The moment she asked the question, Dasha knew how foolish it sounded. He probably thought that he was doing her a mercy.

Even her old flock would never have dreamed of killing her though, and they'd left a child to the mercy of the mountains.

Yes, her wing was broken, she was horribly injured, and she carried a curse plague in her blood, but... But how could he do that? She'd fought so hard, for her friends, for herself, and in less than a few seconds, it could have all been over for her.

He'd seemed so kind...

That was what hurt the most, really. That he'd seemed kind. 

Dasha tossed aside the vial, letting it taint the mountain soil instead of her stomach, which was currently sucking in on itself like it had been poisoned anyways.

She didn't even want to look at the rest of the basket, but her options were limited. She was scared to walk in her state, but if she lay back down, she was afraid she would never have the strength to rise again either. 

Dasha reached for the canteen. It took both of her shaking hands wrapped around to support it. The insides smelled wrong. The water could just be old, but she didn't want to risk it. 

The seed cakes looked normal. Smelled normal. Spongy, golden-brown, dense, square cakes. Likely, he'd grabbed some already existing cakes, instead of making some to mash the posion in.  

Dasha broke off a small piece, parting her lips and placing it inside. After so much time, the flavor of her mouth tasted a little off, so she hoped that she wasn't missing anything.

Swallowing hurt. Without any liquid, the seed cakes choked her. Dasha's head had been pounding for awhile.

She plucked a few blades of the sweet sorget and started to chew. The juice would definitely give her a stomach ache later, but she needed clean liquid now.

This was going to be a long day.

The long day turned into several long days, and several equally long nights, all sloshed together in a pained and miserable haze. Dasha was sick several times, and her fevered dreams left her aching for want of sleep, on top of everything else. But slowly, bit by bit, she managed to crawl through. 

At least, the young man had not come back. That was one comfort. 

Finally, one soggy summer morning, she took a sharp breath, steeled her core, and shoved herself to her feet. The world wobbled. Her knees felt weak. Her heart was pounding.

But she stayed up. 

"Woo!" Dasha cheered weakly. 

All right, first things first. Time to find a river. She was a filthy mess, and she didn't want to think about it. 

Finding a water source as a plague-wing was tricky. So long as the water was purified properly before drinking it, no one would catch plague. At the same time, no one really liked the idea of a plague-wing mucking up the water, so it was good to avoid anywhere other Avar might frequent. 

Unfortunately, beggars couldn't be choosers. Or in this case, horribly wounded individuals couldn't afford to be picky about their water. 

Dasha wondered again, whether Noonin, Fia, and Fia's aunt were all right.

She staggered onwards. She'd had plenty of time to watch the stars, and she had roughly figured out where she was, and where the nearest river was. Aside from one part of the trek, it should be all downhill from here. She just didn't want to hit the lake, where most nomadic flocks tended to congregate on their migrations.  

Then again, sighting a 'dead' plague-wing in the area meant some flocks would steer clear of the water for awhile, at least. 

Speaking of the plague curse... 

Dasha still hadn't looked at her wings. Just the thought of them made her sick. She knew that they were broken beyond repair. She could no longer tell if the random pains shooting through them were from her injuries or the plague curse. She did not want to know. 

So long as she didn't look, she could lie to herself, trick her brain into thinking that this was just normal plague pains. She had to.

Dasha walked onwards, the dewy grass crunching softly underfoot. The sky was light purple this morning, with great golden cracks gleaming through. She could see jewel-birds gliding on the thermal currents high above, circling the skies like vultures. Which they were, technically. Sunlight glittered off their feathers, scattering phantom colors into the atmosphere. 

She wondered what carrion they had found, that there were so many of them. At least a dozen, spiraling like a tornado of living gems. Something big. Perhaps even a person.

Dasha shuddered, and limped on her way. She didn't have time to waste on idle speculations. She had a river to reach.

A good hour of walking later, and she finally heard rushing water. The golden cracks in the sky had widened, and now they were bleeding a velvety crimson, spilling throughout the heavens. Dasha had spotted the distant shapes of a traveling flock, but they seemed to be heading in a different direction than her.

Hopefully, that was the young man's flock. Then she wouldn't have to worry about them anymore. It would be highly unusual for individual Avar to leave their flock during migrations like this. No one wanted to risk getting left behind. 

A memory flashed through her mind, of a young girl, still wobbly in wings she had yet to grow into, watching the people she had called home fly further and further away...

Dasha rubbed her face. She needed to get to water. She would feel better then. 

Past the next hill, and she could taste the misty spray hanging in the air, rocked by the cool mountain breeze. It was a river. Clear and cold, and the loveliest sight her aching eyes had seen in a while. Dasha waded in, letting the water seep into her boots and up to her knees. 

She was wary of drinking it though. Just because she had the plague curse, didn't mean she couldn't always contract a worse strain. Instead, she contented herself with wading, and washing off the worst of the blood and grime. 

She looked pretty bad. Her hair had always had a slick and oily quality to it, but now it was downright greasy, and her braid had come partway undone and tangled into whole nests of knots. Everything was mottled in murky, muddy colors, drowning her blue hair and speckled skin with dried ash stains and blood soaked dirt. There were several rips in her dark, work-issued coveralls, and her cheap boots were already loosening at the seams.

She couldn't see all of her wounds, but nothing was open or bleeding anymore. Pink and white gouges criss-crossed her shoulders, and a string of fist-sized bruises trailed down her limbs.

Her wings were unignorable now. They loomed over the water, angry red lines rippling in the reflections. Her left wing was missing half of itself, ragged slashes forming the edge. She must have gotten accustomed to the shifted balance of weight at some point. Her right wing had a hole punched through it. Small enough that it might have healed if treated properly in time. But that window was long gone.

Her joy at finally reaching water drained away. Dasha sat down with a splash, the water hugging her shoulders, as she cried hot tears into the cold river.

It was nightfall, when Dasha, clean and dry, finally moved on. She had a long trip ahead of her, and sooner or later, running into other people would be unavoidable. 

She would be ready. It was time to get back home.

It was three days of traveling, avoiding distant signs of Avar flocks, following the stars in an aurora splashed sky, foraging for food amongst the plant life, when Dasha finally ran into a roost. The nomads had made camp on a wide, flat area, and unless she was going well out of her way, she was bound to be spotted. Keeping a reasonable distance, she skirted around the main group, steadily walking onwards. 

She didn't want to stare, but she couldn't help it. This one was a decently sized flock, about a hundred strong, and it looked like she had come just before the evening meal. She saw waxy winged youngsters, hopping up and down, testing delicate wings that were barely strong enough to support them. She saw tanned and wrinkled elders, playing games of dice and shells, chattering and laughing. She saw folks her age, or some years off, checking whatever was cooking over the fires (it smelled like meat! Dasha's stomach grumbled.) or talking amongst themselves, getting various tasks done or resting with the others. The camp was loud with whistles and squeaks, clicking in the native Avar language. 

It occurred to Dasha, that unlike down in the valley, where all the towns and cities were, most of the Avar up here spoke solely their own tongue and nothing else. She hoped that Noonin wouldn't have to rely on the scant phrases she'd taught him, along with whatever level Fia's translation skills were at, but it seemed likely. 

A warning whistle pierced her thoughts, and took up through the camp, as the flock fell into silence. Whoever was on watch duty had finally spotted her, it seemed. 

Dasha could feel their eyes on her. Whispers rustled throughout the camp, and she heard powerful wing flaps, as a couple of Avar flew over, landing nearby. She kept walking. She didn't intend to stop unless they hailed her.

"Hail, traveler!" 

Oh a good sign! Someone had called her traveler instead of plague-wing. They were going to try and be traditionally polite, at least.

Dasha stopped and turned, facing the pair that had kept themselves several feet away, and still between her and their camp.

"Hail to the flock!" She saluted back. Her voice rasped from disuse, but it was enough to speak properly.

Two women were speaking, one with her iridescent black hair done up in elaborate beaded braids, the other with snowy white speckles dotting her shale grey skin. 

The one with the braids was doing all the talking, glass beads and dark eyes glittering gold by the firelight. 

"Where have ya come from, traveler, and where are ya going?"

"My friends and I got work maintaining those big metal towers they use to detect monsters."

A general hiss rippled through the gathering at the mention of monsters. The bane of their existence, nomadic flocks flew away at the first sign. 

Dasha knew that the woman was already eyeing her injuries, and putting two and two together. She had a feeling that this flock would be moving on soon.

"What happened?" Breathed the speckled woman, her eyes wide. She had been too pale to start with, but now she shivered under the summer heat. 

The woman with braided hair nudged her, chiding, but she too was listening for Dasha's answer.

Dasha let out a sighing hiss. "Monster attacks. For some reason or other, the last week was full of them. Killed my-"

"And you're not dead?" 

"Figures, a plague-wing would survive that."

A couple more Avar had come over to listen. They were commenting on her broken wing, and everyone knew it. 

The woman with braided hair sighed and punched her brow, clearly giving up on adhering to tradition. Dasha couldn't blame her, she was surprised it had held out for this long. 

"Hey what kind of monsters? Were they coming this way?" A young man asked.

"I don't know. I haven't seen any walking back yet-"

"How long ago was this?"

Dasha wasn't answering that. The timeline wouldn't match up, not with whatever strange teleportation they'd done.

"Hey," She interrupted the man. "Have any of ya seen my friends? We got separated on the way back, I don't know where they are."

"Maybe. Tell us about the monsters first." There was a glint in his eyes that Dasha didn't like. 

She took a step backwards. "I told ya what I told ya. Now have any of ya seen a Mora, green and yellow, about my age, missing an arm-"

"And with a pale Avar girl." Finished a grandmotherly old woman, as she approached the gaggle, rose-gold wings trailing around her like a cloak. Her expression was hard, and her eyes glowed like sparking flint.

"And what, traveler tell, would a plague-wing want with an innocent child?"