Finding What's Eternal
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Chapter 3
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Alys woke up feeling quite a bit more jolly than usual—like a burden had been lifted from her shoulders. "Right," she said as she wandered around the room picking up items she would need for trip out of the cave. "It's a brand new day, and I'm going to keep making progress. I'm going to learn new things," she said as she plopped the book down in her bag, "I'm going to find my dog again, I'm going to eventually tackle that cooking thing again…" she trailed off as she looked around the room for the meat. Where was it? Had Selendrile not gotten her any after all?
With a frown Alys peered around the entrance to her room into the main part of the cave. Selendrile wasn't dozing there. "Hmm," Alys hummed uncertainly for a moment. She headed into his room and wandered over to her 'meat room', abruptly stopping when she got there. Not only had Selendrile gotten her another rabbit, but he had prepared it as well, so that all that was sitting there were already cut up pieces ready for cooking.
"Oh Selendrile," Alys whispered, touched by the gesture. Then a wave of guilt swept over her—perhaps she had extracted a little too much sympathy from Selendrile yesterday. But then it occurred to her that maybe part of the reason he had gone ahead and prepared it for her was because he thought she was incapable of preparing it herself….the wave of guilt was gone.
Alys bundled up the entire sheet and rabbit and headed back to her room for Cooked Rabbit Attempt #2. Cooked Rabbit Attempt #2 ended up notably more edible than Cooked Rabbit Attempt #1, but there was definitely still room for improvement for the hypothetical Cooked Rabbit Attempt #3. Alys sighed as she packaged up some scraps for Scampers, wondering what exactly she should do for Attempt #3. There had to be something she was doing wrong…Oh well, she thought, at least the only person that will ever know I can't cook rabbit is myself. And potentially Scampers, if she ever found him again.
Alys heaved the bag on her back and headed down the mountain path. Once at the bottom she began wandering around looking for her little clearing. Locating it turned out to be far harder than she thought it would've, and by the time she finally found it her feet were aching. Alys immediately sprawled out on the ground near her father's memorial.
"Hi father, how are you? I'm tired. Why did I pick such a hard to find place to put your memorial? Oh, don't answer that, I already know the answer," Alys rambled on to herself. She sat back up long enough to grab a piece of bread to snack on, and then flopped back down. "Now the real question is how I find Scampers again. I doubt he'll come when I call him, I mean, I called him Scampers plenty of times yesterday, but I don't think that's quite enough for a dog to learn a new name. Perhaps walk around slowly and wave some rabbit around? He's probably still in the area and—SCAMPERS!"
After greeting Alys with a giant lick across her entire face, Scampers switched his interest to her bag, pawing at it and then looking over at her expectantly. Alys chuckled as she sat up, wiping her face with her sleeve. She opened the bag and tossed Scampers a little bit of rabbit. Scampers gobbled it up and then tilted his head at Alys waiting for more.
"Sit," Alys said experimentally. Scampers didn't move a muscle.
"Sit," Alys tried again with a more commanding tone. This time she was rewarded with a single tail wag. Alys stuck her foot out and prodded Scampers in the back with her foot, trying to push his hind end down. "Sit Scampers, sit!" Again, no success. Alys frowned and bent over to push Scampers into a sitting position. "Sit!"
Scampers hovered in a sitting position for a fraction of a second before popping back up. "Oh good enough," Alys grumbled tossing the dog another piece of rabbit.
This went on for awhile until Alys could get Scampers to sit about a quarter of the time. Alys deemed the process a success, and went on to trying to get Scampers to shake hands with her. By the time she ran out of rabbit Scampers could 'sit' some of the time and had perfected his staring abilities, sometimes accompanied by a tilting of the head, for the command 'shake'.
At this point Alys decided to start looking for edible plants, and wandered around the area with her book, stopping to flip through the pages every time she ran into a different looking piece of vegetation. She wasn't sure how many hours it had been when she finally sat down next to a stream, with nothing to show for her efforts other than a few plants she already recognized, such as dandelion leaves and sour grass. With a pat on Scamper's head she announced, "Well, that wasn't much of a success, was it?" She looked around her surroundings and noticed an interesting looking mushroom patch on the opposite side of her from the dog. Leaning over and propping herself up on her elbows she flipped through the pages of the book, peering at the mushroom.
"Aha! I think I found something!" Alys exclaimed, excitedly comparing the mushroom to the pictures on the page.
"I wouldn't eat that if I were you."
Alys jumped a little, swinging her head around to see where the voice was coming from. A young girl stood on the opposite side of the creek with wild curly red hair, which was escaping the confines of her thick braid. She wore a simple, yet nice looking dress and had her arms crossed over her chest as she stared over at Alys.
"What?" Alys asked completely dumbfounded.
The girl rolled her eyes. "I said I wouldn't eat that mushroom."
Still somewhat dumbfounded Alys held up her book as she replied, "But it's in my book of edible plants…."
The girl scrunched her face up at Alys and hiked her dress up revealing dirty bare feet before sloshing across the creek. Once on Alys's side, she stomped her way up the slight bank and peered at the page the book in Alys hands was open too.
"Uh-uh. That's not the same one," she declared.
"What do you mean it's not the same one? It matches the picture perfectly!" Alys protested, the shock of the situation wearing off and being replaced with vague annoyance.
"Look lady, I'm telling you, it's not the same mushroom."
Alys squinted at her before plucking a piece off of a mushroom and eying it. "I think it's alright," she said slowly glancing back down at the picture.
"Fine, do as you please. It won't be MY fault when you get sick," the girl stated matter of fact-ly, plopping down on the ground next to Alys.
"Fine! I will," Alys retorted, throwing the piece of mushroom in her mouth, chewing and swallowing. "Who are you anyways?" she asked, moodily eying the cheeky little girl.
"Risa," the girl answered as she took the book from Alys hands without asking and began flipping through the pages. "This is a nice book," she observed with a nod. "How 'bout you? What's your name?"
Alys stared incredulously at the girl holding her book. She had had a friend once who went by the same name, and had died at about the same age as this child, but the Risa in her memory was far friendlier and sweeter than this child.
"Alys," she replied flatly after a brief moment of hesitation. How much could a sassy child get her in trouble if she found out who Alys really was? Maybe none, maybe a ton, Alys thought gloomily.
"Alys, your haircut is terrible. You should fix it. How 'bout the dog?" Risa asked without glancing up. Nope, definitely not like Alys's Risa. When Alys didn't reply promptly the girl looked up impatiently. "The dog—what's it's name?"
Alys took a deep breath, a tactic she employed when Selendrile was particularly ruthless in his baiting her, and closed her eyes for a second. She's only a child, I can handle this, she thought before popping her eyes open and looking back at Risa who had returned to the book. "I call him Scampers," Alys answered in as friendly of a tone as she could manage.
"Whhhhy? That's such an un-imaginative name," the girl complained, finally handing Alys her book back and staring at her.
"It suits him. He's good at…scampering. I was having a bit of a rough day when I named him," Alys answered defensively.
"Like you will be pretty soon too?"
"I'm telling you, the mushroom is fine!" Alys shot back.
The corners of Risa's mouth twitched upwards, and Alys realized suddenly that the girl was testing her. Baiting her and seeing how far she could push the limits. Alys shook her head, but found she was smiling a little now as well.
"How old are you? Why are you all the way out here by yourself?"
Risa shrugged. "Eight. I can do whatever I want to do, no one cares enough to stop me," She answered simply enough. "And you? Where did you come from? I haven't seen you before. And why IS your hair so awful?"
Alys reached up and ruffled her own hair while thinking just what she could tell this girl. "Same," she finally settled on. "No one cares enough to stop me from going where I want."
Risa gave Alys an appraising look before saying, "Suits me just fine. I can help you with your hair if you want you know. It's going to stay looking ugly if you just leave it. It's too long for the original cut."
Alys watched the girl carefully before choosing her response. The girl's demeanor had changed slightly so that now instead of sounding aggressive she sounded carefully uninterested. A sure sign that she did in fact, care what the response was. Was the girl perhaps lonely? Risa had picked up the book and was absent mindedly flicking through the pages again.
"Maybe later, but not today," Alys replied carefully, not sure she trusted an eight year old with her hair. Especially an eight year old with tons of curly long hair. She had to admit though, the girls assessment of her hair matched her own thoughts about the topic. The girl paused a moment as Alys replied, and then continued flipping through the book.
Alys snapped her fingers in front of Scampers and then patted the ground between her and Risa. "Scampers, over here!"
The dog grudgingly climbed over Alys's body and went to where Alys had indicated. "Scampers, meet Risa. Risa, meet Scampers," Alys said in a mockingly formal tone. "He can shake your hand if you like," Alys suggested.
Risa put the book down and turned to Scampers. She glanced up at Alys, and then straightened her back and held out her hand. "How do you do Scampers?"
Scampers stared at her.
"It's still a work in progress," Alys informed Risa, poking Scampers from behind. The dog didn't respond. Risa looked at Alys with a guarded expression for a second, but then she suddenly dropped her defenses and let out a giggle. "Try getting him to sit instead," Alys suggested with a smile.
Risa obliged. And Scampers wagged his tail. Alys frowned and poked Scampers's hind leg. Still no sitting, but Scampers did lounge forward to attack Risa's face with his tongue. Risa giggled again, feebly trying to push the dog away. Alys giggled and patted Scampers's back. "Good boy Scampers, show Risa how much you like her, that's a boy! Practically the same thing as sitting!"
"This… is why… your dog… stinks at fol…lowing commands!" Risa managed to screech in between giggles and licks.
Alys just laughed.
Risa finally freed herself from Scampers attack of loving kisses and began scrubbing her face with her dress. Suddenly Alys stomach started churning uncomfortably. And she felt very hot. Very hot indeed. But her hands felt cold and clammy.
"Uh-oh," she whispered before leaning over and retching. Risa thumped her on the back a couple of times.
"Told ya," she gloated. "Perfectly fiiiine mushroom you said. Yup, looks like it was, alright."
Alys would've replied with a snarky comment, but instead she ended up hurling again, which made Risa laugh gleefully while she thumped Alys's back a few more times. "Hey! Your ugly hair came in handy—it's too short to get in the way when you upchuck!" Alys swatted her away impatiently as she crawled over to the creek and splashed her face with the cool water. As she was rinsing her mouth out Risa came over to her waving the book around carelessly. "You know, I don't know too many of the plants in this book, but I do know more edible stuff than dandelion leaves and sour grass. I can show you."
Alys looked up suspiciously at Risa. "Alright," she conceded. "But if you feed me something that makes this happen again, I'm going to give you an equally ugly haircut."
Risa smiled back mischievously. "Deal."
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Risa had led Alys around showing her various edible plants for a couple more hours, occasionally trying to stuff one or another into Scamper's mouth. After awhile Scampers learned to maintain a safe distance from Risa whenever she knelt over a plant. When Risa deemed her tutorial over after finding Alys eleven other edible plants, they ended up heading back to Alys's clearing, and thus back to the food supply. Alys had perhaps none-to-wisely promised Risa earlier she could get Scampers to shake with her at least once with the help of food. And the problem with making promises with children was that they never let you forget them.
After what seemed like ages later, a few successful sits and one successful shake was executed by Scampers and Risa bid farewell to Alys with her characteristic level of sass and insults. Alys shook her head as she watched the child take off into the wilderness, heading off to wherever she came from. Alys stood there a moment before a sudden thought struck her.
"Shoot! Possum knuckles!" Alys exclaimed, smacking herself in the forehead. The sun was already set, and the light was about to rapidly vanish from the area. How had she not noticed? That silly child had been so distracting that it didn't even occur to her to think of the time. Alys stared forlornly up at the mountain off in the distance. It was no use. Even though she could probably make it up the side of the mountain in the dark, it would be dark before she could reach the mountain. And there was no way that Alys could find the mountainside in the dark.
Alys heaved a sigh. No, it was best to stay where she was, rather than risking getting irrevocably lost. "Well, it looks like it's just you and me and this clearing tonight Scampers." Alys shook her head again, and lightly hit her forehead a few more times before beginning to collect firewood around the edges of her clearing. Every once in awhile she would throw a branch for the dog to fetch, but as she had come to expect, the dog just ran after it and eventually wandered back whenever it pleased him, without the stick. Alys dumped her load between the edge of the clearing and her father's cross and picked up a rock. She began digging at the ground with the rock, pulling up the grass to create a clearing for her fire, vaguely wondering whether if she got a fire going, Selendrile would notice it and come find her. She wiped the cold sweat off her forehead with the back of her hand and took off her shawl—pulling up the grass was hard work. She threw another stick for Scampers and he took off into the woods to not find the stick, and Alys went back to digging her fire pit.
Suddenly the area seemed to grow even darker, and Alys glanced up to see a large shadow swoop across the sky. Alys scooped up another stick and hurled it into the woods as far as she could, hoping that the stick would provide enough distraction to keep the dog from coming back. She wasn't exactly sure how Selendrile would take the news that she had adopted a pet so it was best to just avoid finding out. Alys turned back around just as Selendrile dropped to the ground in human form.
"Ahhhh!" Alys exclaimed as she quickly covered her eyes, and reached down to grab her discarded shawl. She tossed it in Selendrile's general direction, and waited a moment before hesitantly peeking through her fingers. Confirming that he had indeed covered himself, she dropped her hand. "How did you know I was here?"
Selendrile shrugged. "Just happened to see you. Were you planning on spending the night here?" he asked, indicating at her wood pile and make-shift fire pit.
"Uhh…." But that was all Alys managed to get out in reply before there was a sudden rustling in the woods, and Scampers came crashing out of some nearby bushes, proudly brandishing the stick she had just thrown a minute or so before. The dog slowed when it noticed Selendrile, or his scent, or whatever it was that tipped off animals that fey were near, and slowly approached Alys from behind. Scampers dropped the stick at her feet and with a low growl peered at Selendrile from around Alys's skirts. Alys gaped down at the dog, who had finally succeeded in fetching, at the worst possible time, before glancing back up at Selendrile.
He raised his eyebrow at the sight and then slowly said, "So yesterday you were very hungry…."
Alys snapped her mouth shut again with an audible click. "I can explain," Alys said quickly. "You see yesterday I came across the dog by chance, and I was feeling a little lonely at the time, so I figured, why not? And so I started playing with him, and he looked so hungry, he's clearly a stray and so I gave him some rabbit and that's how I ended up falling in the stream yesterday. I mean, not from feeding Scampers the rabbit—from trying to bathe him, and then today I found him here again, and so…." Alys broke off when she noticed Selendrile's expression. Which was looking a little… well, dark.
"I wasn't asking about how you found the dog Alys."
Alys floundered for a moment. Well, what had he been asking then? And why was he looking so displeased at the moment? She hadn't been expecting him to embrace the dog with open arms but this? She hadn't been expecting this either. "Can I keep him?" she asked in a rush. "Look, I've already taught him some tricks! Stop growling, Scampers. Now sit! Sit Scampers. Ummm, I swear he knows that one. Sit! Sit. Sit. Um… shake? Shake!" Alys dared a glance back towards Selendrile.
"Impressive," he remarked dryly.
"Er… can we keep him? You're good at hunting, a dog won't require too much extra food—please?" Alys had taken a step closer to Selendrile as she pleaded and immediately regretted it, for now she could make out his eyes in the poor lighting. They had the cold gleam in them that she had come to recognize as a warning sign that he was about to lose his temper. That or switch into the merciless, very dragon like Selendrile. Alys fought the urge to shrink back, wondering whether she should remain silent or try to mediate the situation. Just what was upsetting him? Was it just that she fed the dog food he had gotten her? That seemed a little fickle even for a dragon. Selendrile had made it clear that while he could interpret and even display his own human emotions that he didn't understand them. It was at times like this though, that Alys found herself wondering if he understood human emotions and their motivations better than she would ever be able to interpret his. Every time she thought she understood him and could predict his responses, something like this would happen and Alys would have no idea what she did wrong.
Selendrile studied her in silence for a moment, while Alys stood perfectly still, trying to ignore Scampers's growls in the background, and to look at him back; only, she found she couldn't quite meet his eye. Thankfully the cold gleam disappeared as quickly as it had come and Selendrile nodded stiffly.
"Thank you!" Alys burst out. Suddenly filled with lots of nervous energy, she waved her arms around a little unsure what to do before turning to the dog and grabbing hold of it's sides. "I'm sure Scampers will get used to you soon-" she paused as she shoved the dog forwards towards Selendrile with great effort, "—enough." Scampers's incessant growling turned to desperate whining as Alys succeeded in shoving him marginally closer to Selendrile.
Selendrile on his part eyed the dog with mild distaste and continued to stand there motionless. "Well," Alys said a little breathlessly as she let go of dog, allowing it to retreat safely behind her skirts again, "that may take a little time." Then in a moment of sudden gratitude and bravery she strode forward and hopped up a little to wrap her arms around Selendrile's neck to give him a quick squeezing hug. He lifted his arms away from his sides slightly, as if to return the embrace, but didn't. Displeased or not, that slight arm lifting was the closest he had come to returning an affectionate gesture when not acting. "Really, thank you Selendrile," she said quietly before quickly pulling away.
Alys reached down to her wood pile and drew out a stick and threw it for Scampers, who toke off after it even before she threw it. "Let's give the poor dog's nerves a break for a little, eh?" She said a little weakly, turning back to look at Selendrile. His only response was a slight upwards nod. Alys cleared her throat. "Well I guess now that you're here I can get back to the cave after all. I'll uh, get my stuff back together."
As Alys bent down to re-stuff her belongings into the sack Selendrile asked, "Why do you need a dog?" He asked in such a way that his tone revealed nothing about his emotions.
"Well I don't need a dog, I just want him," Alys replied. "I don't know, I guess dogs just make people happy."
"By giving them something to amuse them?"
The question hadn't been asked harshly, if anything it had been asked curiously, but for some reason it sent chills down Alys back. Maybe it was because of her imagined squirrel picnic scenario earlier. "No…it's just nice to have something to love, and to have something to love you back for you, no matter what."
"Un-conditional love?"
Alys paused for a moment to sort out the unfamiliar word. In addition to being able to adopt an amazingly human persona, Selendrile had also developed the ability to use words which Alys was unfamiliar with. She wasn't sure where he was picking them up from, but wished he would stop. His rare gaps in knowledge about human society, often about the strangest things given how insightful he could be about other things, were about all that were left to remind her that she had once been the one in power knowledge wise. Well, in knowledge about human society that was. "Yes," she decided standing back up, the sack now fully packed.
Selendrile glanced over at her father's memorial. "Oh, that kettle stays there," Alys informed him, guessing what he was thinking. Selendrile looked at her questioningly. Alys walked a few steps closer to the memorial, and knelt down in front of it.
"It's a memorial," she explained. "For my father. I don't really know where his grave is, so I made this. A sort of place, to you know, honor him, remember him, that sort of thing…."
"You miss him," Selendrile stated as he came over to squat beside Alys, looking over her handiwork. He poked the cross, probably checking how well made it was, and to Alys relief it didn't wobble too badly.
"Of course. I loved him, and he was my whole family—what with mother dying giving birth to me, and one uncle dying of plague, another in a cart accident, one from a snake bite as a child, grandfather from a heart attack, the other from falling through some ice into a pond, grandmother from food poisoning, the other from childbirth, my aunt from childbirth, my cousin from childbirth…" Alys explained ticking them off one by one on her fingers until she ran out. "Well you get the point," she said offering a wry smile.
"And making this makes you feel better?" Selendrile asked sounding genuinely confused. Ah, there it was. A strange gap in knowledge over something that even young children would understand.
"Yes," Alys replied hesitantly, not sure how to explain grieving to him. "It's a physical reminder of them… giving them something that you can still see brings comfort…. Um…you can try honoring them and I don't know… talking to them…." Alys rubbed her forehead, struggling for words, sure that she wasn't explaining this well at all. "Don't dragons grieve? Or do they just grieve differently?"
Selendrile considered the question for a moment. "When something's gone, it's gone," he replied simply.
"But… what about loved ones? How can you just move on from loving something?"
Selendrile shook his head. "Love is primarily a human emotion. Dragons waste little energy on it."
Alys's got an oddly hollow feeling in her chest at that. Of course she knew he didn't have human emotions. Of course she did. The little nagging voice inside her head often reminded her of this, it wasn't like this was a surprise. It was just different finally hearing the words actually come from his mouth. Was his inability to love why he asked her about her desire to have a dog? Or why he thought the dog could only be wanted for amusements sake?
The back of Selendrile's fingers brushing against her arm brought her out of her thoughts with a jump. "You're cold," he stated standing up. "We should go back now, unless you would like more time with… that?" he asked indicating the cross, apparently still unclear as to what to refer to it as.
Alys shook her head and popped up after him, firmly pushing her previous thoughts to the back of her mind.