The Kine of Farnwen
THE KINE OF FARNWEN
Book One of The Anthem of Gaias
© 2015-2021 by Janet L. Hilbert
Prologue
The moon had set and the woods were nearly pitch dark. It would be another hour or two til sunrise. The only sounds rising from the forest were those of the nocturnal birds, the raptors and pink nightjays at their rounds. Occasional screeches from the hawks would be rejoined by the distinct “You. You there. I see you” call of the jays. Three women and eight men worked silently in the dark; they would not light a fire to guide them as it was folly to do so. They hauled crates – heavy, clinking with a swishing liquefied sound, and stacked them into the back of three small wagons. Better to use smaller, faster traps than to put all their goods in one basket, so to speak. There were horses for the rest of them; they'd have to ride escort of course to the meeting place. All were armed.
It had been a long night to cap off a long three months, but finally their efforts would pay off. The three drivers had been practicing guiding their teams of horses in pure darkness; they were ready. The largest of the women, tall but bent with years of labor, grey headed, wrinkled as an old apple, walked back into the dark and hidden building to make sure nothing had been left behind. All clear.
But as she met the threshold of the door on her way out, there was a sound, out of nowhere. A sort of thwack. She heard grunts, heard something fall heavy and wet to the ground. Someone lit a torch and she saw, with wide-eyed horror, that two of her compatriots lay dead on the ground, their throats having been slit in a single stroke. But the perpetrator was nowhere to be—no, there she was, having flipped from out of the darkness onto the stack of brandy crates nearest the middle wagon – just like that, instantly and soundlessly. White hot rapier in hand, something like a golden light surrounding her, terrible, fearsome. Hay coloured hair falling out in spots from the immaculately grey cap atop her head. Freckles against milk-white skin, a slight upward curve to her lip giving the only outward indication that she might be enjoying her task. Eyes of green so deep and luminous that they may have been concentrated moonlight. The woman felt her bowels give way but ignored it, falling to her knees in the soft black soil and raising up her hands in surrender.
Far across the Forests and the Sands, the sun had begun to rise on the eastern coast. A wiry, tanned woman sat alone, plainly attired, back against a tall and mud-covered edifice with her reddish brown hair gathered up neatly behind her. She'd been meditating and now stood, holding a staff and preparing to duel. Shortly she was joined by another, a man taller even than herself and nearly as slim. They bowed to one another and came up engaged. The woman's staff glowed brilliant silver-white and twirled about so quickly that it could only be perceived as a trace of flare. The duel was long, well-fought, but she was victorious in the end. Her sparring partner knelt before her, bowed his head, held his own staff horizontally in front of her. She bowed in return, shook his hand, helped him up, and they hugged briefly before walking towards a large, bustling village with an impressive port and noises and smells that were as exotic as they were reassuringly friendly. At the little city's edge, the sea, turquoise and flawless in the brand new light of morning, stretched into eternity.
Back in the forest, the would-be bootleggers now found themselves surrounded. “You'll not try to escape if you know what's best for you,” the deadly woman had announced. “By order of the Emperor, the Hand of Shaia now arrests you for illegal production and conspiracy to sell unlicensed alcohol.” Two dozen strong men wearing uniforms that matched hers, blue and grey, set about cuffing each of the group— The two corpses excluded, naturally. There would be no attempt at escape. The Captain's reputation ensured that. Jail awaited, but they each hoped they'd manage to escape the noose and simply have to perform service for the realm.
The woman from the coast, meanwhile, was now in her small room, her staff and a worn saffron cloak hung neatly on a peg set into the wall. The room was sand-colored, made of bricks like most of the buildings around, but it was brightly decorated. Anointed candles had been lit as well as an ancient incense, and the woman swept the thick rug in the room's middle, although it clearly did not need it. Then she knelt, head bowed at first, and something within her transformed, casting a blue-white sort of nimbus all around her. When the knock on the door came, she rose to answer it and a lady entered at her invitation. They sat for a few minutes, talking, at the table. Then down to the rug where the woman knelt behind her sitting guest. Something in this shaman's face looked more than human now, as if she were supplemented with a spirit and indeed it infused her from forehead to foot in a calming, blue-white hue. She bade her guest close her eyes and placed her hands on her shoulders. The bluish light began ever so slowly to seep into the patient's own body. While the guest appeared fully relaxed, something was definitely turbulent inside of her, and the blueness trailed through her from both her shoulders to meet somewhere in the middle, not far south of the heart, in the bowel. Where the two paths of light met, there was a popping sound and the woman groaned a bit, but let the shaman's grip on her continue.
The popping ceased and was replaced by purple and red hues as if the blue had intensified and warmed somehow. The color became more and more defined, indeed, so bright that it was too much to look upon, but just when it seemed the aura might actually burst something, it muted somewhat, turned green, then yellowish – the sulfurous hue of a boiled egg's yolk. It stayed that way for a time and the shaman bade the woman lie down. Then, without removing her other hand, she moved her right from shoulder slowly down to the affected area, and held it there. More blue-white light. Something sparkling. The feeling of a bubble bursting – painfully but mercifully brief. And then, like magic, the blue light spreading, uninhibited, throughout the patient's body. She sat up, smiled, glad tears staining her brown skin. She thanked the shaman profusely. Whatever had been eating at her, physically, spiritually, had dissipated. The shaman simply hugged her silently for a moment. When the woman left, she placed some things into an offering bowl; a few small coins, a cluster of dried herbs, an old ring.
The warrior shaman smiled to herself, sat at her table, and awaited the next business of her day. And in a tavern deep in the Forests of Doa, the young blue-tunic-clad Captain lifted an ale to her troops, congratulating them on the flawless execution of a long-planned operation. They followed her lead in reciting some of their ancient vows: “For brotherhood. For justice. For Shaia. For Gaias!”
Neither of them had the slightest inkling of each other's existence, or of how their lives would soon show no resemblance to the routines they'd come to depend upon for their own identities and self-preservation.
Somewhere, far to the south of both of them, a raven and an owl alighted on a single branch. They bowed to each other without sound. The coyote at the base of their fir tree acknowledged them with an incline of his muzzle, then raised it and howled at the setting moon.