beneath him. A soldier took the opening and drove a knife into his haunch. Aeden's roar of pain sliced through the air; his form wavered, shrinking in on itself. I skidded to his side as he fell onto one knee as a human, already yanking the knife from his thigh.

"Easy," I panted, swiping my hand to form a wall of fire and ward off the soldiers. "How bad is it?"

Aeden didn't reply, tossing the blade with a small shudder. Gone was his false, determined smile and casual air—his face was twisted with pure rage. His movements were slower than usual, though. Blood streaked his skin, matted his hair, stained his jaw and clothes. Most of it looked like his. His eyes shone pure gold as he ran at Shayne, his figure shifting into a wolf, then a rabbit, then a bird, then a bear, dodging swords and spears in a constant blur of fluid motion.

The man wasn't having it. The ground trembled once again, and my attention was yanked from he and Aeden as the dirt melted beneath my feet. I slipped—it swallowed me easily, like liquid. A yelp slipped past my lips, and I narrowly managed to grasp a tree root and anchor myself. The dirt solidified, solidly burying me to my thighs. Since setting the ground on fire didn't seem a viable way to fight, I sent a haphazard blast of it in Shayne's direction. A few shrubs caught fire as the flames passed, casting the misty clearing in a blaze of gold light. He ducked aside easily, but there was a certain wary calculation that flitted across his expression when he looked at me again.

Aeden's scream caught me off guard: it was an awful one, full of pain and what might've been fear. I swung about to see that one of the men had actually gotten a hold on him, his armoured arms tight around his chest. Aeden's form blurred, but he didn't seem able to shift. Another soldier wrenched his hands behind his back, cinching a length of chain around his wrists. They'd actually caught him. Aeden writhed, curses streaming from his lips, but it was clear the iron had him in agony. The kind that crippled. He stumbled, and Shayne was the only one there to catch him.

The man's expression was cold as he looked from Aeden to me. Then he turned away, the mist growing thicker around him. He whispered something to Aeden, who tensed and cast a wild, desperate glance in my direction.

I growled and clawed at the earth, slowly hauling myself free. Too late. The lingering mist condensed around Shayne and Aeden, as well as the remaining humans. A shift cut the air, like the world was a length of cloth that had been shaken out, and they vanished.

"Coward!" I yelled, wrenching my bad leg from the earth. Pain tore through me, but I shook it off.

The only reply I received was Ronan's presence. He clasped my forearm and helped drag me the rest of the way from the dirt. I collapsed atop it, panting. He fussed over me, mismatched eyes wide and concerned. "Are you hurt?"

"I'm fine," I snapped. "He... he took Aeden and ran. He didn't even try to fight me."

"That's always been his goal." Morrigan joined us—strangely enough, her eyes had returned to normal. The bloody tears had also vanished. The damn universe must've required that her skin remain clean and perfect. "You're young, Maeve, but you're powerful. I saw it. He doesn't have the resources to fight you, even if he's forced Cael into serving him."

"I don't feel powerful," I mumbled, not realising the truth in the words until they escaped. It had ended so swiftly. I hadn't been able to do anything.

Morrigan averted her eyes and moved to one of the soldiers, kneeling at his side. She cradled his head in her hands, but only just to avoid touching the armour. Choked breathing shook his body, but it was clear he wasn't going to last. She whispered something in the old tongue, closing her eyes. The words slipped together in a soothing melody, like a song or a prayer. She didn't stop until he fell silent.

"I saw this, but I didn't stop it," she whispered. She gently swept the soldier's hair from his forehead, then closed his eyes for him. Real tears glimmered in her eyes this time. "He's so young."

I glanced down at the soldier. His face did bear the roundness of youth, but I couldn't find the energy to care. He'd tried to kill me. "We can't afford to hold back."

"Perhaps," Ronan said after a long moment. His voice was worryingly quiet. "But they weren't in control. They were used like tools. It... could've just as easily been me."

My response caught in my throat. I didn't regret defending myself and the others, but it was true that the humans weren't to blame. I looked away from the bodies scattered about, not bothering to count them. "We need to stop the Ándúr Nimh," I finally said. "Before all the mortal realm gets caught between us."

"What about Aeden?" Morrigan stood, somehow unsteady and weak yet graceful in her movements. It was almost impressive how she balanced all that.

"Of course we're getting Aeden first," I growled. Annoying and shifty as he could be, I already keenly felt his absence—the silence that it left. It hung over me, and it was one that I couldn't ignore. We could agonise over morals when he was back with us.

My mind numbed for a few moments, and then I remembered Cael. I jolted upright, sweeping my gaze across the grass. He was still lying where I'd left him, thankfully, curled up around himself. His form shifted into a human's as I watched, and he groggily pressed a hand against his jaw. A moment longer and he'd be running.

I didn't give him the chance. I wrenched some fire to life in my hands and marched forward, stomping upon his chest to hold him down. Too late, I realised that was my bad leg. It hurt. I hissed under my breath, but kept my boot in place.

"You," I spat, "are solidly on my bad side. Tell me where they went."

A faint grimace broke through his expression. He grabbed at my shin, his fingernails digging into the skin where the leg of my trousers ended. Ice stabbed through my skull as his power tried to creep past my defences.

I dropped my weight with a sharp huff, putting more pressure on his ribs. "Talk to me."

He didn't. As I leaned closer, I noticed that his pupils were dilated, his eyes still unfocused. He didn't seem all there. Cold traces of energy drifted about him, tugging faintly at my chest. The Ándúr Nimh, I thought. I have a name for it now.

Muttering a curse, I got down and shoved my hand against his sternum, drawing as much heat as I could into my palm. It was the same thing as Orin's sickness, right? Just not of this world. And he wasn't a human. And he wasn't going to simply lie down and let me burn him. The last thought came with more pain as he clawed at me again, then shifted back into a wildcat. In that form, the scratching was much worse. I grabbed one of his legs; Ronan's freckled hands appeared in my peripheral as he helped me get Cael under control. Neither of us spoke as I felt for the energy of the cat sí's being, closing my eyes. I needed to focus.

The state of Cael's soul caught me off guard. It was in tatters—his heart beat too fast beneath my palm—every part of his lifeforce that I could feel was dull, distant. Worse still were the binds I sensed around him, thick threads of geas upon geas that wound about him and sunk deep into his being.

I could do nothing with those, but the traces of the Ándúr Nimh were another matter. Smoke curled around my fingers as I transferred energy from the sun, through my body, and into him to burn it away. It was a good thing that Cael's body was more durable than Orin's, because I didn't bother with delicacy. There was no time and I didn't have room enough to care. Cael shifted his form, fought, yelled, and generally made it clear that he was not happy with the situation. I ignored it.

The process didn't take too long. Perhaps a few minutes, though the very idea of time was slippery in Natír. Cael quieted at some point; he fell to shivering, as if I were pouring ice into his veins and not the heat of the damn sun. When I could no longer sense the taint of the Ándúr Nimh in him, I fell back onto my arse and allowed myself a few moments to wheeze.

Ronan thumped onto the grass beside me, clumsily groping for his knife before levelling the tip at Cael. His hand trembled, but his voice remained more or less steady between his pants. "Maeve... what did you do?"

"I tried to burn the Ándúr Nimh away." I swiped a hand over my hair, forcing it from my face. It had yet again come undone, curling haphazardly about my shoulders and covering my eyes. "Maybe he'll listen now. Or... I might've destroyed half his soul with it. I dunno."

Now that we weren't pinning him, Cael pushed himself upright. His movements were slow, cautious, and he pressed one hand against his head. It was nearly impossible to see his eyes beneath his muddy green hair, which was all sorts of mussed.

Morrigan was the first to speak, pushing past Ronan and I to the man's side. She gently touched his shoulder; he twitched, but she didn't hesitate or flinch back. "How do you feel?" she said softly.

Silence stretched between us all. I was about to break it myself when he finally spoke up, his voice as quiet as ever. "Lighter."

"The hell does that mean?" I growled. No response. I pressed my lips together, annoyed. Moving on, then. "Are you still going to attack us?"

Cael's head tipped upwards. He scanned the misty clearing, the shifting clouds in the sky. "He's not here to order me to."

"Shayne?" Ronan probed gently. The man nodded. "Will you tell us where he went?"

Yet another long pause. I bristled—it was Morrigan who held me back with a light touch on my forearm. "You must be patient," she whispered. "We cannot solve everything with anger. Aeden has time yet."

Heat sparked in my chest. "You saw how injured he was."

"I know." Her voice hitched; she pressed her fist to her lips and took a shaky breath. "I know. But Shayne won't harm him."

"No," Cael said, breaking our conversation. "But he'll put Aeden under a geas if he can. Like me."

Ronan lowered his knife, leaning forward earnestly. "Will you help us stop him?"

"If Shayne dies, so will my ties to him." The man's voice clipped a bit at the end. "I cannot harm him, and I must return to him. But there is no geas between us that, should people follow, I need to stop them."

"Is it far?" I demanded.

He paused, dipped his head in a nod. "There are barriers."

"Then we go now." I stood, keeping my face set. My chest ached, though, like a snake was curled about my heart. It threatened to move higher, squeezing my throat and stealing my focus. I grit my teeth and searched for my staff, stumbling a bit on the torn earth.

I found it half-hidden in the tall grass and steadied myself on it. The smell of blood was swiftly strengthening. I found it sickening. Ronan got to his feet and helped Morrigan up. Cael was already standing a few paces away, his eyes upon the fallen soldiers. It was impossible to read his expression.

Then again, it didn't matter how he felt. There had been anger in his eyes when he spoke of Shayne, and that was enough for me. Even if it was a trap, he would take us to the man. Clídna and the Ándúr Nimh would wait—right now, I needed to focus on getting Aeden back. We owed each other our lives at this point; I wasn't going to let him be taken from me like that. Not without paying Shayne back tenfold for the wounds he'd left.