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passed.
    She gripped the hilt even tighter with both hands, trying to ignore her pounding heart.  “You have no victory here,” she said, her voice shaking.
    —You are like the other pests, never knowing when to quit.—
    “Your campaign ends today.”
    —Bold words, but empty.  You have lost—accept it and the end will be easier for you.—
    “Your spawn took my honor—there is no forgiveness for him, or for you his master.”
    —You let him, girl.—  He moved closer, his dark robes swirling around him like the smoke in the air.  —You have brought about your own death, and it will be at my hand.—
    She let loose a wild yell and charged at him.  Images of friends and family flew by in her mind as she ran, spurring her on even more; she saw Hiran’s young face and held on to it as she ran.
    My child, she thought, I am sorry.
    Something struck her in the chest, piercing through effortlessly to her heart.  There was no blocking it—she recoiled from the impact, the momentum from her running carrying her several feet before she landed with her back against the pavement.  She could do nothing but lie there, her body growing cold, her senses growing dull, the world before her eyes dimming.
    She could still feel Bralon hovering over her.
    —I have won today.  Tomorrow I will start to take the world, and you will realize even in the afterlife how wrong you were to oppose me.—
    Darkness swallowed her vision .  She felt herself falling…
     
    Calla awoke with a start, sitting bolt upright, breathing hard as her heart pounded inside her chest.  She looked around—she was still in the forest, Mai still slept on the ground, the air itself was quiet.  She took a deep breath to steady herself.  She had had nightmares in the past, but they were never like this.  She closed her eyes and rested her forehead on her knees.  She sat like that for several minutes, taking deep breaths, before lying back down on the ground.
    What in the world…? she thought. She found herself replaying the dream in her head a few times before she finally drifted off to sleep again.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    X
    The Watcher
     
    The Elf-like creature sat up in the branches of a tree, holding his balance on a limb as he sat on his heels.  He listened intently to the night air around him, sighing with relief when he couldn’t detect the sound of anyone pursuing.  He could sense the girl and the Nymph somewhere ahead of him, and hoped that neither would be able to sense him following.  He was just trying to make sure that nothing could sneak up on them from behind.
    The girl had gone too far down this road now—there was no going back now for her.
    But still he was worried.  The girl was still vulnerable—her true power had not yet begun to surface, remaining locked away out of her reach.  If anything were to happen to them, she would be incapable of protecting herself.  Mai was strong—he knew that, after so many years of knowing her—but by the standards of her people she was still quite young and too inexperienced.  She didn’t have the knowledge or the skill to actually defend her charge if they were attacked, especially by a large group; if that happened, she would most certainly fall.
    He stood up on his perch and looked out through the crisscrossing limbs before him.  For some reason, he knew he would soon end up stepping in to get the girl through.
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    XI
    Mai
     
    “And that’s how it ended,” said Calla as she carefully stepped over a root protruding a foot out of the ground.  “The weird thing about it is I don’t think I was me—I think I was seeing everything as someone else.”
    Mai hopped up and grabbed an overhanging branch with both hands, slowly swinging on it for a moment as she thought on what Ca lla had just told her.  Clearly the dream Calla had the night before had bothered her, so Mai had listened patiently as she