The Heart of Oldra

by Georgina Makalani

  ‘What is the expectation here?’ she asked carefully. ‘What does he want from me?’

  Teven shook his head. Rhali started to cry.

  Cora could feel the anger burning inside her. ‘Boil water,’ she snapped at Teven, ‘and find some blankets. You,’ she continued sharply to Rhali, ‘help this woman forward.’

  ‘What do you mean to do?’ Teven asked, looking over his shoulder.

  ‘Deliver this baby. She is coming whether we are ready or not.’ She tried not to groan as she hit her leg against the wall, nestling into the cushions behind the girl’s back. The girl leaned back into Cora. She took her hands, clenched her teeth and nodded towards Rhali.

  Together, they tried to help the young mother deliver the child. Cora thought light had started to shine through the doorway as the girl finally began to push the child free. She was exhausted, and she had barely anything left when Rhali cried that she could see the head.

  Cora sighed with relief before Rhali slowly shook her head. She felt the life slip from the woman in her arms with the child. She waited desperately for the cry, but it didn’t come. Rhali looked away as Cora pushed the lifeless woman from her body and reached for the child.

  He was blue, the cord too tight around his neck. She wondered what she had seen. This girl was far too young for a child, let alone two. She saw the similarities between the child of her vision and the woman before her. Had this young mother been the smiling child of her vision, and not the baby?

  ‘Who told her it was a boy?’ Cora asked, staring at the child.

  The two looked at each other and then back to the child.

  ‘You knew this would happen,’ she said, trying desperately to get herself out from beneath the girl and failing. Then Teven was pulling her free, and although she wanted to cry for the girl she didn’t know and the child she hadn’t sensed, she simply rested her head on Teven’s chest.

  He didn’t move, allowing her to lean against him. She had been no help for this girl, and she would be no use to her own people. She couldn’t see as her mother could, nor could she heal as her mother could heal. She might be useful with a bow, but she would never be the warrior her parents were. Perhaps it was best that she was lost to them now, and her brothers could step up and be what she could not.

  Exhaustion washed over her as she stepped back. She staggered on her leg and reached out to put her hands on Teven’s chest. The mark of Oldra burned hot and bright in her mind, as well as against her right hand.

  ‘You have the mark,’ she murmured, looking up into his face.

  He shook his head violently, clutching at her arms to hold her up and away from him.

  ‘I can feel it,’ she said.

  He pushed her down to the fur, beside the girl. ‘You couldn’t even tell it was a boy.’

  Cora looked from the girl to him and back again. ‘I can feel it,’ she said again.

  Anger twisted his features and he pulled at his top, surprising her with a well-muscled chest that reminded her of her father when her mother had tried to save him. He stood before her, scowling. Instead of the mark of Oldra over his heart, he was heavily scarred as though someone long ago had taken a knife to his chest and carved back and forth.

  She struggled to her feet and almost fell forward into him. But as she reached for the scarred skin, he grabbed her hand.

  ‘There is no mark,’ he said with an anger that terrified her.

  Chapter 8

  Rhali helped Cora out into the cool air. As they made it outside, she pushed out of Rhali’s arms and leaned against the smooth, soft grass of the outer wall. She had only been pulled from her sleeping mat to watch the girl die. Not one of them had expected her to live, and no healing powers had surfaced, despite Arminel and her mother being so sure she had them. Nor had Cora’s skills as a seer. If what she had were such skills.

  Dreams of the past, and mostly her mother’s, were not enough. Again, she wondered just what her mother had seen, what she already knew of the people around her. Cora had always been so busy fighting against her, and now she wanted nothing more than to sit and talk with her. She looked out into the dim morning light and the dark trees. She couldn’t feel anything there now, no sense of dragons, no golden eyes in the darkness.

  She squeezed her hand closed. She could still feel the heat of the mark in her hand, and a sadness swept over her. Whether Teven was Oldra or not, this was not the place for her. She stepped out across the dry ground, still missing the snow. Rhali didn’t try to stop her as she hobbled painfully towards the trees. When she reached the first one, she leaned into it.

  It felt just like any other tree, maybe less damp due to the lack of snow, but otherwise it was just a tree. And for the moment, Cora was just a girl. She closed her eyes and reached out for Dra. The emptiness took her breath away. Would she spend the rest of her life searching? The chief’s serious face appeared in the darkness behind her lids, and she sighed.

  The rest of her life might not be very long. She didn’t know what he wanted, what any of them wanted. Her father would have a sensible plan, but her mother would know what was behind this, why she was here and why they hadn’t returned her.

  She glanced around at Rhali watching her and wondered whether they could return her even if they wanted to. Teven had expressed concern for what her people might do. But if Cora explained that they had tried to help her and treated her injuries, it might be enough. The Penna didn’t know these people or where they were, and they had been willing to take in Sarn knowing he was an enemy.

  As she stepped away from the tree, she noticed a sturdy branch had fallen nearby. She stooped awkwardly to pick it up. It was rough but strong when she leaned on it, and she moved a little more easily towards the cavern.

  She wanted to look over her shoulder and disappear into the trees. But she needed to learn what the chief was and how he could get so easily inside her head. Despite Cora’s fears, she knew that if it were her mother in this situation, she would try to learn all she could. Teven hadn’t reappeared from the birthing chamber, and she wondered why they’d been called on as they had.

  Cora followed Rhali into the cavern and tried to count the number of hearths. The edges of the cavern were still dark, despite the soft light starting to fill the space. She could hear crying, and the rest of the cavern was silent as she looked towards the soft noise. It was as though everyone had held their breath.

  She blinked quickly and shook her head as the chief came into view, unsure whether he was a vision in the dark or actually there. But he wasn’t focused on her. He stood by the fire of a hearth, staring at a woman who sat crying on the mat at his feet.

  Cora started to walk towards him, but Rhali slipped a hand under her arm and guided her towards their own hearth. She wanted desperately to ask questions, but she bit her lip. In the silence of the cavern, anything she said would be shared with everyone. It wouldn’t be this way with the Penna.

  As Rhali helped her to sit on her furs, a young man appeared in the hearth light. He could have been her brother, young and ragged, although he was pale and his eyes appeared sunken. Rhali gave him a quick shake of her head as she looked past him back to the chief, but the boy dropped to his knees.

  ‘You can’t be here,’ Rhali whispered.

  ‘Tell me,’ he breathed, the strength behind the words surprising Cora.

  Rhali looked at Cora and then back to the boy. ‘You don’t need me to tell you,’ she said softly, kneeling down in front of him. He nodded once and swallowed loudly. ‘He would not let them live.’

  He climbed slowly to his feet and disappeared. As he did, Rhali slumped forward. Cora cursed her leg again. If only they had a real healer, she could be of some use—or at least she could run. As she looked across to where she thought the chief was, she decided that was why he didn’t want her healed.

  ‘Where is Teven?’ Cora asked.

  ‘He will take them into the woods,’ she murmured.

  ‘On his own?’

>   ‘It is his task.’

  ‘He seems to have many. I thought the woods weren’t safe.’

  Rhali glanced around at her then, although Cora couldn’t read her expression in the dim light. ‘He is what he is, and he does as he does. As do we all.’

  ‘Will there be a ceremony for them?’ Cora asked.

  Rhali shook her head slowly. ‘There will be nothing, and they will not be spoken of again.’

  ‘But the girl was named. She was part of the clan. Would she not be remembered?’

  ‘Not for what she did.’ Rhali climbed slowly to her feet and then shuffled towards her sleeping mat.

  Cora watched her for a little while longer, waiting for some explanation, some expression of her grief or reaction to what had happened, but there was nothing. What could this man do that they would allow a girl to die?

  In the silence of the cavern, Cora waited. There was not a sound, not a whisper nor a cry for the girl or her child. There was also very little movement. Despite the rising sun, no one prepared a meal or got on with their tasks. Cora gritted her teeth and pulled herself up on the rough walking stick.

  She was the next chief of her people, and she wasn’t going to sit around any longer. She leaned heavily into the stick and slowly made her way to the pathway between the hearths. They were all quite small and close together. The tension increased to a palpable level, but the silence remained.

  She looked around at the faces pointed in her direction and then forced herself forward, deeper into the cavern. As the light increased a little, she could see that it was very similar to the cavern she had grown up in, although much smaller and with no space between hearths for dragons. She looked openly into the spaces she passed, and the people held her gaze, but they were not as great in number as she had first thought.

  At some hearths, there were only a couple of people; at others there were four or five. But she didn’t know whether they all lived there or were visiting. Looking at the simple rock markings between the hearths, she doubted anyone visited much. She smiled, thinking of the path between their hearth and Nira’s beside it. At one place there was an indent—nothing significant, but when sitting at the table, it was clearly seen as the point at which they crossed. They crossed often, all of them. If Cora had taken the time to look around her own people, she was sure there would be such an indentation in the ground between every neighbouring hearth. There were no such markings here.

  Despite the increasing light, it still felt dark within the cavern. Cora looked ahead along the path and continued until she reached a doorway within the earth. There was no covering over it, and she paused only momentarily before she stepped through. It was dark beyond. She maintained a straight forward path, the sound of murmuring increasing behind her. Then her stick hit wall. She turned, noting the small glow of flames ahead of her and a man crouching by the fire.

  ‘You have come then,’ he said without looking up. ‘You hope to learn from me.’

  ‘What could I learn from you?’ Cora asked too quickly. He looked up. The shadows around him and the light from the flames changed his features, and she wondered for a moment if this was someone she hadn’t met.

  ‘I know what you are,’ he said, standing. ‘And I know what you can be.’

  Cora shook her head. ‘I’m not very much of anything.’

  ‘Geraldine knows different.’

  Cora took another step forward. ‘My mother hopes that I will be something, but I have no skill.’

  ‘You can see.’

  ‘Can I?’ she asked. ‘I dream of stories. Everyone knows the story of Gerry and Pira, and how she saved him.’

  ‘They do not know the fear like you do. They do not know of the world beyond.’

  She remembered the blue lights and the pain in her chest at the knowledge that her mother was gone. And yet, it was not her mother.

  ‘I don’t have the healing abilities she has.’

  ‘Your ribs were broken, as well as your leg, and you no longer appear to be suffering.’

  ‘That was...’ She stopped, unsure if it had been Teven who had healed her, but there was something about that man that she was sure no one else knew. ‘I cannot see as my mother does,’ she continued, hoping he wouldn’t guess at what she might have meant. But he appeared to know far more than he should.

  ‘You will,’ he said, with a confidence that surprised her. ‘Sit,’ he instructed rather than invited. She moved forward slowly and lowered herself to the mat by the fire. ‘Ask me what you will, and I will consider whether I will answer.’

  She looked into the flames and then back to him. ‘You mean to keep me here.’

  He shrugged.

  ‘Will you allow me to eat?’

  ‘If you are willing to work with me.’

  ‘I don’t know what you think I can do to help you.’

  ‘You will work it out.’ He stood then, and she leaned back from him. He moved over to the side of the cavern and returned with a small piece of bread. It was similar to what she had grown up with. The grain was rough, but the bread itself was warm as she snatched it from his fingers.

  ‘What do you want from these people?’ she asked before taking a large bite.

  ‘They are my people. I only want for them to survive.’

  ‘Just survive, or thrive?’

  ‘They do not know what is best for them. I do.’

  Cora took her time chewing the next bite of bread. ‘Why do you send Teven out?’

  ‘I know he will return.’

  ‘That is an odd response. Do you not think others will?’

  ‘His place is here. He knows what he is.’

  ‘What is that?’

  ‘Not important,’ he said.

  Cora took a moment trying to determine what he meant. If he thought Teven was not important, why was it so important that he do as directed and stay? ‘What does he do in the woods?’

  ‘Whatever is asked of him.’

  ‘Can I go with him?’

  The man shook his head. ‘There is more for you here.’

  ‘But no one talks to me. I am of no use.’ Cora tapped her leg, then looked back towards the opening into the main cavern. The light was brighter, yet it was still dark within the space she sat. ‘What did she do that she deserved to die?’

  He sighed and looked at her. ‘You haven’t asked anything of use yet.’

  Cora waited. When he didn’t answer the question, she asked, ‘Was your father chief before you?’

  He looked at her and grinned. ‘Yes, he was. I knew I was to be a stronger chief than he could ever be. I am from a long line of chiefs.’

  ‘And will your son be Chief?’

  The grin slipped, and his focus returned to the fire. ‘He may not be worthy,’ he murmured, then waved her towards the door. She waited, but he didn’t move. After a moment longer, she climbed slowly to her feet and pushed the remainder of the bread into her mouth, then hobbled towards the door. ‘Don’t try to go too far,’ he warned. When she looked back, he was still looking into the flames. ‘I know you are strong, and you will give me that strength,’ he whispered. A shiver covered her skin as she moved out into the cavern.

  Chapter 9

  Cora sat up in bed, the bowl of hot stew in her hands. She breathed in the smell of it.

  ‘It works best if you eat it,’ Rhali said softly. ‘He may not allow it often.’

  Cora took a small sip. It was hot against her lips, and although there wasn’t much substance to it, it was the best stew she had ever tasted. She licked her lips and lowered the bowl back to her lap. Rhali looked at her with some disappointment, then turned back to her own bowl. Cora waited for it to reach her stomach. Although she had eaten very little in the time she had been with these people, she worried that too much too soon would only bring it all back up.

  She took another deep breath and then raised the bowl again. As she lowered it, Teven appeared before her. He looked her over and nodded. He was covered in dirt. It clung to
his clothing, marked his face, and it was even in his hair. He squatted down before her, and she held the bowl out to him.

  He smiled, but shook his head.

  Rhali put her bowl down and moved back to the fire.

  ‘What did you do to get food?’ he asked.

  ‘I asked for it,’ she said, carefully lifting it back to her lips. It was sitting well in her stomach so far. As hungry as she was, she was doing her best not to gulp it down.

  ‘What else did you ask for?’ he asked, standing again as dust fell about him.

  She opened her mouth and then stopped, looking beyond him at an older woman approaching the hearth. She moved slowly, struggling to carry a basket. Teven turned to see where Cora was looking. He reached out to take the basket from the woman, but she shook her head.

  As she entered the hearth, Cora recognised her for the woman who had been crying when they’d returned from the birthing chamber. Teven stepped back, and she placed the basket down on the mat before the fire. Cora heard water move about within it. It was tightly woven, similar to what the Penna would have used for water. For the first time, Cora wondered where the water came from. They didn’t have snow to melt. She wondered if there was something like the lake, and if it was as cold.

  ‘Thank you,’ the woman whispered, bowing low, but Teven caught her by the arms to halt the movement. She sighed and nodded once. ‘Please,’ she said, indicating the water. ‘It is hot.’

  He wiped at the dirt across his cheek, and for a moment Cora thought he might have been wiping away a tear. He nodded once to the woman before releasing his hold of her arms. She turned without another word and disappeared into the dim light beyond the hearth.

  ‘Take the time to wash,’ Rhali said, ‘before you eat.’

  As Teven nodded slowly, Cora could see just how tired he was. She wanted to ask so many questions—where he had gone, how hard it had been, why no one had helped. Her whole cavern worked together when someone died, but not here. It was hard to believe they were a clan at all.

  ‘How long have you lived here?’ she asked. Rhali glanced at her, but Teven, kneeling by the water, continued as though he hadn’t heard her. He removed his tunic and sighed as he pushed his hands into the water.