Journey of Awakening

by Shawna Thomas

  Shadows stretched across the meadow where she’d seen the plant. She frowned. It was early for harvest, but that wasn’t what bothered her. What if she made a mistake? She could kill him. Grandfather had taught her preparation and dosage but she’d never actually used herbs for anything other than a mild cold.

  The dark forest at the edge of the meadow rustled, stirred by a slight wind. She stared at the dark intertwined branches against the violet of the dusky sky.

  Coming for you.

  A shiver ran up Sara’s back. There’s no one here but me. I’m alone. Kneeling before the plant, Sara dug into the sandy soil with shaking hands to release its spindle-shaped root. Concentrate on the task at hand. She didn’t usually let her imagination run away from her, but it was all she could do to walk, and not run, home.

  She shut the door and leaned against the rough barrier, grateful for the merry fire in the hearth and the light of the candles burning on the table.

  “Our Sara knows a bit about herbs and such. I’ll warrant she can help ye, love.” Nolwen’s voice drifted from the back room.

  Nolwen peeked her head through the door while Sara cleaned dirt off the root. “Could you put some water on to boil?” Sara asked, thankful her voice sounded even. As Nolwen stoked the fire, Sara, divided the root into pieces then smashed them with the side of her knife.

  When the water bubbled in the pot, she poured it into a container, measured the root in the palm of her hand and added it to the water. “We’ll give this to him in a bit. It should help him breathe.”

  “Thank ye, lass. The nearest healer lives on the other side of town. I’d send for her but between ye and me, she kills as many as she cures. Not a nice one, that.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “She doesn’t hold to the old ways, if that’s what ye’re thinkin’”

  She wasn’t but she’d let that question go in order to stay on track. “No. I was wondering if she was a true healer.”

  “Claims she is. Can heal by touchin’ a man or woman, but comes at a price.”

  A price, there was always a price for healing someone. “True healers take part of the sickness into themselves—”

  “No, lass. Coin. She charges coin for her services, quite a bit, and what she’d call favors. What I’d call doing her evil work for her. She has herbs too, but...” Nolwen shrugged. “I’d not trust her.”

  Sara nodded. Nolwen didn’t trust the local healer. But she trusts me. Some herbs, when taken in the wrong dosage, could kill. She swallowed. Grandfather had drilled her about dosage and uses of various herbs until she’d known them by rote. The practice was far different.

  “Tomorrow, I’ll prepare a tea out of some other herbs. This will work for now.” Dipping her fingertip, Sara tested the brew. “Tonight, we’ll give him a drink of this every so often and he’ll be fine.”

  She removed the bits of root, then poured half of the contents into an earthenware mug, slipped a small wooden bowl into the pocket of her apron and followed Nolwen into the bedroom.

  “Sara has a drink for ye.” Softness laced Nolwen’s voice.

  “So here’s the lass I found on the beach.” Pierric spoke between bouts of coughing. A much-creased face broke into a wide smile. “Ye look a bit better too.”

  Sara’s cheeks warmed. “So you’re the man who saved me from the ocean. I can never thank you enough—”

  “Ah, puddlie-wack. No thanks necessary, lass. Now, what have we here?”

  “A tea to ease the congestion in your lungs.”

  He peered into the liquid, his hand dwarfing the mug, before drinking the contents down in one gulp. Pierric made a face and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “Can’t say I’ve tasted worse, but if it does what ye say, I’ll not be complainin’.”

  “Ye rest now, love. We’ll be in the other room.” Nolwen tucked the blankets around her husband’s chin, then stroked his white hair.

  * * *

  Nolwen closed the bottom half of the front door before pulling her sewing from a wooden box to settle on a stool by the candle. The breeze from the ocean rippled the flame and cooled the warm house. The older woman held a long bone needle up to the light and then pushed a tiny silver thread through the eye. Sara had tried and failed often enough to know Nolwen only made it look easy.

  Sara sat near her, separating seeds from their dried pods for better storage.

  “Where did you learn herb craft?” Nolwen asked.

  Memories of long treks into the forest on their island and longer lectures danced before Sara’s eyes. What she wouldn’t give to hear what she’d once considered a boring lesson on healing burns now. She blinked and focused on the herbs before her. “My grandfather taught me.”

  Nolwen nodded, the needle’s rhythm never breaking. “’Tis usually passed from mother to daughter. I’ve a cousin skilled in the magic. Not many are now days.”

  “Magic? I’m not a true healer. I can’t take illness. I can’t heal with a touch.”

  “Some say it’s magic that forces the herbs to obey yer command. They’re only plants ’til a mage uses them, then by magic she infuses them with healing.”

  “I see.” Sara hid a smile. “I’ve never looked at it that way.”

  “Me cousin’s a true healer. She and her mother before her,” Nolwen continued. “She lives inland a ways.”

  Ilydearta warmed against her chest. “Your cousin?”

  “Aye, Maelys. She moved to Shayner, about ten days inland by horse.” Nolwen glanced up from her sewing and lowered her voice. “Ye know, she had to. Her mother wouldn’t give up talkin’ about the old ways. She always was a stubborn one.” Nolwen sighed. “Since she left, we haven’t had a good healer in Tyrol. There’s a place for ye here.”

  Sara’s heart constricted as she stared into the capricious flames. The old ways. The Siobani.

  “Sara.” Nolwen’s soft voice grew quiet. “You can stay, can’t you?”

  Sara met Nolwen’s gaze. Could she? She examined the house. The floor and ceiling had been left bare, the wood aging to a beautiful rich golden patina, but the walls reminded Sara of whitewashed sandstone. Nolwen had explained it was sand mixed with the excretions of a mollusk common on the beach in the spring. Every year, women and children gathered the mollusks then set an entire day aside to paint one another’s houses. It had turned into a festival. Would she be here?

  Leave!

  The command was so strong, Sara jumped.

  “Are ye all right, lass?”

  “I think so.” But she wasn’t. Ilydearta weighed heavy against her breast. Did the voice come from the stone? Sorrow arched through her. If only her grandfather were here to help her understand. He was a master tactician. He always knew what to do.

  I can’t stay. She had a horrible premonition that the presence she’d felt, the someone—or something—who was looking for her, wouldn’t deal kindly with gentle waveriders.

  A thread of panic ran along her nerves and caused her fingers to tremble. “I need to do what my grandfather asked of me.”

  “But lass, that’s...” Nolwen trailed off. “Maelys. Aye, I should have known better than to mention her.”

  “Do you think your cousin...” She left the thought unfinished. Was it fair? If she was in danger, should she endanger someone else? Oh come on, I don’t even know what I’m afraid of or if
I’m simply paranoid. But I know that this isn’t where I’m supposed to be anymore. A life of a waverider’s wife isn’t in my future.

  But then what? She couldn’t just set out into the wild with no plan of action. What were her skills? She could become a sword for hire, but the occupation wasn’t in her nature. She didn’t know enough about healing to... Maelys is a healer. She almost smiled. Another gift from her grandfather. She didn’t need to be dependent on anyone. She did have a way to support herself. Herb craft. All she needed was practical application. She would ask Nolwen’s cousin to apprentice her so she could find out more about the old ways. “Maelys is a strange one, but I think she’d not be above havin’ ye to apprentice. But, lass—”

  “Stranger than me?” Sara teased. She reached for Nolwen’s hand to still the response before the waverider’s wife formed the words. “A child of the sea. Isn’t that what you called me?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “It’s time for me to leave my mother’s side.”

  Chapter Four

  “Where’s she now?” Pierric sat in the sun on a small wooden stool, running his fingers over the twined pieces of rope that made up his net.

  “At the back of the house. She finished that...stick this morning and now she’s...practicing with it. Though what she’s practicing is a mystery to me. Tsk. Who knows?”

  “She’s a strange one.” Holding the net in his teeth while he tied two loose pieces together muffled Pierric’s words.

  “Oh, let me help ye.” Nolwen took the rope from Pierric’s mouth, kissing him soundly before he could protest.

  “Keep that up, woman, and we’ll never get this net repaired in time.” He stifled a cough.

  “Ye feelin’ poorly again? It’s not been so long since—”

  “Hush, lass. I’m fine. Sara did right by me.”

  Nolwen brushed a lock of hair from Pierric’s forehead. “She wants to go to Maelys. Keeps askin’ when the next caravan heads out.”

  “Aye, and that’s the problem. Ye enjoy having her around.” Pierric dropped the net and pulled Nolwen down on his lap.

  “Pierric, the neighbors—”

  “And let them see, lass. They’ll know I love ye. Now listen. She’s a sweet girl, but from what ye told me, and what I feel in me bones, Sara’s right. She can’t stay here.”

  “But she’s pretty enough. She’d make a good waverider’s wife.”

  Pierric laughed. “Not even ye believe that, love. She’s got more of a waverider in her than that of a waverider’s wife. I know a soul destined to roam when I see it.”

  “But Maelys is so far. She can’t go alone and there’re no traders due—”

  “Love, I’m fond of her too. I’ll take her. She’ll be safe.”

  “And what about ye?”

  “Tsk, I’ll be safe too. There’s plenty of time before the cold comes. When we arrive, it should be easy to find a caravan headed toward Tyrol. I’ll join it and be back before ye know.”

  “I always know when you’re gone, silly man. Ye take most of me with ye.” Pierric held her close, the smell of warmed cloth and fish filled her senses. “Aye, what am I doing lolling around in the sun, then? There’s work to do.”

  “That’s me woman.” Pierric smiled and picked up the net.

  * * *

  A slight breeze tempered the warmth from the sun. Pierric chattered about the plants and animals they passed and the cart creaked over the dirt road in a gentle rhythm that reminded her of the skimmer. After they left the outskirts of Tyrol, Sara saw no more evidence of habitation. Rolling green hills reminded her of ocean waves, it seemed she and Pierric sailed alone through a sea of emerald. Occasionally, they’d pass a herd of long-haired cows. As the wagon lumbered by, the cows would raise their heads to watch with large brown eyes, grass sticking out of their mouths like whiskers.

  When the sun reached its zenith, Pierric found a group of trees and pulled the horses to a stop. Sara unpacked food from one of the baskets. Her eyes misted when she found sweet tarts wrapped in waxed cloth. Her favorite. Nolwen must have baked them after Sara fell asleep.

  “Mighty fine woman,” Pierric muttered as he finished off his second tart. “Don’t worry about her. She’s always got a mite teary when the children left home.”

  Sara blinked back unexpected tears. “She is a good woman.”

  “That she is. We’ll enter Shayner by nightfall day after tomorrow.” Pierric fed sticks to the flames.

  Sara leaned against the trunk of a tree. She looked up to stare into the leaves against the darkening sky. She knew leaving was the right thing to do but she’d never felt so small or imagined the world was so big. That morning, she’d tearfully said goodbye to Nolwen and the second home she’d ever known.

  The ocean echoed in her ears long after they’d surpassed the distance its voice could be heard. The words she so flippantly stated not long before came back to haunt her. It’s time to leave my mother’s side. The ocean had been a constant in her life. She was doing the right thing, she knew it, but it didn’t stop her heart from racing. She was on her own in a vast, unfamiliar world.

  * * *

  The terrain changed. The mountains, which loomed in the distance, drew closer. Great forests of evergreens dwarfed the dirt path they followed. The air, now thick with the smell of rich soil and pine, lost any lingering scent of the ocean. Then the woods gave way to sweeping fields. Cottages dotted the landscape, dollhouses lost in a shifting expanse of grass and given away by plumes of gray smoke standing in contrast to the azure of the sky. Wildflowers lined the path, nodding their delicate heads in the slight breeze. Soon, Sara and Pierric shared the road with merchants pushing carts full of produce or women herding children like errant ducklings.

  True to Pierric’s word, as the sun dipped behind them the next day, the wagon’s familiar rhythm changed, its wheels crossing from dirt to cobble. The shadows she and Pierric cast stretched out before them as if they, too, were eager to reach Sara’s destination. Sara leaned forward to peer at wooden sidewalks lining the road. At first glance, she saw this was a much larger town than Tyrol. Sara looked down each intersection, curious about the city. Women, sweeping porches with bristle brooms or washing in large wooden tubs, didn’t pause as the wagon passed. Businesses gave way to homes and then, once again, to rolling fields. Cultivated plots of land separated the houses, a buffer between neighbors.

  The sun had set and the first stars glittered across the night sky as Pierric slowed the horses in front of a run-down shack, pulling them next to a fence half-hidden by grasses. “I’ll tend to the horses, lass. Go on in and introduce yerself.”

  Sara glanced at Pierric, but he wouldn’t meet her gaze. She jumped from the wagon, walked around the fence and found the gate. As she opened it, Sara surmised the tall grass was the only thing holding the fence in place.

  From the fence to the house, an herb garden grew with no recognizable plan. Sara ran a hand over lavender, enjoying the sharp fragrance, and paused before the door. Close, the house appeared in worse repair than it had from the wagon. The whitewash had worn away to reveal bare weathered boards, bowing under the roof’s weight. Sara turned toward Pierric, who was taking a long time with the horses, and then knocked on the wood.

  The door opened a few inches. “What do you want?” a scratchy voice issued from the crack.

  Sara opened her mouth to speak but paused. Could this be Nolwen’s cousin? Did they have the right house?

  “Are you going to stand there all night or can you speak?” the woman demanded gruffly.

  “My name is Sara. Nolwen sent me. Pierric is tending to the horses.”

  The door opened w
ider, revealing a shadowed face. “I thought I saw the old curmudgeon out back. And why did Nolwen send you?”

  Sara hesitated. She had the distinct feeling that it wasn’t wise to bring up the Siobani or the stones yet. “She said you’re skilled in herb craft and that you might be willing to teach me.” It wasn’t a lie, just half the truth.

  Maelys stepped back from the door. “Fancy yourself a witch, do you?”

  Sara hesitated then entered the small house. Every unreasonable fear she’d fought on the journey suddenly seemed justified. Maelys wouldn’t like her. She’d have nowhere to spend the winter. She would fail her quest. Sara squared her shoulders. Without the door between them, Maelys seemed smaller, barely reaching Sara’s shoulder. A large crooked nose perched above thin lips and under dark, piercing eyes. She held a candle in her hand, the only source of light in the room.

  “I know better. I have no power and though I’ve been taught the use of herbs, I lack practice.”

  “Well, you’re here now. We’ll see if you have the touch.” Maelys moved farther into the room, bringing an oil lamp back with her, its chimney blackened with soot. “There’s wood on the hearth. Light a fire and I’ll find something to eat. When Pierric gets over his fear, I imagine he’ll be hungry too.” At this, the smile stretched Maelys’s features again before she disappeared into the cabin’s gloom.

  Sara found a tinderbox on the mantle over the hearth and soon had a fire blazing. The light didn’t reach the recesses of the room but revealed a remarkably clean living area.

  Above and across the ceiling, herbs hung in various stages of drying, forming a canopy over a bed opposite the fireplace, a trunk at its foot, and lending a pungent fragrance to the interior. The alcove into which Maelys disappeared lay opposite the front door. A plank table stood against another wall, two rough chairs, three legs each, tucked underneath. Next to the fireplace, a lone door was the only other entrance to the small house.