“And the two boys with you?” quizzed MistyTrail. “Are they wanted as well?”
“Syman and Antello?” Lyra murmured wondering where they were. “You have not harmed them, have you?”
MistyTrail merely shook her head and waited for the answer.
“They have pledged to see me to Alamar,” she explained. “The invaders will kill them when they catch us. I owe my life to them.”
“A price you may pay all too soon,” MistyTrail remarked. “That is a strange ring you wear. Where did you get it?”
Lyra held her hand up again and looked at the blackened ring. “My mother gave it to me,” answered Lyra. “I guess she didn’t have anything else worth giving me. It looks ruined now.”
“Where did your mother…” MistyTrail started to ask when she heard one of the boys returning. “Say nothing about me,” she whispered to Lyra. “Nothing. Your life depends upon it.”
MistyTrail moved so swiftly that Lyra was unable to turn fast enough to see where she went. Antello arrived a few moments later, humming a tune and carrying half a dozen fish on a string.
“Ah so you are awake,” he greeted her merrily. “I have captured some dinner. How are you feeling?”
Lyra was so happy to see her friend that she threw off the blanket and raced to hug him. Antello was surprised to see such affection from Lyra, but his mouth gaped open when he saw the bandages lying on the ground where Lyra had been sleeping. He dropped the fish and pushed her away just far enough to see her hand.
“What? How?” Antello babbled as he shook his head. “Your hand. Your hand is not hurt?”
Lyra held it up for him to see and then embraced him again. “No it is fine,” she stated. “Guess it looked worse than it was. It feels pretty good. Can we have a fire to cook the fish?”
“You must have used magic on it,” Antello guessed. “Only magic could explain that quick a recovery.”
Lyra broke the embrace and picked up the fish. “Magic, yes. Only magic could heal it so quickly. Where is Syman?”
“He is off hunting,” Antello replied distractedly as he stared at her hand again.
Lyra’s thoughts shot through her mind like a pile of leaves in a windstorm. This was too complex to be a dream and therefore it was real. The smell of the fish was real. The feel of Antello was real. This was too much for a dream. What then was Misty? That means she was real too. Was she human? Looked human except for the ears. Maybe they were just a defect. She had known people born with stranger ailments. Sakovan! Misty was one of the Sakovan. A cannibal. Could one’s ears be affected by eating other people? Why did she want to know about Lyra? Because they had trespassed on Sakovan land, she realized.
Lyra handed the fish to Antello and sank to her blanket without comment. Why had Misty asked her questions though? If they were guilty of trespassing, why weren’t they just killed and eaten like the stories said? Why had Misty healed her hand? None of this made any sense, but she knew that there was an answer to the riddle if she looked deep enough.
Lyra rose and headed for the stream. “I am going to bathe, Antello,” she said. “I will be back shortly.”
She didn’t wait for a response, but headed for the stream and stripped off her still damp clothes. The water was cold, but it was refreshing to rid herself of the grime she had been carrying. She replayed Misty’s questions over and over in her mind as she scraped river sand over her body. The questions Misty had asked were not terribly important. So why had she revealed herself to ask them? And reveal herself she did, because Lyra was sure that Misty was the entity that had been stalking them for the last few days. She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she was certain. She certainly matched the vague description that Antello had given some days ago.
Who are you? Why are you here? Who are the two boys? Where are you going? Where did you get the ring? Who was your mother? “Mother!” Lyra exclaimed out loud. The dream. Those were the same questions that Rhodella had been asking in her dreams and she thought it strange that Rhodella had not known the answers. Of course. Somehow Misty had been asking those questions for the last two nights, probably through some use of magic. That meant that Misty had been following them to get the answers to those questions.
Lyra finished washing and picked up her clothes and walked to the large protruding rock she had burnt her hand on. She spread her clothes out in the sun and lay down next to them.
The answers to the questions were obviously important to Misty, but why? If she was a Sakovan, and what else would she be, then why should she care about the reasons for her next meal coming into the Sakova? And why the interest in the ring Rhodella had given her?
Lyra looked at the blackened ring. Some of the darkness had come off when she bathed and she thought she should try to clean the rest of it while she was near a stream. She rose and went down to the edge of the stream. She felt her hand before attempting to remove the ring to make sure the areas that was blistered would not be hurt. She marveled at how smooth her skin was, when only moments ago it was all puffed up with blisters. She easily slipped the ring off to wash it and froze, nearly dropping the ring into the stream because of her shock. The ring had a sparkling blue stone of high quality inset in the center. The stone was in the shape of a five-pointed star and when she removed the ring, her finger underneath bore a blue five-pointed star.
She lowered her hands into the water and scrubbed both the ring and her finger with the river sand. She shook her head as the ring cleaned up nicely, but her finger retained the star. She scrubbed her finger again and again, but the star persisted. She wondered how hot the ring must have been to scar her hand so, but she quickly rejected such nonsense. The star on her finger was unlike any tattoo she had ever seen. It was not just a blue scarring of her flesh, but her skin was like the gem on the ring. She held her finger up so that the sunlight struck it and the light reflected off of the blue star as it would off the stone in the ring. She gently felt the aberration on her finger and it felt like skin, but it looked and acted like a gem. Unsure of what could have caused this to happen, she quickly slid the ring back on over her star scarred finger.
Lyra returned to the rock to finish drying and shook her head in wonderment. She could not even be sure that the star was not already on her finger before the magic accident. She hadn’t had the ring off since the night her chain was stolen. That was probably Misty too, she realized. It dawned on her that Misty had been following them ever since they entered the Sakova. So why hadn’t they been killed like the invaders had been? The questions of course! The Sakovans were not sure who they were, but there was no doubt about who the invaders were. The invaders offered a serious and obvious threat to the Sakovans, but Lyra and her friends did not. That did not mean that they would not be killed, just that the Sakovans had not made up their minds yet. And the ring had something to do with their indecision.
Lyra continued to work on the puzzle while she dressed, feeling excited that she was finally making some sense out of it. They hadn’t been killed because not everyone to enter the Sakova was a trespasser. That was obvious because if it was not true, there would be no need for any questions and they would already be dead. That meant that the ring had something to do with being allowed to enter the Sakova, but the ring alone was not enough or they would not be asking questions. The only plausible answer was the ring in the possession of an acceptable person. So who was an acceptable person? Did it matter, she asked herself. If she was acceptable, then they would not stop her from leaving. If she was not acceptable, then they had better leave quickly. Either way, their only course of action, was to get out of the Sakova as quickly as possible.
Swiftly Lyra finished dressing and ran back to her blanket. Syman had returned from hunting and had three rabbits. They both turned to look at her as she sped into the makeshift campsite. “Pack up, now!” she exclaimed. “We are leaving immediately. No questions. No arguments. Just do it.”