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body felt as though it were falling away from him, spinning into nothingness with only the feeling of his blood entering Pelanor holding him awake. Then he felt the plunge of something metallic go through him, sharp, sudden and deadly.
    When Byre finally did find his way back to his body it was to Pelanor’s lips and sharp teeth against his, breathing into him and kissing him at the same time. He tasted the iron of his own blood, but he could also feel his own strength flowing through her. The spiral of desire and need for blood was heady, and Byre could feel himself drowning in it.
    With a groan he pushed her away and struggled upright. She stayed where she was, legs folded, looking up at him, wiping the line of scarlet slowly from the corner of her mouth. For an uncomfortable moment they stared across at each other in silence as she licked the remains from her fingers.
    Byre cleared his throat. “Is that what you wanted all along, Pelanor? More Vaerli blood?”
    She sighed. “You offered, Byre. Your sister gave hers willingly to seal our deal, but her blood is not as powerful as yours.” Pelanor got to her feet, walked to him, pressed against his chest and traced the bottom of his lip. “You are nearly Vaerli as they once were, full of power and Gifts.” Leaning back she fixed him with a smug look. “Tasting you is like tasting the past, and I like it very much.”
    Whatever smart words Byre could have summoned died away when he became aware of a figure in the flames behind the Witch. The Kindred was part of the fire: an alien shape, tall with a great curved head, but otherwise formless as a statue before the carver set to work. Byre had only seen it because in the moving fires it was utterly still, a black shadow in so much brightness.
    As far as he knew they had been alone since they arrived, but now he wondered if he’d been mistaken all that time. What had he and Pelanor revealed to them while they were trapped in the circle of fire?
    Catching his suddenly alert pose, the Blood Witch turned around to see what he was looking at, and then backed away. It pleased the Vaerli to see the witch cowed so quickly; she was not so young as to not be awed by the Kindred. Pushing her behind him, Byre tried to keep his own bravery intact, but it was hard.
    The Kindred were the original spirits of the land, the masters of the chaos that had been its natural state before the arrival of the other races. His own people’s contract with them and the Gifts they had given in return dated back many thousands of years. Still, the Vaerli did not truly know the Kindred. Time and the elements were their home, and they had not been seen above ground since the curse had been laid on the Vaerli by the Caisah. Byre had come here to recover that ancient pact and the Seven Gifts, as his father and all his race wanted.
    He was not foolish enough to imagine that it wouldn’t be bought with great sacrifice. As the Kindred’s towering form moved beyond the flames, within feet of the Vaerli and the Blood Witch, Byre recalled the tales of Ellyria. His long-ago ancestor’s suffering at the hands of the Kindred had been what secured the Pact in the first place. He imagined that the oncoming Kindred was about to deliver the same to him.
    Up close, the Kindred was not completely solid. The rocky floor could be seen through it. But it did give off a tremendous heat, almost like staring into a blast furnace. The etheric form it wore was one Byre had seen before, but he knew it could just as easily construct another from the earth all around them.
    You are ready . The voice came from no body, but was rather inserted into the skulls of those it wished to communicate with. The sensation was not unpleasant, but Byre caught Pelanor out of the corner of one eye, shaking her head as if it pained her.
    “Is it time for the testing?” he asked, wondering at how strong his voice managed to sound when inside he was quaking.
    Your test is not to be the same as