The Wandering Warlock

Chapter 2: Departures

Once Felcia is well enough to travel, the midwife waits til dusk and quietly escorts her down a servants' passage out of the castle. They meet a carriage that takes them deep into the North Woods. It is snowing.

The path eventually crosses a small stream and the midwife says that the druid circle can be found by following the stream uphill, towards the ancient grove of sycamore trees. The way is difficult for Felcia to traverse, snow obscuring rocks and roots and a baby in her arms. She stumbles a few times, her breath trailing puffs of steam.

Snowflakes accumulate on Felcia's deep blue travel cloak and Ava peers up at her mother's face from below. Felcia wears an intricate sapphire necklace, like a web with sparkling blue droplets. It dangles in Ava's field of view and her dark saucer eyes watch the gems dance with keen interest. Curious, she reaches for them. Her small hands stretch up towards the blue stars, faintly twinkling in the light of a lantern, but they are too far.

The evening fades deeper into night, and though Felcia and the midwife push on, a rogue stone dislodges under Felcia's step and her ankle twists painfully. She tries to walk but can't support her weight and so they rest on a fallen log, half covered in snow. They haven't made it to the druidic haven, there's no sign of them yet. The midwife begins to tend to Felcia's injury but from just beyond the rim of lantern light, a low growling approaches. Six pairs of glinting eyes materialize in the gloom. The women freeze, but they are surrounded.

The next piece of this narrative is not a happy one. Recall, this is Ava's story, and she did not become a druid... In her final moments of composure, Felcia carefully scoops away enough snow to lower her daughter into a small shelter beneath the log. Her mouth moves through silent prayers as she covers the child with her blue cloak. Ride on the winds, Ava Dear. It is not much, but in this moment, it is what she has left to give. A cover, a distraction. A chance.

When Felcia and the midwife make a run for it, they don't make it far. She is injured and exhausted, and Ava's ears are unfamiliar with the sounds of snarls and screams and shattering glass. It bothers her. But the sounds eventually shift, distilling into occasional growls and territorial yipping. A set of snow-padded pawsteps momentarily stray closer to Ava's snow shelter, but a few paces away, they freeze. A soft growl rumbles from the direction of the pawsteps until it breaks into a sharp barking whine. Sprays of snow patter nearby as the whining hurriedly retreats. Eventually, all the sounds fade and the woods return to quiet.

Back at the castle, Felcia and the midwife never return. The Crown Prince solemnly announces to the realm his wife and child perished from complications in childbirth and a period of mourning lasts for the next month. A year goes by and he eventually takes another wife, has another child, a son. Luciana believes what she is told about her mother, and though she comes to love her new baby brother, she can't quite shake the feeling that something is amiss. Though still young when her mother passed away, she remembers her face - her tender smile and warm hazel eyes. 

One fuzzy memory lingers, more unusual than the others. Her mother's tense face with a light sheen of sweat. A quiet baby, pale as snow. Dark eyes and glowing hands. She can never make the pieces of the memory make sense, and her father dismisses it whenever she brings it up, but it fills her with a confusing mix of warmth and safety intertwined with fear and desperation. Maybe it was a dream, since dreams don't usually make sense, but Luci will always remember the feeling.