Chapter 1: Of Time and Regret
To Miss Teriph Lia Randol;
My name is Taro Rallo, I was born in and live in Kulra village. I heard from my brother, who lives in Mishral City, that you are capable of magical feats.
I have little doubt that you know of Kulra, and our Murandi festival, with our famous Ruby Fruit, but there is something that nobody knows but us. A horrible secret. Every eleven years and one hundred and twenty six days, a girl from this village is given a strikingly red cloak. These girls are told to go fetch that year's Ruby Fruit, an honor given to these girls with no friends.
The people of our village are sedate about what happens to those girls, I look back and find that even I was unfeeling when it was my daughter, Keena Rallo, who was chosen for this. Even afterwards it seemed like something negligible, as if I had chopped down a great oak for firewood, not caring how long that tree had survived, just wanting to keep warm myself.
Until a week after my daughter had been sent into the forest. That was when my wife, Marla, couldn't take what I had done, couldn't take what she had done. When she drowned herself in a pail of water.
People of the village talked of murder, for who would kill themselves in a bucket, most claiming she would have wanted to go down with more flair. It didn't matter, it awakened me. Even when we had found my child's body, the day after she had been sent out to her death, when the men went into the forest to collect the Ruby Fruit, for the beast could still be lurking about, and to find Keena, I had felt little, or nothing.
The storm from the night before had washed away the blood and gore, but at the foot of the tree her body lay, in her once lovely blue dress, she'd been killed, but no human could do such damage.
It has been eleven years since my daughter's death, and I wish to keep such horrors from happening to another lonely child.
The date of the festival has changed as it does every eleven years, and it will occur in six weeks. As I have written above, I have heard of your magical abilities, and now I beseech you to help this town, and help the next sacrifice, everybody knows who the next outcast will be, a girl with no father, a girl named Rika Winral.
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They say that time heals all.
But what if the guilt is so great
Wounds just grow deeper
With every second?
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Miss Teriph Randol held a corner of the letter over a blue flame, born from a candle. She watched the flame enjoy the succulent taste of paper as its scorching foot falls destroyed the painstakingly written characters, each word drawn beautifully, every word spelt correctly, hours of effort and no doubt several rough drafts; this Taro seemed very desperate for help.
Teriph had decided to answer her beseechment. Curiosity was the main player in her choice, what had happened to this Keena Rallo? What had this man and his wife done that was so terrible? And even more so, what did those famous Ruby Fruit taste like?
As a gypsy Teriph went where she felt like being, and where she thought she'd make the most coin. As a gypsy gifted in the ways of magic, Teriph could also do what ever she felt like doing, and help those who she thought she would be rewarded for helping.
As the flame finished licking its jaws, it slowly changed back to the uniform color of a candle blaze, with only a small tick of blue in the center. Now all who had read the plea besides her and the writer would forget every word. If a village could keep a secret that long, then there must be some great punishment for telling the world.
Teriph heaved herself up from her crystal ball laden table, something that was actually a hassle with a chair as plush as hers, a necessity if one planned to sit about and tell people about what might happen if they play their cards right.
Future was uncertain, and one could only see down the path somebody was walking down at that moment, and the bridges that where smoldering behind them in the maze of the person's own making.
Teriph fell, ass first, into her well-cushioned chair, pushing her heavy crystal sphere to the other side of the sturdy table it sat on. Teriph traced her finger on the unfurled map from the dot labeled 'Rirap City' through the 'Rirap Fields,' which stretched south down the river, which wound down into the forest lands, where a smaller dot was labeled 'Kulra Village' The gypsy thoughtfully patted her lips with a finger, deciding the trip would take little more than two weeks. Four weeks was plenty of time to investigate and perhaps save the fatherless girl named Rika Winral.
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Stories and Lies.
Lies and Stories.
What's the difference?
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The Murandi Festival. It was one of those things that everybody knew about, but since it was so far into the forest lands, only the rich that were bored ever went to it. If that. Nobody is certain why it happens, and why every eleven years the date moved one-hundred-twenty-six days later into the year.
Knowledge of the Festival's early days is scarce; all that is truly certain is that it was, in part, to celebrate the one-of-a-kind fruit which the one-of-a-kind tree bears. The fruit never rots, on or off the vine, and bugs and birds have a great aversion to the shimmering-red edible jewels. Another specialty is that no matter the season, the tree has no flowers, just the scores and scores of bright fruit hanging from the bottom branches, just in reach.
The festival also has much to do with the village's birth. The fields of Kulra cut through what was once forest, but they extend to the north, east, and west, never to the south, in the direction of the Ruby Fruit Tree. The village was birthed by chance, good luck and a fair share of bad luck as well.
Although nobody is sure of their origin, or why they were going so deep into the forest lands, a group of fifty people had entered the great forests. Many died, people, animals, their graves long lost, their names long forgotten. About thirty starving and travel-worn people, all past any hope of surviving, and yet they did not turn around; they all knew they wouldn't make it if they tried. So they continued forward, continued southward.
Then, they found food, in the form of those wonderful fruit. The people rejoiced, they had the vigor to cut down trees, build homes, and create fields. They had no worries of food. But then all of the fruit had been picked.
They had other sources of food now. The villagers had little need to sustain off the fruit, but it had made its way into so many dishes, and so many tongues, the people wouldn't just forget it. So they waited, through the winter, where the year previous they had so much fruit, when spring came people trekked daily to the tree, to be the first to spot the first blossom. But it did not come. Summer, Autumn, and another Winter. Nothing.
When most people had given up, when nobody had gone to look for their wonderful fruit for an entire year, a girl was sent out by one of her parents to go and see if there was any fruit on the massive tree, three days previous it had been the girl's birthday, and she had gotten a wonderful red cloak. She had worn it through the forest, heading for the tree.
She didn't make it back. At first people blamed wolves, although they had never been seen or heard in the area before. Almost immediately after the forest creatures began to surge into life around the village, they believed the girl to have been taken by the gods, and it was her spirit who aroused the wildlife. And then less than a week later hundreds of the fruit weighed the boughs of the tree. And the festival began. It was also when the tradition of only plucking a basket's worth of fruit every year for the village to share came about.
The reasons for other traditions of the Murandi Festival, or even how it got such an odd name have long been lost, or perhaps have been long held captive as secrets within the village, as Taro's letter had seemed to hint to more than just a monster in the woods that the people feed outcasts.
Teriph closed the hefty book she had been reading from, notes from her parents and grandparents drawn neatly in the margins and the spaces between lines. The gypsy future-seer slid the book onto the table before her, next to the rolled up map, which had quickly re-coiled itself when Teriph had let it free. Golden letters snaked their way across the book's front. 'Rafiea'
She heaved herself from her chair using the padded arms rather than the table. Bangles jingled on her forearms, necklaces clinked against one another, her long, dark hair swished back and forth as she headed towards the entrance of her tent, she couldn't wait to tell the rest of her band they were going to take a two-week trip to the middle of nowhere because their main source of income felt like it.
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Traveling forward,
Traveling backward,
Does it matter which?
As long as you get
Where you want to go?
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"Wow, Teriph, I didn't even know that the village even had that much coin!" Rika was being amazed by the stream of coins falling into a large chest from the bag Teriph kept at her side except when she emptied it and handed out the band their shares.
"Aye, people'll do a lot to know what's coming ahead of 'um. And with such cheap prices as mine, people'll come back, again and again. Good thing I have this bag enchanted, huh?" Teriph winked at her new-found friend as the falling, mostly copper, coins slowed to a trickle. As the last coin dropped into the trunk, Teriph waved at it, the top, which had the word 'Booty' fancifully inscribed across it, slammed shut, followed by an internal click and then four other external locks snapping into place.
"And this week's business is done." Teriph secured the empty bag to her side. Within a week Teriph had met and became close with Rika Winral, at first the Gypsy had thought Taro had spoken of a different girl, this one had a father, this girl was most definitely capable with a bow and axe, and obviously not a young woman to be content with spending her days cooking, cleaning, and making clothes, but she didn't seem to fit the description of 'outcast sacrifice' that Teriph had in mind.
They gypsy had been subtlety looking for a second Rika, until she found that the fifteen-year-old standing before her in fact had only a stepfather. Over the past week Rika hung around the gypsy band with her free time, but none of the gypsies minded, for occasionally she'd bring a large foul to the band, having been target practice her mother had rejected, which had made her some quick friends.
"If you stay around much longer, we'll have no coin to buy things from the annual run up to Mishral." Although the way Rika spoke was accusing, she was not. The girl watched her friend sit in her plush chair, so Rika, in turn, took the plain, stiff, wooden one opposite.
"Mm, perhaps, but we all wanna be 'round when that Festival of yours comes. If I 'appen to drain all of the coin from Kulra, we'll just have to 'donate' some coins to your village for letting us, ever so kindly, bring some of that fruit away with us." Teriph looked slyly over her crystal ball at the girl who was six years her junior. They both knew that the other was just messing around.
"I don't think we'll get that desperate, if we do we could just sell our fruit to the city for much more than what you'd hand back," Rika placed her elbow on the table, all the better to hold her head up.
"Aw, you're calling us cheap." Teriph gave Rika a pitiful look, and her lower lip seemed to grow, slightly.
"Of course," Rika spoke nonchalantly, like Teriph was being extra over-reactive, which she was.
"Meh, caught in the act. I'll give ya a free look into your future if you promise not to tell," Teriph lost the 'Pity me' face, which wouldn't have ran smoothly with the coy and taunting words she tried to tempt Rika with.
"Naw, I'm good with just waiting for it to come." Rika leaned back off of the table and into her chair's stiff back and stretched.
"Well, too bad, I feel like seein' inta your future anyhow. I see … that if you don't leave soon, Roan'll be coming to get ya, and he won't be so happy about having to cross the village, even on such a warm, summer's night," Teriph had dramatically put her fingertips to her temples, a perfect example of fake concentration.
"Well, I guess I can accept that one," Rika scooted her chair backwards on the dirt that served as the tent's floor. "See you tomorrow, Teriph."
"Alright, hon," Teriph watched Rika leave into the day's dusk. Something that really unnerved her about the inhabitants of Kulra was how perfectly they spoke, pronouncing all they're 'ings' and keeping all of their words separate. She felt inferior just talking to one of the village-folk.
Now Teriph would wait, the entire week that the gypsy band had been in the village, Taro had not come once, and the fortune teller had waited, but eventually grew annoyed with the man who would ask for her help, and once it arrived, hide from it. So, she had gone to his home the previous night, and told him to come to her tent after sundown the next day. Today.
She would have spoken with him in his house, but Teriph didn't trust other's homes' walls with secrets. Although the thick canvas fabric of her tent didn't seem amazingly eavesdropper-proof, magic could do many things.
The gypsy leaned into the cushions of her chair and closed her eyes, musing to herself.
Rika really had no friends other than those she had made in the band, odd considering she was, although she could be considered sarcastic at times, even if the sarcasm was usually brought on by Teriph, Rika was kind and friendly. Perhaps having to play the man of the family until Shara, her mother, had been married to Roan, kept her from making friends with other girls. And now, at the age of fifteen, the girls had their groups sorted out, and there was little chance of getting into one.
From what Teriph knew, Rika also had a sister, Mina; the gypsy had seen the girl around town before, cheery and cute. The six-year-old had been born only a few months after Shara and Roan's marriage, which had caused a big stink in Kulra Village, considering she must have been conceived before the marriage, but that was a squabble long forgotten. The little red-head had taken after her father, who was aptly named for his light-red hair and her eyes were only a slightly lighter blue than his.
So, Rika was to be killed? Teriph wasn't about to allow that to happen. She opened her eyes and looked towards the tent flap, which rustled softly in the warm breeze. Still nobody was coming.
Teriph took it upon herself to light more candles than just the pair burning on her table, and once all of the candles glowed with the only fake life to have ever been found, the gypsy pulled a trunk off of a particularly tall stack of the locked containers, the front of this one had the name 'Eramel' emblazoned in silver letters across the front. Eramel, well she was best story teller Teriph, and anybody who had listened to her tales, had ever known. It was another three trunks, and another three names; Kale, Rabi, and Kitelle, before Teriph paused over the second-to-the-bottom trunk in the stack which had the words;
'Magical junk that can kill you if you so much as open this box.
–Marial'
written in a much smaller and easier to read print than the other trunks across the flat top. Although it seemed like something Teriph would have written, it had come from her grandmother.
"Heh, I'm pretty sure that this is the box of doom I put 'em in…" Teriph spoke softly to herself, thinking of the seven other boxes with similar warnings written across the tops by Teriph, her mother, Lorelei, or her grandmother, Marial, like the one before her, that were jumbled in with the other trunks full of her band's belongings. All of the silver or gold writing on the trunks were written with magic, so that the words glowed in the dark, getting rid of any reasons to be 'accidentally' snooping in another's belongings.
Teriph put her hands on the two hefty locks keeping the chest secure, and closed her eyes for a moment before unhooking the unlocked mechanisms from their guard posts. Placing the locks atop Kitelle's trunk, which was standing proudly on the other three chests Teriph had moved. She took an enormous step back and used her magic to slowly lift open the lid, the warning was glittering there for a reason.
To the magical gypsy's relief, all that emanated from the open trunk was a soft golden glow. No foxfire, no demons that where a little more than angry for being stuffed in a trunk, no portal to the netherworld. As the possibilities of actually deadly things that could spring forth crossed her mind, Teriph decided that it would be most wise to begin to label what doom and destruction she actually had in her trunks.
There was only four. Teriph could probably make one more before she would give them to Rika. That was only five total, hopefully this and some good information would be enough to save the girl.
Teriph re-locked the box, bothering to cover it with only two other trunks, not particularly sure how she had gotten the topmost trunk down, had she used magic without thinking of it?
The gypsy looked to the tent flap again. Still, nobody was coming. Teriph gave an exasperated sigh; at least she'd be able to pilfer one of Tagg's good arrows before paying Mr. Rallo a visit.
Teriph exited her tent, which had a small sign hammered into the ground next to the entrance.
"Futures and Fortunes"
Although to Teriph there wasn't much of a difference between the two, the words sounded and looked magical and mystical next to each other.
The Gypsy Band's leader by blood and ability slid from her tent, through the dancing shadows of the trio of fires that were in use by her band, and into Tagg and Kial's tent, Tagg was an excellent marksman, easily able to hit a bull in the eye, let alone a bright red dot on a colorfully painted circle of wood. He often took three onlookers from the group and had them try to hit the rings on the wood, letting them use a shoddy bow before showing them all up with the same ark and string. Kial just kept most of the band's weapons, trick and true alike, in perfect condition.
The inside of the tent was full of wooden boxes, sheaths, long leather bags of spears, more than a few bows, even more axes, and, Teriph's favorite, a set of five halberds. Teriph passed the halberds, giving them a motherly glance through the shadows, thinking of times way back when she had first tried to carry one while she was so little. She could barely drag it. Teriph stopped in the center of the tent, were all of the nice weapons were kept. Not within easy reach of bandits in the front, but not so much of a waste of time to get at in the back for when the troupe needed them, the middle was always a good place for anything.
Teriph tried to lift several of the wooden boxes, finding most to be too heavy to be filled with quivers of arrows, and those that weren't too weighty were far to light, probably extras for holding the band's ever-expanding private armory. Teriph finally found a box which suited her weight requirements and placed it, along with her knees and skirts, on the ground.
After shimmying the box's lid off, Teriph was pleased at the faint shapes of arrows laying within the box in the darkness, she carefully lifted an arrow out of it's quiver by pinching it below the head. She held the arrow up to the little light which made it through the canvas, pleased with the shape of the arrow head.
Teriph placed the arrow, very gently, onto the ground, before hurriedly dropping the box's lid back on and placing the hollow cube at where she thought she had gotten it from.
She squatted down and felt about for her freshly picked arrow, grasping it, she slipped back into her tent, unnoticed.
The troupe had their tents mostly as storage and protection from the elements, all of them choosing sleeping outside next to a fire before sleeping in a lonely tent. Teriph was the only who slept in their's, as she had a soft chair and the ability to keep the tent forever warm. The fortune teller was close with the members of her band, but only while they traveled, enjoying her solitude while they were camped out.
Back in her candle lit tent, Teriph held her new arrow up. It was made of a lovely and rock-hard wood, fletched with feathers from an eagle, and with a point strong and sharper than some of the daggers in the tent she had just snuck away from. Normally Teriph would have just asked Tagg for an arrow, but, having not told her band of why they were truly in Kulra, Teriph didn't want to pique her friend's inquisitive natures about why she felt she needed one of these wonderful arrows.
Teriph fell back into her chair, and felt under the lip of her table, finding what she was searching for, a long, but narrow, drawer slid out from the table's lip. The seer of futures placed the arrow into the hidden compartment, sliding it back into its almost invisible hidey-hole. She'd begin tomorrow, after she was done dealing with Taro.
Teriph wasn't looking forward to getting lost in the little town in the dark once more; at least now she had an idea about where the man's house was, unlike the day before when she had first set out.
The gypsy left her chair, bent over to brush off the dirt that clung to her skirts from her sneaking about, and then paused, still half bent over. Smiling she sat back into her plush, upholstered, mystic's throne.
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When secrets are told,
Those secrets hold
For they stay secret
To those who they are not
Softly whispered to.
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Such horrors that Taro Rallo was capable in relating in gruesome detail, proof that those frightening ghosts of memories haunted the man every day and every night. The gypsy walked him to his home. She had learned much more than simply words in a plea for assistance could teach.
In the way that he told her of how, after every outcast was sent away, all of the naieve villagers who didn't know, at the age of ten or older, where told of what had happened, people of that age able to appreciate the importance and weight of the issue, also those who would be adults by the next sacrifice's time. And also of how these children were able to take the tale in stride, as if it was something that they shouldn't be worried about.
Teriph assured the man that she would help Rika the best she could, and left him at his door, heading back through the village, the sun-warmed air starting to take on the sting of night.
After hearing the whole story, Teriph understood why the man was so uneager to relate it. After hearing the whole story, Teriph wasn't sure about her opinion of the village or any of the people within. Not anymore.
In her eyes Kulra was a village with good people, only a few tainted with such happenings. Now Kulra was a village full of people ready to send out one of their own to die, just because they were different, didn't fit in. Somebody that would be missed by the fewest people possible. How horrid. But there was more. These people had never sent a boy before, apparently they were 'useful,' as if cooking food and making clothes wasn't 'useful.' Apparently the fields were more important than the people.
Taro had also told her of how Clarke had gotten Marla to comply with the village's wishes. The village would turn against people who had sent their outcasts of children away, or hidden them, taking their fields, harassing them. They could do such so far from the lawmakers.
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Morning comes
Then morning goes.
Before you know
The morning comes,
Only to go again.
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Another week had left with little notice to the Gypsy Band, all waiting for the festival in two weeks. The time that was left was edging closer to the cliff's edge. Closer to the spinning freefall to come. Teriph and Rika had gotten closer. Extra incentive to keep the girl alive. This wasn't some request from some man filled to the top with regret; it was a friend who was going to be killed.
"Hmmmm…" Teriph touched her fingertips to the crystal sphere sitting atop its pedestal before her. Colored lights leaked from the points of contact, the ribbons of light spinning into the crystals center as if a whirlpool was drawing them in. The lights compiled into a white mass in the center, and the fortune teller took her hands from the orb, to dramatically wave her hands about it's surface, the internal mass held its shape until the last bit of ribboned light succumbed to it, and then only for half a second after. It collapsed before ejecting the colors it had greedily swallowed creating a pair of spinning great arcs formed from a rippled rainbow. The spinning circles took to dissipating, leaving a lively colored mist, still spinning, in their wake.
Rika watched, interested. Mina watched, enchanted. While the ball put on the show Teriph followed the threads of the little girl's fate within her mind; they were braided with her half-sister, and woven into the fabrics of several others. Then they so abruptly ended. And not far into the future either. Was little girl's fate truly be death if things continued as they where? Had the sorceress accidentally gone from Mina's threads to Rika's? She decided she would speak a half truth to the girl. She hadn't gotten far enough to 'see' anything. She'd need to effect that future. She needed to tell Rika what she needed to know, soon.
"I see… I see such 'appiness, your smile 'til yur death," Teriph slowly opened her eyes, and looked at the entranced girl, "Now, I do believe Eramel is tellin' a story shortly. She's wonderful, I think you should go listin." Teriph gave the little girl a wink, which was received with enthusiastic nodding, which was quickly turned towards Rika for permission.
"Mina, Eramel's by the fire, she's got blonde hair and light-brown eyes, come back here when she's done, m'kay?" Rika took the chair she had been standing beside as her sister left the tent, after a loud 'Okay!'
"Was all that really necessary?" Rika inquisitively cocked her head for emphasis, having had several small predictions with no such fantastic shows.
"'A course not, but it sure makes it look like I'm doing some'im amazin'. Just throw some pretty magic in there and let it do what it likes, an' I get different stuff every go," Teriph affectionately patted the crystal ball, the colored mist within having mostly dissipated.
"Ah, of course, a show for the paying customers. … Mm, you know, you've seemed really tired lately."
"Oh really?" Teriph's mind wandered to the glowing objects in the trunk and the arrow in her table, "Well… it's all yur fault."
"Thanks, that's a real confidence builder," Rika looked towards the tent's entrance, hearing nearby footsteps and wondering if she would have to give up her seat for one of the other villagers. "So, what did I do to make you so tired?"
"Oh nothing, darlin'," It had only been a week, and Teriph was feeling it. She had decided to break the news to Rika when she could give her a set of five, "I just need a scapegoat incase anybody else notices."
"Why don't you go lissin to Eramel wit your sister? 'er stories can get a little fearsome. I'm sure she'll want somebody to cling to," Teriph watched Rika rise from her seat.
"Guess you don't want me hurting business, listening in to their futures."
"Aye, that leader 'a yours, Clarke, seems to be heading 'ere. An' I see ... he'll pay well if somebody isn't hoverin' about." Both of the girls threw annoyed glances at each other, but parted with a smile and a chuckle.
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Friends come from Friendship.
An invisible bond
that can tie and blind you
or free and protect you.
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