One for Ahl, page 2
This was a nightly habit for Astrid. She didn’t entirely know how she came to exist, and Jane didn’t really know about her beyond occasional suspicions. Every night Jane would be drawn into a heavy sleep, and Astrid woke in her place. Likewise, Astrid collapsed at dawn, and Jane took over.
Astrid paused upon a rather large branch, sniffing at the air for anything flying nearby. The musty scent of deer below her was all she could smell, so she spread her shadow wings and pushed herself from the trees, breaking into the sky. Grinning with exhilaration, Astrid reached back to entangle her arms with her wings. The shadow she had collected became solid, almost as if the “being” of her arms had been spread out into feathers and muscle, and Astrid filled the solidified wings with the wind to lift herself towards the heavens. She didn’t know what she was. She didn’t know if there was anything like her in the world, and she didn’t particularly care to look for answers. What Astrid did know was that she could fly.
Higher. HIGHER! Astrid strained as she soared upward, looking at the stars. They were so bright, past the thinned cloud layer, and she pushed toward them with a dream, a yearning to reach past them. Maybe, just maybe, she would find silence out there. Perhaps there she would find peace from the noise of the forest, from the fear of the world below.
Her wings shuddered, and Astrid knew her stamina was about up. Some of the shadows called to be returned to the forest below, and she was never able to collect the shadows from clouds, so she couldn’t safely go much higher. With a deep breath, Astrid opened her wings and angled them to carry her in a glide. Here at least, the world seemed silent, and she was high enough that the light of the scattered fires and buildings looked rather similar to the stars above. She could feel Jane’s mind shift from a warm dream of cottages and porridge to a nightmare of elementals chasing her and stones being thrown by unseen people. Astrid focused on the view below her, then closed her eyes and sent images toward the part of her that was Jane. Feeling her own mind meld into Jane’s dreams, easing the nightmare, Astrid opened her eyes once more and drifted through the night, collecting shadows from clouds until her entire body looked like a dark wisp. It’s just you and me, Jane. Or me and me, whatever the hell we are, Astrid thought to herself as she drifted solemnly towards the noise of the world below.
* * *
Whack! The wooden training sword landed squarely between Jane’s shoulders, the noise echoing in the practice room two floors below the library’s entrance. She clamped her jaw as her knees buckled. “Oh, s-sorry Jane!” Meerkat squeaked out while Candid coughed down a laugh from the corner of the room.
“Don’t apologize, Meer. You did pretty well.” Jane wiped the sweat from her upper lip and slowly stood. “I don’t think there are many people who could block that. Let me try again.” Meerkat nodded and raised her sword. Jane rolled her shoulders and tried to focus. They held their position for a moment, then Jane jumped forward to make a strike, feinting to the side while keeping her feet light. Meerkat managed a tight spiral around Jane and nearly struck the exact spot between the shoulders. Jane was expecting it this time and dropped herself to the floor, rolling out of the way. As Jane was jumping to her feet, she took an awkward step, and Meerkat’s sword struck hard against Jane’s jaw. Jane saw black until Candid held a healing crystal to Jane’s head, providing instant relief.
“Jane, are you okay? You should’a been able to block that. Somethin’ wrong?” Candid helped Jane up. Meerkat’s expression echoed Candid’s concern.
“It’s nothing to bother about. I just… didn’t sleep very well, I suppose. You’re up!” Jane stepped out of the sparring circle and threw her training sword in the barrel full of them.
“A’right, if you say so.” Candid shook her head. “Hey Meer, how about some weapon-free practice, then?” Jane skipped to the stool in the corner quickly to watch them spar from a safe distance. Meerkat shifted into a grizzly bear, easily matching the half-giantess in size, then quickly shifted to a snake to slip away and leave Candid unbalanced from a failed grapple. Meerkat began to rotate shifts, creating a new challenge for Candid each time until the battle threatened to pass the boundary of the ring. Two minutes in, Jane decided it would be safer to escape the sparring if only to save her ears from the deafening roars between her friends when Meerkat held her grizzly form. Footsie was still upstairs, working on his assigned study, so Jane headed to join him.
Sliding into a chair to the right of her friend, Jane eyed Footsie, whose face rested in his palms. A small book was opened to a page with an embedded speaking crystal, a recorded voice quietly droning on about preparedness for various foes. “I can’t believe I am stuck going through this instruction again, Janea,” Footsie groaned. Jane mumbled agreement, pulling the smallest first aid book from Candid’s pile to look busy. She couldn’t give a reason for one of the librarians to send her off.
“Hey,” Footsie nudged his elbow against Jane’s, “you have plans ten days from now? On those few days we’ll be gettin’ off for Meer’s pilgrimage?”
“Nothing real important. What do you have in mind?” Jane stared aimlessly at the pages in front of her, reading the same sentence three times over. So many of these instructions are about the use of crystals. What happens if we run out?
Footsie grinned, his white teeth dazzling against his ebony skin. “Well, I suppose I’ve been invited to my cousin’s wedding, and I don’t have anybody to keep me from utter death by boredom. Plus, I think you’d like the architecture in Pritha. It’d be great to have you there.”
“Which cousin?”
“Handen.”
“The, er… funny one?”
“He likes to think so.” Footsie screwed his face into his best impression of his cousin’s pretentious sneer, and Jane choked on her own spit to keep from laughing. She could feel the eyes of the shifter librarian from the night before bearing into her head.
“I’ll go if I can borrow a dress from Meer. None of mine are fancy enough.” Jane closed the first aid book. “I’m gonna head up before the whole library jumps on me. See you at the track later.”
“Aye,” Footsie returned his eyes dully to his now-silent book, “See you then.” Jane went to the wide set of stairs near the library’s entrance, climbing her way to the uppermost floor. She brushed her hand down shelves of titles, stopping at a section she had previously scoured. It was marked “Dream Translation” on a small wooden plate.
The only book on the shelf that Jane had found interesting and worthwhile was titled On Dreams of Flying and Reaching for the Sky. It did absolutely nothing to help Jane figure out her recurring dreams of flight, but it did cover a shifter’s premonition of their first shift with wings. Jane was endlessly curious about how magic seemed to affect clans in different ways when only a rare few could store magic in the crystals that defined their daily lives.
Jane moved onto the next shelf and grabbed a thick but squat scarlet tome titled Art of the Seers, and wandered to one of the sunlit window seats to start reading. The sun had wavered through clouds until it was past noon when a man cleared his throat obnoxiously behind Jane.
“You’re out of bounds.” The male voice came out as a sneer with a hint of a threat behind it. “What business does a tally have here? Can you even read, girl?”
“I’m not a girl; I’m a woman,” Jane answered dryly. “Also, have you not heard the news, sir? Tally is considered an offensive term. You may call me an Ahlian Listuanian if you want.” Jane barely attempted to mask the dripping sarcasm in a polite and apologetic tone. She turned to look the short man in the eye and consider her adversary. Another human… or perhaps elvish descent? Forest-born, regardless. He wasn’t wearing a uniform at the moment, but his bearing told Jane he was definitely military. The man seemed to be sizing her up as well. For a moment, he seemed so shocked that she had spoken back to him that he couldn’t move his mouth. The moment passed.
“What is your number, girl?”
“Woman, not girl. Try again, guy.” Jane could feel her core shuddering nervously. This was always a dangerous game, standing up for herself while being all too aware that it could go very wrong.
The man stepped closer, visibly pissed. “You will tell me your number.”
Jane stood, pleased that she wasn’t shorter than him, at the very least. “Personnel searches in the training libraries must be done by designated librarians. So, tell me, who’s asking?”
“A soldier of The Confederation, ninth tier. You will give me your number, or I will have you arrested for your insolence.” Balls, this guy is higher up than I thought. Oh well, the damage is already done…. Jane waited a few seconds out of pettiness before answering.
“1-2-5-8, Artemisia family… sir.” The man’s face blanched at his recognition of the number. “And with all due respect,” Jane’s full sarcasm broke free, “your idea that a numbered person is out of bounds can go ahead and be shoved up the rear ends of all nine tiers you’ve climbed and never reach the ears of my big toe. You must’ve been born under the Confederation’s biggest recorded rock because any forest-born knows not to question people’s belonging in the trainee library.”
Jane ended in a throaty whisper, becoming suddenly wary of the librarians climbing the stairwell to find the source of the disturbance. Collecting herself, Jane pushed past the stranger, who was choking on incoherent retorts. She reached the small back set of stairs just as a librarian’s robes ascended the main stairs.
Quickly descending the steep, spiraling steps, Jane stifled back furious tears, shaking uncontrollably. Her mind had already begun bringing up memories she preferred to forget.
* * *
Astrid yawned sharply and rubbed her eyes. She knew Jane’s day had gone sour because Astrid woke that night with a few more shadows under her eyes than normal. Her sleep had been horrible.
Astrid halted on a branch to sniff at the night air. She was well out of the normal flight paths and was shocked when the smell of shifters hit her nose. They were able to shift into any number of creatures, but the smell of their original forms always lingered. Astrid’s collected shadows settled around her, and she pulled herself against the tree trunk before climbing to a higher branch to take a peek.
The sky was full.
Astrid gaped and watched various owls and bats fly through the sky in a line. Two-thirds were heading in the same direction, from the West horizon towards the East. The remainder flitted every which way, carrying packs of various sizes, so that the entire sky was filled with eyes.
Astrid cautiously backed down the tree. It was an old oak tree covered in late spring leaves and layers of thick moss, so it gave plenty of shelter from the eyes above. Even so, Astrid gargoyled herself to the branch, watching above for any sign of having been seen.
A chittering sound broke out below Astrid, breaking the quiet around her, and Astrid looked down to see the small form of a grass elemental watching her. Drifting down on her shadow wings, Astrid kneeled beside the elemental.
Unlike most elementals, grass elementals were small and childlike. They had large eyes similar to a fox’s and bodies small enough to fit in one’s palm. This particular elemental was covered in moss-like hair, with stony skin, no nose, and minuscule holes in the places of its mouth and ears.
“It’s okay, little whistler; I won’t hurt you.” Astrid’s voice came out raspy, since she had not used it for some time. Normally it would have sounded smooth and wispy as the smoke she was shrouded in, but she was grateful it didn’t. The grass elementals were drawn to rough things, including voices. Astrid held her rough, bark-like hand palm-up for the elemental to inspect, wisps of shadows dragging between each finger. The elemental reached two tiny hands forward and began feeling around each finger in turn. Once the long inspection was complete, it turned its eyes back on Astrid and gave a small whistle through its mouth hole.
Astrid held back a giggle at the adorable toot while the grass elemental sat on her palm and hugged her thumb.
“I don’t suppose you know why the skies are full today?” The elemental only shrugged at the question. Hmm, I didn’t think so. “Well, little flower bud, I haven’t tried talking to my other self for a while.” The elemental looked up, confused but curious. “Can you do me a favor?”
The moss-covered head shook up and down, and the elemental’s eyes lit up in a smile as it swung circles around Astrid’s fingers. “Can you shake my thumb if anything comes near?” The elemental nodded again, stopping to investigate a particularly rough patch of woody skin.
Astrid curled up on the forest floor, her back against the oak tree, and rested her hand on the ground so the grass elemental could continue sitting in her palm. It contentedly rubbed the rough patch it found, looking around dutifully, on watch. Once a grass elemental set to a task, they followed through with a sense of purpose. Good job, little elemental, Astrid thought with a smile.
Astrid opened her other palm and focused. Some of the shadows she had gathered were drawn to it, and Astrid pulled them together until a solid black sphere floated above her palm. Meeting the elemental’s eyes, Astrid whispered, “A tree elemental taught me to do this,” and heard a small toot of acknowledgment before shoving the sphere into her mouth and swallowing.
The blackness overcame Astrid like a blow to the back of the head. For a few seconds, Astrid couldn’t sense anything. Her sense of touch came back first, and Astrid ran her hand along an eerily smooth, cold surface beneath her. Tink, tink, tink, a sound similar to a glass being tapped with a spoon, went off every second, from a different direction each time. Finally, a wavering light appeared behind Astrid.
Twisting around, Astrid saw what she came to see. A stone pedestal with a carved basin sat beneath a colossal, gray yew tree. The tree itself was made of stone with silver needles. Its trunk was at least seven feet in diameter, and its branches twisted down toward the ground so that the basin sat in an alcove of branches. The ground and sky were still seemingly non-existent, completely and utterly black.
Twenty years earlier, when Jane was about five or six years old, Astrid woke up for the first time. She didn’t know anything but that her name was Astrid. One of her earliest memories was of waking in a military camp, inside a tent filled with sleeping children.
She was scared of the dark, then. The shadows of the sleeping children felt alive to her, drawing Astrid to the source of light outside. The campfire had seemed so beautiful, so Astrid crawled from the tent. She wanted to be safe in the light. Ignoring at first the people sitting by the fire, Astrid stumbled toward the flames. The moment she got close, however, Astrid heard a scream. A rock had flown through the air, hitting her on the back of the head.
Astrid’s vision blurred. She felt more stones thrown, bruising and cutting her rough skin. Somehow she made it to the forest, where she felt the difference between light and shadow like it was a living, spiraling liquid around her. The shadows had seemed to rush at her from every direction.
It was in her fearful escape, crashing through the forest, that Astrid had been discovered by an ancient yew elemental. The elemental, who initially intended to punish Astrid for breaking some of its branches, felt an echo of a yew inside Astrid. The sentient tree told Astrid a story that had been passed down by the forest. In the story, there were some who carried a small world inside them, accessible by devouring the purest form of their base element. It was from that story, and years of experimenting, that Astrid discovered how to access the place which existed, in some way, inside her.
Astrid stood. Jane’s black tunic and brown trousers were gone, and in their place, a layer of onyx scales covered Astrid’s bark-patterned skin from neck to ankle. Striding around the basin, Astrid looked down at the marble figure of Jane curled up near the foot of the pedestal. It had taken Astrid two years, waking with the night and being forced asleep at dawn’s first light, before she could control the shadows enough to find the stone yew. Within the year of discovering how to get there, Astrid learned that Jane’s marble skin had turned into flesh as dawn approached. Astrid’s skin, at the same time, changed into a stony granite.
At that time, Astrid had also experimented with the water in the basin. She had an instinctive sense of fear of drinking the crystal-clear liquid but had tried a small drop anyway. The single drop had felt frozen in her throat, leaving her gasping and coughing. Nightmarish visions had fleeted through her head, too quick to make sense of, but they scared her enough. After that, it took Astrid until her fifth year to test the waters again. In all, it had taken Astrid seven years from when she first woke to understand that she and Jane were likely one and the same.
Experienced now, Astrid held her breath and submerged her face in the water. Jane’s memories poured into Astrid’s mind, of the training week, of the confrontation in the library, and of the others cheering Jane up at the track that afternoon. In this way, Astrid had been able to connect to Jane, though Jane knew little of Astrid. The others are always so kind to you, Astrid thought; they’re such great friends to us. I wish…
Astrid yanked her head back, her face dripping from its submersion. The tree faded away around her, and the continuous tinking sound was replaced with the rustling and chittering of the forest. Astrid blinked her eyes a few times as her vision blurred and refocused, finding herself unmoved against the oak tree. The elemental in her hand was kicking its feet in the air, seemingly bored.
Astrid thanked the elemental, then made her way back through the forest toward the tent. The sky was still filled with lines of flying bodies, and she didn’t dare to try flying. Safely back in the tent, Astrid curled up to wait for dawn.
Something about the day before, Astrid noted, had seemed off. The physical training had been more intense than usual, and there were people at the side of the track taking down notes.
Astrid twirled shadows around her fingers as unease settled like a stone inside her chest.
