He is here. The boy you hoped would come. I have brought him to you.
Phryne responded, knowing at once that her grandmother was speaking of Panterra Qu. She had told her grandmother of him, tested her command of the Elfstone magic by finding him, and Mistral Belloruus would have been quick to recognize the attraction.
But why would she bring Pan here? He would want to help, but he was no match for a creature like Pancea Rolt Gotrin.
Struggling to wake up all the way and frightened now for Pan, she forced herself into a sitting position and cast about. Her grandmother was seated right where she had been sitting when Phryne had fallen asleep—hadn’t her grandmother done something to make that happen?—still holding the pouch with the Elfstones clasped in her hands.
Time had passed—it must have passed—but there was no way Phryne could know how long she had been sleeping.
“Why is Pan here?” she demanded. “Why did you bring him?”
Her grandmother’s face had assumed a stronger look.
Watch and see.
Pancea’s shade had reappeared atop the triangular marker, all gnarled and bent, radiating its sickly green light, ghostly in the darkness of the cavern. She was turned away from them, looking back over the clusters of markers and tombs to where Panterra was walking toward her. It took a moment for Phryne to realize that the black staff he was carrying was the same one she had last seen in the hands of Sider Ament.
“Phryne!” he called out to her.
She started to reply, but Mistral quickly hushed her. Atop her perch, Pancea was shrieking as if scalded, her rage directed at the boy. In response, the dead who followed her were rising from their resting places and filling the empty spaces between markers and tombs with their ghostly forms, all white and transparent and ephemeral as mist.
Their whispers were wild and excited as they drifted into view and formed clusters, all of them massing and then coming together about their leader.
Mistral Belloruus had gone into a crouch, fingers pressed to her lips.
Watch.
Pancea Rolt Gotrin’s hands swept up and wicked green fire flashed at her fingertips, driving into Panterra Qu. But his black staff responded more quickly still, blocking the attack and shattering its thrust. The boy held the staff before him, sweeping away shards of flame, but the attack had staggered him, and Phryne could see him falter.
“Phryne!” he called again, but his voice was weaker.
Now.
Her grandmother tossed the pouch with the Elfstones toward Phryne, but it landed short and lay halfway between them, unprotected. The Elven girl flung herself across the space that separated them, fingers closing on the little bag. She heard Pancea scream again, saw another flash of green fire that flared all around her and everywhere at once. Curling herself into a ball around the bag and its contents, she tore the leather bindings apart and dropped the blue Elfstones into her hand. A moment later, she was on her feet, the Stones clutched tightly in her hand as she turned to face the malevolent shade.
But Pancea was no longer atop the triangular marker. Instead, she was right in front of Phryne.
-Give them to me-
The words had the force of a curse laid upon her, but Phryne only clutched the Elfstones tighter, fingers wrapped around them as she raised her arms defensively.
-Little fool-
Green fire lashed at the girl, tearing at her with such force that she felt as though her arms had been pulled from their sockets and her legs shattered. She was flung backward onto the cavern floor, pain ratcheting through her unprotected body. But even though she felt she might lose consciousness, she was determined not to let go of the Elfstones.
Fighting through her weakness and nausea, she rolled away from the shade and struggled to her knees, still trying to bring the Elven magic to life, to focus her efforts on making it hers. She could feel the immediate connection, the magic of the Stones filling her body, white-hot as it surged into her, but she could not bring it to bear.
Pancea screamed at her.
-Give them to me now, Princess of nothing-She started toward Phryne, fingers extended like claws, face twisted into something more animal than human, less shade and more ghoul. Phryne, still trying to recover from the damage that had been done to her, scrabbled backward toward the lake, blinking rapidly, shaking her head. There was no sign of Panterra, nothing to tell her what had happened to him, nothing to show that he was even still upright.
“Pan,” she managed to whisper.