A Knot Between

Gwenn's bow rose slowly as she drew an arrow from its quiver, she never broke eye contact with the rabbit. Gwenn was one of the best rabbit hunters in the valley. There were lots of burrows this far down Harehole Creek. Its pink nose twitched only moments before it bounded into a nearby burrow. She sniffed as she lost another arrow to the ground beside the hole.

"Adoman Craiton, stop staring at me! Why must you always make me lose focus every time I go hunting?" She scolded her best friend as she turned around.

"How do you always know?" The boy asked. He knew she needed to have full focus when she was hunting, but he just couldn't help himself.

"I could feel your eyes boring into the back of my head. Now tell me why you came here and made me lose my focus before I box your ears." Her bow sat against a tree as she started scouting for new rabbits, she had the sharpest eyes in the valley.

"Okay," He said quickly, "The Wisdom Women and the Valley Council are speaking together. The rumor is that is has something to do with the Rising Day."

He was ready to get smacked; Gwenn always thought planning for something early was just some rubbish to mess with when you had nothing else on your hands to do. However, when he didn't feel the sting of her hand he opened his eyes to see her gathering her bow.

"What are you doing? Why haven't I been smacked yet?" He asked her. She turned around to face him.

"I figured since this is so important to you I might as well do this when you aren't so excited that you wet yourself." She laughed uproariously when he instinctively looked down to his pants. "Adom, I was joking. You dork, let's go see Masilin, we'll see if what you're so excited about is worth anything. You'd better hurry though. She only sells her information from 2 to 5." With that she walked off, chuckling to herself, as she followed the creek back to the village.

"Well, her bloody information wasn't that good, at least not for 3 gold coins. There's just going to be a stupid Joylad coming, so the big deal with you is what now?"

She turned to face her friend who obviously wasn't listening, considering that fact that he didn't answer her. She saw that he was standing, staring off into space. When she saw this she walked back to him and pinched, hard.

"Ow! What do you want?" He asked, angrily rubbing his arm where he had his wound.

"You were staring off into space, you dork. And as for what I want, you owe me 3 gold coins. That information was useless and better yet, I had to pay for it, so pay up." She looked at him, expectantly holding out her hand.

"No way! I am not paying you, you just pinched me, and it was your idea, not mine." He said triumphantly.

She sighed angrily, she always paid for everything. She had to pay for the rolls stolen for the last Rising Day as well. Okay, she did steal some of them but Adom stole some too. While she was handing out her allowance from her apprenticeship, he was off stuffing them into his big mouth. "Fine." and she stalked off.

Adom hoped she wasn't really mad. She did pay for everything, but he never got a job. It seemed that no one wanted him as an apprentice, (A.N. I wonder why.) He went into the nearby inn, the Three Jugglers, owned by his father and read.

I'm not really mad at Adom, I guess I should go talk to him.

You're right! Her conscience told her.

Fine, stupid conscience, he really does need to pay up though.

So Gwenn went to the Three Jugglers, where she knew Adom would be. His father owned the inn and he lived there about as much as he lived in his own house. She went to his room on the third floor and knocked on the door.

"Come in!" It was Adom. She opened the door and walked in.

"Adom, you know I'm not mad at you right. It's just that I pay for everything and you get away with everything. Okay?" No answer. She walked into the bedroom and saw him lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling. "Adom?"

He didn't answer so she pinched him gently, remembering his angry reaction when she had done it earlier that morning. He didn't stir. She tried to slap him on the arm playfully, this time he did stir; he grabbed her arm before she could blink.

"Adom! Let go of me right this instant." He dropped her arm. "What is wrong with you?!? You keep spacing out, what is happening to you? Tell me now, Adom, I know there is something wrong, you can't hide it." She added when she saw a mock confused look on his face.

"I don't know, I can't help but act strange lately. It's not my fault, you have to understand." His father called up to him. He looked at Gwenn, "Look, meet me tomorrow at the fountain at 11:00, okay? I'll tell you then. I have to go, bye." With that he ran out of the room, leaving her standing there, confused as one can get.

He better bloody well tell me tomorrow, leaving me like that. How dare he? Here I am, being a concerned friend and he has the nerve to go running to his pop like that. Argg!

She left the inn still as confused as ever, but left it at that. It was dinner time and she was hungry. It was a 2 mile walk to her house, she had better get moving, so she set off.

Gwenn was headed to the fountain at 10:45. She could see Adom already there, sitting on the edge. She ran the rest of the way to the fountain and plopped herself down beside him.

"You were right." He said. Adom was staring off at something in the distance.

"About what?" Gwenn knew very well about what she was right about, but she wouldn't bring up the subject, not this time.

"Don't do that Gwenn. You know very well 'about what'. There is something wrong with me." He hesitated before he started again. "There are voices."

"What kind of voices? What do they say to you, Adom?" she questioned.

"They say all sorts of things, but most of all, that there are some Mariers (Mariers are people who serve the dark) outside of the valley." Adom started to lose himself again when Gwenn spoke up.

"Stop, don't listen to them. Keep them out of your head until I can find some help." Gwenn didn't like to leave him alone with the voices, but she had to find someone to help. "I'll be right back."

Gwenn ran off not looking back to see if he was still staring off at some unseen thing. She got to the Wiser's building