Rising From the Ashes: The Chronicles of Caymin (3 page)

Limping and short of breath with the exertion, she carried him back to the sett. Once inside the entrance, she set him down. He managed to crawl into the room where Broc waited anxiously with the new cubs. There, he collapsed.

“What happened?”
Broc asked.

“Wolves.”
It was too dark for Ash to see anything, but her fingers probed the wound in Cuán’s side. He barked in pain, gasping. Her fingers were sticky with his blood.

Broc crept near, nudging him with her nose. His breathing was growing shallower.
“Do not die,”
she said.

“I do not wish to go,”
he gasped.

Ash placed one hand over Cuán’s heart and her other over the wound in his side. A white glow began to emanate from under her hands, so that the blood in them and on them glowed red and hot. The light grew until it was blinding to the other badgers. They closed their eyes and backed away as the underground room became brighter than daylight. The light seemed to go on and on until Ash fell to the side, her energy spent. The light went out, leaving the sett darker than ever it was before. Broc crept close again, nuzzling Cuán who stirred and lifted his head. She licked his side where the skin and fur were healed.

Broc turned to Ash who was still and cold. The badger prodded her cheek.
“Little one?”

Ash opened her eyes, but could not yet sit.
“What happened?”

“I am whole again,”
Cuán said.
“How did you do that?”

Ash lifted her hands, though she could not see them.
“I do not know.”

Broc placed a paw on Ash’s leg.
“Have you ever done that before, little one?”

“No. Never. I do not know what happened.”

The other badgers still cowered in a far corner.

“Do not be afraid,”
Broc said. Slowly, they came near and nudged Ash and Cuán, sniffing them both.

“Do not tell of this,”
Cuán said
. “I do not know what it means, but we must keep it secret.”

Deep in an ancient forest, an old woman paused where she knelt, gathering herbs and mushrooms. Cocking her head, Enat listened. She left her basket and got to her feet. She hurried through the forest and came to an enormous ash tree, covered in lichens and moss, its trunk bigger around than six men could encircle. Laying her gnarled hands on the tree, she closed her eyes and stood quietly for a long time.

“At last,” she breathed.

CHAPTER 2

The Reaping

E
nat stopped to survey the village below her. It was like countless others – a small grouping of perhaps a score of dwellings – some made of stacked stone, others of wood daubed with mud and moss to keep out the cold and wet. She rested her staff against a tree and chewed on an early stalk of asparagus while she watched the activity for a while. The village was situated in a broad, shallow valley. In the distance, a herd of sheep and cattle and goats grazed, tended by older children. There was a large plot of cultivated land outside the cluster of dwellings, the soil in neat rows even this early in the year. It was near a stream for ease of carrying water. Some of the dwellings had smoke rising from a central smoke hole in the roof, but most had fire pits outside their doors. She saw a mix of women and young children below, but only a couple of old men. She hadn’t passed any signs of war parties, so most likely, the other men were off hunting for the celebration. Several dogs roamed the village, sniffing and digging for any leftover bits of food near the fires. She hitched the ropes of her basket higher onto her shoulders, grabbed her stick, and began the trek down the hill. As she neared, she bent over and began to hobble, leaning on her stick as if she were lame.

“Herbs? Shells?”

She called out as she entered the village, and the women paused to watch her. She slipped the ropes off her shoulders and set her basket down, sitting on a log pulled up near a fire.

“Welcome, grandmother,” said one of the women, her belly large with new life. “May we offer you some cold water?”

“Thank you, daughter,” said Enat, honoring the hospitality accorded her. She accepted a gourd filled with water and drank deeply. “That makes an old woman feel refreshed.” She reached into her basket, soft and pliable, woven from reeds, and pulled out a purple shell, already strung on a woven cord. “For you and the wee one to come.” She placed a hand on the woman’s belly. “Health to you both.”

“Thank you,” the woman said. Her face lit up as she turned the shell over in her hands.

Other women gathered around, looking to see what the old woman offered. They had little to trade: some bone needles and gut thread, dried meat and salted fish from their stream. Soon, all Enat had brought with her to trade was gone, all but her salves and potions.

“Have you a healer?” she asked the women.

“We did, grandmother,” said the woman who had offered her water. “But she was very old and passed on this winter past. Are you a healer?”

Enat nodded. “I am. Tomorrow eve is Imbolc. It will be a full moon as well. A good omen for the spring.” She smiled at the woman’s bulging abdomen. “Not that you need more. Brighid has been good to you?”

“Aye, grandmother,” said the woman. “My man and I have five others. All have lived, praise Brighid.”

“You are blessed,” said Enat. She looked around. “Are there others here, anyone your healer was training?”

“None. None here have the gift.” The woman sat beside Enat on the log, grunting a little with the effort of lowering her bulky body. “Oh, many of us know a little of healing herbs and roots, but none have magic.”

Enat smiled. “I will stay through the celebration of Imbolc, if you like.”

“We would be honored to have you,” said the woman. “I am Rós.”

“I am Enat.” She reached deeper into her basket and retrieved a heavy woolen cloak. “I am weary. I am going to rest in the sun.”

She made of her cloak a pad to sit on and placed it at the base of an oak tree standing on the edge of the village. She sat with her eyes closed, her face tilted to the warmth of the sun, just now moving toward spring where it would soon give life to all. As she sat, her hands rested on the roots of the tree, and she listened. She cast her mind out, probing. Nothing for the moment. All was quiet.
You will come.

Ash huddled in the sett, her knees hugged to her chest as she listened. The day before and through the night, she had heard something, almost a whisper on the wind. She was afraid. It spoke to her as the four-legs did, but it was different. She knew it was a human voice – the first that had ever spoken to her like this. She had never questioned how she could speak to Broc and the others when no other two-leg seemed able to.

All the day long, she had listened. Cautiously, she had crept from the sett and made her way into the forest, taking care to remain hidden. From deep within a thicket of holly, she watched an old woman move through the forest, gathering white snowdrops from where they bloomed in patches, pushing their way up through the forest loam. She watched as the woman cut stout branches from the blackthorn, placing all of her gatherings in a woven basket she wore on her back. Once, the woman straightened and seemed to look straight at the place where Ash was hidden. Ash had remained frozen in place until the old woman wandered off to look for more snowdrops.

Only after she had disappeared from view did Ash crawl from her thicket and return to the sett where Broc was still nursing her cubs.

“Did you not hunt last night?”
Broc got up from the nest. Her cubs cried at the loss of her heat and milk. She came to rest against Ash’s leg.

“No.”

“I heard it.”

Ash laid a hand on her wide back.
“It is an old two-leg female. Do you know what she wants?”

“No. But I think you must go see, little one.”
Broc raised her head.
“She calls for you.”

As darkness fell, Ash left the sett. She made her way to the village by a circuitous route so that she came to it from the far side. From above the village, she watched the humans below as they gathered together around a fire lit in the center of the village. The old woman she had seen earlier lit a torch from the fire and went from dwelling to dwelling, hobbling along with her stick, which Ash found curious, as she had walked quickly and without difficulty through the forest. Using her torch, she lit small fires that had been prepared in front of each, and she passed out bunches of the snowdrops and blackthorn branches she had gathered. One of the men began hitting a stick against a stretched animal skin, and the others began moving, all in rhythm with the beating of the stick.

Ash watched them in fascination. She forgot to watch the old woman and suddenly realized that she was no longer visible down in the village. In alarm, Ash looked about, scanning the outskirts of the dwellings, but the woman was nowhere to be seen. She backed out of her hiding place and stood.

“I know you are here.”

Ash froze at the sound of the woman’s voice in her head.

“I have come to speak with you. Will you not come to me?”

Ash looked around in terror. She could not tell from which direction it came. Silently, she crept through the forest, retracing the same route she had taken. Moving farther away from the village and the continued beating of the stick, she rounded a heavy thicket and nearly stepped on the woman who was sitting with her back against a tree.

The light of the full moon was nearly as bright as daylight to Ash’s eyes, and she could see the woman’s eyes fix her with a gaze that was not unfriendly.

“I mean you no harm,” the woman said aloud.

Ash feigned deafness.

“I am Enat. I know you can hear and speak, though you pretend you cannot. The women in the village told me of the ghost-child, and I knew you were the one I seek.”

Ash looked around for the best escape route.

“I mean you no harm,” Enat repeated. “I have come to find you because you have power. I have felt it.”

Ash turned back to her, but said nothing.

“Who raised you?”

Ash looked at her in puzzlement.

“Who cared for you, when you were younger?”

Ash’s eyes reflected her understanding, but she was not willing to speak aloud to this two-leg.
“My clan. Broc and Cuán
saved me and hunted for me.”

Enat nodded. “I would be honored to meet your clan and speak with them. I will not harm them.”

Ash looked back down toward the village where the sounds of the humans celebrating had grown louder.

“They will not trouble us,” Enat said, as if she could read Ash’s mind. “None will follow.”

She got to her feet, and Ash noticed that here again, she did not lean on her stick and hobble, but strode along swiftly as Ash limped beside her.

Ash called out ahead as she approached the sett.
“Broc? Cuán? I am not alone.”
But she was certain they already knew that.

Enat paused and said, “I will wait here. You may speak to them and bring them to me, if they will so honor me.”