It couldn’t be that hard to head out on her own for the wood, and she could pile it up. She noted the water was still by the door as she walked out into the fresh air. Without any real ability to keep her there, they still managed in their way to stop her going home. The beautiful green dragon could have been an option, but Cora knew she wouldn’t help.
Maybe there were others who had an idea of what her future was meant to be, but they weren’t sharing that with her. Or maybe her mother was the only one with such a skill. Although Wyndha had skills that Cora could have used about now. Henda had mentioned not seeing clearly, and Cora realised she hadn’t had the chance to talk to the woman about what she could see.
She continued into the trees. There was no sign of Rhali or any of the smaller leathery dragons. She noticed a fallen branch and walked towards it. Maybe she should have grabbed her spear, but then she wouldn’t be able to carry back wood. As she reached the branch, she heard a strange squeaky noise and stood back up. She looked around the trees but couldn’t see anything, and then she heard the noise again.
She stepped over the branch and towards where she thought the noise was coming from. As she walked, the strange noise continued. And then she saw Rhali, sitting against a tree and sobbing her heart out. She made the odd squeak trying to drag in breaths.
Cora dropped down beside her and pulled the girl into her arms. She could feel the heartache radiating from Rhali, and she tried to comfort her without touching her.
‘Can you heal it?’ Rhali asked.
‘What has happened?’ Cora pushed her away to try and look her over, thinking maybe she was injured. But although she was damp from the tears, there was no blood.
Rhali scared Cora by grabbing her hand and pulling it to her chest. The burning sensation was very different from the sensation she’d gotten from Teven. It was hot, but a dull ache rather than the sharp pain.
Cora tried to pull away, but Rhali maintained a tight hold. ‘Please. You are a healer; you can heal it.’
‘It isn’t the kind of injury that can be so easily healed.’ Cora sat back and took a deep breath. ‘I can’t help you.’
Rhali ran the back of her hand across her nose and then sniffed. Her eyes were red and puffy and her cheeks wet, but she didn’t wipe at them.
‘What has happened?’ Cora asked again.
Rhali shook her head.
‘Is this because of the man I saw you with?’
Rhali looked up at Cora, then chewed on her lip as more tears started to fall. Her shoulders started to shake and, despite the pain Cora knew would follow, she pulled the girl into her arms.
‘The chief doesn’t know,’ Rhali said quickly.
‘He knows far more than he tells you.’
‘But he doesn’t know,’ Rhali said more firmly.
Cora nodded slowly and allowed Rhali to lean into her shoulder.
‘Can you tell me his name?’ she asked. But Rhali shook her head against Cora. ‘Can you tell me what has happened?’
‘He said we could be together, but we can’t.’
Cora gave her a moment to continue. When she didn’t, Cora asked, ‘Why can’t you be together?’
‘They won’t accept anyone from our clan.’
‘But you are all the same.’
Rhali gave a weak laugh and sat back. She wiped her hand over her cheeks, but her eyes were dry. ‘We might have been once, but not now.’
‘He came here from far away. Would he stay with you?’
‘He hasn’t been here very long. He was called to them, and he must stay with them.’
Cora chewed on her lip. If he had been called as her mother was, it was for good reason. She wondered if it was because of a larger fight. Again, she longed for her mother so she could ask her the question, ask her advice. She tried not to sigh. ‘Where is he from?’
Rhali shook her head. ‘Too far to matter.’
‘How did you meet him?’
‘I was looking for herbs by the cliff top.’
Cora indicated for her to go on, but she looked down at her hands. ‘Please,’ Cora coaxed.
‘I am not allowed by the cliff. We are able to move around—I don’t know why I have that freedom, but it is limited. I just walked that way one day and found so many things I hadn’t found before, and I found him.’ A small smile lit up her face, and then she turned to study Cora more closely. ‘Your mother is from a place like his?’
Cora nodded.
‘If we had children, would they look like you?’
‘Maybe,’ Cora admitted. ‘Will you have children with this man?’
‘Not when I can’t be with him. Not when they won’t allow me to come to them.’
‘Your father would not allow it.’
‘And there is that,’ she said with a sigh, staring off into the distance. ‘I know he will never let me leave. No one will ever have that chance. We will die buried in the dark of our little cavern with our great chief trying to be some great man. But how can he be?’ she asked, turning back to Cora with questioning eyes. ‘He hides in his cavern causing fear.’
‘Causing fear? Why did they follow him?’ Cora asked.
She shook her head and looked back to her hands. ‘I don’t know,’ she said softly. ‘My mother never spoke of it.’
‘You have another brother, don’t you?’
Rhali nodded, but didn’t look up.
‘Why are you isolated from him?’
‘He is to be Chief, if he can meet the expectations of his father. He wanted to run away with...’
‘The girl who died,’ Cora finished for her.
She nodded in agreement. ‘They were foolish, and he is lucky the chief didn’t punish him further.’
‘How did he punish him?’
‘By allowing the girl and her son to die. I knew as soon as she came to me that she was with child and how he would react. He was so kind, so reassuring that her son would be strong. But I knew it was all lies and that he would ensure neither of them survived.’
‘But she died in childbirth. My mother is amongst the most skilled healers, and there are some that even she can’t save, babies and mothers alike.’
‘He has different skills.’
Cora looked at her. Merik wanted Cora’s skill, and she assumed he must have something, but she had yet to see what it was. What if it was something dark, something she hadn’t come across before? This man managed to keep a whole clan in the dark of the cavern. They wouldn’t leave him and they wouldn’t save themselves, relying on a boy for food and water. Well, not exactly a boy. But he would have been. His mother had been pregnant when they left the others. What would they have done before he was old enough to go out? Who taught him to fetch water and wood and to hunt?
‘What can he do?’ Cora asked, almost too scared for the answer.
Rhali shook her head and climbed to her feet, brushing dust and leaves from her clothes. ‘Where is Teven?’ she asked, then looked around. ‘Are you trying to leave us?’
Cora stood and placed a hand on her arm. The worry and concern made Cora shiver, and she decided the truth was best. ‘Teven was injured, but he is well now. He is resting at your hearth.’
Rhali sighed with relief and nodded. ‘So why are you here?’
‘We have been gone a long time, and the supplies were getting lower in the cavern. I said I would go for wood.’
‘I’ll help,’ Rhali said quickly, directing Cora through the trees.
Within a short amount of time, they were headed back to the cavern with their arms full of sticks and small branches.
‘We are going to need more,’ Cora said as she followed Rhali into the cavern where they piled the supplies by the water. Without a glance towards her own hearth, she headed straight back out. They spent the rest of the day searching out good-sized branches and dragging them towards the cavern. Some of them were too large to take inside, and she wondered how they could break them up.
Cora realised she had no idea how the
men of her own clan managed to bring in the wood that they did, although their trees were slow growing and she was sure the wood took a lot longer to burn than it did here. They needed a cutting tool. That may also be why the fires didn’t burn as high here. With the reduced and different resources, they had to conserve what they had.
‘Teven has an axe,’ Rhali said.
‘Axe?’
‘He chipped away at a rock with a smaller one, and it is sharp and strong. It is like a large knife that he uses for wood.’ She disappeared inside the cavern, then reappeared a few minutes later almost dragging the tool behind her. It had a large, tapered blade on the end of a very long handle.
‘He swings it up and then drops it down.’ She tried to show Cora how she had seen him use it, but she could barely lift it.
‘Let me try,’ Cora said, holding out her hand. She was much stronger than Rhali. The axe was weighty, but it was no different from the long and heavy spear she had carried. Rhali made the motion with her arms of how Teven had used it, and then Cora tried. She lifted it above her head and let it drop onto the wood. It hit with a thunk, and the branch remained intact although she had to move the blade back and forth to release it from the wood. She tried again, but failed to hit the same mark.
She looked up at Rhali, who bit her lip. She tried again and hit the first spot, then again, and the branch broke. She smiled and rolled her shoulders. She felt like she had done very little serious exercise since she had arrived here, not that she could even remember how long that was. If she were at home, she would have been training regularly with her fellow Draga, hunting with her father, and taking care of any number of tasks for Arminel. If she had been any other woman, like Junah, she might have carried water for the warm room, but she was not like the others. Now, as she moved towards another branch, she realised she was not the same as the others here either.
Her mother might be right. No matter where Cora was, she had a different purpose. There was something specific she had to do, only she wasn’t quite sure what it was yet.
Breaking up the wood was cathartic. Although she had to focus on hitting the same place as she worked the larger branches, it gave her a quiet place to think. Rhali remained with her, moving wood to a pile by the cavern, carrying some inside and helping her lift the larger branches into positions where she could cut them.
In so many ways, Cora’s life had turned out like her mother’s. She had found herself far away from home, amongst people she didn’t know and finding out just what skill she had. Although these people didn’t embrace her like the Penna had her mother, and although Teven was Oldra, Cora doubted he would connect to her as her father had her mother. And yet she knew there was a connection.
Cora didn’t want to stay here with these people in the sunshine. She might have wanted to stay with the people in the valley, with light and an Ancient. She couldn’t live in the dark. And although she loved the sun on her skin, she missed the snow. She put the axe down, wiped the back of her hand across her sweaty brow and tried to transition.
‘Do you want some water?’ Rhali asked, drawing her from her thoughts and the threatening homesickness.
She nodded slowly.
‘You go to the stream. I will carry this in and check Teven. Take your time.’
Cora nodded again and headed towards the water that ran a short distance from the cavern. It was bright in the sunlight, and she was amazed at how it moved. She stood beside it for too long, watching the water flow over the rocks, and thought for a moment that she saw movement. She took a step forward, wondering if it was the fish that Teven had tried to catch.
She looked along the waterway in the direction the water flowed. Where did it go, and why didn’t it flow over the cliff? She bent down and scooped a handful into her mouth. It was cool, almost like melted snow. She smiled. Then she splashed into the stream, allowing the coolness to wash around her legs as she transitioned, enjoying the feeling. If she was to stay here, she didn’t think her transition would last much longer. And it might not be very useful in the sunshine.
She headed back to the shore, feeling refreshed. Although she liked hot water to wash with, she wondered if she could find a part of the stream deep enough to submerge her whole body. The stream wasn’t very deep, nor very wide. She looked back wondering where it flowed from, but then continued along its path. The sun was high in the sky, and her stomach rumbled.
She looked back towards the cavern, but she was enjoying her time alone, despite her earlier thoughts of her mother and the looming homesickness. She would have to be here until she worked out what her gift of healing could truly do. Or if there was another reason for her to be amongst the trees with leaves.
She was reminded of the dragon’s warning, and she imagined her mother for a moment with all the dragons directing their dragonlight through her. She shivered. She hoped that wasn’t her destiny.
The little stream twisted through the trees. At several points she had to get back into the water to follow it, for the trees were too thick around the edges. Then it opened into a large, deep pool before her. She heard rushing water and saw darkness on the other side of the pond. The whole area was closely surrounded by trees. She wondered whether they would have been able to reach it had they tried to find it from the cliff face. Teven would have struggled trying to squeeze through the tight spaces.
The ever-present sunlight managed to make it through. There were no trees hanging over the middle of the pool, and the sun lit the clear water, highlighting the golden rocky bottom. It looked very inviting. Knowing that there would be no one around, Cora peeled her already damp tunic off along with the sodden leggings.
She splashed out and found the bottom dropped away beneath her quite quickly. She stumbled a little, then found herself standing up to her neck in the cool water. Moving her arms slowly around her to try and keep her balance, she breathed slowly and tried not to panic. Her feet were still on the bottom, but if it became deeper, she wasn’t sure what she could do.
A memory flashed through her mind of her mother moving through water, splashing and laughing and floating. She pushed off the bottom and tried to paddle with her arms and legs, but she didn’t get very far. It was harder than it looked. She stretched out her arms before her and then dragged them to the side, moving more easily now. She smiled, sucking in water, and then found the bottom of the pond was too far below her to reach.
As she dipped beneath the surface, a hazy world appeared before her. Strangely beautiful with the smooth, golden stones lining the bottom of the pond and the light dancing above her. She kicked up, broke the surface and gulped in a lungful of air before disappearing below the surface again. It was calm and quiet, and for a moment she thought she could just stay there.
Then her mother’s face appeared in the hazy water that surrounded her. She looked worried as she stared directly at Cora. ‘You must find who you are.’
Cora’s feet found the smooth stones and pushed off, through the vision of her mother and towards the surface. A stone wall appeared before her. She broke the surface and leaned over it. The water ran over the edge in a slow, steady stream into the darkness below. She leaned against the stone, the water lapping around her as she stared into the darkness. She was keen to get down there and see where the water went. Although she didn’t know if someone or something else might be there.
She wondered suddenly if the dragons would be able to take her, or if they might even stay there. At the edge of the stone wall, where the pond met the land again, appeared to be a ledge. There might be a similar walkway down as there was down the cliff, although that travelled at a steady gradient. There wasn’t the space for such an incline. She wondered if this was really a good idea.
It was only once she was standing on the shore that she remembered her clothes were at the other end of the pond. She transitioned, but it wasn’t enough. She didn’t think she could move back through the water. With a groan of disappointment, she made her way through the trees and
back to the edge of the pond to her clothes. Dressed and damp, she was starting to chill in the shadows of the trees. She transitioned and made her way back to the hole. It was only once she was at the top that she paused, wondering briefly if these were the shadows she should be wary of, before she stepped into the darkness. Her mother was right—she had to find out who she was.
Chapter 19
The pathway was narrower here than on the cliff, and Cora hugged the wall as she made her way down. Surprisingly, the gradient was similar. She spiralled around the darkness, occasionally looking up at the open sky above her, which was cut from view when the pathway led behind the water dribbling down from the stream above. Other than the water, the light above and the darkness below, there was nothing but the gently descending pathway.
When the pathway levelled out, it took Cora a moment to realise that she had found the bottom of the darkness. The water sploshed into a shallow pool. Beyond the dribble of water was the warm glow of a fire. Still transitioned, she moved forward slowly. The wall gave way to an underground cavern. She wondered just how deep it might be. Then she turned and looked behind her. For a moment, she thought of the cavern at the base of the cliff. She might be closer to it than she had realised. And they hadn’t been particularly keen to see her last time.
Cora took a deep breath and wondered if she would ever consider carrying her bow with her again. She had spent so much time alone that day doing just what she wanted to do; she could have taken the time to make some arrows.
When she turned back to the water, the man standing directly in front of her scared her half to death. At least she thought he was a man. With the light behind him, he had a tall, broad silhouette. Thankful she had transitioned, she braced herself for an attack, but it didn’t come. When he turned away from her and walked towards the light, Cora chewed her lip and followed.
The cavern felt damp, but the further they walked, the lighter it became. And then they could have been standing at any Penna hearth. The fire burned brightly, a metal frame straddling it and a pot hanging over the flames. A tightly woven mat was laid out before it and a square, low table sat to the side, although it was lower than those of the Penna and had no bench seats along it. Cora allowed her transition to slip.
The Heart of Oldra Page 15