Suddenly both pairs of their eyes snapped toward the center of the clearing as the thrum in the air reached an unbearable pitch.
The deafening howl of the essence storm that had battered the trees and whipped the pond into a frenzy that choked into total, unnatural silence.
The towering vortex of compressed grey-white light, which had torn the moss from the roots and sucked the water into hovering sheets of spray, suddenly collapsed inward upon itself. It contracted violently, drawing millions of threads of ambient essence into a single, blinding point of incandescent brilliance that hovered directly over the center of the hollow.
The glare peeled away like molten slag, burning out until it revealed the figure suspended at the heart of the clearing.
Veylara was hovering three inches above the churned ground, her bare feet hovering weightlessly in empty air.
