The Taint of Power

Krin ran her tongue over dry lips.  The demon was smart.  It hadn't bothered to find something to bind her with, or injured her in a way that would restrict her mobility once they started moving again.  It had just stripped Krin of her boots, leaving her to her own devices under the truth that she wasn't going to try anything drastic over this terrain on the pads of her own feet.
So she was sitting up, knees to her chest, keeping her toes wrapped up in the folds of her cloak to keep them from the cold, unyielding dirt of the clearing.  She was scared, and she was frustrated because the situation was dire, and she was still hurting.  The image of Nofeet, so much like Krin herself as to almost be a reflection, getting impaled from the back; the sound of the long, hard bill opening and splitting her ribcage from within, the avian reptile turning into clockwork and then, with considerable relish, going organic and stealing Nofeet's shape.  It made Krin sick.
The demon, sitting on a log across the space and humming to itself, seemed to be tuning the ethereal clockwork of its essence; many little gears and mechanical bits showing in the joints of one arm, which it toyed with in a disjointed song of soft tiks, like a stick smartly wrapping the spokes of a bicycle tire.  It was still pretending to be Nofeet, obviously just to make Krin miserable; all cool serenity and suppressed confidence even as it marred the changeling's appearance by elongating the limbs and hardening the Mourwin's face.
Krin felt herself shiver.  She was cold, and more than that, she was afraid.  It had been almost ten years since she had been so vulnerable.  It reminded her of the Worldlet and its cruel demigods; it reminded her of being a child in her mother's home…
The wind shuffled the leaved and suddenly she blinked, a musky, earthen herbal odor stinging her eyes and nostrils.  Right beside her, almost touching the hem of her cloak was a stunted, woody, gray-stemmed plant.  
It was flailrung.
Krin's muscles contracted.  She was being offered a chance.
Her fingers- were they really so thin and white?- shook imperceptivity as she reached out and twisted a leafy branch off the main plant.  Krin trusted her body to shield the action from view as she quietly turned a stone over, hiding the remainder of the bitter herb.  She tucked the herb into her sleeve, knowing the round, fuzzy leaves would cause a rash on the underside of her wrist if she waited too long.
Krin swallowed.  Her next move was more of a risk.  She didn't think the girl who wasn't Nofeet would know what she was doing.  But she wasn't stupid enough to hope it wouldn't be suspicious.
She took out the oblong glass marble and rolled it between her fingers, imagining the small copse of trees they had past across from the dry riverbed.  One revolusion.  Two.  Three.  The place was set.  Now to call the meeting…
Krin took out a thin tin tube, utterly plain and unmagical, blew her breath through it once, and then played, as evenly as she had the nerve to, four high, piping notes.  She let the last note linger a few seconds and then hummed a weak, manic tune.  She could hear the demon had fallen silent across the clearing, and her pulse raced.  The summons had been sent, and now she was just trying to hide what she had done.  Krin thought back to the time she had owned an ukulele, humming out a tune over and over as she tried to pick it out on the actual instrument; she prayed that this was all it would seem she was doing; that no magic would be traced in the action.  She licked her lips and played the flute again; this time a straggle of nonsensical noise.  She hummed…
There was the soft sound of delicate footsteps on the dirt and dry needles.
Krin breathed slowly, more notes…
"What are you doing?"