Chapter Five; Sliders.

I have one more day of freedom, then it's back to work!

Sorry for the delay in updating. I've been working on the Tortallian Heroes Awards. If you go to ing at them. They were huge, as tall as Numair and as thick as a tree trunk.

"Numair?" Daine hissed. "Any idea what these are?"

"I've not a clue I'm afraid Magelet."

"Great! So we have no idea what they are going to do to us next?"

"Not a one."

The largest one fell onto its belly. Previously they had been upright, resting on a coil supported by their tail outstretched behind them. They moved fast towards the pair, slithering along the ground.

Daine lifted the crossbow to her shoulder and sent a quarrel flying into the leader's right eye socket. A horrible wail filled the air and she resisted the impulse to clap her hands to her ears to protect her hearing. She had never heard such a sound before, it was like metal scraping down a rock surface, but amplified until she could feel her bones shaking from the sound.

Numair did have his hands over his ears and he shouted a word, gesturing with one hand towards the immortals. Whatever he threw at them hit the one Daine had wounded first and it stopped its screeching. When she saw its face she sucked in air between her teeth harshly, both its eyes were gone. One socket still had her arrow protruding from it and deep green blood was oozing from the wound. She saw the other side of its face as it swung its head from side to side, searching for them. That eye was covered with a white sheen; it was now blind.

A wind was whipping around them, freeing her hair from its confines and making it fly around her face. She risked a glance at the mage,

"This your doing?" She yelled. The wind was rising so hard that she, being light, was having a hard time standing upright. Numair didn't hear her so she yelled again, louder, whilst keeping her eyes firmly fixed on the immortals. They too were having problems; the smallest were lying still in a heap, having been thrown into a tree.

She clutched his arm as she felt the wind pick up again. Without even looking at her, Numair hooked an arm around her shoulders and pulled her tight against his side. From there she was anchored to the ground, the wind wasn't powerful enough to blow them both away.

"NUMAIR!" She yelled, rising up on her toes to try and make him hear her. "Is this your wind?"

"Yes!" He called back, forced to yell even though their faces were not even a foot apart.

She peered out into the clearing. Slowly she made out three figures still standing upright, the two on the ground seemed to be dead.

"Numair!" she called. "Let the wind go! I can't shoot in this wind."

He nodded and let the wind falter and die. Daine was ready instantly, her crossbow was primed and she shot at the nearest one. The bolt punched through its body and pinned it to the ground, thrashing as it tried to get free. Another fell as a ball of fire from Numair enveloped its head. That left only one, the leader. It reared high above them, taller even than Numair, who was above six feet in height. Daine drew her belt knife and slashed at its underbelly, it was too close now for shooting. Green blood spurted from the wound she had dealt it and sprayed across the two fighters. Daine closed her eyes and her mouth and moved the blade blindly, slashing once more at its belly. That horrible scream came once more and Daine moved back, giving into the urge to cover her ears.

When she was out of the thing's range, she felt Numair steady her with a hand on her shoulder, and she opened her eyes in time to see the creature's death throes. Turning away, she heard Numair say something and then silence fell behind her.

"Is it dead?"

"It's dead."

She turned back around, and took in the scene that lay before her. Green blood had stained the dirt in the clearing and she saw, looking down at herself, it had stained her clothes and Numair's as well. The five immortals lay before them.

Cautiously, crossbow primed, she approached. The smell was terrible. She kicked one with her booted foot and jumped back as the skin sloughed off at her touch.

"Numair. If you want to examine these things I'd do it now. They're rotting away like no tomorrow."

The mage came over and stood beside her.

"I see what you mean." Together they kicked over the body of the nearest one, wincing at the smell and the touch of the thing. Numair cupped a handkerchief over his nose and leant down. After a few seconds examining the thing he stood and moved over to the next one.

"Daine, come and look at this one!" He called.

"Must I?" She groaned, walking over all the same. He pointed out a wound in the eye socket, which had collapsed.

"Where did that come from?"

"My bolt o'course." She said, "I shot him in the eye."

"So why do all of them have the same wound?" They spilt up, checking all of the Immortals.

"That they do." Daine said, confused. "The leader was the biggest one, the one nearest me when it died." They inspected the leader and found that all the wounds it had received had been inflicted on the others as well.

"I don't know about you Magelet, but something doesn't seem right here, why would they all be wounded when their leader was?"

"I have no clue." The girl said. Then she turned her head, and Numair recognised the distant look that came over his student's face whenever she was talking to one of her animal friends.

"The Lioness's coming. And they've killed the Hurroks. All the People are saying so."

"Let us go meet them then Daine." He picked up her bow and handed it to her. "We need to get a picture of these Immortals and a description of them down while we still have them fresh in our minds."

She sighed; the two of them had been kept on the move pretty much every day since they had returned from Dunlath. They had worn through about two sets of riding gear each in the last three months. The saddles had remained whole, but the stirrups had frays, as had the reins. Daine's pommel needed constant re upholstering and re stitching with the amount of birds that landed on it. The longest time they had been in Corus was only a week, and that had been before this mission. Before that, they had often only stayed for a day or two, collecting new supplies and having a much needed rest before riding off to the next group of troublesome immortals. The King, Jonathan, tried his best to relieve them of some duties, but as the only Wild mage in the country, and the one of the strongest mages in the eastern lands, they were the only ones who could deal with this sort of trouble. So they were sent across the land. In these last few months, Daine had seen more varying terrains and met more people than she had done previously in her fourteen, nearly fifteen, years.

But she wouldn't complain; coming to Tortall had been the best choice she'd ever made. After losing her ma and grandda back in Snowsdale, she'd found a new family here; The King and Queen, Alanna, Onua, Numair. She loved it here, loved the people but what if she could go back?

If she could return to where she was born, with her ma not dead? Would she? Could she? Daine shook her head slightly and forcibly turned her thoughts away from that direction. But a sense of unease and nostalgia lingered in the back of her mind.