Forest & Kingdom Balance (18 page)

“Man child, what is your name?” Kalibra
inquired.

“Simon.” He answered.

“Simon, I am Kalibra. You can let go now.” Simon
released her and stepped back. “So that you understand,” she added,
“if you ever touch me again without permission you will die before
a second thought enters your mind. Am I clear?”

“Yes mistress.” Simon’s heart raced while he tried
to make sense of the situation.

“I’m going to sit down, you two can do as you
please.” Kalibra dropped onto a couch in the reception area and put
her feet up on the low table. “Simon, you must truly care for this
woman to court certain death to protect her.” She turned to Atheria
as the pair took seats as far away from her as the furniture
allowed. “By the way, what is your name?”

“Atheria, mistress.” She answered in a soft
tone.

Kalibra sat forward to consider the two Mindow. “I
commend you both on your reaction time, you have potential. It
seems that I must spend some time with you two, and as I said, I
have no use for slaves so do not act like one in my presence.”

Kalibra leaned forward to the fruit bowl, “I have
been given an assignment. It seems that ‘he’ feels that you two
would be more comfortable around me than you would around him. He
wants to know more about your people. You surprised him and that
does not happen often.”

Kalibra picked up an apple and bit into it at the
same instant that her free hand flung a peach toward Atheria at
weapon’s speed. She caught it and took bite. The exchange was so
quick that it looked to Simon as if the peach simply appeared in
Atheria’s hand.

“Good! Excellent hand-eye coordination.” Kalibra sat
back to recline on the couch. “No more tests, you two can relax a
little. Seriously, if you two were any stiffer we could use you as
dome supports.” The dancers relaxed a bit in their chairs.

“Unfortunately, this trip has turned out to be more
talk and less warfare than I had hoped, and now it seems that I’ve
also lost my sparing partner. I’ve decided that you two will join
me at my morning workouts. Even together you still would not come
close to Yamikura, but you have some natural talent. We’ll work
with that. Be at the training room at ten bells tomorrow morning
and we’ll see what you’re worth.” Kalibra then returned to the
subject of her assignment.

“I enjoyed your performance the night we arrived,
let’s start with that. As I understand it, the play was based on
the fall of your kingdom to ‘him,’ three or four centuries ago.
Apparently it was a huge insult to the rulers here, though I don’t
know why. Yamikura tells me he had to stop your executions. Is that
correct?” Kalibra nodded to Atheria.

“Yes mistress.”

“‘
Kalibra’ will do, I don’t own
slaves, I’m not your queen, and I’m no one’s ‘my lady.’ Well,
technically I’m ‘his’ lady, but if he called me that I would cut
his heart out with a rusty knife. Again!” Kalibra smiled and added
absently, “That just never gets old.”

“So, tell me your story.” Kalibra made herself
comfortable on the couch, “Start with a little about the time
before your people were slaves and then explain the play to
me.”

II

“Good Morning Adam, what’s on the
menu today?”
Dionara projected her presence to the Forest
village and concentrated to be sure that she only touched the
verbal level of the herdsman’s mind. The wonder and newness of her
ability had begun to fade but the skill of fine control was not yet
automatic.

“A bright good morning to you
Princess.”
He greeted his new friend.
“I’ve been asked for lamb today. Selene’s birthday
celebration is this evening and her parent’s requested something
special.”

“Peace my friend!”
She
withdrew her presence from his mind but continued to observe him as
he worked. While Adam did not possess the Sentinel’s gift, he did
have an extraordinary empathy for all living things, especially for
animals. She watched as he chose a lamb and led it into the
workshop. She could feel him reach out with love and gratitude as
he calmed the lamb and slowed its heartbeat. She could feel the
lamb’s contentment as it fell asleep. Its heartbeat grew slower,
and then stopped. Adam gently ran his hand across its neck and
whispered, “Thank you.”

Dionara continue on with her morning exercises. She
greeted a few more of the Forest Dwellers she had met in the
village, and then went on to visit her grandparents. Her visits
with them were her favorite part of the day. She could feel their
love cascade through her, it made her toes tingle.

Froggy had asked her to be brief this morning so she
moved on to her other stops. Her second favorite visit was to the
Kingdom’s councilors, after years of their lectures it felt good to
have the upper hand. Her last exercise was to let herself roam free
to see what flames she could sense between her Kingdom and the
coast. She noted that Tre and Raphael were making good progress,
and checked to see how far Yamikura had come. She stopped short of
Kingsport, she wouldn’t venture there unless Froggy was with
her.

She opened her eyes and took a deep breath. “Ready,”
she said to Froggy who sat across from her in the chalet’s main
room. “What’s the lesson for today?” Her smile faded when she noted
his expression was as grave as she’d ever seen it.

“I’m sorry my Lady,” his voice expressed the sadness
she felt from him. “Today will be difficult for you, but to reach
your full potential I will need you to rediscover your
memories.”

Dionara was confused, “What don’t I remember?”

“It is not unusual for a child to bury the memory of
a traumatic experience. You have memories of when you lost your
parents that are buried deep within you.” Froggy paused. “I
encouraged this in you when I placed false memories of that day in
your mind. My hope was to give you time to heal.”

“My Lady, this would be a good time for you to
understand that the gift you’ve found within yourself has
limitations. Neither you, I, or anyone with the gift can alter a
person’s actions if their will is opposed to the suggestion.” She
could feel his concern for her as he spoke. “When it came to your
memories of that day, your mind so wanted to forget that all I
needed to do was help.”

“Let us begin” Froggy entered her mind.
“I believe it will be easier for you if I take you through
the events with me first. Join me.”
Dionara joined with his
mind.

Dionara found herself in a strange castle. Somehow
she knew that it was ten years ago somewhere in the far lands and
that it was a man’s memory. He was one of two men summoned to the
Red Knight.

“You two will leave in the morning, do you have any
questions?” She heard the Red Knight’s voice, his curt demeanor now
familiar to Dionara.

“We will of course complete our mission my Liege,
but it will be many years before we return.” The first man nodded
to the second, “My Liege, we are warriors first, even spies and
assassins at need, but map makers? Are there not better men suited
for this task?”

The Red Knight understood his men’s objection. “If
it were as simple as map making, you would be correct, however this
task will be anything but simple. You two are the most skilled of
my agents and have been trained in the art of going unseen. There
is something wrong on the other continent and I need to know what
that something is.” The Red Knight stood to address his men.

“Perhaps it is just that the natives are lazy and
superstitious, too content with their own lands to explore beyond
them, I hope so. In which case you will return with the maps we
need to extend the settlements. However, I want you to approach
this assignment as if there were enemies at every turn, use your
skills to the utmost. I do not know what you will find, be prepared
for any contingency.” The Red Knight dismissed his men.

Dionara traveled forward as she experienced time
through the man’s memory. She was fascinated by how he was able
blend into whatever situation he found himself. Within an hour of
docking at Kingsport he not only looked like he had been born and
raised there, he thought like it.

That was their greatest weapon. They became who they
needed to be. He and his partner took service as farm workers at
the very edge of the settled land in the foothills of the Warded
Mountains. All his thoughts were about his daily life, his duties,
and his prospects to better himself. Even though she knew who he
was, Dionara could barely discern that he was anything but a
farmhand.

One day he and his friend went hunting, they thought
there would be good game at the base of the mountains. The other
workers warned them against it but they decided to try. Once they
had ventured to an area where the ground quickly began to elevate,
a sudden fear overcame them. It was a terror they had never
experienced.

“Maybe the boys were right, let’s get out of here.”
He said to his friend, and the two retraced their route in a hurry.
Then Dionara sensed it, somewhere deep in his thoughts, below the
conscious level, was a recognition that they had found what they
were looking for.

Over the next few months their hunting trips
occasionally strayed into the lower mountain forest. Each time the
fear presented itself, they retreated quickly, but each time they
also adjusted their thoughts to try something new. On one trip,
they went far beyond the area where fear normally stopped them and
nothing happened. Back at the farm they compared notes. If they
kept their thoughts to an instinctive level, they would not be
detected. They made several more trips to hone their skills and
waited for the following spring to set out.

They made their way slowly into the mountains,
always vigilant to keep their thoughts at a level that was
undetectable. It required a mental discipline that Dionara found
hard to grasp. As fate would have it, their task was made simple
through a chance discovery. They spotted a Forest trader on a
return trip with goods for the Kingdom. The trader was well into
the mountains and felt no need of stealth. The pair tracked him
from a distance.

Dionara’s eyes opened as she felt Froggy sit beside
her. “My Lady, how did your parents die?”

She thought the question strange. “They were killed
in a rock slide while on one of their exploration trips, the entire
party was killed.”

Froggy took her hand. “Actually, there never were
any exploration trips, that was the story they allowed their
subjects to believe when they wanted to spend some time away, here
in Spirit’s Vale. So you see, they could not have been killed in a
rock slide.”

“Of course they were, everyone” Dionara stopped mid
sentence. She didn’t know where he was going, but experience had
taught her that she had best keep up. “I’m sorry Froggy, please
explain.”

“I’m going to share with you some memories of my
own, as well as others. They will seem false to you, however I
assure you they are true. It will be difficult, please try to
remain in the moment but separate from the event. If you are able,
think of it as information only.” Froggy kissed her on the forehead
as she closed her eyes.

Her vision was once more filled with a scene from
the past, she knew that it was seven years ago, the day her parents
had died. She saw Froggy at the Forest gate with a boy.
“Oh my!”
She smiled when she realized the
boy was John. He looked so very young.

She felt Froggy begin to scan beyond the gate and
there she was, her younger self, along with her parents at Angel
Falls. Tears started to well in her eyes at seeing her parents
again. His scan quickly went beyond the glade, first he sensed two
farmers a few miles away. He scanned them and found nothing but
farmer’s thoughts. He continued and when completed, his scan had
gone from the edges of Angel Falls to the coastal farms and found
no threats.

Suddenly she was in the mind of one of the farmers
Froggy had first scanned, she instantly recognized him as one of
the Red Knight’s agents. His thoughts were filled with a farmer’s
concerns, one of which was to find a lost horse.
“Maybe that way.”
He wondered and the two set out in
the direction they had seen the royal party go earlier that
morning.

His memory switched to a few hours later, where
their supposed search had brought them to within a few hundred
yards of the entrance to Angel Falls. Suddenly the agent released
his thought mask, Dionara stiffened as the memory of who he was
came fully into his conscious mind. He knew exactly what he needed
to do.
“The royal family must be the source of
the strange power,”
he thought,
“if we
eliminated them, we eliminated the threat.”

With the stealth of predators, they approached the
royal couple from behind. Dionara went rigid as they struck, the
details were blurred but the result was unmistakable. The agents
acted surely and swiftly, within moments there was no one left
alive but her younger self.
“Run!”
Her
mind screamed, but to no avail. She watched as the agent’s memory
recalled his partner approach her younger self.

A thought flashed into the agent’s mind.
“Perhaps we should spare her, we could take her
to the Red Knight.”
He considered the idea, and then
dismissed it.
“No, too risky.”
He watched
his partner slowly approach the girl and raise his sword. Suddenly
a falcon flew through the falls, its talons flashed and his partner
lie dead. He barely had time to comprehend the event before he was
blinded by an intense green light. Disbelief was his last conscious
thought before his vision cleared enough to see the hilt of a sword
aimed at his head. As his memory left her, Dionara surrendered to
the emptiness.