"The crystals are reaching capacity, you are ready now, Commandant?"
Dreek looked up from her lap to the woman in front of her, the robed mage bearing a solemn look from under her hood. It sounded as though she were the executioner asking the condemned for their last words. Annoyance tightened the Sun-Kissed elder's grip on the mask in her lap as she lowered her eyelids to half-cover her maroon eyes. If this mage expected her to succumb to the magic of the ritual, she did not know the power of her elders.
"I am ready, Faerdron sister. Get on with it."
The mage nodded her head and stepped back against the wall. Cycling a breath through her lungs, exhaling through her mouth, Dreek brought the mask in her lap to her face, flinching as the cold metal bonded to her skin. Goosebumps traced he
