The Guardians of the Forest: Book One

by Kelly Napoli

CHAPTER 7

  STORY

  The next few weeks were brutal. Her routine was as monotonous as it was simple: wake up, eat, work on the forest, eat, work on the forest, eat, and then start the whole thing again the next morning. Besides those few minutes to eat and the nights to rest, she did nothing else but grow tree after tree. The days were as long as they were tedious. It seemed that no matter how many trees she planted, there was always more to do.

  Kiethara woke with a start from a very quire dream. Her clearing was once more full and lush, with animals chirping, braying, growling, and sighing from all sides. She no longer had to look upon the vicious wound, which made her mornings a little more bearable, even though she knew it was still there. There was definitely a brighter outlook to the burn, for Kiethara estimated that in a week or two, with consistent, hard work, it would be gone for good. That thought propelled her up from her hammock and to the north.

  Hours later, she returned to her clearing, drenched in sweat and holding a considerably lighter bag. She threw it to the ground with a groan and fell into her hammock, closing her eyes against the sun.

  “I need a break,” she complained to herself. She didn’t feel hungry, only thirsty. Suddenly, a very refreshing idea came to mind.

  She rolled to her feet again and flew out of her clearing, barely having to look at the symbols that lead her northwest. Honestly, she had only needed them when she was young.

  When Kiethara reached her lake, she had never seen a more welcoming sight. The lake shimmered under the hot sun, but was still as glass from the lack of wind. This lake was not like the guardians lake; there was nothing special about it. But the Spirit of Aaron did not let her use that lake for such mundane tasks as bathing and that was how she had come across this one.

  She stripped off her sweaty garments, everything but her bracelets, which could not come off. She decided to keep her locket around her neck, as well. She jumped and pulled her knees to her chest before falling into the water with a quiet laugh as the water washed off the past hours of grime from her work. She broke the surface and took a deep breath, for unlike the guardian’s lake, she could not breathe in this water.

  Kiethara floated idly on the surface for several minutes, allowing her body to cool. Her mind was blissfully blank of anything, except, perhaps, how good the water felt.

  Yet, a voice nagged at her that she had much work to be done. This was by no means helping her get it done. Each minute brought the issue closer to the center of her thoughts, and she knew that she would never find any real peace as long as she still had it hovering over her like a dreary cloud. It was almost torture, but she waded back over to the shore and pulled herself out of the water. She pushed her wet hair from her eyes, and suddenly she was looking into green.

  Not green of the forest, but green of a pair of eyes. Navadar was standing just a few feet into the trees.

  With a wild screech, she threw her hands over her front. It would have been more logical to just jump back into the water, but the idea was overcome by her panic. Kiethara saw Navadar’s head snap in her direction.

  He wasn’t even looking at me, she realized. Well, he was now.

  Before she could figure out how to cover herself a little better, she caught sight of Navadar looking towards her with a confused expression. To her utter shock, he stepped forward into the clearing, narrowing his eyes and turning his head to the left and to the right, looking right past her.

  “Kiethara?” Navadar called out, puzzled. His eyes kept searching, and suddenly they paused, gazing at something on the ground. Kiethara looked over to see her clothes on the ground. Navadar’s face began to color.

  Kiethara was no longer frozen in shock, but confusion. She looked down for an explanation as to why Navadar couldn’t see her naked body.

  Her body was gone. Instead of feet, she could only see grass. Yet she could still feel her body. She put her hand before her face, but her eyes saw nothing. She gasped and stumbled back. It proved difficult to walk without being able to see her limbs, and as a result, she fell back into the water with a splash.

  Navadar’s head whipped around towards the noise, scanning the lake. They rested on the center of the ripples, where she lay, somehow invisible, half submerged. The water curved around her figure, giving her a choppy outline, but she still remained transparent.

  “Kiethara?” he asked again, but a bit quieter, almost wary.

  “Hello,” she said in a small voice.

  “What…?” Navadar started to ask, and he didn’t have to finish the sentence for her to understand what he was asking.

  “I don’t…know…” she said honestly, getting shakily up to her feet. “Maybe it… I…”

  Kiethara walked slowly over to her garments, and avoiding Navadar, she reached down towards them.

  As soon as her fingers made contact with the light material, it turned invisible too. She jumped back, holding the invisible fabric far away from her as though it was contaminated. She whimpered slightly—couldn’t she ever have a normal encounter with this boy?

  Feeling as though she were blind, she fumbled with her dress to find the right holes in which to put her body through. She turned back to Navadar, who was looking very awkward indeed, staring at the lake as if unsure where to look. She was sure that if she could see herself, she would look the same way.

  She took another step forward and promptly tripped over a rock from not raising her foot high enough, arms flying out instinctively to catch her fall. Gritting her teeth, she pulled herself upright.

  “Aaron!” she called in frustration.

  In no time at all a blinding light filled the clearing, condensing to the figure of a man. As the light reached her, she sensed that he was highly amused.

  “Yes, Kiethara?” he chuckled.

  “You know perfectly well,” she snapped.

  “I suppose I do,” he said. Kiethara let out a sigh of frustration.

  “Why am I invisible?”

  “Do you remember what I said about your emotions triggering your power? How they are interlinked?” he asked her.

  “Of course,” she replied indignantly. She never forgot what Aaron told her, knowing how important it always was.

  “Well, the emotion you felt now—embarrassment, I believe—resulted in you becoming invisible,” he explained. Navadar’s red face got redder.

  “But I didn’t even know it was possible for me to become invisible!” she argued. “What element does that fall under?”

  “What element does your shield fall under? Or your flying?” He asked.

  Kiethara opened her mouth to retort, but as his words sunk in, she realized she had none. She had always thought magic was based on those elements. She had never given her flying a second thought, for it seemed so natural to her, and as for her shield…

  “Well, my flying could come from wind…” she mumbled.

  “Nice try, Kiethara. Your powers aren’t limited to the fundamental elements, you must understand. Those simply are the basics, what is used to teach at first, and then as you acquire more skill, you learn to branch out from that.”

  “But—”

  “Another time, Kiethara. I believe you have a guest,” Aaron said pointedly.

  Kiethara turned to look at Navadar, who was staring at Aaron.

  “Can you tell me how to become visible again?” she pleaded.

  “You need to be calm, for one. Then just picture your body,” he explained.

  Kiethara took a deep breath and pictured her body, clothes on and visible, especially her feet. Her crystals brightened, even though there was no source of the light to be seen. She closed her eyes, doing as he instructed, calming herself, focusing…Kiethara opened her eyes, and then sighed in relief as she caught sight of her toes.

  “Thank you,” she said reverently.

  “You are welcome,” he said. He paused for a minute, Kiethara reading into his suggested silence and looking quickly at Navadar. But Aaron made no comment as he wa
lked away from them, his light soon fading into the trees.

  “I-I’m sorry about that…” she stuttered to Navadar.

  “Don’t apologize, the fault is mine,” he said firmly.

  “Nonsense, I was just—”

  “I should have called out, or something,” he interrupted.

  Kiethara reddened. She wanted this conversation to end, she wanted to crawl back into her hammock and shove the embarrassing feeling into the back of her head.

  “Well, you did help me with my training. I didn’t even know I could do that!”

  “Yes, well…”Navadar mumbled, and she could tell that was not a suitable defense to justify what had happened.

  “Er, let’s walk,” she suggested.

  So together they set off away from the lake, both of them hoping they could leave the awkwardness behind them with the lake. A few painful beats of silence followed, until Navadar was brave enough to break it.

  “Would you like to hear an old story from my kingdom?” he asked suddenly.

  “I’d love to!” she answered, surprised.

  “It’s how our kingdom started. Well, how it is widely believed to be founded. Very few disagree; this story is told as bedtime stories for youngsters and even to the king in his own courts. It is recorded as our history.

  “A thousand years ago, two men and one woman were roaming vast plains of green. The men’s names were Lince and Narco, while the women bore the name of Kika. The three were good friends and had spent all their lives in the others company, until one thing separated them forever.”

  Navadar’s words flowed smoothly, like a well-rehearsed chant. She was enthralled already. Kiethara was sure that, if she had been lying down, his slickly told tale would lull her to sleep.

  “What was that?” she asked almost impatiently. He smiled.

  “Love. After traveling so long with men, Kika yearned for something more than their tedious friendship. As Lince and Narco began to realize this, they did everything they could to win her heart. They showered her with flowers of the meadow and jewels of the sea. They drowned her with promises of clothes made of the finest silks, land to her name, and food from every corner of the world. There was nothing they didn’t offer, but she saw through these things, and none would win her heavy heart, which was torn between the two.

  “It became a competition and soon the friendship that had once been similar to the bonds of brotherhood dissolved between Lince and Narco. Fights broke out, nearly all of them dragged Kika into their midst. But still, as they shouted and traded blades, she would not choose. The two men were strained past their limits, and the consequences came to pass one fated day.

  “It was as any other fight, where the woman was dragged into the middle. They both pleaded with her, begging for her with reasons why they were the more superior choice. When she just shook her head, tempers flared past any point they had reached in the past.

  “It became physical. They lunged, sword drawn, at each other, forgetting the girl in between them. They almost crushed her as they fell upon her, blinded in fury. Her cry of pain was what made them come to common senses and they stopped in horror as they realized what they had done. The two of them carried her back to their camp and treated her for her injuries. When she woke, each man had something to say.

  “Lince apologized over and over again with tears gushing down his cheeks. In pure character and humility, he showed her how disgusted he was with himself. Narco, however, did not do the same. Instead, he used their mistake to turn it against his former friend. He told Kika that Lince had fell upon her, that he had been the one who had lost his temper. He lied to her by telling her that he had pulled her out of the way and saved her life. She could not remember; she only looked between the two men in confusion. Lince did not fight back, because he realized the fighting had been what had hurt Kika in the beginning. Throwing his selfishness behind him, he gave up his pursuit of Kika, packed up his belongings, and left.”

  “Narco wasted no time. The next day, he proposed to her.

  “But, to his utter bewilderment, she denied him. Lince’s noble action had awed her so much that she understood where her heart truly lay. Leaving Narco dumbfounded, she pursued Lince, hoping to give him her heart. It took her a year to find him again, but she did in the end, finding him broken and lost. Needless to say, he became the happiest man in the world. They got married and built themselves a home, where Kika bared many healthy children. As their children grew, they developed the land around them. As farms expanded while houses and shops popped up, it became a small village. But this is not the end of our tale.

  “Narco was stung by Kika’s flight. He was wounded by his lose, and when news reached him of Lince’s prosperity with Kika, he became enraged. He began to despise them both.

  “One night, after a few drinks, he decided to set off towards the village that Kika and Lince had successfully wrought. It was late, and the village was sleeping. He took a torch and ran through the sleeping town, lighting everything he could on fire. He watched from a small, nearby hill as the flames engulfed roof after roof and screams began to break the night’s silence. He laughed at the sight.

  “Back in the village, Lince awoke. He shook Kika from her slumber, flames already burning their home. Together they ran out and screamed for the other villagers to do the same. As people realized what was happening, they fled in panic to the nearby fields. The surviving villagers watched in agony as all they loved burnt to ash.

  “Narco sauntered down from his post towards the lamenting villagers with a hungry expression. The villagers parted silently as he made his way to where Lince and Kika stood. Anger boiled in Lince at the sight of the fiend; pain rippled through Kika. Narco grinned at their reactions and declared that in order for him to stop terrorizing them, Kika would have to return to him. Her reply to him was to take Lince’s hand and spit at his feet.

  “Enraged, Narco flew at her. Lince jumped in front of her and the two men collided once more. They separated, each drawing their blades. Kika shrieked and attempted to separate them, but one of her sons prevented her from interfering.

  “Narco and Lince’s battle became so fierce that sparks flew as their swords collided in the air. They dueled for hours. The men were equal in skill, driven by the same force: Kika. Human necessities were the only thing that could stop them.

  “Both fighters were growing tired. Lince was finally able to take an upper hand, and Narco fell suddenly to the mercy of his sword.

  “Yet…Lince could not muster up the courage to kill Narco. Even through all the years of hate and jealousy, he remembered once they had been as close as brothers. Instead, he left Narco wounded in the mud as he turned back to his villagers. He did not see Narco drag himself up from the ground, or pick up his sword, so he could do nothing to stop the sword that Narco pitched into the night.

  “The blade of the sword drove itself into Lince’s back. He fell to the mud, bleeding profusely.”

  Kiethara gasped.

  “Kika screamed and pried herself from her son’s grasp, throwing herself down upon her Lince. Her eldest son did nothing to stop her, because he was consumed with his own revenge. He picked up his father’s sword and killed Narco with it.

  “Meanwhile, Kika was listening to her husband’s last words, tears streaming down her face. He whispered for her to rebuild the village, to continue with what they had created together. With his last breath, he proclaimed his love for her.

  “After the entire village held a huge burial in his honor, Kika did exactly as Lince wished. Together the villagers rebuilt their homes from scratch. Kika named it ‘Redawn,’ meaning that there was light on the horizon and hope for a shining future.”

  Kiethara was could not think of anything to say—his story had blown her away. Why had she never heard a tale like this before?

  “That was amazing,” she said breathlessly.

  “I thought you might enjoy it,” he said with a superior grin.

  “I’
ve never heard anything like it!” she exclaimed. “Are there more?”

  He looked at her for a moment from the corner of his eye as they walked. “You really haven’t been around many people, have you?”

  “Besides Gandador? No…” she frowned. She wondered if Aaron had any stories.

  “Well, I would love to tell you some more, if we have time,” he said regretfully.

  “It’s not that late,” she protested.

  “Well, let’s see if you can give me the moral of the story,” he challenged.

  “The moral?” she asked. “Er…don’t fall in love with your good friends?”

  Navadar laughed so hard tears fell from his eyes. Kiethara smiled in spite of herself.

  “No, but that was a good try.”

  “It’s true!” she defended herself.

  “I suppose so, but that’s not the reason both men died,” he disagreed.

  “If she hadn’t fallen in love with either of them, I’m sure the ending would have been a little happier.”

  “Yes, but suppose she had to fall in love with one of them. What were the men’s mistakes?”

  The question gave her some trouble. Obviously, Narco had made the most mistakes, but what was the moral? A few minutes went by.

  “Revenge has its cost?” she answered timidly.

  “Exactly.”