A splash of pink and yellow was flying in a tight figure eight pattern against a starry sky. Underneath the strange tableau, a spinning nightmare of ashes was manifesting giant soot claws to slash at Trenn.

  With his long club in hand, his feet firm in a batter's stance, he swung at a swirling hand, sending it back to the Dust-Devil in ash particles. He kept his jaw clenched to minimize the pain radiating from his slashed cheek and ignored his screaming calf.

  Skate, at his feet, was trembling with worry; the slack purple slime was completely useless against the Ash-Wraiths.

  Each of Trenn’s swings met a grasping claw of packed soot with a satisfying FWOOSH, dissipating its form into a hissing cloud. The wraith would re-materialize an instant later, but it was an instant he desperately needed.

  A claw struck from behind and gouged three parallel furrows into his left bicep. Fire lanced up his arm as the grit of the ash cut his flesh. Blindspots. He was surrounded; even with his enchanted weapon, his position was untenable.

  Stop panicking! Think, he chided himself.

  Lady Yradone, her glade… the Sound Element. Invite. Match its pitch. He reached for the hum in his core, the chaotic frequency of his own soul, and tuned it instantly.

  The world ignited behind his eyes.

  The shrieking gale became a landscape of vibrating waves. He could feel the density of a claw coalescing behind him, the whisper of its approach a discordant note in the storm's symphony.

  No more blind spots.

  The club became a blur of reactive violence. He spun, batting a claw from above. He ducked, the club coming up in a brutal uppercut that shattered a hand, lashing for his throat. He was a whirlwind of defiance in a storm of death, meeting every assault with a concussive blast of wood and magic.

  A searing fire burned in his leg, in his cheek. He was moving fast, striking hard. His arms were becoming leaden weights, their muscles screaming with every swing. It had become a battle of attrition, and Trenn’s wounds were costly handicaps.

  A hole appeared in the vortex as Mara’s claws ripped a wraith from it. She turned into a white blot of focused fury, slashing wildly at the ash whirlwind. Her Jagged claws, glowing with a venomous light, infected the Ash-Wraiths it struck with its black-green hue. The contaminated ashes didn’t reform after being scattered. They simply fell to the ground and turned to dust.

  Trenn’s sonar caught something new. Movement… a strange creature flung the cottage door open. Its body was wide and thick, slightly hunched forward, and covered in a robe adorned with tissue flowers around its collar and sleeves.

  He had no time to process it. A fresh claw of packed soot lashed at his face, forcing his world to narrow back to the fight. He struck it before it could strike him, as Mara continued to rip wraiths out of the Dust-Devil, reducing their ashes to necrotic dust with each hit.

  The newcomer was running, four-legged, towards Ezy and Zeen. It had a wide, flapping tail and a beaver’s head.

  A humanoid beaver in a log cottage. Sure. That makes sense. Good job, translation spell.

  While Trenn continued batting every claw, every fang that manifested around him, the Beaver Kin reached their goal. They hauled the catatonic Zeen up and effortlessly scooped Ezy’s limp form from the ash.

  Then, a Gnome in each arm, the robbed figure waddled back to its cottage and slumped on its balcony. Satisfied, they turned to face the Dust-Devil and, with steely resolve, threw their arms towards it, palms forward.

  A new sound sliced through the gale. The Beaver Kin’s voice was soft and feminine. Their alien words were structured, resonant, a current of ancient order in a sea of madness. Some reached Trenn’s ear, words like “rest” and “cleansed,” but most were swallowed by the ash storm that surrounded him.

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  The vortex wall tore open under another of Mara’s assaults. A hand of packed soot shot out and clamped onto her arm. She vanished into the spinning grey wall. A flash of white fur whipped past, her limbs flailing against the overwhelming force that held her.

  Her body stiffened as her feet were ripped from the ground, her free hand shooting to her side while the vortex dragged her progressively higher. She tried to strike at the grasping hand, but the wind, the ash, the pull, its speed… It was like the entire world pushed against her.

  Shit, I need to get her out of there!

  The spinning vortex brought her past Trenn. His sonar sense locked onto the single soot-arm that held her fast. He tracked its chaotic orbit, his mind a whirlwind of prediction and timing. He roared, and the enchanted club arced in a brutal, calculated strike.

  The spectral claw shattered with a satisfying FWOOSH. Suddenly freed, Mara was ejected from the storm. She struck the packed earth in a furious, controlled tumble, her body a white blur that ended in a grinding skid.

  A choked grunt of air was forced from her lungs. For a single, ragged heartbeat, she lay still in the ash, then one hand pushed down, then the other, her entire frame trembling with the effort. She rose, favoring her left side, a low growl of pure, animal fury rumbling in her chest.

  The Dust-Devil’s cohesion frayed. Mara had taken much of its mass away from it. Trenn’s sustained battering forced it to coalesce constantly. And now, the Beaver Kin’s song was an assault of an entirely different nature; it unmade the bonds that held the ash tornado together.

  The roaring gale faltered, and its Ash-Wraiths were shot in every direction. The overwhelming pressure vanished, replaced by a chaotic swarm of individual shrieks. The one had become the many.

  The quivering Skate took advantage of the situation to roll away, bounce up the cottage’s few stairs, and climb atop Ezy’s new gash. It sank onto the wound and started sucking out the dirt and ash to cleanse it.

  They split into two streams of ashen claws and fangs. A jet of wraiths came crashing towards Mara, while the others turned their hate on Trenn.

  Mara met the swarm with an upwards slash of necrotic claws as she jumped to her feet, each swipe unraveling a shrieking ghost into a silent puff of inert dust. She swung furiously against the tide while dashing backwards to buy time.

  For every wraith she unmade, two more swarmed over its fading form. Soot-claws screeched against her armor, tearing at the leather, gouging shallow, bloody furrows into her arms and shoulders.

  Mara was a dwindling island, her white fur stained with blood, slowly being consumed by a tide of ashes.

  A new incantation began, a soft, rhythmic prayer that vibrated in the very air. The Beaver Kin pointed a palmed finger at a claw, inches from Trenn’s face. A gentle luminescence haloed its form.

  Through his sonar, Trenn felt the discordant, shrieking frequency of its hate suddenly go smooth, turning into a clear note of weary resignation. The malice in its spectral features went slack, replaced by a look of profound confusion.

  Its form lost cohesion as its ashes lifted upwards into the air, became illuminated by the haloed light, and slowly disappeared from existence. Her incantation found its rhythm, a slow, steady pulse that beat against the chaos. Another wraith, losing its purpose, unspooled with a sigh.

  With each beat, another shrieking note of hate in his sonar sense would clarify, then fade into a peaceful silence. A ghost lunged for his throat, only to be caught in the spell's current, its murderous intent dissolving into a quiet acceptance as its form came undone. The tide of hate receded, drop by drop.

  Hedge Magic! The Beaver Kin’s face, a mask of strained concentration, now turned toward the other battle.

  Her head tracked Mara’s futile attempt to combat the ashen tide; her steady, melodic chant intensified. She pointed to an Ash-Wraith near Mara, and it glowed white, then dissolved into specks of light.

  Mara immediately stopped retreating and pushed against the stream of death. A white splash fighting against a stream of black. The dwindling swarm broke against her relentless assault. She pressed the advantage, carving a path through the river of assailants, turning their ash to dust with every hit.

  But the pressure on Trenn was ramping up. A hand of packed soot latched onto the club's length, its grip an instant vibrational deadening. He roared, muscles straining against the grinding resistance.

  A second spectral hand clamped down just below the first, doubling the weight, twisting the weapon downward. His knuckles screamed against the abrasive grip, his stance broken by the twisting, downward drag.

  A third hand slashed at Trenn’s unprotected stomach, digging deep gouges in his skin. He winced and screamed, and the long club was ripped from his hands. The club tumbled through the air, carried a dozen yards before it dropped with a heavy, final thud into the ash.

  Bomber, who had been circling the scene, immediately dove towards the discarded weapon.

  The structured wave of the Beaver Kin's chant wavered, a single note fracturing into a dissonant chord of alarm. The rhythm recovered instantly, but its pace had quickened, a desperate new urgency beating against the storm's oppressive roar.

  Dozens of grasping hands latched onto Trenn’s limbs, his torso, his head, before the ground fell away. He was dragged into the air, like a puppet hauled up by its shrieking strings.

  The world became a mess of flying ash and moonlit sky. Tearing leather echoed as his chest plate was ripped away, fluttering down like a dead leaf.

  A thousand burning points of agony erupted across his back, his arms, his legs. A raw, inhuman sound tore from his throat, a scream of shredding agony that echoed across the ruin as he was borne away into the sky.

  What was the single moment in this chapter that hit you the hardest?

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