Deo gave her another nod. There was warmth in his blue eyes, understanding, sympathy. Radstac had stood by him, her employer, when he'd gone off on this mad endeavor. Though she wasn't one to make such assumptions, she felt sure he would stay with her through whatever hardships were still to come.
The Far Speak mage had completed the necessary communications. The Far Movement mage, matching the efforts of his complement in Callah, now opened the portal. It was a wavering breach, a hole torn through the air, through the substance of what Radstac had always understood to be reality. She was from the Southern Continent, a far more civilized place than this Isthmus, where magic wasn't regarded with the same cultural fears. Even so, it was an act of unsteady faith to step inside that hole, into a world of milky uneasiness and chaotic perceptions.
PRAULTH (1)
There came a winking impression of speed and danger, a quick whisk of wind across her nose. Then a hard chunk sounded from the tree trunk on her left, just off the road, and a single leaf, brittle but still a spectral green in the autumn climate, detached itself from an overhanging limb and twirled to the ground.
Praulth, her reaction delayed and exaggerated and unproductive, seized her horse's reins violently and yanked with all her muscle. This succeeded only in causing the animal to make a frightened noise and rear, which consequently dumped Praulth off the saddle and onto the road.
Around her was a suddenly terrifying confusion of hooves. These were Xink and Merse's horses. Both men were still in their saddles. Praulth put her hand to her nose, quite certain she'd been struck there, by whatever that thing had been, whatever projectile...
She looked to the left and saw the arrow embedded in the tree. Her hand came away from her nose unbloodied. The feathers on that arrow must have brushed her. It had been that close.