The days blurred together after the encounter in the cove.
Nussudle and Nova left the rocks at first light, climbing hard into the clean morning air until the sea fell away beneath them. Neither of them looked back. Whatever had happened between him and the Akula stayed with him, but he did not have the words to shape it into something simple. It sat in him as a stone dropped into deep water, heavy and quiet.
So they flew.
For the first two days, the journey felt almost mechanical. Rise with the light. Fly until the sun climbs high. Drop low when they spotted a reef, an island, or some thin stretch of land where they could hunt or drink. Sleep in short pieces. Wake and move again.
Repetition became its own kind of shelter.
Nussudle hunted where he could, mostly fish near the shallows or, foolish enough, those resting in open places. Nova adapted more quickly than he did. The ikran learned how to watch the edge between sky and sea, how to ride the heavier winds, how to strike fast and leave before anything larger below could respond. At night, he slept more deeply than he had near the Akula's cove, though not quite as fully as he once had above the forest.
Nussudle slept less.
He would lie against a stone or a root, staring upward, listening to Nova breathe nearby and feeling the strange shape of the days settle into him. Sometimes he thought of Nayat'i. Sometimes of Home Tree. Sometimes, the sea creature that had not killed him when it easily could have.
By the fourth day, the ocean began to break into longer chains of islands and rising stone. By the fifth, forests started to appear again, first as dark smudges on the horizon, then as true land beneath them. Nussudle felt relief at the sight of trees. Nova did too. The bond eased. The air smelled richer, fuller. Even the light felt less harsh once it filtered through the leaf and branch.
They should have been nearing familiar territory.
That was what Nussudle believed.
It was only on the sixth day that doubt began to creep in. At first, it was small. A ridge that should not have been there. A river that bent in the wrong direction. A floating rock formation he did not recognise. He adjusted course slightly, trusting memory over instinct.
By the seventh day, he knew.
He had taken a wrong turn a long while back, somewhere over the sea where sky and water had offered no markers and the days had folded too closely together. He was not heading home. He was moving through a place he did not know.
He clicked his tongue softly and rested a hand against Nova's neck. "That's on me."
Nova gave a low sound in response, not blame, just alertness. He had sensed the uncertainty before Nussudle admitted it.
"All right," Nussudle murmured. "We correct and keep going."
He began to angle them back toward what he hoped was the right line.
Then the world ahead changed.
At first, he thought it was a cloud shadow. A dark stain across the forest, too broad and too still. But as they flew closer, the truth revealed itself in layers.
The land was burned.
Not in patches. Not from a strike of lightning or controlled fire. Whole stretches of forest had been blackened, reduced to standing skeletons of trees and wide beds of ash. Smoke drifted in thin, constant veils. The smell hit him next, thick and bitter, carrying burnt wood, cooked sap, and something deeper that made his stomach tighten.
He slowed Nova at once.
The ikran's wings widened as he glided forward, both of them staring.
Ahead, a mountain rose from the wounded land. Its peak was broken open, glowing with heat. Fire lived inside it. It spat boulders into the sky, each one trailing sparks before falling somewhere into the ruin below. Streams of magma cut glowing paths down its sides and into the dead forest.
Nussudle said nothing.
He did not need to. Shock moved through the bond as clearly as any word. Nova hated the place instantly. The ash. The heat. The wrongness of a forest without life beneath it.
Below them, nothing moved.
Only smoke. Only ruin. Only black trunks reaching upward like hands that had failed to hold on.
Then Nussudle saw it.
At first, it looked like another broken rise in the land. Then his eyes found structure. Form. Intention.
A great tree.
Or what had once been one.
It was larger than Home Tree, at least in width, maybe not in height, but the shape was unmistakable. Kelutral. A living place. A people's heart. Yet half of it was gone. One side stood jagged and broken, torn open as if some giant force had bitten into it and left the rest to burn. Branches the size of bridges lay scattered across the ash-covered ground, splintered and dead.
Nussudle felt his throat tighten.
A clan had lived there.
Maybe still did. Maybe not.
He nudged Nova gently, urging him lower for a better look.
Nova obeyed, reluctant but steady, dropping them toward the ruined canopy. Nussudle's attention stayed fixed on the broken kelutral below. He looked for movement. Survivors. Tracks. Anything.
He did not look up.
The scream came first.
Not one voice, but several, tearing through the smoky air from above them.
Nova reacted before Nussudle understood. The ikran twisted sharply, the bond surging with alarm so fast it made his chest seize.
Nussudle looked up.
Ikran.
Two of them, maybe three higher still, dropping through the smoke with terrifying speed. Their riders were Na'vi, but not like any he had seen before. Their bodies and faces were streaked with blood and dark paint. In their hands, they carried flaming spears, the fire trailing behind them as they descended.
There was no warning. No call to identify. No hesitation.
They attacked.
Nova folded one wing and dropped hard. The first spear cut through the air where Nussudle's head had been a moment earlier, trailing sparks. Heat brushed his cheek. He ducked low, gripping tighter as Nova plunged toward the dead forest.
The enemy Ikrans followed immediately.
Nova skimmed just above the ash, weaving between burnt trunks and shattered branch carcasses. Dust and black powder exploded upward behind them. Nussudle heard the screams of the riders above, sharp and furious, and the answering cries of their ikrans.
"Left," he hissed, though Nova was already moving.
A burned trunk loomed ahead. Nova cut around it at the last second, wingtip clipping ash. One of the pursuing riders overshot slightly, then corrected with brutal skill. These were not frightened survivors. They were hunters. Warriors.
Nussudle forced one hand free and reached for his bow.
The motion was clumsy in the chaos. Ash stung his eyes. Nova's turns threatened to tear him loose. Still, he got the bow up. Drew. Released.
The arrow vanished through the smoke and struck clean.
One of the riders jerked backwards as the shaft punched through his head. His body flew from the saddle and tumbled into the ash below. For one strange, suspended heartbeat, his ikran kept flying as if nothing had happened.
Then it screamed.
The creature bucked hard, banking wildly as the dead weight of the missing rider threw it into chaos. It crashed through a half-burned trunk and vanished into the grey below.
The second rider did not break.
He came in harder.
Nova twisted beneath another dead branch, but the rider matched him closely enough that Nussudle could see the fire reflected in his eyes. He drew his arm back and launched the spear.
Nussudle shouted a warning, but it was too late.
The flaming spear struck Nova's wing.
The ikran screamed.
The sound tore straight through Nussudle, pain flooding the bond so hard it blurred his vision. Fire bit into the torn membrane. Nova's control vanished in an instant as one wing failed beneath him.
They dropped.
The ground rose too quickly to avoid. Burned branches shattered beneath Nova's body as they hit, ash and dust exploding upward in a choking wave. Nussudle was thrown forward, then sideways, his shoulder slamming into blackened wood before the world spun into noise and impact.
For several long seconds, there was no shape to anything.
Only ringing.
Only pressure.
Only the taste of ash and blood in his mouth.
He tried to move, and pain answered from everywhere at once. His ears worked poorly. Sound came distant and distorted, as if he were underwater. Through it all, one thing stood out clearly enough to understand.
Nova was screaming.
Not once. Repeatedly. In pain. In rage. In fear.
Nussudle forced one eye open. The world was grey and blurred. Shapes moved through the ash. Shadows above. More wingbeats. More ikrans arriving.
He tried to reach for his knife. His hand barely moved.
"No…" he rasped, though he could not hear the word himself.
Another scream from Nova. Closer now. Then the heavy impact of something landing nearby. Voices shouted, rough and strange, their words broken apart by the ringing in his skull.
Nussudle tried to rise.
His body refused.
The last thing he saw was the sky above him, darkened by smoke and wings.
Then everything went black.