124 Sacrifices

Up in the air, the Patronus Spirit Guardians charged down the Dementors, passing through them and then turning back to chase them some more. The Dementors recoiled in response, and their forms began wriggling madly. Had they actually been made of solid matter, it would have looked as if a thousand worms were trying to burst out of their bodies. Was this really how Dementors were supposed to react to the Patronus Charm?

And then, the screaming started. Howls of horror and pain; rivulets of blood streaming out from each one of the Dementors and into the grass below. But that didn't make any sense; Dementors were non-beings. They had no bodies to injure, no blood to bleed. However, the Patronus Charm was clearly having an effect; what on earth was happening?

One by one, their bodies fell out of the sky, in wriggling, squirming bloody messes. A few Dementors who had managed to escape this gruesome fate threw away their cloaks and landed in a hurry, before running away in terror. 

Oleandra released her magic, wincing; she could feel their abject terror through the feedback the sigil of the Helm of Awe branded into her forehead provided her. With these feelings invading her mind, she could no longer picture her happy place in order to maintain the Patronus Charm, and her spell fizzled out.

A certain poem that had come to her in a dream came to mind:

Better not to ask than to sacrifice too much

For a gift is always rewarded

And a boon always demands a return

Better not to offer than have to slay too many

It was impossible to gain something with sacrificing something else in exchange, Oleandra realized. There was a price to pay for power, and it was impossible to skip out on the tab. But no matter what choices you made in life, it was impossible to live without losing anything.

Either you sacrificed what you held dear for the sake of your ambitions, or you sacrificed the opportunity to gain control over your life in order to live a simple life. You couldn't have it both ways, but as with all things, there are no absolutes. 

The question was, how much were you willing to sacrifice? And would the price be worth what you gained? Oleandra wouldn't know the answer to this question; she suspected nobody actually knew until they had actually made the decision. Very little people had no regrets, be it in this world, or any other.

"Lumos," Oleandra said, lighting her wand to get a better view of these 'Dementors' in the darkness of the night. 

Upon seeing the remains, she almost retched in revulsion. As she had expected, these were no Dementors, these were Dusk-Elves, and it looked as if they were being eaten alive by their own clothes. Their cloaks had wrapped themselves around their bodies, grotesquely gnawing and ripping at them with sickening noises, as if their lining was made of teeth.

Black tentacles covered in sharp fangs slipped out from under the cloaks and drew in the Night Elves' limbs that were sticking out. Their hoods, their cloaks, they were alive! She remembered how a few of the survivors had ditched their cloaks in a hurry when they'd seen their comrades being devoured alive. They had run away instead of flown away, which meant they used these things to fly. And from the looks of it, they hadn't been expecting to be eaten by their own clothes, which meant they were supposed to be reliable.

She had no choice; she was hundreds and hundreds of miles away from anything, with no food and no supplies. Either she tried wearing one of those things and flew back to civilization, or she starved in the middle of nowhere. At any rate, she had to hurry. It looked as if these cloaks were nearly done with their meal, which meant Oleandra would be next on the menu if she didn't get out of here.

Oleandra gingerly sidestepped around the wriggling corpses and headed towards where the surviving Dusk Elves had ditched their cloaks. Looking down to make sure she didn't step on anything, she gently made her way outside the circle of death she had created. As she neared the edge, she spotted a familiar face: that of the young Elf who had inadvertently saved her by allowing her to drink a healing potion.

"I'm sorry," Oleandra whispered to him shakily. "You didn't deserve this. I don't even remember your name."

She stepped over him and grabbed one of the black cloaks that hadn't been affected by her Patronus Charm. It was gently undulating and pulsating, but it didn't instantly try to attack her. It was soft to the touch and slightly warm, and it didn't have any teeth or tentacles like the others. Nevertheless, Oleandra wouldn't put it on quite yet.

With the cloak in her possession, she ran away as fast as she could manage from the monsters. Once she was a safe distance away, Oleandra once again attempted what she had been trying to do before being attacked; she began stargazing, to find Nidavellir's altered rune forms. 

As she walked, she looked at the stars. One foot before the other, she had to keep moving forward. One more rune found, one step closer towards her powers becoming whole again. One step closer to home.

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Oleandra woke up with a start and shielded her eyes from the glaring sunlight. Somewhere along the way, she had fainted in a ditch from exhaustion and luckily, the Dusk Elves hadn't sent any more pursuers her way after their last fiasco.

Closing her eyes and examining her mindscape, she found the presence of all twenty-four runes in their altered forms. She sighed in relief; it would have been a huge waste if she hadn't managed to get them all, considering how long she had to wait for the sun to set!

"Wunjo, Ehwo," Oleandra murmured. "By the Standard and the Twins, let a dialogue be opened through which we may attain harmony and understanding."

The cloak was sentient, which meant that Oleandra could reason with it. Its mind was as alien as they came, but as long as two beings shared something in common, they could understand each other.