The choice is not made easily, nor swiftly, nor with any kind of joy. Nor does every mage in Dorana agree with the Council’s decree. Father turns on son, mother on daughter. Brother and sister fly at each other’s throats. Husband and wife clench their fists and turn away, unforgiving. Ravaged by terror and mage-mist, Dorana falls apart. No Council can hold together what blind arrogance has destroyed.

Unchecked, the mage-mist creeps across Dorana’s unwarded borders. The princes and potentates of the magickless nations regard the blight with furious dismay. The mages of Dorana have proven themselves false. Now countless lives are on the brink of ruin.

They send their warriors into blighted Dorana.

Word of this disaster reaches Elvado. The warriors of Brantone and Trindek and Ranoush and Feen and Manemli are chanting Death to all mages! as they ride with drawn swords and spears ready to kill. In their wake they leave bodies, and silence.

At last run out of time, Venette Martain and Dreen Brislyn accept they cannot wait until every mage agrees to abandon their home. Those who would run will run… and those who cling stubbornly to denial of Dorana’s dire predicament, or who simply cannot face the terrible unknown, will remain to take their chances against the swords and spears and blight.

“I cannot tell you where we will fetch up,” Venette Martain tells the anxious crowd crammed into Elvado’s central plaza. “Or how long it will take us to get there. I can only tell you what I believe… that we will find a safe haven. And that once we are far enough from Dorana our magework will return to us, and when it does we will find a way back and heal what is so sick. This is not the end. Dorana will rise again to greatness.”

Barl wants to take Morgan with them. She is shouted down, loudest of all by her brother. Defeated, Barl falls silent. She cannot stay behind, for her magework is needed. She agrees to abandon her love.

But she weeps when she is alone, afraid she will never see him again.

Though she wears a bold face in public, in private Venette is also afraid. She fears the angry princes and potentates will not relent until every man, woman and child of Dorana is dead. She fears there might be no safe place where its mages can catch their breath… and that even if they do find a haven, by then there will be no Dorana left to heal.