A Clove of Fates

18. Like A Whisper

This whole "dokkt stjorn" thing was starting to get on my nerves.

Before I was kidnapped, my tutors had suggested meditation to help activate the talisman. Something about "getting my spirit onto the same frequency" or something. I don't know, it sounded absurd and I couldn't go a whole hour without talking to anyone on a good day. So I skipped the meditation.

However, the times were a little more desperate now than usual. So, last night I tried it. I laid on my side with my back to the fire and tried to relax. I tried to let the magic that had been collecting in my bones since the flight spell wore off float to the surface of my skin. It tickled. But! It was working! Despite everything, I was actually able to relax.

The excitement that this inspired in me began to draw the magic from my skin back into my bones. Deep breaths, Ifera. There... that was better.

Now... what was the next step again?

Dammit, curse my short attention span!

But then there was...something. Like a whisper on the back of my neck. A tug on my magic. I felt that I was meant to turn around. And that's what I did.

I saw her. Jarelis. The farm girl. My kidnapper. She was crying. I'm not sure why, but I didn't want her to be. That was weird. I wasn't that good of a person. I wanted to reach out to her, to comfort her in some way. The reasoning was beyond me. Perhaps it was this tugging on my magic.

I was an observer to the energy that danced on the back of my hand as it travelled up my arm, bringing a warm sensation through the appendage as it did so. And it did something I never thought my magic could do.

It left my body.

And it entered hers.

I could still feel it, faintly, but the feeling was unlike any other sensation that I had ever experienced. I didn't feel it through myself, but I felt it through her.

A moment of surprise before I pulled it back, yanked it really, gathering it all in my core and holding it close. I started to cramp, but I couldn't let...whatever it is that that was happen again. Ever.

Did she feel it? For a moment, I thought she had. She sat erect, her eyes widened and her tears stayed. But then she looked over her shoulder and woke Fraed. We had been found? The point was that it was time to run.

And then the whole issue was swept under the rug. Embarrassment raged on like a forest fire inside of me despite the fact that it had about an hour or so since I shared my magic with her by the fire.

I looked at her now, and she expertly avoided my gaze. Her dark brown eyes lazered straight ahead and her ebony face pointed ever-so-slightly away from me.

I inwardly turned over my magic. It had been that bundin salir thing, hadn't it? Our Bound souls, our entwined fates. I guess there was more to it than just mutually assured destruction. What else was there? My fingers twitched. I wanted to know. I wanted to explore it, all of it, with her.