Subject: Re: An ambush that fails, an ambush that succeeds, and a general who takes the field

Pensive watches the macabre dance on the battlefield below with anger. . . and a growing sense of dread.

"Garyth," he begins, slowly, nudging his horse forward a bit. "This is not. . ."

His stomach clenches in a fierce knot, and Pensive snaps around to look-- not at the dying man on the battlefield, but toward the center of the isle. Toward the Mountain of Sand and Shadow.

And before he can cry out, the world dies.

A clutching darkness surges over him, and for a moment Pensive thinks he sees . . . something in the darkness. Mass of darker darkness, tentacled back, muzzle of spikes, claws. . . Nightmarish thing. Pensive clutches for the stonesash, but his fingers are stiff with cold and fear. He cannot untie the bindings there.

Don't see me, he whispers in his heart. Don't hearsmelltastefeel me. I am not here.

The blackness reaches him, smothers him, eats him. But something else-- it searches. This thing, whatever it is, is looking for. . .

Blood and stone. It wants the Kaishin still.

It is greedy for him. Its hatred and hunger for the child are immense. And it knows that Pensive knows something. And more than anything, Pensive wishes he did NOT know of Mission's boy. The thing on the battlefield below twists in Pensive's guts, tearing him, grasping at the knowledge.

Give me the child! it whispers and hammers at his mind. Pensive feels like he is boiling in the creature's hatred, boiling and choking and burning all at once.

But the Kaishin is beyond Kor Garesh's reach. And it is that fact that grounds Pensive at last-- the Path of Stone and Blood remained safe. And what was darkness to Stone? Nothing.

"You have lost him," Pensive mutters between clenched teeth. "I shall not give him to you."

To his great suprise, he doesn't. There is a moment-- a terrifying moment, when Pensive believes he has betrayed the Kaishin, and he begins to plunge into despair. But no-- he has not. And that moment extends to two moments, and if he can just hold on. . .

The darkness fades. Pensive finds that his hands are clenching the horse's mane, and that his shoulders are taut with strain. Someone is wailing, and the battleground has erupted into chaos.

He swallows. How could they hope to defeat such a thing? Why did he not run, as fast as he could, back to Bannock's Ire?

Elf-boy, I will eat you in the child's place, and your death will bring you no Peace. It is a whisper in his mind, but it sends cold fingers down his spine.

Pensive shakes, coughs. "The Path is not straight," he says faintly to Garyth. "nor is it soft. It leads to Overlook, and to the innocents that must be protected there."

Subject: Re: In the library

As the lights go out, Farron feels a panic well up within him, but before he can scream, the feeling is gone. The lights back on he looks quickly for Sa'id, fearing an attack by whoever killed Cadfael. But Sa'id is still sitting across from him, pale and shaken, but otherwise apparently unharmed.

"You felt that, too." Farron says. It is not a question.

Sa'id nods. "Something has happened. I fear for our friends on the battle field."

They sit in silence several minutes as Farron ponders this. "I should have gone with them," he says. "I have been no use here. We have learned almost nothing -- only that Kor Garesh is even worse than we had thought, if that is even possible. If any of our friends are dead . . . ," he almost can't finish the thought. "It will be my fault."