by Barb Hendee
How wrong she had been.
Majay-hì here were of all the colors she had known and feared. There were mottled brown, silver gray, near-black ones, and more. But there were none so black as Shade or any white like Shade’s mother, the one Wynn had named Lily.
The white majay-hì—Chap’s mate and Shade’s mother—had set Wayfarer on the path to this place through a terrible journey.
It had taken a while, but Shade occasionally joined the others in their touching memory-talk. Not right now, though. Wayfarer leaned over and rested the side of her face against Shade’s neck. Almost instantly, a word rose into her head out of her own memories—in Magiere’s voice.
—Dinner?—
Wayfarer sighed and pressed her face deeper in Shade’s fur. Even for all of the memories shared, she had come to like Shade’s “voices” in her head almost more.
“Soon . . . not just yet,” she answered, the answer somewhat muffled.
Even Shade was such a complication, though Wayfarer had grown to need her desperately. Shade was “sister” to Wynn, ally of Chane, and even friend to Osha. Perhaps in another time and place Wayfarer might have shunned Shade as she had Osha.
Facing Osha amid all else in this new place while he still thought longingly of Wynn was too much. And so, slowly, she had cut herself off from him.
Wayfarer rolled her face out of Shade’s neck to gaze down the gulley.
At its nearer end stood a vast fir tree with a trunk nearly as wide as a tower of the keep where Wynn had once lived in Calm Seatt. The hint of a dark opening showed in its bare base, closed off by a hanging of dyed wool in that doorway.
Wayfarer had been unsettled by the “made” structures of a’Ghràihlôn’na—after her initial awe had passed. Here, she found comfort within a living tree like those of her own people, even as a temporary home. The wool curtain shifted, maybe from movement inside the tree, and a muffled voice called out.
“Wayfarer?”
“Yes,” she called back.
Vreuvillä emerged from the tree dwelling, a circlet of braided raw shéot’a strips binding back her silver-streaked hair. Wayfarer had taken to wearing the same.
She had also cast aside old clothes for ones like the elder Foirfeahkan. She now wore pants and a long-sleeved tunic, as well as high soft boots, and a thong-belted jerkin, both made of darkened hide. There was also a pleated, thick wool skirt of dark forest green split down the front that could be bound around her waist as needed. She rarely wore that, as she did not like how it got in her way.
“Supper is ready,” Vreuvillä said, striding closer as some of the pack shifted and circled in around her.
“Is it so late?” Wayfarer asked, sitting upright. “I should have helped.” They normally ate well past dusk and into the night, and she always helped with everything.
“I would have called if help was needed,” Vreuvillä said bluntly before Wayfarer could apologize.
Such brusque responses—sometimes before a question was even asked—had become almost normal. At first, Wayfarer had found the Foirfeahkan woman rather sharp. But this was just her way, and she had opened a new world before Wayfarer’s eyes.
That new world had not always been comfortable and was often confusing.
Vreuvillä explained that the Foirfeahkan were—had been—a spiritual sect reaching back before what humans called the Forgotten History. And even farther and farther. Vreuvillä did not know how far back they began.
From what Wayfarer understood, the priestess was the last of them.
Their ideology was animistic, another strange word with which Wayfarer had trouble. They believed in the spiritual—ethereal—of this world rather than a theistic focus common to the outside world. They believed—somewhat like the an’Cróan but more—that Spirit itself was of this world forever and not from a separate realm. More confusing at first, the life of Existence had a heart, a center, a “nexus,” which was another word that Wayfarer had never heard in any language.
Chârmun—“Sanctuary”—was the center of all.
It was called so because its presence was why the Lhoin’na forest was the last place where the Ancient Enemy’s darkest forces could not enter during or since the Great War.
The tree grew in all its mystery and beauty in what others called “First Glade.” The true place of that name to the Foirfeahkan was somewhere else nearby. Wayfarer had gone to look upon Chârmun many times, though she had often needed Shade to help find her way through the forest. At first, she had been frightened, and even Shade had been reluctant.
In a hidden, remote place in her own people’s forest stood another sacred tree of a similar name—Roise Chârmune, the “Seed of Sanctuary.” Its clearing was the last resting place for the ashes of the first an’Cróan ancestors. Only the most honored dead of their people were allowed to have their ashes laid in that place. And most others only visited there once in their lives for a vision by which they took their final name.
Though Vreuvillä revered Chârmun, as the last Foirfeahkan she did not truly worship it. She saw it as sacred in being integral to everything, as were the majay-hì and other Fay-born. Because of this, she could share memories with the majay-hì . . . as could Wayfarer now. “How” was still a puzzle, and, though it was never said, Wayfarer often wondered about Vreuvillä’s physical appearance.
The priestess looked in some ways like an an’Cróan or a Lhoin’na and yet neither. This was mostly because of her dark hair—like Wayfarer’s—but there was something more.
Was Vreuvillä also of mixed blood?
Was it the same with all past Foirfeahkan?
Vreuvillä never spoke of this, even when asked, though from other things, Wayfarer knew there could be no form of heritage for this calling. All who had become Foirfeahkan did not inherit it; they came to it, as she had now done. In that, her taken name before the ancestors had better meaning.
Sheli’câlhad, “To a Lost Way.”
And even that was not the final naming, according to her new teacher. Vreuvillä once mentioned that all Foirfeahkan took a name by their new calling. It was a name of their own choice. Even so, Wayfarer wanted no name but the one she now had, created for her by Magiere, Léshil, and Chap.
At first, she had not known what to expect in coming here, but after initial explanations, Vreuvillä did not spend much time with instruction. Rather, she encouraged Wayfarer to simply exist and feel what was real for herself.
“Commune among the majay-hì,” she said, “and with First Glade . . . the true one . . . when the need calls you. These will teach you far more—more quickly—than can I. And after that, there is even more.”
At first, and only at night, when even the trees slept, Vreuvillä had taken her to the true First Glade. It was a clearing with a broad circle of slender aspens at the far side. Those trees looked no different from others of their kind, but perhaps they were too pristine for a wild place. Within their circle, the grass was low and clean. And when Vreuvillä breached that circle to stand at its center surrounded by the aspens, her hair suddenly glistened as if she had stepped into a spring dawn.
Silver streaks in her locks turned almost white. Her amber eyes sparked as she raised her face upward. The majay-hì paced softly around the tree ring.
On that first visit and others later, Shade always remained at Wayfarer’s side.
The priestess spread her arms low to the sides with palms forward and whispered in a tongue difficult to follow. It sounded like an’Cróan or Lhoin’na but perhaps older. That Vreuvillä heard or felt something answer her was clear, for it was the only time all traces of harshness vanished from her face.
But Wayfarer had neither seen nor heard anything, and Vreuvillä never explained.
Wayfarer had gone to this First Glade several times with only Shade. Though she tried to copy what Vreuvillä had done in clearing all thoug
hts from her mind, nothing happened. She felt nothing and heard nothing each time; ask as she did, Vreuvillä only answered, “You will receive an answer when they think you are ready.”
And when Wayfarer asked, “When who thinks I am ready?”
“That is part of the answer you will receive.”
There were too many nonanswers like this.
Days and nights passed much the same, except for “listening” to majay-hì memories in Shade’s company. In that, she was almost at peace in forgetting things she had yet to understand. Freedom was hers for the first time among the pack, until Vreuvillä mentioned something else.
Wayfarer pressed about why the Foirfeahkan lived isolated from the world, and the priestess hesitantly whispered . . .
“Jâdh’airt.”
Wayfarer frowned. Much as that sounded like a word of her people, it made no sense. Her only guess was something like “an overwhelming desire.”
Vreuvillä’s jaw clenched, and walking away, she uttered in a low voice, “The true wish.”
Again, that was not enough. Other than being just a youthful nothing, it did not seem such a horrible thing. Wayfarer headed after the priestess.
“How is that different from just . . . a wish for something wanted?”
Vreuvillä slowed but did not look back. “Nothing can be created or destroyed in such a way. Only changed . . . exchanged.”
Striding on, she had offered nothing more.
Tonight, Wayfarer pressed all such things from her mind. She was glad for the company of Vreuvillä and the pack, and in this moment, she was determined to think only of following the priestess back to the dwelling—and eating dinner together.
The two of them had taken only a few steps when . . .
A leggy, light brown majay-hì ahead to the left whirled from watching over tussling pups. She lunged down into the gulley and stared toward the far end. In less than two breaths, others of the pack stopped and turned.
Wayfarer did so as she heard Shade rumble shortly. Something shook the low branches at the gulley’s far end.
A silver-gray majay-hì pushed out through the brush.
“Chap!” Wayfarer shouted, running to him.
There had been a time he was so sacred, she did not dare touch him. Then there was a time when she would but was still in awe of him. And later, even needing him curled up beside her at night, she found the old reverence was still there.
Now she skidded in, fell to her knees, and threw her arms around Chap, nearly knocking him over and sending both of them tumbling. Much as she had come to adore Shade, she had missed the one who nurtured her earliest self-discoveries.
“Oh, Chap!” she cried again, even as he grumbled at her. “You are safe . . . safe!”
—Yes . . . I missed you too, but enough . . . Wayfarer, enough!—
She had barely sat back, determined not to cry, when the brush beyond Chap rustled and tree branches parted.
Osha emerged into the gulley’s end, and Wayfarer’s body clenched.
He stopped just beyond the trees, looked her up and down, and then dropped his gaze.
A part of her still clung to him. Another part found him a distraction for the mix of resentment, betrayal, and longing she still felt toward him. This was why she had stopped going to see him a moon ago.
Wynn had sent him away, but Osha still kept her with him . . . inside.
Chap shoved his head into Wayfarer’s shoulder.
—Not now . . . There is much to do—
She should have reveled in the sound of memory-words in her mind from him.
Some of the pack were closing in, a few rumbling softly. None of them knew him, but they knew he was not one of them. She never had a chance to show them.
A wide and stout form with loose red hair thrashed out of the trees behind Osha.
Even at night by the glowing lanterns, Wayfarer recognized him. He was a friend of Chane’s who had helped them escape from Calm Seatt. Osha stepped closer behind Chap, watching her again. Even before she realized what all of this meant . . .
—We have . . . the three orbs—
“Where is Chane?” she asked Chap.
“Back in the city, guarding our cargo,” Osha answered.
Wayfarer looked up once to see the scowl on his horselike face. And then Vreuvillä appeared, standing over Wayfarer.
“What is the meaning of this overly late visit?” the priestess demanded.
“Forgive us,” Osha answered. “It was necessary.”
His use of the Lhoin’na dialect had improved.
Wayfarer ignored him and focused on Chap. In recent days, she had worked with Shade on something new. The sharing of memories involved more than mere images, sounds, and touch and smell. There were emotions connected to them.
Wayfarer had shared memory after memory of Chap with Shade, his daughter, showing that daughter how Chap had protected her, befriended her, given her comfort. She hoped this might ease some of Shade’s own resentments toward her father.
Now Wayfarer twisted on her knees away from Vreuvillä and looked back. Shade had stepped forward within reach, likely out of habit, for they needed touch to speak her way. She did not approach her father, though at least she was not bristling with hackles raised.
Shade huffed once at her father.
Chap stared back at her, wide-eyed and motionless, perhaps afraid to do anything to ruin even so little acknowledgment.
Wayfarer turned the other way and looked up at Vreuvillä, though she never got out a word.
“Yes, I see it is time,” the priestess said, her voice tight as if restraining something. “And you are done learning . . . at least what you are.”
Wayfarer rose up and nodded.
“You will come again to finish,” Vreuvillä said quietly, “when there is time again.”
Wayfarer could only nod, swallow hard, and look around the gulley at its lanterns and all of the majay-hì. This was not her home; that would be somewhere else with Magiere, Leesil, and Chap when all was done. And still . . .
She had known this was coming and did not like it.
• • •
Hidden among the trees and dense foliage, Chuillyon absorbed all that he saw and heard. It was almost too much, even for missing pieces that left him frustrated.
After gathering her belongings and saying short good-byes, Wayfarer left with Osha, the dwarf, and the silver-gray majay-hì, and Shade as well.
Yes, I see it is time.
The vexing priestess’s words were the crux, but time for what? In a long life in the light of Chârmun, Chuillyon hated the darkness of ignorance most of all. And he was going to do something about that.
CHAPTER TEN
Upon reaching the one city of the Lhoin’na, Chap and the others headed for the stable. After lodging the wagon and horses, they decided to find an inn for the night. Osha mentioned he already had one in mind.
Chap then communicated to Wayfarer that she and Osha should accompany Ore-Locks the following day when he went to purchase supplies.
Standing near the wagon’s back, Ore-Locks frowned when Wayfarer related this.
“I do not need the assistance of a boy and a girl in bartering,” he argued.
“Chap thinks our presence might make others here more . . . friendly,” Wayfarer added.
Ore-Locks scowled but did not argue. “Supplies for a longer journey, even beyond the Sky-Cutter, could take more than a day. I assume we are to help resupply the others we are traveling to join?”
Chane nodded absently, and to Chap it appeared the undead was preoccupied. This time, he wished he could dip into that undead’s surface thoughts. Still, his mind was busy with other concerns. He had caught some things about the route from the young stonewalker, but not enough for his liking. And facing his daughter also worried h
im.
Shade lingered near Wayfarer. Whatever had happened between her and Wayfarer in two moons had changed them both.
Chap did not want to risk losing what little acceptance he seemed to have gained from his daughter.
“This time, we will not need to search for the seatt or its entrance,” Chane said while fidgeting strangely, “so the journey will not take as long. But Ore-Locks, please do not wear out the patience of the local merchants.”
Ore-Locks scoffed. “If they cannot barter adequately, that is not my fault!”
“A little restraint, please,” Chane advised. “That is all I ask.”
His voice sounded strained, and Chap studied him closely. A light sheen glistened off his pale face. Chap had no intention of asking what was wrong. If Chane were alive, he might have looked ill. Was that even possible for a vampire?
Again, Chap had other pressing thoughts.
Since arriving in this land, he had not stopped thinking about the moment when he, Chane, and Ore-Locks had passed through a large clearing. Even before arriving there, he had seen a glowing building ahead behind the trees, vines, and choking undergrowth.
Though Chap had never seen Chârmun for himself, he had seen it in the memory of someone else. Years ago, he had caught the deep memories of Most Aged Father, the ancient and decrepit leader of the Anmaglâhk.
Though it was difficult to believe, Most Aged Father was at least a thousand years old.
Once called Sorhkafâré, he had taken a cutting from Chârmun before leading others all the way to the eastern continent to found the territories of the an’Cróan. While reading the memories of the paranoid madman, Chap had seen an image of First Glade as it had looked a thousand years ago—and Chârmun within that place.
For some time now Chap had contemplated confronting his kin, the Fay, one more time. He had broken with them when they had once attempted to kill Wynn. Due to an error of the same thaumaturgical ritual that allowed Wynn to hear him, she had unwittingly overheard him speaking to his kin. Their outrage and reaction had been swift upon realizing that an outsider was aware of them. He had been forced to defend her in an ugly battle and, in the end, had broken with them.