One of the crows grabbed the arrows, and they took off clustered together. Even knowing that the arrows were there, Maia couldn’t see them.
Maia didn’t know how many days passed before the crows returned with a healer. Clyton’s leg was obviously hurting, and Samina, despite Maia’s—and Dexter’s—best efforts, became feverish and delirious. Maia collected several bruises trying to care for her. She wondered, when she had a moment to think, if she would have done a better job if she actually knew anything about healing. “Just keep her alive till the Healer gets here,” she told herself. “That’s what matters.”
Finally she heard the chatter of crows escorting the healer. A woman in green robes arrived in the clearing riding double with another person dressed in white and riding a white horse, presumably another Herald and Companion.
The crows were all talking at once, telling her all about their adventure, but Maia was too tired to care. As soon as she finished telling the Healer what little she knew and what little she had done and explaining to the new Herald what she knew about the attack, she fell asleep and didn’t wake for days. By then the military units had rounded up her brother and his fellow bandits and taken them away for trial. The Healer explained that Maia would not be needed for the trial as she had not been present during the attack.
“I guess I’d sound pretty silly telling a judge that I saw the attack hours later through the eyes of a horse,” Maia told Samina later. Samina was recovering, but the Healer didn’t want her to move yet, so she encouraged Maia to sit and talk to her. Clyton was doing better also, but he still wasn’t up to galloping at top speed while carrying a rider, so they were still camping in the safety of Sorrows. It was a much more comfortable camp now; someone had brought three mules and a load of actual camping supplies, so they were no longer making do with what Maia had been able to scrounge from the Waystation.
Samina looked sharply at her. “You can see through Clyton’s eyes?”
“Only when he wants to show me something,” Maia clarified, “but when he does, I can see what he saw.”
“And you can communicate with the raccoon . . .”
“His name is Dexter,” Maia said.
“ . . . and the crows. Anything else?”
Maia shrugged. “I can understand pretty much anything that wants to talk to me. Why?”
Samina smiled. “It’s one of the Gifts. We Heralds call it Mindspeech. It appears that you have a strong aptitude for it.” She paused, and then asked, “Could you hear your brother?”
Maia shook her head. “Just animals. And Clyton. I didn’t even know that my brother wasn’t supporting us by selling the arrows I made, the way he told me. He was using them to rob people.” She frowned in thought. “Does that mean that my arrows aren’t good enough to sell?”
“I though they were very effective,” Samina said dryly. “They certainly made an impression on me.” Her face was straight, but Maia could tell that she was joking.
“Several impressions,” Maia agreed, keeping her face straight and as innocent as possible. “But I didn’t put the barbs on them,” she added quickly. “Did Clyton tell you that?”
“He did,” Samina reassured her. “He also said that you saved my life.”
“It was the least I could do, after having made the arrows that nearly killed you.” Maia shrugged off the praise and returned to her original subject. “I notice that you carry arrows. If my arrows are good enough, can the Heralds use a fletcher?”
“I’m sure we can find a place for you.” Samina smiled. “Are you saying that you want to go back to Haven with us?”
“Can Dexter and any of the crows who want to come with me?”
“I don’t see why not,” Samina said. “I’ve brought back stranger things from my travels. Are you really certain that you want to leave your home?”
Maia nodded. “I wasn’t raised alone in the forest; that happened after my parents died and my brother antagonized all our neighbors. I didn’t know why everyone suddenly hated him—and me—but now that I do, I think it will be better for everyone if I leave here.”
“Then you can come with us as soon as Clyton and I can travel,” Samina said.
The Healer had done some work on Clyton, and he was walking normally now. It looked as though the flesh Maia had accidentally gouged out of his leg was going to heal completely without so much as a scar.
The crows were still telling stories of their trip to the temple; they had been ever since their return. They appeared to regard it as a great adventure.
Samina smiled as she watched Maia listen to them. “What are they saying?” she asked.
“They’re telling stories,” Maia said. “It’s hard to sort out and put into words.”
“Did you know that there are two name for a flock of crows?” Samina asked.
“No,” Maia admitted. “Most of the villagers called them a nuisance, but I never thought of them that way.”
“They’re often called a ‘murder of crows,’ but yours saved my life, so that’s not right for them.” Samina grinned. “These are obviously the other kind: a ‘story-telling of crows’.”
“I do talk with them a lot,” Maia admitted, “and they certainly talk back.”
“You know,” Samina said. “I think you’re wasted as a fletcher—not that you aren’t good at it,” she added hastily, “but there are more good fletchers than there are people with Animal Mindspeech.”
“So you think I should do something else?” Maia asked uncertainly. “What?”
Samina smiled and took Maia’s hand. “There’s a Temple in Haven that would kill to have you—if all its priests weren’t such gentle and peaceful souls.”
“There’s a temple that would want me?” Maia said in astonishment. “What kind of temple is that?”
“The Temple of Thenoth, the Lord of the Beasts.”
:It does sound like your kind of place.: Dexter’s mental voice was encouraging. Maia started laughing.
“Yes,” she agreed, “that does sound like a place I could fit in.”
Waiting To Belong
by Kristin Schwengel
Kristin Schwengel’s work has appeared in two of the previous Valdemar short story anthologies, among others. She and her husband live near Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and recently adopted a gray- and-black tabby kitten named (what else?) Gandalf. Kristin divides her time between an administrative job, a growing career as a massage therapist, and writing and other pastimes.
When the Companion had come to Breyburn, folk had gathered in the square, though no one had raised any summoning cry. Nearly the whole of the town was there to see who would be Chosen when the dazzling white horse trotted into the square, gleaming harness-bells jingling and dancing in the late afternoon light.
Not that anyone truly doubted for whom the Companion had come on Search. No one was surprised to see Teo standing to the front of the crowd, framed by his family, staring at the Companion with a dumbstruck, delirious smile. His joy shone from every fiber of his being, so strong Shia could have sworn that she felt it too, rippling through her in waves.
Shia had turned her gaze away at the last moment before the Companion brushed its (no, her) soft nose against Teo’s, incandescent blue eyes meeting guileless brown even as their minds spoke. To Shia, it had seemed too intimate a moment to be observed—never mind that the rest of the town was staring avidly. She could not watch it.