Dear Reader, Getting a story out of Shrilynda is no easy task, but when presented with the opportunity, I couldn't turn it down. I think you'll agree with me the risk to life and limb was worth it. However, Shrilynda was adamant I retell the story t...
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Shrilynda had arrived in Bayselle after a necessary strength-gathering respite on the fringes of Curi and Kianne. The respite looked quite a bit like a woman barely holding onto her sanity holing up in a cave and draining anything that crossed her path of its blood, but Shrilynda had come through more than a few lows in hundreds of years of being an enemy of the Naxturae. Blind hate fueled survival until she was strong enough for targeted vengeance.
Sorceress Athena was doing her due diligence to track Shrilynda, of course, but she was limited to all her old tricks. Athena's tricks were effective and bothersome, but easy to anticipate. Shrilynda's power may have been depleted, but that was nothing blood and crushed bones could not fix temporarily.
News of the relocation of Flifary Island flowed through the protectorates like water, but most of the chatter centered around insipid idle curiosities. As keepers of magic, the Flifary were of some interest to Shrilynda. Of course, they were all trapped in the Glade, putting them and any of their magical toys out of her reach. For now. Shrilynda might have found temporary allies in Iketa and Dalor, but they were currently bottled up in the Pit. Shrilynda had seen enough of the Pit to last a lifetime, and she was not strong enough for a breakout, nor did she have any interest. Iketa and Dalor were morons.
No, Shrilynda had no desire to insert herself in the middle of the shifting politics of Flifary Island. She was interested in the divination stone. The loss to Arlana was a faint silver lining on the thundercloud that was the heart-wrenching destruction of such an amazing magical talisman. The divination stone was easily as powerful as the pearl. Without nonsensical ethical restraints and the infusion of the lifeblood of a magical creature or twelve, the divination stone could have been even more powerful than the pearl.
At some point during her despair over the magical loss, Shrilynda realized the destruction of the stone was an assumption rather than a fact. No one piece of information, overheard conversation, or purloined letter spelled out the distinction, but Sorceresses studying at the palace loved to chatter with their friends and family. Generally, they were in awe of Issabeth's skill, which was misplaced praise, all things considered. The pearl had done all the work of transporting the island away from the weapon channeling power from the sun straight into the divination stone. The poor pearl—all that ancient magic gathered across centuries and put into the hands of—
Shrilynda released her clenched hands and took a long, slow breath. She was too exhausted to shoulder the sheer wrongness of it all. She could do nothing about the pearl right now. Right now, she was heading for a Senira outside town. She was walking, which she hated. There was comfort in hating the toils of putting one foot in front of the other, she supposed, but still the sheer time consumption of walking was frustrating when time was so valuable. So she used the time trying to put recent events in order to make sure she hadn't missed anything.
Shrilynda must have heard the same conversation a dozen times in letters or from reports gathered from temporarily enchanted animals who had no clue they were listening in on the conversations of girls returning home for a season. Something about the twelfth retelling of the same story made Shrilynda finally focus in on the details. The island had been transported away from the stone. No one had witnessed the stone's destruction.
