A Different Sort of Pilgrim
By Storylistener
Prologue: A new Power
Saguaro swayed in the heavy breeze, mesquite trees bent almost in two. A girl of almost thirteen years old ran through the gale force winds towards the small hut beside a patch of prickly pears. Her shoulder length brown hair blew back from her tan face, her liquid brown eyes protected from the dust devil by her thick glasses. Tomorrow was her thirteenth birthday, the most important birthday in the Vashna People's lives. She was running home in order to begin the preparations for the ceremony.
"I'm home!" she yelled. Her shunta, Kaini, glared at her. "Sahmi," the young caretaker cried, "you were supposed to be home three hours ago! Get in here and begin the Bataku in the sacred place!"
'All this fuss over some Bath.' the girl, Sahmi, thought, 'Oh well, sooner begun, soonest done, as my mamai used to say.' Sahmi ambled into the sacred place and started to bathe in the precious Holy Water.
While Sahmi began her Bataku, Kaini looked out the window. As the first drop of the Holy Water touched Sahmi's skin, a sound started, a sort of rumbling; faint at first, it grew louder as she continued to bathe. Whilst Kaini stared around her in fright at the noise, one of the Guardian Mountains that surrounded the desert began shaking, then, slowly, it commenced tumbling down. Every Vashna in the valley, except Sahmi, ran out of their homes to look at the falling stones. For the first time in the history of the People, there was a gap in the Hallowed Ring. The Elders held an immediate Council, to decide what had caused this catastrophe. They finally guessed that the level of Power in the valley had grown too much for the Guardians to hold. In order to find the cause of the power flux, they began by seeing who hadn't come out of their house. Only one person was missing; Sahmi Nijilo.
Utterly oblivious to the commotion outside, Sahmi finished her Bataku, and then dried herself with a handful of plant fibers. Once done with that, she proceeded to dress in the pure white Ascending robe, then made her way outdoors. Everyone was waiting right outside her door. They just stared at her.
"What? Why are you all staring at me? Did I grow another head just because I did the Bataku?" Sahmi asked sarcastically. Kaini came up to her, gently grasped her shoulders and turned towards the remains of one of the Guardians. One of the Elders came up on her other side and murmured "Your Power was too much, even for the Hallowed Ring." Sahmi stared straight at the rubble, looked at the Elder's un-joking face, and fainted right on the spot.
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Elli stared in fright through her honey colored locks at all the loud men shouting in the Three Brooms Tavern. They all wanted to be heard and they wanted to be heard NOW! Finally, Elli's father, Jahn the barkeeper, got up and shouted "SHUT UP THE LOT OF YOU!!!!!" Instant silence fell on the room. Jahn pointed to one of the more coherent men and said, "You, Meekal, tell us all as calmly as you can what you saw."
"Well," Meekal began, "it started out as a normal day, us caravaners skirting the Forbidden Mountains, just as we always do, when out of no where comes this HUGE earthshake! We all fell to the ground, o' course, that being the sensible thing to do. Once the shakes stopped, we got up and looked around. We saw a whole mountain turned to rubble! And that ain't the weirdest part! As we looked at the gap, we saw this creepy, green, glowing stuff sorta ooze out o' it. And through the gap we could see this big wasteland, and, get this, there were PEOPLE standing there! They had tan skin and brown hair! They just sort of stared at us and then we all came to our senses and ran straight here. We kinda figured you'd know what to do. So, here we are. What should we DO Jahn?"
"Do?" Jahn replied, "What we should do is stay calm. Panicking just makes everything worse." Elli's midnight blue eyes shot from one man to another as they resumed their shouting match. Then she noticed something odd happening. A pitcher of beer started floating through the air, seeming to be held by a green-glowing hand. What was even odder was she had just been thinking that these caravaners were probably thirsty after their terrifying ordeal. The pitcher was even serving the distracted men the way Elli normally would have. Elli thought that this was a much better way to do this, then getting in the way of the men. Just then, Meekal noticed the beer wasn't being served by Elli. He shrieked at the top of his lungs and ran out of the tavern so fast that his cup was still spinning as his cape exited the door. All the other caravaners looked at what had scared their almost fearless leader, then swiftly followed him out the door. Jahn just stared in fear at the green stuff holding up the pitcher, then at Elli. It was then Elli noticed the slender green thread connecting her to the pitcher. Her entire world fell apart in that moment.