#ynfiel

           Ynfial shifted, wrapping an arm around his own bent knee as he watched his partner's pacing. "We should be here. On duty. Even if it is dull." He patted the carved stone beside him. "No one said we had to stand."

           Tel'tharan exhaled a breath that sounded like it had come all the way from his feet, and then slowly sat down, facing him rather than the water. "I actually like it here most nights." He admitted slowly. "It's quiet."

           "It is." Outside the stone room there were a thousand night sounds, crickets, the song of the stream, the distant howl of wolves. But here it was only their breaths and the whisper of the leaves in the canopy of the roof above them. The moonlight found its way through the woven roof above them at intervals, lighting a floor of rune carved dark stone and four strong walls capped by nothing but ancient branches and sky. It shone on the darkness of Tel'tharan's hair and alternately made a mirror or void of the pool.

           His own eyes drifted skyward. "Heard you're training a new horse." He murmured. "Is that what you're so anxious to get back to? Or have you got a sweetheart?" His eyes slid sideways to Tel'tharan, and he could not entirely keep the laughter from coloring his voice as he teased. "Or maybe it's both?"

           Tel'tharan tensed, one hand lifting ready to cuff him.

           A soft chuckle escaped him as he shifted, bracing himself.

           "You little..."

           A soft sound stopped them both mid movement. Such a simple sound, quiet even in the stillness of the space around them. The soft slap of water striking stone. All teasing forgotten, Ynfial's eyes darted to the pool. Ice settled into the pit of his stomach as he watched the water rush back across the surface. There was no mirror now to reflect his own drowning ghost of a face back at him, only a ring of ever growing ripples and the spark and glow of the magic flaring into life above the water.

           "The wards!" He hissed, stumbling to his feet and running for the nearest of the carved stone poles that that marked each cardinal direction. Behind him he could hear Tel'tharan running for another but another sound held his focus far more than the slap of his partner's feet on the stone. The growing laps of tiny waves against the sides of the pool.

           His hand came down on the stone, hard enough to sting his palm. There was comfort in the familiar feel of the stone cold under his hands, the shape of the runes his fingers knew by touch. Ynfial closed his eyes briefly, focusing his will, desperate, as he called the magic to life. Every morning as they all passed, it was done. Hand to the stone, that little rush of will, each adding one more thread of magic to a weave generations old. Every time guard duty began, a touch of spirit, one more thread to the wall they made of their will to protect. And each time the shift ended with nothing but quiet water, that touch made like a benediction, the peace of the time marked by the strengthening of the magic.

           He did not hesitate in calling it to fully awake now, adding one more fear born strand to the blanket of light that sprang to life above the pool. He could feel the hum of Tel'tharan's will amid that light and for just a moment he found peace in the strength of it, the thousands upon thousands of glowing threads their brethren had made. And then as he turned back, the water rippled again.

           It was a wave, rushing outward in all directions from the center, the water breaching the sides of the pool, splashing hard upon the stone. With it came a weight in the air, as though a hundred storms all gathered at once. That weight crackled over his skin like the magic, singing a fierce discordant note across the faint song of the wards.

           He lifted his other hand to the stone too, curling his fingers around the pole, and no longer certain if he was pushing his will into the magic or holding himself up. The waves rushed inward, and for just a moment everything was still. Then water surged again.

           And the wards snapped.

           They broke as though the entire combined strength of those countless tight woven strands had been no more than a single thread of spidersilk. He felt and heard it like thunder in the air, and the darkness in the wake of the magic's light left him blinded for a moment. "Tel'tharan!"

           Across the room he heard a single loud blast of his partner's hunting horn. And then something else far more terrifying, a soft splash and the sound of a footfall on the stone before him. It took seconds to blink his eyes clear of the aftereffects of the broken wards, and make out the figure standing at the edge of the pool.

           There was a strange duality to the man in his sight. To his eyes he might have been a halfbreed of their own people, tall and leanly handsome, long dark hair flowing like silk over red and black armor, his sculpted lips curved up into a smile Ynfiel might almost have called beautiful. But there were knives in that smile, razor-edged and deadly. And his magic sight showed him something else entirely.

           Energy seethed and roiled over the man's skin, crackling and sparking like galaxies of dangerous light, strong enough he could feel it in the air around him, like a breaking storm. Like lightning sparking at his skin.

           This was the monster they were here to stop, and he was more beautiful and far more terrifying than anything Ynfial could ever have imagined. He hurt to look at, and he was too frightening to tear his eyes from.

           He could see a movement at the corner of his eye that was Tel'tharan. It reminded him and he tore his hands from the pillar and reached for his sword. There was a cold comfort in the blade in his hands, the sing of the energy in it against his palm as he drew it. "Two Wolves!" He yelled across the silence and then charged.

           It was a coordinated attack, meant for two and he and Tel'tharan had practiced it until he might have done it with his eyes closed. Until he could move through it despite the fear that made his heart thunder so loudly in his ears. He leapt at the man, blade first and teeth bared, his swing fierce and forceful despite the unsteadiness in his heart. He had braced himself for the impact of it, for the spark of that magic along his blade and the feel of flesh and bone cleaving beneath it.

           But his quarry was simply no longer there. He had leapt too soon or Tel'tharan a breath too late. And the monster had moved. He tried to turn, catching the glint and spark of the demon's magic from the corner of his eyes, tried to correct his swing mid strike. But pain flared at the base of his skull, exploding into white behind his eyes and then falling dark.

***

           It was far from silent when he woke, the air humming with frantic voices that made his head spin. Ynfial opened his eyes cautiously, wincing as the whole world spun a circle beneath him the runes in the circle on the ceiling danced before his gaze. He retched, and paid no mind to the hands that held the basin up for him as he emptied his stomach into it.

           He fell back exhausted, and swallowed repeatedly to try to make the room stop swooping under him. He could feel it rocking even when he closed his eyes again and see the ward breaking over and over in an endless flash behind his eyes. "What happened?" He whispered.

           "We found you beside the pool." Despite the softness of the voice he winced at the way it thundered in his ears. "Did something come through?"

           "Yes..." He swallowed hard. "A monster."