[Location: Holo Taxon]

[thornandmoss]

Briar buried each of his hands in a jar of the temple's medicine supply, green energy flowing from his fingers into the dried plants. The medicines were due for a renewal, and this would double their strength. They would be needed.

The Yanxing emperor had decided his empire was not vast enough, and his troops were coming. A temple might be a terrible thing to target, but it was a strategically sound one. Living Circle temples were centers for mages and healers, and they would be as vital to the defense of Gyongxe as civilian militia. Briar's first priority was always Rosethorn and Evvy, but doing everything he could to help temple mages and healers survive the onslaught came in a close second. Time was limited, and he set aside his current jars to move on to the next pair.

Bells rang, a warning rather than a call to service. Briar's head snapped up. Extending his magic through the network of plants in and around the temple, Briar withdrew as several of them died. The temple was burning. Where were Rosethorn and Evvy?

Briar ran toward the fires rather than away, keeping an eye out for Rosethorn's familiar green magic as he went. She would always be where she could do the most good, unless she were looking out for someone. He stopped very briefly to pull a jar of burn salve and three cloth-wrapped balls of thorn seeds from the kit slung over his back, then broke into a sprint. He had to find them.

Comments

[allthatlife]

Martha wanted to tell him that plants and people were very different things, but, even if Briar had been listening to her, it wouldn't have made a difference. She didn't understand his magic and she certainly didn't understand the sort of bond that he had with plants. All she could do was stay close and hope to keep him out of trouble.

She dropped down immediately, accepting the tea with gratitude.

"If she's here, we're going to find her," she promised, forced to release his hand in order to crawl but remaining as close as she could.

[thornandmoss]

Once they started moving, he gave in and asked Martha for help. "I can't... tell me when you see flames, not just smoke, alright?" Briar was already seeing them, and he couldn't tell what was real and what wasn't anymore. Even in a jumbled mixup of memory and reality, though, Briar still had faith that he'd know Rosethorn the second he felt her.

"Yes," Briar breathed, coughing after he'd gotten out the word. Martha's promise replaced the desperate chorus of Find them, find them, find them in Briar's head with a slightly calmer mantra of Going to find them.

He withdrew his magic. There were no plants to run it through anymore. Briar would have to find them the old-fashioned way.

[allthatlife]

She nodded, stifling a cough and tearing off a strip of her shirt to use as a makeshift face mask. It wasn't much, but it would at least keep her from breathing in some of the particles of dust. She handed a second strip to Briar a moment later.

"Here," she said, "Put this over your mouth and nose."

They still had a long way to go.

[thornandmoss]

"Thanks," he repeated, sounding a lot more grateful than he would for just a strip of cloth.

He crawled forward, the floor growing hotter beneath his hands and the smoke searing his eyes. "Rosethorn!" he manages to get out, but he knows that at this point she's elsewhere or she's gone. Nothing looks any different, he's been seeing flames all along, but something in the air tells Briar that this time they might be real. They spread so quickly last time. Nothing has changed, just another night in his nightmares. This time, though, without Rosethorn, and with Martha dragged along.

He waits for confirmation from Martha that the orange light flickering through the smoke in the hall isn't imaginary and tries not to have a breakdown here in the smoke-filled corridor. Rosethorn has to be elsewhere in the temple, then. She'll be headed for the exit he sent Gwen and the other mage toward. He'll meet her there.