“Why?” Ash tried to picture this strange custom.
“To bless them and keep them healthy.”
Cíana nodded. “And all the fires in all the houses are doused and then relit from the Bealtaine fire.”
She pointed to a clump of tiny purple flowers and led them over.
“Let’s pick these. Comfrey is on the list. Be sure to get the roots.”
Ash dropped to her knees and dug. She placed the flowers in a woven bag Diarmit carried over his shoulders.
On and on they walked, collecting the things on Neela’s list. They crossed a stream, Diarmit and Cíana stepping on stones to stay out of the water, while Ash splashed through.
“Don’t your feet hurt?” Diarmit looked down at Ash’s bare feet.
“No. I have never worn shoes.”
“Not even in winter?”
Ash giggled. “Badgers don’t wear shoes.”
Diarmit grinned. “You could have made little shoes for them.”
They all laughed as they pictured this.
“I wish we could meet your clan,” Cíana said.
Ash sobered. It had now been more than three cycles of the moon since she had left them. “I do, as well.”
“What’s left for us to find?” Diarmit asked, rubbing his stomach. “I could eat a whole cow.”
Cíana consulted her list. “We need only mushrooms.”
They stopped abruptly at the sound of something large moving through the forest. Ash held her breath as an enormous antler appeared around a stand of trees, an antler so broad she could have lain upon it with room to spare, the prongs as big around as her good leg. The three of them looked up into the eyes of an elk, the largest four-leg Ash had ever seen. She had seen other deer and elk, but none like this. His shoulder stood higher than she could reach, and his hooves were as big as her head. He saw them and stopped, sniffing the air, his black nose quivering.
“Greetings.” Ash stepped forward and inclined her head.
The elk inclined his as well. “Greetings, small one. I am Ríordán.”
“I am Ash. These are my companions, Cíana and Diarmit.” She gestured back toward them.
Cíana and Diarmit stood, looking puzzled.
“You are all here to learn from your elders?” Ríordán asked.
“Yes.”
“And you speak to us?”
“Yes.”
He lowered his great head, and the shadow of his immense antlers shut out the sunlight filtering through the trees. “Ash? That is not your true name.”
“I do not know my true name.” She reached out and laid a hand on his jaw as he nuzzled her scars.
He raised his head and surveyed them once again. “Until next time, Ash. I think, by then, you will know your true name.”
He walked on, leaving the three humans dumbstruck.
“What did he say?” Cíana whispered.
“His name is Ríordán. He… he asked if we were here to learn.” Ash watched him disappear. She didn’t know why, but she did not wish to share the other things he had said.
“He’s a giant elk,” Diarmit said in a hushed voice. “We thought they only existed in the songs and tales told around the fire. No one has seen one, not for ages and ages. And you talked to one!”
A loud grumbling sounded from the direction of Diarmit’s stomach.
“Mushrooms. I saw some back this way.” Cíana led the way.
Ash followed, turning once to look back in the direction Ríordán had gone.
By the time they got back to the village, preparations were well underway for Bealtaine. Gai and the others had already returned. They took their finds to Neela, who thanked them.
“What took you all day?” Gai asked.
Diarmit looked up from where he was stuffing his face with an oatcake. “We met a giant elk. Ash talked to him.”
Neela looked over at these words. “You met Ríordán?”
Ash nodded.
Gai came nearer. “And he spoke to you?”
Ash nodded again.
“He honored you,” Neela said. “We rarely see him or his mate, Osán. It’s always a great thing when they come to our part of the forest.”
Gai looked at Ash. “What did he say?”
“He told me his name and asked if we were being taught by our elders,” she said.
Neela watched her for a moment but remained silent.
They all spent the remainder of the day preparing for the celebration. Even Timmin joined in the preparations. Ash found the others’ enthusiasm contagious and was soon looking forward to nightfall.
The sun settled far beyond the trees, and the sky was turning a deep indigo. A feast was laid out on a long table: roasted venison and last year’s parsnips and carrots, different kinds of breads and cakes, asparagus drizzled with cream, cheeses and berries. Ash tried some of everything. She laughed as she saw Diarmit trying to balance two plates piled high with food.
Night had fallen completely as they finished feasting. The torches were doused, and the four elders gathered around the bonfire pit, positioning themselves at the compass points. As one, they raised their staffs and magically ignited the wood piled there, the flames roaring high into the dark. The elders chanted in a language Ash did not understand, sprinkling handfuls of herbs and plants into the fire. The air shimmered and her skin tingled. The atmosphere felt charged, as it did during a thunderstorm. She could feel the power of all those gathered, building on itself. The village had no cattle or sheep to bless, but the elders blessed the apprentices, all ten of them, wrapping their heads in garlands of wildflowers.
“Like a crown!” Cíana said.
Ash did not know what a crown was, but she reached up to touch the flowers adorning her own head. Cíana was beautiful, with her golden hair and her flowers. Gai was beautiful, as well. The flowers on his dark head glowed, as did his pale face. Méav and Ronan and the others looked again like gods. Even Diarmit seemed to shine with an inner light. They joined hands with the elders and were led in a circle around the bonfire. Cíana laughed and twirled Ash around and, for a little while, Ash felt as whole and beautiful as the others.
After dancing a while, Ash backed away from the circle of light cast by the fire and sat, breathless, as the shadows of those still gathered around the fire danced over her.
Enat approached, holding a torch lit from the bonfire. “Come. It is time we went home. Tonight, you shall have your name.”
Enat used the torch to light the fire when they got back to their cottage. She gestured to Ash to sit as she murmured more words and tossed more flowers into the fire. She filled the kettle and swung it over the flames before sitting next to Ash.
“When you spiritwalk in your sleep, do you ever recall where you’ve been?”
“Usually, I am back in my forest with Broc and Cuán and the others,” Ash said.
“Do your spiritwalks ever take you to places with other humans?” Enat reached for a few bowls of dried leaves and herbs, and sprinkled some of each into the water in the kettle. She stirred the mixture.
Ash thought. “Sometimes, I can almost see a gathering of people. But it all fades, like smoke, as soon as I wake. I cannot hold it.”
Enat nodded. She filled a cup from the kettle and held it out. “Drink all of this. It will help you to sleep deeply. Then I will guide you on a spiritwalk to find the answers you seek. Bealtaine is a good night for this. Your power is great on this night.”
Ash took the cup and drank. It was bitter, and she made a face as it went down. Enat led her to her sleeping mat and placed stones and crystals on her forehead, her chest, her belly, and then covered her. “These will help you on your journey.”
“How long will this take?”
Enat smiled. “As long as it takes.” She laid a hand on Ash’s shoulder. “Sleep, child. I will not leave you until you wake.”
Ash felt certain she would not be able to sleep with Enat sitting over her, but the potion she had drunk began to work almos
t immediately. She felt as if her body were drifting slightly above her mat. She thought how odd it was that she could look down on her sleeping self with Enat sitting beside her, humming a low, calming tune. She turned and wandered out the cottage’s door.
Immediately, she was surrounded by fog so thick she could see nothing. She kept walking, following a path only just visible in front of her, as if it was forming itself, step by step, leading her to some unknown destination. She reached out to touch the mist, but it parted before her hand, always just out of reach. Trusting that Enat would not allow her to come to harm, Ash followed the path. She walked for she knew not how long and, suddenly, the mist cleared.
She was standing on the outskirts of a village obscured, not by mist, but by smoke. She gasped as she saw that it had been plundered. The remains of buildings burned, and bodies lay everywhere, pools of blood lying dark beneath them. The vacant eyes of some stared up at a sky they would never again see. Others lay with their faces pressed to the earth, hidden from Ash’s sight. She stepped warily among them, wondering why she was here. She heard a whimper and turned toward the sound. Something small writhed on the edge of one of the smoldering dwellings. She started at unexpected movement from the edge of the forest.
Broc.
Transfixed, Ash watched as Broc approached the squirming thing on the ground, and she understood. This was the night Broc saved her. She watched Broc drag her from the fire, wincing as she saw the raw, burned flesh on her face and arm and leg. She raised a hand to her own face.
“Broc?”
But Broc could not hear her. This was not a normal spiritwalk. Ash understood that she was an observer here. She watched Cuán and the sisters come to Broc, listened to them, watched them retrieve the shield and the cloak and drag her away to the sett.
The mist came again, and Ash was again led along a path she could not see. This time, when the mist cleared, Ash stood on the outskirts of a village that was whole and undamaged. It took a moment before she realized it was the same village.
Fascinated, she walked among them, unseen, as the villagers laughed and worked. The men had brought down a deer and were butchering it a distance away, portioning some to each household. The women were tending their babes and grinding flour and mending clothes as they watched the older children.
This village was much like the one she had watched from the safety of the woods when she lived with the badgers, the one where she and the dogs had worked together to get food. The badgers could not have dragged her so very far, and she suddenly wondered if the village that knew her as the ghost-child had been rebuilt on the same location as the one she had been rescued from.
She heard a woman’s voice and turned. There stood a woman with hair the color of a fox, long and flowing gently about her shoulders. She was laughing as she held a small girl with hair the same color as her mother’s, struggling to get down out of her arms. She set the child down and watched as she toddled about on unsteady legs. Nearby, a man sat, sharpening a scythe with a stone and smiling at her.
“No, you don’t,” the woman said as the girl immediately made for a nearby dog, grabbing at its tail. She produced a small doll made of cloth. “Here, Caymin, play with this.”
Ash’s hands flew to her face.
Enat sat quietly, allowing herself to fall into a kind of waking trance. Occasionally, Ash twitched as she wandered in her sleep. Though she could not see what Ash saw, she felt the girl’s emotions as she progressed along her spiritwalk, felt her horror followed by joy. Then, she felt nothing for a while but waited patiently. Time in the spirit world did not move at the same pace as time here. There was a shift, and Enat became more alert. The girl had reached her destination.
She roused herself and kept a closer eye on Ash as she lay there. There was a surge of emotion, and she saw a tear leak from the corner of the girl’s eye.
Enat clasped her hands together and pressed them to her lips as she whispered a prayer of thanks.
Enat was asleep when Ash woke. Silently, she got to her feet and crept from the cottage. The night was still dark and moonless, but Ash did not need light. Sure-footed as she had been when she lived with her clan, she strode through the forest. To all she encountered, she reached out with a reassurance. On and on she walked, as she had in her spiritwalk, not sure where she was going, but confident that she would know when she arrived.
Through the canopy of the trees, the stars watched her as she made her way. She knew that the animals of the night marked her progress as well.
As she walked, she tried to recall every detail of the things she had seen, afraid they might disappear as regular spiritwalks usually did, but this one had been different, and she soon realized she would never forget the one she’d had this night. Her mother. She had seen her mother and father. Memories she hadn’t known she possessed flooded her, and her eyes filled with tears. Memories of being held and sung to, memories of her father, laughing as he carried her on his shoulders.
She came at last to a clearing in the forest, a clearing with a circle of ancient stones, some standing, connected by stone lintels laid upon them. Others of the stones had collapsed, their lintels fallen. All were covered in moss.
This place was old, older than any place Ash had ever been. She felt the power emanating from the stones as she stepped inside the circle and stood, her face to the sky, her arms held wide.
“I am Caymin.”
Back at the cottage, Enat sat by the fire. She had awakened to find the girl gone, but she was not worried. A ripple of energy moved through the air, moved through the very earth. She lifted her head. Caymin. It suited her, but Enat knew her heart would always have a special place for the girl named Ash.
CHAPTER 8
An Arrow Through the Heart
For two days after Bealtaine, Caymin avoided being with the others. Enat let her be, allowing her time to walk in the forest or just sit quietly, lost in her thoughts.
“It is strange,” Caymin confided. “I feel exactly the same and completely different – all in one. How is that?”
“Not so strange,” Enat said. “You’re the same as you’ve always been, but you know something about yourself now that you never knew before. That’s bound to change how you see yourself.”
“Will it change how others see me?”
Enat considered. “It may. You are no longer the nameless orphan, raised by badgers.”
Caymin frowned. “But I do not wish to leave my badger family behind, as if they never existed.”
“No.” Enat smiled. “You will now have two families to think on. You are blessed to have been loved by both.”
That thought warmed Caymin as she walked through the forest. She came to a stream and crouched down. Moving her hand in a circle over the current, she murmured a calming charm and a portion of the water became as still as ice. She was pleased to notice that she felt almost no energy leave her. Leaning over the water, she gazed at her reflection. She nearly didn’t recognize the face staring back at her. She had asked Enat to keep her hair short, cutting it every moon with her silver knife, but her face was rounder, fuller than it had been the first time she’d seen herself. Her leggings were shorter, so she knew she was growing. The scars, though, were the same. And always would be.
Beanna flew down and perched on her shoulder.
“Caymin, is it?”
“How did you know?” Caymin released the charm and the stream gurgled on its way. She got to her feet.
“The whole forest heard.” The crow tilted her head, looking at Caymin with her bright eye. “How did you find your name?”
“Enat guided me on a spiritwalk. I saw my village the night the badgers saved me, and then I saw my mother holding me. She called me by name.”
Beanna’s head bobbed up and down. “Powerful.”
Caymin thought about this. “It was powerful. A powerful memory.”
“No. I meant you.”
Caymin stopped so suddenly that Beanna had to flap her wings t
o keep her balance. “I do not understand.”
“There is strong magic in this forest,” Beanna said. “Small things like the magic you have been learning, these do not affect the forest. But the night you claimed your name, all heard it. All felt it.”
“What does that mean?”
“I do not know, Caymin who was Ash. But it means something.”
Beanna pushed off from Caymin’s shoulder, cawing as she flew away.
When Caymin got back to the cottage, Enat was waiting for her. “Is it time?”
Caymin nodded. “It is.”
Enat held out a bowl of porridge. “Eat first. Would you like for me to go with you? To help you tell them?”
Caymin ate a couple of bites. “No. I am ready to tell them.”
“Very well. I’ll see you this evening.”
When Caymin got to the village, she found the others gathered with Neela and Ivar in the meetinghouse.
“Welcome back, Caymin,” Neela said with a nod.
“Sit here.” Cíana slid over on the bench to make room.
Caymin sat and could feel the curious glances of the others as Ivar continued talking about how to create a summoning spell.
“It’s similar to levitating something,” he was saying. “But it takes more concentration to draw something to you. Of course, the greater the distance and the larger the object, the greater the strength it takes, so take care before you think about using this spell. Once you summon something, the spell will hold until the object comes to you, and if you deplete your energy in doing so, you will either have to draw from another source, or it will kill you.”
He called Daina forward to try summoning a scroll from the far end of the room. They watched as she frowned, muttering the words. For long heartbeats, nothing happened, but then the scroll slid off the shelf and moved through the air to her waiting hand. Daina looked around proudly as the others gasped and cheered. Diarmit tried next, screwing up his face as he tried.
Rising From the Ashes: The Chronicles of Caymin Page 8
