His gut feeling had been right, the child was a halfling. He bit his cheek at that, annoyed.
Well, I suppose I’ve found the half part. Now, for the woman…she must be the ‘one’.
Shifting his gaze to the sleeping woman he held his breath. Her ears! Yes, she was definitely comyenti; full comyenti he guessed, so yes: one. His heart leaped, for that was more than he could have expected. A half comyenti female child and a grown female, her mother without a doubt! He had searched for a couple of months since leaving Ashanna and Twello, combing out the Balla Mountains, but without any luck. And here they were…
The female was stunning. He only vaguely remembered his own mother and she had been beautiful. On seeing this young comyenti woman stretched out on the grass, scarcely dressed in a dark pine green dress his heart leaped up. The colour of her skin was the same as his; bronze. Her dress was open at the neck, and a small line of sweat trickled between the cleft of her full breasts. Sweat circled her neck like a necklace of dew. He raised his eyebrows; she wasn’t using a cooling technique? Well, he was and even he sweated in this heat, but then again it was more his emotions that caused it. He tore his eyes away from her body and focussed on her face: her pointed ears, her long black eyelashes, her arched eyebrows and when he saw her mouth a little open he felt his legs tremble and his knees weaken.
His breathing had become faster and he felt his heart almost burst out of his chest. He wanted to cry out from joy, I have found you! I can call off the search now! Mother, father, brother and sisters, finally. Your deaths will not have been in vain!
But he could not, not yet. He could not wake her or talk to her. She wasn’t alone. Shazar could see why she picked the human man but he could not fathom why she had stayed with him. Didn’t she know the horrors of her history?
Better to wait for another moment to meet her and ask; that would be a special moment. He would not let them out of his sight. No, he would watch their every move.
He closed his eyes for a heartbeat, concentrating on his Mindskill and in the next heartbeat he sprinted off; as fast as a hare, the branches of the trees closing behind him.
Sula awoke at once, jamming her eyes open, sitting up, immediately sensing a presence. Suspiciously she looked around, feeling a stir in the air, unable to grasp what it was.
There had been someone here, right here.
How foolish of me to think we’re safe!
She concentrated on the smelling sense of the wolf and sniffed the air around them. Yes, she could definitely sense it had been a being large enough to be human. However… it didn’t smell much like human. She frowned and sniffed again. Not a deer, nor lynx nor a bear. It smelt unlike any other creature she’d smelt before; however it did smell vaguely familiar. She stood silently; alarmed and confused, staring at the grass, kneeling and searching for any footprints. But the grass had already been flattened so much that any other footprint would have gone unnoticed.
How foolish of me to fall asleep on such an open meadow, making us so very vulnerable!
She woke her family up, coaxing them to leave the clearing and look for a suitable camping spot. She didn’t tell Felix about a possible intruder yet or the chance of them being followed and he did not suspect. He wasn’t able to read her thoughts after their Heartmerge but she could. Only comyentis could, she found out.
She could mind read with her daughter, them sharing the same blood, and their relationship was very close and easy because of it. There were hardly any misunderstandings between them but sometimes Sula had to block her thoughts from her daughter, if she wanted some privacy. Felix had always been a little envious of this but was also proud of having such a special little family.
It would only worry Felix if she told him about their visitor and she kept it well hidden from him and even from Fay.
They chose a camping spot deep in the woods and they had their dinner. Fay soon dozed off in her soft bed made of fern leaves and moss beneath a blanket, after Felix had told her a bedtime story. Sula lay beside her daughter spooning her, more protectively than normally and pretended to be fast asleep when Felix gently put a warm hand on her waist underneath the blanket. When she did not respond he caressed her hair and kissed her in her neck, whispering, ‘Sleep well my love.’
She felt a little guilty for leaving him out but she had to do this on her own. She waited for him to fall asleep, listening to his steady shallow breathing and feeling him stir occasionally in his sleep.
Soundlessly she stood, then rearranged the blanket over her husband and child. Next, she opened her senses in all directions.
~~~
It was a moonless night and therefore utterly dark but by the light of the stars she used the night vision and precision of the cat and moved sleekly and silently through the trees. She would go back to the clearing, only a few miles away, and start tracking the, by now, old trail. Already she knew deep in her heart that she would not have to look far, for someone had been following her…
Sula whiffed him clearly behind her now, close. He did not seem to be interested in the camping spot. Good, so he would not be a threat to her family…yet. It was her he wanted, that much was clear.
She smelled him nearby and walked slowly, using all her senses. It was only a matter of waiting for him to show up now.
A small movement of leaves in the bushes a few feet away from the meadow and a whisper, ‘Don’t be afraid, I mean no harm to you or your… family.’ There had been a slight odd sound in the man’s voice when pronouncing the word ‘family’ as if he had difficulty saying it, but he sounded kind enough.
‘Show yourself,’ she whispered defiantly back, stiffening and ready for an attack, even if he said he meant no harm.
Slowly he slipped out of the bushes holding his hands up to show her he had no weapons, knowing she would fear those. Under the light of the stars, using her cat-vision, she saw a handsome slender tallish young man dressed in black. His black hair reached his shoulders and his green slant eyes stared directly into hers; wide with curiosity.
‘Who are you?’ she asked angrily.
‘Look at me thoroughly and you will know,’ he answered and he used one of his hands to slide aside a few strands of his hair; shining almost blue in this hour of the night. Her heart sank when she saw his ears; pointed at the tips, bigger than she had ever seen, but beautifully shaped and proportioned, just like the rest of his almost feminine or genderless face. She would have sighed but she was in too much of a shock to respond. When she saw his eyes she recognized her own in his; something Felix could never get used to; the irises shifting with colour; sometimes deep jade, a moment later emerald, sometimes even shifting to tangerine or hazel, depending on her mood. This man’s were bright grass green at the moment with specks of peach and lemon, glittering like the sun on water. One could quench ones thirst just by staring into his eyes alone.
His mouth and eyes showed a friendly smile when he saw her reaction and took another step forward.
‘Sister…’
His intimate tender voice startled her.
‘Sister?’
‘Yes, we are the same and by calling you sister I acknowledge that we are both comyenti. It is a way of greeting one another, sister, brother…’
‘Brother…’ she softly spoke impulsively and tried out the, to her unfamiliar, word on her lips. She’d never had a brother before. As she spoke she saw his eyes growing watery and a tear running along his pale cheek.
She swallowed hard and she felt a bit dizzy. For so long she had been searching for others of her kind and now that she had lessened her efforts she had found one, or rather he had found her.
‘How…did you find me?’
‘That was easy; the halfling child was to be heard from miles away, and since people hardly ever stroll these woods, I got curious.’
Shivering at the clarity in his voice Sula stared down at her loose flannel nightgown and hugged herself to stay warm in the chilly night. She didn’t have to be cold for
she could easily use the spirit of the sheep to stay warm by its imaginary insulating woolly coat, but the man held all her attention for now. However, he had seen her shiver and that made him frown. He wore tight fitting black leggings, laced up black boots and a roughly woven black shirt which was open at the neck and rolled up at the arms. His arms were tanned and muscular. She noticed he wore a dark string around his neck, but she couldn’t see the jewellery attached to it.
‘Come, let us talk.’ He gestured her to sit beside him on a tree trunk. She hesitated only briefly, reading the relieved face of the stranger. She sat down beside him, holding his gaze. She felt odd. She had imagined many times what it would be like when she would finally meet another comyenti; what she would do, how she would greet him or her, what she would say. But now that moment had come she felt frozen and numb.
He seemed sincere and patient, for he was excited as well, although he had had more time to prepare himself.
They sat silently next to each other in the darkness, very much aware of one another, not knowing where to start.
‘My name is Shazar… and yours?’
‘Sula,’ she replied in as level a voice as she could manage.
’”Sun”,’ he translated the word with surprise in his voice. ‘A good name.’
After that silence again.
Her hands were in her lap and glancing sideways at him she moved one of her hands towards his elbow that was leaning on his knee. He looked at her and swallowed hard, giving her his hand. She squeezed it tight and embraced him suddenly, crying her old tears on his shoulder. He held her close and wept silently with her.
Chapter 19 Brother
‘I was born in the South-East in the Shanzarian Mountains,’ Shazar explained to her in a steady voice, after the ice was broken between them. His voice had a slight lilt to it, almost an accent, but it was like a mixture of languages. ‘Hence my name, we nomads tend to do that, to remind ourselves. I’ve been travelling Bhan since my early teens. How old do you think I am?’
Sula took a better look at him with her cat eyes. His smooth beardless face was young, with hardly any lines, with its high cheekbones and strong jaw, yet his eyes were calm and wise. They confused her. He looked ageless.
‘Thirty, thirty something.’
He smiled at her with a big grin, showing perfect teeth.
‘Fifty seven.’
‘Impossible!’ Her eyes grew bigger.
‘I’m telling you the truth, I wouldn’t lie to you. I can’t guess your age either. You look in your middle twenties but I suppose you might be older?’ Shazar looked intently at her eyes.
‘That is true,’ she answered. ‘I will be forty five this autumn. I always wondered how I remained younger looking. The food, the water, the mountain air? My mother never told me. She herself had always looked the same to me and I was sure she didn’t use the ability of any animal to do so. I mean she could have used the ability of any long living animal such as the giant tortoise,’ her face suddenly looked thoughtful. ‘Both me and my mother have tried to Mindmerge with a certain type of jellyfish so we would be able to live longer. They can turn the clock back all together over and over. Have you ever tried this?’
Shazar shook his head smiling.
‘I find it very hard to reach their mind as well but we might have to keep trying. If we could do this we would be immortal, like them.’
‘But even if we could I’d be afraid to use it! What if our minds changed back into the foetus stage all together?’
‘Even in a Mindmode we still keep our identities!’ he argued.
‘Yes and our bodies are never physically changed by using a Mindskill; we fool our bodies. But my point is, if we truly wanted to be immortal we would have to ‘be’ the jellyfish all the time!’
‘Hmm, we don’t know about that. Perhaps we only have to go in the jellyfish-mode when our bodies show signs of aging? But yes it could prove very exhausting or…fatal.’
‘Not even that. You said it yourself how hard it is to reach a jellyfish’s mind. They are so different than mammals, even from fish. They’re almost the same as floating plants! It’s impossible to make eye contact and I don’t think they have a brain as most animals which is essential to make the Mindmerge. I’m worried if we ever succeed and have to stay in a Mindmode too long it could cause us to lose ourselves all together, to lose who we are. My mother lived with wolves for a couple of years and she used their abilities a lot, she told me she was in wolf-mode so often she started to forget her comyenti side. She even started to behave like a wolf and even develop a liking to the hunt and that is very unlike any comyenti! When she met my kind human father she tried hard to change back. After all, she had to mate. She did change back all together but it was a struggle and she had copied a lot of wolfish attributes. So she always warned me not to use any Mindskill for too long a time., Sula swallowed hard remembering her mother. ‘She died from a fever when she was fifty eight. That’s twenty four years ago now.’
‘Hmm. She might not have known everything. We can reach up to two hundred and fifty years if we manage to stay safe, just like a giant tortoise! Some comyentis have even claimed to have reached three centuries. Few of our time knew this, because it rarely happened due to the killings. We look younger because we age more slowly. We reach full adulthood when we are about twenty.’
She opened her mouth in surprise.
‘I did have my first cycle late.’
‘Not late; late in human terms but on time in ours.’
Sula bit her lip and thought fast, her eyes darting from side to side.
‘I’m sorry about your loss, Sula. Your mother…what was her story then?’
‘She fled as a child when her family was killed. A pack of wolves found her and raised her. Luckily she remembered her duty and had had some training from her parents to pass on to me. But her memory of comyentis was clouded,’ she looked up at him with her hands folded in her lap and added, ‘She was so young. I’m interested in what you know? You’ve searched most of your life like me?’
He nodded.
‘The Search; a comyenti necessity. The last ones made the binding promise and we cannot forsake it and not only because it’s done under the Comyenti Oath.’
‘Yes, the Comyenti Oath; if we break our promise we lose all our traits, abilities and skills, so it is said, my mother knew that. But I never just searched because I gave her the promise.’
‘Nor me. Oh, but the Oath is very real by the way. My parents knew someone who broke a promise and became…human. Even so, The Search is more than that; it is our duty,’ and he glanced at her. ‘I have travelled every deserted place that I could find, knowing a comyenti would seek a safe place, shielded from humans. From the west to the east and the South to the north, the north being my latest search,’ Shazar said.
‘So have I and I have especially searched the north thoroughly the last four years, since I live here.’
Both looked sadly at one another.
‘Either they hide too well or…we are alone,’ Sula stated plainly.
Shazar gently took her hand in his and looked at her without blinking his eyes.
‘Sula… we are alone. We are the last.’
‘How do you know?’
He briefly explained his encounter with Ashanna and her Truthstone and the answer the stone had given him.
‘So it is true,’ she started sobbing.
‘I knew you were out there somewhere, though. I’ve always felt it,’ he comforted her. ‘Even though you travelled, like me, we tend to hide too well to be found. I have found you and for that I am more than glad. The Search indeed is over.’
Sula looked at him and saw his misty eyes admiring her, looking so pleased. She did not know how to deal with his overwhelming sense of joy.
I have found you… it resounded in her head when she thought about it. His face showed no sign of hair and Sula vaguely remembered her mother saying that comyenti men had no beard or moustache growth and nev
er needed to shave. He was ridiculously handsome.
She was of course in one way relieved that The Search was over too, yet sad that there were no more comyentis other than the two of them, if his story was true and if she could trust him. But she had to: he was comyenti. They didn’t lie, there was nothing wicked about them.
Yet, unlike him; her life had moved on and she was married now, had a child and was happy.
‘You seem to know more about our common history than me. What do you know?’ she almost demanded of him. But he smiled and told her what he had been told by his grandparents and parents and she in her turn what she knew from her mother. It seemed Shazar’s family believed they did not spring forth from Bhan and he showed her the pendant hanging around his neck underneath his tunic; a simple round metallic object with a hole in the middle where the string fell through.
‘It belonged to my father’s father who received it from his mother, I believe, but the family was scattered early. They had to live in small numbers spread about as that was safer. So we don’t know everything and nothing is written down so our legend is lost too. Only some uncertain tales remain.’
Sula looked at the round coppery piece with strange symbols carved upon it and touched it. It felt warm and smooth and she could feel power radiating from it, almost like electricity. She could see Shazar’s pulse in his neck and feel his warmth. He stared at her and she reluctantly let go of the pendant. Ruefully, he looked down.
‘It is not a metal made from this world and even though we are not sure any more whether this tale is truth or fiction, this pendant is some proof of our origin. All the rest is lost together with our ancestors.’
The Comyenti Series Book Bundle, Volume 1 and 2 (Epic Romantic Supernatural Fantasy) Page 16