by Katy Winter
They saw many rows of pallets with the wounded who waited for attention, and passed pairs of refugees, or larger groups of walking wounded and shocked, dazed escapers from Ortok. Myme Chlo was drawn towards them, but a firm grasp on her hand and a very stern negative in her mind made her hesitate and kept her away. She and the scholar often recognised faces that passed close to them. The little girl looked long at the suffering expressions and though it repeatedly brought home to her what she'd been rescued from, it also renewed distraught grief for her brothers and mother. She wondered often about Lian, but never thought to ask after him. The young face looked tense.
They heard comments, too, and drifts of conversation. They listened to scraps about the invasion and the vicious crushing of Ortok, along with tales of atrocities, and while the scholar tried to block as much as he could from Myme Chlo he could see from her face that she heard enough to have a reasonable understanding of what happened to her home.
Myme Chlo heard of a warlord who was a brute, that he liked pretty boys and abused them. Some died. She thought of Bethel and felt sick. She heard about enslavement, too. It terrified her for her other brothers, and always she'd try to persuade the scholar that they should join up with the refugees.
His answer to her pleas never varied and as the weeks passed and they saw fewer refugees, Myme Chlo stopped asking. The scholar didn't relax his vigilance for a moment though he seemed more at ease with fewer people around and even drew out his pipe which was something Myme Chlo hadn't seen him do since Ortok.
The trip through the huge forest continued to be an erratic affair. The scholar and Myme Chlo headed north, but increasingly westward towards Sindabar, while the refugees mostly veered due north. There were still patrols they had to avoid, but these became less frequent the further west they went.
Sindabar was a poor province of disparate small cities that vied for supremacy but were uniformly fairly impoverished, and they bordered southern lands conquered by the Churchik. They were bounded, in the north, by desert. This desert was inhabited by the Wildwind tribes. It was a risk the scholar had to take, because he couldn't go directly north where the child in his care could be vulnerable to southern men. He recognised the patrols were mostly from those escaping from the south, but he refused to let Myme Chlo near them.
They sat under a tree one evening, eating a late meal. The scholar had made Myme Chlo cook and set camp while he hunted, so they'd not rested very long.
"I think, little one, you should call me Autoc." The scholar chewed meditatively as he spoke.
"Is that your real name?" Myme Chlo asked, tilting her head so that she could glance up at him.
"Aye, little one, it is."
"Where are you from?" Autoc's blue eyes met her violet ones and he smiled.
"And you, child," he answered, ignoring her question, "will be known as Chlorien." Myme Chlo wrinkled her nose.
"Why?" she demanded. "I'm Myme Chlo."
"You must start thinking and acting as a boy, child. It's not going to be enough that you're dressed as one. I'll treat you as a boy from now on."
"But why the name Chlorien?"
"It's near your own name for you to answer to it without hesitation." Myme Chlo had finished eating and now busily drew in the dirt with a stick. "Isn't that so, Chlorien?" Myme Chlo looked up, took a deep breath and met the serious look.
"Yes, Autoc," she answered quaveringly.
She got a gentle smile and didn't move when the scholar came to her to put his arm round her shoulder. She again rested her cropped head on his chest in a gesture that had become her trait.
"Chlorien, I'm sorry if I seem rough with you. It's not that I don't care deeply. I do, you know that, don't you?"
"Yes," she murmured, her eyes closing.
"It's just the times we live in, little one. I can trust no one."
Autoc looked down to see tears slide down Myme Chlo's face and instinctively cradled her protectively, one hand quietly wiping away the tears. The scholar's heart ached for what he saw as this child's future.
~~~
At the time Sarehl became reconciled with Daxel and Bethel was being introduced to Churchik life as brutally as Luton struggled to survive and cope with daily life on a slave train, Myme Chlo became a boy. With her talent she could become what she wished, because she could now translate with careful thought and relative ease. Being a boy was no hardship for her.
Chlorien learned many skills, both mental and physical. She stalked prey and caught it, learned what was edible in the forest and what wasn't, knew how to skin an animal and dressed anything she caught and cooked it herself. The lessons of survival were not easy ones, but Chlorien adapted easily because she was young and it was necessary for her to do so. The scholar did indeed treat her as a boy and in time she responded as one. She became tougher too and very fit. The scholar taught her rudimentary self-defence as well as survival skills, and Chlorien could now use a knife.
She opened her eyes wide one morning when the scholar entered the clearing leading two horses, both of them saddled and provisioned.
"Where are they from?" she asked, staring at the animals as if she thought they might disappear.
"Ask no questions, child," was the affable response. "Such a rogue as I'm becoming."
"Did you steal them?"
"Now what sort of question is that?"
Chlorien had never ridden a horse and though she'd grown over the last season, this one was far too large for her. She was told, despite the horse's size, she'd have to learn to ride and very fast, the scholar merely smiling at her indignant expression.
For the first few days the scholar led her horse, then he gave her sharp and instructive lessons. When she fell from the horse she sat on the ground, bruised and outraged, and, if the scholar laughed down at her, as he was wont to do, she glared up at him. The days passed, Myme Chlo grew very rapidly and she learned to ride. The pace of their travel quickened.
Seasons after leaving Ortok, the two fugitives were well west and riding hard, Chlorien completely at ease on her large horse. The scholar began to teach her again too; there may have been no desk or chair but Chlorien learned you could absorb information anywhere.
Autoc insisted she continue with her newly acquired skill of translating, telling Chlorien that it had to be instinctive, not a practised routine. He'd be with her one minute as she slipped uncertainly into a form he first encouraged her to assume, then she knew he flew above her in lazy spirals, his mind in hers encouraging her to join him. Tempted and yearning she finally did, though her first flights were frightening and uncomfortable and she made several crash landings that hurt. The scholar never did, or said, anything.
"Do you think you'll sit and watch me kill myself?" she stormed at him, after one abortive and singularly painful flight. Hearing the deep chuckle, she stared crossly up into the delighted face above her.
"No, I'll not sit and watch you kill yourself, child. Get up and try again." Chlorien ground her teeth.
Chlorien learned to enhance and project images, something that fascinated her for days on end. She realised she could shape and mould the forces that surrounded her by learning to tap the energy that coursed through the ground beneath her. Autoc didn't need to tell her the forest was a source of power, as was all space around her, because as her senses became attuned to the Ambros around her, she knew that for herself. She opened her awareness to nature and absorbed its flow back into her.
Her mind, ever curious and insatiable, never stopped, questions tumbled from her lips and her eyes were bright and alert. She perfected her conjuring and entertained the scholar with her projections. Encouraged by him to greater efforts, she sent Autoc into fits of laughter.
She learned to scry and to follow the lines of the aethyr, the latter a skill she knew it would take her many, many cycles to master. Autoc never let her travel alone. His discipline was inflexible and his control absolute. He kept her to one set of faint lines that she could dimly see, and she acc
epted, without question, that should she stray from them she'd destroy herself. She never questioned anything the scholar told her to do in their work together.
This night as she lay back against Autoc's chest, she was restless in a way that made the scholar stroke her hair in a calming gesture. She sighed.
"Are you a mage, Autoc?" came out very quietly. Chlorien was nearly eleven cycles, but the scholar knew in many ways she was much older than her Ambros cycles.
"Yes," he said very softly, "I am."
"Am I then an apprentice?"
"I guess you could be called that, though you're very young to be so, nor have you been chosen to be one."
"Do you call me that?"
"No, little one, I call you Chlorien."
"You were sent to us, weren't you?"
"If you say so, child."
"Who sent you?"
"Ah," sighed the scholar. "So many questions."
"Tell me," insisted Chlorien.
"No, little one, I won't. Be content that you know I'm a mage."
"But not from here."
"No, not from central Ambros."
"You don't look as they say southerners do."
"No," agreed Autoc imperturbably.
"So where are you from?"
"Shall I put you to sleep, child?" Chlorien tilted her head back challengingly.
"Could you?" Autoc began to laugh very softly.
"Oh yes, child, very easily."
Chlorien smiled up at him affectionately, saying, "I'm glad it was you who came to us."
"So am I," replied Autoc gently, his hand brushing her brow.
He watched as the head drooped, laid his pipe on the ground, and carefully lifted the slight figure into his arms. He laid the girl in a nest of ferns and pulled skins over her, then stood frowning down at her before he strolled back to where he'd been sitting. He pensively picked up his pipe and puffed steadily, reflecting that it was difficult at times trying to separate the child from the more developed mind that inhabited the child's body. Autoc closed his eyes and leaned back against a tree.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
As weeks passed and autumn became increasingly colder, the scholar taught Chlorien how to see beyond normal sight. She learned to truly look for the first time, and though it was only a beginning and she had a long way to go before she would control such a skill, it helped pass the time and it entertained her. She invited the scholar to join her as she practised but he only smiled across at her, shaking his head.
It was during these days that the scholar heard Chlorien hum to herself and occasionally break into a tuneful melody. At first she stopped, the small voice choked with emotion because she unwittingly sang a piece she associated with Bethel, but soon she defiantly threw back her head and sang in memory of a brother she loved.
With winter came bitter cold. Chlorien and Autoc were forced sometimes to shelter in small villages, sometimes quartering overnight in a Sindabaran town so they could replenish supplies before moving on. Their progress was slowed over those long weeks, but Chlorien noticed the scholar didn't seem unduly perturbed.
It was in late winter that the scholar urged the horses on. This acceleration in pace troubled Chlorien, because she sensed the scholar felt pursued. She shivered, looked back over her shoulder, her mind uneasy, and finally turned to the scholar with her large eyes wide and her hands sweating a little.
"Autoc," she asked in a small voice. "Are we being chased?" His answer gave her pause.
"Oh yes, little one, all the time - but not necessarily in the way you might expect."
"Is there no-one actually chasing us then?"
"Is that what you sense?" Chlorien considered for a moment, an anxious look in her eyes.
"Yes," she responded positively.
"I see."
Autoc looked thoughtfully at the slim boy who stared up at him. He'd been aware of pursuit for some time, but was as yet unalarmed by those who dogged their every step. He knew the pursuers drew closer and was keen to see exactly who they were, so he could gauge the degree of menace from them. He had an uncomfortable suspicion who they might be, but he wanted his fears confirmed.
"Do you know who they are, child?"
"So I am right," Chlorien murmured with satisfaction. "No, I don't know who they are, though I know they seek a little girl."
"Myme Chlo by any chance, child?"
"Yes," whispered Chlorien.
"But they don't seek a lad with his father, do they, boy?" Chlorien suddenly gave a broad grin as she looked up at Autoc.
"Is that what you are then?"
"Yes, child. I could easily pass as your father, though your hair is very much darker than mine. A blue-eyed man could have a son with violet eyes."
"Shall I get used to calling you Father, Autoc?" The scholar's look down at her was grave. The girl saw the seriousness in Autoc's eyes.
"Yes, lad," he said gently. "I think you should."
As the days went steadily by, Chlorien learned to think of the scholar as her father. It got easier and easier until by very early spring she began to think Autoc was who he said he was. She called him Father and responded to him as that without hesitation. He was no longer Scholar, nor was he Autoc.
Autoc didn't slacken their pace. The twosome still travelled across the boundary that separated northwest Samar from Sindabar. By the fourth week of spring, they drew rapidly closer to the south of the last Samar city-state of Lenten, but the scholar skirted it because it lay directly in the line of the southern army. Autoc was convinced the warlord would've begun moving towards it by now. He assumed, correctly, that Lodestok's army would have to travel the perimeter of the huge forest and that it would take them a very long time.
The scholar deliberately pushed all but Chlorien from his mind, knowing, with considerable distress, he couldn't afford the luxury of worrying about her siblings. If he let himself be distracted, then the consequences for Chlorien could be devastating. The scholar's one objective, and this had been made clear to him Ambros cycles ago, was to get Myme Chlo to sanctuary at the appropriate time, untouched by those who most wanted her.
Sometimes the scholar felt apprehension shake him when he allowed himself to think of what could be done to her, and though he taught her as fast as he dared, it was mainly for her protection. To reduce her vulnerability, she had to learn, but the more she learned the more valuable and useful she became. The scholar felt like swearing when he thought of the situation the child was in. She became more endangered every day.
Autoc watched her carefully, making sure his imperceptible enhancements of her as a boy worked. He even made her eye colour reflect a bluish hue. He'd ceased to think of her as a girl. He used dyes from plants to darken his hair so he more closely resembled Chlorien, the very light tawny gold gone, so the scholar looked quite different with his long locks dark, wet-mud brown. Chlorien teased him but he just grinned amiably, a hand to his head in a rueful gesture. He believed a tall boy could well be the son of a man as tall as himself.
Beside him, the scholar saw a slight boy, finely built and now noticeably taller, with cropped black curls and large expressive eyes. She didn't know it, but Chlorien looked very like Bethel, almost a twin, thought Autoc with a wrench. She was every bit as pretty, but there was a stubborn jut to her chin and more determination in the expression than was ever seen in the beautiful dreamy musician.
Autoc noticed she was in the throes of another growth spurt and had almost outgrown her brother's clothes. When the scholar gave her new garments he'd bought at a town only days before, he noticed she took them, put them on, and then buried all Bethel's clothing, except his belt, in a deep hole at the base of a huge ommentadi tree. She placed several heavy stones as a marker before turning away, tears streaming down her face. She never spoke a word to the scholar. She just buckled on Bethel's belt before throwing on her cloak and mounting her horse. She didn't look back.
Chlorien was eleven cycles. Bethel, aged twelve cycles, was riding
north of Ortok beside his warlord master. The girl, with her mind full of her brother, and the boy's thoughts centred wistfully and sadly on a family he assumed was dead, both moved resignedly on.
~~~
By summer, Chlorien and the scholar had well and truly left the forest behind them and were west of Lenten. They'd left what was once the Samar Confederation and were now in the province of Sindabar, moving northwest towards the coast. The weather was mostly pleasant. Chlorien, having admitted she'd forgotten anything about Sindabar, was receiving geography instruction from the scholar. He watched her in amusement as she wrinkled her nose in an effort at memory, finally saying to him in frustration,
"How many tribes did you say inhabit the northern reaches, Father?"
Autoc went to answer, then stopped, a frown hitching his eyebrows. He sat his horse, very still, his eyes scanning the horizon.
"Chlorien," he sent very softly. The mind call alerted her. Her eyes looked up and across into his.
"Father," she sent in response.
"Two men approach at speed. They're those who seek you. They'll be on us within twenty minutes or so. Close your mind, little one. Now!"
They rode on mostly in silence, Chlorien not wanting to join any desultory conversation. She heard the riders at the same moment the scholar did.
"Nothing untoward, child," Autoc sent. "We're having an enjoyable lesson, aren't we?"
Chlorien didn't turn as she had the urge to do, but allowed the scholar to carry on with his discussion of geography as if nothing was happening. She only briefly sensed the scholar in her mind. Then she was unaware of his being there at all. Autoc withdrew, satisfied none could touch the child's mind other than another mage.
The scholar gestured in the throes of an elaborate explanation and his hands waved in exaggerated gesticulations, which, in different circumstances would have made Chlorien laugh. The horsemen drew up to the scholar's right. Chlorien took her cue from him. He glanced up enquiringly and she slewed in the saddle, both of them looking over to the two men who sat, stilling their fidgety mounts.