I lifted my fingers to the purple gem resting against my skin. Slipping my fingers over the cool surface, I tried to peer into the future. The invaders who killed Tristram’s father, they were coming, and if I was right, they were coming for me. Yet my father told me not to trust Tristram… but in my heart I knew it was my father that I did not trust.
I also knew, although I couldn’t explain it, that I needed to go with the invaders.
But if I left who would help the people here in the settlement? Who would protect them? Heal them?
Letting go of the necklace, I studied my hands. They looked as they always had, but I knew they could heal. I could sense it.
So. Plan. I would heal everyone I could, do everything I could before the enemy came for me.
I flung back the covers, determined to get ready for the day. Before I left, preparing to brave the chilled air and the frigid water put aside for washing, I glanced back at my bed where Alana, my sister, still softly slept. Her breath whispered shallow and even; her blonde hair fanning across the mattress like the light of the moon.
Discarding my cotton nightdress and pulling my warmest dress over my shoulders, I splashed water over my face, breathing in the fresh herbs that had been left to seep in the water overnight, then I stole out of the small house before I had a chance to be caught. I wanted to see if I could find Heather. I needed answers and I knew she would have more than my father. She’d guided me more than anyone else; her cryptic words always hinting at a deeper understanding of my power and abilities I hadn’t yet understood. I also wanted a chance to sit on the earth and to try to learn what I could of the coming days.
Time was passing too quick. A sense of approaching doom tightened my chest, making it near impossible to shake the feeling that Tristram and I were both going to die. My dreams had echoed it back to me. Although the images had been blurred—almost impossible to work out—the words of my dream had been clear, ‘I think we died on those stones’.
Slipping out into the dawn, I made my way to the stones, sure that they were waiting for me. I placed my hand on one and it thrummed under my palm, almost a deep pulling sensation like someone or something was tugging my hand. “I know,” I whispered, “but I don’t know what you are telling me.”
Settling on the ground, I folded my legs and rested my back against the stone. Closing my eyes, I felt inside me for the gold thread which tied my skill and magic with me. Father had explained that the old ways of magic were bound with gold. That gold ran in my veins. Those who lead, those who seek power but never truly own it, they were tied with a thread of red, their blood running with the crimson blood of man.
Tristram was red. I was gold. Yet my dreams were full of him like they’d always been, ever since childhood. Once we’d stood by the river and made a childish promise to one another. Could that promise now withstand the red of his blood and the gold of mine?
Feeling out of myself, using my senses to drive through the earth and extending my vision from what I could feel to what I could sense using the plants and trees with their interconnecting roots, I searched for a path that could save us all. No matter which way I sought a route of safety for us, all I found was the approach of the marching army from foreign shores. Men in red were coming for us, a steady arrow of marching soldiers sweeping across the land adjacent to ours. At their tip was the familiar black figure, her cloak sweeping behind as she forged a pathway of destruction towards me—her ultimate goal. I shrugged back, pushing against the stone. It warmed against me, heating my spine, gently vibrating. Taking in a deep breath, I prepared to open my eyes. To leave the vision behind and to start on my mission of the day, to heal my people, so I could have them fit and well to outrun the coming threat. Instead, the stone vibrated, and a loud keening screech split the air. Catching my breath, I clasped the purple pendant.
What was happening?
I looked above me where the sky stretched a vibrant blue and small clouds of candyfloss fluff floated across its wide expanse. Candyfloss? My eyes fell on the line of the trees from my forest finding them desperate and aged. They bent towards the ground as though they had long ago given up the strength of their roots to stand upright.
When I’d shut my eyes, my forest had been alive, bare with winter’s frosty touch, but alive. Now it was dead; decimated with age. Peering through the trees, I tried to seek out the distant smoke of the settlement waking. People would be rising now, and I should be there playing my part. A movement closer to hand caught my attention. My breath catching in my throat, I scurried against the stone.
His name escaped my mouth before I could stop it. “Tristram?”
“Mae? What are you doing here?”
He stepped towards me as my gaze fell from his face and onto his clothes. Instead of the tunic with its wide leather belt decorated with his hunting knife, his legs were encased in dark denim, his wide shoulders bore a top with a hood. His eyes though were the same. Dark with endless depths of soulful thoughtfulness. He was not the Tristram who’d carried me
