Yngvild and the Forest of Dreams

Freeing Noren

'Good point. What should I do if he attacks me?'

'If he wanted you dead he's already had several chances.'

'I still don't trust him.'

'That makes at least two of us.'

I didn't have any means of telling the time, but the inn hadn't closed down as I'd expected it to. There were sentries and some of the army grooms were awake. I went over and asked if they could saddle our horses and prep them for leaving. I willed them to obey, and then felt a little bad about it. They seemed glad enough for something to do that helped them stay awake.

My next thought was to give Jerre and the horses the same sort of night vision that I had. We could go faster and be safer if we could all see in the dark. I hadn't done this before, so I wasn't sure that I could, nor how to achieve it. My previous attempts had just been about focusing on how I could see in the dark. I'd squinted harder, but that wasn't going to work with the horses, although it might with Jerre.

The only thing I could think of was to try something and see what happened. I'd kicked up a storm by focusing on changing the weather on the horizon. Maybe if I focused on changing Jerre so that he could see in the dark that might work?

I knelt on the straw beside the sleeping Jerre. Dark stubble poked out of his chin and cheeks, I gently ran my fingers over it. His eyelids fluttered as I touched him.

Keeping in contact with his skin I imagined his eyes widening to work better in the dark. Giving him the same night vision that I had. I spent a few minutes concentrating on that, until I started thinking about other things. I bent over and whispered in his ear.

'Jerre, time to wake up.' I shook him gently.

Jerre stirred and opened his eyes. 'Gods forgive me, it's morning already.'

'Not yet Jerre, but it's time we left.'

Jerre rolled off the hay and stood up, 'But it's bright, must be a good moon up.'

It seemed that my efforts had worked. Now I needed to repeat it with the horses. I left Jerre to sort himself out while I went round to where the grooms had taken our horses.

I started with Whiteface, the horse I'd been riding. With the groom still holding the reins I stroked her neck and face. She was calm, until I focused on her seeing darkness. Her ears flattened back, her nostrils flared and she whinnied. I kept on stroking until she calmed down. Jerre came out, and looked puzzled by the cloud cover and lack of moon.

'Thank you' I said to the grooms 'we can take it from here.'

The pair of them nodded at us and handed over the reins before sloping off back into the stable. Jerre took a moment to loop the pack horse and the spare for Major Duerte into a chain from his saddle.

'It's me Jerre. I've made your eyesight better.'

'You can do that?' His eyes widened and he stared at me.

'I can. Just sorting the horses out.'

Jerre's horse looked alarmed when I worked the magic on him too, but it recovered quickly. The other two I left so that they would just follow Jerre's horse.

We mounted as soon as Jerre had finished securing the spare horses to his.

With our improved vision we were able to reach the edge of the woods outside the Citadel before the gates opened. We had time to feed the horses and have a cold breakfast of bread, cheese and water before they started to open the gates. I made Jerre wait five minutes after they opened the gates before we mounted and rode at a walk through the wood to the road and then into the city.