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Drake saw her face go pale in the evening light and was glad his arm was already around her waist because she sagged a little. He dropped his pack and caught her with the other arm. "What is it?"
The moment he asked, he felt it, too. A surging alarm within his very being. He swallowed hard. "Garth." No one else could have followed him so adeptly. Garth had been close behind when he went through the portal. Garth must have found his way, too. He released her. "Stay here."
"Stay?" She stared. "You're kidding right?"
"You may be harmed if you follow." He couldn't stop to explain further. He turned in the direction of the portal.
"You are conceited." She pushed her way through the brush to confront him, putting out a hand to stop him. "And misled. I am the one who must lock the portal. And you must be on the other side of it when I do."
Bemused, he paused in his forward journey, folding his arms over his chest. "Do I have to point out to you that there is an Elf warrior-one who is not as friendly as me-on this side of your Galohisdi, and I am the only one who can put him back on the other side?"
Her eyes narrowed. "Humans in your world aren't considered equal to Elves, are they?"
He froze for a second. "I?This has nothing to do with that."
She looked triumphant. "Then I'm right. And it has everything to do with that. Are you certain you've brought no such prejudices to this world?"
How could he put it into words? The anger and shame he felt for his race, the?was it pity? Yes, in spite of himself, it was?the pity he felt for the humans in the face of Selwyn's hatred and the other Elves' indifference. He scrubbed an impatient hand over his face, knowing he needed to address this with her if he hoped she would accept him into her world. "Elves are faster, stronger on the battlefield, longer lived. Humans?are not. And Elves have no pity, no?ability to empathize or admire what is beautiful about the other races."
He could see dismay on her face, but she nodded. "Go on. Tell me why you left your king if humans are so useless to your world."
"Humans are? They live such short lives but those lives can mean so much more than that of an Elf. Sometimes I wonder if most Elves live for anything but battle. But humans are much more emotionally connected to their world."
She stood with her arms crossed over her chest for a moment longer, then-just as he wondered how she'd distracted him from going alone to kill Garth-she nodded. "Very well. I will trust you because I have no other choice. If you can put him on the other side of the portal, I will lock it. And we will talk about your request."
"Fair enough." He decided not to mention that she could not force him through the portal on her own. "Where can we find the Little People?"
"The Yundi Tsundi?" She looked startled. "You wish to find them? Most only want to stay out of their way."
"A good policy for most." He shrugged. "I am not most."
"That I am certain of." Her words were reluctant. "The Little People are scattered throughout the woods. I only know of them through stories. Warriors found frozen in the cold or wandering the forest without direction or memory-"
"I am aware of what they can do. I am also aware that they do not always do it. You, for instance, seem unafraid of them."
"I-" She paused, as if realizing he was right. But then she shook off the comment. "I am the keeper of Galohisdi."
"And therefore immune?" He cocked an eyebrow at her, then turned to continue down the path. "The Little People might help us, if we can find them."
She didn't answer, and after a few moments of silence, he glanced over his shoulder. "What does Galohisdi mean, anyway?"
"It's the Cherokee-my people's language-word for doorway."
"Appropriate. Elegant, even."
"It's the obligation of my family. The eldest female of our line. My mother was the keeper before me. When she died?" She gulped and continued, "When she died, it fell to me to take the responsibility. And I have failed. My father said I was too young and too silly to take her place. I suppose I proved him right."
"I would not say you have done any such thing." He paused to hold a branch out of her way. "Your mother said you'd have to choose a path, right? Explorer or guardian? You made that choice. No one can fault you."
She smiled gratitude for his words as she passed him. "And yet I find myself on a different, much stranger path than either of the ones my mother imagined for me, don't I?"
He couldn't suppress a wry answering smile. "A strange path indeed. But one thing at a time, what do you say? First we find the Little People. I believe they will help us."
She shook her head, her expression doubtful, but she followed him and they made their way through the forest. He paused from time to time, checking the air. The Little People left a sort of electrified, almost metallic scent in the air-something like the smell after lightning strikes but does not burn.
He'd dealt with the Little People of Ayeli many times. He thought-especially since she seemed to know about them and regard them with the same sort of cautious respect they were awarded on Ayeli-that the Little People must be very similar in Eladi as they were in Ayeli. If he could strike a bargain with them, they might aid him in finding Garth.
He paused at a fork in the path. "We could wander these woods for the rest of the night and not find Garth on our own. In the meantime, he could be doing a much better job of tracking us. Do you have any specific idea where we might find the Yundi Tsundi?"
She bit her lip as though thinking, then she raised her large brown eyes to his and he found himself wondering how many shades of gold and brown there could possibly be in the world. In that moment, he felt he could happily spend the rest of his life finding out. Then she motioned to the right. "This way."
Whatever it was she'd woken in him, he'd have to explore that happy feeling later on. When it was all over and her world was safe again.
Strange Path: A Synchronicity Story Page 3