Leaf and Branch (New Druids Series Vol 1 & 2)

by Donald D. Allan

  In a moment, we stood outside the pen and watched a couple of dozen sheep wander around. I could see no pattern in the movement of the animals. All I could sense were their desires and that they knew Dog was nearby. They weren't alarmed. They just felt that something about their life would change with Dog there. That was about it.

  I looked at Katherine. She was looking the sheep over and I could see a frown on her face. "What's the matter, Katherine?"

  "That one over there? The one with the little bit of black by the tail? She's not getting at the fresh grass as much as she would like."

  "Why?"

  "The others are being mean. That's why."

  "Can you tell them to stop?"

  "I already did. They will but I need to watch them. You can't trust sheep. They forget too easily." Katherine laughed. "I told them Dog would get after them if they cheated. Now they can't keep their eyes off him. Dog thinks that is really funny. So do I."

  I nodded. "What you do is remarkable."

  "Huh?"

  "The draoi could never do what you do. Did you know that? I asked Nadine about it. We searched the manuscript, too. There is no mention of draoi communicating with animals the way you do."

  "Can you not hear Dog? He talks to you all the time."

  "He does?" I looked at Dog and knelt down. He came up to me and licked my face. "I'm sorry, Dog. I can sense you. We've shared images but not words."

  "Silly. They don't speak words! They send images. That's what I do. Images."

  "Ah," I said. "I have done that with Dog. But not with horses and sheep."

  "Really? Well I suppose that makes sense. It's harder with sheep. They aren't very smart. They imagine all sorts of things all the time so it's hard to get them to pay attention. Cows are the same. Horses are super easy. And pigs. Really easy. Chickens — forget about it. Cats hear you but don't care. Very rude animals in my opinion. Sometimes I just have to push harder, you know?"

  "Yes, I think I do. That's remarkable, Katherine. You have a gift that has never been seen before."

  "What does that mean?"

  "It means that how we teach the draoi needs to change."

  A couple of hours later Nadine found me sitting alone in the kitchen. I had followed her moving through the house with our bond and let her know where I was. I had just finished with Agnes and removed some of her pain and symptoms. She was asleep now and resting. Her condition was not any better. I couldn't see any way to make it better for her and I was disheartened. I wanted to be the healer she needed but there was only so much I could do. Nadine felt my sorrow and came to find me. She sat across from me and poured tea from the pot I had made into a cup I had placed where she now sat. She took a sip and murmured appreciatively.

  "That's good."

  "Thanks," I replied.

  "Franky and Anne?"

  "I don't know. Somewhere. Not here. It's quiet. Reminds me of your house when it gets like this."

  Nadine smiled. "Our house. How's Agnes?"

  "Not much better, I'm afraid. I can only do so much for her. I think my estimate of her time left is wrong. She hasn't much time left."

  Nadine nodded in agreement and reached out and snatched up a cookie from the tray in the middle of the table. She took a bite and grimaced. "Not yours?"

  "No, Katherine's. They're for Dog."

  "Oh," she said and placed the remains of her cookie on the table. "So, what's bothering you, love?"

  "Everything."

  "Care to explain?"

  "I'm trying to figure it all out. Gaea says come here and train the new draoi that are soon to come here. It's been months and no one. And I worry that we can't do it. The manuscript is a good start, I'll admit. But there is more happening here."

  "More? Why do you say that?"

  "Take Katherine for example. Her powers are not the same as yours and mine."

  "She just needs to learn how to use them better."

  "No, that's not right, love. She already does. Better than you and I in some ways. I don't think she needs to be taught. I think she will be one of our teachers."

  Nadine looked at me in alarm. "How can you believe that? She can't sense anything through her bond. It's as if she is weak, or stunted, like I was. How can you expect her to teach others?"

  "She has a different power, Nadine. I'm sure of that. We were just looking at her through our own abilities. Hers are different."

  "Different? In what way?"

  "She bonds with animals. All animals. Not equally but it appears to be connected with the animals' ability to reason. The smarter the animal the easier time she has of it."

  "With animals? Not people? That's her power?"

  "Yes. She does it like breathing. It's natural for her. She is an expert on animals."

  "Are you sure? I admit she's great with the horses and Dog. But how can you think she can teach that?"

  "I don't, actually. It's just my instinct telling me I'm right. Nadine, I don't think Gaea is giving her powers to the draoi the way she used to. The way you were used to. I don't expect you to believe me just yet, but I'll know for sure when the others show up. The manuscript talks about the three powers: Vision, Sense and Influence. But it talks about them in ways that the draoi use them to commune with nature and other draoi. It explains how we can reach into people and heal them. And understand what they are feeling. With Katherine, it is different. She has those same powers but they work for her with animals much more strongly than with people. You and I work with people, she works with animals."

  Nadine pondered that for a moment. "Let's say you are right. How does that change things?"

  I was very proud of her at that moment. I had expected an argument but instead she was open to listening. I pressed on with more confidence. "Well, it changes how the draoi will need to be taught, Nadine. You and I can't help other draoi that don't share our same abilities. It would be like a farmer trying to explain how to seed to a blacksmith. A little would get through but their abilities are too different to make a significant difference. Like the blind leading the blind. That's not all, though. I think there will be many kinds of draoi. Draoi who work with plants in ways that have never been seen before. I told you about the oak tree when I was captured?" Nadine nodded. "It ignored me but I could sense it as a conscious being. There will be draoi that will be able to speak to plants as easy as you and I talk to one another — or like how Katherine talks to animals."

  "You can, though. Talk to animals and plants. You admitted as much."

  "True, but only a little bit. I'm a healer, Nadine. I can sense how a body works and functions. I can see the intricacies of bodily function and make improvements. Correct problems."

  Nadine sipped her tea. "And me? What powers do I have that make me unique?" I could sense she wanted it to be something wonderful.

  I looked at her. "You and I are alike, Nadine. We share the same power. Our bond makes it so. It is why our bond is the way it is. We strengthen one another. We..." I stopped talking as a thought came to me. "Follow me," I said, suddenly excited, and grabbed her hand and dragged her out of the kitchen.

  "Will! What are you doing?" Nadine allowed herself to be pulled into the front room. We stopped in front of Agnes and watched her sleeping peacefully.

  "Help me, Nadine," I whispered, careful not to wake Agnes. "Together we might be able to help her. Combine our strengths."

  "Together?" she whispered back. "It doesn't work that way, Will."

  "Yes, it does. I'm sure of it," I said. "Try it with me."

  I led the way into Agnes with my senses. Nadine followed me travelling through our bond. We had done this before when we had slept together and made love. We had joined into something powerful and nearly lost ourselves. I felt her resistance. Her fear and longing competed and stopped her from joining with me. Shh, hon, I said to her through our bond. Trust me in this. Look where I look and help me. She resisted again but, at my urging, she allowed herself to join closer with me until we became one throug
h the bond. We were lost for a moment as our hearts sang out to one another. The joining was full of such joy. Two souls joined for a single purpose. I nearly wept with the happiness that flooded me. To not be alone. To share your heart with someone who loves you so unconditionally back gave me such hope and strength. I could lose myself in her. So great was my joy that I released my resistance. This woman was the centre of my world. To lose myself in her would be such a great victory. I gave myself willingly to her and felt her do the same with me.

  A great light filled my senses and a loud peal of pure sound overwhelmed all my remaining senses. I turned within myself and found myself holding both of Nadine's hands. I saw her then in all her beauty and flaws. My heart exploded with my love and a smile burst across my face. We spoke no words - we merely stared at one another - lost in the moment. We stayed that way for an eternity before I remembered, with effort, why we had joined. It was easy once we remembered what we were doing. We were not lost in one another. We merely basked in the joy of the joining. I sensed a wicked delight from Nadine and knew our next love making was going to be amazing. Our vision cleared and together we turned our attention outward to Agnes.

  We examined Agnes and saw immediately where her disease lay rooted. It was deep within her cells. The damage was locked inside a strange twisted pattern that made her who she was. The pattern duplicated itself within all her cells: replicating and dividing, a great constant in her design. We examined it and saw the flaw that lay within. Her body fought a losing battle against the error. We sensed where the problem lay and struggled to find a way to reverse it. We saw what needed to be done and then we hesitated. We waited to feel the warning pain that came with the intent to cause harm to another. Gaea set those boundaries in our power and punished those who broke it. We were afraid that this would be considered harm. We were about to fundamentally change who Agnes was. We could change her hair colour, her skin colour, her height and even her sex if we wanted. We held within us the power to make great change. We felt a warning then from Gaea and instead returned our focus to the damage we had identified. The warning faded and bolstered, we reached out tentatively, joined in our power and focus, and made the small correction to one of her cells. It was like instructions that had been written wrong. We erased the error and rewrote what we felt it should be. It was beyond rational thought. It was instinct and we could no more fight it than we could fight falling out of a tree. Together we had a focus of intent that we lacked as one. We halted again and waited to feel our punishment. When nothing happened we felt vindicated and the pressing need to heal this poor woman and we pressed on to other cells and fixed the problem there. Much like how I dealt with the motes in Jaipers, we pulled back and took in the error as a whole. Like holding hands, we merged our power and made the change in a single burst of will. A flash of light crossed our vision and we opened our eyes and looked down on Agnes.

  She slept, unaware of the change we had made. We examined her for a time and discovered nothing negative. We traced her disease and found it had been eradicated. We had healed her — together. We slowly pulled apart until we stood as two people again and looked at one another. A single tear slipped down Nadine's cheek and she pulled me close to hug me.

  "Oh, Will," she cried against my chest. "That was beautiful. We healed her, didn't we?"

  "Yes, my love," I whispered. "We did." Possibilities opened up in front of me and I felt hope for the first time.

  Seth Farlow sat on horseback looking down at the farm and the little ants that were people who worked it. On top of the rise he could overlook most of the farm, but it was his bloodstone in his hand that turned his focus to the farmhouse. He had watched the Target talking to a new demon and then disappearing inside the house. He had watched the house for an hour and saw no others. He could sense that three demons lived in the house. Already they are spreading, he thought. From one small coin lay the seed to their growth. They will spread like cancer across the Realm, devouring all that lay in their path until nothing remains.

  He twisted his back a little and felt the fresh scabs break and blood trickled down his spine. He was whipping himself at dawn and dusk now. Trying to purge his sins from his body. He had failed in Jaipers. He had allowed Bairstow and the Reeve to flee. His fear had taken hold of him and he had lost reason for a time. It was only when one of his Sect members had shown him the note hidden in the leathers of the Reeve that he had calmed. The note led him here to this large farm outside Jergen. He had arrived two days ago and watched and noted the movements of the farmhands and the demons. They would all have to die for knowingly harbouring demons. That was the law of the Purge. A law he was more than happy to enforce.

  A smell of rot on the breeze turned his attention to his horse. It no longer breathed or had a need for feed or water. Flesh fell from its ribs exposing them. It was surprisingly maggot free. Seth had expected swarms of insects to follow him but, oddly enough, even the insects stayed clear. He wasn't certain how it still lived or moved. He was somehow giving it strength with his powers and he enjoyed the feeling. He leeched power from nature all around him and fed the horse that energy. His men recoiled from it and he felt their fear. He had been forced to show them what real fear looked like and now they obeyed without question.

  Encouraged by his horse, he had raised one of the fallen men in the square in Jaipers. He had been with the men that had come with Brent Bairstow: one of his officers who had bled out on the ground. The man did what he commanded him to do with his mind. He fed him power as he did his horse. Seeing what he could do, Seth had raised all his fallen Sect members and he controlled them with very little thought. It was written in the bible that the dead would rise and now they did. It was Judgement Day. God willed it. A titter of excited laughter escaped his lips and Seth pressed them together to silence himself. His eyes danced with glee and he remembered how strong he felt when the men had risen from the blood-soaked ground.

  He had wanted to raze Jaipers. His Sect brothers had convinced him to leave it. It had been a close thing. They said the townspeople had been ignorant of all that had happened within the walls, that none knew what had happened there. It had been a difficult choice but Seth was satisfied that coming here was the most urgent of his duties. So he left Jaipers untouched but now regretted that decision. They harboured demons. Whether they knew or not, they should have known. That is death. I would see Jaipers burned to the ground. I will return to make that so.

  So much had happened. He felt out of control at times. The sight of Brent Bairstow with the symbol of the Church of the New Order blazing from his forehead into the dim light of the common house had frightened him beyond reason and a vision of that returned to him in his dreams. He doubted himself now and blamed Brent for it. He finally saw reason and saw the error of his doubt. The demons were good at deceiving people. They thrived on deception. They offered temptation and Seth now knew he was not immune to their power. He had been deceived by Brent. It shamed him and hence his increased self-flagellation.

  He had gathered his people in Jaipers and rode hard for the farm. He called on the other Sect members in the area with his bloodstone and they responded. His stone drew them like moths to a flame. Down below in the farmstead lay the strongest of the remaining demons. He would rout them and burn them alive. They were the last. He would return to the Archbishop and declare the plight eradicated and seek absolution.

  The Archbishop could then return the land to the Church and replace the Lord Protector with the bastard son of the late King he had hidden in Jergen. He would be a glorious King and reign with the law of the Church behind him. People needed to be returned to the way of the pious and religion gave them atonement for their many sins. The Word would be destroyed. Struck down and demolished. Burned from the histories and banished forever.

  Behind him, he had over fifty men gathered in the nearby woods. Tonight he would anoint them all and ready them spiritually for battle. Tomorrow morning while it was still dark, he would strike and
bring victory to the Church.

  He turned his horse with a thought and returned to the woods.

  Forty-Four

  Rigby Farm, 900 A.C.

  THE SOUND OF horses whinnying outside in the stables woke me up from a deep slumber. A sense of dread descended on me and I quickly shook Nadine beside me. A faint cry from the farm outbuildings came to my ear and I turned to my vision. I looked out through the walls of the house to the outside. All around the house figures crept. Most stood out with a red shimmering aura. Some had no auras and they horrified me. They were more not there than there. My eyes slid off them and I fought to pierce through to what they were. Nadine sat upright and I felt her vision join mine.

  We scanned the entire farm area. About two dozen figures, both with red auras and missing auras closed in on the house and some were already inside the barn and stables. Their intent was clear. With a pulse Nadine and I woke the others across the farm. We didn't know we could do that until we tried. The pulse woke the farmhands and Katherine's family in an instant. Cries filled the air and I knew then that we were under attack. The Sect had found us and fear stabbed our hearts.

  I felt Katherine reach out to the horses. There was a moment of silence from the stables and then screams of fear erupted from the attackers. I grimaced and tried not to think about horses intelligently fighting back against aggressors. Hopefully, the horse will be okay, I thought and rose from the bed.

  "We are under attack," I whispered needlessly to Nadine. She nodded and grasped my hand. We crept to the top of the stairs and waited. We saw Franky appear at the bottom of the stairs and look up at us. She gripped a long dagger in each hand. Ben joined us and, in a moment, so did Agnes. Ben carried a well-used short sword in his right hand. A leather jerkin had been pulled over his head and offered protection to his chest, back, and abdomen. Agnes carried a beautiful longbow and a quiver bristling with long arrows. One arrow was held by two fingers and nocked to the bowstring. The arrowhead was steel and barbed and it glinted in the moonlight coming through the house windows. They glanced at Nadine and I and nodded with a grim look to their faces.