Years had passed since that fateful day. In the lives of elves it was but a drop in the ocean in terms of time passed, except Shar felt each day as it ebbed and flowed with the push and pull relationship of the sun and moons. There were many mornings where she was awake early enough to see the golden rays chase away their cooler cousins. Most mornings in fact, since she was the one who tended to the earliest chores.

That time was hardly filled with any fun moments for Shar. Having to tell Healer Gaeran that she would no longer be studying with him had been a terrible blow. He was sad to see her go, but it wasn't long before he had a fresh new face trailing him like a duckling to learn the trade. Shar had liked the craft well enough, but it also had been her only true excuse to leave the village. To escape from the prying eyes of her parents and the council of elders.

Even the holy days had been dimmed, as she was deemed an adult the next summer and expected to be more restrained. No longer was she allowed to wear the short tunics and leggings of youth, but rather she was wrangled into chemise and front-laced kirtles. No more sturdy boots that could hold up to tromping through the woods, but thin soled shoes that let one feel every rock under foot.

Part of her newfound adulthood were these dinners with potential suitors that she was forced to attend. This one was particularly onerous as Elehas was from a rather prestigious family. The Nightgroves lived in the biggest of the villages in the vale, though it was still tiny compared to the Outside world. Still, it would mean getting away from her family.

She glanced up from the food she was barely eating, and over to Elehas. They'd intentionally sat him askew from her so he'd only be able to see the good side of her face. He was engrossed in conversation with her father, talking about something to do with this year's crop harvest. She supposed he was handsome enough, with his fine features hinting at some high elf or faery blood. His hair was a deep blue-black and his eyes....

He must have sensed her looking, because just then he turned his sparkling emerald eyes on her.

It was like a jolt of electricity shot down up her spine, and she nearly jumped out of her chair. Her cheeks flushed and she ducked her head down. She didn't need to look up, because she could feel the weight of her gaze. Her father was droning on about something.

"Tell me how you got your scars."

That made the whole room go quiet and still. There wasn't even so much as the scrape of knife on plate. All eyes were on Elehas, including her own, but then they switched to her. She swallowed thickly.

"I know you have them, I have heard that much, though," he shifted in his seat while he spoke, to get a better look at her. Shar turned her face away. "...You do a wonderful job of hiding them." Her father started to say something. Elehas stopped him with a raise of his hand. The command he held over the older elf made her heart thump. She'd never seen someone cut her father off. "Let her speak, Aregaer. You can't keep her quiet forever. There was a fire?"

Shar wanted to shrink under the table. She wanted to run as far as her legs would carry her. After a little while of silence, someone at the table cleared their throat. Kellan on one side of her poked her leg, on her other side her mother pinched her. She sat up straight, her eyes wide, and her cheeks flushed even brighter.

"Ah....Well....yes..." She fidgeted with the edging on the linen napkin in her lap. "It was when I was still very small....Kellan was just born and there was....there was a fire." No one was interrupting her and those green eyes didn't waver from her face. She went on. "It was an accident. A lamp was left lit in the bar, and somehow it got knocked over. It was very dry that winter and the hay caught like..." She snapped her fingers. "In no time the barn had gone up and while they were trying to put it out, the house caught, too. Mama rushed to get us out, but I was too scared and I was hiding in the wardrobe..."

She figured by this point that it would have been enough. But Elehas gestured for her to go on.

"When the smoke got too bad I tried to get out, but a beam had fallen and blocked the door. The window was too high for me to climb out, so I had to drag a....a chest over to stand on. But the sleeve of my dress caught on fire." She rubbed at her arm. "And....and my hair..." She grabbed at the end of her braid. It was long now, long again so it could hide her face. "...I broke the window so they knew where I was, and papa came and dragged me out. The healers did what they could....but..." She ducked her head again and cut herself off before her voice could quaver too much.

"Well it doesn't bother me." Shar looked up, surprised, into his smiling face. She wasn't looking at anyone but him, but around them her family looked stunned as well.

"Why don't the two of you go for a walk?" That would be her mother breaking in. "There is still a little light left, and the gardens are beautiful at sunset."

There was a flurry of agreement, and before Shar could say anything at all, she found herself shuttled out the door with Elehas and then being guided by him down the garden path. He seemed to be in good spirits, while she was a bundle of nerves. They walked in silence like that, while he seemed perfectly at ease and she struggled to find something—anything!—to say.

"I expected more from you."

She looked at him, puzzled by that statement. He was still smiling, but it had taken on a rough edge.

"I know your father put a leash on you, but I didn't expect a timid mouse." He sounded bored. Shar stopped and he walked a few more paced away before turning on her. "Aren't you the girl who found the way Out' Didn't you run away with the humans when you were barely off your mother's apron strings" I was expecting someone more....exciting."

Shar shook her head. "No....no....I mean....I never ran away." She had nothing to fidget with, so she wrung her hands together. "I found the way, but I only....I only went a little ways. How did you...?" She stared at him, the way he was eagerly leaning her way. "How did you even know about that' No one knew."

He scoffed. "The elders talk. And what the elders know, my father knows." He crossed his arms over his chest, tapped a foot. "The only reason I agreed to this meeting was I thought you'd be....Different." He had shifted from being bored, to being disgusted. "But now I see you're just like every other dull down river maiden. You're not even worth the energy to tumble in the weeds." He sneered at her. "Though I might, just to say I did."

Elehas had only gotten a couple of steps forward when Kellan surged out of the shadows. The years had made him taller, and broader, so they no longer looked like twins.

"What did you say to my sister!?"

The two men collided, Kellan taking the other by surprise, but Elehas recovering rather quickly. Shar didn't know what to do, but the two men's shouting had alerted the household. She had tried to step forward to pull them apart, but Elehas had swept her aside with a stiff arm and knocked her to the ground.

Kellan, in a rage tried to punch the other elf, but his opponent ducked out of the way. He countered with a hard shove to Kellan's midsection, and the silver haired youth fell backwards to hit the ground with a sharp crack.

That sound. Shar knew that sound couldn't be good. Her father and uncle had come up to restrain Elehas, who was shouting about how he'd been attacked and this wouldn't go unanswered, while Shar crawled to her brother's side.

"Kellan' Kellan?" He just looked dazed from the fall. She shook at his shoulder and his head lolled her way. Red rimmed his blue eyes that were so much like hers. He smiled at her briefly, then it faded. He went still.

"No!" That one word made the crowd go still. Shar slipped a hand behind her brother's head to feel the rock he'd struck. It had a sharp, coned shape to it. She felt at his skull, but there was too much blood. She didn't need to feel the broken pieces to know what had happened.

That was the first time she watched someone die.

There was a better name for the land beyond her people's secluded little lands than the "Outside", but the only people who remembered it was the elders, and they wouldn't tell. Shar's first lashings were thanks to her insatiable curiosity and insistent questions.

What she did know was there was a lot of magic involved in the creation of their home. Once they had lived elsewhere. It was a story they told only once every fifty years when the moons above aligned into a certain position, and the elder mages renewed the magical barriers that kept everyone else out.

The war had been devastating to their people. They used to populate vast cities. Now their tiny villages each held less than a thousand. When she had apprenticed with Healer Gaeren he had told her that birth rates were down despite ample encouragement for large families. She didn't quite understand it at the time. Older now, it made sense. They were a dying people and with their long lives they could linger for centuries with no growth.

Since the barriers went up the only time anyone was allowed to come in was on market days. The grand market abutted the mountains where there was a gap wide enough for small wagons to come through and sell their wares. The market was the only place to get certain herbs that didn't grow in the valley. Sometimes food stuffs. There had been that day, before she was banned from the market, when she had lied to her father about having met the traders. One of them, a human girl who was about her stage of development, had given her a piece of something she'd called chocolate in exchange for her hair ribbon. She hadn't even told Kellan about that.

Before leaving the world they were renowned for their metal crafting. The finest of jewelry, the keenest blades, fine chain mail as good as mithril. They were so good that even in their seclusion traders would come to bargain for their rare offerings. There were mines in the mountains, but few hands to swing the picks. Trade had dwindled as a result to just a few merchants who passed them regularly on their routes. Shar hadn't been allowed in the markets for years, but she was certain the rumbles there were still worried.

The path beyond the market wasn't the only way out, though. Shar had found other breaks in the barriers when she was out in the deep woods searching for elusive potion ingredients. There was a moss that only grew near mountain streams that was necessary in a cure for a common ailment that affected the very young and the very old. When she was young and naive she told her father about the narrow cracks through the mountain. The elders had the paths collapsed cutting them off.

Kellan was the only one who knew about the last path she'd found. She hadn't been able to visit it in years, so she was hoping desperately that it hadn't closed up in the meantime. It had taken her a week of careful planning and squirreling away of supplies before she was ready to make the trip. Uncertain of what she'd find beyond the shadow of the mountain she had packed several days worth of food, a sturdy blanket, a couple of traps, and two water skins.

She had left just after the moons had reached their peak in the skies so that she would reach the hills before sun's first light. She had brought a lamp, a flint and steel, but she was too afraid to light it. Had anyone noticed she was gone" Were they looking for her" The forest was too deep here to see any lights. They could be upon her at any minute. It had to be now or never.

The crack loomed ahead like a pitch black slash in the world. It was so dark in there that even her keen elven eyes couldn't see more than a few feet within. As she moved forward she sucked in her breath and held it. The pathway was narrow, but not so narrow that it was necessary. It just kept her from hyperventilating.

Which she nearly did when she got so far in that she was surrounded by darkness. She knew that the path had to be long, the traders said the open path at the market was long enough that they'd sometimes camp halfway in. There was no way she was going to spend a night in this cramp cavern even if she at times found more open spaces with views all they way up to the sky.

By the time she made her way out it was at least late morning. Shar hadn't stopped once to eat and she hadn't found any streams along the way, so she was starving and parched. Both those things and her fatigue were forgotten once her eyes had adjusted to the blinding light after being so long in the dark, and she could see across the world.

She wasn't sure what she had been expecting at all. Her vantage point was up higher than she thought, halfway up the mountain face, and gave her a good view down and across. There was forest stretching long and far off into the distance, but there were notable breaks she was sure was towns and villages. She could easily pick out broad roads. And there, far off in the distance, she swore she could see the end of trees. Was it a plain" An ocean' The unknown drew at her like this was what she was meant to do.

The glance backwards was just as surprising. The path through the mountain was there, though it looked even narrower here than it did in the beginning. She could also tell very easily that there was no valley beyond the crags. It just looked like more mountain. She was sure if she walked all the way around the peak that she'd never find her homeland within. That moment she realized just how very strong the magic concealing their home truly was.

For a moment it was enough to scare her. Should she turn around" Just go back" What was it they were so afraid of out there"

She could feel the weight of Kellan's dagger at her belt when she moved. One step forward and she could feel the sheath rub against the outside of her thigh. Gripping at the hilt gave her strength to stop. The blade sang as she drew it, the bright metal shining in the sun.

"I'm going, Kellan," she told the blade. "I'm going to find....it. I'm going to. I don't know what it is yet, but it's mine, and I will find it."

She pressed her lips to the blade and returned it to its sheath. Just a bit of ceremony before she turned to pick her way down the mountain side.

It wasn't until she reached the road that she found trouble.

"Wait for me!" Shar grabbed her pack from where she'd dropped it and chased after him. He moved far faster than she'd been expecting, and she nearly had to trot to keep up with his long strides. "Thank you for helping me!"

The man tutted quietly at her. "You should not be out here all alone, girl."

The road behind them vanished as they walked. Shar had no idea what direction they were going as the road had been her only point of reference. The trees were too tall for her to make out any of the landmarks she'd seen from her higher vantage. He seemed to know where he was going, so she followed like a little duckling.

As much as she wanted to argue that she could take care of herself, it was clearly obvious she wasn't well suited for this adventure. It made her heart sink.

"Are you injured?" He had stopped so abruptly that Shar walked right into his back. She stumbled back a step with flushed cheeks and rubbing at her nose.

"N-no....I'm not hurt," she replied in a mumble. The man didn't take her at her word and he strode around her in a circle looking her up and down. She drew her arms in towards her torso at the scrutiny. "I'm fine!"

He nodded finally when he'd gotten back around to her front. His eyes lingered on the scars on her face, and she turned away.

"It appears you are. We should keep moving, that lot might not give up so easy." Again he turned and strode away from her. Just when she'd caught up he turned towards her. "I am Niall. Niall Richardson. What is a vale elf doing out here anyway' I haven't seen one of your kind in....oh....ages."

"I'm..." She faltered in introducing herself. "Shar. I'm Shar." She drew herself up with a look in her eye that challenged him to question the name. Only Kellan had ever called her that. Their parents had found the shortened name distasteful. "I'm traveling." She patted her pack.

Niall shot her a look that suggested he didn't believe her. "You ran away," he guessed. "Why?"

She didn't answer him right away. He didn't press, and didn't say anything else while he patiently waited for her response. They walked in silence for quite a time. Finally too agitated by the silence, she spoke up.

"I don't belong there," she told him.

"Of course you don't belong there," he replied, surprising her. "None of you belong in there. You were never meant to stay so long."

"What do you mean?" Shar gaped at him. "What do you know about us?" Niall didn't look like he wanted to explain. Shar grabbed onto his sleeve and tugged at him like an insistent child begging for sweets. "Oh please! I know so little about our history."

He sighed and stopped. A glance back the way they came, then a look up towards the sky. "We're not going to make it before the sun sets. I think we'll be safe to make camp here."

"Where are we going, is it a village? I want to see a city. I've heard in cities they have buildings as tall as the sky." She stood up tall with her hands over her head.

Niall gave her a puzzled look. "No, I'm bringing you back home. You'll get yourself killed out here."

Shar went stiff. "No." She shook her head slowly, and backed away from the robed man. "Thank you for helping me back there, but I can't got back home. Even if I wanted to." She turned to walk away in a random direction she wasn't even certain was away, but the man's voice stopped her.

"Shar, the forest isn't safe. There are worse things than bandits out there." He wasn't following her, though. He had sat his own bag down to start setting up for the night. "At least stay until morning. I'd feel terrible if a wolf ate you."

With the fading sun, the woods were starting to look dark and scary. They were just trees, just like at home, but in the dying light they looked monstrous and foreign. She sighed. "Fine, but I'm not going back."

His smile was gentle, but sad. "We'll see about that."

Returning home had been a surreal experience for Shar. Everything had happened so fast that days later she still felt like she was waking up from a dream. One moment she was Outside, camping in the woods with a stranger, and the next she was back home doing her chores like she had never left.

The whole trip back with Niall she was a bundle of raw emotions. She was in such a panic after they got to the massive metal gates blocking the entrance into the vale that he'd broken down and made her drink from his flask. Whiskey, he'd called it. To her it tasted like fire, it felt like fire, but after a few sips it did help her to feel more calm.

"You've been here before," she said to him after they had passed through. No guards watch the outer gate and it wasn't locked, but magic alerted the Marketplace when ever anyone entered. They would have company by the time they had made it through the tunnel.

"I have," he confirmed. "Many times, in fact, but not in many years. Not since they built the market town and stopped allowing people to trade freely."

Shar gaped at him. "I thought it was always that way. That must have been a long time ago..."

"Not so long ago as you think, little one." He told her with a kind smile. He'd gotten a torch lit for them and they started walking through the cave. Shar was secretly hoping they wouldn't reach the other side for another day, but she knew it'd only be a couple of hours at most.

"What happened" Why did it all change?" She asked, hungry for the knowledge her people kept under tight wraps. "And stop calling me that, I'm not a child."

"You're still very young," he told her, a hand raised to stop her from arguing. "Do you want to hear the story?" When she settled down he continued.

"You've heard of the war, yes?" Shar nodded. "But I'm sure they never told you what it was about' Ah, of course not," he murmured when she shook her head. "You see, the old king had two sons who both wished to rule. The old king decided to give them both half the kingdom, but the sons could not agree. Each wanted more. The old king died without a decision ever being made.

It became more and more clear that there was not going to be a peaceful resolution to all of this, so both sons began to form armies. There were few battles in this war, but there were a great many raids on villages and settlements. And both sons desperately wanted to control the mines. Did you know the ore your people use to craft their wondrous weapons and armor from is only found here?"

Shar shook her head slowly.

"Mm, and there is very little left. Your vale was created not to protect your people, Shar, but to protect the mine. They closed up the whole mountain range so that no one could touch it. For a while this passage didn't even exist," he gestured to the tunnel they traveled through with the torch. "When you could no longer sustain yourselves the elders were forced to open it, and when they did they found the war was over, and their people shattered. One of the sons had paid a great fortune to bring a mercenary army across the sea from the main continent. When they were done taking out his brother, they had turned on him as well."

Her heart was hammering wildly in her chest. Why didn't everyone know about this" How could such a story be forgotten by so many"

It was like Niall had read her mind. "They thought they were opening their arms to their people to find they were the only ones left. There are still some elves around of course, but your cities are gone. Your elders decided the best way to preserve your people was to cut you off from the rest of the world. As I understand it your people are fading and not flourishing."

Shar wasn't sure when they had stopped until he stopped speaking. Her feet were frozen to the earth. "You know how awful it is, but you still want me to go back" Why?" That last word was a mere whisper.

As sad as his smile was it was also kind. "I don't know what you expected to find out here, Shar, but I do know that if you didn't find, they would never let you back in after too much time has passed. How would you feel if you could never see your family again?"

That question hit her like a punch. It knocked the air out of her lungs more effectively than the tackle back in the woods.

"They won't even miss me," she said with tears welling in her eyes. "They just want to keep me quiet and dull and stupid so they can marry me off and never have to deal with me again." Her voice shook as she spoke. "I have nothing left there, nothing! Not since my brother died, he was the only one who cared!"

Niall let her vent without interruption. Once she was done and had started crying in full force he pulled her into a tight embrace.

"You're still so young, Shar. Things might change for you in there for the better." He nodded with his chin in the direction they were going. "And if they don't or they get worse, you can always leave again. And you can come and find me."

The moment was cut short. Ahead there were voices and soon after torches flickering in the distance. Shar had stepped away from Niall by the time the group had arrived, two of the market guards, an elder....and her father.

She expected him to yell, shout, maybe even hit her, but not to take one look at her in her brother's clothes and scoop her into a bone crushing embrace.

The tavern was the sort that was dimly lit so there were plenty of dark, shadowy corners where those who wished to remain anonymous could lurk, were there was a layer of grim on everything except for the mugs, and the ale flowed freely and cheaply. The crowd was a rough sort of cut throats and mercenaries with their own layer of grim. There was a raucous rumble of noise keeping the volume to a low roar, with a tables of dicers and card players shouting to be heard over the girl, dancing on the low dais at one end of the room singing bawdy songs while a lazy dulcimer player plucked at his strings. She had the layers of skirt and underskirt hiked up to her knees and there were men tossing coins on the stage begging to see more.

"...And so you left him at the altar?"

The loud question to her right pulled Shar's attention away from its absent wandering around the sleazy drinking hole. This one was a familiar one to her now, but that didn't make her any less wary of its occupants.

With a laugh she stretched, arms up and her hands laced behind her head, back arching. The leather jerkin pulled tight across her chest and drew more than a few eyes that jumped away when they noticed the array of knives strapped to her baldric. She let out the deep breath she'd drawn in and sagged at the middle to return to her lazy, boneless sprawl in the creaky chair.

"We don't marry at altars, Roric. There's," she waved her hand a little, "An arch we stand under while they bind our hands. Very symbolic."

Roric was a human youth late in his teenage years with barely a whiskey coating his chin, though he'd tried. A bright eyed kid who was new to their little rag tag band of sell swords, with smooth honey words and quick hands. He was joined by gruff Serin who was the muscle, and Caleb the half-elf who was as much of a leader as they had. He'd been the one to recruit Shar, though he was really trying to invite her to bed. She changed his mind. He was in one of those dark corners leaned in close with a hooded individual she couldn't quite make out. Their next job, no doubt.

"But you left him there" Just waiting?" Roric was all but giggling at the thought. When she nodded he slapped the table a couple of times. "What happened after that' You left?"

"No, not right a way," she replied with a shake of her head. "I thought it had just been nerves. Believe it or not, he was pretty understanding. That was part of what drove me off really." She rolled her blue eyes up towards the rafters overhead as she summoned up the memory of Adren finding her in her hiding spot. The barn loft behind the bales of hay. They'd had a long chat that night which had only left her more unsettled than she ever had been.

"So what was it' Why'd you end up leaving?" The kid was literally on the edge of his seat. Serin grunted and shook his head at his enthusiasm.

"About a month later I caught him locked in a very intimate embrace." Shar cringed at that memory, though she didn't seem all too bothered by it. Roric gasp.

"No! He was marrying you and smooching on someone else!" Who was she!?"

"He was a goat herder from a village in between Adren's and mine." She laughed brightly at the look of shock on Roric's face. "I was hurt for a little while, but it didn't bother me all that much. I wasn't in love with him and I never felt very connected. It was good to finally understand why."

"Are we done wandering down memory lane?" Caleb had returned to their table to pull out a chair and plop into. The group fell quiet, all eyes on him. "This is going to be an easy job, recovery. Our client lost an important possession and they'd like us to retrieve it."

Shar's attention started to wander a little again. Her role was going to be the same it always was: recon. She was a ghost when she wanted to be, a blade in the dark when needed, and occasionally a sniper from the trees. This didn't sound like the sort of job that was going to demand too much of her skill set. It'd been a couple of years since she'd settled in with this lot and she had quickly become comfortable within her role.

The door opened and she didn't so much hear it as she felt the sudden gust of fresh air that cut through the various unpleasant odors filling the place. It was a pleasant change from the sweat and stale ale and worse so she had turned her face into it.

It wasn't unusual to see a hooded and cloaked figure step through that door. She wasn't interested in that. In fact, she'd started to turn back to the conversation at the table when the man had lowered his hood and her heart stopped in her chest.

"Shar?" She vaguely was aware of Roric's confused tone when she got up from the table. Her other companions might have said something, too, but she didn't hear them. She was cutting a shift path through the crowd to meet the man standing at the threshold toe to toe.

"Niall," she greeted him with her chin raised and meeting his amused gaze full on.

"This is so cold, Shar!"

The elf winced a little at Roric's loud enthusiasm over the gift she'd give him. And his misuse of the slang.

"Cool, Roric. It's cool, not cold," she told him with a laugh. She couldn't really consider him a kid anymore. They were probably about the same age now, at least developmentally speaking, since humans age so much faster than her sort of elves. It had been a little shocking to her to realize how quickly age started to show on their faces. Roric had finally managed to grow himself a beard which he now kept close cropped along his jaw and his smile highlighted the lines starting to form at the corners of his eyes.

The group was camped out in a deep wood well off the beaten path. Shar had been traveling back and forth from Rhydin city, each time leaving for a little longer, and each time coming back with more stories and more souvenirs. Before she could dole out her presents this time Caleb had announced she was just in time for their next job. The others had been a little surprised, but he said he'd been waiting for her to return as they were all needed.

"What is this guy's name again?" Shar glanced away from Roric who was waving around his present, a small pistol that she was suddenly really glad she had removed the bullets from, over to Caleb who was pacing on the fringe of the light cast from their small, shielded fire.

"It doesn't matter," he muttered. "We don't need to know his name, just what he'd done." The group looked dim for a moment. He had told them the man they were hunting down had locked a family inside their house and set it on fire. No one had survived. It wasn't going to be a lucrative job, but they all had wholeheartedly agreed to go.

"I like that we're goody goodies now," Roric said as he aimed at a bird up in the trees. There weren't any bullets, and the safety was on anyways, so nothing happened when he tried to pull the trigger. "When can I try this out?"

"When we're all done. These things are pretty damn loud." She patted at one of the pockets on her vest where she had the clip hiding. Caleb shot another disgruntled look at her clothing. Jeans, a long sleeved tee shirt, and a military vest. He'd been angry that she hadn't gotten changed, and angrier when she had given him a pair of combat boots. He hadn't accepted anything she'd brought back for him.

"I'm going to gather firewood," he announced abruptly and stormed away from camp. Roric and Serin both stared at her until she got up with a sigh to follow after.

"Caleb! What is your problem?" She asked when she caught up to him. He'd picked up a couple of branches and was snapping them into tiny pieces.

"My problem?" He asked in a hushed voice brimming with suppressed rage. "You....You!" He pointed at her. "You are the problem, Shar. All of....of this!" He gestured at her up and down. Shar tried to speak but he steamrolled right over her. "We were a team, Shar. We had something good going for two whole years. And then you run into this guy who was nice to you one time and you....you run off with him. And you leave us behind."

The color drained from her face. "Caleb, it's not like that. You knew I wanted to see the world, that I didn't want to stay here. Niall gave me that chance." She shook her head at him. "I know you never wanted me to go."

"You're right I never wanted you to go!" He shouted, then swallowed thickly and when he spoke again he had lowered his voice to a normal range. "I know when we met you thought I was just some rake....But I thought we had something, you and I. After what happened at Caeldyn I thought something had changed." The bright, hopeful look in his eyes was so hopeful. "But now you're with him and I don't get it. He's ancient, Shar."

She tried not to look at him with pity. She knew it wouldn't help. So she pinched at the bridge of her nose and turned away. "I didn't plan for that, Caleb. I didn't plan for us, and I didn't plan for him..." She turned back towards him and was not surprised to see the look of hurt etched on his face. There was a pleading there that broke her heart.

"I thought if I changed you'd come back," he told her in a strangely quiet voice. "I stopped taking jobs that made me money, because you wanted to only do good. We've been struggling and you've been living it up."

"You could have come with me. I asked you to. What I didn't ask you to do was change." She kept shaking her head. She never understood the depth of his feelings for her.

"Whatever, Shar. It's done now." He dropped the pieces of wood he'd been clutching still and brushed past her on his way back to the camp. "You should get some sleep soon. You have last watch."

She stayed a little longer in the darkness before she returned to the subdued camp to sleep. They had another half day of travel before their hunt truly began.

It was a few hours later that Caleb was shaking her awake to take her turn at watch. She tried to say something to him, but he shook his head at her and paced for his own bedroll. She sighed and got herself up to her feet. The night was quiet and still except for Serin's snoring. Roric was splayed out on his back. He could somehow find a comfortable position anywhere. No rock ever bothered him. Caleb had his back to her and she suspected he wasn't going to sleep with her staring at him.

She slipped away into the trees, moving so lightly that she didn't so much as stir a single leaf. It was a skill she'd perfected as a child and had been her best asset as a scout. No one ever heard her coming and with her keen hearing she heard everyone else. She headed out until she couldn't see the sheltered fire any longer and then turned to do a lazy circuit of the camp. They were well off the beaten path, so she figured such vigilance was unnecessary, but she found peace in pacing under the moonlight.

It was less than an hour into her watch, just as the birds were starting to rouse in the early morning hours, when she heard a noise that bothered her. It was quiet that she almost missed it and nearly second guessed she'd heard it at all. It was a muffled sound like....someone had been hurt. As soon as the thought registered in her head she rushed back to camp.

What she found made her eyes go wide and her heart hammer in her chest. She rushed to Roric's side, but it was too late. His throat had been cut deeply from ear to ear. There was no way he had made the sound she'd heard. Neither Serin nor Caleb were anywhere to be seen and their bedrolls were in disarray. She saw blood spattered around camp that suggested there'd been a struggle. Why hadn't she heard anything"

She stood and followed the trail of blood leading into the forest. Not twenty feet into the trees she found Serin slumped against the trunk of a great elm, gasping for breath. He had several stab wounds that she could see, including a shallow cut to his neck and more to his abdomen.

"What happened?" she asked as she knelt at his side. His wounds were terrible, his face ashen, and his eyes already losing their light. If his eyes hadn't darted up when they did Shar never would have rolled out of the way of the sweeping blade.

She hit the ground hard, shoulder first, and with enough momentum she managed to get to her feet to face her attacker.

"Caleb?" She was stunned to see her friend, the man she had trusted with her back for years, standing there with a bloody blade in his hand. His answer was to lunge at her again.

Shar was far quicker than he was and dove out of the way again, taking off towards camp where there was more open space. And her sword. She had knives, but fighting Caleb close quarters was suicide. A knife whizzing past her ear had her veering sharply and stumbling over Roric's cold body.

This time when she hit the ground she could recover as quickly to her feet and she'd had to think quickly. Her hand fell on something cold and hard under the dead man's blankets and she pulled it free in haste. Another knife was lobbed her way and she rolled to the side. Not fast enough, to grazed her arm.

By the time Caleb emerged from the trees she'd slammed the clip home into the handgun, flipped the safety and fired wildly laying prone. The first shots missed but the third hit home central mass. The half elf staggered, confusedly touching at the wound in his chest, and dropped to his knees.

"Why!?" Shar demanded as she got up to her feet. "Why did you do this, Caleb!?" She lifted the gun and shot again, this time hitting him in the shoulder and knocking him to his back. He was grasping for the knife he'd dropped and she kicked it away from his hand. "Tell me before I kill you properly."

"Bounty..." He gasped. His breath rattled as he struggled to speak. "You left me....you left..." He coughed and gurgled, blood seeping out of his mouth. She lowered the gun. He was dead anyway. "Loved....I loved....you left..."

She back away slowly, eyes darting around the camp. The gun fell from her hand to thump into the dirt. The scent of blood was suddenly sharp in her nose and the lack of sound chilling.

Death was all around her.

Shar stood naked in front of the full length mirror staring at her reflection while she absently towered off the damp ends of her long hair. Her skin was still dewy and flushed from her shower. Her gaze traveled down the jagged edge of the scars marring much of the right side of her upper body, examining the place where healthy skin merged into the ruined mess.

Some parts were worse than others. Her shoulder and arm where the wool of her night dress had caught was the worst. The marks wrapped around her front and her upper back, but most of her chest was clear. Her neck almost looked untouched unless one looked close, and time as well as a faithful routine of creams had been kind to her cheek and brow. There was no mistaking it for the flawless half, though.

She had just touched her fingers to where perfection met ruin on her chest when movement behind her in the mirror drew her eye. A man came up to wrap his arms around her and press a kiss to her scarred shoulder.

"Vain elf," Niall chided in a playful tone. "Don't get lost in your reflection. She isn't as good company as the real thing, and you'll miss your portal."

He was just as damp as she was, only he had bothered to wrap a towel around his waist. She smiled at him in the mirror and began to sway side to side. He groaned a little. "Keep that up and I will make you late for your portal."

"Do you think it's going to hurt?" She asked, head tipping to the side to give him more room to kiss her neck.

"You're going to get your skin cut off," he said, his voice muffled against her skin. "Of course it's going to hurt. The healing will be miserable. You are going to make me miserable until you're healed."

She hummed happily when his lips grazed over a particularly sensitive spot. "You're going to love every second of it. Three months where I can't come home covered in grease and oil."

"Three months where I know you're not going to run off chasing some rumor of trolls to slay or bandits to wallop."

She frowned at him, her swaying slowing until she stopped. He sighed into her neck. This was not the first time they'd had this argument. He knew what was going to happen.

"You disapprove of everything I want, Niall," she started. Going with the broad attack. "You don't want me to cut my hair that gets in the way, or treat my scars that I hate, or do the jobs I love. You think it's about the money, but it's not, Niall. I love going out there and helping people."

He pulled away from her and started to walk away. "No, Shar, you feel like you have to make up for all of the mistakes you made in the past that got your friends, and almost you, killed." She had turned to follow him, but his words made her stop short. This wasn't the first time she'd heard that, either. "Every time you start to feel happy you have to run away to atone for your sins. It's never going to work."

Shar crossed her arms over her chest and scowled at him while he pulled on his clothes. He glanced her way and she looked aside. He sighed again and turned back to her once he'd gotten his jeans buttoned.

"I don't care what you do with you hair, but?" He trailed off as he stepped back over to her and wrapped her up in his arms even though she tried to turn away. "I love your scars. They are a part of you." He buried his face into her shoulder while she pouted. "I'll miss them." He kissed her shoulder again. "And I worry I'll lose you one of these days."

The silence stretched between them. Her posture was stiff, his firm and comforting until she finally sagged her weight into him.

"You're not going to lose me," she started to say, and he squeezed her.

"But I worry, Shar," he told her. "You're so reckless sometimes. Like this procedure to remove your scars." Then he was releasing her again and patting her on her bare behind. "Get dressed. You can't go adventuring naked."

"Well, I could?" There was a flash of her usual smile. He grabbed her leathers from the bed and tossed them at her. "One of these days I'm going to have a set of armor made, just like that' compuder game."

"Computer," he corrected. "And I'll never let you out of here dressed like that."

"Prude," she countered while pulling on her breeches. "I don't know how you keep all of that straight. I can't even turn the thing on." She shot a mistrustful look at the computer sitting in the corner of their bedroom.

"I've had a lot longer to learn how to adapt to new things." He turned to grab a shirt to put on, but she snagged it first. Smiling she slipped it over her head, then pulled on her leather jerkin to hide it.

"That's right. Somehow I keep forgetting what an old man you are," she said as she tugged at the laces on the sides of the over shirt so it fit snugly against the curves of her body.

"Old man?" He arched up an eyebrow at her. He looked much the same as he had the first time she'd seen him in the foothills like he hadn't aged a day. "I'm pretty sure I was showing you how old I'm not last night. Twice. And again this morning. I've half a mind to show you again right now to make sure you don't forget while you're away. The whole winter."

"You should just come with me, I keep offering." She wasn't going to put on all of her gear now. She'd have plenty of time for that once she got back to Caeldyn. "Then you could keep reminding me every night. And morning."

He laughed. "I'm retired now, Shar. And digging bandits out of a network of caves doesn't sound like a very good vacation to me."

"Fine, fine. But if you change your mind, just leave a message at the inn." She had picked up her pack to sling it over her shoulder and stepped in close to give him a good bye kiss. "Don't have too much fun without me," she said before she was slipping out of their bedroom and soon out the front door.

Niall stared at the spot where she had been moments before a worried frown creasing his forehead.

He had a bad feeling.

It had been eight years since she'd buried her friend's bodies in the woods far from home. She'd promised Serin as he lay dying that she wouldn't leave them there, that she'd find a way to bring them back. She knew he'd want Roric there next to him as the boy had never had a real family. Serin had taken him under his wing.

Buried under those markers were some of their things. Serin's sword and helm. Roric's lockpicks and flask. Things they always carried, and Shar had felt carried the most of their essence. The gesture had felt hollow, but Gala had insisted it was enough. She had been the one to encourage Shar to speak to the graves to 'relieve the burden of her soul" as she put it.

At first she would just sit there in silence for awhile and leave feeling even more guilty that she was alive and they were dead. Then one particular visit she just' started talking. After that it became easier and easier to talk to the memories of her friends. She couldn't make herself talk to Caleb, though. She had left him to the carrion eaters and cursed him over and over and over again.

This visit started much like her others. She dropped her bag on the bench, but sat herself on the ground between the two markers. Reilan slipped away to give her space. She flopped onto her back in the grass, fingers laced behind her head, and stared up at the clear blue skies.

"Did I ever tell you guys how Niall and I ended up together?" She waited a moment for an answer that wouldn't come. "I didn't think so. Well, it didn't happen like you guys think. I wasn't always in love with him, you know. I did want to find him again, because he knew the history of my home and I wanted to know more. There wasn't much record of it anywhere. And you also know I always wanted to go to Rhydin, to the continent and to the city, and he had offered to take me.

So of course I jumped at the chance when found me. I wanted to know more, to know everything. And boy, did the moment we showed up there did I just want to know even more, because I just had so many questions.

But we were never a thing. A couple. That was just a lie I let Caleb believe. Serin, you needed to be with your family and Roric! You were seeing that girl, you remember" That blonde seamstress. You were just nuts over her" And Niall had gotten me time with a mechanic to learn about cars.

That was what I loved. Those first days tinkering around inside an engine?"" She shuddered and blew out a noisy breath like she was hot and bothered. "That was something unlike anything I could ever imagine. The most advanced technology we had was the water wheel for the mill.

So when Caleb made his assumptions, I let him. We were all moving on, but he" couldn't. It wasn't fair to anyone. When we came back that first time and I saw the jealousy in his eye I knew there was only one thing I could do. I booked a room together for Niall and I.

He offered to sleep on the floor, but that wasn't nice. We curled up together. Nothing happened. Nothing until after you guys?" this part was always hard for her, tears welled in her eyes and emotion swelled in her voice. "Died. Not until after he murdered you.

I was a wreck. I was shattered into pieces. I didn't even go back, Niall found out through rumors. I had become so self-destructive" I tried to take down that warlord in the east' You remember the one. Marrk the Mad. I nearly killed my self tearing through his forces. Niall saved me and almost got killed, too.

Even though he had dragged me physically away, back up to the city, I couldn't stop. I drank until my stomach bled and tried all sorts of? things. Drugs. None of it affected me right, of course. Nothing could numb my pain.

And then one night he finally had enough. He burst into my place, warded me in and made me detox everything out of my system for days. I yelled and screamed. I hit him. And he took it all until I was sober and spent. I had no more rage within me.

It was actually a few months later when I was finally starting to dig myself out of the deep dark hole I found myself in that I kissed him. I just wanted to feel a loving touch, I didn't even expect anything more. He surprised me by kissing me back.

Everything started to get better at that point. I started to live again. I never could have done it without him there every step of the way. I don't know what I would do without him."

She was quiet for a while after that. The sun had started to slip behind the trees when she finally spoke again.

"I think I am going to ask him to marry me.?

Sometimes life is so rapid paced that when you think back all you recall are flashes of memories that almost feel disconnected from the rest of reality. It was something Shar found herself having trouble with living in a city filled with beings that have a much shorter life span than her. To them it feels strange to blink and have months race by like nothing. It'd been difficult for her to adjust to the rush and every time she thought she had a handle on it she discovered she was woefully behind.

It had been late spring when she and Niall sat at that cafe going over the village they were planning to move to after the wedding.

Now they were watching snow drift past their apartment window while Christmas music played softly behind them.

"What is it?" Shar had asked as she examined the gift he'd gotten her with a faintly puzzled expression. She held up the pendant hanging from a delicate chain. At first she'd thought it was an hourglass, but a closer look revealed it was two triangles overlapping at their points. The etching in the soft gold was difficult to make out even with her keen eyes. She could just make out the unfamiliar runes. "A talisman?"

"Yes," he confirmed, his arms sliding around her waist from behind. "For protection against outside influence. It will safeguard you waking, but more importantly in your dreams."

"You're giving me a protection amulet?" This time her tone was rather dry.

"Of course," he told her. "I worry that the court will try to sway you away." He pressed his nose against her neck and breathed in her scent. "I want you to always be mine."

She sighed at the touch to the delicate flesh where her neck and shoulder met. The press had turned into a kiss, and then a gentle scrape of teeth.

"Oh Niall, I will always be yours."

Winter faded and the snow melted. The spring flowers had come and gone. They were arguing.

"Niall! Oh! You make me so mad!"

They stood in their apartment. Almost everything was stowed away into boxes and labeled for the move. Some things had already been shipped to Earth. The wedding was only weeks away. Midsummer, it was the one thing he had insisted on about the ceremony. Midsummer, their vows exchanged under the moonlight.

At the moment Shar was stomping her foot. Clutched in her hand, crumpled in her tight grip, was a letter. "I can't believe you were going to do this behind my back, and not tell me!" She shook the letter at him. "My parents, Niall" You're writing to my parents" And reading this....Gods! How long have you been in contact with them?"

He spread his hands in a pacifying gesture. "Since you asked me to marry you, Shar." He waved a hand to stop her from speaking. "I had to ask your father's permission. It was important to me."

She stood there, quivering with barely suppressed rage. "I have no connection to that life. I would never go back, even if I could. You know that."

"It was important to me," he repeated. "I sent two letters....that would have been the last. They never replied."

"Of course they didn't." Rip. She tore the pages in half. "I'm dead to them." Rip. "And they are dead to me." Another rip and she flung the pieces down. Then she stormed out of the apartment.

The two days that passed until they made up had felt like the longest days of her life.

Shar had slept in the backseat of one of her cars. Niall showed up to take her home. She had been utterly miserable away from him. They hugged, they apologized.

They made a dent on the hood of one of her cars.

"You can fix that, can't you?" He asked her with a laugh.

"You're not sorry at all you hurt my car!"

"It was your ass," he retorted.

They laughed, and made up again.

After the third time they cuddled in the back seat of the El Dorado convertible that she was currently working on.

"I love that you can make me laugh," she told him softly. "Even when I am furious with you."

He smiled and kissed her bare shoulder. "Will you always laugh for me" Even when I do stupid, insensitive things?"

"Always."

It was only a few days before the wedding. Things weren't supposed to happen like this. It should have just been a simple trip south to collect flowers. It was one of the only things Shar has insisted from. Flowers from her home land. They were in luck that they grew on the mountain side and not just in the vale. The trip should not have taken more than a day, but they planned to spend the night right there in the clearing where Niall and she had stayed that first night they met.

They were beset on the path, taken completely unaware. They weren't just any garden variety bandits, but at first they weren't having any difficulties. After all, Shar was a very capable fighter and Niall wasn't so bad himself. It would have been over before it had started, but he had sworn never to use magic on those without. Only their enemy had cheated. The fight had dragged on forever, then suddenly it was all over.

"I don't know what to do!" Her voice cracked with raw emotion as she scrambled to stop the bleeding. There were too many wounds to count and she knew she'd never heal them fast enough to save him. "Niall, tell me what to do!"

He smiled. How he could muster up the energy to smile up at her when he lay twisted and broken beneath her grasping hands eluded her. It was the most beautiful thing she'd ever seen even with the blood trickling out of the corner of his mouth and the way one eye was all but swollen shut. There should have been nothing but pain etched in the lines of his face. Instead of fear in his eyes there was warmth. Trust. Love.

"My little Shar." His voice was only a whisper. His strength too weak to touch her cheek when he lifted his hand, so she had to guide it with her own. So many times he had supported her. It was her turn.

"My little Shar," he repeated, a little louder, with a rattle in his throat. "Make me laugh, melamin."

"How can I think of laughter when I'm watching you die?" The tears she'd been fighting could be held back no longer. The first drop rolling down her cheek lead to another and another until they were a flood blurring her vision. The thumb weakly brushing at them did nothing to help stem their flow.

The sound of his gentle laughter broke her heart.

"Oh, my Shar" don't forget to laugh." His voice began to fade. "You have such a beautiful laugh."

Her shoulders lurched with the force of her sob. She could see his life force draining away, flowing away like the blood seeping into the earth.

"Don't leave me, Niall, don't leave me!"

He didn't listen.

They were out of time.