The Binding (19 page)

Again I nod
, accepting my charge for the Binding to Lily and I know that I mean it.

“So be it,” reply the voices as they fade away in a thousand whispers and the E
arth S
pirit herself slowly disappears.

I find myself holding Lily once again. I look around me and I’m able to see beyond ourselves as the darkness recedes. I see in the dimness that we a re on Lily’s bed in her room. The walls waver and the items around her r oom go in and out of focus. We a re sitting in the dark with the only light coming from under the door. Then the walls begin to shake and Lily cramps up next to me in pain. She has her arms wrap ped around her stomach as the in sistent beating grows louder. The oak. She screams again and I look around the room, searching. I scan the corners briefly, and there in the closet stands the dryad. S
he’s young and looks to be around five or six years of age, but I know that her real age is that of the oak.

She stands huddled in the closet, looking at me with large brown eyes. Her hair is of leaves that are dry and crumbled, falling off her like flakes each time she moves her head. Her limbs are not dewy and ample like most dryads her age . Instead, they are dry and dusty , with c racks running along the length of her arms and legs. Her feet should be flowing with new shoots of roots but are instead stumped and misshapen.

“Please,
l ittle s ister,” I beg, “you’re hurting her. She ’s the daughter of Senestra and heir to the Willow throne.
She can’t disconnect from you, please release her.”

Within a blink of an eye, we are once again sitti ng on the ground before the oak .
Lily is passed out in my arms. I look at her face and I can see that she’s sleeping peacefully, easily breathing without any sign of pain. I look up and see Julia still at Lily’s side, holding her. The dryad ha s release d Lily from the tortured soul of the oak.

When Julia catches my eye, she says through her own tears, “Please don’t ever do that again.” I smile and nod, exhausted from the ordeal of the Binding.
I sit and let what I’ve just done sink in .

I know Julia is torn between staying with Lily and being by Tolan’s side. I tell her we are al l right . S
he pauses for only a moment before getting up and running to Tolan, putting his head on her lap. I look over at Phoris and before him is the dryad, speaking softly. I turn behind me to see Mellis standing over us, including Tolan and Julia. Alorn is still standing next to Phoris, covering his back, even though the dryad has shielded us for the time being. I look at the oak tree and it seems to have grown ten times its size since we arrived. Its branches with dry, crumbled leaves extend over us like a dusty canopy.

*

I’m
fourteen again, cowering in the dark and I’m scared. I realize the darkness is the result of my eyes being tightly shut. I slowly open them and I find that I’m standing in Julia’s room on the night before they take me to see Marilyn for the first time. Julia is telling me to sleep in my clothes. She puts on more layers of clothes and tells me to do the same. She tells me that no matter what happens to stay quiet, but she thinks that with me here tonight nothing should happen. Yet, she continues to put on more clothes and tells me to stay quiet.
We are in her bed now, asleep, but something wakes me. I open my eyes to see Julia’s own eyes opened wide and scared.
We are facing each other and I notice for the first time that Julia has my hands in hers, holding on tightly. Then I hear it, footsteps. Someone else is in the room wit h us and I feel my heart beat faster.

“I knew you two were dikes,” sneers Chris with quiet menace. Then the blows come. Chris is beating us through Juli a’s blankets with his fist. He’s only fifteen, but we are young as well, and the punches are hard, fast and full of brutal hatred. I begin to cry as my left arm taking most of the hits shoots pain through me, but Julia puts her hand over my mouth silently telling me to stay quiet. I feel her cover me with her own body taking most of the blows. It seems like the punches go on forever .
T
hen , suddenly , it’s over. We hear him laugh as he quietly walks out of the room and closes the door without a sound.

Julia ha
s buried my head under hers and when she pulls away I see the large welt around her upper cheek swell before my eyes. I see the blood trickle from her nose and the split at her lip and I start to cry even more, but without sound. I look at Julia’s eyes and I see no tears, just defeat. She whispers to me quietly to close my eyes and find a place to hide, to block out the pain, but most of all to block out what her stepbrother has done not just to her face, but to her spirit.

I do as she tells me and in my mind I find shelter, she lter from Julia’s stepbrother.
Shelter f rom everything that has happen ed tonight with Lucas’ disappearance and from the knowledge that I will be alone . I find shelter and begin to shield myself from everything outside of it.
It’s so safe and warm here. It protects me and here there is no pain.

I open my eyes again and find myself standing on a path that divides two worlds.
O
ne side is dark and cold. I immediately recognize the shelter that I built for myself so many years ago.
The other side is light , and in the light stands a lone figure. I can’t make out who it is, but he seems familiar. The path beneath me begins to move, shrinking by the minute and for the first time I notice that beneath the path is a long drop. I see a red and yellow ribbon at the bottom realizing after a moment that it’s a river of fire. Frighten ed , I start to run, but no matter how fast or how far I run, the scenery on both sides never changes and the path continues to shrink . The shelter on one side , and on the other the lone figure.

I slowly come to a stop, winded. I hear voices, hundreds, no thousands of them whispering to me. I can’t make out what they’re saying and I resist them in my head. I look around me desperately and realize I have two choices : S
tep to the one side and find shelter from everything around me, or step to the other side and run to this person for help. I look again, trying to make out who it is and see that it’
s a man. I close my eyes and try to calm down, to think clearly and keep the panic at bay. When I open them again, the man is Tharin. He reaches out to me, but I hesitate . The shelter is so close I can feel it calling me with its promise of a safe and painless existence. Tharin continues to stand and quietly wait s .

What will happen if I choose to go with Tharin? There will no doubt be pain for he loves Kalis.
What does a heartache feel like , I wonder. Will it be worth leaving my shelter, a shelter that has been my haven all these lonely years? I look at Tharin and see him for the first time with clear eyes.
He’s tall and strong, young and arrogant, but with the burdens of a king on his young shoulders. His stare is clear and unwavering, his chest proud and forgiving. He still holds his hand out to me. I stand staring at it . I see the strength within his hand and the promise of safety it offers.
He’s also offering me the opportunity to feel all that I should feel, including the pain of heartache when the time comes. I don’t know what I’ll find walking beside him, but I know the darkness no longer has a grip on me.
No, calls the shelter to me, he loves Kalis. He will only bring you pain and misery. C
ome to me and be safe.
I look into the darkness and see the fourteen-year—
old me standing at its edge. She smiles and waves, then points to Tharin, her young face at peace.

Suddenly, I feel free , and without hesitation, I step into the light and reach for him .
Once I’m in the light, however, the ache starts through my body slowly at first, then moving faster until it beat s at me.
I clutch onto my chest as it feels like someone has punch ed a hole through it.
I call out to Tharin, but my words are sluggish and the pain, so much pain! I feel myself being pulled under and I call once again to Tharin, telling him that I choose him. I choose him even knowing he loves another. Then all goes black.

I’m
curl ed up in a ball of pain in the darkness once again. Somehow, this feels different, more real than the shelter that I built around myself. I feel people holding me as if to keep me anchored , not allowing me to slip away into the darkness again. I hear Tharin talking to someone, but I can’t make out his words. I try to speak , to ask him to make the pain go away, but the pain keeps me from saying anything . Then suddenly …
it’s gone. I open my eyes and a beautiful child is looking down at me. She has golden hair and her large brown eyes are filled with so much love and wonderment I want to cr y. She gently stroke s my cheek, then leans down and kisses it.

When she moves away I hear her whisper, “Sleep , child of Senestra, peace will come to you this night.”

I thank her quietly and let sleep take me.

*

I wake to the sound of someone snoring nearby. The bed I’m in feels unusual, but soft and comfortable. The air is filled with the scent of fresh cut grass and sweet jasmine . I sink lower into the strange softness wanting to lose myself in sleep once again. The snoring grows louder and without coming out of the covers too much, I turn over to face the snoring perpetrator.

Across from me in a similar type of bed is Tolan. Sitting next to him is Julia, but s he’s slumped over him with her head on his chest. Tolan has one arm around her shoulder and his other hand is placed gently on her head.
He’s sound asleep with a content ed smile on his face. Julia, howev er, is in a deep sleep and she’s the one snoring. I knew it had to be her .
I would recognize that snore anywhere.

I smile at the scene and lie for a minute watching them. Somehow , they have found each other. It was rough going at first, but looking at them now , it’s as if they have always been this way.
A s I lay watching , I realize they were meant to meet, they were meant to be here, now, in this place together. In a short time , they were able to find one another, recognize it, fought and resisted it, and then gave into it.

I look at my sleeping friend and I feel so happy for her. With everything that she ha s gone through in her life , she deserves to be happy . She deserves to be with Tolan . I wonder if I’ll find what she now has and my thought s instantly turn to Tharin.

I
don’t remember much of what happened earlier. I think I passed out, but I can’t remember why. I do remember the excruciating pain and there was a child, too. Or was I dreaming?
I was exhausted. It had been a long day with so much happen ing . Remembering Tharin’s meeting, I sit up quickly, looking for him even though I know he wouldn’t be here.

The room is dimly lit with a panswa floating in the farthest part of the room. I t grows a little brighter as I sit up .
I wave my hand at it to stay dim, not wanting to wake Tolan and Julia . T
o my amazement , the panswa returned to its original state. Did it just do what I wanted it to do? I look at it curiously as if it would respond and say “
Y
es , you did .
”

I look about me and find that we’re in a circular room.
Our beds look like hammocks made from tree branch es that gently sway when we move. Just when I’m about to remove the covers, I stop and bring the strange blanket up to my face for a closer inspection. The panswa once again brightens . A gain I wave at it and it does as I wish. I exam ine the cover closely and find that it’s made of grass .
The thickest and softest grass I’ve ever felt , and woven into it are sweet jasmines .
I try to pull a section of it away to see how it’s sewn together, but there’s no seam. I scoot around me to take a look at the bed I’m resting on and realize it’s an actual oak branch, full of leaves .
No matter how much I move, the leaves remain in place. Yet, when I pick up one of the leaves, it pulls away easily. When I lay it back down, it melts back with the rest of leaves as if it had never been disturbed . I follow the branch to the wall, trying to see how it’s built so that it sways with my movements.
I’m on my knees trying to exam ine where the branch connects to the wall and realize it’s growing right out of the wall .
The branch, I mean the bed, which is the branch ―
is a living part of the tree!

I put both hands on the wall trying to feel it against my palms . I t feels like smooth lacquered wood , but it’s all natural. I place my nose to the wall and breathe in the woodsy scent.

I pull back and find tha t I can see the fine grains . I’m startle d to find that the panswa is floating next to my face. Instead of it growing brighter, it just moved closer to help me see, leaving the rest of the room dimly lit. I reach out for it expecting it to be hot , only to find that the round light sphere is cool to the touch. I gently take hold of it .
I t pulsates against my hands , oddly comforting . Then I remember what Tharin told me. The panswa is a living plant and the elves have found a way to weave its energy to produce light. In remembering my short lesson with T
harin, the panswa grows brighter as if happy that I’m able to make the connection. I quickly put my finger to my lips and it dims back down.