Ancient Watchtowers Ch.02

She smiled, "I do not know the reason for any of it, but I like that they keep the place up. The few who come are easily avoided."

She turned to Bolga, "We could claim it and Chicha would have a place to grow and play."

Bolga nodded carefully, looking up from her little one, though it appeared that she was still on the fence, even while thinking about it.

"I will go with you sister," Loriel said using the word as Naïsa said it with a nod, "I will come."

"I as well," Bolga announced to the surprise of the others - especially Naïsa.

"Why, if the Drow make you tremble from so far away?" she asked, and Bolga looked a little uncomfortable for a moment.

She looked down, "Not long I have been here, but what I have seen of this place - I must either leave this cave - or go with you to leave this land.

The land around here does not suit me much, too open and yet the shorter things are weeds, only weeds. The forest is thin and barely grown and it does not speak to me because it fights itself to live, tree against tree.

The dirt is dry because it is sand. I come from dark forest earth, alive if you smell it, not sand. I cannot get used to sand. Where there is forest here, I thought it looked good, but ..."

She held up her hand as though there was something in it, "Only needles, dry needles, nothing else, and not much good smell. I hunt for us and must eat what I kill. Things here taste bad, what I can catch, or they fight too hard for how small they are. Everything fights everything.

Also ... also, I think there are no others like us here, and it says to me that this is a bad place if no one lives here. I seek a better place for us, not a worse one."

She looked up, "I do not need for you to say that you would protect us, Chicha and me, but I know that you would anyway if there was need. Loriel said you are fell bow elf. I don't know this - but I see that you can fight. I feel that."

She looked from Naïsa to Loriel and back, "I would protect you as I can. I can fight and have magic. I have trust in Loriel and I have trust in you enough to put us in your hands."

She nodded, "I fear the Ilythiirin. I have seen what they can do. But you live still, and if you are right, there are not so many there.

I came with only my Chicha, and it was a hard way to go, hiding like mice from fear. I am not helpless myself and I think that between three such as we are, we can fare better. You care for my Chicha, so I think that you would care for her mother also.

And we like you both. I am a huldra. I made my way with lies and tricks to live by cheating people's lives from them. But Loriel - she is a good judge."

She rolled her eyes, "Took me weeks of living honestly to make her trust me. I thought I would die first. But she trusts you, so it is enough for me."

She looked down again, sounding as though she was speaking to herself as she nodded, "That is why I would go with you."

Her face came up then, looking uncertain, "If you would have us with you."

Her eyes widened because Naïsa was bowing to her, "Any mother with a young one speaks to me even if she says nothing. You are Chicha's mother, so you need say nothing - but I wish to hear anything from you. Now I wish to travel with you as well."

Nila looked down but said nothing to any of it.

She knew then that she'd driven the elf off, likely saving her from a lonely life like her own.

She knew that she'd ruined a little of her own chance of greater happiness as well, because she now knew that Bolga would leave with them.

When they asked, Nila declined, telling them that she preferred to remain there with her male.

"This comes at a good time for us all, though in different ways.

From what I know of the cats a little like mine where I am from, my boys will need to mate one day soon as they grow and I am the only female - once you have gone. Before that happens, their father will either drive them off or kill them. And if he fails at it, then they might join together and kill him in time. I will allow none of it.

It will break my heart, but you must take my sons with you when you go." She looked down for a moment and the others could see the pain in her.

A single sob managed to escape her and then she had it in hand once more. She looked up slowly as she wiped her tears, "I can only ask.

Please finish raising my sons for me."

The elves looked at each other and Loriel knelt down, "But Nila, ... They get bigger and so much stronger every day. I think that I can guide them if they would listen to me as they do to you, but ... I cannot manage two. They fight together. It is play but if they grow only a little more, I will not be able to pull them apart and ..."

"I will take one, if it makes the task easier," Naïsa said, "I will take the bigger one, ... what is he called?"

"Weda," Nila said, "And I have no way to show my thanks for it."

"Then I will have Deheya and try to raise him as you would," Loriel said.

"The Great Spirit bless you," Nila nodded, willing herself not to burst into tears, "Let them come to know your scents and they will seek for you.

The fighting is natural for them and you must know this. Try to get them to learn not to before they grow much larger or one will kill the other in too small a place if Deheya cannot leave to go his way."

It ended the discussion after a time and one by one, they turned in.

But Nila didn't sleep.

She held her sons and watched the elves.

Over the course of that long, strange day when they'd met, months before, Loriel had begun to feel some attraction to Nila. She wrote it off later as her neediness coupled with the fact that here, all that she knew was largely useless and she needed to learn from the lovely, dark-haired woman.

Looking back on it now, she felt quite foolish for the way that Nila had stopped her attentions and spurned her ever since. Loriel thought that she could understand it to a degree, but she felt a little put-out afterwards that she wasn't given the choice.

It had just been removed from her completely by Nila.

That first evening, before Bolga had shown up, Loriel would have bedded down with or at least near to Nila.

But after what had happened, she said nothing of what she'd hoped for and she just made her bed in another small chamber which dead-ended and had only the single opening to get inside through. She kept it neat and cleaned it often - almost every day - because it was no sewer and she never wanted to live like that again.

With a little thought over some time, Loriel came to admit to herself that she'd been too quick that first night. She saw herself back then as just a little less-mature and self-reliant and it might have influenced her actions.

Teaching Loriel to be self-reliant was the only thing that she felt that she owed Nila for now.

When she saw Naïsa looking around for a place to bed down for the night, Loriel stepped over and asked in a slightly whispered tone - in the words of the Wood Elf dialect whether the blonde really meant what had been said by calling her elf-sister. She only hoped that the wanderer would know enough to understand her.

Naïsa looked a little surprised for a moment and then she smiled that amazing smile of hers and nodded very earnestly, answering in the same tongue.

"Happy I am to have found you," she grinned, "and yes, Loriel. I meant what I said.

Why? Do you not see us that way?"

She put her hands on Loriel's shoulders to look into her green eyes, "I see wonders here. The large one who is happy with everyone, the little huldra babe, sweeter than any that I have ever seen. And her mother, Bolga. I feel how she wants better for her little family and how she seeks for love - though she does not say it.

The human - who really is not one such any longer - she causes me much wonder and it is good to see what I do in her."

She tightened her light grip a little then, "But Loriel, to meet a she-elf on the same day - and such a lovely one ... I only wonder at my great fortune.

Yes, we are elf-sisters. Of course we are that. I seek to know you and well, wanting to see the light of your eyes there like the sunniest meadow, the deepest yet sun-bathed woodland.

In truth, I am over-hopeful, maybe."

She paused for a moment and then she grinned softly, "But I think not.

My heart sang when you said that you would come with me. To one like I am, who has wandered so long alone - well..."

She smiled, "It is no little thing, not to me."

Loriel nodded, returning the hopeful smile and led Naïsa to her chamber, "Then we sleep here. This is my little room and now it is yours also ... sister."

They made up their beds next to each other and since elves do not need much sleep at all, they spent most of the night whispering together.

"Forgive me," Loriel began, "but is there something to being what you are?"

Naïsa didn't understand the question and said so. So Loriel looked uncomfortable for a moment and tried again.

"Is there some old law which you need to uphold as you travel?"

Naïsa shook her head, a little relieved that the question wasn't what she'd thought that she'd heard, "No. That law is gone, Loriel. Ever the choice is mine what to do in anything. I do not even act oftentimes, unless I see unfairness which bothers me.

To see a small huldra near to paying with her life for only being a young babe and to dogs who spawn much quicker than huldras ever can, the choice was one that I took up and made my own. I no sooner saw the way of it than my bow was in my hand.

I defend mostly - and that is if I even act at all.

I attack very seldom and I must be roused then."

"Like when a pack of dogs wants to eat someone like Chicha?" Loriel asked, to show that she understood.

Naïsa nodded, but it came with a shrug, "If they were going to attack a gull, or ... if I saw that it was more of a fair thing, I would have walked on.

Some things need protection without thought," she said a little seriously, "Like a Wood Elf who seeks to learn and might make a misstep as she does."

Loriel's eyes opened wide in surprise, "But - but I haven't even worked up my courage to ask you, Naïsa!"

"Nevertheless," the archer said without smiling as she reached over and moved a little nearer, "I know that it comes - because I think that it must.

From your words tonight, you are one who has never known what her birthright would have brought to her - what it should have given her - and yet she is one who would seek it regardless.

It was taken from her long ere she was born, this beauty whom I now count as an elf-sister, for we are few and to withhold what she seeks would be a crime to my eyes.

You have learned things in order to live - as must we all, sister. But in your heart, you seek the life that none of your kind have known for so long. I know it because I see it in you.

You knew nothing of how to live away from where you were. yet you no sooner found yourself here than you sought to learn from your friend. Having learned all that you could, you would seek to learn from me the rest."

She smiled down into Loriel's eyes, "Sister, I will teach you all that I can for only that - to see the want in you fulfilled."

They were silent for a time, and then Naïsa asked about the way that Loriel dressed.

Loriel explained about what had happened to her clothing.

"I can make things for myself now," she nodded, "Things that work and look not bad as clothing. Mostly, what I make allows for quick movement. I don't really have any need to look like a fine lady elf. I need things that will hold up and protect my skin and keep me dry underneath in a rain storm and a little warm for when winter comes."

Naïsa said that she liked what she'd seen of the clothing, adding that the functionality was obvious, and yet, that Loriel had managed to craft things which were attractive in their own way.

"You are still very much this rogue sort that you spoke of to me," she smiled, "I see a little challenge always in the glint of your eyes and the small set in the way that you hold your mouth."

She chuckled, "And I can never truly say whether what I see is a little taunt, or only an elf-girl, hanging just on the edge of soft laughter. This has confounded me all the afternoon and evening, sister.

And yet - it suits. Far from the forest were you born, but you yet have in you to look of the Wood Elves of old.

But I wished to ask of the other things that you wear - that leather thing."

Loriel had to grin at that, "It was the center of what I was," she smiled, "wearing that under my clothes left me many pockets and places to hang things - like a few ells of rope that I might need, or more blades of different sorts and my set of lockpicks.

Where I was, to be caught with them in sight was worth hanging just for that, so I had a flat little pouch that I kept on the harness with a snap.

But what I always wanted was a little crossbow. I could never find one for sale, other than the big ones and a small hunting crossbow was too big and crude.

I used to have a shortbow."

She looked over at Naïsa and shrugged, "Well I AM an elf after all, right?

But it was too big to carry around most nights and the damp hole where I lived attacked the wood and made it full of rot, once the shitworms got at it. I still cried when I threw it away, because my father made it for me when I was growing up - before they hung him for cutting purses in the square.

My mother left when I was just little. She used to hunt for nobles and from what my father said, she found one for her to take care of her if she'd be his wife on the side. I guess he might have been hurt by it, but he never let on to me.

Most of what I know, I learned from him. He was hard, and inside, I knew that he was lonely, but he never forgot that he had a daughter, and I never gave a rat's ass that I didn't have a mother at all."

She looked up then ... "But I was talking about crossbows.

I knew that I could never afford to buy one like that, and I couldn't make one - but if I knew where there was one, I'd have stolen it faster than Chicha can get into an egg.

I heard that the Drow that you were talking about - I heard that they make them, just little one-handed things, that they can pull out of nowhere and kill somebody with and then they made them vanish again.

"I'm not stupid," she said, "I guess those ones do have some kind of magic, the way that you and Bolga were talking. But for things like that, I'd bet that they aren't any more magical than they are quick-fingered. They just have to have places to tuck those things in for when they need them, that's all.

Now, I guess I just wear my harness when I'm feeling a little naughty and want to feel some breeze against my skin, that's all."

"I saw," Naïsa nodded, "You looked fine like that in the sunshine.

To me, anyway. I would wear something like that - in the right place to feel that sort of ... freedom."

"That settles it," Loriel grinned, "I'll make one for you. I've got one half-made anyway. We're not that far apart in size. You're just a tiny bit longer in your body. I'm sure the one I was making for Nila would fit you if I cut it down.

She couldn't wear it anyway, not the way that she shifts back and forth. Both of us forgot about that.

I just don't have any buckles. My pack rotted away months ago so I made one out of buckskin and I used the old buckles for that."

"If the cat can spare me a wide bone or two," Naïsa said, "I can carve rings to use for cinches."

Loriel laughed a little, excited that she could do something for Naïsa. "You make them in pairs," she said, "about this big around, and I can finish it in a couple of days. If the rings work out, I'll just need to put in the double-stitching along the edges. I've got plenty of thin strips that I've cut already."

Does it get cool in here at night?" Naïsa asked, "There will not be much of the little fire's warmth coming to us this night. Not from so small a fire and from so far away."

"It might get a little cool," Loriel said, "but I never mind it much. Why? Do you feel cold?"

Naïsa shook her head, "I have slept in far colder places and with no blanket out of my need, not having one. I can stand a little cold. We are what we are, no?"

Loriel had been growing a little sleepy and now thought of turning in. It came to her that she felt good here like this, so she looked over.

"If you feel even a little cool here sister, then move to me. I won't mind it at all. Why not come now and we'll have your blanket to cover us too? There is only us here, so why not?"

Naïsa didn't know what to say for a moment, but she wasn't about to let her lack of words get in the way, so she moved over and covered them both with her blanket. Loriel was already lying facing away from her, but was looking back with a smile.

"I've known sisters who wouldn't piss on each other if they were on fire," she smiled as she turned away, "Much less offer a little warmth at night."

She heard Naïsa's soft chuckle, "As have I, now that I have the thought. As well, I have seen some who are closer than twins. But I think now that our new sisterhood can stand the test."

She moved her body just very close to Loriel, but without touching her, other than lightly at the back of her knees with her own. Loriel shifted back instantly to press herself against the blonde.

She sighed, "We might as well do it now. As sure as the sun will rise tomorrow, we'll be lying this close anyway and I want to feel something his nice while I'm still awake to know."

She couldn't see it, but Naïsa was smiling - though she was also a little touched that Loriel might want this. She slid her arm over the rogue and drew her the rest of the way against herself.

Both of them sighed at the same time and then chuckled in a little embarrassment.

"We fit together so well," Loriel smiled to the darkness before her.

"Mm," Naïsa groaned pleasantly, "We are the same and like this, the small difference in our heights works for us. You feel good to hold. I hope that you do not mind that I say it."

"Psh," Loriel began, "all my life, I've wanted to feel something like this. I'm not even surprised that we both like it."

"Nor am I," she heard from behind her, "I have wanted this in just the same way."

-------------

The next day, Loriel helped Nila and when she could, she joined Naïsa, just wanting to be near her and to learn anything that she could glean. The cubs went with them wherever they went and the elves wondered about it some. It was almost as though they knew somehow.

At some points during the day, Loriel would find Naïsa looking at something a little farther out and when she stepped over to look, the blonde would point and the boys would be there, caught in a moment of play or exploration perhaps. The cats would look back, sensing eyes on them and pause and if the elves did not look away, then the cubs would come running and the elves knew that they had to prepare themselves for the grand welcome.

As it grew near to the time to head home, Loriel stepped up again and looked past Naïsa, "What now?"

The blonde slipped her arm around Loriel's waist and smiled, "I never thought much that I might become a mother one day - and like this ... I would never have even imagined it. I think that we will need to give them some time alone with us, if there is some bond which must come from it."

"Nila lies with them and talks quietly," Loriel commented, "I have even seen her let them suckle, but only for a moment each. It happens when she holds them as the beast that she is."

"Then that is a habit that Weda will be broken of," Naïsa said flatly, "They are nearing the size of wolfhounds. I will finish raising him. He may not know it yet, but his time for suckling is long over."