Private Tales Crossing Over

[Syuri]

Syuri halted and turned back to him with a small frown in question as he stopped..

"I.." she chewed on her lip, about to answer when she heard the sound of distant splashing and her head whipped around to peer through the trees.. "Did you hear that?.. No, no going back. They're here somewhere and I'm not going anywhere until we've found them.." she answered as she looked back at him.

She turned and continued along the brook, muttering "We'll just have to figure that out later..." with a huff as she strode quickly, weaving in and out of trees and ducking the low branches of the thick forest.

 

[Keernan]

Keernan pursed his lips and gave a sharp nod. He had given her the choice and she had made it. For him, it was as simple as that.

Keernan turned towards the noise. It could have just been a large fish or a fishing bird. He had the sense that it wouldn't be so simple.

Moving far too casually for someone drawn into a fae realm, he rounded the bend in the river. There was a young elf playing on the shore, throwing sticks into the water and watching them float downstream. It was the first of the children who had been taken.

Keernan narrowed his eyes.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri's pace quickened as the splashing grew nearer and she paused as she spotted the little girl playing by the river, her gaze narrowed with a brief moment's hesitation, but she recognised her.. "Mirryn?" she called out, and the little girl's head whipped around to face Syuri with a sharp gasp in fright..

"Su?" the child's head tilted and she stood.. "Is it you?.." she asked cautiously. Syuri nodded.

"It's me!" she grinned and looked to Keernan. "It's Kip's little sister.." she laughed under her breath in relief and rushed toward the girl, arms open to scoop her up.

 

[Keernan]

The girl leapt into Syuri's arms. She squeezed her tight and nuzzled her head into the crook of her neck.

"I lost the others. I'm so sorry. I think they're further down the stream..."

Keernan meandered slowly around Syuri. His expression again gave nothing away. He met the child's gaze just briefly.

"Kaan'sk, drosun taal," Keernan hissed suddenly.

The child bared its teeth. "Ack trass!" it hissed back.

"Syuri I would probably put the changeling down if I were you..." Keernan warned.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri laughed and held the child tight against her chest, her fingers stroking through her hair as she offered hushed reassurance by her ear.

“You’re safe now. We’ll find them.” She smiled warmly. They both looked to Keernan as he wandered around them both, Syuri’s brow ceasing slightly in confusion as he hissed in a language unknown to her, and she blinked as Mirryn answered. She turned to look at the child in her arms, who looked back at her with a smile and unfamiliar eyes.

She dropped the child immediately with a gasp in panic and took a few steps back, her bow quickly drawn and arrow nocked and aimed at the creature, whatever it was.

Her skin crawled at how the thing looked like Mirryn, how it had known her name and sounded like her.

“Where are they?....” she asked in a shuddered breath to neither of them in particular.

 

[Keernan]

The child turned to look up at Syuri. That childish innocence and fear had gone from its expression. It spat at her feet and swore something in a foreign tongue. Without warning it dove to its side, striking the surface of the river with a splash and vanishing beneath the surface.

Keernan gave a dismissive sigh and stepped after it. The moment his boot touched the river the water leapt to meet him. It wound its way up his body and in an instant it seemed to wash Keernan away. The transparent elemental spirit turned to look over its shoulder at Syuri. It still captured the aspect of the elf it had been moments before.


He melted into the water, leaving nothing but ripples in his wake. Three seconds passed. The water erupted upwards, throwing the changeling back out. It cursed and spat and rolled across the bank.

"She asked you a question," Keernan said calmly, emerging from the river. Water flowed off him, making him a tangible and very dry elf once again?

"That way!" the creature hissed. Its elven form had melted away. It still resembled the child but its limbs were longer. It had webbed toes and fingers and sharp, needle-like teeth.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri’s heart drummed in her chest as she struggled to wrap her head around the fact that this creature wasn’t the child she knew, and yet it felt wrong to be aiming an arrow at her.. it. Even as it spat at her feet, Syuri grit her teeth and pulled a little tighter on her bowstring and yet had no intention of firing. She needed answers, and the fear that the children were dead only grew in her chest. If not for Keernan she’d never have known, she’d have taken that thing back to Mirryn’s parents. She’d never been so repulsed by a creature in her life.

Her aim followed the child as it dove into the water and she growled in frustration and lowered her bow as she turned to Keernan with the intention of spitting questions at him, only to watch him step into the river and physically become water.

Her crystal blue eyes widened, waves of fear, confusion, intrigue hit her one after the other and her mouth fell open as she stared, dumbfounded as he too disappeared into the water.

“What the shite is going on..” she muttered to herself, cautiously wandering over to the edge of the water to peer into her rippling reflection before being hit by the eruption of water. She rushed backwards, coughing and wiping the rush of water from her face and she peered out behind the curtain of soaking white hair with a scowl at the man.

She didn’t even bother to sort herself, her fists clenched and she pressed them against her hips as she stared Incredulously between the two.

The day was getting weirder as it went on, and she wasn’t going any further until she got some explanation from the elf... whatever he was. She drew her eyes away from the changeling with disgust and set her glare back upon Keernan, her jaw clenched and her brow arched in question.

“Well?!”

 

[Keernan]

Keernan looked back at her blankly for a long, drawn out pause. He tried to think back to before the moment he had died. It was difficult to think about seeing the world through the eyes of just an elf. Their people used to be so much more connected to the magic of the world.

"Oh that's not an elf, it's a changeling. Means someone took the children and was going to replace them with these little fuckers," Keernan replied. He was trying to see it through her eyes, where a minor fae was far more otherworldly.

"Who took the children and are they still alive?" Keernan demanded.

The changeling spat at him, but he simply delivered a swift kick.

"Yes, yes alive still!" it hissed back at him.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri's teeth clenched together and her lips pressed into a thin line as she watched Keernan explain what a changeling was, her eyes shifting between them as she got the answer that she wanted before she reached to shove at the man.

"I meant you! What sort of magic was that?!" she frowned and folded her arms with a huff and looked down at the Changeling with a growl.

"You can show us the way. I don't trust your word." she pointed a dagger at the creature in warning. "Don't go trying anything either."

 

[Keernan]

"Cos he's not a fucking elf!" hissed the changeling. It was still obedient, turning its back to Syuri and marching down the riverside.

Keernan made a quiet, contemplative noise. He didn't think about exactly how to describe his magic to people, just as he didn't think about how strange walking into a fae realm could be.

"It is raw, elemental magic. Water, fire, living things. Not like the more refined, constrained magic that is more common now. Not that what the humans in their colleges do is constrained. They tap into dangerous powers without regard for the consequences."

 

[Syuri]

Syuri kicked a rock at the changeling irritably and turned to stare at Keernan as he explained, sort of. Her head shook with a huff at him and she waved a hand dismissively, quickly losing patience “Gods you really are an odd sod.” She muttered and turned to follow the changeling’s directions in search of the children.

“Go on then move.” She frowned at the little creature and pointed ahead of her.

She fell silent for a while, unable to get the thought out of her mind or contain her curiosity any more.. “So you’re some sort of, elemental shifter?” she asked and glanced back at Keernan.. “Can you shift into other things too, then?” her brow quirked.

 

[Keernan]

"I don't try to be strange," he protested. He still wore an easy smile.

When that raw spirit had merged with the shattered soul of the dead elf he had ceased to be either of those things. The spirit had been a whimsical, curious creature. Keernan was never going to quite fit in with society.

"It depends where I am, how the magical aether is moving," he explained. All things that made sense to him that he could not explain easily. "But yes."

He narrowed his eyes at a plant on the water's edge. It stood out against the flora here. Its roots sunk into the river itself. Its leaves were thick and dark, each nearly a meter long.

"Leave alone!" the changeling hissed but Keernan ignored it. He stepped forwards and lifted a leaf to be faced with the sleeping visage of another of the children.

"Another changeling transforming."

Suddenly the changeling gave a shrill cry and ran for the trees. There was another splash further up the river. Something was coming.

 

[Syuri]

"Oh so it's an effortless thing.. Well congrats on that.." she commented with a smirk and a shake of her head. Syuri listened to his explanation and her brow furrowed in confusion, but she held back her questions as she turned to see him fussing around in the flora.

She frowned with a step forward to see for herself, a look of fury on her ferocity on her face.. "These horrible little--". Syuri's words were cut off by the sound of the changeling's cry and her gaze followed the creature into the trees before her attention was drawn toward the sound of splashing. She moved to Keernan's side and nocked her arrow again, her bow string pulled back as her arrow remained aimed toward the ground, ready to find a target..

"Any ideas what that might be?.." Syuri asked, apprehension clear in her whispered words.

 

[Keernan]

"No," he replied. This time even he sounded worried.

Keernan stepped back away from the water. Dark shapes moved beneath the surface towards them quickly. They didn't erupt from the river. Instead the five figures slowly emerged, walking up the bank.

They were shorter than elves, perhaps just stooped over. With long dark hair and dark green skin it was easy to identify them.

"Nyxie," Keernan grunted. "That explains the song."

He hoped the children hadn't been drowned. Chanelings didn't typically work that way, but there was more than one kind of fae at work here.

The Nyxie were armed. Short, curved swords that they dragged along the bank.

 

[Syuri]

She didn't like his tone at all, and she too moved back from the water, her heart a flurry in her chest as she watched the ominous figures emerge from it's surface.

Nyxie?.. Syuri lifted her bow and moved her aim between each of the five creatures in warning as she moved backward still.

"We don't want trouble.." the young elf uttered with as much conviction as she could muster. "We just want the children returned and we'll be going." she frowned. Somehow she doubted it would be that simple, but it was worth a shot.

 

[Keernan]

"No," hissed one of the nyxie without pause.

"Do others know the way?" The next asked. Their voices were thin and raspy.

"The way here?" a third clarified.

"The children," Keernan said quietly. He sounded as if he wanted to talk the situation down. "Just release the children. You can't replace them with changelings now."

"They don't know...if you don't leave..." one of them reasoned.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri's skin crawled until she could no longer suppress a shudder, her fingers tightening on her bow string.

"We're taking the children, the real children, and we're leaving. There is no alternative." Syuri's gaze narrowed and took aim at the one in the centre of the group.

 

[Keernan]

The nearest Nyxie pulled its arm back, and launched its spear at Keernan. He stepped aside as it hissed past his face.

"That wasn't nice," he muttered to himself, as if someone had just offered a rude comment - rather than tried to skewer him.

Keernan wasn't the quickest to react as another Nyxie darted forwards. He brought his left arm across his chest. Dark green roots sprouted from his skin, wrapping around his forearm. The roots turned a deep brown as they hardened to bark and protected him from a wickedly curved sword.

 

[Syuri]

Shit..

Syuri loosed her bow at the chest of the Nyxie that had launched it's spear. It let out a horrible screech and gurgled before it burst and splashed to the ground as though it had been made entirely of water and nothing else. Syuri blinked, and in her hesitation another of the creatures had dived at her, shoving her to the ground and screaming into her face as it tried to press it's blade into her neck.

She let out a sharp gasp and grit her teeth as she pushed upward with her bow, holding the creature off but for how long, she wasn't sure..

"Keernan?!" she yelled out with a growl in exertion, catching sight of another approaching in her peripheral.

"KEERNAN!"

 

[Keernan]

Keernan would have been content to delay the Nixie until they felt like being more reasonable.

They were not going to be reasonable.

The curved blade stuck fast in the bark that had now surrounded his entire left arm. Keernan drew his right hand back, balled into a fist. As he swung forwards more vines wrapped around his arm, tightening around his fist and forming a wooden pummel.

The noise of it striking the nyxie's head rang out. Keernan thought it was actually quite a satisfying noise.

He turned towards Syuri and finally there was emotion etched into his face. The elf had come here with him and was about to pay the price for his own inquisitive nature.

Keernan shouted a warning as turned and sprinted towards her. Within a few strides he was more like an animated tree than a man. The nyxie pulled the knife back to defend itself but that didn't even slow the shifter. One kick sent the fae tumbling through the trees.

The last one leapt for him, but Keernan caught it with mid air. It was stuck, suspended in the air within his grasp for half a second. Keernan took a step and slammed it down into the wet earth.

"She asked you a question," he hissed as vines started to wrap around the faerie's throat.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri dragged in a lungful of air as the Nyxie let up the pressure and her head whipped to the side to see the tree... Keernan launch the fae into the forest with a single kick. She could feel the earth tremble as another was slammed into it, and Syuri rolled back to her feet and stared at the shifter in bewilderment and awe.

"Thank you.." she muttered, rubbing at her collar and rolling her shoulder of it's tension as she looked down at the Nyxie under his grip.

"Take us to the children, and he'll let you live. It's not a difficult choice." she frowned irritably with a sneer in disdain.

 

[Keernan]

It seemed so simple when she spelled it out like that. He would strangle the life out of the nyxie if it didn't talk. Extinguish a life, a flame, even a rotten one like this. Keernan found he didn't want to kill the creature like this.

It was a vile thing, it had lured children from their beds with its song. He didn't quite feel emotions like most people. Keernan knew that, knew that there would always be something that seperated him from the more magical realm and the one the elves walked. Not matching either side. Sometimes he felt emotions more keenly, other times he was disconnected, unfeeling.


Keernan didn't know if he felt remorse, but he hoped the Nyxie would agree to the demand. He loosened the vines, giving it the chance to speak.

"Fine! Take you to them, but the Aralyssian will not let them go! You will see."

Keernan hefted it back to its feet, the bark receding until he was his usual self. He gave the nyxie a gentle shove and it started to walk.

"You are not hurt?" he asked Syuri.

 

[Syuri]

Syuri drew in a slow breath as she tried to slow her quickened pulse, a venomous gaze fixed on the nyxie as she waited on the creature speaking. They would have been more than happy to see Syuri and Keernan dead, they’d lured the children here to meet whatever fate they awaited, and they killed people the way they did. She’d have felt no remorse for ending their miserable lives what-so-ever.

She sneered at it as it agreed and she growled a quiet “Good.” She frowned, pausing a moment before forcing the question from her lips. “What’s the Aralyssian?...”

Her attention returned to Keernan as she watched the shifter return to his skin and she sighed quietly. The day had been anything but dull, but she silently cursed herself for not fetching her brother and the rest of the rangers to come along on this quest, but she had no idea she’d been stepping into another realm. She felt vulnerable here, she didn’t know much about these creatures at all and she dreaded the path ahead. Keernan had no doubt saved her life, but she couldn’t shake the anxiety of being so outnumbered, not to mention how they were supposed to get back if they ever did get to the children.

“No.. I’m alright, thank you.” She reached to squeeze gently at his forearm to reiterate her gratitude, and followed after the nyxie as it begrudgingly led the way.

 

[Keernan]

The light shifted without warning. It wasn't as if the sun had changed, or the trees had shifted in the breeze. It took on a new quality, as if something was leaching the colour from the world.

"The question is not 'what is the Aralyssian, but who," came a silken voice from behind them.

Keernan shivered. There was a power in that voice. It slipped down his neck and settled in his gut. It made the hairs on his arms stand on end.

A ghastly apparition glided around them, darkness following. Not as shadow, but as something else. Like a filter on the world it carried with it.

"Silly creatures," she sighed. "I expected more from you Maredh."

Lifting one hand. The nyxie fell to the ground, as if it had been a puppet and had its strings cut. It was quite dead. A true name was a powerful thing in the fae world.

"Are you going to introduce yourselves?"

 

[Syuri]

Syuri paused as she noticed the light change, the vibrancy of the plush and verdant forest around them seeming to grow paler. Her lips parted and she drew breath, intending on speaking when the voice behind them cut in first and her body whipped around to face the creature with a sharp exhale, her fingers tightening around her bow.

The woman sent the same shudder dancing across her spine and goosebumps bloomed over every inch of her alabaster skin. She took a step closer to Keernan as it glided around them, her eyes widening as the nyxie they'd been following was quickly snuffed out, and she stared back at it's open eyes for a moment. Her brow furrowed slightly and she looked up, she didn't feel sorry for the creature, but it had been leading them to the children. This one, she wasn't so sure would be as easily persuaded.

"I..." she bit on her lip. She didn't much want the woman to know her name. "No, we are not." she narrowed her gaze and took a bold step toward her.

"We've come to return the elven children home.." she told her with a firmness to her voice despite the chill that lingered uncomfortably on her spine.