On the edge of discovery

“Can he come here too? I want to see.”

The request was so hesitant and filled with longing that Tamy found herself unexpectedly and deeply touched. Not that she hadn’t already been affect just by conversing with this aggravatingly familiar and wonderful energy, but to literally feel such a vast amount of raw emotion envelop her - in this place where all was of such equal physical energy, including feelings and thoughts, that she was left staggered in their wake - was an experience that she could barely comprehend.

Tamy knew that Dase was eager for this too. Her brow tightened in consternation as she struggled to maintain her connection to Airy, and she carefully extracted herself somewhat so that she hung equally between both planes. Reaching out in the physical world where she primarily belonged, she took Dase’s hand very carefully in her own and, concentrating on the physical contact between her skin and his own, she drew herself back to Airy’s plane, she and Dase’s linked fingers a bridge to his own roots in this inner dimension.

But, although he had the potential to be, Dase was not a conscious part of this world, and her mind reeled at the effort of trying to draw him into it. The process grated…although he was willing, his subconscious self was resistant, and for a moment Tamy felt as if her mind was being torn in two directions. She steeled herself, summoning the outstanding amount of mental energy that existed within her despite her age, and steadied her hold on Dase.

She had created a link that was intense enough for Airy to at least see Dase completely, and for him to possibly see Airy as well, if he would allow himself to. Tamy felt his confusion.

“It’s okay,” she managed to say, not sure in which plane the words were spoken, or if he could discern them in both at once. “I’ve got you.” This was a blind place…vision didn’t exist here. “Look with yourself, not your eyes, and you’ll see her,” she encouraged, the words somewhat weakened by her struggle to hold the link intact.



Torbin was completely absorbed in her study of Tamy and Dase, until Rhn attracted her attention with a subtle whisper that she responded to absently. Absently, that is, until she saw that his medallion had taken on a muted glow and was pulsating steadily. Her hand instinctively flew to the stone at her waist, but it was cool and unresponsive where it was wrapped and tucked in its pouch on her belt.

When Rhn revealed that the medallion seemed to gain the greatest intensity when directed toward the two children, Torbin felt an ominous ripple pass through her body. This proved that there was indeed a connection between Tamy and the medallion, and her stone, too, because the medallion and the stone were obviously associated with one another in some mysterious way. And Dase, too? Was it the interaction between he and Tamy that was causing this reaction in the medallion, or was it simply that Tamy was radiating a certain type of energy because of the task she was performing? Or was it, Torbin thought with a tensing in her neck and shoulders, the interaction between Tamy and this Airy creature?

“Did your medallion react at all earlier, when Tamy was looking at either Sai’a or Odin?” She assumed that it had not, because she was sure Rhngeylor would have mentioned it, and so Torbin was not surprised when he shook his head. That meant that it was this situation specifically that had activated the medallion. But why?

“It’s okay,” Tamy said softly, at that moment, drawing Torbin’s sharp glance. The girl’s eyes were closed and sweat was beading on her brow, dampening the soft brown locks at her temple. Without those luminous brown eyes, the child was so small and angular and plain that no one would suspect the exceptional talent that lurked within her. “I’ve got you,” the child continued. “Look with yourself, not with your eyes, and you’ll see her.”

Torbin’s attention moved to Dase, who seemed no more at ease than Tamy herself. However, neither of them seemed to be in any sort of danger…if Tamy thought that they were, Torbin couldn’t imagine that she wouldn’t pull them both out of this ulterior space, whatever it was. She felt the need to make some sort of discovery regarding Rhn’s medallion and its reaction to the situation, before Tamy’s strength dissipated and the session ended.

Taking the stone from its place on her belt, Torbin hesitated, but only momentarily, and then slipped it around her neck. As the cool surface hit her skin, it seemed to cause a great lurch in her heart, as if it was re-associating itself with her body. She shuddered at the chill of it there. She hadn’t worn it, had barely touched it with her bare skin since Ravin and Kyri’s wedding, when she and Rhngeylor had first discovered the reaction between their seemingly innocent ornaments.

There was the familiar dizzying rush that had prompted her to take the horrid thing off in the first place, and then a sort of warmth that made her go very still. This was unfamiliar, but it caused a great sobriety to consume her in the wake of the drunken wave that made her naucious. She felt her resentment of the object fade and disappear. She was unsure as to the cause of this – was the stone still meddling with her mind, trying to get her to accept it and ignore its implications…protecting itself, almost, from the as of yet undiscovered truth surrounding it? She doubted that, simply because she felt clear-headed enough.

Rallying and recalling herself to current events, Torbin glanced down at her throat where the stone lay, and glanced back at Rhn’s medallion. While the medallion was still active, her stone was dormant and outwardly cool, although she knew the burn inside her echoed one within the rock. Whatever had existed before in the necklace was still there now, but it wasn’t reacting to its surroundings or the medallion at this time. Mystified, Torbin looked back at Tamy and Dase, just as the girl gasped and her eyes opened.