Through the Fire and Flames

the edges of the orb fuzz and fray as possibilities began to diverge. In theory, if Taslin chose a path which lead to a hazard, the thousands of layered possibilities would begin to wink out, one by one, the overall light fading as miniscule differences between approaches led to deaths at different points in time. No sign of that yet, though.

  Taslin moved towards the fire again, and Rel forced himself to match her step. The bare skin on his hands and cheeks began to prickle with the heat, and he had to turn his face down and away slightly for protection, watching Taslin's light through the blur of his own eyelashes at the corner of his eye. Though Clearsight cooled his eyeballs to almost numb, it wouldn't stop them burning with the rest of him.

  It took an effort of will not to look down at his own hand to check for burning. Do that, and his Gift would lock up completely. For Taslin's sake as well as Keshnu's and Dora's, he had to keep pushing on, however much it hurt.

  The light stopped moving forwards for a blessed moment. There was an instant of confusion, where it seemed to be shrinking and moving while staying in one spot, and then Rel's brain caught up to his eyes; Taslin had turned to her right and taken a step in that direction. He matched her, taking the opportunity to edge a little further from the blaze. Couldn't risk going too far from her path, because she might already be within the Sherim's distorted threshold, but he'd be no use to her if his eyeballs charred.

  He flinched as the fire hissed and spat. It seemed to have swelled and grown taller at their approach. A low breeze whispered around his ankles, and the air held the acrid scent of burning pitch. Strange for a Sherim to be so noisy - normally the Second Realm's silence enveloped Sherim completely.

  Deep in the belly of the blaze, shapes that could have been faces flickered in and out of alignment. Rel forced himself to look away, to focus on Taslin's steady light, before his enhanced vision could cut the faces free. This was going to be hard enough without ghosts of Wild Power attacking them.

  Taslin's next bobbing step brought her closer to the curling claws of the Sherim. Bracing himself, trying not to breathe air already hot enough to parch his throat, Rel followed suit. He still couldn't feel the Sherim tightening around him. On the back of his hands, the tickle of too much heat rose a step, suddenly out-and-out painful.

  There was still no sign of Taslin running into any difficulties. Again, Rel gritted his teeth and managed not to try to get a glimpse of his own future, though his hands screamed for attention. He actually gasped with the next step, closer again to the Sherim, and the sudden rush of hot air jabbed sandpaper and knives through the top of his nose and the back of his throat. His sound made a smoke ring for a moment before the fire blasted it away.

  Eyes screwed down as narrow as he could hold them without blinking, hands scrabbling for cover in his pockets, he forced himself to match another cruel step. Turbulence in the air, traced in immense detail by the power of his Clearsight, began to obscure Taslin's light. It should have been a breeze, gently drawing the heat away, but no such luck; instead, it just prodded and poked at the most painful areas of his exposed skin.

  He covered his left hand, closer to the fire, with his right, and immediately felt the knuckles on his right begin to burn. Under his right palm, the skin of his left hand retained all too much heat. It was like trying to pick up a bread roll too soon after it had come out of the oven. Again, he gave a little gasp of pain, then choked as the air scorched his throat.

  Coughing, he staggered, struggling to call Taslin's name as he threw himself away from the fire. He sprawled headlong on the grass, Clearsight evaporating as the impact made him blink. Taslin reappeared, one leg raised half-way through a step, amethyst light held aloft. The grass was dry, rough on Rel's burned cheek, but at least he was outside the reach of the worst of the heat. His nostrils stung with the scent of soot.

  "Are you injured?" It might just have been Rel's ears playing tricks, but Taslin's voice sounded softer than he would have expected. Maybe the noise of the fire was concealing the usual sharp edge on her tongue.

  Rel croaked, "Burned." He tried to lever himself upright, but his hands stung at the effort, and beneath the stinging was a bone-deep ache. It seeded a sour feeling in his stomach, as if to push himself too hard now would gut him. Instead, he rolled onto his side. The least he could do was look Taslin in the eye as he failed her. "I can't... it's... Is there any other way? Please?"

  The Gift-Giver's skirt rustled as she flowed out of the Sherim and knelt beside him, all in one effortless, alien movement. She still held Keshnu, though she'd shifted his limp form to hang over her shoulder. This time, there was no mistaking the concern in her voice as she said, "The fire is a problem for you?"

  He nodded, cringing, awaiting her anger.

  "I had hoped we could get deep enough into the Sherim quickly enough that you would be safe from First Realm physics." Taslin's eyes sparkled as she turned from him to glare briefly at the fire. The glare vanished, though, as she looked back down at him. "My apologies. We shall try another route. I'm afraid I can do nothing for your burns."

  Rel coughed, somehow found enough saliva to speak. "I'll manage. Sorry for holding you up."

  Taslin frowned. "Your fatigue won't be a problem? This will all be for nothing if you burn out while we're only half-way across."

  "I'll manage." He gritted his teeth, pushing more force into the words. "I have to, don't I?"

  The Gift-Giver nodded and pushed back to her feet. "In the Second Realm, your mind may be free enough to heal you."

  Rel gave her another nod. He pulled his knees up and clumsily rolled onto them. That let him straighten to kneeling, and from there he could heave to his feet, flailing for balance and ignoring the aches of strained and tired muscles all across his arms and torso. The bruises Taslin had left him with when she smashed him off the ledge at Vessit made their voices heard, too, but next to the raw, crawling agony of his burns they seemed nothing but ghosts.

  He met Taslin's eyes, surprised to see them gently shining. Perhaps there was enough of the Second Realm bleeding through here that she was already beginning to recover. She said, "I will try another route. Do not neglect your own safety in guarding mine."

  Again, Rel found himself frowning, and not just from the pain. Yes, Taslin needed his help to reach the Court, for Keshnu's sake, but her own fatigue couldn't be making it easy to show him human kindness. Why was she bothering? He cleared his throat to say something about it, but the motion set a tickle there that drove him into another coughing fit.

  By the time he'd straightened up from that, Taslin had reformed her ball of light and was stood facing the Sherim. The faint haze still drifting from her spread out in breathtaking webs, mingling with the disturbed air around the fire as if testing its currents. Without turning, she said, "I might be able to reduce the heat a little with Wild Power, if that would help."

  Rel shook his head. "Can you afford the extra strain?" His voice was a little steadier, though it still sounded rough in his own ears, and he coughed again.

  "I would be more worried about using such a technique near a Sherim this active." Chiselled out of the gloom by firelight, Taslin's face seemed just short of natural, like a finely-crafted doll's. "With any luck, in a few minutes we will be back in my Realm, and my fatigue will be no problem at all."

  "If there's any extra risk, let me shoulder it. You're doing enough."

  The Gift-Giver's face leapt back into reality as she turned to study him, eyes wide with surprise. After a moment's pause, she said, "So be it. Are you ready to begin again?"

  He nodded and stretched his eyelids back, welcoming the liquid chill of Clearsight settling in. It sucked some of the feeling from his cheeks. Again, Taslin melted away, leaving only the violet globe floating just below head height. Pushing a second and a half into the future revealed a tight, violent spasm in the Sherim, and despite himself, Rel flinched. He managed not to blink, but the snap of tension across his face jabbed clumsy probes into his almost-forgotten fatigue head
ache.

  "I may need to move more quickly on this path." Coming out of thin air, Taslin's voice turned ambient, as if it came from the forest surrounding him. "Stay close, and shout if you begin to take harm again."

  "I will." But only, he swore to himself, if he really couldn't go any further. Keshnu's well-being could not wait for Rel's frailties. For that matter, neither could Dora's unresolved fate.

  Before Rel could lose himself down that well of recrimination, Taslin's light bobbed once and set off, passing close enough in front of him that, a second and a half later, he felt the brush of her invisible sleeve. The air swirled behind her, and Rel fell into step.

  Almost immediately, a tingle ran across his skin, sliding under his clothes and tugging at his hair. The Sherim, beginning to tighten around him. Where it fell on burned skin, it pulled viciously at the cracks already forming. He hissed in pain, wincing, but pressed on. That tingling sensation always made him think of Pevan's strange delight in it, but there was no time for worrying where his sister had fled to after the debacle at Vessit.

  Ahead, the light bobbed again, and Taslin took a step closer to the fire. Rel followed suit, and the surface of the Sherim seemed to slough off the worst of the increase in heat. He took a deep breath, and though his