Miradey

Immanen

"Yes." Her fingers flexed, her scarred hand feeling empty without.

They put a cloth on the tang and long pretty shiny ribbons on it and called it a sword now. Fancy that. They even gave it a name. As she had for long stretches, when it wasn't being examined or discussed by Lady Doria's advisers, when it was at her side, Miradey stared at the christened sword. Knew it was hers.

"Immanen," she murmured reverently.

"Yes, it is," said Doria. "You did a very brave thing, Miradey. You saved the Burchs and and slew a beast not unlike a dragon by all accounts. Not very many grown witches can boast such a feat, you know. But wherever did you learn the enchantment cast upon this blade? It is very powerful. I and my Knights are very curious."

Miradey touched her head and the place over her heart.

"It just came to you?"

She nodded.

"You found it in the mines?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Ma'am?"

Miradey blushed and called her what she heard some of the other witches calling her.

"Yes, my Lady."

"Better, but someday you shall call me Doria. There are other questions I must ask quite urgently, Miradey. Is that alright?"

"Yes, my Lady."

"The flying beast came down from the mountain?"

"Yes, my Lady."

"Are there more than the one you dispatched?"

She nodded, eyes wide and fearful.

"More than a dozen?"

Miradey nodded again. Emphatically, densely curly puffs bobbing around her face.

"Go to Ironhart mansion," Doria commanded over her shoulder. "Take the most skilled in sealing magic. Close down those mines and any paths to and from the mansion. Advise the iron barons to leave. If they wish to remain, very well, but I will not risk the lives of Nyte Village for their sake. No doubt they're responsible somehow I'd wager. We'll be overrun before nightfall. Go."

The wizards promptly vanished.

"Have you ever known anything else to slay the creatures?"

"No, my Lady," she whispered. "Only my spike."

"The blade that came with you," Doria murmured. "Yes, it is special." Again, speaking to the remaining witches nearby, she ordered, "Send knights into the mines immediately. She escaped from a tunnel somewhere up there. That's our way in." This rescue was decades in the making. Doria wouldn't let the chance slip through her fingers.

Alarm pounded in Miradey's chest. Were they going there? They couldn't go there. That way lay death.

She reached out a small, scarred hand gripped Doria's sleeve desperately. Doria looked down at the child. Miradey shook her head desperately, tears filling her eyes.

"You don't want them to go?"

She shook her head again.

"Why?"

She took two big shaky breathes but could not speak. The burning was starting again. Tightening her lungs drying out her throat and mouth. Stealing her voice. It brought panic with it, robbing her of breath.

Comprehension dawned and Doria was suddenly so sick with the knowledge it brought she felt she nearly listed against the bed though she stood perfectly steady.

"There's no one left to save anymore." It wasn't a question.

Big tears streaked down Miradey's cheeks. She shook her head, sobbing dry breaths.

Ever guarding The Third, Tihone saw something in his master's eyes that he had never seen before.

Despair.

"I didn't know you smoked. It doesn't smell at all odious," said Ben, deeply inhaling the blue fumes.

"Miradey," she explained. "My namesake. It grows inside the mountains. Even in the heat from the mountain's cauldron. Grows and glows in the dark. Most potent there though too dangerous to retrieve ordinarily." She had never thought much of it as a girl, only thought that the flowers were pretty.

"Can we go there?"

Miradey took a swig of cooling water from an earthen jug roughly the size of a grapefruit tied to her belt. The plant's smoke and the water washed down her throat in an icy chill that relieved her greatly.

Stoppering the jug once more, she swept a bow. "As you like." Miradey tucked Ben's ice crystal inside her satchel then lead the way.