A geyser of water knocks me flat. My cheek digs into the stone as the air is punched from my lungs. I wheeze, but breath won’t come. I’ve lost breath enough times to know it’ll be back, but dodging the glint of steel above my head is nearly impossible. I flop around like a fish out of water, eyes widening as something grabs my legs and pins me to the floor.

I fight to drag a breath in and ignore the screaming of my lungs. I use what's left of my brain to move my arm. My tiny arm shield barely punches a rust-encrusted blade off target so it sparks against the ground beside my head instead of my forehead. Arin screams—it’s somewhat of a mix between a wolf and a dragon. I didn’t know a man could make such a guttural roar. A blade thwacks with a sucking sound into the hand holding the blade above my head. But the thing doesn’t even wince as the black-encrusted blade once again comes for my head. My insides scream and my arms grow heavy from lack of air. My arms flop helplessly on the ground.

A howl of pure vengeful fury pierces past the screams of the dead and dying. It permeates the air like a fog permeates the morning with her mist. It settles on every shoulder and the ground cracks with its terrifying intensity.

I squeeze my eyes shut, not wanting to see the blade pierce my eyeball. That just seems like it’d hurt and I really don’t wanna experience it and want to just move… but heck, what else am I supposed to do when blackness encroaches around the edges and my arms feel like they’re gonna fall off?

Then my lungs inflate. I pull in a tiny breath. It’s enough that I know, I know, I should be dead by now. There’s a hint of stillness in the air, then a warm breath of air brushes across my face that stinks of rotting meat and freedom. And, oddly enough, peppermint.

I crack open one eye, yelping when I see the blade a scant hair’s breadth from my eye. Ran huffs out an amused breath, her saber teeth also dangerously close to me with a drop of drool dangling precariously on the edge. I am dangerously close to getting either drool or a knife in my eye. And neither sounds in any way, form, or fashion appealing. One way I lose an eye. And I only have two of those! I don’t really have any to spare. And the other—I shove down a gag. Which would move me enough to where I may would lose an eye.

Ran has the gall to wink at me, blowing another stinking breath across my face.

Miss me?

GET THE KNIFE OUT OF MY EYE!

She winces, and I would shriek in pure terror if not for the fear it would make me move and poke my own eye out with that disgusting black thing serenading as a blade. The blade dips before she raises her head and throws the creature, his body slamming into the rock wall with a splat that would normally make me feel some hint of empathy.

But right now? I’m more concerned with making certain my eyeball is still completely attached. Then I cut the vines from my legs. And I feel something wet dribbling down my cheek. I flick the slimy substance from my cheek.

I gag, gulping back bile.

Ran pats her tail on the cold, hard ground, her tongue lolling out with more drool on the end.

Blood, gut, and gore don’t bother you, but my drool still does after all these years of exposure?

I glare at her, still trying to find my equilibrium and having no immediate retorts, much to her amusement, which slides over the bond with a happy trill.

Around us, Timber Wolves fight beside mages and squirrels scratch at eyes while birds dive bomb from above. A few younger Eldertrees toss creatures aside with mighty swings of limbs. Fox hamstring the monsters and harts ram their pearly antlers into chests. Even lesser seen creatures, such as nymphs, cute, hand-sized bramble-jumpers who seem a cross between a rabbit and a butterfly, and pond fairies who guard the deeper parts of the forest fight beside humans.

Now this is a battle.

I wouldn’t let you lose an eye, rider, Ran says, nudging my forehead even as she kicks out with her back leg, making another creature splat against the wall. Besides, technically, the knife was never in your eye to begin with.

I roll said eye over to better glare at her, but it morphs into a smile despite my best efforts. I throw my arms around her neck, burying myself and all my worries into her scent. The scent of freedom. Of family. Of life.

I pull back. “Shall we?” I ask, a part of me wondering if I’ll hurt the pups.

But her ears perk and her tongue hangs out of her mouth in a beautiful smile. A smile I hadn’t even thought to miss, but in this moment realize I missed like my soul depends on seeing it just to live.

She steps up beside me, and I leap, trying to get on.

That ends disastrously when my foot slams against her rump and I slowly slide down her flank even as I struggle for a handhold.

Heck… she’s grown.

Someone puts their hand on my backside and pushes. I yelp, even as I wiggle up on her back.

I turn to glare, but Silver only throws me a wry salute and dives back into the fray.

Ran growls, the ground spiderwebs under her paws, and I feel free. I set a hand on her shoulder, breathing in all that is… her. I feel the individual strands of fur part beneath my fingers, feel her ribs expand, hear the rumble of her growl and rejoice at her light residing in my soul.

Together, my sister?

Forever, my Alpha.

She launches forward, two Timber Wolves at our back and those we trust fighting before us.

Ash stumbles back when Ran growls long and low at the boy, staring him down with a predatory smirk, and his pants grow wetter with something I do not think is water.

I chuckle low in my throat, feeling Ran’s humor over the bond. I sink my hands into her fur. “You got me?” I whisper.

Do it, sis, she replies, one eye turning back to throw a wolven smirk at me.

I grin, popping my knuckles. Then I dive into my Blessing.

So many strands. Then I find the Empath. She feels warm and soft but also strong. It’s almost… ahhh. Like a spider web. She’s silky, smooth, but inordinately strong.

I touch her thread gently, and she turns. I feel her surprise before she hides it behind a wall. Help? I send softly, gently, trying not to pry into her soul.

A pause… and then she opens. And something pours from her strand, something both dark and light, gentle and hard, compassionate yet rough.

What can I do?

I need to know how to send a massive, complex message to all here. Gently, I tack on with no small amount of embarrassment.

She seems to think on my words, and then the thread gathers itself into a ball and forms strands on top of strands. It bunches, weaving things on top of each other. The threads almost working like hands to weave strands of light into the ball. It seems similar to the way the fairies create their shields. It’s a slow yet beautiful building of light and matter and Other.

And then it’s left. A small ball the size of my hand in the real world. It pulses with an inner light, gentle yet strong, just as the one who made it.

I reach out, but hesitate right before my fingers touch it.

But I feel a gentle push from the other Empath and touch the ball.

Light is seared into my eyes as the ball implodes.

It sends a gentle wave crashing over every creature and I feel them anew. All I must do is push the words from my mind and they will go where I wish. I know that I can send a message, but I—heck, how in the worlds did she do that?

I need to know how to do that!

A gentle feeling of humor comes from the Empath’s thread.

And then I send the message.