Life Giver

by Lisa Lowell

  Rashel would not let him dwell on what he had done. She wanted him to recognize it had been a service to her, and she drew his eyes away to focus on the good. “No, you’re a life giver. Honiea wanted me to make you remember the Life Giver. Do you know what she was talking about?”

  “Life Giver?” He looked away from Norton to Rashel and for the first time truly seemed to consider her again. “She wanted me to remember the Life Giver? Where did I leave that…my pack?”

  Abruptly, he put down his spoon and then held out his hand over the table. With little idea of what he was trying, Yeolani sent his magical mind out into the night and over the prairie. He noted how the green grasses now poked through the winter dead patches and spoke of spring to him. He passed horses and great herds of buffalo and antelope, seeking an empty place in the middle of nowhere.

  He found it after raising his mind’s eye up into the sky and pressing down with his thoughts, seeking a depression in the earth. The well he had built, invisible except from high above, waited for him. Yeolani plunged his mind through the hole and into the crystal cavern. He avoided the water and strained for the shore in the pitch dark. And there he found his boots, his pack, and all his belongings undisturbed after weeks in the cave. He closed his mental hand over the strap of his pack and pulled it back to Rashel’s cabin.

  She lurched in alarm as the supplies landed with a thump on the table without Yeolani even physically going after it.

  “I left my pack, but if it doesn’t die of neglect, the Life Giver should still be in here.” He began rifling through the things he carried with him. “I’d forgotten I even had it.”

  Rashel looked at his belongings in interest as he pulled items out: a wickedly sharp hunting knife, bow and a quiver of arrows, stylus to record his travels, a sack of desiccated apples, a change of leather trousers, a clean shirt, and wooden dishes. Finally, he upended the bag and out spilled three objects she couldn’t identify: one furry little ball and two gently glowing marbles the color of the moon on a clear summer night. Her hand reached irresistibly for the furry thing, but unexpectedly, it rolled away from her and into Yeolani’s lap. It chattered and yipped with indignity at her, and Yeolani absently began caressing the creature. As Rashel looked up, she saw a stunned expression on his face. He stared at the glowing marbles. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.

  “Yeolani, what is it?” and she snapped her fingers in front of his eyes. He jerked as if he had just been slapped.

  “Oh…um, um… it’s a horrible trick, it is,” he replied with consternation and then peered again down at the two glowing balls of light. “There used to be one and now there are two. I didn’t realize that it came with the name.”

  “What are you talking about?” Rashel asked, forcing herself to be patient with his slowly returning memories. She knew better than to reach for the obviously magical orbs, especially since they seemed to have terrified Yeolani. For his part, he wasn’t sure how much he dared reveal to Rashel, a non-magician. He knew one of the two Heart Stones was his, but from where did the other appear? How could he tell which one was his? And what was he to do with the second Heart Stone?

  Then he realized who was supposed to have it: Elin, the toddler. The thought of waiting twenty years until that little girl grew into a woman… it overwhelmed him. Could he wait for that balance and love that he witnessed in Honiea and Vamilion? Could he endure the loneliness? And how would he explain this situation to Elin’s parents?

  With a trembling hand, Yeolani reached out and touched the Heart Stones. At the cool sensation of their glassy surface, he knew what had happened and how to resolve the mystery. One spoke his name to him and the other whispered the name Elin. The second one even pulsed to another heartbeat and breathing. It was Elin’s, with her bright eyes the same color as the swirling light in the stone. He felt the compulsion. He must protect the child and the stone from all other interference, protect it more closely than he had his own life.

  With a tremendous effort, he remembered that Rashel watched him and had asked him a question. “It’s a Heart Stone,” he whispered and picked them up. “It is what will turn my lady into a magician, once I find her. In the meantime, I’m supposed to protect them, although that's not gone well.”

  “The bottom of your pack is hardly a safe place,” Rashel pointed out logically. “Bury it somewhere or make it invisible. It’s a stone on your heart. Hide it there.”

  The words Heart Stone triggered an idea in Yeolani’s mind, tickling at the magic at his disposal. He remembered how Honiea’s pack felt weighty but was almost empty of anything except the exact thing she wanted. Everything else was invisible. He held up his Heart Stone to the lantern and then closed his eyes while he wished a spell of invisibility on it and then placed it in a space near his heart, small and undetectable, even by him unless he wanted to draw it back out into the open. Not even another magician would know where or how to find it. He could sense it if he wanted to, but he couldn’t feel it unless he drew on it.

  “That was an excellent idea,” he complimented Rashel, but then he held up the second stone. “And this is my Lady’s. Did Honiea tell you…” But he couldn’t even finish the sentence.

  You’re a coward, he chided himself. You barely know this woman and you are frightened to leave her to go waiting for a fairy’s fevered dream to grow up. And yet he did love Rashel, a lovely and compassionate adult woman. And what would this do to his magic? He had enough experience with the supernatural to know he could not ignore the impulses and compulsions being a Wise One would demand. More so, since he now knew where to find Elin. He would have to fight that contrary wind every step of the way. Would he come to resent these drives? Or would he grow bitter over the severed ties his magic imposed? It formed a scar on his life either way.

  Rashel murmured from far away, “She told me you had a decision to make and that the Life Giver could help. She said you would have to leave me to seek your Lady. And that either way I would not be safe here. If you leave, the people would think…that they could do what Norton presumed. And you will have to leave. You’ve killed the brute, and the villagers will demand justice and you will be hung. And Nevai? Traveling in a magician’s wake is no way to grow up, but neither is starving to death with me.”

  Yeolani found himself shaking his head in denial before he could reject that future. “It will not happen that way,” he intoned. “I swear that will not happen to him.”

  Rashel’s eyes blurred with tears, or so she thought. Then she eased back and looked at Yeolani. She recognized his very appearance had altered before her eyes. He hadn’t moved, but now his clothing seemed to glow. His simple linen tunic, too big for him, had shifted into a fine silk shirt that rippled across his body in an unfelt wind right there in the cabin. He wore a jerkin of fine, sage green velvet with gold stitching that shone in the lanterns. Over that rested a cloak of subtle suede, tawny and rich and also patterned with embroidery of gold that crafted imprints of wheat and horses running across a vast expanse. At his back, Yeolani had strapped on another bow and arrows, but these shone with polished mahogany wood, fletching of stiff white goose feathers and black arrowheads deadlier than she cared to guess.

  Yeolani didn’t look surprised at his transformation, just resigned. He took off the calfskin gloves that came with his changed status and placed them on the table as if they were a burden. “I’m sorry. That keeps happening. Every time I make a promise. Usually, I can stop it if I start cussing, but…but, Rashel, I find it very hard to use that kind of language around you. And I used to be a sailor,” he laughed and reached toward her hand.

  “What….what is this?” She managed to get the words out but only just. Her own hand instinctively pulled away from his reach. She watched the pained expression in his eyes as if she had rejected him. She really hadn’t, but the stunning changes overwhelmed her.

  Yeolani picked up his glove, muttered a curse under his breath and watched himself shift back into his simple clothing, worn,
stained, and human. “It’s the sign of my magic. I am the King of the Plains, just as Honiea is the Queen of Healing and Vamilion is King of the Mountains. We have charge of these gifts. I can travel as a tornado and am drawn to the open spaces. That, and I seem to be gifted with messing up things.”

  Rashel nodded and managed to relax at his snide remark. “And that globe, it makes someone else a magician?”

  Yeolani had forgotten the second Heart Stone and picked it up again. “It belongs to the Lady I’m supposed to marry.” Without more explanation, he made it disappear beside his own and hoped that would end her curiosity.

  He had no such luck. “And what is the Life Giver?” Rashel asked, nodding to the contented furry creature still nestled in the crook of his arm, undisturbed by the magical transformations going on around it.

  “It’s another mistake I made. It is a way to repair the messes I seem to create.” He looked down at Norton’s corpse that had turned an ugly plum color where his blood had settled. “Honiea can heal him if I use the Life Giver to bring Norton back.”

  Rashel didn’t argue that thought, though her strange eyes widened a bit in wonder. She’d seen enough in the last few hours to believe anything he claimed possible. What she did question was the wisdom of doing this. “I understand bringing him back to life, but is that really going to help the situation? He will still think he can have his way with me. You will still have to run for your life, and we’ll be exactly where we were yesterday.”

  “No,” Yeolani looked deeply at her. He had made up his mind, and now he had to convince her of what they could do. “No, I’ll wipe his memory. He won’t remember attacking you. He won’t remember me shooting him, though I might give him some nightmares to prevent him from wanting to rape anyone else again. Norton will be easy.”

  “And what about Nevai?” Rashel asked frankly, her eyes moving past Yeolani to the cradle where the baby remained.

  Yeolani reached out and touched her hands again, this time not letting her pull away. Instead, he almost begged for her peaceful eyes to settle him down. He could never be out of balance, he hoped, but he was willing to run this risk if she would simply help him. The fairies had given him Nevai, and so in a roundabout way, they included Rashel too. He had to put faith in that alternative magic. He might have to wait for ages to find Elin again, but he would be happy while he waited. He took one steadying breath and then spoke.

  “Rashel, will you marry me?”

  She stopped breathing for a moment, and if she could, her heart would have stopped just as suddenly. A thousand thoughts, like leaves scattering in the fall, flickered through her mind and then the branches of her mind were bare. She couldn’t think at all. Spring in her thoughts took some time to arrive, and when it did, it came in a blossoming of buds that emerged and then faded before she even got them out of her mouth.

  What about your Lady? What about when I grow old and die? I cannot follow you all over the Land. I won’t hold you back. You’ll be torn in two. What happens when you find the Lady? Will you have to break my heart and Nevai’s? Honiea would never approve. I would be left behind. I would always be worrying every time you tore away in some tornado to battle with evil. A marriage should be between equals. I’m nothing, a dairy maid.

  “So? I was a very bad, sea-sick fisherman,” he whispered as a way to cut across her unspoken ranting.

  “You were listening to my thoughts?” she glared, and for the first time, he realized Rashel had a temper. Yeolani thought she would be gentle and peaceful like she’d been with Nevai. Now, too late, he realized she was the mama bear and he had stepped in too far.

  He nodded his guilt and admitted it. “I’m an idiot as well as a bad sailor. I’ve been bumbling through becoming a magician this whole time. What makes me think I will ever be better at it with experience? I'm a worse magician than I was a fisherman.”

  Rashel pulled back and looked surprised. “Don’t put yourself down, sir. It’s unbecoming,” she ordered in mock severity. “You are amazing, and that doesn’t include magic. You took on Nevai even though you never asked for him. You didn’t for one moment try to avoid that responsibility. You tried to wipe your memory of me in order to spare us this problem. That took true courage. If you think I will allow you to sacrifice your magical destiny, pinned to the ground…it’s not right. You’re like the fairies. You shouldn’t be grounded.”

  Yeolani lifted up the furry creature from his arm and held it out to her. “A grounded fairy. I cursed them by accident. My first act of magic. I actually killed them, but Honiea worked an amazing spell and brought them back in this form. She called them Life Givers because they will regain their wings if they bring someone back from the dead. I am going to give this one its opportunity with Norton. Will you give this grounded fairy an opportunity to love you?”

  “I….I…” Rashel could not bring another thought to mind for a long moment, with his pleading eyes unhinging her. “You cannot be happy with someone like me. I’m just a simple person. I would never be able to keep up. This farm and Nevai, that’s all I need. I’m rooted here.”

  “Then that’s where you’ll be. I could marry you here. My home is fine here. I know we can be happy here. I don’t have to go Seeking. I could stay and love you and our child, and the world would grow old all around us, and I would be content. Please, Rashel.”

  She set her hand gently against his lips to stay his pleading. “How will you deny magic when it brought us together? When it brought Nevai to us? When we acknowledge that we love each other because the magic made it so? If you do not water your garden, you cannot expect plants to spring up with fruit. You will need magic like a plant needs water. It’s in your blood.”

  Yeolani shook his head, unwilling to listen to that logic. “I’ve resisted using magic before, and with you in my life, it would be so much easier. Besides, too often with my magic I’ve made a bigger mess of things. It’s better that I not overdo. I need you to balance me, keep me from foolish, flashy spells. No one should ever be a magician alone.”

  “Yes,” she countered. “But I cannot be with you always. I will fade. You will last forever, like a great oak, and I am only a daisy, withering in days. All the Life Givers you have will not keep me from passing. And it will become obvious to the townsfolk. You will have to leave me before I look old enough to be your mother.”

  “I will never leave you,” he promised and felt the shimmering of his clothing changing. “I will hold your hand until you cannot any longer….”

  But unbidden, he saw in her mind’s eye an image of them together in sixty years. He looked no different than he did now, still an exuberant twenty-two. And she, with silver and white hair, still in long braids, but with wrinkles on her weathered skin, hunched with age, and her eyes watery and dim. The older Rashel leaned her head in exhaustion against his shoulder and then slumped into a long sleep. He brushed his hand over her wispy hair in the vision and felt the breaking of his heart once again.

  “Do not swear,” Rashel whispered. “I will not let you break your heart twice. Once is enough.”

  Yeolani looked at this wonderful girl, so determined to set him free, and realized he could not win. She would refuse him for his own sake.

  “Your answer is no?” he whispered in finality.

  “I love you too much to let you make that sacrifice,” sighed Rashel. She pulled back, trying to be clinical and cold like Honiea. “I will recover from the heartbreak. We only have to decide how we will take care of Nevai and the farm and…and how I will fare. It’s best this way.”

  At those painful, truthful words, Yeolani felt an ache in the back of his throat. With all the magic at his disposal, he could not change her mind. That lesson of the coin had not prepared him for this bitter truth.

  With a shuddering breath, Yeolani managed to match her detachment as best as he could. “I’ll wipe Norton’s memory and bring him back so you don’t have to worry about accusations. We can sign over the ownership of the farm to you
and insist that the town allows you to stay…stay where you’re rooted. I’ll leave you all the gold you need, and you can buy fodder rather than worry about planting each year. The spell to milk the cows will last as long as the barn is upright. See that it keeps mended. Eventually, if you find someone else, you might just make a habit of seeing that the cows aren’t in their stalls at dusk. He need never know there’s magic in the milking.”

  “And Nevai?”

  Yeolani’s voice almost broke, and he had to draw on the memory of the cold cavern’s lake before he went on. “He’s yours. You are right. Being raised by a tornado or in the middle of a herd of buffalo is no life for a baby. Perhaps, when he’s old enough, I’ll come and teach him some of the things boys need to learn, so he knows he has a father. And I’ll look in on him…I will…”

  “Please, do not swear,” she interrupted him. “He’ll need a father.”

  “Yes, and you can find someone and fall in love and give him a fitting father. Find yourself someone who can be your equal, though there cannot be another person in the world that is worthy of you. You are….”

  “A milkmaid,” she reminded him.

  “Don’t put yourself down, miss. It’s unbecoming,” he echoed, and she smiled sadly at his admonishment. Then he continued. “Shall I wipe your memory too? It would ease your way.”

  Rashel looked away from him, turning to Norton’s corpse just to have some way to remain impassive. “No, I need to remember. You’re a part of me now. How else will I know where Nevai came from. I need to remember because you are the most beautiful thing that has come into my life; a rose in a field of daisies. I want to remember that, and someday, it won’t hurt. For those of us will die, the pain will fade too. All I’ll really hold on to are the happy memories.”