UNFOLDING
No matter how hard Enver focused, no matter how he opened himself to the voice of the world, the murmur of other voices intruded like snakes slithering into his mind. The patch of moss in the woods he sat upon was some distance from the cottage, but he still heard his father conversing with a visitor.
Since his arrival in Eletia, the only way he could find peace for himself was to practice his meditation, to travel into the world of the aithen’a. He was watched so he would not attempt to leave to go in search of the Galadheon. He’d also been forced to make promises that he would not. It was not easy to sense her from Eletia, for the forest had its own natural energy that inhibited the outside world, and even more so, the unknown calling that was drawing Eletians home from far lands interfered with his search. Still, he was able to perceive she was alive, and he must content himself with knowing that much.
As the voices of the men continued to annoy him, he decided to give up his meditation and eavesdrop.
“. . . a feeling I had about her from the beginning,” his father, Somial, was saying.
“Yes, unpredictable, and the honor is unprecedented. The prince will not explain the reason, and so we must wait until it becomes apparent.”
Somial’s visitor was Ealdaen, Enver guessed. It was hard to miss the ancient tones in his voice, though a mortal, perhaps, would not recognize it with their less keen hearing. He wondered who they were talking about.
“So, are we to call her Cearing Asai’riel?” Somial asked.
Winterlight, Enver thought.
“That is so,” Ealdaen replied. “The prince deems ‘Galadheon’ inappropriate given her status.”
Enver stood. They were talking about her? He strode through the woods until he came to the cottage. His father and Ealdaen sat outside enjoying the sun beaming through the leaves upon them.
“My son,” Somial said, “you have come to join us?”
“What were you saying about the Galadheon?” he demanded. “How is it we are to call her by this other name now? This Cearing Asai’riel?”
“Dama Cearing Asai’riel,” Ealdaen said.
“Dama?”
“If you had stayed here as I had suggested,” Somial said, “you would know. It seems our friend was here not so long ago.”
“She was here?”
Ealdaen nodded. “It is quite a story, young Enver. Have a seat and I will tell you.”
Enver sat upon a low-growing cedar trunk that had turned itself into something of a bench. Ealdaen proceeded to tell a tale of whisper wraiths, a trial, and a surprising announcement from Prince Jametari.
“She is of the House of Santanara?” he asked incredulously.
“So it would seem,” Ealdaen replied.
“How can this be?”
“How the prince came to this decision is a great mystery.”
Enver could not believe what he was hearing. The Galadheon, now Winterlight, was Eletian and a member of the highest house in the land. She’d been there, but he had arrived too late.
“When will she be back?” he asked. If she were now of the House of Santanara, she must return.
Ealdaen gazed at him with sharp eyes. “I do not know the answer, or if we should even expect her return.”
“But how can we not?” Enver demanded.
“There is much that we cannot know.”
A breeze stirred leaf and bough above with a restless sigh.
“Can you at least tell me how she was when she was here?”
“She seemed well enough to my eyes,” Ealdaen replied, “but Gweflin would know more.”
Enver knew of the healer, Gweflin, though they had never met.
“A very fine healer she is,” Somial said. “The Asai’riel was in very capable hands.”
Enver stood. Gweflin’s cottage was half a day’s walk.
“Where are you going, my son?” Somial asked.
“To visit Gweflin and introduce myself.”
“Why not wait for another time?” Somial said. “There is no rush.”
“I am going,” Enver said defiantly, “and you will not stop me.”
He put words to action and strode down the path and away. The Galadheon had been here, and he had missed her, but Gweflin could tell him what he needed to know. In his haste, he missed the significant look passed between Somial and Ealdaen, and the slight smile on his father’s lips.
“This was much too easy,” Somial said.
“I warned Gweflin to expect him,” Ealdaen told him, “as you asked.”
“May his time with her cure his obsession,” Somial replied.
Enver walked relentlessly, pausing only to sip stream water from his cupped hands. He had left without his pack, without even a cloak, but this was Eletia, and if he’d had a need, he’d find it in the land or be provided what he required by the generous folk of the wood. It was unlike the outside world of the mortals where everything required payment and the people jealously hoarded their belongings, even when they could help someone in need.
Night had fallen by the time he found the pathway to Gweflin’s cottage. As he approached, he found a woman kneeling in an herb garden.
“Enver, Somial’s son,” she said as she clipped a sprig of evaleorn. “I have been expecting you.”
He stopped short. “You have?”
“Come, you are in need of a repast, for I see you have walked long and hard to reach me.” She stood and, with a basket of herbs in hand, led him into the cottage.
As she set out food on the table, he asked, “How did you know to expect me?”
“Ealdaen told me.”
“Ealdaen? Why would he think I would be coming here?”
She placed a loaf of fresh-baked bread on the table, as well as a crock of honey butter. “Your father wished it.”
“My father? I don’t understand.”
“It seems he thinks you are in need of healing.”
“I am not, for I suffer from no illness or injury. I have come to ask you about the time you spent with the Sacoridian woman, the Galadheon, though now she is called Asai’riel.”
Gweflin sat beside him. “Yes, I expected this as well. I cared for her back while she was here. She even asked about you.”
“She did?”
Gweflin nodded.
He warmed with pleasure. “How is she? How did she look?”
Gweflin patiently described her sessions with the Asai’riel and how impressed she was with the healing he had done. It had surely been a mortal wounding, she said, if he had not intervened. He barely tasted the greens and the herbed roast grouse she served.
“The Asai’riel seemed a remarkable person for a mortal,” Gweflin said, “and though troubled as anyone would be after what she’d gone through, she was doing well.”
Enver gazed at the bread in his hand. “Thank you. It eases my heart to hear.”
“I can tell,” Gweflin said, “but it is not enough, is it?”
“I am not allowed to leave Eletia to go see her,” he replied.
She nodded as if it was exactly what she expected to hear him say. “Which is why your father is concerned, and why you need healing.”
“I need no healing as I stated. I don’t know what you are talking about.”
“Deep inside,” she replied, “I believe you do know. We who heal are infamous for not treating ourselves as well as our patients. We neglect our own needs. And sometimes those needs are hidden from ourselves. You have not completed accendu’melos, and your interest in the Asai’riel has in turn become an obsession.”
“She was present when it came upon me.” He did not know whether to be angry, amused, or unsettled by Gweflin’s insight. He decided to simply accept it. “I sent her away,” he continued, “because I could not bear to harm her when the accendu’melos overtook me completely.”
“It was honorable of you to do so. Mortals are not up to the rigors of accendu’melos, and it would have been even more unpleasant had it been forced upon her, a heinous act. It is remarkable you restrained yourself when every instinct, every fiber of your body and impulse in your mind, urged you to force yourself upon her.” She spread honey butter on her bread. Her fingers were long and graceful. “Unfortunately, it has left your time of unfolding unfulfilled. You cannot progress without it. If you do not attend to your need, if you continue to hold it locked up inside you, the bitterness will consume and destroy you.”
He knew. “But the Asai’riel—”
“She is far away, and as I understand it, she does not hear the song that is you.”
To hear Gweflin say it was like shards of glass cutting him up inside.
She placed her hand on his wrist, and as soft, warm, and gentle as her touch was, it sent shockwaves through him.
“Are you suggesting—?”
“I am recommending that you allow me to heal you.” Her hand moved up his arm and his pulse quickened. “You must complete accendu’melos.”
“I do not know. I—”
“I am a healer. Let me heal you.”
“But you do not know me,” he protested.
“I know enough. You are suffering, and I can alleviate it.”
His thoughts raced. He could not think clearly. His sense of her heightened, the scents of soil and herbs, the softness of her touch. Desire pulled at him as accendu’melos awakened in him, pressure building in his loins. Her song called out to him. Not in the same way as the Asai’riel, but with openness and compassion. Before he knew it, they were standing and she was in his arms.
“I should not,” he said. However, he did not think he could stop himself, not this time.
“Shhh,” she said. “It is time for healing.” She kissed him, her lips sweet with honey.
Her kiss awoke every nerve within him to even the lightest feather touch, and he realized he could feel what she felt, as well, his lips on hers, how her hand traced the muscles of his back. He shivered.
“Yes, Enver,” she murmured, “let the healing begin.”
Accendu’melos took him then, and he lost all sense of himself, except for the need to satisfy the desires of his body. Over the days that followed, there was no telling where he began, and Gweflin ended, they were so entirely melded. At times, her assistants came to check on their welfare and ensure that they drank of cordial and water to sustain them. They also tended any wounds from the more intense portions of their coupling, for pain was closely allied with pleasure, but mostly, Enver was oblivious to their presence.
Still, even as he and Gweflin shared in passion, one small part of his mind remained fixed on the Asai’riel, his Karigan, and at times he imagined it was not Gweflin whom he held in his arms.