Standing in their places while the rest of the people melted back into the town, Drae Ghern spoke softly to the chief, but Kimi’s sharp ears heard his words and relayed them to Lydria. “His heart is hard, my son. He has seen the wielder’s power and it has taken a place within him. He needs to find a path under his own power, with his own strength. It is good that he goes now, for the spirits tell me, this journey will show him his true heart and bring him back to us. But when our daughters go into the wild, they must go by a different path.”
Lydria and Haidrea worked together for several more days preparing for their journey, and consulting Drae Ghern on the best path to find the legendary Haustis. Lydria’s magical strength continued to grow and she became skilled in basic tasks that, she thought, were no more useful than having the right equipment or skills. Each night she, Haidrea, and Kimi would join Drae Ghern to speak with the spirits and through these journeys Lydria began to understand how magic took a payment from wielders – sometimes physical, sometimes emotional – but always in relation to the difficulty of the task. A small task, practiced often, took less of a toll, just as a skill practiced often could be accomplished quickly and with ease, but not altogether without cost. But still, she felt, Nethyal was wrong to think it was such a great power. Other than healing, it seemed there was nothing she could do that Haidrea could not, given enough time.
On the night before their departure, Drae Ghern called his daughters and Kimi into his home. “We will prepare your bag. Bring out the old beaver and let us refill his body with items to take you on your journey and protect you.”
Lydria placed the bag gently on the ground between herself and Drae Ghern, carefully opening the gut laces that held it closed, and then took from another small pouch several items she had gathered. As she laid them in front of her, Drae Ghern chanted and moved around the room encompassing all the company in a circle as he did. Slowly, and reverentially, Lydria placed into the bag the feathered end of the arrow used to kill her father, and a thin white bone – her finger. Drae Ghern stopped chanting after the first item was placed in the bag.
“Aside from the stone, these are all I have,” Lydria said.
“I have something for you, daughter.” Drae Ghern smiled as he presented the pipe he had shared with Lydria during their first spirit journey together, and he gave her as well a small pouch of weed. The woman smiled and gripped Drae Ghern’s hand in thanks.
“The women of Eifynar have asked you to have this,” he said and brought out a small package wrapped in leaves. “It includes herbs and berries for healing. You have been a great help to us this last moon and the women would have you be spared from harm with the healing spirit to look over you. And there is one more thing, but I cannot say what it contains; it was left on my doorstep last evening.”
The final package was slightly larger than an acorn and wrapped in a finely detailed linen with images of trees and with beautiful curved lines worked around the edge. “It says, Lydria, friend of the Eifen, and Wielder,” said Drae Ghern. The old man added it to her possessions and sealed the bag with a short, low song.
The three humans and bobcat were silent for a moment as Lydria took the bag and placed it over her shoulder. “Father,” Lydria called Drae Ghern the name out of respect as he had called and treated her, like a daughter. “Nethyal believes my magic could be used as a weapon. How?”
Drae Ghern had his back to Lydria when she asked the question, and she could see his shoulders slump slightly with her last word. As he waited to respond, time in the room seemed to freeze. Haidrea and Kimi, who had been rising to go back to their own beds, froze as well to await the answer, for the question was theirs as well.
“Sit,” Drae Ghern said. It was unlike him to command in such a way, but it was not loud or demanding, but said with a tone and resolve that left no doubt as to his authority.
“This question I had hoped would not be asked of me, but of Haustis.” He turned to them and slowly sank to the floor, his old joints creaking with exertion. He sat with his head down and when he at last lifted his eyes, Lydria could see sadness in them. “I’m sorry, Father, I did not mean…”
“No. No, you are right to ask. I am a fool to have not told you more of what has been shown me. But I am not the right person … Haustis must be the one.”
“So, I can use magic as a weapon?” Lydria absently sent her message to Kimi though a quick look told them both that Haidrea was thinking the same.
Haidrea, who did not speak often of magic or question her grandfather, spoke quietly when she asked, “Grandfather, what have the spirits shown you?” The pleading quality of her voice convinced him to speak.
“The spirits have shown me light and darkness in such contrast that it can only be the work of magic. You said Wynter has a stone alike to yours, and the spirits tell me that he too, is capable of magic. Perhaps more so, for his heart is not well and it is unlikely he will use his magic to heal.”
“But if you can heal with little cost, what can he do…?” Kimi’s question made Lydria’s eyes widen and her heart race as her head snapped up to look at Drae Ghern.
“Kimi was wondering…”
“What Wynter is capable of?” Drae Ghern smiled again at the bobcat who lay across Lydria’s lap, his head up and staring at the old man. “Magic, as the spirits have shown me, has very few limits, Wielder, and I do not know what those limits might be. You may be able to fell an oak in the forest and build a lodge without moving. You may, as you have demonstrated, clean a deer, tan a hide, or make dried meat.”
“Or…” Lydria offered. She was almost certain what the final ‘or’ might bring, but she couldn’t be the one to say it.
“Or kill…,” offered Haidrea with a whisper. As she said the words, Drae Ghern bowed his head and muttered only, “perhaps.” The women could tell Drae Ghern hoped he was wrong.
“But what would that do to me?” Lydria asked. “The things I’ve done here have all had some effect on me, and they were small things. Killing is certainly no small thing?”
“I do not have the answers you seek, and the spirits do not provide them to me.” Drae Ghern lifted his head again and placed his palms on his knees and straightened his back and his arms, locking his elbows as if to hold himself up. “I believe there would be a price for such an act. A severe price. But I do not think it is the stone’s nature to destroy itself by destroying its possessor." He let the statement linger before continuing. "What have you noticed with your magic since you’ve arrived?”
Lydria thought, and instantly knew the answer. She shuddered, and Drae Ghern nodded gravely. “The more I do something, the easier it gets and the less of an effect it has on me,” she whispered, her voice barely audible in the stillness of the room. The realization of what they all knew, when held up against the terror of Wynter, made everyone pause.
Haidrea lifted her head to speak before Lydria’s breath had faded into the darkness that enveloped the house. Only the embers of a fire were visible, and they cast a heavy shadow across her sharp features. Finally, Drae Ghern’s granddaughter gave voice to their shared concern, “given enough time, a person with this power could kill with ease.”
“If they can kill. But, now at least, you understand why you must seek Haustis first,” Drae Ghern replied. “As long as Wynter walks the land, there will be no peace. His shadow will fall over all kingdoms, and all people until he is destroyed.”
“Would it not make sense, then, for me to prepare to fight him – like your warriors prepare, through practice?” Lydria was breathing faster and her voice rising in pitch. Kimi sent soothing thoughts to her to keep her calm. He faced her so the others would know he spoke to her.
“What would you do, Wielder? Kill for practice? For sport? Each creature in the forest does what he does best to survive. Not all creatures have claws and teeth. Some are fast, some fly high, some are cunning. Each uses the strengths he was given, and in this way, fights. Do not try to become that what you are not – tha
t is the surest path to defeat.”
Lydria took a deep breath and relayed Kimi’s message and then she thanked Drae Ghern and excused herself for the evening to do as her father had taught her – examine the options and then sleep. In the morning, along with Haidrea and Kimi, she would speak again with Drae Ghern and Wae Ilsit and leave the town and search for a legend.
TWELVE
Lydria and Haidrea left Eifynar the way they had come, heading back toward the crater. Haidrea knew the way as if she were walking to the house next door, and Kimi ran off ahead, as a silent scout, sending back word to the women of what the terrain held.
“There are rabbits here! Lots of rabbits.”
“Kimi is hunting again,” Lydria told her friend. “I don’t think he’s going to be much use to us until he’s full.”
“He is embracing his nature. Bobcats are very cunning and rarely the prey for others, yet they happily indulge in everything from mice to animals many times their size. He is small, yet he is, in his way, formidable.” Haidrea surprised Lydria by saying so much in a single breath.
“You are talkative today,” Lydria teased.
“Kimi is ahead of us and I trust his instincts and his senses more than my own. I have no doubt if he hears or smells anything, you would know right away.”
“If he isn’t thinking about food.”
“Grandfather and I have had many long talks about the animals in the forest and your connection to Kimi; Grandfather has wondered if you might be able to take part in his senses if you wished.”
Lydria could tell Haidrea was not sure if she believed her grandfather, but given Lydria’s other talents, she was willing to accept the possibility. “Have you spoken with Kimi about it?”
Lydria smiled and told Haidrea of her experience seeing through Kimi’s eyes at the ceremony with the warriors.
Haidrea stopped. She didn’t seem surprised by the admission, but she sounded concerned as she spoke to Lydria. “You walk away from a destroyed forest, turn back a man who would kill you, speak with the forest animals, move objects with a thought, and now you say you can see through his eyes as well. Does this gift, too, have a price your body must pay?”
Haidrea’s question receded as Lydria kept walking, only stopping as Haidrea’s voice finally tailed off through the trees.
“No.” She turned to look at Haidrea who was walking toward her again. “No, there wasn’t. It requires some concentration, but the connection takes nothing from me.” Lydria paused and explained to her friend how the world looked through Kimi’s eyes, as if everyone were different, with less color, but more distinctiveness. “If anything, I think I felt better when I was finished, but I didn’t really give it any thought.”
“You must give all of your efforts thought from now on,” Haidrea admonished. “You have a power without equal, and you must make yourself aware of it, and be the one who holds the reins, lest it control you.”
Lydria smiled and impulsively reached out to hug her friend, who at that time sounded so very much like the old shaman. Kimi chose that time to bound back toward them, hurtling through the trees, the mottled fur of his snout stained a dark red. He stopped several feet from them along their path, and ran a paw across his nose, alternately licking it and wiping away the blood of lunch.
“You can see through my eyes, and I believe you could hear through my ears and even taste that delicious rabbit, and not quite so filling squirrel I just ate. But I would discourage it.” Lydria relayed the message and then turned her head toward the cat again, who spoke before she could verbalize her next question. “When you look through my eyes, I am … not blind, but nearly so; I cannot see clearly, as if I were looking at things under water.” Kimi said no more but wandered over to Haidrea and rubbed his head across the woman’s buckskin trousers. “She smells like a herd of deer and it makes me hungry.”
Lydria watched Haidrea scratch Kimi behind the ears and laughed. The bobcat was still a kitten and just as playful. With his stomach full, he might allow himself to be scratched for hours.
Soon they were walking again and Haidrea was more alert, her spear held as Lydria had seen it when they first met and her eyes glancing at the ground. She whispered Lydria’s name and held her hand to signal a stop. Kimi, fluid and silent back amongst the thinning trees, continued forward and moved south of the pair, staying in denser forest.
“Kimi says you have seen something?” Lydria whispered, crouched on one knee behind a small birch watching Haidrea examine the ground around her.
“We are fortunate the rains have not come yet,” Haidrea said, her voice rising to a more normal level. “Come, see. You can still make out the prints of a small person’s booted foot.”
Lydria was impressed. Her father had been a reasonable tracker and she learned a little from him of the subtle signs to look for when searching for the passage of others – bent tree branches, scratches on bark, crushed leaves and, of course, prints. But on his best day Cargile would never have spotted what Haidrea casually observed. Only when she pointed them out by circling them with her finger, did Lydria see them, and even then, not clearly. They were, Haidrea insisted, made after the rains several days earlier and had dried into their shape making them an easy track to spot for someone who knew what to look for. “Whoever it was, is lightly encumbered and in no hurry,” Haidrea said, looking at once to Lydria, and unconsciously shifting her spear to a defensive position.
“Do you think we should be worried of a single person traveling through the forest?” Lydria’s attempt to not sound worried came out instead as deeply concerned.
“Lydria, tell Haidrea I think whoever it is, it is not Wynter,” Kimi said and bounded off to the west.
The two women ran ahead, their worry lessened by Kimi’s frenetic passage through the thickening ground cover. Lydria followed Haidrea, who picked the best paths and easily moved among the rocks and tree roots. As they traveled the trees thinned noticeably and the light became brighter, until they stood along the edge of the forest where piles of trees and earth led to the trench and the crater. To the west of the crater, Kimi lay upon a small pile of stones, one of several that had been placed recently judging by the damp lines still visible on rocks indicating they had only recently pulled from the ground.
Haidrea moved toward the crater while Lydria went to Kimi. “Those are graves,” she noted quickly, and she saw her father’s remains had been moved from where she had last seen them. Moving toward the bobcat and the burial mounds, she noticed a crushed helmet placed on top of one of the stones. It was her father’s. She had more than once mended the leather straps that lined the metal, and hefting its weight, she moved as if to put it on, and stopped as the faint but still familiar odor of her father raced into her nose, silencing all her thoughts. Holding the mangled metal in front of her face she felt a wave of grief as the smell of oil and leather brought back a flood of memories from her childhood in the army camps, running to her father after a battle, or learning how to inspect a weapon or piece of armor.
She did not cry, but her lip trembled as she thought of his face amongst the dirt and stones and trees with an arrow shaft sticking out of his throat. Lydria started to place the helmet on the rocks of her father’s grave and hesitated. Holding her palm to the inside of the helmet and pushing, a white light left her hand and poured from the steel helmet like a waterfall. The metal gave a satisfying pop as the largest dents were pushed out. There was hardly a seam to show it had ever been damaged. Lydria staggered a little and placed the helmet on Cargile’s crude grave as Haidrea and Kimi, stood respectfully nearby.
“You honor the dead, Lydria. That is good. The dead deserve to be remembered for their actions, and through their stories. You will tell the story of your father one day.” Haidrea looked at her friend warmly for a moment before moving to recover the trail. “Our prey does not try to hide their movement,” she said. “They went this way back to the woods and toward the road that heads west to the small kingdom fort.”
>
“Steven’s Folly,” Lydria sighed. She took one last look at her father’s resting place and stumbled forward landing heavily on a bank of dirt. She took up a large stick and used it to pull herself back up and continue walking.
“Perhaps you should have something to eat?” suggested Kimi. “You’ve done something new and it has weakened you.”
“Thank you, my furry friend, I’ll be fine,” was all the reply the bobcat received.
For the rest of the day they rarely spoke. The air had become warm and small flies gathered around their heads as they neared the shores of the Great Lake. The smell of dead fish washed upon the shores reached them soon after and as the sun made its lingering descent, they made camp early. Haidrea left to hunt, while Kimi and Lydria set up camp and prepared for a light meal. Lydria turned her thoughts to her companion, “You worry too much, Kimi. I will be fine. I’m tired and hungry.”
“I’m glad. I’m going into the trees more where the flying pests aren’t so bad. Really, what’s the point of having a tail so short I can’t swipe flies from my eyes!”
Lydria laughed and soon after Haidrea returned bringing a small, freshly gutted young deer into camp where she cleaned the animal and set venison to cook for the two women, and to bleed for the always-hungry Kimi.
“The person we follow continues to walk west and her pace has slowed,” Haidrea said as they finished their meal and Lydria used magic to artfully preserve the deerskin to be sold to the soldiers at Steven’s Folly.
“You said ‘her’.”
“Yes. The prints are narrow and shallow. The stride is also short and the path she travels continues to the west. Beyond your folly, there are great forests. Grandfather says far beyond those forests, there is an enormous city of the Eifen – a city that make Eifynar look like a collection of huts.” Lydria kept silent hoping her friend would continue. She had never heard more than small tales of the Eifen and their city north of Bayside; she had never heard any about other Eifen cities.
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