by P R Glazier
Chapter 5. Revelations Revealed
Nar’Allia looked up at Lo’Rosse. He held the quiver. He smiled at her and raised it in both hands, offered it to her, he winked, she couldn’t help but smile at his light-hearted attempts at encouragement, at his naivety. That was so like him. Sometimes he seemed to still be that little boy who used to play childhood games with her in the forest. The boy who used to tease her, try to trip her in the muddiest puddles. The one who always had to win at their games, nudge her arm when she was just about to release an arrow. Yet he was always there to save her, always there to pick her up, dust her off and set her back on her feet. Always there to clean the mud from her knees in the cool waters of a stream before they went back home. Always there to wipe the tear from her eye. He knew her, knew her better than she did herself perhaps. She frowned at him. He cocked his head to one side and thrusting the quiver gently forward repeated his offer.
Nar’Allia looked down at the quiver; it remained empty of arrows, at least for now. She herself had learnt to place one arrow within, watch as the arcane properties of the quiver duplicated that arrow into many. Yet such arrows remained transparent, for they were both here in the quiver in the world of men, but also in another place, a place that Nar’Allia did not know. They remained upon the bridge between the two. She had learnt how to retrieve these ethereal arrows; it was all a matter of belief, a matter of faith. She remembered that feeling, the sensation of wanting them there, picturing them multiplied within the quiver. In the right hands the quiver could still do whatever mysterious things it did and she would have a limitless supply of arrows, all ready to be plucked and shot from her bow. It was incredible when she thought about it, but she knew that she would never fully understand how it worked, for none now lived that had such knowledge, at least none she had come across.
She reached out slowly opening her hand, then as if in scorn at Lo’Rosse’s insistence she took the quiver. The stones and the animal claws tinkled melodiously as they struck against each other. So there it was, once more in her hand, once more in her possession. She owned it once again, for it had been freely given back to her by Alonso. She looked at it, for she had not seen it or held it in many years, yet it looked identical to the last time she had seen it, before she had left it behind.