Scars of the Earth (14 page)

“But how is that possible?” She asked turning to him.

His strong features were highlighted against the firelight, casting sinister shadows. His face looked hollow and angry, an empty shell of the person she knew. Amanda would have been frightened if that look were on anyone else’s face, but seeing it on his just tore at her heart.

She thought that he looked like he was a million miles away, unaware that the two ladies were even having a conversation, until she noticed the strange set of his mouth. He was biting down hard on his lower lip as the rest of his mouth seemed to fight against it. Madgie sucked in a loud breath.

“Good lord he is trying to speak!” She shouted.

Amanda thought it just as Madgie said it, because she could now feel the internal struggle that Cole was fighting through. His spirit was lashing out against a dark blanket that wouldn’t lift itself from him. His face was red with effort and a line of blood crept down his chin from the corner of his mouth.

“Stop!” Amanda shouted and grabbed his face when he didn’t listen. “You do not need to fight it Cole. I don’t know what you are trying to say, but we can work it out later. You need to keep your strength.” Cole nodded his head and his face relaxed. Madgie sighed in relief.

“Wow that is some silencing hex you have on you boy, I thought you would pass out. The Ancients do that to you?” Madgie asked. Cole didn’t, or couldn’t respond, which was answer enough for Madgie.

“So it is true? All of the things that we have heard over the years and dismissed as lies.” Madgie looked to be on the verge of tears or ready to hit something, Amanda wasn’t sure which it was.

“How could they do that to young boys?” Madgie whispered.

Amanda was still studying Cole wondering what could have happened to him. When his haunted eyes met hers she lurched forward and embraced him, hoping if she held him tight enough nothing in the world could hurt him. He gently caressed the back of her head as she held him, nuzzling his face into her neck.

“Good God, I am fine Amanda.” He said with a smile.

“You know, if I had known that my…painful experiences would render this kind of affection I would have told you years ago.”

Amanda released him and looked into his eyes; they were back to the bright happy things that she knew.

“Really?” She asked surprised.

“Obviously not I can’t even…” He made a strange face again.

Talk about it now. That is what he is trying to say. She thought.

“Well Madgie let’s see what you know. It might help Amanda understand what we have coming.” Cole said.

“Ok.” Said Madgie. “Since you know nothing about the Guard, I guess I’ll begin at their creation. Which was after Shiphra fled.”

Amanda was about to ask: Why then, how did it happen, what does Shiphra have to do with all of this? But she decided against it, letting Madgie go on uninterrupted. “The other Ancients were horrified when they couldn’t find her. They devoted all of their time to tracking her but it’s hard to find someone as crafty as she is on a planet this size. So they rose up the Guard so that she would be forever hunted, always fleeing. They feared that she would rise up an army of her own if given the chance, so they made sure that she was never in one spot long enough to do that.” Madgie shifted her weight trying to get comfortable on the hard ground.

“Back then the Guard was much more than it is today. Every male child was trained, I guess tortured would be a better word for it, to be a member of the Guard. They were subjected to black magic and shock treatments until the Ancients approved of them. Most of the Guard members have a light so dim it is hard to even tell that they are Healers, which I guess is the point. Shiphra couldn’t see them coming, or so they thought.”

“That is terrible.” Amanda gasped. “They did that to twelve year old boys? Just to keep Shiphra on her toes! Tortured them until they…”

Amanda realized that this is what Cole had been subjected to, probably during the years that she deserted the Hovel.

I was running around the country while he was tortured? She thought feeling like she had been kicked in the stomach. She had always felt terribly guilty for those two years of self pity. But that guilt was nothing compared to what she felt at this moment. She had abandoned him when he needed her most, the little boy that was the first to show her kindness at the Hovel.

Amanda thought back to the day after the dredging. The new Healers were ushered into the dinning hall. Every child, including her, took a seat. Not wanting to eat so full of fear and uncertainty. Only one child remained standing. A dark haired boy was looking around the room searching for something, and then his eyes met hers. She’d never known what he had seen in her eyes, but he made a b-line for the table. The tight curls on his head bouncing up and down as he moved, his hair was even curlier when he was young.

Cole made a bit of a mess as he served himself a bowl of soup and walked over to Amanda with it held aloft. He placed it in front of her slowly and sat down across from her. All of the children followed suit and soon they were all eating. Except Cole, he was making her smile and making sure that she ate. She had always wondered why, out of all of the children there, he had chosen to set that bowl of soup in front of her.

Maybe I looked the most frightened. She thought. Amanda was looking at Cole when Madgie confirmed her realization.

“Yes, that is what Cole went through. Lucky his light is so bright that they couldn’t extinguish it, they had to release him from the Guard, but not before they silenced him as you can see.” Madgie said.

“How do you know that I am choosing not to speak of my own accord? Maybe I didn’t want her to have to think about me…going through that.” He said.

“Sorry, sorry, but you can not protect her from this any longer. Where was I? Oh yes, so they had what they wanted but Healers around the world were starting to become concerned about it. Too many Healers were no longer doing their job. Scars need to be healed or, as you know, the world becomes unbalanced and falls into darkness. It had happened before then, the bubonic plague wiped out so many healers. There just weren’t enough of us left to keep the balance; historians now refer to that time as the dark ages.” Amanda was taken by surprise. She had heard it preached at the Hovel, but she never realized how essential Healers were to the world.

“So as the Guard got bigger the world became darker. And as they hunted Shiphra, World War one started and ended and World War two began in its place. Thousands upon thousands of men and women and children were being slaughtered like animals. Awful things that we had never seen before were happening in the world. Things that made us cry, and made us beg God to restore balance.”

“The wars left more Scars behind then we could heal, and it seemed that the world was destined to end. But the Healers rose up and told the Ancients in one voice that their Guard needed to be downsized and return to their duties of healing. The Ancients came up with the idea of the dredging to increase our numbers.”

“It hasn’t always been that way?” Amanda gasped.

“No, no. Before that time we found Healers and told them what they were and where to find us if they chose to be around those like them. They came in their own time, sometimes in youth sometimes old age, but they always came. When that didn’t even restore balance the Ancients obliged. Most likely because they were satisfied that Shiphra would not rise up. At the time most thought that it was kindness on their part, so selfless and understanding of them to give up their army. How foolish of us.” Madgie looked disgusted at herself as she thought back to the days she was speaking of, seeing her look that way filled Amanda with rage at the Ancients for taking advantage of the innocent.

How easy it must have been to have gained power over the Healers, they are so naturally kind, peaceful, and trusting. Amanda thought venomously.

“It isn’t your fault Madgie! You aren’t foolish for trusting those that you are supposed to be able to trust. I think that the reason they shrunk their Guard wasn’t because they were done with Shiphra. I doubt that they are ever done with those who speak out against them. They downsized it because you came together; all of the Healers came together and said no to them. No more. Well I have only been alive for seventeen years and I can’t take it anymore. I don’t know how you have lasted this long under their reign. Maybe we should be finding Shiphra for more than one reason; I think that she will agree when I tell her that it is time to end it.” She finished defiantly.

Chapter 13

Amanda looked up and saw a twisted dead tree on the hill top with a small figure at its side. The tree’s white fingers were a stark contrast to the dark sky. She glanced behind her and saw her pressures closing in. Wiping away the wet hair clinging to her face she ran as fast as her feet would carry her across the soggy terrain. Lightning cracked above her head and she studied the angry clouds, she had never seen the sky so black at mid-day. Digging her toes into the muddy hill she began her climb.

“Help!” The girl cried out. The small voice was like an arrow to her heart.

Kaedin! I need to be faster! She thought as she slowly made her way to the top of the hill.

She knew that if she could just reach her she would be at peace again. She heard a noise beneath her and saw that the hill was surrounded by cloaked figures. All of her enemies’ faces were hidden beneath heavy hoods, save one. He towered above the Guard members and his light shone brightly in the gloom.

“Baal.” She whispered.

He smiled up at her with pointed teeth.

She was temporarily blinded as lightning struck the tree. Her vision came back as she flew through the air out of breath. The large tree was split in half and fire climbed its white bark. Carter stood hunched in the space Kaedin had occupied, acid burned flesh running down his body like candle wax. He moved toward her with jagged uneven steps.

“Murderer!” He bellowed, glaring at her with blood shot red eyes.

“No, no. I didn’t mean to.” She cried out closing her eyes.

“Open your eyes and look at what you did to me!” He demanded. When she opened her eyes he had closed the twenty yard distance between them and was bent over her shaking body, skinless fingers outstretched.

She awoke breathing heavily. She was glad to find herself safely sandwiched between Cole and her wolf’s warm bodies.

I did that to him, I am a murderer. She thought.

It wasn’t easy to shrug off the fear and defeat that her dream had brought, but she felt safe next to Cole and her wolf. She had slept like a log-which was fitting because they had to sleep on the forest floor. She felt more than rested rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she felt strong.

She stretched her arms into the air and arched her back. Slits of sun light sliced through the foliage and drew a pattern of stripes across her skin. She studied them and wondered why they seemed so strange, this wasn’t an unusual occurrence. Light and shadows drew patterns over everything coloring the world one way then changing it completely with the drifting of a cloud. Her mind was on the verge of understanding why there was something off when Cole spoke to her.

“What is going on with you? Do you know, or is it as big a mystery to you as it is to me?” She jumped at his voice, either because she had thought he was asleep or was startled by his question.

“What do you mean?” She asked as he rolled to face her.

“I saw Carter’s spell hit you Amanda. I saw it break your skin I heard you cry out in pain, and now all I see is a hole in your shirt…” He put his hands on her shirt, his fingers lightly kissing the charred fabric. “Burnt around the edges.” He paused clearing his throat and removing his hand. She wasn’t sure, but she thought that she saw something other than worry burning behind his eyes.

“You ran into that cloud of acid and came out of it miraculously fine, other than your minor burns. Which by the way are completely healed.”

She looked down at her palm and understood why it had looked strange to her earlier, the burns were gone. Her hand almost seemed normal, even the poison in her veins had faded. She threw off Cole’s cloak and drew her shirt up exposing her toned midsection. Her skin now looked paler than normal but not grotesque. Cole had frozen at the sight of her bare skin; apparently she looked far from grotesque to him.

“Can you believe this?” She exclaimed in happy surprise. Beneath her the large rib cage of her wolf heaved in and out in a calm breathing pattern, and she knew why she was healed. She understood why she felt so strong but wasn’t sure that she could explain it to Cole. She truly didn’t understand why this wolf was with her or what he really was.

“No I can’t.” He said reaching over and pulling her shirt back down and shaking his head back into the conversation.

“I don’t really know what is going on with me Cole; I wish I understood so that I could tell you. I know that all of this must seem extremely strange, but you don’t need to worry. I’m still me, beneath all of the demonic poison and mystical healing.” Amanda cringed back, hoping that her words came across better then they sounded to her ears.

“Demonic poison and mystical healing?” Cole said in a thoughtful voice. “Yes you are definitely yourself, no one but you could make an attempt at reassurance sound like an argument against yourself.” He said with a smile in his voice.

Her cheeks flushed red and she tried to hide her face but he lifted her chin up. She felt a little relieved when she saw a huge smile stretched across his face. His shoulders were shaking as he tried not to laugh.

“Go ahead and laugh!” She said throwing her arms in the air.

Cole didn’t hesitate at all. His rolling laughter lifted her heart so much that she joined in. They laughed together. The strong care free laughter that hurts the sides, the laugh that only those you are comfortable with ever get to hear. Then Madgie woke in a fit. Amanda had never seen her in such a state, half asleep and hair like a lion’s mane. She started shouting at them for “Being young and able to sleep on the forest floor.” This only fueled their laughter.