There were two dense areas of light and as Lydria’s hand reached out to one, another hand collapsed over the other. As she closed her fingers around the light, she was thrown away from the center of the crater to land with her back against the dirt wall. Lydria’s breath left her and she lay in the dirt, staring at a stick the width of her arm that had narrowly missed impaling her, but giving it no more than a seconds’ thought because her attention was again drawn to a blue glow laying in the dirt near her left hand. It was a small pulsing sphere and it seemed to invite her to take it.
The bandages of her left hand were mere tatters of cloth, but most of the bleeding had stopped. Using her three good fingers and thumb, she reached out and wrapped her palm around the sphere and her world changed again.
Her vision was clear and well-defined as though she could see further into the distance. The dirt that continued to fall was moving very slowly toward the ground, and she opened her mouth in wonder as each grain of dirt drifted slowly past her eyes as it fell, tumbling and losing pieces of itself as it made its way to the ground.
In her hand she saw a stone, a brilliant blue sphere, and watched as it slowly broke, a piece of it falling onto her palm and passing through her skin in a faint blue mist. The remaining stone turned to liquid in her hand, swirling once before reforming into a complete, slightly smaller sphere, with a series of fine silver lines segmenting the stone into fourteen pieces.
As quickly as it started, it was over, and time returned to its normal speed and Lydria’s vision was once again clouded by falling dirt. Across the crater she saw the figure who held what she presumed was a similar stone, but it was not Cargile, as she had hoped, it was Wynter, who looked more injured and beaten than before. His body was contorted like something was broken and he seemed to be in a great deal of pain. Lydria was encouraged by the thought.
Struggling to stand, Lydria made out the details of Wynter’s face as he stood opposite her – separated by dozens of feet of blackness and waves of heat that rose from the center of the pit. Wynter leered at her and wiped a wrist, a torn rope still hanging from it, across his lips to clear them of dirt before licking them with a bloody tongue. Lydria gripped the stone in her left hand and reached for her sword. Before she moved her arm an inch, she realized it wasn’t there. She had been holding it when she was thrown, and it was now likely buried beneath the trees.
Wynter’s eyes were wide and his mouth hung open, not in the disgusting lecherous way she had seen from men in the taverns, but in the awe-struck way children look when they see something for the first time. Lydria was now sure he had a piece of the stone and had seen the world as she had seen it.
“Kill the girl.” Wynter spoke the words, not to Lydria, but to himself, she realized. Lydria cast her gaze around the pit for a weapon and finding none she started to look for paths of escape when Wynter spoke again. “No, too tired. Injured, and I just used my last arrow.” He said the last with a smile directed at Lydria and looked down to untie the frayed rope from his wrist.
His voice lowered and sounded grittier than she thought it should have from someone in his condition. “No, not now. It will have to wait, unless - you, girl, be a good girl and fetch my last arrow.” He inclined his head toward where Lydria had seen the silhouette earlier and he gave her a wicked smile and looked her straight in the eyes. “I won’t kill you yet. But I will find you. You can’t hide your eyes. I will find you. I’ve given my word and I will find you and I will kill you. All of you.”
He glared at Lydria for long seconds before turning to walk down the trench, holding his glowing blue sphere in his left hand and stooping for a branch to use as a walking stick with his right. As he began to move away, a burst of light broke through the haze around Wynter’s head and Lydria saw a bright band of blue outline Wynter’s neck. He turned briefly, raised his hand to his neck, raised an eyebrow and then shuffled on, limping down the trench on his makeshift crutch. As he walked his features disappeared in the haze, but the dimming blue glow around his neck allowed Lydria to follow him as he stumbled on until he was far enough away where he could step over the shallower walls of the trench. The light soon faded from his neck, leaving only his shadowy figure haltingly struggle over the mass of broken trees on his way toward the boreal forests of the frozen north.
Lydria was used to judging people underneath their rags, seeing the person underneath the cloth and Wynter’s ragged clothing and malnourished face did not haunt her thoughts. Wynter was not what was under his clothes, but what was behind his eyes. His eyes were those of a dead man, yet they were alive in awareness and suspicion. Wynter was a mystery but she was sure he was a thing borne of malice. Lydria knew everyone had a weakness to be exploited, but Wynter was different. He was savage but not in the way of animals. He was intelligent and thoughtful and deliberate. It was a dangerous combination and Lydria couldn’t suppress a shiver. For the first time in her life, she feared a man.
A tingling sensation around her followed by a bright light similar to the one that lit up Wynter, pulled Lydria’s thoughts away from the limping form of Wynter. Lifting her hands to her throat she felt her skin under her chin and moving her hands lower, she contacted a smooth surface about three fingers wide over her throat. Tracing the surface around her neck with her fingertips she realized she was wearing a collar, only it wasn’t a collar – it was part of her as much as her own skin. She held her right index finger with the pad of her thumb and flicked the collar with her fingernail and was rewarded with a sharp rap, like she had banged it against stone. She picked up a rock and scraped it against her skin and then against her throat. She could feel the sharp edge of the rock make its way down her sweaty, grimy neck until it reached the collar where she felt nothing but heard the click of two hard objects making contact.
Confused but with nothing else to do, Lydria looked around the crater and began a scrambling ascent of the far wall using half-buried tree roots to climb. When she reached the top, she surveyed the carnage again and spied a small movement from a pile of debris a few yards away. It wasn’t wind. The movement was unmistakably something mostly buried under the trees and dirt – most likely it was someone’s hand or finger, but as she moved closer, she half stopped in surprise. Amid the destruction, there was a small animal, a bobcat cub she would have never noticed had it not moved.
Bobcats were rarely seen in the wild and Lydria knew most hunters went their entire lives perhaps only glimpsing one as it ran away. Smaller than catamounts, bobcats were still deadly hunters, but as Lydria moved branches and dirt, the sound that came from the cub was anything but ferocious. It was mewling with rasping breaths. She took it by the scruff and removed it from the rubble and sat down with the small kitten in her lap, moving her fingers carefully along its body, looking for broken bones.
“Well, boy, what’s wrong with you?” Lydria spoke out loud to hear herself and found the sound still thick and low. “You’ve broken a bone in your back leg, but I’m not sure what I can do. I can splint it, there’s enough wood, but I’ve never splint a cat before.” Lydria was exhausted. With Wynter gone, she knew she had to find food and water and a place to rest; but first she had to tend to the cub and suppress a desire to curl up and sleep herself. She lowered her head toward the cat who was purring lightly as it relaxed in her lap and thought about what she would need to do to help the animal. She closed her eyes and stroked the cat absently, thinking about how she would set the bone of a man, when she felt a warmth in her hands and saw a warm yellow light behind her closed eyelids. She wondered for a moment if she had missing a wound and whether her hands were bleeding. Not wanting to see her own hands filled with blood again, Lydria opened her eyes in time to see the dimming of a faint blue glow around the cub, and feel a painful pressure behind her eyes, before closing them again and falling to her side.
FIVE
A splash of cool water startled Lydria into wakefulness and a voice broke through the dullness of her ears telling her to wake up. By the ti
me she had wiped away the light mud on her eyelids created from the falling dust and the water, she felt a small warm weight on her stomach. She pushed her arms underneath her to lift her torso and blinked away the water and dirt to reveal the cub resting on her stomach. When she stopped, the bobcat rose and licked her nose, rubbing his forehead under her chin. Lydria noticed he was walking well and that he had a thin blue collar like a tattoo of gemstones barely perceptible under his fur.
Standing next to Lydria, holding a dripping water skin in one hand a hunting spear in the other, was a willowy female wearing leather breeches. She had a delicately curved bow on her back and she smiled when Lydria’s eyes found her own. The woman’s own eyes widened as they glimpsed the blue and green orbs staring back at her, and she proffered a hand to help Lydria to her feet and said simply, ‘friend.’
The women stared at each other for some seconds before they were interrupted by the cub that jumped onto Lydria’s shoulders, startling both women. Lydria reached her left hand to stroke the cub’s chin and the newcomer pulled back half a step, looking from Lydria’s neck to the cub’s.
The cub was kitten-like in his appreciation for Lydria and purred loudly when she stroked him. For a cat that relied on elusiveness and cunning, she thought it was out of their character to remain in the company of humans regardless of how much help she had provided.
“He must have lost his mother,” Lydria declared, trying to reassure the strange woman with a friendly tone.
“You are his mother now. You must name him. I am called Haidrea and in this place of desolation, you are the only two living. You must come with me to my home in Eifynar.”
The mention of Eifynar startled Lydria who had heard of the place only rarely from her father. Although known to the people of Wesolk, the Eifen people were much like the cub on her shoulder - rarely seen, preferring to stay deep in the woods and interact little with the people of the Wesolk. Lydria looked at the woman more closely, and saw a story come to life. The Eifen were said to be slim and graceful, blessed with a cunningness of woodcraft that was unmatched. Lydria’s father had told her stories of how the Eifen moved nearly silently through the forests and helped Aric win his kingdom by protecting their homes, and therefore Wesolk’s northern flank. The Eifen did not fight for any but themselves, but their reputation as archers of unmatched skill was the stuff of legends.
Haidrea’s face was delicate but hard, fine lines mixed with a rugged determination, and her ears were not rounded at the top, but extended further from the woman’s head than did Lydria’s. As she stared, Lydria was startled and amazed to Haidrea’s ears move, back to front, much like those of the cat on her shoulder.
“Am I the first Eifen you’ve met, then?”
“Yes, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to stare. Your ears…”
“And your eyes. We are what we are made and no more. Come, we can speak more when we are away from here.”
Lydria steadied the cat on her shoulders where it lay easily, its small, needle-like claws finding purchase in her clothes and skin. In a few months the cub’s claws and size would make riding on her shoulders impractical if not impossible, but for now he was small enough that it was only a slight discomfort. And his purring was very soothing.
Haidrea motioned that they should walk east when Lydria paused to look at the wasteland of trees, dirt and rock. “There is something…” Lydria said, and Haidrea turned and followed her back toward the pile of rubble just past the crater. “I saw someone here before I fell into the crater…” Lydria picked her way through the tangled mass of branches and dirt to the place she had seen.
“What do you hope to find?” Haidrea asked.
“My father. Someone. I don’t know, but I saw someone here.”
“How did you see someone in all this?”
Lydria didn’t answer. Her eyes were locked on an incongruous site among the wreckage – a thin piece of wood sticking straight up amidst the tumbled branches. It was an arrow, and she remembered the shadow’s arm raising and falling, she knew what the find meant and retched a little before moving forward. A little closer and she saw a dirty and bloody hand and then the neck where the goose-feathered arrow was buried. It was her father, and from the fresh pool of blood sprinkled with the still falling dust, Lydria realized he was alive when Wynter found him. Was this why Wynter let her live, she wondered, because he had already killed her father and wanted her to live with the pain of knowing who was responsible?
Cargile’s face was bruised but intact. Stroking his grey hair, Lydria murmured ‘father’ and uncurled the dead fingers to hold them in her own. The cub, sensing her emotion, climbed down from her shoulders and sat quietly to the side.
“Your father’s spirit is part of the world now,” Haidrea said after several heartbeats of silence and stillness. “He will watch over all who come here, and it will be a sacred place. There is power here. I can feel it, as can the cub.”
Lydria mutely nodded. She was preparing to rise when her hand reached out and snapped off the feathered end of the arrow and tucked it along with the stone into the pouch on her belt. She tapped her shoulder for the cub to jump up. “Why did you come to me in the crater – how did you know?”
Haidrea paused before she spoke. “I heard your group and made to see who passed along the trail. I was there,” she pointed to the east and south where the standing forest was closest. “I was there in the nearest standing trees behind a large rock when the earth was thrown into the air and the trees fell. I too was thrown but was not seriously injured. When I got up I saw the man moving and then you. I watched as you ran into the hole and as he followed. I waited. When he left, I let him go. And then I saw you gather this cub in your arms and … fall. So, I came to help.”
“Why?”
“The land and the animals can tell us much if we take the time to listen. It is the same with people if we are open to the signs Eigrae provides and take the time to watch. The man has a dark spirit that seeks to harm. You have no such spirit for destruction … though I believe you capable of it.”
Lydria nodded slowly. She had made up her mind to trust Haidrea, as she knew she could do little else. If she had meant to harm her, she could have easily done so. “The man’s name is Wynter and he has killed several people, and he promises to kill more.”
“Then we will go to Eifynar and you will speak to our chief and our Graetongue and they will provide guidance for you.”
“May I bring my cat?” Lydria looked at Haidrea with a smile, the animal curled happily around her neck, its nose pressed against her chin, thumping her nose and mouth as he banged his stubby tail against her face.
“We do not own animals – they have spirits of their own and they will do as they will. It is more likely to say that this cat has you. I’m sure you both will be received well, for it is not often we have visitors, much less someone with two souls.” Haidrea looked pointedly at Lydria’s eyes. “Nor have we ever seen a person or a cat who wears a collar such as yours, although I feel it is safe to believe the man Wynter may have one as well, as each of you were bathed in a light for a short time before the blue glow left your neck.” Haidrea motioned at the small animal and Lydria nodded for her to touch him. She stroked the animal lightly but Lydria noticed she took great pains to not touch the cat’s collar.
Lydria reached for a stick to help her travel. She was sore and the pain from the impact that destroyed the forest and the bruises from being repeatedly thrown to the ground had begun to make her stiff. “What do you mean, two souls?” She pulled herself upright on the stick and the cat shifted slightly to maintain his balance.
“You have twin souls. The caring soul of a blue-eyed spirit, and the dangerous soul of a green-eyed spirit. It is very rare. Most people have the brown-eyed soul of balance.” She said no more about it.
Haidrea lead the way with Lydria struggling to keep up. The Eifen made barely a sound, walking lightly on the balls of her feet through the limb-strewn landscape along the t
rench and into the standing forests beyond. Her head moved slowly and ceaselessly from side to side, her spear pointed always forward, and her arm loose but coiled and ready to shift grip on the wooden haft of the weapon.
Lydria’s father made many of the same motions Haidrea made, even when walking through peaceful lands. The motions came from years of training and awareness. Cargile had often said, when you cease being aware, you quickly cease being alive. The memory caused her to suppress a gasp as the reality of her situation struck home. She was wounded and sore, although whatever healed the cat draped over her neck seemed to have helped ease her pain. She had lost a fair amount of blood despite her bandaging, and her head swam somewhat. But despite these physical injuries, she realized that she was alone in the world. With her father gone, she had no one to look to for support or comfort. As if reading her thoughts and offering consolation, the cat around her neck pushed the bridge of his nose into her chin and licked her own bent nose before resting his head again around her neck.
Trusting that Haidrea had awareness for both, Lydria focused her attention on the slim Eifen and how gracefully she moved across the terrain. Even through her clothing, Lydria could discern taught muscles ready to respond to any threat. Despite that, her neck and shoulders were relaxed as if out for an afternoon walk. Although, she thought, stalking would be more accurate. The effortlessness of her posture and movements were a thing of beauty and Lydria’s father would have been in awe of the sparseness of motion she used to complete a task. Her skin was a radiant black, so dark that in the right light, it was almost blue.
Lydria wondered if the Eifen were like the people of Wesolk who came in many shades, with darker or lighter skin appearing at random like the color of one’s hair, or eyes. Haidrea’s hands were unadorned and shifted subtly on the haft of the spear, the paleness of her palms contrasting against the dark wood of the spear. She exerted minimal effort as she carried the spear, but she kept it poised to be brought to bear in any direction at a moment’s notice.
Magic's Genesis- The Grey Page 4