Tayre

  I awoke to find myself weeping again. I thought there could be no more tears, but I was wrong.  I could no longer cry in self pity for sure, but there were plenty of tears left for Ren now that my memories had broken through and I could remember how much I. . .never mind.   I steeled myself to face the world again, creeping out of my cocoon, only to be met by blazing light.  Finally, it was the Tayre,  outshining the light of the morning sun.
    “Why do you call for me child?”  Again, I heard her voice, though the enigmatic smile never changed.
    “It’s Ren.  You healed me before.  Won’t you heal him now?”
    “I don’t know.”  I could not tell if there was compassion or indifference in her eyes.  Her gaze never wavered.
    “What do you mean you don’t know?  Can’t you just decide to do it?”  Worry made me irritable.
    “What does this boy mean to you?  Why must he be saved?  Why should I heal him instead of another?”  She seemed unaware of my anger, calmly gazing into my eyes, searching out the deepest secrets of my soul.
    I opened my mouth to answer but she cut me off.
    “No words.  Let me see your heart.”
    I closed my eyes and concentrated hard, trying to let her feel my worry for my younger brother, my need to find him, my guilt at allowing him to be lost and my inability to find my way alone.
    “This is very interesting, but you still have not answered my question.  Why Ren?  Why can’t you let him die and find another companion.  You are not yet too far from the village.  I will take you there myself and you can call another one to help you.”
    “No!” I cried.  “It must be Ren.  I need him, not another.”
    “I see.  Let me reach into your memories.  Let me see why he matters.”  She reached out one black hand, light gleaming from a ring on her finger, and touched my forehead lightly.  I plunged into dreams.
    I was only five.  It was my first day in the pastures.  I had been begging to go for so long but I had always been too young.  Father took my hand and led me out with the sheep.  I kept up well for a while, determined to show my father that I was grown up and could do this by myself very soon.  I was so much more grown up than Ezra, my little brother.  He was still too little for everything.  He couldn’t do dishes, he couldn’t water the garden or even dress himself without help.  I was the big girl and I was going to show my daddy what I big help I could be.
    “Chomper and Rabbit will be yours to take care of.”  Daddy knelt down in front of me when we got to the closest pasture.  Chomper and Rabbit were the two smallest lambs.  “They are too weak to travel the long way that I must go with the big sheep.  You must take care of them here.”
    “Daddy, I’m scared.” I hugged his legs and wouldn’t let go.
    “It’s ok Elyssa.  This is Ren.  He can take care of you.”  He pointed to a solemn boy of almost seven.  “He has his two lambs, Ivy and Holly.  He has been taking care of them here alone for more than a year.  You can ask him if you have any questions.”  I looked at the boy and hid behind my daddy.  He wasn’t big, but he was bigger than me and I was shy.
    “Goodbye little one.  I will be back for you at the end of the day.  There is a piece of bread and some cheese in this bag for your lunch.  You can drink water from the stream.  Now before I go, let’s make sure you are protected.”  Together we spoke the words of the Ajaecir.  Then my daddy left me there, alone with this strange, quiet boy.
    For most of the morning, I played with the lambs, cuddling them and helping them to find the greenest grass and the freshest water.  As the sun climbed higher in the sky, I sat down to eat my lunch and then, with my tummy full, I lay down in the warmth of the day and fell asleep.
    I was shaken awake suddenly.  Ren stood over me.  “Chomper is running away.  You better go catch him.”  I stood up, all in a panic and promptly tripped over a rock, scraping my knee.  Ren was beside me before I could begin to cry.  I lay on the ground, eyes welling up with tears, drawing my breath in for one colossal wail, and he picked me up.  He was scarcely bigger than I, but he sat down there on the ground and pulled me onto his lap.
    “Let me make it all better.”  He gave me one slobbery kiss on my cheek and I managed a watery smile before he ran off to catch my lamb.  After that moment, whenever something happened that scared me or hurt me, I ran to Ren.  I knew in my heart he would make it all better.
    “Interesting.”  The Tayre spoke to me again.  “But I must know more.  If I am to heal him, I need to see more than just a childish trust.”

I plunged deeper back into memory, searching for something that would save his life.  Pictures of him from our shared childhood flooded my mind.  I saw Ren’s gentle hands holding a newborn lamb beside its dead mother, urging it to eat, willing life into it, tears on his cheeks as he tried to save it and the joy as he watched it grow to become a part of the flock.
    I saw his strong sure hands pounding nails into a tree and hanging a rope for us to swing from into the swimming hole.  I saw us together, our faces alight with laughter as he pushed me into the water and I pulled him in after.  I saw the three of us, Ren, Ezra and me, sitting in our dark cellar, telling frightening stories of the night, hiding from the chores that awaited us just outside, Ren’s warm hand holding mine as I got too scared.
    I saw his smile.  I saw the way he always stood up for Ezra and me and how he could never take no for an answer.  I pushed these memories at the Tayre, willing her to see what a kind, generous person he was, what a great friend he was.
    “It is still not enough.  I see that he is, or at least was, kind and good and that he was your friend.  But I do not know who he is now and why you need him now.  There are others just as kind, others just as gentle who would gladly be your friend and help you bring your brother home.  This is not what makes Ren the one you want.  I must see why you want him and him alone.”
    At that, I unlocked the deepest part of my heart and let her see my most treasured memory.
Ren smiled and pushed me back down onto the blanket we had brought out to the meadow.  He lay down behind me and pulled me against him.  Every curve of his body hugging mine.  I held his hands as they held my waist.  He put his lips gently to the top of my head, then held me in silence, our breathing slowly relaxing into unison as we fell asleep, spending the whole night there, finally not afraid of the dark but revelling in the true glory of the night.
I woke as the world was beginning to come alive.  The sky was growing lighter yet no hint of sunlight yet shone over the mountain.  We were surrounded by the fog of early morning and it was as if there were no one in that valley but us.  The harsh crags of the mountains were softened by the mist and all fear of the dark seemed but a distant memory as the golden light tinged the edges of the clouds.
I was cold and wet from the dew.  I could see my breath in the air, yet I did not move, relishing the feel of Ren’s arms around me.  I knew if I acknowledged that I was awake, the night would be over and we would have to part, facing the horrors of the world separately.  All we would have would be the memory of this night spent in the sacred circle of one another’s arms.
Something stirred in my heart and I knew that I always wanted to wake up just like this, listening to his heart beat as I lay in his arms.
He moved then and I knew he was waking up.  I did not move, pretending to sleep, hoping he would remain there, thinking the same thoughts and wanting the same things.
I felt the warmth move away from my back, and I almost looked back at him, but resisted the urge.  He would never leave me alone with no protection.  I felt him lean over me and his lips gently brushed my forehead.
“I love you Elyssa.”  He whispered.
I made no outward sign, but my heart was turning cartwheels inside.  I lay there, waiting for him to hold me again.  Finally, I turned to look at him, only to see he was gone, vanished in the morning mist.
I never saw him again.  It was not more than two hours later that I heard the screams of the Khresh and the cries of a voice that I knew must be Ren’s.  It was hours after I heard the news, after I sat in shock at my mother’s kitchen table, that I realized that I had never told him that I loved him too.
“There, you see now why it must be him.”  I wept softly.  “I love him and I never got to tell him so.”
    “He is a man now, not the boy you knew so many years ago.  How can you know that you still love him.  He has had a hard life, full of hardship.  It has sharpened his edges and turned his vulnerable heart to stone.  Are you sure you love him?”
“Yes, I am sure.  The boy may have changed into a man, but he is still there.  He was willing to give his life for me.  He is the one I want by my side as I face the Khresh.  I love Ren, not any other man in the village and that is why I choose him.  Please will you heal him?”
The Tayre looked into my eyes.  “I can’t heal him.”
I sunk to my knees.  “Why did you give me this hope?  Why did you make me bring up the painful past?  You knew you couldn’t heal him and now you have made me acknowledge my love.  I cannot bear to lose him.”  I sobbed.  “You healed me once.  Why can’t you heal him now?”
“I needed to know how far you were willing to go.  Are you willing to suffer for him?”
I nodded, tears running down my face.
“I have been watching you for a long time.  You are someone very special.  You can take his pain from him.  He will be healed.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this sooner?  I could have healed him so long ago if you had only told me.”  I reached for Ren’s hand.  “How do I do it?”
“Wait, if you heal him, his wounds have to go somewhere.  If you take them from him, they will be yours to bear.”
I looked up at the Tayre and nodded.  “I love him and I will do whatever it takes.”
“Take his hand,” she instructed.  “Close your eyes and feel his blood pumping through his veins.  Follow it from his hand to his back, find his pain, find the open skin and pull it toward you.  Pull it into your hand, into your blood.”
It was a curious sensation.  I held his hand and it was as if I was inside of him.  His pain was a light, red and pulsing.  I felt it, cupped in the palm of my hands and watched it from the inside of my head with a horrid fascination.  Then I pulled and I screamed as if the Khresh were behind me at that moment, tearing my flesh with their poisoned claws.  I could feel the blood dripping down my back, soaking my dress, and I could feel the heat of fever taking over me.  At the same moment, I could feel Ren growing stronger, his skin growing cooler, his breath coming stronger and his heartbeat finding its rhythm again.
He sat bolt upright, air rushing into his lungs in one frantic gasp.  He looked at me in horror as he realized what I had done.
“Save Ezra.  Save my little brother,” I rasped.  Then the pain became too much and fear for Ren’s life could not keep me awake.  I slumped to the side, pain washing through every pore of my body.  I had never been so happy.
 

Reviews

[Lorelee Tate]

I'm finally reviewing again! My apologies for taking so long, but I've been having a few health problems and I haven't been able to do much.

Anyway, I have a few suggestions for you. This chapter was good, but I think it could be better with a touch of editing. My biggest suggestion would be to consider having some of these scenes earlier, particularly the one where Ren tells Elyssa that he loves her. I almost feel like the plot began a little too late. If you included that particular memory earlier on in the story, you could just have her recalling a few fleeting images in this chapter, as opposed to the whole thing. I think it might be more effective to have her think of (for example) the smell of the grass in the meadow, the cold of the dew compared to Ren's warmth.

This is just a quick note: I thought that the sentence ending with "...now that my memories had broken through and I could remember how much I. . .never mind," was a bit awkward. I would recommend just taking off the last part of the sentence. I think that will be much more succinct.

My last suggestion has to do with the Tayre. I would mainly like a bit more description of the Tayre's voice. I think describing the voice would help add to the character, to give the Tayre some more mystery.

I hope this is helpful to you. I'll try to get to the next chapter some time this week!

Lora

[Twilight]

Ha, ha! Lora does it again, bless her. She has completely missed the point, regarding one of the sentences in this chapter. The sentence ends with "I...never mind". However, that would have been intended by the writer. Any experienced reader or reviewer knows, that this sort of ending to a sentence, is indeed supposed to appear "awkward". That simply reflects the way in which the character, is thinking or feeling at the moment of speaking.

The opening of this chapter seems genuinely sad, an atmoshere with the writer has captured well. As in the previous chapters, the characterisation is very good, and the writer has quite an original story in mind.

The comments from Katherine are more more constructive, and all of the praise which you have received is fully justified. Keep writing!

[Katherine Hall]

Some good descriptions and exposition in here, but I would again caution against disjointedness in the chapter. I am not entirely sold on the Tayre holding Ren's life over the narrator's head as a way to get her to admit she loves him. She doesn't give the narrator any good reason NOT to save his life. If she had said 'I see no reason to save him; he can't be that important to you if you did nothing to save him yourself', that would also give an opening for the narrator to grow in this novel. At the moment, she has been quite stagnant--either running, or crying, or running and crying and waiting for someone to save her. This chapter gives her the chance to start growing. You give a hint of that in the end, when she takes on the pain of Ren's injury so he may live, but that instance feels very out of place right now; there is nothing showing her readiness to grow leading up to that moment of action.
Keep up the good work!
~Katherine

[Leah C]

Hey I LOVE THIS!!!! I awarded ur Choices first place, remember? Well plz write chapter 6. PLZ

[Victoria Harlequin]

:O This is great! I loved the scene with the lambs, original.
Left us hanging though. Can't wait to read the rest!

[mirui]

this is really good

[Martina]

OKAY WRITE MORE< OR I"LL DIE *DYING*

[Martina]

Can you plz write more? PLZZZZZZZZ