Free Eolyn by Karin Rita Gastreich Page A

“and as for their parents, what treachery is there in tending chickens and harvesting grain?”
    “I do not know, Eolyn. All I am saying is he must have had a reason. Sending the Riders upon a village is not a decision the King makes lightly. There must have been some justification.”
    “What possible justification could there have been?” Her voice broke like a clap of thunder.
    When Akmael offered nothing in response, Eolyn sank to the ground and began to weep.
    Akmael had known Eolyn in many moods, but he had never witnessed this core of pain and anger. Then again, he had never asked why she lived so deep inside the forest with only an old witch for company, or what had happened to her real family.
    Now with the truth laid out on the carpet of her tears, he felt torn between the loyalty he sustained toward his father and the brutal consequences of the King’s justice.
    Sheathing the sword, Akmael approached Eolyn and knelt down beside her. “Eolyn.”
    “Don’t you dare tell me it’s my fault!”
    “Your fault?”
    “That’s what you think!” Eolyn’s sobs coursed through her body in harsh shudders. “It’s what you said!”
    “What I said?”
    “You said women’s magic invokes tears and bloodshed. You said magas bring death upon their families, even upon their own sisters. But it wasn’t my fault! I only knew Simple Magic back then. And even if I had known what I know now, what’s wrong with that? With who I am? How can something so beautiful be wrong ?”
    Her words lost their way in a renewed round of tears.
    Akmael sat back, uncertain how to respond.
    Yes, he had said that, though he could not quite remember when. But he had not meant to hurt Eolyn, only to warn her about the dangers of women’s magic.
    He placed a tentative hand on her shoulder. “Eolyn, the attack on your village was not your fault. I don’t know why the Riders came, but it could not have been because of you.”
    That much was certainly true. No hamlet had ever been punished just because one girl knew a few medicinal plants.
    Eolyn’s weeping wavered, fell, and rose again.
    Akmael was reminded of the lamentations of his own mother, which haunted the shadows of his early childhood.
    “I lost my mother, you know.” His voice sounded small. He’d never spoken about this to anyone, not even his father. “She died defending me and I saw her fall. I had not yet seen eleven summers, but I blamed myself for her murder. I thought I should have been able to protect her, but I couldn’t. It still gives me bad dreams, sometimes.”
    The tremor in Eolyn’s shoulders faded.
    Encouraged by her response, Akmael continued, “I’m not saying it’s comparable to your loss. I mean, how can one grief be weighed against another? But I think I understand something of what you experienced.”
    For a moment Eolyn’s sobs intensified. Akmael drew her close and inhaled the honey-and-wood scent of her hair. Embracing her like this gave him a sense of warmth and completion.
    “I’m sorry the Riders destroyed your village, Eolyn. I’m sorry they took away your family. If there were a magic in this world that would allow me to undo what was done, I would.”
    At last Eolyn stopped crying. She wiped the tears from her cheeks and tried to recapture her spirit with unsteady breaths. She lifted her earth brown eyes to his. Short sniffles interrupted her words.
    “I’m sorry about your mother, Achim. I didn’t know. I’m so sorry you lost her. I would bring her back, if I could. I would bring her back for you.”

 
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
    C hapter Nine

Winter Vigil
     
    Eolyn flattened a scrap of paper crafted from plant fibers and bay leaves. Taking a piece of charcoal from the edge of the hearth, she wrote a wish in sacred symbols. Then, with the hot fire warming her face, she folded the paper three times and offered it to the flames.
    “May the Gods see honor in my desire,” she said. “May my hopes for the future guide the sun