by Sandra Elsa
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As the days passed she learned the valley by heart.
Sitting with the colt, in a nook above a waterfall where the creek dropped fifteen feet to form a small pond, she practiced the small exercise Johann had given her.
At first she only managed to relax her mind sporadically. Each time she succeeded she was greeted by the brilliant white glow, fed by the rainbow of colors.
The colt stomping, insects buzzing, or a change in the rhythm of the falling water, brought frustration, as the distraction made her lose her tenuous grasp. But as the days went by, her energy became more familiar and accessible.
One day, as she leaned against a tree, completely relaxed, viewing the swirling brilliance she moved her hand to pluck at the strands of color. It amazed her as she watched the multi-hued tints that formed her hand of spirit, move slowly through the currents of energy. She flexed her arm, rotating her shoulder forward and turned her head to watch the glow separate from her physical form.
Remembering Johann’s warning that if her energies became too depleted, the filament that connected body and spirit could rupture, she wrenched her hand back.
The speed she withdrew into her body, and brought herself back to consciousness, left her with a throbbing headache. As she stood to return to the house, the colt tried to block her. She waved a hand at him and started around. The fine black head followed her, his lips pulled at her hair. The sharp tug brought her up short, and before she could react, he pressed his nose into the curve of her neck and blew gently. The throbbing in her temples dimmed.
He herded her back to the tree. Recognizing that he had just removed her pain, she tried to do as he was demanding. She leaned back against the tree and attempted to send herself back to that calm state. The oddity of the colt’s actions and a persistent fear of tearing the filaments prevented her from repeating the feat.
The next time she stood she scratched his nose and explained that it just wouldn’t work that day. They would try again tomorrow.
He was waiting when she stepped outside the next morning. He pushed and prodded her in the direction of the waterfall. She waved to Johann who had emerged just behind her. “I’ll be back.”
Johann shook his head and watched the colt's peculiar behavior, but made no move to stop them.
As she relaxed, the small black horse stood over her. She found herself able to separate her spirit from her physical substance, stand up and move about while her body reclined against the tree.
This was far more than Johann had told her to do. But it seemed a natural progression of the exercise she'd been doing.
Moving away from her body frightened her, the silver glowing cord that connected body and soul, stretched and thinned as she moved away.
She floated above her supine form. The colt’s eye tracked her spirit as she roamed, testing the limits of where she dared to go. She circled a nearby tree and watched to see if the silver cord would snag. It bisected the tree and panic flooded Pink’s mind as she thought it had been severed. She retraced her movements and was gratified to see the cord emerge from the tree trunk intact. She played with the idea of walking through the tree, but uncertainty overwhelmed her sense of exploration.
After her success, she spent days becoming familiar with and perfecting this magic. Then, choosing a place much closer to the house, she went in astral form to find Johann.
Relaxing into the grass, her spirit left instantaneously and the colt stepped over her.
Making her way to the door, she stopped and considered it.
Out by her pond everything was much too dense for her to find the courage to meld with it. With great hesitation she put a hand through the door. After retracting and extending it several times with no damage, the rest of her slowly followed. At the table, Johann stopped talking. He glanced about but failed to follow her position the way the colt could.
A wild, terrified whinny erupted from outside. From the clarity of the sound reverberating in her mind the colt must have his head right next to hers. The panicked sound brought a resounding answer from the forest.
A strident, deep, challenging neigh rang through the air and vibrated the magical energies around her. A glowing white form appeared at her side. He was the most sensational creature she had ever seen. She stared at him in disbelief. What she faced existed only in fairytales. But here he stood, called from the forest by the stress of his son. The similarity in conformation was plain to see.
Johann and Tomas stood from the table, their eyes searching the corners for the unfamiliar presence. “Pink?“ Johann called uncertainly. He sank into a trance and the white form herded her none too gently, back outside. As soon as she returned through the door the colt settled down and the white aura disappeared, gone back to wherever its body lay hidden. She merged with her physical substance, and the colt moved to one side to allow her to rise.
She looked at him in awe, knowing him now for what he was.
There had been no mistaking the family resemblance. The main difference besides color, was the golden spiral of horn glowing from the middle of the adult’s forehead. "Don't worry," she told him. "Your secret's safe with me. And I won't go out of your sight again." She rubbed her hand over the white star on his forehead; now that she knew to look, she noticed a slight thickening of the bone. In the adult that density was needed to support the horn.
She wondered if the colt would ever grow a proper horn or if he would remain anonymous as a half-breed. Having seen his sire, she did not doubt that he would grow much larger. He would most likely mature at a slower rate than a pure-bred horse. Everything she knew about unicorns, which admittedly was only the stuff of legends and tales, said they lived much longer life spans than horses or even people. It made sense that he would mature at a much slower rate.
Johann and Tomas came out the door and down the steps at a run. As she looked at them she saw their auras without even trying to. Tightly coiled power awaited release if she required their assistance. The rich golden brown power of the bones of the earth emanated from Johann. Dark green, the power of the living earth, suffused Tomas. The energy dimmed as they saw her petting and soothing the colt. They stopped, so as not to chase him off.
Now that her spirit and body were one, he nuzzled her side and pushed her towards them. As if to say, "You go explain it to them, you should have known better than to go where I couldn't see you." With a flick of his tail he disappeared down the valley to join the mares.
Johann approached and demanded an explanation. “What did you think you were doing.”
She flinched at the anger in his voice. “I’ve been practicing what you told me to. I’ve gotten to where I can relax and see my aura without a moment’s hesitation. I learned how to separate some of that energy and leave my body behind.” She registered Johann’s surprise, fading to irritation, but finished explaining herself. “I wanted to show you what I’d taught myself, but my guardian angel didn't like it when I projected through the door out of his sight." She glanced toward the colt with a smile, realizing she had just named him.
"I felt you enter the room—then he screamed." Johann nodded at the diminutive form at the opposite end of the field. "I swear I felt another presence enter the room and then you were both gone. But I couldn't identify the other aura. You just scared years off my life girl.” Gaze fastened on the black shape hiding behind one of the large plow horses, he asked, “Was it him?" Even Johann didn’t look like he believed it could have been.
Pink shook her head and tried, with little success, to look repentant. "One of Angel's friends came to retrieve me, to calm Angel's fears." She hoped Johann would leave it at that. If it became important she would tell him the rest of the story. But if the unicorn had been there all this time and not made himself known, she didn’t think he would appreciate her telling the men about him.
Tomas glanced at the colt down the field and muttered, “Angel... Bah... I’d have named him Demonspawn.”
Jo
hann frowned. He surveyed the forest, anger faded. He spun back to her and said, "If you maintain consciousness he shouldn’t be so concerned when you project. In order to do that, you must learn to partition your mind. There must be a small core of you that you can leave behind to maintain animation.”
“What difference would that make to him? He is able to watch my spirit, and he stands guard over my body.” Pink stared from Angel back to Johann.
“If you need to move, partitioning allows you to do so. You wouldn’t be defenseless. He would be more secure knowing you could care for yourself in an emergency. Once you have that control, I'll teach you other magic. With your familiar you should be able to progress rapidly."
"Familiar?"
Tomas stroked his chin thoughtfully. "That would explain why he stays with her."
Johann smoothed back wisps of white hair and turned to Pink. "A familiar, is a spirit that watches over you and sometimes instinctually assists when you use your power, they are bonded to you. If that doesn't describe this little guy I don't know what does."
Pink decided not to argue. As Johann described familiars, Angel most certainly fit the description. Only she knew he was so much more.
"I suppose," Tomas said, "that means he'll be going with you when you move on.” He shrugged. “Oh well, doesn't do me much good, small and flighty as he is."
"Move on?" Pink questioned. She hadn't been aware that they were even discussing moving on.
"Not just yet," Johann told her. "I'd like you to become more practiced while we have the luxury of safety and privacy but I can't infringe on my friend’s goodwill forever. You will see, there are many exciting places to go, things to see, people to meet.”
Excitement at the prospect of returning to his old way of life shone in his eyes.
“I've been thinking we could travel as my wife and I did, performing as magickers to earn our way to Relante. The gold and silver I brought along won’t last far beyond Trell. I would like to go to the capital and see if perhaps my grandson has survived his time as a soldier. It would be good to see him again."
"That sounds like as good a plan as any I might have.” She turned to where Tomas stood watching the small black colt, “And Tomas, thank you so much for Angel."
"Don't thank me. Keeping him here would be something akin to boxing up the wind. Separating a familiar from his witch is one of the most difficult things in the world to do.”
“Still, thank you so very much.”
“He will probably come to accept you projecting through doors and being out of his sight for short periods of time. But try doing something he thinks is unsafe and see if you can't make him crazy."
Sorrow crept into Tomas’s voice and his face took on a haunted expression, similar to the one she frequently saw on Johann's face when he talked about magic. "Many are the times during the last campaigns that I wished I had a familiar. My skills just aren't that great. I could have saved so many more lives if I’d had that help.”
Johann wrapped his arm around his friend’s shoulders and said, “You did what you could. We all did what we could. At least you were saving lives.”
Tomas focused on the ground. Then looked up at Pink, the haunted expression buried under his usual mask of cheerfulness. "I'm small time. Johann is ten times the wizard I ever was. You couldn't have planned for a better teacher if you‘d been looking. It’s odd, the way the Gods get things done."
Johann smiled and chided his friend for putting down his own skills. "I may be able to do more varied magic, but you my friend, are the greatest Healer, King Caryon had in his command. I would like you to work with Pink and teach her how to Heal with her magic, she is quite skilled with herbs, but we both know much more is often required to save a life. I think she will be able to master the magic of Healing, since she is strong in the earth related energies.”
Tomas pushed his hair out of his face and stared at her with that blank look Pink had come to associate with the use of “second-sight“, as Johann called it. When his eyes focused he said, "I would be happy to teach her. She is very strong in the energy of the living world. Green is dominant. She should be able to learn, just tell me when.”
"One thing at a time,” Johann said. “Once she gets partitioning down, she can start on Healing. I'd like her to learn from you, but we need to be on our way before it gets too far into summer or we won't make Relante before the snows come."
As soon as the men went back into the house, Angel returned.
He gently grabbed Pink’s tunic with his teeth and pulled her toward the woods. She reached over, scratched him between the ears and laughed at him, "All right, I get it, I'm coming."
They walked far into the dense, deciduous forest until Angel stopped in a secluded glade surrounded by tall old oak trees, reminiscent of the Travel Oaks. She sat down at the edge with her back against one of the trees and relaxed, thinking about what Johann had said about partitioning her mind.
Sending her mind into deep relaxation, she attempted to project. It happened as she had practiced so many times before, and her body slumped forward unconscious. She retreated and tried again. After several more tries she quit in frustration. She obviously needed to get Johann to give her further instruction.
Having come to that conclusion, she sat back and relaxed, enjoying the quiet. She was glad Johann had spoken of moving on. She liked it here and she found it restful but she was ready to see more of the world. Her eagerness faded as she pondered whether or not Garec would still be searching for her. If learning Healing took anywhere near as long as the exercise she’d just learned it would still be awhile. Perhaps waiting awhile longer would be a good idea, and it would not be so boring if she was learning something new.
Johann became more fit with every passing day, helping Tomas with the chores on the farm. Both old men took the easy way out of chopping wood and used their magic but moving and stacking it required greater expenditure of energy than simply bending over and picking it up did.
It delighted her to be learning how to use her latent magical skills, but at sixteen years old, she was finding life on the small farmstead suffocating. If not for Angel, she didn't think she'd have been contented even this long, now that she knew he would go with her, she was ready to travel.
On the far side of the clearing she thought she sensed motion. When she looked, nothing stirred. Angel too peered into the trees directly across from where she sat. She looked to where his eyes focused and as she watched, Angel's sire stepped from the forest into the dappling sunlight of the glade. His voice rang in her head.
"Welcome."
Chapter 8
