Mantle: The Return of the Sha

by Gary Bregar

  “Will you not tell me of my task? Surely, it will not spoil your plans if I know it.”

  There was a pause and for a moment Bella thought that she might get what she wanted.

  “There is nothing to be gained by knowing. Be quiet now—we are done speaking,” the inflock said.

  He paid no attention to her after that, and as they rode she noticed that the forest was completely silent. The animals, if there were any, had gone quiet and there were no birds to be seen. She had never in her life felt so utterly alone.

  ****

  The Hidden Forest was like nothing that they could have imagined. To Lizabet, it felt as though they had been shrunken by some wild magic and been thrust into a land of Giants. The wide trunks of the trees were covered in long hair-like moss that laid flat against the bark. A light mist hovered motionless just above the ground.

  They lost their sense of direction almost immediately after entering the forest. They hadn’t felt lost, but couldn’t be sure, and they relied heavily on both Dorian’s intuition and Pike’s height. Pike could see farther ahead to determine the best routes around the trees, but he was still nowhere close to the height of the lowest branches of them. At times they seemed to be surrounded entirely by walls of bark and moss. The going was so slow at times that Lizabet and Dorian would dismount from their horses and lead them by foot through the maze-like forest.

  They couldn’t be sure how many days they had even been in the forest. They slept when they all agreed that it was necessary and rested when they needed to, as well. The dull and gloomy darkness of the forest was constant and determining day from night was impossible.

  It was agreed that they had been lucky not to have come across the inhabitants of the forest. There were many stories that had been born in the Hidden, and they would be glad not to give birth to one of their own. It was the sounds of creatures that unnerved them all—Pike especially, who would begin shaking and breathing heavily whenever the sounds seemed to come from nearby.

  It was during their sixth day (at least as far as they were concerned) walking through the forest that they realized that their food supply was low. Lizabet and Dorian had brought enough to get them through for some time, but they hadn’t counted on Pike being with them. Instead of food for two, they were now feeding three, and it was no small matter when it came to satisfying the appetite of a Loper. Pike was doing his best to eat as little as possible, but he was accustomed to large meals and became weak if he did not replenish his strength.

  They had known when they left Obengaard that they would need to forage for food on their journey, but they hadn’t realized how dangerous that might be. It was when Lizabet spotted what looked to be hanging fruit on one of the larger bushes that sometimes grew between the trees that they would learn just how dangerous the forest could be.

  “Dorian, look!” Lizabet said, running toward the bush.

  The bush itself was nearly twenty feet tall. Growing from between two trees, it wrapped itself around the trunks of both of them so that it looked like a huge green wall with massive trees growing from it. The leaves of the bush were large enough to cover Lizabet’s head and the bright red fruit that it held were the size of melons.

  Lizabet came to a stop in front of the bush and began to reach her hand out to pluck the fruit, but her hand froze and then jerked back to her suddenly when she saw the fruit move. It seemed to shiver. As she stood watching, the others began to do the same, until all of the hanging fruit was shivering.

  Dorian and Pike couldn’t see the fruit moving, but they could see her stopped in front of the bush, seemingly frozen. Dorian had a bad feeling and ran toward her. As he did, Lizabet let out a quick shriek and backed away. When Dorian came up behind her, he put both of his hands on her shoulders. She didn’t take notice.

  As they stood before the bush, the bright red fruit began to unravel into wings that unfolded, revealing the body of the creature. Once the wings had fully extended, they recognized it for what it was—a butterfly. But these were not the butterflies that Dorian and Lizabet were accustomed to in Terra, and Pike, who had never seen a butterfly, was petrified with fear.

  They unfolded a wing span of nearly two feet, each wing bright red with dark black spots. The body was bright yellow and the eyes of the creatures were an ice blue. It was when they noticed the stingers on the butterflies that they began to run, swords in hand. The stingers protruded half the length of Lizabet’s forearm, and they started to vibrate back and forth so rapidly that the air was now filled with the deafening sound of a humming buzz.

  As they ran back to where their horses were standing, the horses began to jump and nay before finally running as best they could between the openings in the trees. They stumbled over protruding roots and jumped others, but managed to gain distance. There was no time for them to worry about losing the horses—they were running for their lives now, but had run out of places to go. The butterflies, numbering now in the hundreds, or perhaps thousands, flew around them so that they were surrounded.

  The three of them stood bunched together, each of them facing a different direction, with both Lizabet and Dorian holding their swords up, ready to strike if necessary. The butterflies only flew above them, though, moving quickly from side to side, changing their positions above them in a blink of an eye. But they did not attack, and it was Dorian who finally mumbled under his breath to Lizabet.

  “Why aren’t they attacking? What are they doing?”

  It was then, before Lizabet could utter a response, that the largest of the butterflies flew down to them. It was not moving aggressively and Lizabet didn’t take it as such. She took her left hand and slowly put it on Dorian’s shoulder to signal for him not to react rashly. He stood still, thinking, I hope to all the Fathers that she knows what she’s doing.

  “Pike, do not make a move,” Lizabet said in a whisper.

  The creature hovered, slowly circling them before finally stopping directly in front of Lizabet. It hovered before her, seeming to stare her in the eyes knowingly.

  “Can you speak to it, Dorian?” she asked. Dorian had the gift of Animal-speak, but she wasn’t sure how to define this particular creature before her.

  “We’ll see,” he replied.

  Dorian made clicking noises followed by a series of well-placed hums from deep in his throat. The butterfly took its hovering over a bit so that it was looking at both of them. It replied with its own series of clicking sounds mixed with a sound that reminded Lizabet of a cat’s purr.

  “I’m not sure if I can translate this,” Dorian said. “It seems to be some sort of cross language—a mixture of Animal-speak and Bird-speak, with something else that I can’t quite make out.”

  “Can you understand any of it?” Lizabet asked.

  “Some…it calls you Montiff, I’m not sure why.”

  “Montiff?” Lizabet asked in confusion.

  “In Animal-speak, Montiff means Mother of Mothers—similar to that of a creator or sometimes queen. Do you know what this means?”

  Lizabet thought for a moment before answering. She thought that the secret that she had held from Dorian would now be given up and it was actually a relief to her. Now that the fates of both of them were so closely tied together, she supposed that there would be no room for secrets between them any longer.

  “Kindly correct him, and tell him that I am a sha—not the montiff that he believes me to be,” she said.

  Dorian turned to her, with his mouth open in shock. His mother had told him of shas, but she had told it to him as though they were only a myth. Surely, shas are not real, but surely Lizabet would not put us in danger with such a bold lie.

  “Tell him,” Lizabet insisted.

  Dorian obliged and went about telling the creature what Lizabet had said. The butterfly responded at once, and this time the sounds it made seemed entirely different to Lizabet. She could tell that the creature had changed to Animal-speak, and she could see that Dorian looked more confident in his own s
peech.

  When they stopped talking, Lizabet asked, “Well, what did it say?”

  “He says that it makes no difference, a sha and a montiff are the same to them,” Dorian replied. “Not only does he say that you are a montiff, he says that you are the montiff—the one they have been expecting for many generations. He says that you are the mother of all mothers, a montiff, sha, and blue witch. They are all the same.

  “Lizabet, what is he talking about?”

  She looked at Dorian, now feeling ashamed. She wasn’t ashamed of who or what she was, but she should have told him before they left home.

  “It is true, but I will explain it later. What do they want from us?”

  Dorian spoke a few words to the creature and then translated.

  “They want nothing of us. It was you approaching their roost that woke them, but he says it was the power of you, nothing more. They felt you coming,” Dorian explained.

  “Will they help us, do you think?” she asked.

  Dorian asked the butterfly and then replied, “They cannot escort us, but assure me that we are so far, at least, moving in the proper direction. We may be half through the Hidden, but I shouldn’t trust that. The butterflies, I think, have no sense of distance as it would apply to us. They see things differently, I’m sure.”

  “So they cannot help us find our way?”

  After another series of sounds that meant nothing to Lizabet or Pike, Dorian replied, “He says that we do not need their assistance. He says that we may have the assistance of the forest if we need to call on it.”

  “And how would we do that?” she asked.

  “He says that you need only to emit your voice so that the forest hears it.”

  “Am I to yell at the forest?” she asked, now confused.

  Dorian made a quick inquiry to the butterfly and then said, “He says that as the montiff you will know what to do.”

  “That doesn’t help at all,” Lizabet said. “So we are free to go?”

  Dorian spoke to the butterfly one final time and then turned to Pike, who was clearly the most anxious, and said, “Yes, they wish us safe travels.”

  And as he finished speaking those very words, the butterflies flew away—maneuvering effortlessly through the trees until they could no longer be seen.

  ****

  Once the butterflies were gone, the three of them stood in the small clearing. They were silent, but the expression on Dorian’s face seemed to carry enough noise to fill the forest. His face was filled with shock, but Lizabet thought she also saw sadness and even contempt.

  “I didn’t know how to tell you, and I don’t really understand it myself, although I think I’m beginning to,” Lizabet said in an apologetic tone.

  Dorian knew the tone of her voice to mean that she was begging forgiveness.

  “How could you not tell me of something so important? I thought we could trust each other with anything.”

  “We can, Dorian,” Lizabet said, fighting back tears. “I just didn’t know what to say about it—I understand so little myself.”

  Pike, who heard everything that Dorian had translated, had fixated on only one thing.

  “You are a witch, Miss Lizabet?” he asked with a wavering voice.

  Lizabet smiled at him and said, “It would seem so, Pike…but a good witch, a blue witch.”

  Pike seemed relaxed by her answer—at least somewhat. Dorian, however, had been hurt and she knew it. It would take time to mend his feelings. That was what it really was, after all—his feelings had been hurt.

  “Dorian, I am truly sorry that I did not tell you. I promise you that I will not keep something like that from you again. We will be honest with each other from here out.”

  “Fine,” he said. “I will hold you to that, and your apology is accepted.”

  It was her smile that had softened him.

  ****

  When King Zander was informed by Grey Eagle that Lizabet and Dorian had snuck away from Bannister Castle and Obengaard, he was furious. But more, he was concerned for their safety. He thought surely they would not venture into the Hidden Forest, but messengers had been sent back to Obengaard along the route that they had taken and their tracks confirmed that they had.

  How can I have lost them both?

  He had felt some relief that the boy, Dorian Bellows, seemed to have run away with her. He was at least somewhat older, and it was always better not to travel alone, no matter where you happened to be going.

  He had immediately ordered scouts to search for signs of them along the edges of the road leading back to Obengaard, but he didn’t see any way of helping them if they had taken the route through the Hidden. It was too dangerous for scouts to go in that direction, and the odds were not in favor of them being found. He could not afford the loss of his men for a search that would be likened to finding a particular pebble on the beaches of Bore. So he did the only thing he knew that he could—he made a request to the Eagles to keep watch for them. But even that would likely not help, since the Hidden Forest would block all sight of them from above.

  He had done what he could for now, so he redirected his attention back to his own journey. They were nearing the Outlands now, and the heat of the air was wreaking havoc on his men. They had just passed through the Durbin Valley and now rested along the Green Lake, so he had taken the unusual step of instructing his generals to give the men an hour to cool themselves in the lake. It had improved morale immediately, but that was only temporary. Soon the heat would attack and the energy would be drained from them once again.

  General Brask had been summoned to the king’s tent, and when he arrived, he found Zander standing over a map that covered a large table.

  The map itself was very old and, as Zander contemplated his strategy, a thought kept making its way into his mind, how many wars have been won or lost by direction of this map?

  “You wanted to see me, Majesty?” Brask said as he entered the tent.

  After a moment of silence, Zander finally replied, “Yes, General, I would like to discuss the weather.”

  General Brask smiled and breathed a chuckle.

  “I’m sorry to report that I have very little power over the weather, Majesty,” he said. He was still smiling, but the king remained serious.

  “Yes, I understand that, General,” he replied. “However, I would like for us to begin traveling only by the dark of night from here out. What do you say of this arrangement?”

  General Brask’s eyebrows raised in surprise. It was unheard of to travel at night anywhere in Mantle, if it could be helped.

  “Sir, I believe that we might have success with travel at night, were it not for our numbers,” Brask said. “If something were to happen along the road, it would be very difficult to instruct fifty thousand men in the darkness of night.”

  Zander had considered this and decided that the risk of finding trouble on the road was worth the survival and readiness of his men. But the general’s concerns were valid. The sounds that they heard coming from the outer edges of their camps, seemed hostile and sometimes aggressive. But more disturbing, the sounds coming from the forest surrounding them seemed unnatural.

  He had thought to himself on several nights, it can’t be the Skites—not yet. And surely the Locks have not come this deep into Forie lands.

  “General, I would like for you to organize a series of coded instructions that can be handed down to the men by way of beacon.”

  General Brask understood at once. They would use torches to send signals along the lines of men, with other signals to be lit along the way until they had reached the last of them. Two torches might mean forward, three would indicate for them to stop, and four would signal an attack. Others might be used as well, but they would keep it as simple as possible.

  “I understand, Majesty. When would you change the routine?”

  “Tell your men that we will remain here until the sun sets or the weather cools,” the king said. “We will still be at risk for
what might be lurking under cover of dark, but I would prefer a fight against a physical enemy, over a battle with the Father of Nature on any day.”

  “Do you believe that the warmth of these lands are the doing of nature, Majesty?” Brask asked in an attempt to make a point.

  “No, I suppose not,” Zander replied, “but it is equally out of our control, no matter the cause.”

  “Very well, I will make the orders. Will that be all?”

  Zander stood quiet for a moment, and then said, “The queen’s sister is traveling with the Bellows boy, presumably to the Outlands.”

  “Yes, Majesty, I’ve been told.”

  “I’ve been stripped of one of them, General, and I will not have her sister taken from me, as well.”

  It sounded to General Brask as though the king was simply leaving his thoughts unguarded.

  “Majesty, we will win, and both will be safe. You will make sure of it.”

  “Yes, we will win—of that, I am sure. Of anything else…” Zander stopped short. “Thank you, General, that will be all.”

  Of anything else…I am lost.

  ****

  If the encounter with the butterflies had taught them anything (other than Lizabet’s newfound fame), it was a lesson in caution. The horses would eventually return to them, they knew. After all, the horses themselves had agreed to the trip beforehand. They would not abandon them so quickly.

  They moved more carefully now, inspecting everything around them, watching where they would step, and they kept their silence as much as they could. It was Lizabet who had first noticed Pike’s inability to walk quietly, but it was Dorian who had found a solution.

  It was his feet, Dorian realized. Pike had extremely large feet, as any eight-foot tall Loper would, and the moccasins that he wore were thin. Every time Pike would flex the muscles in his feet, it would break the foliage under him, even when standing motionless. Dorian’s solution was simple. He removed a shirt from his roll, tore it in two, and wrapped pieces around each of Pike’s feet. And whether it was his intuition, or simple luck, it was good that his solution came about when it did.