Chapter 1: Skipping Stones

     Ithil sat upon the bank, finding the smoothest stones to toss into the water. He had smooth brown hair that flowed to his shoulders and blue eyes that shone as if there were sapphires deep within. He was tall, about six feet, with scars that covered his arms as was the way of his people. His hands brushed over the bank’s rocks, seeking out the smooth from the rough. The cool rocks would pinch and scratch his hands until he would find a smooth stone, he would pick it up, admire it, then send it soaring across the surface of the water. Seven skips was his record, but few really cared. He only had a few friends, because he did not take as much love in fighting as many of his peers in the village. The true Ithándi, those who could transform completely, normally loved the thrill of the hunt more than any other sensation in the world. Ithil took much more interest in the beauty of nature’s gifts than in violence. As he picked up a smooth stone to toss, he liked to think of himself as a smooth stone among many rough rocks, not wrong in its shape, just different. Besides, smooth rocks fly farther on the water.
            Ithil’s dark brown hair fell into his blue eyes as he turned to the sound of footsteps. His friend, Maria sat on the shore beside him, staring out over the lake and the trees around it. Ithil could notice every feature of Maria, an odd talent of his. Her red hair with a streak of blonde down the sides shone radiantly in the sun, her pale scarred skin was always beautiful in a way to him. Her emerald green eyes gazed out over the lake, deep and intelligent.
            “Beautiful, isn’t it?” She asked, peering at the mountains on the far shore reflected in the water, sun gleaming upon her face.
            “On the surface, yes, but imagine what lies beneath,” Ithil noted with a philosophical sheen. She humored him.
            “Perhaps a mystery, but do we truly know the water until we explore the submerged?” she asked back, “We have the funniest conversations, you and I. I sometimes wonder what my life would be like without your random tangents.”
            “Much more boring, I expect,” Ithil laughed, tossing another rock across the surface. Three skips, he sighed. “Maria, am I strange?”
            “Absolutely,” she said with a smile, “but that’s why I like you. Otherwise you would not be interesting at all.”
            “Small comfort,” he sighed, “but I’m not like the others. The more I think about it, the more I realize it. I love nature, maybe too much. Everything is beautiful to me! The mountains, the water, even the brown blades of dead grass, everything is connected! But everyone else is so driven by fighting, by that hierarchy! Sometimes I just wish to be like the rest of the Ithándi. What’s so different about me?”
            Maria sat and pondered for a moment, arms wrapped around her legs and head on her knees, emerald eyes staring out over the water. Then she looked at him with a smile and put a hand to his chest. “You have a pure and humble heart. That is different from many here. Many hearts here are coarse and hard like sandstone, not focused on the beautiful. You are focused on the intricate and the beautiful.”
            Ithil sat deep in thought upon the shore of the lake, fingers digging into the deep sand. It was depressing at times, to think that he was different. Maria could sense his thoughts and grabbed his hand, and he looked into her eyes. Their love for each other was not romantic, it was from the Yaeda bond that existed between them. This bond was one of the greatest mysteries to those outside of the Ithándi world. Truly, even the wisest among the Ithándi could not understand the Yaeda bond to its full extent. This bond told of the connection between each pack in the Ithándi world, of stronger friendship than any other race. Thoughts could be concealed in the bond, but most shared everything in their thoughts with their pack, and in consequence, many grew old and became the most close of friends, closer than any in any other race save the oldest elves. The most accurate way that other races could describe the Yaeda bond would be through the sharing of thoughts and emotions.
            “Come,” Maria said softly, “let us go look from the mountains. We need to be fast.” Ithil nodded, and both stood apart. The most literal interpretation for Ithándi is “man-wolf”, which described the two states of mind for each true Ithándi. Each true Ithándi had, in best description, two sides to their minds, one human, one wolf. Each had a tendency to be more of one side than another, some more human, some more wolf-like. To transform, the soul of one of the true Ithándi would simply indulge itself in the side of the mind that it wished to be in, so that the transformation was merely a reflection of the mind’s state, not the “magic trick” that many in other races naively called it.
            Ithil stood and closed his eyes, indulging himself in the natural wildness of the wolf. Each true Ithándi accomplished this in different ways, some in violence, some in the speed, but Ithil did so through the smell and thought of deep nature. Suddenly with a roar, he sprang up and while in mid-air, changed into his wolf form, a six food auburn wolf with a long snout and thick fur.
            Show off, Ithil heard Maria’s voice enter into his head as she watched him jump into the air. She was a dark red wolf with a blonde stripe down the middle of her body. Come, we go. She intoned, and sprang off. Ithil felt the thick, corded muscles in his back legs brace against the smooth sand and with a yelp sprang off after Maria, traveling extremely fast. To the normal eye, a transformed Ithándi would merely be a blur when traveling at their fastest pace.
            The wind whipped through Ithil’s fur as he followed Maria around the lake to where Carhador lay at the other side of the lake, the large mountain they had gazed upon from the other side of the lake. To Ithil, everything became more defined and more beautiful than before. He could feel each tiny grain of sand as his paws struck the ground so intricately that they were as miniature worlds flying through open space before falling lightly back down again. Ithil cast his mind about, feeling the tentacles of his consciousness touch the wildlife around him, from the deer in the forest to the most minute ants traversing the mighty desert of sand before them. Far in the distance, he felt another member of their pack, Fynor, and greeted him.
            Where are you off to? Fynor’s quiet voice inquired across their connection.
            To the rim of the Carhador. Ithil replied, glancing to the mountain at his right approaching fast.            Ah, the air is always so clear over there. If only I could see it. Fynor said with a sad tone to his quiet voice. From birth, Fynor had been blind. That did not stop him from being a great asset to the pack, however. What he lacked in vision he made up for in hearing, smell, and feeling in his paws, which in wolf state overrode sight, which is why he enjoyed remaing as a wolf as much as possible. If anything, Fynor hated to rely on others because of his handicap, and the pack refrained as much as possible from helping him in sight unless he asked.
            Trust me, the air is better than the sight, Ithil consoled, but he didn’t truly mean it.
            Hmfh, liar, Fynor laughed, I can feel your emotions over the Yaeda. I can see through your memories and thoughts, it is truly beautiful. I only wish to see it with my own eyes. But that’s alright, I can feel more than you. Ithil laughed, expressing his true jealousy.
            Do you want to come with us? Ithil offered.
            No, thank you, I think I’ll hunt. Besides, I wouldn’t want to ruin your alone time with Maria, Fynor teased, making Ithil’s wolf cheeks turn red, if that were possible.
            I heard that, Fynor, Maria growled,I’ll make sure that when I am alone with you I make you pay for that.
            Not a chance, girl, Fynor laughed again with mirth, and Ithil felt him bounce away after a scent of a tall buck deep in the forest ten leagues away.
            Farther away towards the town, Ithil could feel the other two memebers of their pack, Fera and Hordan, still in their human state. Until the Yaeda bond had developed more deeply, wolves and humans in the same pack could not share thoughts, only emotions at a close distance.
            Almost there, Maria said, nodding towards the base of the mountain, which was surprisingly close. In only an hour the two Ithándi had covered the five leagues to the mountain around the left side of Lake Ellandari. Before them stood Mount Carhador, the highest mountain in the realm. In the common tongue, it was called “Watchtower of Heaven” due to its vastness, its peak never submitting to be below the clouds. As the pair ran closer to the mountain, Ithil felt the soft grassy plains turn to hard rock and the path edge upward. After they had traveled another half-league, they came panting and sweating to a resting spot that overlooked Lake Ellandari.
            From their view, they could see the great lake shimmering in the sun, reflecting it over thousands of tiny waves blown by the wind, a dazzling sight. Farther south, the town of Unor lay in a large clearing of trees, bustling with life. Even farther south lay the capital of the Ithándi people, Ithán, where the great king and elders resided upon their high seats. The edge of their realm was a ring of mountains: the Ilkandor range. Thus was the realm of Ithándi, to which few men ever traveled, and those that left told great tales of wolf people, which soon became legend and myth in the great ever-warring kingdoms beyond.
            Maria sat up and allowed the waning sun to shine upon her fur and the wind blow through her ears, while Ithil lay on his stomach, feeling the many pebbles, offspring of the great rocks of Carhador press into his furred underbelly. Ithil then felt Maria’s mind retreat from the Yaedabond and turned to see her transform to her human state. Her clothes reappeared as she became human once more, another strange mystery to the Ithándi people was where clothing and weapons went when transformed, but it was accepted and appreciated all the same. Ithil delved into his human mind and felt his body change once more and felt the cold air more upon his bare skin. He pulled his cloak tighter around his body and Maria inched closer to him and leaned against him for warmth on the chilled mountainside.
            “Beautiful,” she breathed.
            “Yes,” Ithil replied with the simple word, but he had never agreed with anything more. They sat like this for a while saying nothing, simply watching the sun make its daily journey to the horizon, cool mountain breeze lightly kissing their faces.
            “If ever there were a paradise in this life or another, it would be hard pressed to compete with this place,” Ithil said, staring at the slowly disappearing sun as it painted the sky with a bright red turning slowly purple against the white canvas of cloud.
            “Mmm,” Maria agreed in a thoughtful way. She leaned up and wrapped her arms around her legs and put her head on her knees as she had by the lake, which was only a distant piece of landscape to them now. She went on, “Not many people see what you see, my strange Ithil.”
            “What do you mean,” he asked, interested.
            “Many just see the world as the ground we walk on, just changing. You see it as a work of art, a masterpiece created by some mysterious artist. Others just see it as existing, but you see it as existing beautifully,” she said thoughtfully, and Ithil smiled. She turned to him with a piercing emerald stare. “It is because you have a humble heart Ithil, you don’t see yourself as a master of the world, just as a portion of it and a spectator admiring its beauty. You feel more than the others do. You are a smooth rock among rough ones, loving to fly across the water and enjoy the flight, not sink to the bottom. You are different, I like that about you,” she finished, looking back over the Ellandari lake at the retreating sun and breathing deeply.
            Ithil sat back in thought, glad for her reassuring words. He looked back over the lake to the wooded land beyond, and for a moment he thought his eyes gazed upon a bright white flash in the distance, but took it for a trick of his eyes and leaned back, breathing deep the chill mountain air.
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Deep in the forest of the Ithándi realm, the Zyndir rode away from her recent kill to a hillock that protruded from the trees. She sprang from her noble horse and intoned the ancient words: “Sxyoroth, Lienthe!” and felt her spirit leave her flesh with a white flash. Suddenly she was in the presence of a great dark power, her master.
In the darkness, a deep and rolling voice spoke, and it carried with it years of malice and hatred. Where is it? Where is the amulet?
The dog sent it away before I could retrieve it, master, she said, fear lining her voice. A deep rumbling wrath came from the darkness, but no pain came.
You must retrieve the amulet, Yxen. This is the key to my success. But take caution, when the Ithándi discover the body they will begin to search for evidence. Leave none. The darkness is your ally. Be swift. The voice commanded, I will not be so lenient next time you should fail. Go.