Two of the three DunBroch tribes arrived to see Merida's party off. Per usual their mode of transportation was boat, and they raced each other to the pier of DunBroch castle amidst shouts and whoops from land and sea. The first ruffle in the greeting was the absence of the third ship, that of the MacGuffin clan. Twenty minutes before Merida had gushed to Juri about the temperaments and sons of the clan leaders, even imitating them as she spoke on their behalf. Juri found it amusing though did not laugh. Her eyebrows ever furrowed in thought, and they had yet to soften. Now Merida's own brows furrowed as she looked across the loch, upon whose waves two ships sailed forward. The empty sea usually inhabited by the third looked sad and tired, its tides flitting forward and pulling back in a lazy fashion. "You said there were three," murmured Juri as they watched.
"There were," responded Merida. Then she hopped to the lowest part of the peer and sauntered to her father's side, shocking him when she tapped his shoulder. "Where is MacGuffin?" she whispered, but her father indicated for her to go away. The eyes of the grey man beside stared at her as she departed, and when Merida caught his cool silver gold gaze, the lids overlaying them narrowed, flashing the eyes a brilliant, sharp yellow. For that second Merida saw the hot flicker at the center of every torch and candle rimmed in each of his irises. But in their middle lay pupils of a deep shadow, their darkness heightened by the glow surrounding them. "Go to your cousin, Merida," the man murmured so that Merida left his side. When she did he returned his attention to her father. Merida stared at his back as she moved towards the castle. Her mother was standing just inside the gatehouse, waiting. The brown eyes held discomfort, and as Merida passed she touched the girl's shoulder.
"Where is MacGuffin?" she asked. "I hope we did not insult them upon our last greeting." Merida shrugged and walked towards the stables, where her horse Angus usually relaxed. "Do not wandering today, Merida," her mother called after her. Merida ignored her. As usual, Angus was standing with his head draped over the side of the stable posts, eyes closed as he napped. But when the familiar sound of Merida's footsteps pricked his long ears, his eyes opened and he neighed loudly, huffing and stamping his hoofs as his mistress reached his side. After nuzzling her face into his nose and kissing the top of his snout Merida took her cleaning supplies and brushed him off, tidying his coat and tail before harnessing him up and hopping over his back. But as she made to escape a loud snap of wood cracked through the stables, garnering her attention. Juri was acting as roadblock. The snap had been from a thin firewood branch.
"I've been sent to guard your path," announced Juri. Merida let out a long sigh and slumped her shoulders in dissatisfaction. Then she slid from Angus' back and stuck her tongue out at Juri, pushing past her towards the castle. Juri followed her with hands folded behind her back. "That was kind of immature, Merida," she murmured, making Merida stick her tongue out again. "Did you ever hear the story about the little boy who stuck out his tongue when angry?"
"No," responded Merida. Juri quickened her pace until she walked by her cousin's side. "Well it was very fun until he came across a renowned officer of the king dressed in humble clothing. The officer challenged the boy, and when his tongue slithered out again it was sliced off by the officer's knife."
At these words Merida blinked in quick succession. Then she scowled and spit. "That's stupid," she added as she trudged to her room. But when she reached the hallway leading up the stairs, the horns signaling the meeting of the clans sounded. Both girls flew to the window and peered out from its limestone sill. They watched as the clans shook hands with Fergus and then the grey man. There was the same amount of recoil from both clans upon viewing the stranger, but no fray. Instead the men lumbered up the stone steps to the gatehouse together, with Eleanor and Fergus side by side. Juri's mother followed at a distance, and behind Maudie shuffled arm in arm with Dingwall's hulking bodyguard. "Aren't we leaving tomorrow?" asked Juri and Merida nodded. "There is always a feast before the family departs. We have only done so twice, so this is going to be an occasion," she added. "And the next day we depart at noon!"
Juri responded with a nod but left Merida's side. In curiosity Merida followed, standing inside the bedroom doorway watching as the girl retrieved her fencing materials. "Are you going to practice again?" asked Merida, and Juri nodded. "My fingers are itching," she murmured distantly. Then she threaded her fingers around the hilt of her sword and unsheathed it from its scabbard, her eyes flashing the same moment the sun from the window glinted against the blade's point. Without realizing, Merida's eyes drew to her own weapon, the long bow above her bed. Her quiver sat beneath it. "How good are you at fencing?" asked Merida.
"Undefeated champion of the county," responded Juri. In reply Merida gasped. "In all of Goldenestadt?" Goldenestadt encompassed two viscounties, DunBroch and Ulstead, and six baronies. Its massive expanse shielded half the kingdom's northeast border from Archadian soldiers and organized bands of thieves with ease, while the Transylvanians stumbled to protect its underside. That Juri was undefeated in all of Goldenstadt was a great feat. And her ensuing smile made Merida's heart pound with excitement. With a gasp the younger girl leapt under the canopy of the bed and clung her arm to its post, pointing with her other to her long bow. "Undefeated in all Dunbroch! None came close!" then, with a smug grin she added, "and I was wearing a stiff corseted dress."
Finally the fiery grin Merida had been waiting for her whole life plastered across Juri's face, and the girl leapt from her slumped position against the wall and sheathed her sword again, setting it to the side as she hopped on the bed with Merida. Though the mattress creaked and wobbled beneath her, she stood in perfect balance. One foot tucked behind the other and left hand folded behind her back, she held her right hand forward as if she were gripping her sword. "I was in breeches," she hissed, and Merida gasped before falling into a fit of giggles.
"How did they allow you to wear breeches?" blubbered the girl as she tucked herself against the wall. Before speaking Juri jumped from the bed and scurried to the door, shutting it and running back with pink cheeks. "They did not allow it," she muttered as she sat on the bedcovers. "I dressed as a man, used a different name and title. I attended the national fencing conference."
This proved too much information, and Merida sat gob smacked as she processed it, waiting for Juri to elaborate. It did not take long.
"If you really want to know," the girl started in discomfort, her breath falling to a whisper, "our cousin Adam has a rather grand title he is oblivious of."
"You went dressed as Adam?" gasped Merida, nearly flying off the bed as her hair shimmered like a firecracker. "When did you do it?"
"When I was sixteen," responded Juri, "two years ago. No one had seen Adam for years, and he was always so little it was easy for me." Then she gasped, directing her eyes back to Merida's and setting her hands over the palms of the other girl. "My brother is very ill right now, fourteen years old and stocky. My parents want to send him on vacation to the south to heal his mind. If you came to visit during that time, we could accompany him. I'm sure there are massive archery competitions there!" Juri's eyes flashed as she spoke and her arms gesticulated wildly, transitioning between tapping her chin and jutting forward with palms closed in indication. Only when Juri realized the Merida's silence did she stop speaking and look with suspicion on her cousin. "Do you not agree?" she inquired, stiff. Merida slipped from the bed and trudged towards the fireplace, looking amidst its ashes. Tonight it would burn bright again. Now it lay in quiet darkness.
"You can't just wait for the moment a sibling is sick and take their place," murmured Merida, pressing the sides of her nails with her thumb and forefinger. "Besides being of questionable morality, it is dishonest!" Then she turned back to Juri and pointed at herself. "When I am champion, I want to be recognized as myself. Not as a male family member."
In anger Juri slid off the bed and planted her feet shoulder's width apart, her hands balled into fists and her normal, indignant expression returned to her eyes. "I would rather be recognized as another than not recognized at all!"
Both girls stood their ground until Merida's shoulders relaxed and shrugged. Juri stared after her for a moment. Then she grabbed her fencing materials and disappeared from the room, leaving Merida on her own. The younger girl sat on her bed for a while and wrung her toes in her shoes. But once her indignation grew too great she stole from the tower and stomped towards the stables again, unhitching Angus from his post and hopping on his back before anyone could tell her otherwise. Then, amidst the cries of Maudie from an upstairs window she flew from the castle and across the bridge towards the forest, where her archery targets were set in various nooks and crannies throughout the trees' branches. For thirty minutes she practiced with them, until a chill loch wind, colder than any she had ever felt before, drifted past Merida's shoulders till her breath billowed in front of her like smoke. She shivered. Then she gripped Angus' reigns and traveled in the wind's direction. Her eyes widened when she came upon the clearing, the one holding the circle of stones where she fought Mor'du. The single paw that escaped one falling stone was long decomposed, now only a cracked skeletal frame. But the nails still glowed black while the wind grew biting.
In the year since Merida's fate was first changed this place had fallen cold and dark with bitter fog, drifted down from the peaks of the Ben Vair. Beyond those mountains lay the Archadian Empire. Perhaps the mist was theirs.
Shivering again, Merida decided to turn and ride home. But just as she tightened her fingers on Angus' reigns a childlike, whispering voice entered her ear and froze her in her tracks. When she turned towards the stone circle again her heart near stopped.
A meter ahead of her hovered a small orb of light, deep blue with spots of grey heat at its center. As it drifted its arms lifted against its sides like translucent fabric. There was only one. There was always just one in the beginning. In silence Merida slipped from Angus' shoulders and crept towards it, feeling the wind drop to freezing as she passed the threshold of the stone circle and disappeared into the deep pines at its back. When Angus stayed rooted behind Merida whistled for him to come forward until he walked again. But the muscles of his back quivered in strange spasms, causing him to beat the area of skin with his tail as his eyes moistened.
With light feet Merida followed the orb as the wind blew her hair. Scowling, she took the red mass against her scalp and tied it back with one of the strings from her dress sleeves. Then she trudged forward. To her surprise the orb drew towards her as well. It went in this way until the two beings rested in front of one another, Merida bending down so that she knelt at the little orb's foot.
"What are you doing out here on your own?" she whispered in curiosity, reaching her hands out and pressing them together beneath the wisp's underside. At the warmth of human contact the light quivered and changed, taking on a man's face. He spoke in sighs, lips pursed in and out as he whispered things Merida did not understand. His features were gaunt. Bending her face closer Merida told him to speak louder. But instead of talking the wisp groaned and shivered as the grey spots acting the man's eyes grew black and hot. Merida hissed in fright as the heat burnt her fingers. But when she glanced towards the wisp again, it was far in the distance. Frightened and unsure it blinked back and forth. As Merida followed it the cold air billowed across her scorched hands and soothed them.
Her breath was heavy now, white grey as it puffed before her pink cheeks. She ran forward. Behind her Angus became disoriented and galloped about in circles, harangued by some strange disposition washing over him. He did not see Merida as she disappeared farther into the woods ahead.
The ground crunched and buckled beneath Merida's feet, as the fog around her grew higher. Soon every footstep squelched when she stepped forward, and bog water seeped around the leather exterior of Merida's shoes and caused her toes to ache with the cold. The sky did not help. Overhead it had begun to rain, an icy one that pricked like needles. It seemed to grow more solid as Merida trudged forward. When her feet sank and the mist surrounding drew to her chest she wacked the air with her arms and peered around for the wisp with eager eyes. It was ten steps in front of her, quivering as it rested itself over the strange glass like surface reflecting its blue mass.
The ice wind blew gusts against Merida's face, sending her away from the wisp and onto the boggy floor of the forest's edge. But with determination she crawled to the orb's side and knelt beside it, holding her dress down to keep it from tipping her backwards. The wisp looked up at her with peering black eyes.
This time it held the face of her father, playing pieces of her memories with him- when he told his stories, when he fought his guests at feasts, when he laughed. Merida smiled as she looked upon it. The wisp took the shape of her brothers, shimmering and morphing as it became threefold. Images of them running amok rotated around the orbs' middles until they charged together and made the wisp whole again. For a fleeting moment Juri's deterring face came into the orb, but it quickly passed away, replaced instead by the warm smile of Merida's mother. Merida's hands tightened around the hem of her dress as she stared at this one. Lightning resounded in the distance and colored the veins of the clouds with white light, while blue wisps filled with cool heat popped up and hovered across the bog's surface, tinkling and laughing like anxious children.
Inside the orb Merida's mother played with her as a young child. Then, encouraged by Merida's memory it switched to when she won her own hand in marriage by archery competition. Her mother's disapproving face switched to one of delight as she and Merida put the mended tapestry against the wall once more. But what had happened in between? Merida's mind would not let her recall it. Hungrily the orb flickered in front of her. Its body was dusk now, and the grey circles inside it had turned to yellow gold. In gentle whispers it coaxed the memory from Merida. Inside its walls played the battle with Mor'Du. While Merida and her father assailed the great spirit bear, a fuzzy shadow hovered at the side of the memory's frame.
"Is that who you want?" whispered Merida. The orb flickered yes. But as Merida bent closer to tell it, a screeching neigh resounded from across the valley.
"Angus!" Merida breathed in fright, stepping away from the bog towards the face of the woods before her. Behind, a gust of ice wind blew violently past the wisp and reduced it to black dust, and as it fell it sunk to the ground like a limp shadow. Quest forgotten, Merida flew forward, grinning as rain fell away and the land grew warm. Sunshine peeped through the trees above, and as Merida whistled for Angus his responding neigh entered her ear. With a sigh of relief she charged towards the stone circle and laughed as she passed its threshold. Then she collapsed at its far side and called for her horse. Angus did not come.
In worry Merida peered in the direction of his voice and pressed the sides of her nails between her thumb and forefinger. "Angus!" she bellowed. The forest was silent. With a huff Merida turned around and bit her lip. Then she pressed her fingers together and shut her eyes.
"Guardian of the moon's high realm, though my horse is overwhelmed..." Puffing her lips out, Merida struggled to think of another rhyming verse. "Draw him safely back to me... and for this gift I will thank thee!" she muttered with conviction. The dark clouds hovering over the sky disappeared, revealing the moon's tiny crescent. A cold breeze wafted past and cooled Merida's pink cheeks. Then it drifted away.
Angus neighed again, and the familiar clop of his hoofs on the forest floor pricked Merida's ears and made her run towards him. Upon reunion she charged forward and slipped her arms around his long neck, nuzzling her face into his chest. The fingers on her left hand grazed a deep cut. But other than that Angus was merely shaken.
"Let's go home," sighed Merida, hopping back on Angus' back once more. The horse had never traveled so fast. When Merida cleared the forest she looked on her castle in alarm. Surrounding it were deep dark clouds and a setting sun. The battlements were lined by hundreds of hands bearing torches, and men ran back and forth screaming to one another. As Merida's horse climbed the stone steps leading to the gatehouse the palace guard accosted her until they discovered her identity. Then she was allowed inside, greeted in a frenzy by her mother, who swept her in her arms and nuzzled her nose into Merida's curls. "I told you not to wander," she hissed in a shaky voice, pulling Merida towards the great hall by the scruff of her neck. "MacGuffin has sent us a messenger of ill tiding."
The great hall spilled out in front of the two women, its expanse lit in solemn silence. The torches had dimmed to naught, and the men surrounding them sat somber. Without speaking Merida ascended the stairs to the bedrooms. Her mother would not answer her questions. Instead, the woman told Merida to stay in away from the hall and shut her bedroom door behind her. Then the Countess' sweeping footsteps disappeared downstairs.
In confusion Merida paced before the door. But soon her exhaustion overcame her curiosity and she sat against the floor, turning her head to meet the eyes of the figure on her bed. It was Juri. Her irises sparkled with a strange wonder as they stared into the pit flames at the front of the room. The orange glow that reflected against her cheeks bent the shadows under her eyes to gaunt holes. But when Merida shuffled closer she caught the girl's gaze, one of narrowed suspicion. A moment of silent communication passed between the girls. Then Juri wet her lips.
"MacGuffin is dead," she murmured, pupils deep and dark. "We depart tonight."