Anticipation filled Samara’s heart as she nearly sprinted up the last hillside separating her from her beloved home. The rough rocky soil tumbled down behind her, kicked up in clouds and clods by her haste. Finally, just as the sun was setting behind her, she reached the top of the hill.

Spread out before her was the Fivecrags. Five massive cliffs, each decorated with scars and deep gouges. They all surrounded a massive flat space, with a thundering waterfall rushing off the easternmost crag and flowing through the middle as the river Oshun. Samara took a deep breath, savoring the scents of sun-baked stone, clean water, and sagegrass that permeated her home.

Unlike Riverward, with its wooden walls and permanent homes, the Fivecrags was left as nature had intended. Her people set their large, sturdy tents on the rocky soil, always ready to move if needed. Indeed, she had seen every part of the plain and beyond as the tribe relocated to where they were needed most. But she’d always had a sentimental spot for the center of the cliffs—the place she had been born and had later bonded with Sharvor.

“I swear, Samara, you act like a maiden sometimes. Running ahead just to see something a little bit sooner,” Moragrin chided her, hauling the sled up with Sharvor. He and the orc stood on either side of her, once the sled had been steadied. “But, given the view…” he trailed off, and Samara could see that same wonder and satisfaction at being home in the old lion’s eyes.

Once the sentries that kept watch over the tribe spotted the trio against the setting sun, a mighty holler of welcome rose. In stark contrast to the tepid reception Samara and Sharvor had been offered at Riverward, this time they greeted the onrushing crowd with enthusiastic joy. The supplies they were bringing, even if it was less than what was expected, were a huge boon and were received as such.

Two figures stood apart from the throng of happy tribespeople, and seeing them both here brought a grin to Samara’s lips.

Lillatha Silvershadow stood with an air of otherworldly elegance. The sun shimmered off her silver-blond hair, worn long and loose around the pointed ears of her people. Her eyes shimmered an exotic and alluring magenta, set above lips that often were quirked in subtle amusement. Dressed in dark hunting leathers that left her long legs bare and her midriff free, the elven woman nodded her head a fraction of an inch. “Mi salutas vin, fratino de mia koro,” the words slipped out in flowing Aldressan.

Samara wasn’t fluent in the elvish language by any means, but she had heard the heartfelt greeting often enough. ‘Sister of her heart,’ a sign of the deep friendship that Samara and the elven archer shared. “Ankau al vi, fratino de mia koro,” she responded back, her own attempt far less flowing and lyrical than Lillatha’s but no less heartfelt.

“Maybe something we can all understand, eh?” Mortah Stonefist growled goodnaturedly at the two much taller women. Barely breaking four feet, Mortah made up for it with the characteristic stockiness of the dwarves. Dressed in overlapping slats of hard boiled leather, he might have resembled a very small armored fortress, were it not for his long red braided beard and grinning face. “Tree fuckers, always wanting to show off that damned nonsense language of yours,” he grumbled good naturedly

“Who and what I allow to bed me is a mystery that will sadly remain out of your reach, rockhead,” Lillatha replied, shifting to the human language, colored with her unmistakable accent. Turning to Samara, the elven woman embraced the barbarian warmly. “It’s been too long,” she said happily, breaking the hug and letting Mortah take her place.

Kneeling down to embrace her friend, she received a bone jarring slap on the back. “Heard you and lover boy went off to hunt some beasty?” he asked, glancing toward Sharvor.

“Yes,” Samara agreed, standing and gesturing for her friends to follow her. “But it’s not the tale for dry throats and tired legs.”

“Ye’r shitting me!” Mortah demanded, slamming his tankard on the table hard enough to spill the ale inside. “You launched yerself straight up with Daray’s might and came right down on the beast’s fucking head?”

They had retired to Samara’s tent. It was a cozy, homey space. Her personal trinkets lay on the mismatched slats of wood they’d pressed into service as shelves, while her axe lay on its stand, clearly the pride of the place right next to her mass of blankets and furs. Catching up had turned into fond reminisce with her friends, which in Samara’s mind all but demanded ale.

Samara nodded, taking a well deserved gulp from her own tankard. The ale was sharp, fresh and had the proper bite to it—a far cry from the weak substitute the Riverwarders enjoyed. “May my hair turn gray and fall out if I tell a lie,” she said firmly.

“Is it any less believable than you shattering that minotour’s knees last midwinter?” Lillatha interjected, smoothly. “Or when I pierced that giant wyvern’s heart mid flight last summer?”

Mortah grinned at the elf, flexing his calloused bare hands. “Aye, fair enough.” Turning back to Samara, he lifted his tankard in the air. “Still, it’s no easy thing to slay a giant bear. To Samara, beastslayer!”

Lillatha and Samara each raised their tankards, meeting Mortah’s own with a wooden thunk. Draining the ale, Samara smiled at her friends, feeling the warmth of their camaraderie and the seductive haziness of the ale beginning to form in the back of her mind.

Before the conversation could continue into further recollections of their many past exploits, Lillatha and Mortah shared a significant look. Despite the haze of alcohol, Samara caught it, but before she could press the issue, Lillatha shook her head. “We didn’t come from our respective tribes just to catch up,” she admitted, carefully.

“There’s... something... brewin’,” Mortah added, darkly. “Both Lillatha an’ I have seen a right sinister looking bastard, talkin’ with our chiefs. I would bet a month’s worth o’ ale this same bastard’s bound to come creepin’ round here too.”

“What did he look like?” Samara asked, unease growing in her.

“I never got a good look,” Mortah replied with a shake of his head. “All I know is what the chief’s guards told me. Masculine figure and covered head to toe in dark robes.”

Dark robes could mean any number of things, Samara knew. It was only children’s stories and old legends that dressed the villains in dark robes.

“I saw him,” Lillatha volunteered. “Just for a moment,” her voice was quieter than normal and lacked her characteristic grace. When Samara saw her eyes, they looked distant. “A human, and he didn’t look much older than twenty summers, except for his eyes. They were eyes that saw things no mortal should see. I could feel the malevolence pouring off of him.”

Silence fell over the table like a shroud. “A wizard,” Samara finally broke the silence. “Robes, an evil aura, eyes that can unnerve Lillatha. Has to be a wizard.”

It happened from time to time. When a child began to mature into an adult, they occasionally showed signs of magic. Owing no oath to any god, their magic was theirs alone to use, or misuse. And so many fell to evil and temptation.

Samara breathed a heavy sigh, lost in the memories of the last time her tribe had borne a wizard. It was three summers ago when Bordrain’s magic had manifested. The difference was astonishing. It seemed like one moment the young man was a dutiful son and dependable member of the tribe. The next, he was sowing chaos and mischief with his powers, simply because he could.

Straps on clothing and tools fell apart with a gesture, people Bordrain disliked found themselves constantly tripping and fumbling and he was scolded and punished for it. Then he was discovered hidden away in a canyon grotto, his cock being rhythmically stroked by a young woman a few years his senior. From all accounts she was staring ahead, eyes glazed and mouth slightly agape, enough for everyone to know he had used his powers on her.

That had pushed him far beyond boyhood mischief and into the dark mutterings of the wizards of old. Death was considered, but a Caller of the Shala—the goddess of mercy—had intervened on his behalf. He was just coming into his manhood, she had argued, and there was no lasting harm done to the woman he had charmed. So Bordrain’s life was spared, though he would never speak another word of the devil speak of wizards.

His tongue was removed, overseen by the same Caller of Shala who used her own powers to ensure he recovered from the ordeal.

In the here and now, it seemed like they had another wizard to deal with, one much older and not content with a little forced sexual release. From the dark accounts of her trusted friends, this wizard had much grander designs.

The dark mood that covered their table seemed to have spread to the sky itself by the next morning. Rain wasn’t uncommon in the grasslands, and the rainfall was vital to the land, but the gloom that infected the day had everyone on edge. The heavy gray clouds never let loose a drop of rain, and the bracing wind that often accompanied a storm was absent. Instead there was a stifling, heavy feeling in the air.

Samara, and everyone else she passed, were tense and jittery. Any laughter that rang out was harsh sounding. The younger children cried or clutched at their parent’s legs, while the hounds the tribe kept spent the morning with their hackles up and ears alert.

Finally, as a blessed release to the tension, the sound of galloping horses could be heard coming from the grasslands. The sentries were quick to report a black wagon pulled by two fine warhorses.

It moved down the guarding hill with unnatural grace, as if the two stallions pulling it barely to noticed the incline. To even call it something so simple as a ‘wagon’ galled Samara’s sensibilities. It was roughly in the same shape as a beetle’s shell, rounded and elongated at the edges.

The reason for its smooth descent made itself clear as it got closer. There was nothing underneath the main body. No sleds, no wheels, nothing but air that shimmered like a heat haze. The sheer alien nature of it raked across Samara’s nerves, pushing her Fury to grow and demand to act.

She, Sharvor, Moragrin, Lillatha, Mortah, and half a dozen other warriors all waited with weapons drawn in a tense silence as the horses drew to a standstill on their own. No driver was present to steer the device. A crack opened in the seamless metallic looking shell, revealing a door of some kind, and out stepped a tall human. He was slender, with short-cropped dark-blond hair. A sharp, angular face with piercing blue eyes looked out along Samara’s assembled tribe. He wore dark robes, somewhere between midnight black and a deep blue, decorated with... with…

It was a stylized rendition of a spider in its web, picked out in thread that seemed to glow to Samara’s eyes. A man dressed in robes with the markings of a spider.

The moment she saw the eight stylized legs crossing the front of his robes, its web wrapped around to the back, Samara relaxed and quelled her Fury. There was simply no reason for it. This was a man to trust, even a savage like her knew that.

Samara’s brow furrowed when the hateful word nestled in so comfortably. She never thought of herself as a savage, or the rest of her tribe. But they were, surely, to this man. And so what if he thought of them that way? He was a trustworthy man, and probably had perfectly good reasons to think of her and her people as savages.

Slipping her axe back over her shoulder, she was gratified to hear the rest of the warriors all follow her example. They did it hesitantly, true, but that was just nervousness, surely. They had to see that this noble man was trustworthy.

“I bring you greetings,” he said in a smooth baritone voice. “I am Emissary Aldercan, and I come on behalf of the true ruler of this land, High Lord Carathas.” He spoke the words with such deep conviction. If this man was just an emissary, she felt an eager excitement in her stomach to meet this ‘High Lord.’

“I greet you as well, as Caller of the Lord of Battle,” Moragrin began, extending his hand cautiously to Aldercan. The robed human took it, shaking it firmly. “You are a wizard?” Moragin all but challenged.

“I am,” Aldercan said proudly, inciting a series of mutterings behind Samara. She fought the urge to glare at them. He wasn’t hiding anything, and even the legends said that wizards could be good and kind. “I assure you, I only use my Art in service of diplomacy,” he offered in a conciliatory tone.

Samara toned out what Moragrin said in response, focusing all her attention on Aldercan. He called his magic ‘Art,’ and that struck a resonant chord with the barbarian. He looked like he used magic like her tribe’s savages used paints. The thought felt odd in her mind, bouncing around without fitting. No, no he wouldn’t use splashes of pigment on cave walls. He would be like how she imagined an artist in far away Astoria would live.

“Samara,” Sharvor’s gruff voice made her turn around.

The moment she did, a disperate fogginess lingered in her mind, almost begging her to turn around and watch Aldercan some more. But the sight of her Bonded pushed it away. His look of care and concern washed over her, and she smiled back at him. “Yes?” she asked pleasantly.

“You were staring at our... guest, quite intently,” he said, glaring behind Samara. She followed his glare, seeing Moragrin leading Aldercan toward the big meeting tent. The spiderweb thread on his robe caught the gloomy light and sparkled in the barbarian’s eyes.

“He wears that robe so well, I’m glad his High Lord sent a wizard like him.”

“You… are?” Sharvor’s deep confusion pulled Samara’s gaze back to her beloved, and the giddy lightness vanished from her mind again. She thought back over the words that just spilled from her lips. She was... glad there was a wizard here? But... Why was that? “He didn’t lie or anything,” she found herself saying. “He could have kept his magic a secret, that could be a very damning thing to admit.” She caught up with her reasoning as she spoke it, and it made perfect sense to her.

“I suppose,” Sharvor muttered, looking unconvinced.

Before she could fish for another reason to trust the wizard, Lillatha and Mortah joined them. “Damn if he doesn’t give me the creeps,” the dwarf muttered. “Couldn’t even use a carriage or a wagon like a normal person, has to show off his damned devilry.”

Samara glanced back at the thing Aldercan had arrived in. Without the man himself present, it hovered silently while the horses attached to it nickered and shifted. They at least seemed satisfyingly mundane. A brief gust of wind brought the faint scent of sweat and horse manure over to confirm it.

“He sets my teeth on edge,” Lillatha said with a shake of her head, not elaborating further.

Irritation flared at her friends and comrades. They had only just met the man, and they were acting like such savages about it. Again, that word wormed its way into Samara’s thoughts in a way that made her pause, then rub her forehead. “Samara, are you alright?” Sharvor asked quietly, his comforting presence close to her ear.

Nodding, the barbarian woman gestured for her friends to follow her. “Let’s let Moragrin deal with him,” she said firmly. “I want to hit something.”

The heavy, muggy air felt like it was pressing down on every inch of Samara’s skin. Sweat clung to her brow, feeling heavy and stifling without so much as a gust of wind to cool it off. The oppressive clouds hadn’t budged since that morning, nor had they allowed more than a drop or two of rain.

Despite the uncomfortable atmosphere, Samara felt far more centered and grounded than she had all morning. She had her axe in her hands and a worthy foe in front of her. Mortah was in a wide stance, bare hands charged with the power that his training let him focus. Charging headlong at him would earn her a bone-shatteringly powerful punch, but he wasn’t the type to make the first move.

That suited Samara just fine. She called on her Fury, and let it seep into her legs. They burned from the additional power, coiled tight like springs. With a mighty yell, Samara sprung skyward, aiming for the ground behind the powerful dwarf.

She landed hard, feeling the reverberating force even with the dampening effect of her dissipating Fury. Lashing out with her axe, she felt it impact with an earthen CLUNK. Mortah’s fist, encased in a layer of stone, had halted her blow while his other fist was speeding towards her shoulder. It impacted hard, pulling a pained grunt from her lips.

It felt like a bruise, not a break—something Samara could easily push through. Using her taller stature, the dark-haired barbarian brought her knee up hard and fast into Mortah’s chest. It knocked the wind from the dwarf, allowing Samara to sweep back for another powerful charge. Mortah predictably put his hands up to block the charge, only for Samara to shift her axe down and to her side, impacting him with the full weight of her shoulder.

He braced and Samara allowed herself to fall over his shorter frame, wrapping her arm around his neck and squeezing hard. Mortah choked and flailed for a moment, then dropped his hand and tapped her on the arm three times.

Releasing her friend, Samara sat down heavily, laying flat out while fanning herself with her hand. The meager air movements did little to cool her off, leaving her sweltering in the thick air.

“I don’t want to spar like this,” Lillatha said dismissively. Samara sat up enough to glance at her friend. The elven woman’s hair stuck to her forehead with sweat while she huddled in the shade of an earthen pillar.

“Ay, this damn heat is oppressive,” Mortah said, laying out next to Samara with a defeated sigh. “At least in the forges of Ocher Sky, it’s always a dry heat.”

“And in Terethellen Forest, we even go so far as having a livable temperature!” Lillatha grumbled back, sarcastically.

Footsteps on gravel drew the attention of all three beings as Sharvor made his way over to them. He had stripped to the waist, and his toned green chest momentarily brought a flash of warmth to Samara that had nothing to do with the awful weather. Getting to her feet, she briefly embraced her Bonded. “So, what does this wizard’s master want with us?” she asked, gathering Lillatha and Mortah to come listen in as well.

“This Carathas, he has big plans for the grasslands,” Sharvor announced, uncertainty heavy in his voice. “Increased trade between the tribes, a system of coinage, a standing army,” his eyes flicked to Samara. “Mandatory literacy.”

“It sounds like he wants to civilize us,” Samara spat, earning a firm nod from Lillatha.

“We’ve managed just fine on our own,” the elf declared firmly. “We don’t need some ignorant human forcing his grand ideas on us.”

Mortah stroked his long beard thoughtfully. “Ay, I can’t say the rest of my clan will take kindly to that. Increased trade sounds nice, but coinage is a dwarven thing, we respect that you and yours don’t want to bother with it,” he said, nodding at Samara and Lillatha.

“I agree, I’m not in favor of changing how things have worked for hundreds of years,” Sharvor said, and Samara tensed for the second part of his sentence. “But, that’s not his immediate plan. The reason he has been to all three of our tribes is to hunt some great beast.” Sharvor said, the uncertainty melting away in the face of his growing enthusiasm. “A Shadow Panther.”

The unease about the future slipped away from the group, replaced by eager excitement. “A real Shadow Panther?” Lillatha asked, decorum fading as she bounced on her toes. “Here, in the grasslands?”

“Daray’s hairy sack, that’s almost as good as a dragon!” Mortah said, a wide grin on his face.

Samara only nodded, her mind already playing visions of the battle to come. Shadow Panthers were powerful, magical creatures. Stronger than the bear they faced, larger and more vicious as well. They could be as insubstantial as a shadow one moment, violent inky death the next. There were a hundred legends about what happened to warriors caught in the shadows that poured off its skin, from madness, to instant death, to things altogether too spectacular to recount. “I want to fight it,” she breathed out quietly.

“And you will. Moragrin wants us all to join him on this. Aldercan has promised us our usual fee plus fifty barrels of that wine from Cerene.”

That got a reaction nearly on par with news of the hunt itself. The people of Cerene were renowned warriors, for being such city dwellers. And they made wine as delicate as a butterfly’s wing with the kick of an enraged horse. “Fifty barrels to share?” Mortah asked, tentatively.

A wide grin matching Mortah’s own split Sharvor’s lips. “Fifty for each of our clans.”

Anticipation filled Samara, banishing thoughts of the heat and the humidity. She could see the looks in her fellow warrior’s eyes. And beneath the excitement, a thought burrowed a little deeper in her mind. I knew trusting Aldercan was the right choice.

Night had fallen, and with it had come a blessed relief from the heat and humidity of the day. The clouds broke up, letting patches of starlight fall over the campgrounds. “Samara, come with me,” Lillatha half-asked, half-demanded after their shared evening meal. She took a small leather pack from her little pile of belongings, then slipped out into the night.

Standing and looking at her friend curiously, Samara shared a quick kiss with Sharvor, then followed Lillatha out of the tent. With the partial cloud cover, it was nearly pitch-black out. “Where are you taking me?”

“To the bathing pond,” the elf responded. “I’m disgusting, and I don’t want to go alone.”

Rolling her eyes, Samara held out her hand. Lillatha’s own delicate-yet-calloused fingers entwined with hers and off they went. It was slightly disconcerting to travel in a world composed of dark shadows, darker shapes, and the occasional firefly-dim glimmer of starlight. But Samara trusted her friend, and had seen her navigate places even darker than this. It wasn’t something every elf could do, but like her own Fury, Lillatha seemed to have something extra at her command.

“Bad step,” she said from ahead, pausing to let Samara climb over the jutting edge of rock that would have seriously gashed her shin otherwise.

“How much further?” Samara asked, quietly. A few tents here and there had slivers of light spilling from their flaps, but most of the camp seemed asleep.

“Not much,” Lillatha said confidently, leading Samara along. The sound of water rushing to her left reoriented her somewhat. The river had a lot of canals and channels dug into it, leading it to places where it could be purified for drinking or washing clothes. And special larger ponds where they could bathe in clean, cold water.

The air was cool and smelled of fresh river water—clearly the pond had been magically purified not long ago. “Perfect,” Lillatha said, stopping and letting go of Samara’s hand. She was left in the dark for only a few moments longer before the elven woman stood up with a tiny stone in her hand that glowed with a pale luminescence.

“Moonstone!” Samara exclaimed, lowering her voice at the last moment. “How did you get ahold of a chunk of Moonstone?”

In the cool light, Lillatha’s expression was smug. “I won it.” Placing the glowing pebble on the top of her pack, the elven archer crossed her hands under the hem of her top and lifted it over her head, baring her breasts to the cool night air. They were smaller than Samara’s own, with pale pink nipples that stiffened in the chill. “A scholar from Aldressa came through a few months ago. He brought his own pathfinder—” disdain dripped from the word. “Some decorated tournament archer that had never set foot outside their city.”

Samara smiled as her friend told the story, stripping off her own clothes as well. The cool air felt wonderful to her grime-covered skin, and the thought of sharing a private bath with her dear friend without anyone rushing them was an almost unheard-of luxury. “And…?” she encouraged, slipping her boots off. “How did a smug city elf end up giving you a treasure like that?”

“He wanted to fuck me, of course,” Lillatha smirked. “Made a big show of how important he was, scion of House This-and-that, in sworn service to the lord of whatever vale,” she continued, wiggling out of her own brief leggings.

Samara slipped into the water first, feeling the first sharp shock of the cold water quickly normalize with her own body. Sinking up to her shoulders, she kicked back to contentedly float by the lip of the pond. “You didn’t…?” she asked, already knowing there was no way her friend would have sold her body.

“Of course not,” Lillatha said, relaxing her composure enough to giggle. She gave her own gasp when she slipped into the chilly water, which quickly shifted to a pleased sigh. “But I offered it,” she added with a very satisfied looking smirk. “If only his oh-so-skilled-looking pathfinder could beat little old me in a marksmanship contest.”

“How badly did he lose?” Samara asked, enjoying the story.

“Oh he could shoot an arrow straight enough,” Lillatha said, dismissively. “But put anything in his way and he turned into a first year apprentice. Apparently they only practice in open clearings in Aldressa.”

Samara laughed along with her friend at the absurdity of that. “Imagine your foe being kind enough to stand out in the open like that, waiting for you to shoot them.”

“Well, when time came to pay up, I graciously offered to take his chunk of Moonstone instead of insisting on the traditional service.” the elven woman said, slyly, while passing Samara a waxy chunk of soap.

“Would you have really kept him for a season and day?” Samara asked, taking the offered block of soap. It was fine elvish soap, scented with herbs, and Samara drifted over to give her friend a hug in thanks. “You know Sharvor is going to be all over me when he notices me smelling like an elf maiden.”

“My gift to you, fratino de mia koro,” Lillatha said, smiling in the pale light and returning the hug.

The cold water was bracing, and the feeling of grime and sweat washing away was incredibly pleasant. Here, in the heart of her camp, with her attentive friend nearby, Samara let herself slip into a comfortable silence as she washed herself.

The silence was broken moments later, with a faint plaintive meowing. Laying along the lip of the pond was that pure black cat with eyes the brilliant color of wildflowers.

“Hello, little one,” Lillatha cooed at the animal, gliding through the water so smoothly that she barely made a noise.

“Did you follow us all the way here?” Samara asked the cat, earning a questioning look from her friend. “I met this beautiful creature back in Riverward.”

“You’re sure it’s the same cat?” she asked, glancing out towards the grasslands. “I’m sure there is more than one pure black cat out there,”

Samara shook her head. “None with her eyes.”

The cat, having noticed that both women were now bobbing in the water and looking at her, regarded them both with an aloof demeanor before sitting back on her hind legs. A soft, comfortable sound, just on the edge of hearing, filled the quiet night air. “She’s purring,” Lillatha said, pitching her voice softer to not overpower the lovely sound.

“It’s really nice,” Samara agreed. The sound wrapped around her, slinking into her ears and resonating in just the right way to make the barbarian woman smile. Glancing to her friend, Samara saw that Lillatha also had a carefree smile on her lips.

Sit on the edge of the pond.

Words. Samara distinctly heard words woven into the purring. Did... was the cat trying to speak with them? Samara asked herself. It wasn’t impossible, magic could give a cat that ability. “Did you hear that, Lillatha?” she asked in a soft, quiet voice.

“Yes,” the elf said, simply, already climbing out onto the bank of the pond.

It was easy to follow her friend, moving next to Lillatha and regarding the magical cat expectantly. No more words wove themselves in her purrs, but the sound remained so pleasant to listen to that she didn’t care. It slipped so tantalizingly over her mind, wrapping her thoughts in something light and incredibly soft.

The cat regarded them right back, with its beautiful eyes gleaming in the pale light of the Moonstone. Samara heard Lillatha give a small gasp, and moments later found out why. The cat’s eyes had a new depth to them, an attractive invitation to follow the golden shifts of color. A vague worry tried to form in Samara’s mind, cautioning against the wiles of magic, but the sweet purring sound overtook it, leaving only a placid excitement in its place.

Awareness of the rest of the world dimmed to the two points of color, the centers of which kept sinking further and further beyond Samara’s ability to follow. It wasn’t that the chase was frustrating, as the reward was the chase itself and the blissful blanket of calm that followed.

Her thoughts vanished under the numbing comfort for long stretches, only fleetingly rising above it, just to sputter and fade out anew soon after. Worries about missing sleep, about her friends finding her missing, they all faded in importance to the swirling golden light that captured her eyes.

Feel good, stare, drift away.

The words returned, feeling so much stronger than her own misty, half-formed thoughts. There was a force behind them, a gentle but inevitable presence that demanded she obey. Not that it was any kind of punishment to do so.

She was feeling good already. The clean water, the lingering scent of Lillatha’s soap, and the warmth of the woman herself leaning against her all helped Samara feel tremendously good.

Staring, likewise, was simple to do. She didn’t want to look anywhere else. The cat’s eyes were the most fascinating things she could imagine. A thousand shades of gold swirled around each other, pulling Samara’s attention toward the wide dark pupils in the center. It was a comforting kind of black, dangling temptingly at the center of the swirl, hers to take if only Samara could reach it.

Drifting away. That was different, and it made more worries try to fight through the layers of numbing purr that filled her mind. She... She shouldn’t just drift away. They were still exposed, still naked and if she and Lillatha both drifted away then—

Drift away

The command returned, the force behind it more insistent. It pressed against the bulwark of Samara’s mind, filling in every crack and lapse with that beguiling purr. Her Fury manifested, a feeble whisper-thin mewl of defiance that was quickly pressed beneath the swirls of golden light and the numbing purr.

“D—drift... away,” Samara found herself repeating. Her own voice leant a dreamy, drowsy quality to the words.

“Drift… a—away,” another voice, familiar and just as soft, sounded close. Lillatha. The slender elf shifted against Samara’s arm, her whole weight suddenly resting in the dark-haired woman’s lap. The archer was breathing so slowly, appearing so utterly calm and at peace.

“Drift… away,” she breathed out, every last scrap of tension vanishing, leaving Samara with her friend’s warm relaxed body laying against her.

Drift. Away.

The command wasn’t hard to follow either. In fact, it was remarkably easy. She already had to grasp at each thought—willing herself to move from one to the next. It would be so much easier to just stop. And she... She wanted to do it. It felt good—everything felt good.

Breathing out, Samara let go of the need to grab the next thought. The swirl of color glimmered so much more powerfully, holding Samara’s attention completely. The last vestiges of awareness of anything outside the eyes and the sound, of Lillatha’s own utterly relaxed body next to her, and of the scent of the water—they all vanished.

The void between her thoughts grew, each moment getting deeper and more profound, while the tranquilizing purr filled her mind completely, silencing every last chance of awareness in Samara’s mind.