12. Waking up to Despair

Liam and Titania arrived at the location within thirty minutes, but it was too late. The scene was hard to describe. It looked like some giant monsters had been fighting. Windrows of trees had been knocked down. The waterfall looked injured, with large chunks missing. It gave the falls a scarred look.

In the clearing lay a man unconscious, clothes were torn and bleeding. They both rushed over after making sure that no one might cause them harm. The man's blonde hair had streaks of blood running through, and he was bleeding, but nothing looked fatal. As they got closer, the man started to stir, and Liam put his hand out to Titania. She stopped and looked at him questioningly, and he mouthed, "wait."

"They took her," the man's voice rasped out, and he coughed, rolling to his side.

"They took who?" Titania asked as she pushed passed Liam's hand and rushes to the injured man's side.

"The one that fell from the stars," he said as he began to try standing up. "I have to get Pandrea..." But that was it. Darkness claimed him before he could take a step, but Liam caught him and laid him down.

Sigardus awoke to the smell of roasting fish and mushrooms. As his eyes opened, he realized it was night and started to panic. Where was she? The last thing he remembered was Pandrea shrinking and him trying to fight the prince. It was a joke. He was no match for a real dragon. Valkiarus batted his body around and then took Pandrea and left.

The memory of Pandrea taken snapped him out of his revelry, and he jumps up. Sigardus began to look around, and panic started to set in more until he noticed something. Two very surprised and also very different people let out sounds of shock.

One of them was tall with dark hair. The man's eyes that danced like fire and his skin was dark in color shared by most Hallen-Gra. The other was a terse woman that seemed vaguely familiar. She was Fae, and her face had intricate tattoos of lines that almost changed color in the firelight.

"How do you feel?" The woman asked him, and the question struck him. He felt fine, right, maybe even great, one might say. This made no sense to him. He should be covered in bruises from the beating he had taken, but no pain at all instead.

"I feel great, but I don't understand how. I should be covered in bruises and cuts," Sigardus says, feeling his body, and then he stopped. Kira?

"I'm sorry we couldn't save her," came Kira's soft and whispering voice into his mind. That let him relax a bit.

"It's not your fault. There is no way we could stop something like that," Sigardus expressed to Kira through mind-link. Then, turning to the others, he says, "Thank you for everything, but I have to get going."

"Going where?" The man asked as his eye looked like they were moving and getting brighter. The female pushes herself forwards and transfers between the two of them.

"Let's start with names before you go running off into the dark. My name is Titania, and this is Liam. Both of us have been sent from our respective kingdoms to located and possibly retrieve whatever fell. Are you with me so far?" Titania asks him.

"Yes, sorry. I didn't mean to come off as rude. My name is Sigardus, and I caught what fell. It was a girl from somewhere else, but she had a full Were-Shyft black as midnight. I'm no emissary like you two, but I'm sure you guy understand what it means for a Wolfven to appear. Suppose she or the Shyft falls into the wrong hands. That's bad news for everyone."

"Were-Shyft? Wolfven? What are you talking about? I've never heard of anything like that," Liam said, a bit confused.

"You wouldn't have heard of them, Hallen-Gra doesn't preach has been Kingdoms. The Three King only recognizes the five kingdoms and considers the sixth to have never existed. No offense, Liam, but your leader-god only recognizes stable power, and I don't think you disagree." Titania spoke to them.

"You're not wrong, Hallen-Gra always competes for the top place and are not afraid to fight for the top," Liam said with a bit of a smile.

"My sister, Liliana, taught me about the betrayal of Demorian, murdering the queen and then invading the capital and killing everyone. Now though, according to you, the daughter is still alive and is here?" Titania asked Sigardus.

"Yes, and her father might still be alive since he was the one that sent the Were-Shyft to her in this other world. The real problem is Prince Valkiarus. He is the one that took Pandrea, and I'm sure he is going to take her to his father. No one knows what the old King is ever thinking, and he plays on no one's side," Sigardus explained.

"Who are you exactly?" Titania asked him curiously as she began to move closer to examine Sigardus.

"That's an interesting question. I am a researcher of Shyfts and a person just trying to find his way. I ended up stumbling onto one of the most amazing case studies a researcher could ask for, and now she is gone. All because I couldn't stop them," Sigardus said and hung his head.

"So it was you that made all this mess?" Liam asked.

"No, that was Pandrea," Sigardus said and then proceeded to explain about what happened. He told them about how she was not only able to absorb his Shyft, Kira, but also two others from the enemies. Then he told them about how changed and became huge, squaring off with two large dragons before running out of energy.

"Amazing, being able to absorb and control some many Shyfts," Titania said in wonder. "No wonder the DWaves were off the charts."

"I wouldn't call it controlling them. From what I could tell, Pandrea's Were-Shyft seemed to be the only thing holding it all together. Regardless, it doesn't change the fact that she did it," Sigardus said with the corners of his mouth turned. Then he got a puzzled look. "DWaves?"

"Dimensional Waves, they are what we call the energy that Shyfts give off. Shyfts always have a small amount of DWaves surrounding them at all times. When we take in our Shyfts, we arent just breathing in random Aetherial energy. The Shyft are opening portals in the Aether to their spiritual bodies, and they allow us to absorb them to do amazing things. When they run out of the DWaves, their Aetherial forms are drawn back into the Aether." Titania explains to the boys, Liam seemed just as confused as Sigardus.

"That makes sense and answers a couple of questions I had, but all this talking is getting us nowhere, and Pandrea is getting farther from us," Sigardus said as he began to turn to leave. As he did, he tried to take in his Shyft, but nothing happened. Then his stomach started to growl, and he began to feel dizzy.

The next thing he knew, Liam and Titania were at either side of him. They guided him back to the fire and sat him down. His head was spinning, and he felt famished all of a sudden. Sigardus turns to see Titania laughing at him.

"No point in struggling, Verta, my nature Shyft healed you. The trade is that he uses your energy to complete the healing. So, no going anywhere till you eat and rest. It's more dangerous to travel at night anyway," Titania said in a motherly no-nonscience tone. Liam just shrugged and laughed, handing some of the cooked meat to Sigardus.

Her head hurt, but besides that, something didn't seem right considering her last memories. She didn't smell a dungeon, not that she would know what that smell would be. She was lay in a place that felt more comfortable than her old bed, back in the real world. Or is this the natural world and the other one is just some alternate reality that she was stuck in. None of this what helping her headache, so she decided to risk it and opened her eyes.

Above her was a brick ceiling, and it seemed she was in a room and the door... was open? The feeling of being trapped as a prisoner was slowly deteriorating. Pandrea kept the images of Sigardus crushed by the prince to keep her on edge. Just then, she heard the sounds of some people coming closer to the room.

"Let's see if our little Highness is awake yet," Said a deep and rich voice that gave off an ageless sound. The voice was just outside the room, and when the person belongs to the voice entered, Pandrea's breath caught in her chest.