Free The Keeper's Shadow by Dennis Foon

Apsara’s true home; there the rock can shield you.”
    â€œI thought we were going to Roan.”
    â€œHe is there, but the journey is long. I had hoped you could regain some of your strength before we continued but you’re too vulnerable here to stay. We will leave. Today. Rest while I make preparations.”
    Unable to bear his sadness, she turns away. Still, she can’t help but hear the heaviness of heart in his every step as he leaves her.
    Willum says her brother is with the Apsara; if Roan is there, then surely that is the safest place to be. Does Roan have dreams like hers, she wonders? Visions of a monster constantly seeking him out, wanting to consume him?
    â€œNo,” Mabatan snaps. She knew Willum would be proposing something unpleasant when he’d led her to the outskirts of the village’s busy market. “What you are asking is dangerous. It’s beyond my abilities.”
    â€œVery little is beyond your abilities, Mabatan.”
    â€œShe is a Dirt Eater, Willum.”
    â€œThat door is no longer open to her.”
    â€œI do not trust Dirt Eaters. I cannot.”
    â€œPerhaps not. But you trust in the path. You must open yourself to what it offers, Mabatan.” Willum pauses to glance at a stand displaying stacks of antique photos and picture postcards. Mabatan knows he’s waiting for her to agree. But she cannot guide the healer through the cleansing on her own. It is not possible.
    Willum holds up a picture of a man and a woman posing in front of a gigantic tree. “These trees may return one day. We might stand before them like these two…if we defeat Darius.”
    Mabatan takes the picture from his hand and gives it back to the vendor. “And what has our succeeding to do with the Dirt Eater?”
    â€œHer name is Alandra. She is not evil, Mabatan. She was only a child when the Dirt Eaters found her. She was sick, alone, and afraid.”
    â€œThat is the past. Roan warned her, Willum; still she remained with them. And right now, there is so much Dirt in her system, it will be easy for the Dirt Eaters to walk in her dreams. What will she do then, Willum? What will she tell them?”
    Turning to face her, Willum grips her shoulders. “That is what you need to discover. If you can find a way to trust her, Mabatan, then we can be sure she will work with us. She saved the Novakin once, gave up a great deal of her spirit to do it. She is linked to them, perhaps in ways we cannot understand. She is deep in her sickness, her behavior too erratic to make travel with her safe—and I must travel quickly if Stowe is to survive.”
    Mabatan’s father had warned her that trusting the path and allowing it to lead her would often be difficult. Perhaps the future will reveal truths that she now finds impossible to imagine…and she can see that Willum will not be swayed. She slowly nods her head in agreement. “I pray you both reach your home safely.”
    Willum’s smile is grim. “I have no choice. You too will accomplish your task, Mabatan. Because you must.”
    â€œWhat do I do if she cannot be trusted?”
    Willum takes her hand, drawing her closer to him. “That you must put in the hands of the Apsara.”
    After he walks away, Mabatan picks up the picture of the giant tree. There is writing on the back. And though she cannot read it, she knows what the smiles of the people in the photograph are saying. “Look at us,” they say, “how can we be so small and this tree be so big? How can we be so young and it so old? Our flesh so weak, its wood so strong? And yet, despite all these things, we are its master.”
    The Wazya have planted the seeds. Some, even now, are being tended. Neither she nor Willum will live long enough to see them grow so tall. But perhaps if they all follow the path with open hearts, these giant trees will thrive once again, the Masters of today long gone into the earth