by Sandra Elsa
Four weeks after their arrival in Relante, Johann had still heard nothing from Trace or Sergeant Gallo. He found several old friends and Pink rarely saw him during the day. He often invited her to join him, but after tagging along once and feeling out of place, she chose instead to spend her time with Conall and Angel.
At night, Johann continued to instruct her in the use of magic and she finally had enough control, he trusted her to light a candle inside a building without fearing that the building would burn down around them. It still required an inordinate amount of effort on her part to maintain such a tight rein.
On her excursions outside the city, Johann trusted to Angel, Conall, and her burgeoning magical skills, to keep her safe. Angel guided her through the streets. If anybody came close the large black head snaked around, bared teeth opened distance rapidly. He never bit anybody, but he was a large and very real threat to any who might think her diminutive size made her an easy target for either theft or rape.
Walking into the silence of the forest, Conall warned her she was being followed. She glanced over her shoulder. Empty hillside, met her eyes. It was not the first time somebody followed her up here. Usually she or Angel saw them before they got this far. It made her nervous that even with Conall’s warning she could not locate this pursuer.
“He entered the woods to your left,“ Conall told her.
Pink spun to her left and surveyed the forest. Nothing moved. The birds still sang, the wind whispered through branches, nothing was out of the ordinary.
“Come forward quickly,“ Conall ordered. She obeyed without hesitation.
They traveled deeper into the forest and she found herself on one of the trails she hunted occasionally. Still she heard nothing, but she trusted Conall’s senses better than her own.
With a thought, she used Conall’s ears and was able to hear the lightest of steps behind her. She broke into a run and distanced herself from her pursuer. He came on, following at the same steady pace. Once she gained a bit of distance Conall ordered her to circle around and climb a tree. Angel traveled straight forward, creating enough noise to cover her movements. Almost without a thought she swept all trace of their passing from the ground.
Waiting for him to pass her by, she felt her heart beating rapidly. Sweat beaded on her brow and she struggled to keep her breathing silent.
He passed underneath her and continued on far enough to find where the footprints disappeared.
Spinning around, already drawing his weapon, his eyes searched the woods. From her perch in the tree, bowstring taut, an arrow aimed at him, she ordered, “Drop it.”
His eyes focused on her, his arm did not stop.
The knife flew with deadly accuracy…to bounce harmlessly off her shield.
Pink dropped the shields for no longer than was necessary to loose an arrow. The stranger went down, her arrow piercing his leg, her aim disturbed not at all by the knife. She was learning to have confidence in her magic. She intended nothing more than to disable him; he on the other hand intended to kill.
Angel joined her as she scrambled from her perch. Together they went over to where he lay on the ground, grasping his leg and gritting his teeth. The arrow missed the bone but completely penetrated the muscle of his thigh.
She approached him with caution. Heart still pounding. Shields firmly in place; anticipating the possibility of another attack.
Lifting hands covered in his own blood, he offered no further trouble.
Conall read his thoughts and told her, “He does not intend to harm you, the knife was a defensive move. He wishes to talk.”
“I’ll help you,” she offered the prone man. “But then I want some explanations.”
Conall assured her his mind lacked bad intent. She knelt by his leg and broke the fletching from the arrow. He looked faint as the arrow jerked when it broke. After making certain no splinters remained that could break off inside and cause infection she pulled the arrow through the wound. A controlled gasp of pain was the only sound he made.
After she removed the arrow, he slowly reached inside his cloak to a pocket hidden in the back. Suspiciously, she brought her dagger up as soon as his hand moved.
Conall’s assurance relaxed her. From within the folds of the cloak the man withdrew a roll of bandages and a small jar of salve. He smeared the salve on the wound and bound it with the wrap.
When this was done she helped him to his feet and he hopped over to the tree she had been in. He sat down with his back to the tree.
He was a young man, no more than twenty years old, but the way he had tracked her, and dealt with the pain of the consequences spoke of a maturity far beyond his years. His shoulder length blonde hair was clean and well kept. His clothing, while not remarkable was not poor. His sharp features came together in a pleasing way that seemed almost familiar.
He would not stand out in a crowd. Somehow she got the impression that being nondescript was what he wanted.
“Why were you following me?” she asked
Sullenly he said, “You’re a good looking woman and I wanted to get to know you better.”
“Be wary Bellana. He’s upset that you got the better of him. His words are deceitful,” came the mind touch from Conall.
That was followed by a glint of humor and the thought, “I know why he’s here. Your question brought it close enough to the surface of his mind that I picked it up. You’re not going to believe it.”
“What?” she thought back at him.
“If I tell you, he will think you’re able to read minds. The fewer who know of my abilities the better. He will tell you.” Laughter flooded her mind.
“You lie,” she said to the young man at her feet.
“Why? Do you think yourself so ugly a man couldn’t take an interest in you?”
“I’ve had too many take an interest in me in the past year. That is why you are sitting on the ground with an arrow wound in your leg, but I can tell when somebody is lying to me, and you are.”
The young man frowned, looking back to where the arrow lay on the ground. “Very well then, the way your footprints disappeared you may have some tricks I can’t counter. I might as well tell you. I thought perhaps before I managed to stroll into some sort of trap, I ought to at least meet my ‘sister’. HQ notified my company commander that my grandfather was in Relante searching for me. My Commanding Officer gave me permission to come here to see him. Imagine my surprise when I walked into HQ after traveling hard for nearly two weeks, and being harassed by the guys about never telling them about my beautiful sister.”
Pink blushed, “You’re Trace then. Oh Gods, and I shot you.”
He looked at her and shook his head. “It’s my fault for not confronting you openly. I’ve followed you through town several times. You never did anything the least bit suspicious, except for your trips out here. I pretty much decided you were harmless, but I wanted to know what you did here in the woods, so I followed you.”
He was pale, the wound was bothering him more than he was willing to let on. And he nodded at his leg. “Perhaps you're not so harmless after all.”
She knelt down beside him and said, “Let me Heal this. I caused it, I can fix it.” He didn’t argue with her as she unwound the bandage. If he had been a stranger she would not have revealed her power to him, but surely Johann’s grandson had grown up exposed to magic. Conall reassured her that she was doing the right thing and she reached out with her hands and touched the wound, exerting her powers to knit the muscle and skin back together from the inside out.
She finished and Angel automatically fed her more energy. The pain she had taken on disappeared.
“I should have known,” Trace muttered. “Why else would Grandfather claim you as family?”
“I owe him a lot,” she told him. “He took me in when my situation was not good. He gave me shelter and food, and when my past caught up with me, he abandoned his quiet life and brought me here in the hope that I would be anonymous among the masses.”<
br />
“I can’t believe anybody got him to leave that village. After Grandmother died, he withdrew into himself. I left because I didn’t want to stay around and watch him die too. From what I’ve seen of him in town, he looks better than he has in years.”
He looked at her with a touch of respect, and asked, “Where did you learn Healing? That‘s not one of his talents.”
“He took me north first and we stayed with Tomas for a couple of months. Johann has been attempting to teach me other things as we traveled.”
With a snort Trace asked, “You mean like shields? Don’t think I didn’t notice how my knife bounced off you.” He looked over where the knife lay embedded harmlessly in the ground. “I know he didn’t teach you how to handle weapons. He never thought anybody needed any weapons beyond magic.”
“We stayed with a border guard for a month or two, he taught me the basics of weapons handling,”
“Basics!” He almost laughed. “I’m guessing that shot went just where you wanted it.”
“I have practiced a lot since we left there. I’ve got an excellent instructor.”
At his look of inquiry, she heard Conall’s thought, “Take his weapons and introduce me, he is family after all.”
“I'll introduce you to him, since he has requested it. First you must give me your weapons.” After he willingly handed her a second throwing knife and a dagger she said, “Don’t be frightened. You should be honored. Even your grandfather has not met him. Conall said he would like to meet Johann but the curse he’s under forbids him to seek out wizards.”
“Your weapons instructor is cursed?”
“Yes, and he’s not… precisely human. He thinks a lot like a human but he’s not.”
Conall materialized out of the bushes behind her.
Chapter 22