It was impossible to guess what time it was as they trudged through the Falefal the next day. If more than the bravest rays of light could penetrate the canopy, Healer would at least be able to get some sense of the passage of time, but few sunbeams dared to challenge the haunted forest.
The go’thial strained his senses. He didn’t like being so dependent on the nu-sadis ranger and Yesha coiled around his shoulder. Even though he eschewed the warrior ways of his people, it was practically baked into his bones to protect and provide for his tribe, a purpose virtually written into the soul of every demigiant. And these three women, the shapeshifter and two zephyrni, they were the closest he’d had to a tribe since Estoria called out to him.
“Estoria!?” he could still hear his father rage. “A human goddess!? Of harvest and healing!? Be gone! You’re no son of mine, Healer, Pastor of Estoria!”
Father, he mentally sighed. If only you knew the path she’s guided me on.
He could still remember the looks of disgust his tribe wore as they turned their backs to him. Shunned. Banished. The pain on his mother’s face.
Thaygon. Heir of Chief Runebreaker. Destined to one day lead the Gatinakumo Clan. A disgrace.
“You alright there, old man? Don’t reckon I’ve ever seen a go’thial look so sullen,” said Vadanian.
“Aye.” Healer cleared his throat. “More than a might hard to see. Letting my mind wander on back home.”
The forest elf nodded knowingly. “Well we’re in the right place for that.” He motioned to their surroundings. “Us rangers that know these parts, we call this the Grove of Regrets. Dredges up the worst memories. The sort your heart buries and salts the earth over.”
“So,” Echo muttered, “that’s why I can’t stop thinking about the day I heard father calling me a failure.”
“Most likely,” Vadanian affirmed.
“For me, it’s the day I was banished by my tribe,” said Healer. “I was meant to follow in the path of the warrior. When I was to choose my name and become a man in my tribe, Estoria had other notions.”
“My father had hired an elven mage to instruct me in the arcane arts,” Echo explained. “Had him flown in from the mainland on a golden roc. I thought it a wonderful gift. Turned out it was because I hadn’t any natural magic as the other girls of the court did. I’d been doing well in my studies and went to show him Orbish. Overheard him lamenting to the bloody butler what a failure I was. Only good for marrying off.”
Healer laid a great hand on her shoulders, patting them lightly. “Suppose the two of us should have ourselves a toast when we get back to Sitri, eh?”
She scoffed amusedly. “To us failures.”
“Aye.” A deep laugh rumbled in his belly. “Just a pair of failures against the world.”
“Ms. Knight lady?” Rosalie called gently from Healer’s shoulder. “Is everything alright?”
Sighing, Mira shook her head. “Let’s keep moving,” she barely breathed.
The knight adjusted her sword belt, and pushed past them, forcing Vadanian to lead on.
For the brief time Healer had known them, he’d never thought to pry into their pasts. What was, was, and what was buried should stay there. In all his years, he’d never met a single soul without at least one skeleton in their closet, and he’d found leaving them there to be for the best.
After all, if Lady Estoria guided them together, it wasn’t for him to dredge things up.
But as they pressed on through the Grove of Regrets, the weight Mira carried became palpable. As if with every step she took, she shrunk a little more. Crushed beneath the burdens she bore.
Rosalie’s scales bristled against his skin. Even though he couldn’t see her, he could tell the Yesha hadn’t taken her eyes off the zephyra.
“Gotta say,” Vadanian said to break the silence. “You two’re taking it better than most.”
“Lived with it long enough,” came Echo’s reply.
She’d not as much as loosened her grip on Mira’s hand since they stepped from the magical cabin. Not that Healer could blame her. After that thing decided to take her form, the duchess had been shaken to her core. After all, it wasn’t often someone saw what they’d look like with an arrow piercing their heart.
“I’m afraid I was born without sorcery,” she continued. “Natural magic, that is. Rather rare for the nobles of Clearwater Cove. There were more than a few rumors of mother being unfaithful as a result, but my plumage is decidedly Zeerie so those were squashed as soon as my primaries came in. Doesn’t stop the occasional whisper from cropping up from time to time, naturally.
“Regardless,” she shrugged, “father hadn’t seemed to take issue with my disability. He hired a tutor to train me in wizardry, and I was doing quite well at that, if I say so myself. Then I overheard his lamentations to the butler.” She scoffed. “The bloody butler. Our relationship never repaired.”
“What a load of bollocks,” Healer grunted.
“Oh, I agree, pastor. I threw myself fully into my studies, and while I concede that sorcerers present far more raw power, it’s undisciplined and limited. As a wizard, however, my only limitations are what I can learn, and I find my curiosity is as insatiable as my thirst for knowledge.”
“Good on you, lass,” said Vadanian. “In all my years, I’ve never understood this idea of limiting ourselves to what we’re born with. Imagine if that’s how it was with everything. The whole world’d be run by dullards and brutes.”
Rosalie laughed. “I’ve seen such bully run societies in the swamp. We call them goblins.”
“Aye, that they are,” Healer agreed. “I reckon that’s what’s wrong with most go’thial tribes, too. Everyone’s so concerned with being the biggest, strongest bruiser they can be. Then they turn around and whine when a wee gnome goes and outsmarts ‘em.”
“Or being dull enough to banish a lad for being called by a literal goddess, eh mate?” said Vadanian.
Healer gave a grunt of a laugh. “If father knew the dangers my Lady has guided me to, he’d know that the hand that heals fights the hardest battles.”
“To say nothing of smashing curses and demons,” Echo added.
“That as well.” He nodded. “Sometimes the mace is needed so that the healing can begin.”
“What’ve you, my knight?” Echo gently probed. “What nonsense weighs on—”
“I don’t want to talk about it!” Mira snapped.
A single sound. The birth and death of a word in the span of a fraction of a second formed in Echo’s mouth. Steel ringing from a scabbard cut its life short. Blue lit up the grove. Icy wind screamed from Frost Fang as Mira drew and struck at the darkness in one motion.
There was a dull grunt from where the magical blade vanished in its purchase. Tugging it back, a thud hit the earth. A creature, another of those things that masqueraded as friends rapidly rotted at her feet. Its face only halfway turned into the knight’s.
“Stay alert,” Mira growled as she sheathed the sword.
“Good on you, bird knight,” Vadanian said approvingly. “That one nearly got the drop on us.”
“Pure luck,” she admitted.
She’s hurting bad, Healer assessed. Holy Mother, he silently prayed. Estoria, give her peace. Show me, your servant, what to do to grant her respite.
“Water!” a deep voice bellowed. “Fetch water!”
The go’thial’s features pinched as he turned in search of the source.
“Leave it! Run!” another screamed.
“Here comes another one!” yet another cried.
“Hold on!” a familiar voice joined them.
Healer wheeled in place. Turning this way and that, he strained against the darkness blanketing the grove.
“Something the matter, old man?” said Vadanian.
“Aye, I’d say so,” Healer grunted. “I hear voices. Familiar.”
“Another mourn pitcher?” Rosalie ventured.
Vadanian sniffed the air. “Don’t smell none. Upwind of the swamp anyway. What’re they saying, lad?”
“Incoming!” the woman’s voice shrieked.
A massive impact shook his senses, though the world itself didn’t respond. Still, he couldn’t help but brace against the illusory sound.
“Hurry! Everyone! It’s blown!”
“I don’t… I don’t know!” Healer growled back to the elf. “They’re panicked. Something about something exploding or some such.”
“Father!” the familiar voice roared. “Where’s the chief!”
“Warden!” Healer gasped. “That was my brother’s voice! He’s searching for father!”
“Steady on,” came Vadanian’s voice. “I’ve seen this before. It’s not real, lad. Not for you anyway.”
“What do you mean, not for me?”
“The grove,” the forest elf began darkly. “Sometimes it doesn’t show you what you regret. Sometimes it shows what’s happening to what you miss.”
“You’re telling me—”
“Move! The lava’s flowing!”
Healer paled. “The Narrons… They’re erupting!?”
“Healer!” Echo gasped as she leapt from Mira’s arm to the priest. “It’s not real! Do you hear me, pastor? It’s just the forest!”
“Wish that was true, m’lady,” said Vadanian. “But that ain’t always the case.”
The darkness of the grove parted. He was still in the forest, he knew that, but he could see it clear as day.
Fearsome orange lit his world. Go’thial scrambled, leaving everything behind as they fled the pyroclastic flow where magma breached the surface. Steam vents hissed as they sprayed choking toxins at the retreating demigiants. Superheated rock and raw, molten ore rained down on them.
And all he could do was watch in horror as smoke and fire consumed half his tribe.
“You mean,” Healer barely muttered, “this might actually be happening? That it’s not just a trick of the forest like that plant or them things?”
The elf’s eyes drifted. “I’m afraid so.”
An icy sensation washed over the go’thial. Colder than anything he’d ever felt before. As if he’d climbed to the summit of Mount Ertos, a mile above the clouds in the dead of winter in naught but his breeches.
“You can’t let it break you,” Vadanian insisted. “That’s what it wants. You’ve gotta push on or else here’s where you’ll join the others in the Falefal’s roots.”
“This might be happening,” Healer repeated. He drew a great, growling breath. “But it’s just as equal a chance it’s not.” Straightening himself to his full height, he raised his head, rejecting what visions played before him. “We are leagues from the Narrons. Even if we weren’t in this damned forest, I would arrive in the aftermath were I to leave now.”
Turning to Vadanian, he nodded. “We press on. We find the tower. By the time we return to Sitri, the truth will have arrived. Either there’s been an eruption or there’s not.”
“Good man,” said Vadanian. “That’s using that boulder on your shoulders.”
They pressed through the gloaming grove. Fire and smoke drifted in and out of his mind’s eye. Screams and swift silences pierced his mental ears. The forest made its offer. Stop. Turn. Go to them.
He would not.
There was no them to go to. Not that he could save anyway. Assuming the Falefal showed truth in the first place. That was the worst part, though. Not knowing if the forest lied or not. All he could do was press on.
Once they were safely back in Sitri, he would know the truth. Word traveled swiftly along trade routes, and the eruption of the greatest mountain range on the continent would hardly be a passing whisper. Still…
Estoria, Healer silently prayed. Holy Mother, if this accursed forest speaks truth, be with them. Protect them, as the fields from which I grew. Let your golden sickle cut safe paths for them. Thresh away the chaff that would keep them in danger. And if any of them should fall, let their end be swift and painless.
He shook. He couldn’t not. The sickness of not knowing was worse than the mourning that might follow. But in those unspoken words, even in that cursed place, he felt the calloused hand of the harvest goddess.
She heard. She always would.
It was the smallest solace, but the greatest at the same time. Even in that accursed place, she was with him.
Still, as they gathered around, safely away from the Grove of Regrets that evening while Echo prepared to conjure the magical cabin, he couldn’t shake the worry. The dread. That sinking feeling that Warden now led their people. Assuming any of them remained.
“We made up most of the time we lost to that bloody mourn pitcher,” Vadanian assessed as he pulled off his boots to rest his feet by a fire Rosalie had lit to boil water. “Should reach your man’s tower before dinner tomorrow.”
But Healer’s attention remained on the war within his mind.
Could be happening don’t mean is, he assured himself.
“Mr. Priest sir?” He looked down to find Rosalie stretching up on tiptoe, offering him a steaming cup of tea. “For your nerves.”
The Yesha sized cup would hardly register as a drop to the demigiant, but yet he took it with the best smile he could manage.
“There,” said Echo as she finished her spells. “We’d best get inside before it gets much darker—”
“Excuse me?” came the high, lilting voice of a woman.
Even Vadanian started. None of them heard the approach of the golden-haired nu-eston, sun elf, nor her three companions.
She wasn’t much taller than the wood elf. Dressed entirely in hunter-green, her pale eyes shone with the touch of magic. A wizard, no doubt, from the book she held close to her chest.
On her right side, a man dressed in the clerical garb of Korik stood at her elbow. The human was in his advancing years. White had completely filled his tonsured head, and his gray eyes were filled with age.
To the left, a half-elf—a nu-sadis on her elven side based on her red hair and green eyes—kept wary distance. Hers was the bearing of a warrior maiden. Adorned in heavy scale armor, a thick shield was strapped to her back, and at her hip sat ready a longsword.
A few steps behind them stood the tallest of the four. The broad-shouldered figure was completely encased in plate armor. Visor drawn, there was little Healer could make out. He couldn’t even tell if he was looking at a man or a woman. All he knew for certain was that they were a holy warrior, a paladin of Maldroon, the God of Justice, based on the holy scales emblazed on their breastplate, and that they weren’t human. Humans, after all, didn’t come to the demigiant’s collarbone.
“You’ll have to forgive Ilana,” the half-elf said. “She’s always on that way. Don’t never make sure she’s seen before speaking. Always givin’ folks a terrible fright.”
Jamming his feet back into his boots, Vadanian groaned as he rose to meet them. “Might deep into the wood to not have a guide, mates.”
The half-elf’s eyes narrowed as she cast the human priest a sideways look. “That’s what I said.”
“We were just wondering if we could warm ourselves by your fire,” said the elf. “Share camp and watch with you, perhaps?” Glancing to Echo’s magical hut, she sighed. “I see you’ve no need for extra eyes, though.”
“I’m sure we can make room for you in the cabin!” said Rosalie.
“Oh.” A weak smile flitted across Ilana’s face. “That’s quite alright, dear. If we could just sit by your fire, we wouldn’t want to intrude.”
“Don’t be silly!” Rosalie chirped. “It’s dangerous out here! All sorts of nasty things we’ve run into. It’d gut me knowing you’re out here on your own.”
“No.” Ilana smiled mournfully. “No, we’ll be fine.”
“Ms. Noble Lady,” Rosalie said as she turned to Echo. “Please make them see reason. It won’t be any trouble, will it?”
Before Echo could speak, Vadanian hastily stepped between the Yesha and the strangers.
“More than you know,” he said. “I don’t reckon they can.”
The shapeshifter’s brow furrowed. “Why not?”
“Cause ghosts can’t leave where they died, mate.”
Raising a finger to them, Healer’s eyes went wide. They’d looked so normal before. They stood on the bare earth. Their voices carried on the air same as his. He could make out faces and armor, emblems and equipment. But now that it had been pointed out, he could see. Not just them, but the trees behind them.
Right through their translucent forms…
