"The Dawn that Rose from Fire"

Day 19 of Novel November- The party is attacked and something blossoms

“So you’ve killed a wyrm?” Tavren asked from behind. The Fey’ri looked back at them and nodded.

“It’s called the Rising, our coming of age.” It felt so long ago now. “A Fey’ri at the age of around seventy-five, or whenever their parents believe them ready, heads into the Wastes, where the wyrms spawn.” Alenyah’s eyes were far off, looking into distant memory. “My Elder, Vesper, accompanied me. They have to witness the wyrm culling as proof that you did it alone. And if you are a Singer, you must prove you can tame them with your Song.”

She smiled at the memory- “It’s a messy business. We stunk for days afterwards, my friends and I. There’s always some of the Fey’ri who are young but have passed their Rising who also attend for support or to intervene. It didn’t happen often in those days, but sometimes we COULD fail.” Sometimes, a young Fey’ri, cocky or scared, would die.

“Not only did we patrol the North, keeping the population of wyrms low, we would heal corruption wherever it tried to seep past.”

Alenyah closed her eyes. She could still feel the heat on her face, the grit of ash on her skin. Her pulse had been a war drum in her throat; the Song had been a raw, blistering edge inside her ribs. She had been so young by Fey’ri standards, not yet ninety, barely old enough to pretend not to fear death.

Kaelen’s head tilted, listening more intently than the others. His horse slowed to match hers, though he pretended not to be doing it.

“The first thing it did was try to swallow me whole,” she added dryly.

Althea squeaked.

“Maker,” Foxran muttered.

“I survived.” She lifted one shoulder. “And I sang. And it died.”

They rode in silence for a few heartbeats. Even Tavren looked unsettled, though they tried not to show it.

Berin cleared his throat gently. “Is that why… these smaller creatures today aren’t so difficult for you? Because you’ve already faced worse?”

“I’ve faced worse so FAR,” she said, thinking of the Great Wyrm.

“And…that day?” Althea finally asked the question. “With the Great Wyrm…did you try?”

Alenyah shuddered, not wanting to answer. But with what they were facing ahead, she knew she had to be honest.

“I did. It’s harder over large distances.” Her eyes looked upwards at the invisible sky, hidden by the dense pines. “I was…a rock trying to stop the rising sea tide. It was inevitable. HE was inevitable.”

“Well, we will definitely be close enough,” Seth reassured her. “We will try to get the jump on the beast and give you the advantage.”

At least she wouldn’t be alone.

Chapter 11

By midday, everyone was on edge. The forest seemed to be growing quieter not with silence, but with anticipation. Alenyah was growing uneasy. She hadn’t seen anymore of the smaller wildlife, as though the creatures knew not to traverse to deeply in the wood.

Ahead, Foxran suddenly raised his hand. Ahead, Alenyah could see the grey brown back of a buck, standing in waist high grass in a small clearing, the first they had seen in days. It looked ordinary against the underbrush, but it’s pointed head was raised, ears up and listening. Foxran and Tavren shared a look, and the healer notched an arrow to their bowstring, breath held. Fresh meat would ease their rations for a few days.

Even so, Alenyah felt discord, as if someone was blowing a horn off key. Tavren lifted the bow, drew their elbow back to loose. Alenyah’s heart dropped, and the Fey’ri reached out on instinct. Her lunge was just enough to nudge Tavren’s arm, and the arrow hissed off mark. The shot went wide, slicing past the deer’s flank.

Rather than bolting, the buck stilled. It didn’t startle, and almost too slowly, the neck twisted the pronged head in their direction. The mouth was too wide, too long, stretching back and filled with needle like teeth. The lips were torn and blackened, and the eyes were glassy as though nothing lived behind them to look out.

Kaelen cursed, pulling his mount back who was whinnying in alarm.

A soft click-click-click issued from the buck’s throat. Not breathing. Not warning.

Calling.

A doe’s head and form rose from the tall grass beside it. Then another. Then six.

Doe after doe, rising from the tall grasses like things shaking off sleep. Each face was smooth and wrong, each mouth curling into that same too-wide, shredded smile. Their jaws hung slightly open, clicking in irregular, unsettling rhythm.

“Althea,” Alenyah breathed softly, unable to move. “Berin…up the trees. NOW.”

The Rhea were unmoving behind her. Althea, chest heaving, whispered, “I can’t move.”

Berin shifted on Pumpkin, who tossed their reddish head in alarm. “Althea,” he begged. “Please.”

But the small woman was frozen and eyes locked wide on the predators ahead of her.

The buck stepped forward. Only now could they see its limbs, bent slightly the wrong way, joints rotating with a loose, jerking precision. It froze again, perfectly statuesque. The only motion came from the flick of one torn ear.

Alenyah reached out, desperate, but the Song recoiled from her touch.

There was nothing left to soothe.

Nothing left to save.

The herd crouched, unnatural.

“Run!” Tavren barked.

But the clicking rose behind them, ahead of them, around them, the sound of a hunt beginning. Valka snarled, hackles raised. Alenyah unhooked her boots from the stirrups, preparing to jump off and not hinder Valka in her attacks.

The buck lunged, zig-zagging erratically, each burst of speed sharp and predatory, covering ground in violent, angled strides that broke the shape of a normal run. The herd followed suit. They were eight nightmares tearing forward in a stuttering, unpredictable rush, closing the clearing in heartbeats.

Alenyah flung herself off the saddle, and Valka crashed through the undergrowth to meet them, teeth bared. Her Song snapped out of her like a whip, desperate, searching for the creature’s chord. For a heartbeat she felt it, a distant, shivering thread, tangled and discordant but still there. A remnant of what it had once been.

She seized it and pulled.

The buck staggered mid-stride.

But only for a moment.

The twisted Song bucked against hers like a furious, trapped animal. Too fast. Too fractured. And there were more. The herd lunging from all sides, shapes flickering between the trees in jagged, staggering leaps.

She drew her sword, grateful she had not taken off her buckler that afternoon.

The Fylgja’s fur bristled, muscles coiling, a snarl ripping from her throat as she leapt at the nearest deer. Teeth and claws tore into the twisted flank, but the buck didn’t falter—only a jerk, a stagger. Alenyah’s stomach twisted.

The Stoneborn had dismounted, and Berin jumped for a tree from Pumpkin’s back who whinnied and bolted. Seth had fallen back and seized a stunned Althea. She squealed as he boldly tossed her into the trees.

“Alenyah, fall back!” Kaelen barked at her. She glanced over her shoulder at Berin and Althea as Seth charged past.

They scrambled up its lowest limbs, Althea pulling herself hand-over-hand, skirts bunched around her waist; Berin gritting his teeth as his sore thighs protested every movement.

A doe slammed into the trunk below them. The tree shuddered violently. Althea yelped and caught a higher branch; Berin’s foot slipped, and she snatched his forearm just in time.

“Hold on!” she gasped.

“That is exactly what I am attempting to do!” Berin wheezed.

Another impact rattled the tree as a second deer attempted to leap, jaws snapping inches from Berin’s boot.

Kaelen hit the first doe like an avalanche.

One moment he was beside her, the next he had launched himself forward with Stoneborn speed, slamming his shoulder into the creature’s ribs. The impact cracked like breaking timber. The doe spun, legs flinging wildly as it hit the ground.

Foxran’s twin axes flared in the dim light as he spun them in tight arcs. When the second deer leapt at him, he met it head-on, burying both blades in its elongated jaw. A spray of brackish ichor hissed across the leaf litter.



Tavren moved like a dancer among shadows. A lunging buck met their spin, and they severed its front tendon with one clean slash. It collapsed mid-charge, skidding across the dirt. They stabbed downwards, silencing its thrashing in a pained screech.

Seth roared something unintelligible and barreled into another, his hammer ringing as it struck the side of its skull. The creature dropped instantly, limbs twitching in post-mortem spasms.

Valka still tore into the buck at the front of the fray, and Alenyah could see the spatter of red blood and dark ichor.

“Valka!” She screamed. But the Fylgja did not need her concern. As a deer crashed into Alenyah’s side from Berin’s tree, Valka wrenched the buck’s head from its muscled shoulders. Pain exploded in the Fey’ri’s shoulder as she was thrown back, but luckily she had taken the brunt on her buckler.

Blade in hand, unable to focus on the Song, she leaped forward. Muscles screamed. She stumbled, bringing her sword down across a snapping jaw, feeling it grind beneath the edge. Blood spatters, wet and coppery, painted the pine needles, yet the creature surged on.

She bashed it with her steel buckler, grateful this one didn’t have antlers. She pushed upwards, grimacing, and tried to thrust her blade into the exposed belly.

Althea and Berin chucked pine cones, raining them upon the creature’s skull. Alenyah’s knees strained; she couldn’t reach far enough. Then there was Kaelen.

Kaelen launched himself like a living battering ram, shoulder slamming into the deer with enough force to send it staggering sideways, legs skidding across the littered forest floor. The creature’s head jerked violently, teeth snapping in a discordant rhythm that made Alenyah flinch. She seized the moment, lungs burning, and surged forward, driving her blade into the side exposed by Kaelen’s strike.

The doe yelped, a hideous, broken sound, but it didn’t fall. Its clicks rose, joined by the eerie chorus of the remaining herd, echoing off the pines like a perverse rhythm section. Alenyah’s stomach twisted.

The air was thick with tension, coppery blood, and the smell of crushed pine. Alenyah’s ears rang, her heart pounding, but she could feel the Song, weak but still alive, connecting to the nearest twisted deer. Just a little more… she urged herself.

The doe froze mid-lunge, its spine stiffening as Alenyah pushed forward with everything she had left, the Song snapping taut like a whip. The creature staggered, limbs buckling beneath it, before collapsing in a heavy heap. Kaelen stabbed downward, severing the spine.

Only two remained, clicking anxiously. As they hesitated, Valka lunged, sending them scattering into the trees. The Fylgja started to give chase, but Alenyah whistled sharply, calling her back. Turning, the hound tossed her head proudly and trotted towards the pine tree Althea and Berin had taken refuge in. Blood sluggishly seeped from gashes in her forelegs, but she seemed healthy.