The Dals and the ki'zadun stared in terror, then they turned and began to flee in desperate, hysterical panic.

It must be done. It must be done. There's no other way. Goddess, forgive me!

"Oh, I don't know about that one, Kimmie," Jasana bubbled happily as the Were-cat female showed her a small stone that had flecks of quartz in it, that made it glitter. "I don't think that wouldn't be very pretty, even if it was polished."

"Well, kidlet, if I used it as a decoration, I'd be worried."

"What do you use it for, anyway?"

"Well, this right here is used to create a little ball of light," Kimmie replied, holding it up so she could look at it and Kimmie's face at the same time. "It's part of a magic spell."

"Papa never uses things like that."

"He's a Sorcerer. I'm studying Arcane magic. They're different, kidlet."

"Why-" Jasana began, but then she gasped and put her paws to her head, covering her eyes.

"Jasana? What's wrong?" Kimmie asked in sudden concern.

"Cub?" Jesmind asked quickly, rushing over from where she was looking towards Torrian, fuming over having to stay behind when she should have left Jasana with Kimmie and did what needed doing. She was already worried, because she had heard some strange rumbling sounds from that direction, almost like thunder. But it was a clear night, with no lightning anywhere. "Jasana?" Jesmind said in sudden concern when Jasana cried out suddenly, as if in pain. "Jasana!" Jesmind said in a strangled tone, physically pulling her small arms away from her face, demanding that she look at them.

But both she and Kimmie were unprepared for what stared back at them.

Jasana's eyes were glowing an incandescent white.

"Papa!" Jasana managed to gasp. "Papa! He's doing something, something big!" She gasped again. "Fire! He's making fire!"

And then the ground shook, and a sudden explosion of light illuminated the western horizon.

The ball suddenly shivered, and then it exploded outwards. It was not the blast of Air that Tarrin had used to destroy before, this was a one-weave spell, a spell of pure Fire. It swept out from him in a circle, incinerating anything it touched, causing wood to explode and thatch to simply evaporate and stone to burn and steel to melt, blasting the flesh of anything it touched into ash as it swept out from the center of town as fast as a leaden ball fired from a Wikuni musket. In the span of four heartbeats, the towering wave of fire swept up to the walls of the city, then engulfed them, sending a shockwave of heat and ear-splitting roaring emanating out over the cultivated farm fields surrounding the city. And then they stopped rushing outward and instead turned upwards, swirling up into the sky, creating a cyclone of fire that reached into the night, a vision of hellish proportions that utterly engulfed the city.

Almost as quickly as it appeared, as it had engulfed the city of Torrian, the massive cyclone of fire simply ceased. It left behind a raging inferno of normal fire in its wake, burning what the firestorm did not instantly incinerate, leaving a firestorm that illuminated the forest beyond fields that were being rained upon with burning embers. A firestorm that would leave Torrian a blackened wasteland of ash, charred bones, twisted, melted metal, and shattered rock.

Those who had been outside, the armies of the Rangers and the Woodkin, stood in mute, dumbfounded shock, staring at the wall of fire that consumed the logs that made up the walls of Torrian, watched them fall and reveal an entire city being consumed by a raging inferno, the likes of which they had never witnessed before.

Standing in the center of the firestorm, ankle deep in ash and melting rock, stood Tarrin Kael, his expression one of emptiness, and tears flowing freely down his cheeks.

To: Title EoF

Chapter 28

The fire burned on and on.

Those outside had gathered around the destroyed city of Torrian, trying to comprehend what had happened. They had seen the bolts of lightning in the air, and then the white bar, clear indications that something had gone terribly wrong. That was confirmed when they found Ariana not long after the fire had erupted, laying half-conscious in a field not far from the treeline with a crossbow quarrel in her back. Sathon managed to get her conscious, and it was from her that they began to piece together at least the first of it. That Wyverns bearing riders attacked her, that Tarrin had somehow gotten free of his basket, and what was more surprising to her was that he could somehow hover in the air, and he had killed the Wyverns with magic. Knowing this, they could reason that Tarrin was also responsible for the bar of light and the subsequent fire and explosion that erupted from somewhere inside the city. But after that, it was anyone's guess as to what happened, what had caused the titanic magical calamity that had destroyed Torrian. All they could do was gather as near the raging inferno as they dared and watch Torrian burn.

And they did. Centaurs and Were-kin joined Rangers as they crossed the fields and got as close to the burning walls of Torrian as they dared, trying to see something, notice something, that would solve this most dreadful mystery. Some wept at the loss of life; the fire had whipped up so incredibly fast that there was no chance anyone escaped it. Not with the gates closed. Some stared in confusion. Some refused to believe what they had witnessed with their own eyes, angrily arguing that what had happened had to have had some natural, logical explanation.

About an hour after the fire, Jesmind, Kimmie, and Jasana had rejoined the host. Jesmind looked pale, Kimmie looked almost hysterical, but what caught everyone's eye was how sad and depressed Jasana looked. They all knew that Tarrin had fallen into the city, and they all believed him dead. But nobody knew how they had known that, since Tarrin had all but forced them to stay well away from the city. They were surrounded by the other Were-cats immediately, who formed a buffer of protection from prying eyes and demanding questions. None of them spoke from the moment they arrived, but it seemed obvious to everyone that they must know something. It was the only way to explain why they had arrived in such a state.

About two hours after the fire, the first Centaur spotted a hazy, indisctinct form that appeared within the flames. He pointed to it and noted it to his companion, and by the time he looked in that direction, the form was obvious and apparent. More and more people and Woodkin looked as an excited buzz sprang up around the host, and many of them were there to see Tarrin Kael literally step out of the fire, a fire that could not touch him. He had black ash and soot on his face, on his burned clothing, but his flesh and hair were untouched by the intense heat of the flames. It wasn't just this that caught everyone's attention, however. It was the look on his face.

He looked like the walking dead. There was no life within his eyes, and his expression was one of empty emotionlessness. He stepped from the flames and stopped just beyond them, still too far away for anyone to approach and live, due to the intense heat the flames radiated. The Were-cat stopped and stared at the Rangers and Woodkin with those empty eyes, and then he did the most curious thing.

He turned around and stepped back into the fire.

Jesmind had to be restrained by Rahnee and Thean as she tried to run into the inferno after him, and Jasana burst into tears. Kimmie hugged herself with a horrible look on her face.

Arren, who had arrived on the scene just after Tarrin returned to the fire, noticed them and their behavior immediately. He marched over to them and gave Jeri and Singer a look so flat that even they would not stand in his way, and then he stood before the Were-cat females with a desperate look in his eye. "What happened?" he demanded loudly. "I can tell you know something, Mistress Jesmind! I demand to know what happened to my city!"