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Wy
The pack elder paced before the dense growth, and the other dogs trotted aimlessly about, arching necks and raising ears as they peered into it. The deer rolled its shoulders and shifted nervously beneath Wy
These animals were as puzzled and disturbed as Wy
The elder paced left along the wood's border and then suddenly lunged into it.
Wy
A chokeberry bush ripped apart as the dark elder leaped out. Berries scattered in his wake like small black pellets. He stumbled, favoring one foreleg, and turned to stare back at the barrier. The rest of the pack circled hesitantly.
Lily turned right and darted for a birch of peeling bark, its lowest branches tangled in climbing blackberry vines.
"No!" Wy
Chap went after Lily, but not before she tried thrashing her way into the thorny vines. She quickly retreated, never getting deeper than her shoulders.
Wy
Chap remained on the barrier's edge as Lily arced around behind him. He rumbled softly in frustration. They could go back but not forward.
Wy
Chap's growl rose to a snarl and startled Wy
Fay… my kin… now they choose to return.
Wy
The last time she had heard this was at the northern gate of Soladran as Chap communed with his kin, the Fay.
Chap quickly brushed heads with Lily and then bolted into the open forest behind them. Wy
Before Wy
I am here… show yourselves, my kin… I demand it!
Chap ran blindly through the trees, searching.But not with eyes and ears and nose.
His spirit expanded in rage, reaching in all directions, until he felt them as he had upon staring into the dense barrier woods.
That warped growth should not be there. He had seen this in Lily's memory flash. No majay-hi had ever encountered such a tangled mesh and it was coated with the tingle of Chap's kin.
They tried to stop the majay-hi-stop him-from reaching Nein'a.
Show yourselves! Answer me… now!
His coat rippled under a breeze whirling downward from the night sky. It increased to a strong wind, encircling him as it ripped up mulch. He pulled up short amid a hushed chatter of branches and turned a tight circle with a low rumble. The wind settled to a breeze once more.
Chap stood in a small clearing loosely walled by sycamores and beeches grown tall from roots sunk deep into the earth. Their branches interlaced like the limbs of sentinels holding hands, and movement within them made those limbs sway slightly.
He would not cower before them.
Why interfere now, when you have been silent… so useless? Why return after abandoning me for so long?
Branches behind him shook softly, and he wheeled about. Leaves rustling in the low whirling breeze shaped to a chorus of voices in his mind.
Further and further you stray from your path… your purpose… to keep the sister of the dead in ignorance and away from the Enemy.
Chap rumbled at one birch. A bend in its trunk looked too much like a figure seated in judgment. His shoulders tightened as he half-crouched to lunge.
Leesil is necessary to my task… our need. But his suffering serves no purpose. So why bar my way? Why can he not free his mother?
A long vine of red hyacinth rustled.
Return to your task… Return to the sister of the dead… Leave this land and keep her far from her makers reach.
That was no answer. In what other place could Magiere be farther from the Enemy's reach?
The hyacinth rustled more softly.
You have told your mortal charges far too much. So much that they might well turn upon a path that would end this world. Tell them no more, and take them from this place.
Chap's rumble grew. All Leesil wanted was freedom for his last remaining family.To be with his mother once again. Yet Chap's kin became obsessed with inaction.
And why could he not remember… more?
Bits and pieces learned in his mortal life still did not fit together. He did not retain enough awareness from existence among his kin to bind those pieces and fill in the gaps;
The branches shuddered around him.
You have taken flesh and lost our full awareness. Trust the path… trust in us. In flesh, you ca
Chap wavered in silence. He had relinquished eternity to follow the will of his kin. Once he must have known and agreed with their purpose, but now he could not remember why.
There must have been a reason… one that he had forgotten.
Wy
A chorus of a thousand shuddering and crackling leaves erupted within Wy
You have taken flesh and lost our full awareness. Trust the path… trust in us. In flesh, you ca
Wy
His snarling howl rolled through the forest.
Wy
Lily cocked her ears. Wy
Before Lily could react, Wy
Chap quivered as his howl faded from his ears. Why did his kin treat him like a servant who owed blind obedience?
He had been one of them-one with them. He saw no possible harm in a son finding the mother who birthed and raised him. Nein'a did not want to see harm come to this world any more than the Fay, even though she had raised a son in her own caste's ways for her own purposes.
Chap's shudders faded, and he paced a slow circle, studying the sentinel trees. No voices came on the low rustling breeze. But they were still there-still waiting for him to acquiesce.
This had nothing to do with keeping Magiere from the enemy.
Why do you fear Leesil reaching his mother?
Chap's question rang in Wy
She spun around, lost once again with nothing to guide her. She had not taken one step. Yet if her eyes turned away for an instant, a vine, that patch of moss, or even the bare spot of earth to one side appeared to have moved.
Take the sister of the dead and leave. Go back to the human realms and never return to this land.
Wy