Spéir: [gives another slight, quick nod before releasing Scamall's hand and fluttering his hand forward, gesturing for her to move ahead of him… so he could watch her back]

Scamall: [takes a slow, deep breath, letting her own eyes scan the dark and unruly forest underneath them—though she's able to see much less than him]

[Even from above, the forest is clearly a tangled mess of branches and trees that do not want to let them through]

Scamall: [lips twitch, brow slowly furrowing]

Scamall: (to herself, uncertainly)  ... this... is a lot of effort to eat a faerie with such little essence...

Scamall: [but, forcing a sigh and quickly shaking her head, dismisses the thought]

Scamall: [... though her ears still droop uncertainly as she decides) the forest is probably just really hungry... or it's something about their essence, specifically...

Scamall: [without any more hesitation, drifts forward and steadily gains speed, zooming through the air. Keeps an eye on her surroundings and the forest underneath, but heads toward Nova—]

[Mist quickly rises from the forest in a dense haze, obscuring the area beneath

[… and the mist thickens the air, making it difficult to fly through.]

Scamall: [huffs, snarling slightly, but just forces out a gust of wind to clear her path]

[The mist resists the movement, but it's hardly more than Talamhdé's obstacles usually did. It quickly parts, granting them passage… although it tries to slowly creep back into place.]

Scamall: [relieved, but stifles a smile. Instead, focuses on scanning the forest below as she slows her descent, hovering above a particularly-dense concentration of branches]

Essence: [weak, but very clearly Nova's unusual essence… it was hard to place—though Scamall had never been the greatest at distinguishing between essence—but seemed… vast]

Nova: [almost directly beneath her… and all-but-shielded by the thicket]

Scamall: [takes slow, deep breaths to focus as she slowly drops, still suspiciously scanning every inch she could see of the woods]

Spéir: [silent as he falls not far above her, keeping an eye out... as he always did]

Scamall: (to herself) Spéir would say something if he saw anything, but… this feels too easy? For all this trouble?

[The air was still thick—and grew thicker the closer she got to Nova—even without the mist Scamall continued struggling to clear from her sight]

Scamall: [despite being an air faerie who could see through the air itself… there were plenty of threats that could still manage to hide themselves, requiring vision to notice]

Scamall: [after another moment of hesitation, glances back in the direction they'd come from]

Scamall: [and, feeling a sense of dread settle over her, looks back down at Nova]

Nova's essence: [slowly growing weaker, disappearing beneath the overwhelming essence of Talamhdé Itself encasing them—]

Scamall: [heart pounding in her chest, to herself) … this feels like a trap. This feels like a trap! But I need to—

Spéir: [having lowered himself to her side, gently sets his hand on her shoulder]

Scamall: [flinches, quickly looking at him over her shoulder—]

Spéir: [face dead serious, but flashes her a forced-reassuring smile as he murmurs) "you okay? We can go back if you—"

Scamall: [snarling, snaps) "no! We're not leaving them behind!"

Spéir:

Spéir: [sighs heavily, fae-ears drooping as he looks away, but—]

Scamall: [at the same time, mostly releases her magic around her, all but completely dissolving into air. Only keeps a weak grasp around her body in preparation to stop at any moment, but lets herself drop near-completely uncontrolled—]

[The air is still thick, slowing her descent itself and resisting her every movement—both physical and magical. On top of that, the forest's canopy is woven into a dome-shaped cage, surrounding Nova]

Scamall: [fighting her dread again, takes a deep breath and rolls her eyes. Finally, carefully weaves herself between the branches, clambering through the canopy]

Cage: [except… growing denser—with progressively more and more thorns—the closer to Nova they got]

Spéir: [shortly behind her; a slight edge to his voice) "Scamall."

Scamall: [snarling, quickly turns a sharp glare onto him]

Spéir: [interwoven between branches himself, his half-formed hands and legs carefully wrapped around places with as little thorns as possible]

Spéir: [has an intense look on his face, but speaks carefully) "if you really want to do this, I can teleport us the rest of the way. But it's going to take a lot of what I have, and you're going to have to be prepared in case the forest attacks us."

Scamall:

Scamall: [swallows, hesitantly glancing at the thicket between her and Nova]

Voice: (subtly uneven, nervous) "is this seat taken?"

Scamall: [tenses, her ears reflexively going back slightly, and quickly looks over her shoulder—]

Faerie: [standing awkwardly behind her, subtly shrunken in on themself and fidgeting with an archfaerie's emblem. Has a shabby, clearly-worn dark green cloak on, its hood over their vermillion hair]

Faerie: [flashes Scamall an anxious smile]

Scamall: [except… after her years of learning how deceitful other fae could be, has learned how to read emotions well]

Faerie: [and has subtle creases of fear and loneliness around their face and eyes]

Scamall:

Scamall: … :'D

Scamall: [takes a slow, deep breath]

Faerie: [uses a majority of their essence to warp the three of them far through Kilrey and the massive Faewilde storm]

Faerie: [dragged them past the edge of Kilrey's dominion… and placed themself between the town and siblings, their arm held out as they shield the siblings with their own body]

Faerie: (struggling to raise their voice and sound braver than they felt) "I'm going to take him on. Just run. Even if I can't stop him… you can get away. I'm sorry for getting you dragged into my problems."

Scamall: [slowly lets out her breath, then looks up at Spéir with a determined look]

Scamall: [… though it quickly gets replaced by a forced smile as she struggles to act braver than she feels]

Scamall: [holds out her hand for Spéir to take; voice uneven) "let's go."