There's a furtive shadow perched on one of the statue's shoulders, one that watches Bloduewedd pass with faceted red eyes as the mantis ascends to the Reckoning's crowned head. Iskierka's been here for--she doesn't know how long, huddled in a place that feels right for want of anything else to do now that the words have stopped. For anything else to do now that she's written the last of them and kept them to her, a feeble little scroll she clutches like a lifeline to her Sleeper.

The sight of an Omen she knows is like another lifeline. Bloduewedd means Fern, and Fern's someone her Sleeper trusted; in the absence of any other directing force, Fern's a direction she can go in and the thought gives her a jolt of energy. She pops out of the hollow she'd tucked herself in and leaps into the air, more falling than flying in her haste to get to Fern. It's only in the last second before she'd collide with his head that she remembers herself and flares her wings to drop to the ground instead.

friend. The not-word's impatient, worried, impassioned. friend. help. read. She waves the rolled note above her head in emphasis.