Syl couldn’t answer. She was too overwhelmed at finally finding him. Her exhaustion and grief were temporarily extinguished as she simply relished her father’s loving embrace.

  “You’re alive!” Dena said excitedly, then ran forward and wrapped her arms around both Syl and her father. “We were so worried.”

  “I can tell,” Firon said, Syl’s arms still vice-like around him. “What are you doing out here? You don’t know how dangerous it is…” he trailed off as the others limped over to join them. “Ancestors! Kule, your hands. We need to treat them right away. Syl, darling, we need to work.”

  Syl heard it in her father’s voice, the gentle reminder that sometimes she needed to put aside her emotions for the greater good. Couldn’t he just let her enjoy it a moment longer? She’d worked so hard to find him…

  No, he’s right, she thought. Kule needed attention an hour ago when we left Teb’s farm. He can’t wait anymore. My tears can.

  “Right,” Syl said, releasing her father and wiping the few tears dotting her cheeks. “He was hurt about an hour ago, but I didn’t have the chance to clean or bandage his hands.”

  “You can explain as we work. Come on further inside, the others will be glad to see friendly faces,” Firon said, and led them into another hallway lined with blue torches.

  “Others?” Syl asked.

  “This place is bigger than the last one,” Rogar said quietly to Reylo, who only nodded.

  “People from Teb’s farm,” Firon said, though he was holding something back.

  “We were at the farm,” Syl told her father quietly.

  His head turned to her with an unspoken question, and Syl shook her head. No survivors.

  Firon closed his eyes for just a second, as Syl had seen him do so often before, in respect for the dead. “Before we go in,” he stopped a few paces away from a carved arch in the hallway. “Did you bring any food with you? Water?”

  “We have a little left,” Dena said, “but not much. Why?”

  “When we fled the farm,” Firon said quietly, “we had little more than the clothes on our backs. There are sixteen people in that room, and we’ve hardly had a thing to eat, and barely enough to drink since we got here.”

  “We’ll share what we have,” Dena said confidently.

  “Thank you,” Firon said, and led the way through the arch.

  The room on the other side was much bigger than the caved-in one they’d found the day before, and every head immediately looked their way.

  “Finally, we’re rescued,” a woman said and stood up. Then she got a good look at the battered and bruised youths that entered behind Firon, and her mouth hung open.

  “What’s this?” a man with leathery skin and wiry muscles asked. “This is what the village sent to save us from that thing? They don’t even look old enough to work the fields!”

  “Calm down, Junay,” Firon said evenly while leading Kule over to an empty area near one of the torches. “That’s my daughter, Syl, and these are her friends. And this man,” Firon pointedly said about Kule, “is injured. Questions can wait.”

  Junay opened his mouth but quickly shut it again out of respect for Firon.

  Syl took the opportunity to take in the room. It was huge, bigger than even the Ka-Sho ring she’d danced the Ka-Sho-Dan in a few long nights before. Racks containing bows, arrows, and Sho-Vals lined the walls, and in the few ‘bare’ spots between, flickering blue torches.

  It’s not just like the Ka-Sho ring, it IS a Ka-Sho ring, Syl realized. The only difference is…

  A pillar in the centre of the room. Except it wasn’t a pillar, not exactly. A pedestal rose from the ground and a mirror of it extended from the ceiling. Inexplicably floating in the two-foot space between them was a blue stone, smaller than an egg, with fine gold chains hanging loosely. Wisps of clouds lazily circulated around it, never moving outside the boundaries of the pillar.

  This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

  “Ancestors,” Edar said reverently. “A Cloud Stone.”

  “What’s that?” Rogar asked and took a step forward.

  “I wouldn’t,” Firon said. “It’s warded. And something we can talk about later. I think you should tell us what brought you here while I see to Kule’s hands.”

  Syl’s eyes, like Edar’s, couldn’t leave the mysterious Cloud Stone. She didn’t know what it was, not like Edar seemed to, but she could feel it, like she did the Anihazi. And it called to her.

  “Syl,” her father said, breaking her focus on the stone. “Help me with this.”

  “Right,” Syl said, distractedly, her eyes lingering on the stone a moment longer before she forcefully pulled them away. “Right,” she said again, stronger.

  Syl sat down beside her father and opened his medical bag. She methodically prepared the salves and bandages she found while he went about assessing the damage to Kule’s hands. Remarkably, Kule stayed silent during the inspection, despite the agony he must have been in from her father’s gentle yet insistent touches.

  “Nothing appears broken,” Firon said. “But there’s a lot of damage to the flesh, and to the underlying ligaments and muscle. What exactly happened?”

  “It’s a long story,” Syl said, handing her father the first salve she expected him to use. He glanced at it, nodded his thanks, and then gently began applying it to Kule’s hands. “The short version is lightning.”

  “That would explain the damage, but it’s so localized. Tell your story while we work,” Firon instructed.

  And so she did, starting with the night of the Ka-Sho-Dan and Kilik’s late return. Dena helped fill in details Syl missed and the others in the cave quickly moved closer to listen.

  It took almost two hours to tell the tale in its entirety, with only a short pause to break the news about Jurik and Milia. The others from Teb’s farm handled it stoically; they weren’t the first casualties. During the story, Dena handed out what little food and water the group had to spare, and Firon finished his ministrations to Kule’s hands.

  “… and that’s when we followed the tracks to the cave,” Syl concluded. “I guess you know the rest.”

  “Anihazi,” Firon said, considering the implications. “So that’s what attacked us. And made of clouds you say?”

  “That’s what it looked like,” Syl said, the image of the cloud-like panther etched in her mind. The image of its claws cutting Leeze nearly in two…

  Syl closed her eyes and forced her thoughts onto other things.

  “Edar,” Firon said, but his eyes lingered on Syl until she nodded she was okay. “This is the first I’ve heard that fact, but you said that little mystery in the middle of the room is called a Cloud Stone?”

  Edar was quiet during the entire story, obviously still blaming the people in the caves for the Anihazi’s coming. When Firon spoke to him, however, he finally broke his silence. “Yes, I think so. It matches my grandmother’s description.

  “That Anihazi were made of clouds though…” Edar trailed off and shrugged. “That was new to me too. I always believed the references to clouds in our lore were because they blocked our Ancestors’ sight, not because the clouds themselves were the enemy.”

  “What does the lore say about this stone?” Reylo asked, walking a full circle around the pillar.

  “That it’s cursed,” Edar said, and the look he gave everybody clearly showed his feelings on being in the cave.

  “How is it cursed?” Firon asked, putting aside the feelings and remaining logical.

  “It’s directly connected to Anihazi. Like I said, cursed.” Edar finished, and his gaze fell directly on Syl.

  It’s not the only thing he thinks is cursed…

  “If it’s connected to the Anihazi,” Reylo said, doing another lap around the pillar. “Maybe it will help us fight the one hunting us? Or at least let somebody else sense it?”

  Edar ground his teeth but didn’t speak.

  “What do you think Edar? Could Reylo be right?” Firon asked.

  “It’s cursed,” Edar said, as if answer enough.

  “That wasn’t his question,” Rogar said.

  Edar spread his hands out and gestured at the weapons lining the room. “We have all the weapons we need. We don’t need another one.”

  “So, it is a weapon,” Reylo said, picking up on Edar’s wording.

  “No! I don’t know,” Edar said, and corrected. “But it’s connected to the Anihazi. It will call them here, and they will destroy us.”

  “Edar, I know how you feel,” Syl said, standing and taking a step towards her friend. He immediately took a step back from her, so she held up a calming hand to let him know she wouldn’t move any closer. “But the Anihazi is already here. It’s already trying to destroy us. We need to protect ourselves.”

  “Then use the weapons!” he exclaimed. “There must be more than enough here to kill it.”

  “It dodges our arrows,” Rogar said. “And after what happened to Kule, I’m not sure I want to be close enough to use a Sho-Val.”

  “Then give one to me, I’ll do it,” Kule said. His hands were tightly bandaged, but he’d insisted he at least have the flexibility to hold a spear. When he’d threatened to simply not allow Firon to bandage his hands, Firon had little choice but to comply.

  “If it’s a weapon, we need to try,” Reylo said, and all eyes turned to him as he reached out for the stone.

  “Wait!” Firon said, too late.

  As soon as Reylo’s outstretched hand touched the Cloud Stone, a peal of thunder echoed through the room and hurled Reylo backwards.

  He hit the stone floor and skidded several feet before finally rolling and coming to a stop.

  “Reylo!” Syl cried in unison with Dena and Rogar, and all three ran to their friend.

  “Ow,” he said, and rolled to his back. “That… hurt.”

  “Are you okay?” Syl asked, immediately searching for any new injuries.

  “Tried to warn you,” Firon said, standing behind Syl. “Stone is warded. We tried the same thing, once, even before we knew what it was.”

  With help, Reylo sat up. Given the thunderclap—and distance he’d travelled—he was surprisingly unharmed.

  “Guess we can’t use that after all,” Rogar said regretfully.

  “I told you it’s cursed,” Edar said.

  Syl’s eyes went back to the Cloud Stone though. She could still feel it calling to her. Beckoning her.

  Inviting her.

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