There's A Wicked Wind Still Blowing

Oh, heck, now she was scared. Avantika's world had been shaken even more than it had been already. The crystals had spread from the old scratch, which had healed long before, and taken their place around her ears and even the corners of her eyes. She wanted them gone. She really wanted them gone. She curled up on the ground and started scratching as carefully as she could at one of her ears. But she couldn't budge any of them. She tried harder and harder, until she almost yelped from the growing pain and had to stop. She was no healer, but she knew they were stuck fast. She could get them off, maybe, but it would hurt like a son of a bitch.

She was considering just that when she saw a woman with the same condition nearby. She'd sparred her once, she thought. Not like she was going to be thinking much at the moment. She felt a drop of something under her eye and swiped a paw over it. She hadn't thought that she was crying, but she was surprised when she saw the drop of liquid blue ooze. She wiped her paw on the ground, making sure she got all of it off. "Hey," she said to the woman.

"Speech"