Warrior Priest of Dmon-Li: The Morcyth Saga Book Three (17 page)

A chill runs down James’ back,
“Waiting?”

She turns her attention to him and says,
“Yes.”

“For whom?” Jiron asks her.

“For he who bears the Star,” she tells
him.

James looks to Miko and Jiron who both give
him a startled glance as well. He reaches into his shirt and pulls
out the Star of Morcyth. Holding it up, he shows it to her.

“I thought as much,” she says as she nods
her head. “After I felt the power of the spell that had been used
earlier, I thought it might be you.”

“And that’s why you invited us here?” Miko
asks.

“A month ago, I had a dream that a star had
fallen from the sky and landed on the shore,” she explains. “In my
dream I had gone and picked it up.” Laughing, she says, “That’s
more or less how it went.”

“What else did you dream?” James asks,
almost holding his breath.

“That when the star left, it would be bigger
than when it had arrived,” she replies.

“What does that mean?” Miko asks.

She shrugs but doesn’t answer the question.
Getting up, she says, “Please, make yourselves comfortable. You may
rest here in safety, naught will disturb you.” She gestures to a
corner of the room where several bedrolls and blankets are neatly
stacked.

“Thank you,” James says, coming to his feet
as well.

“You’re welcome,” she says. She begins to
move to the other room when she pauses and turns around, saying,
“Until morning.”

“Good night,” Miko says as he goes over to
where the bedrolls are and grabs one. He unrolls his by the fire
and lies down. Taking several of the blankets, he settles down and
quickly falls asleep.

The others get theirs as well. From the
other room, they can hear her gentle singing coming through the
door, lulling them. Unable to fight off exhaustion any longer, they
all fall asleep.

James wakes during the night and can hear
her soft singing coming from outside. Getting up quietly so as not
disturb the others, he goes to the window and sees Lyria outside
sitting on an old tree stump. His eyes open in amazement when he
sees little creatures, three altogether and no more than a foot
tall, sitting before her. They seem to sway to the music as she
sings.

They remind James of garden gnomes his
grandmother used to have in her flower bed. These were dressed
nothing like them, but the height and general resemblance is
close.

He moves to the door and opens it as he
walks out. As soon as the door begins to open, the singing stops
and when he is again able to see her, the little creatures are
gone.

She turns her head to look at him and
flashes him a slight smile. “Hello James,” she says.

Coming over to her, he looks around to try
to see the little creatures but they’re no where to be found.
“Where are they?”

“Around,” she tells him. “But they’re
extremely shy.”

“What are they?” he asks her as he comes to
sit by her.

“Spirits of the earth,” she explains.
“You’re fortunate, very few people have ever seen them.”

“How can I get them to come out?” he asks
her, still looking about.

“If they want to, they will,” she replies.
“And they rarely want to.”

“They come out to you,” he says.

She gives him that smile again and says,
“I’ve been here a long time, they’ve learned to trust me. I think
they like my singing too.”

“So do I,” he says before he even realizes
it. Blushing, he turns his head away and looks out over the
lake.

“Thank you,” she tells him and then reaches
out and pats him on the arm.

“It’s peaceful here,” he observes when he at
last has found his voice.

“Yes, it’s the reason I’m here,” she says.
Then she continues, “Partly, anyway.”

“Partly?” he asks.

“We needn’t go into that now,” she tells
him.

They sit there for awhile, enjoying the
tranquility of the night when he says, “Have you had any other
dreams foretelling the future? Like the star falling?”

“Oh, many,” she says. “Dreams are very
important if you just know how to interpret them.”

“Do gods ever talk to you?” he asks.

“No, I’ve never known them to talk to anyone
but their priests,” she tells him. “And even they don’t always
understand what they’re trying to say.”

“I think I have,” he suddenly admits.

“Oh?” she says. “And what makes you believe
that?”

“Ever since coming here,” he says trying to
avoid mentioning where he’d really come from, “there’s been this
little creature, about four and half feet tall. He appears and
disappears in unusual fashions.”

“And?” she asks, prompting him to
continue.

“And, well, he gave me the Star of Morcyth,”
he explains. “Could he be Morcyth? He denies it though.”

Shaking her head, she says, “I doubt it.
Every god has minions who deal with the mortal world. This creature
may be one of Morcyth’s on this world.”

“But he doesn’t act like any I’ve heard of
before,” he tells her. When she glances at him, he continues, “I
mean, he takes me to get pizza, that’s a food where I come from.
And then he takes me to a place of fun and amusement I used to
visit as a child. It all seems rather pointless.”

“I doubt if it is pointless,” she says. “The
gods and their minions never give straightforward directions to
those from whom they want something. But whatever he’s been doing,
there’s a meaning behind it. Usually the one who’s experiencing it
will understand at the appointed time.”

“But why wouldn’t they just come out and say
it?” he asks.

“I don’t know,” she admits. “But that is the
way they work, mostly. What you need to do is think hard about what
transpired during each visitation and see if anything has a meaning
other than what happened.”

“Take my dream about the falling star,” she
says. “Did it mean a star actually fell? No, it was pertaining to
you coming here. Why you were to come here remains unclear, but
here you are. The gods see far into the future, or rather paths
that the future may follow.”

“Paths?” he asks.

“Yes,” she replies. “Let me explain. Say I
wanted you to go from here to my house. If I asked you to, you
would turn and go straight there. But if I saw that the result of
that would be for you to fall and hurt yourself, then I may not
tell you to go there, but arrange, through another series of events
for you to make it there by another path. A series of events that
would enable you to go without hurting yourself. Does that help you
understand?”

Nodding his head, he says, “I think so.”

“Good,” she says. “Now, you should try to go
back to sleep if you can.”

“Alright,” he says, yawning. “I am getting
tired again. Will you be alright here alone?”

Smiling at him, she nods and says, “I’ll be
fine, but thank you for your concern.”

James gets up and walks back into the house
where he pauses by the window again as she begins her song once
more. He looks out and sees the three little creatures once again
standing around her in rapt attention.

He goes over to his bedroll and lies down,
letting the sound of her voice lull him to sleep.

When he wakes up in the morning, he sees
Jiron sitting at the table holding a necklace of beads and hair. As
he gets up, Jiron turns and waves him over to the table. “Here,” he
says as he hands him a note that was lying on the table. Taking the
note, he reads what’s written on it:

James,

Take this necklace, it will prove useful in
the days ahead,

Lyria

He looks around and Jiron says, “She’s not
here. I looked for her but she’s nowhere on the island. The boat’s
still here though.”

Over on a side table is stacked a bunch of
fruit and roots, “I guess we’re suppose to take those with us?” he
assumes. The idea of having something more than meat makes his
mouth water.

“It looks that way,” Jiron replies. “They
weren’t there last night.” And then he indicates where three
jackets and a tunic are lying on another small stand against the
wall.

James examines the necklace for a moment, a
leather string with beads and a four inch length of braided hair
hanging from the middle. “Wonder what this is for?” he asks.

Shrugging, Jiron says, “A charm
perhaps?”

“I don’t think so,” replies James. “There’s
no magic to it.” He looks at it for a moment more before putting it
into his belt pouch. Looking over to Miko who’s still sleeping, he
says, “Guess we better wake him and get going.”

Jiron gets up and goes over, nudging him
with his foot.

Snapping awake, Miko sits up and looks
around, at first disoriented. Then he sees the stacked food on the
side table and gets up as he makes his way over to them. “Is this
for us?” he asks, turning slightly toward James.

“We think so,” he replies.

Taking several of the fruits and a couple
roots, he brings them over to the table and commences eating. He
suddenly looks around and asks, “Where is she?”

“Don’t know,” Jiron tells him. “She was gone
when I woke up.”

“Too bad,” he says through a mouth full of
fruit. “I kind of liked her.” Then he notices the tunic and
jackets. Going over to them, he takes the tunic and slips it over
his head glad to have one on again. He’s been bare-chested ever
since his old one had been used for James’ leg. “A perfect fit,” he
announces. Then he takes one of the jackets and puts it on as well.
When he finds it’s too big, he looks through the other two until he
comes across one that will fit him. He brings the others over to
the table and hands them to Jiron and James.

The others try on the jackets and find them
to be good fits as well. Then they begin eating the fruit and roots
and when they’re done, clean up their mess leaving the place as
neat as they found it. They find a backpack of sorts sitting near
the fruit. Placing the fruit inside, James shoulders it as they
head outside where the boat is still tied to the dock.

“Hate leaving without saying goodbye,” Miko
says as he climbs into the boat.

“She understands, I’m sure,” James assures
him.

“I hope so, she sure was nice,” he says.

Allowing the others to get in first, Jiron
then unties the boat from the dock before jumping in. Pushing
themselves away from the dock, they begin drifting out onto the
lake. Jiron takes the oars and begins to row across the lake to the
north. The mountains on the northern shore loom large above
them.

They see where a river comes out of the
mountains and flows into the lake. Deciding that following the
river up into the mountains would be the best idea, Jiron aims the
boat so they’ll land several feet from where it enters the
lake.

Grounding the boat upon the shore, they get
out and Jiron looks at the boat and asks, “How is she going to get
it back?”

“I’m sure she’ll have little problem with
that,” James assures him.

“Hmmmm,” mutters Jiron.

As they begin making their way along the
river into the mountains, they’re immediately grateful for the warm
jackets that Lyria had supplied them. The air coming down off the
mountains is quite cold in the early morning hours. James wonders
how she could have gotten the jackets so fast and in the right
sizes. Or did she know more than she let on when they talked the
night before? Regardless, they have them now.

They make decent time as they follow the
river, the land adjacent to it is not very overgrown with bushes
and allows them to walk with little obstructions. Two hours after
they left the lake, they come to where the river cascades down a
series of waterfalls where the mountain rises abruptly ahead of
them.

Jiron goes first as he begins to ascend the
side of the mountain, using the bushes and trees growing along its
face for handholds and support.

Miko goes next with James bringing up the
rear, his leg feeling much better today after the rest of the night
before. The hillside is not seriously steep and they are able to
make it up with minimal problems. At the top, they discover the
waterfall to be the outflow of another small lake. Several
tributaries bring water to it from the surrounding mountains. One
small waterfall cascades down one side of the mountain, falling
into the lake as well.

They skirt around the lake and jump across
several small tributaries as they make their way to a larger one at
the far side. It’s much smaller than the river they followed after
disembarking from the boat.

With Jiron still leading the way away from
the small lake, they continue to follow alongside the stream as it
meanders its way further up into the mountains. They pause around
noon for a quick meal, the sun now high overhead.

Miko has removed his jacket, the tunic
giving him enough warmth in the midday sun. “Does anyone know where
we’re going?” he asks while eating some fruit.

“North,” James tells him. “I doubt if anyone
will be able to find us up here in the mountains.”

“Let’s hope not,” Jiron says. “If we follow
the mountains, and stay away from the roads, we may be able to make
it a fair ways before trouble finds us again.”

Finishing their meal, they resume following
the stream. Miko’s arms get tired from carrying the crossbow but he
just grits his teeth and continues on. No matter how tired he gets
from carrying it, he’s not about to lose it. If trouble happens, he
wants to be more help than he was last time.

The sword at his waist, though, that’s
another matter. It isn’t long before he unhooks the belt and lets
it fall to the ground. As he walks away from it, Jiron says, “You
sure you want to do that?”

“I’m no good with it anyway,” he explains.
“If I use it in a fight, I probably would end up killing myself.”
He hefts the crossbow and continues, “I’ll stick with this for
now.”