Prophecy (The Destiny Series Book 4) Page 5

  Tabitha snorted quietly to herself, but she didn’t say anything else as she watched her brother following behind Aesri.

  “Grandmother, can they come in now?”

  “Oh! Oh, yes! Where are my manners?” Meeshe grinned broadly and stepped back to allow her guests to enter her home.

  Tabitha had to duck slightly to avoid banging her head on the door frame, but once she was inside she realized the room was surprisingly spacious. Looking at the rolling hills that were the Etrafarian dwellings, Tabitha had expected there to be dirt floors and dirt ceilings. Her imagination had conjured images of the fairies living very close to nature with simple furnishings and lots of plants. What she saw instead were floors, not of dirt, but of stone, set into the earth in patterns so tight that unless you looked closely, you couldn’t see any cracks between them. The colors were muted shades of moss green, slate grey, marble white, and here and there, shiny black. They had been worked to a soft gloss, making the floor smooth and easy to walk on but still retaining enough of their original texture to keep the surface from becoming slippery.

  Tabitha’s gaze traveled to the walls which were rounded and blended into the ceiling, reminiscent of someone having taken a wooden bowl and placing it upside down. There were windows cut into the wood, and they were propped open to let in the warm summer air.

  There was a small fire in a hearth. A vegetable stew was simmering in a heavy pot, filling the room with a rich, mouthwatering aroma. The fire gave off a weak light, but Tabby noticed that the room was still quite bright. She looked around for candles but found none. It was then she realized that the light was coming from the walls themselves. She moved hesitantly closer and placed her palm against the wood, which was warm to the touch.

  “Solas oir.”

  Logan had moved close behind her without her noticing, and when he spoke, she startled a little.

  “Sorry, I did not mean to sneak up on you,” he said, without sounding like he meant it. “The wood is called solas oir. It means golden light. They are somewhat common here on Etrafa. You probably did not notice anything more than a faint glow as you walked and dismissed it as filtered sunlight. At night, they illuminate the forest, as well as our homes. We do not use this wood in our sleeping rooms, and we do not often use candles, so if you wish to read after dark, you will need to use this space.”

  Tabitha turned to face him, and when she did, he stepped back a pace. “I’m surprised at the use of wood. I can’t quite fathom you cutting trees down for such purposes.”

  “We never cut down living trees! We are not monsters!” Logan said too loudly. Holly paused in her inspection of the room and Tabitha leaned away from his unexpected flash of ire.

  Who did he think he was? She planted her hands on her hips. “Don’t snap at me! I promise you, I know how to snap back.”

  Meeshe acted as though nothing was amiss. She gave the stew a quick stir to keep it from burning, then busied herself in the kitchen, humming as she worked. She made no move to intercede between the two young people who were now almost toe to toe with each other.

  Logan closed his eyes and took a deep breath before opening them again. “What I mean is, the trees are harvested only after they die. We gather the wood and work it then. It retains the same light-giving quality, even after a natural death.”

  Tabitha let her arms relax at her side. “Thank you for your kind explanation.” She refused to break eye contact with him, waiting for an apology, but none seemed forthcoming.

  “Come now, girls,” Meeshe said. “I will show you to your room, and then we can all have a nice supper together.”

  Tabitha was forced to step around Logan, who, it seemed, was not only unwilling to say he was sorry, but to even move aside for her to pass.

  ***

  Tabby lay in her bed and stared at the ceiling, listening to the soft sound of leaves rustling in the night breeze. It was soothing, but she was used to the sound of the ocean through her bedroom window, and she couldn’t quite adjust to its absence.

  Supper had been a quiet affair. Meeshe had asked the occasional question, but Logan had hardly spoken at all. Even when Holly tried to engage him in conversation, he would only answer in monosyllables or nods, seeming more interested in his stew than his guests.

  “Tabitha?" Holly's whisper came to her ears, drawing her from her quiet contemplation. "Tabitha, you asleep?”

  “No, I’m awake. What is it, Holly?”

  “Nothing, really. I just can’t sleep. The night sounds…wrong. You know what I mean?”

  “I imagine we’ll get used to it, but I do know what you mean.”

  “Meeshe seems nice, don’t you think?”

  “I suppose so,” Tabby answered after a short pause. “She said she'd show me some healing plants tomorrow.”

  “That’s nice,” Holly whispered. “What did you think of Logan?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, he’s very handsome, don’t you think?” Holly asked.

  For a split second, her mind flashed back to his emerald eyes. “I didn’t really pay much attention,” Tabitha answered in an offhanded way.

  There was a quiet sound from Holly’s bed. “Did you say something, Holly?”

  “No, no, nothing,” Holly answered.

  Tabitha didn’t argue, but she was pretty sure she had heard her say “Good.”

  Chapter 6

  “Siusan,” Brin grumbled, “Stop fussing. It’s fine.”

  “It is not fine! There is a giant hole torn in your wing. Now, you may allow me to see to it, or I can make you. In either case, I will have my way.”

  “You will make me? Siusan, I don’t think you fully grasp the situation. I am a dragon of considerable power and strength. I could crush you with one flick of my mighty tail. I could burn you to cinders with one breath. I could—”

  “You could bore me to death with your endless prattling. Yes, yes, you are very frightening. Now, let me see the wing.”

  Brin sighed and stretched his wing out for her to examine. “You know that I’m only doing this to humor you, right?”

  “Of course. You are all things patient and tolerant. A little to the right, if you please.”

  Brin tipped the wing as she'd instructed, and she floated upward to get a better look. Her fingers gently probed the wound. Brin winced as a shudder swept over his body.

  “Fighting krakens,” Siusan huffed. “What were you thinking? You could have been killed. Reckless. No! Reckless and foolish.”

  “What would you have me do? I didn’t have a lot of options. Ouch! Stop poking around so much!” Brin yanked his wing back, and Siusan was knocked about by the sudden gust of air.

  “I will need to put something on that, and it will need to be sewn. It will never heal properly if I do not.”

  “Sewn? Absolutely not! I am not a quilt. Slather some cream on it, if you must, but I will not have you sticking me with needles.”

  Siusan lowered herself back to the ground and walked around to his head so that their eyes met. “It must be mended. Sewing it is the best way to do that. Now, had you come here straight away, I might have been able to do something a little less drastic, but you are the one who chose to try to care for it yourself, and so…here we are. You know it does not work as well with the hole in it—you will expend much more effort trying to get the lift you need, and you must conserve your energy as you will require all of your strength for what we believe is coming. Besides, it would be a shame to have you permanently scarred in such a way. I mean, you are still incredibly handsome, of course, but with the wing as it is….”

  “Siusan, are you trying to play on my vanity?” Brin asked, narrowing his gaze.

  Siusan’s amber eyes twinkled. “Maybe a little. Is it working?”

  Brin shook his head disapprovingly before saying, “Oh, for Tolah’s sake! Go get the blasted needle, then.”

  “I just happen to have it ready.” She laughed, and pulled it from inside her cloak.

>   “Mind where you poke that thing. I don’t want to end up with one large hole and a dozen smaller ones.” Brin eyed the needle warily. “You know, the wound is still a little sensitive. Maybe we should wait until it’s not quite so sore to try this.”

  “It is sensitive because it is infected, but we cannot wait—it has already healed over too much. I will have to reopen it and clean it as it is, before it can be sewn. It is the only way to make sure it grows properly back together.”

  “Wonderful,” Brin moaned.

  “I can make it so it does not hurt so much, if you will let me. Not that I think it is necessary—a dragon, such as yourself, should certainly have no difficulty enduring this small discomfort without complaint.”

  “True, true,” Brin said, nodding. “Still, I wouldn’t want to flinch while you are working. It would likely only make things harder for you. I think…I think I shall allow you to help, for your sake, I mean.”

  “How very thoughtful of you.” She hovered over his outstretched wing. “Hold very still, please. You are a fire dragon, so I do not want to overdo it.”

  Siusan held her hands over the tattered and bloodied wing and began to chant softly to herself. Brin felt the cool air wash over him, and he shuddered as the cold intensified. The faint red glow emanating from his scales dimmed.

  “Hmmm,” Siusan said. “It is too much. I cannot get it focused exactly where I need it. I wonder if—”

  “Wonder if what?” Brin asked, turning his head to better see what she was doing.

  “Hold still!” she scolded.

  Brin’s eyes widened when she floated closer and then, oh so softly, blew onto the wound. The shudder running through him this time was of a different nature, and his eyes closed. They opened abruptly a second later when he felt her cleaning the dirt and scabs from the wound. He shifted uncomfortably.

  Siusan looked away from her work and into Brin’s eyes when she saw his muscles tighten in pain. Her brow creased with worry and then softened as an idea came to her. She lowered her head to the wound and pressed her lips to the edges. She first kissed a spot with icy lips and then blew a frozen breath over it before moving her mouth to another area.

  Brin swallowed convulsively, his heart beating frantically against his ribs. When she began to work again, there was no sensation of pain, only a strange kind of tingling that made his head buzz. Even when she took the needle to his abused wing, he felt nothing, but for the tingling that remained.

  “There, now,” she said, wiping her hands off on her skirt. “I was never much of a seamstress, but that looks fairly close to perfect to me.” Once more she reached into her cloak, but this time she withdrew a small container, and poured its contents over the mended wing.

  Sensation had begun to return to him as the cold leached away, and Brin hissed at the sharp sting.

  “Oh! I am sorry! I should have warned you. Would you like me to numb the area again?”

  “No!” Brin shouted, taking a few hasty steps away from her. “No,” he said again with less force. “I was only caught off guard, is all. It is already fading.”

  “Is something wrong, Brin?” Siusan stepped closer to him.

  “Of course not,” he answered, taking another step away from her.

  “Then why are you running away from me? Surely I did not hurt you that much.”

  “Hurt me? No, you didn’t hurt me. I—”

  “Brin, please. If I have done something to upset you, you must tell me.”

  “Why do you call me Brin?” he asked, apropos of nothing.

  “Are you trying to change the subject?” She put her hands on her narrow hips and tapped her foot impatiently.

  “I am not trying to change the subject; there's no subject to change. It simply occurred to me that you call me Brin when all the other Etrafarians call me Brin’du Drak’Tir. You used to call me by my full name, and I can’t recall when that changed.”

  “Aesri has been known to call you Brin,” she corrected. “Why should I not? You told me you had even come to like it.”

  “No reason. It’s only that Etrafarians seem so set on purity in all things, including language, and I thought—”

  “Bah! Purity!” Siusan almost spat the word. “Won’t, I’ve, couldn’t, we’ve, didn’t!” She spoke in a flurry, as if hurling curse words.

  “Siusan! What’s gotten into you?”

  “I am sick to death of Etrafarian ideas of purity! We do not even speak that way out of some higher moral imperative; we speak that way because we have been trained since birth to do so. It is a habit, and like many habits, it is a bad one. We try to hold ourselves up as being higher and better than the other races, but Rah made them all. No one wants to talk about that though, do they? No, indeed. Better that we close our eyes and pretend we are the sole light in the universe, and the other races are some sort of magical anomaly not worthy of our notice or concern.”

  Brin looked at her with his mouth slightly agape, as if she'd suddenly transformed into an entirely different creature, right before his eyes.

  “Oh, for Rah’s sake, Brin. Close your mouth. I have not gone mad, but I am angry. I believe we are doing ourselves harm with our constant vigilance against anything impure.

  "Impure. What a stupid word—what is pure, anyway?” She said, scowling.

  Brin lowered himself back to the ground beside her. “You are careful, are you not, about who you share these thoughts with? These ideas aren't going to be popular, and I wouldn't want to see anything happen to you.”

  She placed her hand on his cheek and smiled. “I am careful, Brin, but it is past time that we stopped being so closed-minded. Some of us believe that the fact we do not interact with other races is one of the reasons why we see fewer and fewer children born into each generation. Some of us believe we are purifying ourselves into extinction.”

  “That’s a bit of a leap, isn’t it? What makes you think that’s the cause?”

  “I do not know for sure, of course, but Meeshe, for one, and then, of course, there is Carly.” She paused long enough to see his confused expression and hurried to explain. “You know how difficult it is for us to conceive. Some of us never do, but along comes Meeshe who was with her young man no more than a few times, and she was pregnant. Now, that alone would not mean much, but Carly! If what Aesri says is true, and I have never known her to lie, Carly and Daniel were together but one time and she was with child. I grant you that she is not full Etrafarian, but one time! It must mean something.”

  “Siusan, you are reaching. Carly is not just not full Etrafarian—she has so little of the bloodline it is almost laughable. You can’t make a connection with only those two examples.”

  “I admit the Etrafarian ancestor is far back in her line, but her powers are so strong, which means the Etrafarian blood is quite dominant within her.”

  Brin shook his head. Siusan was excited, and he didn’t want to dampen her enthusiasm, but she needed to be reined in a bit. Maybe she was right, but she was more likely wrong, and most of the Etrafarians were apt to greet that kind of theory with open hostility. Brin saw the way Meeshe was treated, and she was considered “pure.” Just the fact that she had born a child of mixed parentage was enough for her to be seen in a disparaging light.

  And then there was Logan. Meeshe’s grandson lived a life of virtual isolation. He was ignored most of the time, but he’d been teased mercilessly growing up. Once he'd reached adulthood, he was rarely seen amongst others, preferring, instead, to roam the forest, spending most of his time with the trees and woodland creatures. His talent for speaking to animals was something he inherited from his grandmother, and they were probably his closest friends, with the exception of Meeshe, who adored the boy beyond reason.

  Brin had been silent for some time, and Siusan gave him a gentle nudge. “Are you still with me?”

  Brin blinked slowly a couple times before huffing loudly and saying, “Of course I am. Just promise me you will be careful.”

  �
�You worry too much,” she answered lightly before kissing his nose.

  “Go on with you, then,” he said in a gruff voice. “I’ll see you in the morning, I suppose.”

  “Of course,” she answered with a quick grin. “I will need to put more antiseptic on that wing, and afterwards we can go for a walk down on the beach where you can further explain to me the error of my logic.”

  She waved over her shoulder and skipped toward her home. Brin reached one clawed hand up to touch the place where she'd kissed him before shaking his head once more and taking flight to make his way to the cave that served as his home away from Maj.

  Chapter 7

  “No, no, child. Lay one over the other before you crush the leaves. That is it! That is the way. You see, the juices from the leaves blend together as they are being crushed.”

  Tabitha brushed her hair from her face once more. The heat of the room was making her sweat, and much of her hair was plastered to her forehead. She had learned so much in only a few short weeks. Meeshe was a wonderful teacher, but she was strict. Tabitha had to concentrate every moment they were together. Meeshe was fond of saying Tabby could make all the mistakes she wanted, so long as she only made them once.

  Logan, as was his habit, sat quietly at the table, looking up every once in a while, to gauge their progress. He usually had a witty remark on hand should she make a mistake, which only served to motivate her to try harder.

  Holly sat on a soft chair reading a book, but she seemed to spend most of her time watching Logan, rather than giving her attention to the pages before her.

  “Now, Tabitha, what do we do next?” Meeshe asked her.

  Tabitha stilled and tried to recall what she'd been taught thus far about healing salves and unguents. “Stir counter clockwise three times, then let the mixture cool?”

  “Are you asking me or telling me?” Meeshe said.

  “Telling,” Tabitha answered firmly, but looked down for the smile of approval she hoped to see on Meeshe’s face.

  “Well, then, do it, child!” Meeshe said, rapping the counter with her spoon.