Maelstrom, Kyaru and Shiri had played together until night fell, although they hadn't left the circle of the flock. Maelstrom had no desire to, at least not for now. The bullies seemed less intent on picking on him at least for tonight...he didn't know about tomorrow.
Brelanda stood up from grazing. She waved her aged flippers wide and blinked her lights in a series of bright flashes to get everyone's attention. Electricity danced over her skin.
Maelstrom was still playing a pebble game with Shiri on a patch of dirt when Thalenes stepped right over to it, so that her hooves rested right at the edge of the pebble game. "Yuh better peeey attention tuh eyomah Brelanda." Thalenes nodded for emphasis.
"Tonight," Brelanda was speaking now, "we all journey to the House of Light, to ask the ancestors for a safe and fertile autumn."
Maelstrom travelled the whole long way over the field, and down a rocky path towards the small cave where the House of Light was. Brelanda started out leading the procession, but Heero-ki insisted on being right up there at the front, so he led. Maelstrom walked alongside Thalenes on one side and Shiri on the right. Heero was rude and had no respect for the eyomah, he thought.
"What's the house of light?" said Shiri, her eyes on the path ahead of her, then turning her head to look at Maelstrom.
"It...you'll...see." It was hard to describe, and Maelstrom did not feel like he was ready to do so.
Heero climbed up into the cavern's edge, then he checked inside. Some zubat guano littered the ground...they had been living in here once again, for some time it seemed. Maelstrom hung back in the cavemouth, and he noticed none of the other sheep entering. Brelanda started to flicker her lights in a pattern known as a lightsong. The old ewe danced, swishing pieces of long grass in her folded flippers. And in a voice made gutteral by the many years, she began to sing.
"As Haru calls the fall, And makes the trees turn bright,
Phos, your children walk, Through darkness but always with light.
When Shayna walked these fields, And brought us all up right,
Phos, your children grew So swiftly, but always in light.
Inside, her great light rests, A beacon to our sight,
Phos, your children plead, For you to grant us light."
Brelanda finished her song and dance and waited in a crouch. Heero had meanwhile exited the cave again and stood back with the other sheep. Finally Brelanda laid the grass down in front of her, rose and walked over it into the cave. Maelstrom and the other sheep crowded in now, and in the warm summer evening, it grew hot and stuffy.
"Mama Shayna." Brelanda leaned over a waist-high stone where a pile of small rocks rested. One by one, Brelanda removed the stones until the tailball of an ampharos was revealed, sitting in the midst of the pile. Maelstrom saw it and thought of the stone he and Shiri had found.
Brelanda prayed over the dead red tail globe, which seemed to come to life from the many lights within the cave, many of them reflecting in the tailglobe of her deceased mother. Her mama had been eyomah before her, and her death had not stopped Brelanda from communicating with her, from taking advice from her.
"Shayna...Shayna and those who flocked with you and before you...we ask you for a safe and fertile autumn. As the rams ask this of Haru as Haru flows in their veins and brings them to the rut, we ask that no lives be lost, and no flocks be broken."
Maelstrom joined in the lightsong that they offered up to the ancestors. The whole cave was lit by the coloured lights, it seemed to away and dance like the sheep within.
"We shine our lights against Bangaa below. Bangaa deep below Cloudspin Mountain, stay deep within the forbidden cave...exibos, Bangaa! Exibos!" Her old bleating voice uttered the word of cursing and banishment loudly. She made it ugly.
"Exibos!" repeated the flock.
"Speak your visions...speak to those who have passed on. They have gathered in this chamber, they are in our lights, in our bodies and in the sweat in the air. They live," said Brelanda. "Speak...now."
Take this stone and steal the light, chanted the words in Maelstrom's head. The heat rose within the cave; the musk of rams, the sweat of everyone crowded Maelstrom's sinuses. Take this stone...
One of the ewes was crying something to her own mama, who had passed on some years before this one. Some ewe who had died before Maelstrom had been born...some harsh winter that had taken her life. Take this stone...
"Take this stone and steal the light," muttered Maelstrom, staring at Brelanda as she became the strange ampharos from his dream.
"What?" whispered Shiri.
"Take this stone and steal the light!"
The tremour began subtly, causing the sensation of one's balance being upset. It mounted to a shake that caused rocks to fall from the ceiling close above them. The rocks grated against each other, rumbles echoed through the chamber. Maelstrom splayed his four legs and hung on. What had he done?
Thalenes scooped Maelstrom up in her arms and ran out of the cavern with him. She wasn't going to stay in there while the cave collapsed! Her faith did not extend that far. Besides, something in what her son had said had angered the ancestors and she wasn't about to risk him. "Heey's only a lamb! Sheeeeyna pleeeese!"
Sheep bleated as they poured out of the cavern. As quickly as the quake had begun, it ceased. There was another shudder as the flock stood on the mountainside. Maelstrom had his eyes closed, praying. Then all was still.
No one moved at first. Maelstrom opened his eyes to see Heero-ki coming towards him and Mama.
"That youngling is cursed with the kuros!" Heero pointed an orange-yellow flipper down at Maelstrom as he accused him of the curse of darkness. Maelstrom quivered in his mama's arms. "He spoke and the ancestors answered! Foul spawn of Moonbeam! I knew it...I warned you but did you listen? Did anyone listen? He stays with the flock and he will be our downfall!"
Maelstrom swallowed to wet his drying mouth. He could only glare back at the gûndah, whose crazed eyes were fixed on him.
"What dew yuh thenk ah ken dew?" Thalenes was sobbing. "Ahm not leefin' him."
"He should be thrown down into the pits of Bangaa in the Forbidden Cave!" Heero-ki was raging. Thalenes growled at him and held Maelstrom tighter.
"No! Noooo! Go aweeey yew nasty ram! Yer burakos tew! Exibos!" Thalenes clutched her son and ran from Heero. Heero-ki moved to go after her. How dare she say that word to him! How dare she call him a dark one! A ewe!
"Please," Brelanda stepped in front of him. "Heero, don't make things worse. Don't jump to conclusions. Just because he spoke right when it happened--Just because the ground shook--yes, the ancestors were speaking but that doesn't mean--"
"It means plenty to me! And to defend the darkness is to invite it to snuff out all our lights!" Heero pointed at Maelstrom again. "He is marked for Bangaa!"
Maelstrom was finally let down by Thalenes, onto the ground. He found Shiri standing close beside him. Shiri stood as tall as she could and tilted her head up to reach his ear. And she whispered.
"I had that same dream too."
- - -
Butterfree swarmed in Maelstrom's stomach. Cud never seemed to stay down. And as the day progressed towards night, the young ramling felt almost sick with worry. But he knew that they had to go do this.
He bedded down on the cotton-spore bed with his mama, pretending it was just like any other night. It had been a day since the visit to the House of Light and the bullies had strangely left hi alone. Maelstrom knew they didn't even want to touch him. Aside from knowing he could defend himself, they did not want to be associated with the burakos, the Lightless Ones.
He curled in a ball and shivered in the warm air. He was poison.
The last few sheep went to sleep. Maelstrom watched their lights dim; he could tell. He knew that the time had come, and he would seek the answers. This was something Mama couldn't help him with.
A hint of autumn sat in the cool air as the night aged. Maelstrom had not had to fight sleep. He was too overwrought with what was to come.
With his tailbulb tucked low between his hind legs, he crept away from Mama. He headed over to the patches of pokénip and nipped off one of the leafy stalks at its base. He took the plant in his mouth and moved to the east edge of the flock, where the slope began.
He looked around for Shiri at the flock's edge and found her waiting by the edge, towards the ridge and the trees. Maelstrom stole towards her and they touched noses. Then the two of them stepped away from the flock, towards the stream.
Maelstrom overtook Shiri crossing the water, but he waited for her at the forest's edge.
The stone was right where they had left it. Maelstrom stepped into the little recess and let his tailbulb show the way. He dropped the pokénip plant to the side. In the dark this place was a lot more creepy...
Shiri stepped on something that moved. "Aaah!" Her lights flared brightly, and a skitty scrambled in a blur of paws, scratching over the stone floor as the lamb spooked it. Maelstrom jumped back seeing it. The small cat took off into the woods outside the cave.
"Oh...oh..." Shiri was panting. Ï don't like this."
"We can't head back now, we're finally here." The climb down here had been laborious and long. Maelstrom went over to the small pile of rocks and pushed them aside. "Stone...we need to know. Is there danger coming." He thought that he would've felt more silly talking to a rock, but it was an object of light, and to Maelstrom, things with light were always alive.
From the stone came no answer. Maelstrom and Shiri sat on opposite sides of the small glowing shard.
"We wait," said the young ram, watching the stone.
Shiri watched the stone too, but finally, she found herself looking at Maelstrom more than the stone. After all, he was a living breathing creature and the stone kind of wasn't. It was more interesting to look at him. And he had a thoughtful look on his face. "What're you thinking about?"
Maelstrom looked up at Shiri, at the two stars of light within her eyes. It was the light of the stone reflecting in them. "I'm wondering if I really am evil. If the mountain doesn't like me."
"Of course the mountain likes you," said Shiri. "And even if it didn't, I do. You're my best light-friend, you know."
Maelstrom wanted to tell her the same thing...but he didn't know how to come out and say it, so his mind landed on something else. "Most people in the flock don't think I'm any good. They're all pretty sure I'm one of the Lightless Ones, except my mama."
"Well I don't." Shiri grinned at him, the stone lighting her chest, chin, and the undersides of her striped cone ears.
"So what're you thinking?" Maelstrom would rather talk about her than himself. Talking about himself was making him feel kind of squirmy.
"I'm thinking about if I'll hear from the spirit of my dad and my sis," said Shiri. "They died in the spring."
"What happened?"
"Well we don't know if my dad really died or if he's even really my dad," said Shiri, "my mama mated with two rams. She thinks he's my dad though because I look more like him. Well, he disappeared and no one knows where he is so they think he's dead. And my sister died when an articuno flew off with her."
"I--oh. I'm sorry."
"It's okay, I don't really remember her that good I guess." Shiri sighed. She looked back at the stone again. "This isn't working."
"We need to eat some of the plant," said Maelstrom. He looked around behind him for where he had dropped it.
"Oooh but it's not safe to do that," said Shiri. Öh--well I know it's the only way but what if our souls don't come back?"
"We just eat a little bit of it." Maelstrom sniffed at the plant, then before he could hesitate any more, he started nipping off leaves, eating several. One after the other, and the taste was sweet and spicy all at once.
Shiri liked the taste of the leaves. At the same time, her mama had always warned her about this stuff, so she didn't eat too much. But when she swallowed her last leaf and looked up at Maelstrom, there was a strange haze around his tailball. "Maelstrom...your light!"
"Yours too." Maelstrom stared, for the air around Shiri's light began to ripple and dance. He felt light headed, and suddenly he realised that it did not matter...all of their worries were for nothing. He had come down here to search for signs of danger, but there would be no danger coming. Everything would be fine.
Shiri giggled and rolled on the ground, wiggling her legs. "Hehe. Maelstrom I feel so weird!"
In the light of the stone were dancing shapes. The shapes echoed the shadows that their own bodies cast on the rocks around and above them. Shadows danced with lights. Maelstrom danced with Shiri, their laughter was the music. The stars came alive in Shiri's eyes, they danced within them and then travelled outside them, two bright stars, tossed by the shadow and light spirits.
In the white light of the stone, many fair colours swam. Blues and pinks, violets and yellows, a slip of green here and there. The colours rose up above the shining rock as Maelstrom reared. The light formed the figure of an ampharos ram.
Maelstrom didn't know if Shiri saw the same thing. He stared, forcing his spinning head to focus on the image. The ampharos ram stood tall, then faded into shadow, and the shadow-ram held a strange light in his flippers.
Shiri was rolling on the ground and giggling. As she giggled, the shadow-ram grew until it was a cloud of shadow. The shadow reached out for Maelstrom. The giggling suddenly became a scream.
- - -
Maelstrom woke up to Shiri nuzzling and nudging his head. "Who," he spoke through a headache. He cracked his eyes open. "Did you scream?"
"No," said Shiri. "But it's good that you're awake. It's gonna be light soon! We got to get back up. We gotta hurry!"
Maelstrom headed up the outcropping after Shiri, scrambling where he could. He felt exhausted, refreshed, and scared. All the feelings jumbled together and left him confused. He followed Shiri in a daze. What had the spirits been telling him? Who was the ram in light and shadow...and why had he consumed Maelstrom? Maelstrom knew that Shiri had called his spirit back into his body, and if she hadn't managed to nudge him awake he might still be spinning in darkness somewhere in the netherworlds.
"Soon," said Shiri, breathless from her climb, "we meet again down there?"
"Yeah. But next time we don't eat so much of that stuff."
"...Yeah. So when?"
"In a day. Not tomorrow but the day after." Maelstrom needed time to recuperate. He knew that what they had done was dangerous.
"Okay." Shiri reached the top of the rocks together with Maelstrom. "Whew! Some climb."
"Yeah."
Shiri thought of something. She stepped right up to Maelstrom until she was inches from his face. "Lean--can you lean your nose down a little?"
Maelstrom did so, not sure why. She touched her nose to his nose. "There," she whispered, "now it's official."
Back at the flock, Maelstrom slipped in next to Mama, feeling like he had not even been gone very long. He lay down and put his chin to the grass, trying to wind down from what he had experienced. It was still dark over the flock, and clouds had obscured the sky. There were no stars.