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“Bryn has to deal with a lot of us. There’s new whelps coming all the time…”
“Not so much since the war stopped. Hardly see a new orphan in six new moons,” Elise pointed out.
“And that is a good thing. Bryn deals with problems. That’s what I am. I’m not special. I’m just a problem. Bigger than most. But I won’t be now. I’ll be gone, and he’ll have more time for you.”
“I don’t need Bryn’s attention. I’m not some baby whelp still wetting the bed. I’m just saying he always treated you differently. Because you’re special.”
Hail fell silent. There was no point arguing with Elise over not being special. Elise was convinced of it. She was convinced that she was less important than all other inhabitants of Bryn’s little den. There was no telling her that she was intelligent, or beautiful, or that she possessed any positive quality whatsoever because she would simply refuse to believe it.
They kept on walking, Hail planning her no doubt glorious future. “You should pay close attention,” she said to Elise. “A great many things will be taking place, and we will want to be able to recount those tales to others when we are famous.”
“When you are famous,” Elise muttered. “I will never be famous.”
“Not with that attitude,” Hail agreed. “You never know, if you become practiced enough at retelling my stories, you might end up becoming renowned for the tales. Glory is always reflected on those who are…”
“The most shiny?” Elise tried to anticipate what Hail was getting at and failed almost immediately.
“It is getting cold,” Hail noted. “You didn’t bring anything with you. You don’t have a cloak to keep yourself warm.”
“Well, I couldn’t exactly pack, could I? I saw you striding down the road with all your belongings and I just knew in my gut you were going for the last time.”
Elise had many gut feelings, and they were more often than not accurate. It was a gift, not that she ever got any credit for it. Bryn didn’t believe in encouraging special talents that had even a whiff of magic about them.
“The last time?”
“Yes. I knew you would never be coming back. I had to follow you. I had to make sure you were okay. Especially as Bryn wasn’t going to go after you.”
“You knew that too, did you?”
“He shut himself away in a bad temper. That was what made me come looking for you. I had a feeling…”
They were still walking, but suddenly the night was closing in around them ever more swiftly. Day seemed to give way to dark very readily around Mount Eternal, almost as if the natural order of sun and moon had no place there.
Elise began to shiver. Hail considered offering her a spare cloak, but she had not much in the way of spare clothing, and there were other ways to deal with inclement conditions.
“It’s so dark. And so cold. And we have neither matches nor kindling, nor flint, nor…”
“We need none of them,” Hail said rather proudly. “I have a spell which can conjure fire and warmth anywhere you might need it.”
“I don’t know, Hail,” Elise said dubiously. “That doesn’t sound safe. I don’t know much about magic, but I know you don’t get something for nothing. If you ain’t burning wood, then what are you burning?”
Hail had never really thought about that aspect before. “There’s endless magic,” she said. “When you have the gift, as I have, you can access a pool which stretches from here into infinity.”
“Oh.”
Hail wasn’t precisely sure that was true, but it sounded true enough and that was all that mattered.
She concentrated on the palms of her hands, willing heat to grow between them. Intention. That was what was most important. Wanting the fire to exist. Feeling its existence before it even began to be.
FWOMP!
The fire burst from her hands in a great ball and whisked itself toward the nearest source of nourishment, which happened to be a tree. The lower branches caught first and the conflagration quickly spread up the trunk to the very tips, cones cracking and popping as the flames encompassed them.
“Is that what you wanted to do? Start a forest fire?”
“No.”
The forest did not catch fire. The flames ripped swiftly through the tree and then just sort of burned conveniently, like a beacon.
“Come on,” Hail said. “We need to find some shelter. If we walk through the night we will be easy prey for creatures which see better in it than we do.”
As fortune would have it, the light from the tree fire followed them far enough to make out the shadows and the shapes of the abandoned town of Old Rahvin in the near distance.
“Don’t worry. I’ll set another, larger fire soon,” Hail promised Elise, feeling the younger woman draw close to her for comfort.
