Healer (4 page)

An ear flick confirmed
the faintest rustle somewhere along the back wall. Outside, he could hear
Blackavar and Eclipse conversing about semi-precious items. Although he needed
to be with them, something else drew his attention to the last stall. As he
peered over inside, a figure shrank back in the corner.

“Can we start bringing
things in?” he heard from behind.

“You know, why don’t
we leave them at the door for now?” The prince rejoined his companions and
pointed to the men lifting out bundles of dishes and clothing. “Let’s just do
the main building first, then deal with merchant wares later.”

“Need some help?” the
voice of Alexander floated from the roadside. Glory was already ten steps ahead
of him as she entered the gates. She approached her fiancé with quick strides,
her long dress swishing around her ankles.

“Did it come?” she
asked eagerly, and nearly grabbed it from his hand when he pulled out the
letter.

“There’s that,” he
said. “Then there’s this.” He gestured to what the men had brought, then
pointed inside the stable and lowered his voice. “I’ve a little issue to deal
with first.”

“Trouble?”
Alexander paused by Glory’s side.

“Nothing a Healer
can’t
handle,” Wisdom said. “You know the layout of the clan’s interior?”

“Pretty much,”
Alexander said. “From the cleanup we did, I should be good.”

The prince nodded and
turned to Glory. “You want to show these men where to put some of the things
inside?”

Glory lifted an
eyebrow as she glanced over the lot. “You’re letting
me
decide?”

Wisdom grinned. “I’ve
requested some…accommodations a young lady would require.”

He had never seen
anyone glow with as much pride as she did. He relished the moment a bit longer
before quickly introducing the Master Thief to his future fiancée and Western
Clan leader.

“Eclipse, would you
mind taking the things I need inside while I tend to something out here?
Anything you’re unsure
of,
just put in my bedroom.
Glory, you and Alex start putting your things where you like. I’ll be in soon
as I’m finished.”

“Something wrong
with..?” Alexander inclined his head toward the stable.

 
“Temporary delay,” the prince said. “Get
Eclipse to signal if you need me.” He tapped the side of his head.

Satisfied, everyone
began hauling up belongings while Wisdom checked the stable again.

“Hello? You hurt?”
When there came no answer, he peered over into the corner stall.

A boy, huddled against
the wall, drew his knees up against his chest. The smell of blood drifted from
a gash he tried to cover. But upon drawing his knees up tighter, the place on
his leg became more apparent. Strands of dirty-blond hair fell over portions of
his face. Most of it looked clumped together in a damp mesh of straw and dirt
sticking out in various places. His clothing was stained, but contained no
signs of other injuries.

Wisdom slowly opened
the stall door to approach the youth. Ears lay back in a sign of submission as
he knelt to make eye contact.

“Are you all right?”
When he received no answer, he tried again. “It’s okay. You don’t need to be
afraid of me.”

“I didn’t take it!” was
the quick response. “I saw it in the window, but I didn’t take it!”

“You saw
what
in the window?”

“It was homemade, too.
Just like my mother used to make. But I swear it wasn’t me!”

Wisdom thought back to
Josephine’s comment about his missing pie. When he called upon his
sight-reading ability, the boy’s thoughts revealed a blurred version of a
blond-haired boy swiping a dish from an opened window in town.

Peter Schevolsky,
will you ever learn?
Wisdom cracked a
smile.
“You thought I was after you for a pie? Where’d you get that cut
from? Here, let me see.”

“I’m not afraid,” the
boy said, but his voice lacked a persuasive tone. “I’m just….”

“Hiding from someone?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

While the boy slightly
relaxed, the prince checked the wound. It was not deep.
 

“What’s your name?”

“Ashpin Agecroft.”

The prince nodded.
“I’m Wisdom, Prince here at the Eastern Clan. I think I know who you saw in
town.” His sight-reading picked up another image. From it, he saw Peter try to
fight. “He did this to you, didn’t he?”

“All
over a piece of a pie.”
The boy
grinned. “My mother taught me manners, though. I don’t start fights. I finish
them. Would have won too if those others hadn’t been nearby.”

Wisdom laughed at the
scene in the boy’s mind where Peter was knocked to the ground from a fist
swing. When he called to his brothers for help, the fight ended with Ashpin
fleeing.

He held a hand over
the cut. “Trust me when I say you’re safe here. Just hold still a moment.”

He could feel earth
stirring beneath the floorboards as he extended his free hand toward the
opening of the stable to draw Nature’s energy. Just as he had done to open the
new road for Alexander’s clan, so too was the same process to heal. Energy
poured from his hand in a faint green glow to close the wound. When the prince
removed his hand, not even a scar remained.

He could hear Glory
and a few others returning to gather more goods. It was Glory’s voice who
mentioned the dead grass outside, though Wisdom knew why. As he healed, Nature
had surrendered her own growth to his call. The price of life for one resulted
in the death of another. In that way, there was always a balance.

Ashpin stared at the
place where the gash had once been, then lifted his gaze to the prince. There
was thankfulness in those green eyes. But something else was there, something a
mere boy would not normally know.

“You’ve come back.”

In the moment the
words left the boy’s lips, the prince knew there was no need to explain his
healing abilities. And yet explanations were needed for his kind’s absence in
the human realms. There came a vision of his dying mother, and questioning echo
as the boy kept thinking,
Why
weren’t you
there for her?

*****

Shy let the wind
currents carry his hawk form. He circled higher, cutting through spurts of clouds
until he coud view the entire layout of Trully. Farmland spread from the north
to where the start of woods surrounded town. Everything south of that was
occupied by the clans.

How pathetic they
look! A coming war between our kinds would just wipe everyone out. Lexington
would have a far better chance than this!

At the thought of
Lexington, a distant rumble of thunder turned his gaze north. The bordering
Realm of Sapphire was but a day’s journey. Yet the sound he heard was a
constant warning to what lay within the deepening rolls of cloud coverage
spanning that realm. Both he and his brother had witnessed the power behind its
creation. Both knew such a force should not be in existence. Now, as he
descended in a lazy circle, he wondered if the storm could somehow play a part
by distracting his kind in a likely attack.

Surely, Chronicles
would sense the chaotic power coming from it. There’s no way to avoid it. Even
humans are affected by its presence.

The chances of reasoning
with his father were slim. He knew how self-centered his kind could be under
their current leader, and recalled some of his training. The majority had
prepared to invade human realms. Now
he
was here. Invading was the
furthest thing from his mind. Instead, he tried to focus on the type of people
his brother presided over.

Farmers…
Shy let out a sigh that ended in a hawkish whistle.
But what of the rest?
He scoped out the three
clans directly behind Wisdom’s location.

The Western Clan was a
large structure that backed up to a wooded area. It would have remained hidden
had his brother not opened the road for travel. Although Shy had not seen the
inside of the place, his brother’s thoughts had once confirmed a weapons room –
or at least contained enough weapons to display around the room.

Shy skimmed the trees
until he reached the Mystic Clan. No better than farmers, Mystic homes were
mere stone huts. A large tent toward the back of the yard signaled its leader’s
location. There were no other buildings he could make out through the
surrounding trees, although he had caught wind of a possible building project
in the near future. A few inhabitants wandered throughout the yard, but were of
no interest other than overhearing conversations.

The hawk moved on to
the last clan.

There’s
not even enough people here to stand up against one
of my kind! What are they going to do when an entire race arrives?

Frustrated, Shy
searched for the remaining clan of Simpletons. He doubted they would be any different
as he spotted a clearing nestled within a grove of pine and oak trees. A short
dive landed him at its edge, where vines of crimped leaves spiraled up a few
trunks. Here and there the forest floor rose in a collection of roots and
moss-covered mounds of soil taller than humans. Knee-high grass rustled from
scurrying animals. All around, birds called to one another in the traditional
manner of territorial songs. Where sunlight scattered along the ground, crimson
clover sprang in clusters of contrasting red and green.

This can’t be it;
there’s no one here.
Yet when he
lifted back into flight and hovered overhead, there were no other indications
of another clan.

The Healer landed
amidst a few clusters of crimson clover sprouting along a trodden path. After
returning to his true form, he began following the path to see where it led.
The moss-covered mounds were intriguing, as there were quite many situated
within the clearing. Certainly, the path was being used, but by who?

“Need something?”

The startling voice of
another caught Shy off guard. He whipped around, a throaty growl warning the
intruder not to venture any closer. Ears flattened as he looked the stranger
over. It unnerved him that the other person stood so close, as though he had
emerged from the two mounds of mossy covered bramble Shy stood between.

A piercing gaze of
forest green swept over the Healer. Tarnished red hair spastically stuck up in
odd directions with the ends fading in a warm honey color. His skin also took
on a mottled look with dark patches of pigment around the cheek and neck. Where
his long shirt sleeves did not cover, the same could be seen along the hands.

Shy flicked an ear
forward. He had seen this person during his brother’s demonstration and
recalled the name of the Simpleton leader.

“Master Mididus?” and
the man nodded. Shy glanced around the clearing, searching for others. Finding
none, he fixed his gaze back upon the lone figure and crossed his arms. “You
know, I am a being of supreme power. I could have killed you for creeping out
like that!”

“We are well aware of
your abilities,” the Simpleton spoke in a slow, calculated response, as though
he was testing each word before it was allowed to pass his lips.

“We?”
Shy glanced around the area and spread his arms for
emphasis. “Who’s ‘we?’”

He blinked. Ears
twitched to tune in sounds of movement as he turned about.

The man was gone.

“What the…?” Opening
his mind to sight-read, Shy sought to pin-point the leader’s location. What he
heard instead was not one, but multiple transactions of thought processing
around him. The clearing seemed full of people he could not see, with the
thoughts getting louder by the minute.

With hands over his
ears, Shy thrust up a mental barrier to block all communication. It had little
effect, though, as echoes of thought still lingered. The rapid patterns of
quick talk left the Healer in a daze. Feeling light-headed, he reached out to
support a possible collapse.
 

A hand quickly grasped
his shoulders and guided him to a sitting position next to one of the mounds.
Shaking his head to clear it, Shy tried to register what his body sensed.

It took Master
Wisdom by surprise as
well,
the Simpleton’s thoughts came to him.

Shy instantly
recoiled.
“How did you get in my head?!
I’m second
under my father’s mental strength! No one can penetrate my thoughts!”

This is our way of
speaking,
the thought came again, and
he recognized it as Mididus.
Let me show you how.

As though a curtain
had been lifted from the area, Shy could
see
the clan. What he presumed
as mounds of moss and bramble, were actually the structures of various homes
jutting from the earth. Even people were present. They carried on as though
nothing was out of place, and walked the paths Shy had done to reach their
present destinations.