The Eighth Warden Bk. 02 Ch. 09-10

Shavala waved to the two of them, and then she and Katrin continued out of the camp.

"What are we looking for?" Katrin asked once they'd reached the tree line. "Can you really find much in the winter?"

"Sure, many things. I'm not looking for anything specific, but if there are any crab apples, we should try them out."

"Crab apples?"

"Some types become less sour after a few freezing nights, and even the sour ones are better if we cook them. It would give us some variety from the dried fruit we bought in High Cove. Stay away from the bitter ones, though."

"Oh—" Katrin started, but she'd turned her head to reply, and walked straight into a branch full of pine needles. She grimaced with distaste and held it back with two fingers to keep it out of her way.

"You've never wanted to come out here with me before," Shavala mentioned, hiding a smile. Her friend preferred cities to wilderness.

"I wanted to talk to you without everyone else around. You've been really quiet lately. More than usual, I mean."

Shavala shrugged. "Sometimes there's too much going on in the group," she said. "Too many people talking at once. I'd rather not add to it unless I have something to say."

"It's not that many people. It's less than the place where we found you."

"The border outpost? That was different." Shavala wasn't sure how to explain it. In a group of dorvasta, everyone knew who would speak next...and they'd have a good idea of what that person would say. It was different with these others—even with Ellerie, though Shavala wasn't sure if that was because the other woman was nilvasta or because she'd lived among the humans for so long. Shavala enjoyed the differences when she was just speaking to Corec and Katrin, but the larger the group grew, the harder it was for her to figure out when to interject something.

"You're sure you're all right, though?"

Shavala hugged her friend's shoulders. "I'm fine. And look," she said, pointing. "A rose bush."

Katrin's brow furrowed. "What about it?"

The rose petals had long since died and fallen to the ground, but small, bulb-like fruits still adorned the bush.

"Bobo wanted me to look for rose hips. He thinks he can make a tea that'll help with an upset stomach."

"Oh. How many does he need?"

"Probably not many, but we should get extra so we have them." Shavala handed over one of the thin cloth bags she used for her gathering. "Fill this about half full. I see some chicory, so I'm going to dig up the roots."

"For that drink you and Boktar like? I don't know how you can stand it."

Shavala shrugged. "It reminds me of home." The chicory brew had been a favorite of hers since she'd first gone to the border camp to study under Meritia. The rangers drank it all the time, and she'd picked up the habit herself.

Katrin was quiet for a moment as she worked, but then spoke up again. "Is that what's been bothering you? If you want to go home, it would be all right. You don't have to stay just because of this whole warden thing. Corec would understand."

"I'm not ready to go back yet—I want to keep traveling. I miss home, but Meritia says that's normal. Maybe I'll send some letters to my family, letting them know what I've been doing."

"I was thinking of doing that too, but Barz and Felix will just get mad when I tell them I'm not settling down in Tyrsall after all, so I'll probably wait a bit."

"And I'm not worried about the binding spell," Shavala said. "Venni mentioned that she and the others don't spend all their time with Yelena. They go off on their own when they want to."

"They do? That demonborn woman did, but I thought she was different. If it's normal, we should tell Treya and Ellerie. They'll be relieved."

Shavala cocked her head to the side. "I hadn't considered that. I should have mentioned it earlier." To Shavala's mind, what was done was done, and there was no sense worrying about it, but she should have remembered that the others were less accepting of the warden bond. She needed to pay more attention to what was going on around her. "We talked about something else, too—about how old she is."

Katrin grew still.

When the redhead didn't reply, Shavala continued. "I believe her."

"It's not that I didn't believe them," Katrin said. "I just don't know what to think about it. What do you say to something like that?"

"It's not that weird. Even that elven warden—Shayliel—is only a thousand years old, according to Venni. It's not that much older than other elves."

Katrin laughed. "I think you and I have a different perspective on that sort of thing. But if she is telling the truth...the reason you decided not to tell Corec you were interested in him was because humans don't live as long as elves."

"And because you didn't like the idea," Shavala pointed out. Katrin had been shocked to find out that elves sometimes shared their lovers with their friends. Apparently humans didn't usually follow the same custom.

"Umm, well, if you still want to, it might be all right." Katrin looked down, blushing in embarrassment.

"I don't know," Shavala said. "I'll think about it." She was still attracted to Corec, but would it make things awkward if the warden bond linked them together for the next thousand years? And why had Katrin changed her mind? "Perhaps we can discuss it later. Someone's coming."

"Who?"

Shavala pointed toward a thicker batch of trees to the south. "Not who. What. Don't make any sudden moves."

"What's going on?" Katrin asked.

"There's a wolf out there."

"Again?"

"Come closer!" Shavala called out to the animal.

"Not closer!" Katrin hissed. "Scare it off!"

"We'll be all right."

As the wolf approached, Shavala examined it with her elder senses. It was a male, nearly full grown, and seemed familiar somehow. When it came into view and saw her, it wagged its tail.

"You?" she said, startled. "How did you get here?"

The wolf didn't answer, of course, but Katrin said, "What are you talking about?"

"It's the same one we saw before, but we're too far away. Wolves can go far when they're looking for a new territory, but not this far." She spoke to the wolf again. "Have you learned how to hunt yet?"

He stretched his front legs out before him and wagged his tail again.

"Well," she said, "I suppose I could go with you for a little while." She handed her bag of chicory root to Katrin. "Could you take this back to the camp?"

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to hunt with him. I'll be back in a few hours, and if we find enough, I'll try to bring back something for tomorrow."

"Shavala! Are you crazy?"

"I've hunted with him before. He's not as scrawny as he was, so he must have learned something, but a single wolf can't bring down larger prey by himself. They like to hunt as a pack, and he hasn't started a pack yet. Save me some supper."

#

Leena stalked out of the shallow marsh, glaring at Sarlo, who was trying to hide his laughter.

"You said that would be safe!" she exclaimed. She'd followed him in teleporting across a meadow to a spot she'd been able to see from where she started. Now, her feet and shoes were soaked up to the ankles with icy water.

"It was, wasn't it?" he replied. "I admit, maybe we should have walked over here first to check out the ground more closely, but you ended up where you wanted to. Come on, we'd better get a fire started so your feet don't freeze."

She just grunted and followed him to look for firewood. Hopefully if she dried her new shoes out soon enough, she'd be able to save them.

Once the fire was going, they took a break for their midday meal, though they stuck to cold trail rations rather than cooking.

"I'm never going to learn this," she complained. Being able to teleport at all had come as a surprise. This was their fifth day of attempting the small hops, and it was the first time she'd been successful. Sarlo was convinced that she'd built up a block in her mind due to fear after her previous attempts, so he'd made her keep at it until it worked.

"Nonsense," he said. "You're learning the same way I did. If you stick to these short jumps so you can see where you're going, it eliminates the danger from the training. Uh...mostly."

"But what's the point? If I can only do it once or twice a day, I'm saving, what, ten or twenty minutes of walking?"

"Once you get more comfortable, then you can start trying longer jumps. And it's easier to teleport to a place you know well. I can't go very far, but if you can go from Sanvar to Larso in a single jump, then you can return the same way."

She shivered in fear. "Maybe these little hops are better after all."

"With how much you hate Traveling, how did you end up in Larso at all? It doesn't seem like you'd have just tried to teleport on a whim."

Leena stared into the fire, trying to ignore the images that flooded her mind. "I was walking home from the bakery and a group of men chased me into an alley. They had knives, and they were wearing sand veils so I couldn't see their faces. I thought they were thieves, so I gave them my coin pouch, but then they tried to stab me." She rubbed her shoulder in remembrance. She'd jerked away, so the cut hadn't been deep, but when the same fellow had raised his knife again, she'd teleported in desperation. She'd been aiming for home, but had ended up about as far away from it as possible without crossing the sea.

"Sand veils?" Sarlo asked. "I thought you lived in Sanvara City."

"A town just outside there, but yes, it's nowhere near the desert. I don't know why they had the veils."

"Except to make sure anyone who saw them couldn't identify them." Sarlo shook his head. "Which makes it even more important for you to learn this. What if you run into them again?"

"Matihar is a safe place," Leena insisted, "at least since the war ended. And they weren't dwarves or lizardfolk, so it wasn't that. It was just a random attack. Besides, it's not like Larso was any better."

Sarlo nodded. "Larso doesn't like mages. You're sure the fellows who came for you said they were taking you to somebody who'd protect you from the church?"

"Only if I served someone. They spoke in trade tongue, not Western, so I understood them fine."

"But they were wearing guard uniforms?"

"Yes."

"I suppose one of the nobles in Telfort might be recruiting mages for some reason. I'll have to tell...some friends of mine. They like to keep an eye on things in the area. Speaking of that, I may know someone who could help you with your magic."

"Another Traveler?"

"No, this is different. She's...another type of mage. She can make it so that it's easier for you to use your magic, and easier to learn how to use it. She did it for me a long time ago. I wasn't much of a Seeker or a Traveler before that. All she would ask in return is that after you master your skills, you help us out occasionally. As a Traveler, you'd be able to do that even living in Sanvar, at least once we figured out a way to communicate with you. That shouldn't be a problem."

"I just want to go home and never think about magic again."

Sarlo looked disappointed, but nodded. "Well, I'll write down how to find us in case you ever change your mind. For now, though, let's get back to it. I wonder if we might be going about this all wrong. What if we have you Seek a safe place to Travel?"

"I'm not a Seeker."

"There's a reason why Seeing, Seeking, and Traveling are related—they all rely on finding something far away. There's often some overlap between the three gifts. The Zidari just don't bother training the weak gifts because they usually have someone stronger nearby. You're on your own now, though, so if you can do a bit of Seeking, it would be a big help."

"How do I do it?" she asked.

Sarlo thought for a moment, then rummaged around in his belt pouch before holding his hands out in front of him, clenched into fists. "Which hand is the coin in?"

She pointed to the right. "That one, maybe?"

"Are you guessing or Seeking?"

"Guessing."

"Good, because you're wrong." He opened his left hand to show her a copper coin. "Where's your favorite hairbrush?"

"I suppose it's back home. No, wait, it's been more than a month, and I didn't pay my rent in advance. The landlord must have thrown my things out by now, unless my parents got there first."

"That gives you three places it can be. Which one is the truth?"

"How do I tell?"

"More practice," Sarlo said with a grin.

Leena sighed. It looked like her run-in with magic was going to continue for a while longer.