28. Legends: Wisdom

Ariesa was confused when she first woke up. This was her wall, yes...

Reality came swimming back. She was on the padded bench under her window. Then if she wasn't in her bed...

"Elazul!" she cried. She swung her legs onto the floor, only to find herself embarrassingly crashing down as a wave of dizziness came over her, her knees buckling. She caught herself on hands and knees, and raised her head to look over at her own bed.

Thank the Goddess. There was Elazul.

"What are you doing?!" screeched the familiar voice of Lisa. "You need to stay in bed!"

"Elazul..." she muttered, and suddenly she felt Daena's furred arms lifting her, helping her walk over to the other invalid. She stumbled at the bedside, but shook her head to clear it. "What... is he..."

"He'll be okay. We think," said Bud proudly.

Slowly they filled in the gaps of the story in her head. How they had gotten the villagers to brave the caverns and retrieve the Jumi Knight who had become part of their community. How they had handled the question of where Pearl was. (Denial, denial, denial had been pretty much the order of the day.) How they had decided to bring a second litter, just in case, and were proved right when they found Ariesa slumped unconscious as well. "Better two injured than one dead," noted Daena.

Ariesa contemplated. That last memory from the cavern, the feeling of Elazul trying to survive… "When you're near, he seems to get better," Lisa said, as if reading her thoughts. "That's why we had you both here. We didn't think you would mind if he got the cushier bed."

"It's because you care for him, and he for you," Daena said softly. "With Pearl gone, he needs something to live for."

"It's worth a try," Ariesa mumbled. With the little strength she had, she clambered next to him, pushing aside her sudden feelings of impropriety. She hadn't worried about that holding him in the cavern, why did this suddenly seem so intimate now?

He did not move, but he was still alive, still there with her. Instinctively she reached a hand to his core. The last thing she felt was a small hand - she didn't know if it was Bud or Lisa? - pressing a wet cloth to her head as she fell back asleep.

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Elazul was dreaming.

He hoped he was, anyway, because there was no other explanation for the bizarre linkages of colors, shapes, images, that troubled him.

Flickers ran through his brain of a place that he thought was the Underworld, not truly able to form the picture of it, but experiencing rather the sensation, a deep, balmy cave with the feeling of immense age, even eternity. The Underworld. Huh. Well, I won't be going there, I'm Jumi, he thought to himself, surprised the thought was able to form.

Other figures invaded his thoughts as well. A golden-haired woman, not Ariesa. A Jumi of ruby; a Jumi of sapphire; both old, both hard. A beautiful, seductive woman clad in red, someone he felt like he had seen before. A tall woman in gray silk, hair shining like moonlight. A man with one woman he loved, and one he was sworn to protect. Past and present seemed to swirl together. His past, or someone else's? The past of the Jumi themselves?

The cave called to him, its warmth offering comfort, relief from the pain he was in. Fires seemed to flicker just out of the range of vision. He knew he should die, and he wondered why he hadn't already, but despite the haze, he knew he hadn't yet. He should, his core was injured deeply, but he still was somewhere at that critical divide between life and death, not knowing if he would fall to the Underworld, or make his way back.

The Underworld. The Mana, the life, of a Jumi was in a core, not a soul. And a core had not place there. How quickly would he give up? Would he stay there, clinging to life? It was said that was what happened to Jumi who were abandoned - as Pearl had abandoned him, he thought, a cut that ran much deeper than the one in his core. Or would allow himself to pass on, leaving only his core behind, on the slim hope of being brought back in the future, or else remain as nothing more than a damaged jewel?

Death tempted him, as it had once before.

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Elazul tossed and turned that night, talking in his sleep and waking Ariesa nearly every time, she jumping to alertness only to look over and see him deep in the throes of slumber. Except one time, when she turned to see some semblance of clarity in his eyes.

One word. "Pearl?"

Ariesa paused. "We don't know," she finally forced out reluctantly.

It wasn't what would make him feel better, but she felt he deserved to know the truth. He spoke in hushed tones, every word weighed and quiet, and that in and of itself freaked her out, coming from Elazul. "Pearl... I only ever wanted to protect her..." He trailed off for a moment, and she reached an arm around him, pulling him a little closer to her. It was a measure of his exhaustion that he let his head slump against her without even a fight.

"Will you take care of her for me..." His voice was hushed but pleading.

"You'll be taking care of her soon enough," Ariesa whispered back reassuringly.

He laughed once, ironically, and the effort cost him, as his eyes rolled back slightly, he slumping back onto the pillows. She pulled the collar of his shirt back to reveal his core, a spiderwebbing crack now marring what had been a smooth blue surface, darker but just as piercing as the blue of his eyes. She had not gotten a clear look at the injury before, and it made her gasp. It looked like it hurt.

She moved her eyes up from the stone to look him in the eye, and saw real fear there. "Ariesa... it's too late... core injuries are lethal, stones take thousands of years to be formed... but then they are so easily destroyed, in an instant…"

"Quiet," she whispered, but he ignored her, seeming only barely conscious of her. She couldn't allow herself to contemplate anything but his getting better. "You'll be fine."

"Only Jumi tears can heal... but Jumi cannot cry..." he forced out. "Jumi tears... are really..."

"Shards of life," she finished for him.

His eyes were glazing over. "So many things I should have said... done..." He focused on her for a split second, then drifted off into unconsciousness.

How she managed not to cry then, she would never know, but she threw herself over him. Whatever happened to him next, she would be there for it.

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Elazul woke up with moonlight shining through the window, and Ariesa lying next to him. Not merely next to him, but quite neatly wrapped around him. It felt… pleasant.

He allowed himself to savor that feeling for a moment, while he contemplated how much better he felt. The memories were hazy, but he remembered enough to know that he should be dead, or well on his way to the Underworld. But as he mentally scanned his body, he felt almost perfectly fine; except for his core, and that had only the faintest hint of pain to let him know the crack was still there.

How that had happened, how he had survived, he wasn't exactly sure, but he knew that responsibility waited for him. Pearl.

His sense of her felt a bit odd, somewhat unfamiliar and blurred to the point he could barely put a finger on it, but it was enough. Shutting his eyes momentarily, he knew he could point a finger in her direction. At some distance, yes, but at least he had a general path to follow. But he had to go before she got further away.

Reluctantly, he extracted himself from Ariesa's cozy embrace, her arm flopping down but her sleep undisturbed. He stepped quietly across the room to retrieve his possessions, and was about to turn down the stairs, when he paused, stepping back for a moment.

He knelt down on one knee by the bed, putting himself at a level with her still-closed eyes. Motionless, the only sound he heard for a while was the slow, even rhythm of her breathing, and the slightly more agitated of his own.

He looked at her contemplatively, trying to remember the way he had seen her the first day he had glimpsed her. Why was she even involved in all this? She was exactly what he had thought she was all along, a young girl without much knowledge of the world, not ready for the things she was seeing now. He should have never allowed it. He was Jumi, and he was prepared for the things he had been through; it was part of his very being. If he was fate's punching bag, so be it.

They would always be on different paths. He belonged to Pearl, and always would, and Ariesa deserved to live her life the way it had begun, in peace and freedom.

Only, he found it hard to dismiss her as casually as he had when they first met. She had changed, but… she shouldn't have to.

He reached up to her hair, lying messily across her pillow with the hairsticks removed, tangled from the shifts of sleep. He pushed one lock gently away from where it had fallen to tickle her nose. She twitched slightly, but did not wake.

He was leaving, and there would be no way she would be able to find him. It was for the best, he told himself. Why, then, did he feel full of regret?

"I'm so sorry," he whispered. The sleeping figure did not respond, and he silently turned without a backwards glance.

As he crossed the threshold of the house, a creak from a window above made him pause, but he shrugged it off. He took a few steps, and suddenly a sharp pain ran through his core, he stumbling and gasping for breath. Slowly, the pain subsided, and he straightened, resolutely heading for where his core told him to go.

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Ariesa woke up, feeling something strange was there. Then she realized it was something that was not there.

"Elazul?" she cried. She tried to pull herself up, but her body wasn't ready, and she crashed back on the pillow, exhausted.

She heard running footsteps up the stairs, and then Bud burst into the room. "Ariesa... we didn't want to wake you, but... he's gone."

"Where's the core??" she cried, suddenly tossing blankets onto the floor, sheer panic giving her the strength. Elazul, it couldn't be...

"Whoa! Not like that! I mean he left." Ariesa looked up from the pillow she was about to throw off the bed.

"Left?" she asked, somewhat more calmly.

Lisa arrived behind her brother. "Sometime last night. We heard noises, and we figured one of you was just thrashing in their sleep."

"But then I crept to the window, and I saw him leave," filled in Bud.

Ariesa slumped back. Her stomach growled, and she realized she was hungry on top of it all. "Why? Why wouldn't he say goodbye?"

"Like he's any good at that," said Daena, coming up the stairs with what looked suspiciously like food.

"But he's out there alone... with a damaged core... I know he's looking for Pearl, but how do I find him?" she asked. Daena shoved breakfast into her hands, and wouldn't answer the question until Ariesa was halfway done eating.

"We've been talking about that, and I think the twins and I have come up with an idea," Daena finally told her.

"So?" Ariesa said between mouthfuls. Goddess, she was starving. "What have you come up with?"

"We think it's time to talk to Gaeus," Lisa replied.

"I want to ask him how to be a great sorcerer!"yelled Bud, bouncing around the room.

"We all have questions for him, and perhaps he can tell us where Elazul went as well," Daena suggested. "Whenever you're ready."

Ariesa dipped her spoon in the bowl, only to sadly find out there was no more. It helped though, her strength was rapidly coming back. "I'll be ready in an hour."

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Daena seemed scattered, distracted, as they made their way towards the Luon Highway. Ariesa placed one arm on her arm, and Daena suddenly snapped to attention.

"You startled me," she said.

"I'm not surprised," Ariesa told her. "You were completely in your own little world. What's on your mind?"

"Lots of things," Daena said, sighing. "What do you know about the Mana tree?"

"Well..." Ariesa thought back. What did she know, really? Lots of stories, and little truth. "I don't know," she finally concluded.

"It makes me wonder, really, what we are all doing, and why," Daena replied. "I guess… that's sort of what I wanted to ask Gaeus about. I had this picture of the way things were supposed to go, and now…" She changed the subject, getting sidetracked once again. "What happens to your soul after it dies?"

"I've always feared it disappeared... but I hoped it would live forever." Ariesa shuddered suddenly, thinking of Elazul. How injured was he? And here he was all alone somewhere, who knows where, looking for Pearl... "He's wounded," she suddenly said before she could stop herself.

Daena looked at her with sympathy. "I've been wounded a hundred times, but no one has ever hurt my soul. And Jumi cores are their souls, Ariesa, from what I understand. They must be able to outlive a simple injury. He'll be fine, and worrying about him changes nothing."

Ariesa had her doubts, after what Elazul had told her. "I should go to him, somehow, I shouldn't have let him go..." She slashed her sword through the air in frustration.

"You think you should have stopped him." Daena suddenly stopped in the hot dust of the highway, and looked at her with piercing understanding.

She did think so. She also thought she should have gone after Pearl and promised to take care of her, but she was sure she had needed to stay, who knows what might have happened otherwise?

Ariesa mulled over that for a couple miles, and quiet settled over the two women, bringing her peace as she tuned out the thoughts of the twins running ahead with an energy she, in her current frame of mind, could not hope to imitate. Bud and Lisa behind them were talking and laughing, joking about Gaeus, the young people excited to go see him, especially Bud. It made Ariesa wish she could steal some of their good mood.

She didn't want to continue her morbid thoughts any more than Daena had wanted to continue her own. "You know, this canyon is the place my mother named me for," she said, desperate to change the subject.

"Oh?" Daena replied. "I figured as much, but did she tell you why? I never knew the story behind it."

"It's supposed to be the name of a queen of a kingdom that died here," Ariesa replied. "My mother wanted me to feel that I could take care of myself, that I could do anything I wanted."

She suddenly paused awkwardly. That had been what her mother had wanted for her, but she had so many doubts about herself still. Really, was she doing anything important?

"You have helped," Daena replied soothingly, when she voiced her thoughts. "Matilda knows, and I know."

"But that could have been anyone," Ariesa insisted. Uncomfortably, she remembered Irwin's comment on she and Elazul as a "gift"; she had been scared to bring that up with him, and was scared still. "What is it about me that makes a difference?"

Daena was left without an answer, leaving a somewhat brooding duo of confused young women.

"Wait! Isn't that Escad?" Lisa's voice finally broke into her thoughts. Daena turned her attention to the girl as well.

Sure enough, as they approached the living hill Ariesa knew was Gaeus, a familiar figure entered her view.

Daena strode ahead. "I have something or two to say to him." But as she barged forward, Ariesa pulled her back.

"Wait," she suggested. "Let him have his moment just as the rest of us." The waited back a few feet, trying to give the guy some space, but they could hear just fine.

"Why did Olbohn think I could defeat Irwin?" Escad was demanding, in a tone she wondered whether or not it was appropriate to use with a Wisdom.

Gaeus did not seem offended, if a hill indeed could be offended. "A Wisdom does not think about just one victor. He chose you so that all shall win."

"That sounds like a lot of jibberish. I have never been tested by Olbohn, but he just sent me off to defeat Irwin. He probably could have done better himself."

Gaeus sighed, a low, rumbling sound that echoed across the valley. "People desire power, not the words of the Wisdoms. You will only gain what you desire. You are the one who will decide your own destiny. Olbohn told you the same. Asking me is pointless."

"Harrumph. That's what I get for talking with Wisdoms," Escad complained. "Never a straight answer from any of them."

Gaeus smiled indulgently. "I merely dispense advice, as I will do for those others who have arrived." Escad turned, finally noticing Daena and the group with her, eyes widening in surprise.

Daena and Escad together stepped aside slightly. "What are you doing here?" she inquired of him.

Escad slumped, defeat replacing his prior arrogance. "Hoping for some answers, though that didn't seem to work out," he replied, dejectedly. "I thought I was going to defeat Irwin, but I was pretty much getting my ass kicked until you show up. I keep seeing fairies, everywhere, you know, like they're trying to tell me something? Just like she used to see them." He did not fill in Matilda's name. "Now I have no target for my anger, and a bargain to keep…" He cut off abruptly.

Ariesa's attention was split between the two, the enthusiastic twins charging down the slope, and Gaeus himself, a gigantic, rocky face with a whimsical expression that belied the millennia the hill had been there. He looked nearly as mischievous as Bud.

Speaking of… the boy was practically jumping out of his robe. "Hi, Gaeus!" he yelled at the top of his lungs, though the hill probably could hear just fine.

"Come closer, my children," Gaeus greeted him and his sister. It was the first time Ariesa had remembered Bud not being upset at being referred to as "children", as he barged forward and the twins climbed onto the outstretched, stone hand. Lisa squealed as they were suddenly lifted some distance into the air, to look directly into Gaeus's stone eyes.

Bud, however, was not in the least unnerved. "I wanna become a really awesome sorcerer!" he announced proudly. "What should I do?"

Gaeus indulged the young man with a gentle, rocky smile. "And Bud, what do you mean by wanting to be a "great" sorcerer?"

Bud paused for a moment, unsure of how to respond.

"I will tell you more," Gaeus continued. "You can be a sorcerer who is well-known, or a great sorcerer. There was once a mage named Halciet, who was larger than me in many ways."

"Never heard of him," Bud sulked.

"That's because he was forgotten, as was much of the history of the Fairie Wars," Gaeus told him. "But he understood Mana, and that was what made him great."

"What's there to understand?" Bud questioned.

"That you don't need to ask me about this, because Mana is everywhere, and it will speak to you if only you let it. You can choose how to use Mana. You just need to figure out what the Goddess wants you to do with it. You are still a child, you have the advantage that you are not yet trapped in the mold left by adults, you can created new ways."

Bud looked unconvinced, and Gaeus laughed. "So stubborn, young man. Would you like to know something more precise? Remain the way you are, create from your thoughts. You will be going on an adventure with a Jumi Knight seventy-three years from now. By the time you finish your adventure, your name will be known in the four corners of the world."

Bud perked up at that. "Wow! that's awesome!"

"Get yourself a proper teacher, one who knows Mana," Gaeus suggested. "One who knows Mana in a way that has been forgotten." That caught the attention of both twins, Bud looking perplexed, Lisa only considering.

Ariesa couldn't help but wonder. A Jumi Knight? Could that be Elazul? Would it be Elazul's name known in the four corners of the world as well? Stop thinking about him, Ariesa reminded herself. It changed nothing, as Daena said.

"And for you, young one?" Gaeus addressed Lisa.

Lisa looked up. "Um... I'm okay, I guess. Not really any problems. Unless you know how to make my feet stop falling asleep, or a recipe for a really good whalamato sauce."

The children remained where they were, Lisa dangling her feet over the edge of the rocky hand and Bud looking out over the valley, as Daena approached, looking up at the hill. "Gaeus, you were right the last time," she greeted him.

"Ah, Daena," he replied. "That is why I am a Wisdom. Then Matilda is gone?" Daena nodded. "My sympathies," the hill replied. "She left for a new destiny."

"I suppose you're right," she replied. "But it just makes me think of so many more challenging things. Such as, why does this world exist?"

"Perhaps to let you think about what you have asked me. Perhaps to give spirit to your imagination. Do you affect the world, or does it affect you?"

"That is not what I wanted to hear!" Daena suddenly seemed unaccountably angry. Even Escad seemed surprised at her outburst. "Why do we exist? There is nothing we are supposed to do in this world, is there? Just survive, and suffer under the whims of the Goddess?"

"You misunderstand the Goddess, Daena. You are always searching to answers to your questions, answers that mean something to you. You may not always get the answers you want, what is meant to happen may not be what you hoped for, but as long as you keep asking, your life has meaning. It is only when you give up, and cease to renew yourself by thinking and feeling things, that you are no longer living as a part of Mana. Might as well be a rock," he said, with a chuckle.

Daena swallowed. "You're telling me the spirit can renew itself many times, but the body only decays. It depresses me to think that people do die, in the end. Is it worth it?"

"You have emotion, and that is a luxury, a privilege of Mana and the Goddess's gift. You must decide for yourself if it is worth it. As you proceed towards your destiny, you will find out the advantages. It is something she will have to learn as well," he said, looking towards Ariesa.

"Me?" Ariesa looked around, but there was no one else in that direction, the twins having scattered to the other side. It reminded her uncomfortably of what Irwin had said, and she was suddenly afraid. "What do I know? What do I know about this world, the future?"

Gaeus looked at her. "You know this world is supported by Mana, the energy of life itself. You know that we are all connected - the lands of fairies, spirits, and humans, all connected to the Tree, the Goddess. You know that Mana can connect these things, and the stronger the connections, the stronger the world. The sproutlings know this. They are all connected, and that is how they survive."

"The sproutling outside my house said something like that," she replied glumly. "Everyone knows Mana holds things together."

"Yes, but there should be more for you… Unlike a plant, you don't know your roots. Few truly understand Mana, nor expect it to be bountiful, or to return. It has become a scarce resource to be hoarded, not something belonging to all."

"The Goddess provides Mana and links us all, they say." Ariesa wrinkled her nose. "Too bad the Goddess is a myth, Mana is finite, and I am no one of significance."

"The paths are always cut open by those without titles. Eventually you will become what people call a heroine."

"I don't want to be a heroine!" she cried. "All I want is to find Elazul before he hurts himself!" It made her think, uncomfortably, of her own thoughts earlier. Who was she, really?

"That Jumi guy?" Escad finally spoke directly to them. "What happened?"

"His guardian is lost," Daena filled in.

"Too bad. He's a good guy to have in a pinch," Escad grudgingly admitted.

"How do I find him?" demanded Ariesa of Gaeus.

The living hill looked at her. "There is... a connection of sorts. I can sense it from you. Pay attention to your heart and soul."

Ariesa was about to protest, but she hadn't seen that arguing with Gaeus had really helped Daena terribly much, so, swallowing, she shut her eyes, and tried to find what the Wisdom had been talking about. For a long minute, nothing, as she dug, but then her mind began to clear, and sure enough…

She felt something bubbling up from the depths within, and somehow, she did feel wiser. It wasn't Elazul, exactly, though she felt like he was there in it all, but it was more a connection to totality, to Mana itself. She opened her eyes to see Daena looking at her, questions in her expression.

"Well?" the cat-woman asked.

"I'm not sure how well this will work," Ariesa admitted, "but I think I'm ready to try."