and steadied her being. She could beat this!
Lysia stirred under her blankets. A groaning moan heralded the waking of the party's new quartermaster. She had impressed the Zecarins with her ability to organize, ration, and keep a mental log of where anything was at any given moment – even the riders' soiled laundry – so the Zecarins had given her status. They now had their own private tent when they camped. A scout patrol this large made camp for two days while alternating groups made their sweeps; one stayed to guard the site and rest while the other was out. The two Eltharian elves had today to rest because tomorrow they pulled camp.
Riyarra stretched her back and gave her neck a thorough massage. She wanted Lysia to be awake, but wasn't going to deny the girl the rest she needed. Since they were no longer prisoners, they had duties to perform. Today was Lysia's day of rest. Riyarra was given the task of instructing the Zecarin troops in how to track an Eltharian scout – her. There was a twinge of resentment for having to give up military secrets in order to keep up their cover. With a piece of string she tied her long hair into a ponytail and tucked it into the back of her shirt.
She stood up and stretched her legs. Opening the tent flap, she strode out into the morning sun in just her tanned leather pants and beige shirt. No boots, no cloak, no sword. She fell back into the old training routine of morning exercises. Finding a visible, but out of the way area next to her tent, she began to stretch. By performing a series of poses, and flowing very slowly from one to another, she loosened stiff muscles and tight ligaments. It always brought onlookers, some out of curiosity, some out of suspicion, and some out of perversion. All stood and watched as she moved gracefully, sometimes with only one foot on the ground, and always maintaining her balance. To the more astute Zecarin soldiers, they also noticed she didn't make a sound when a foot moved to step on a leaf or twig, or patch of grass. At the conclusion of her routine she let out a long exhale.
"How many this time?" She asked the gathered onlookers. Five Zecarins stepped forward in various manners of dress, with one only half dressed. The others dispersed to see to their own chores, or to enjoy some quiet time in their tent after that alluring display of her flexibility. "Right. Begin!"
Without a sound she ran to the nearest tree, leapt, placed one foot on a withered knob, and vaulted up to the nearest branch. All eyes followed her as she climbed, in leaps and bounds, up to the top of the tree in a matter of seconds.
"Is she part squirrel?" one of the soldiers joked, and some laughed in response. "Wait, where'd she go?"
"You blinked, idiot. Too busy making jokes." The half naked Zecarin said as he turned to follow something unseen moving high above. "She's over there now." All other eyes tried to follow where he was looking, but once they had lost her they couldn't recapture a visual tracking on the pale-skinned elf.
High up in the treetop canopy she stood poised delicately on a flexing pine top. The world spread out before her in all directions. Riyarra wanted to grasp this moment of peace, but there was a purpose to this. She scanned the geography all around her. The Zecair territory spread to the south - the Alcabalhain mountain range, with the Zecarin capital nesting underneath it, was a ghost in the distance. To the north and northwest spread the wilds of the neutral territories – wild areas that buffered Zecair and Elthair, populated by a handful of frontier lands held by savage humans. To the east, past the open plains of the Lidark River was the human kingdom. It changed names after every uprising or revolt, or conquering by its enemy across the great sea. These events occurred every couple of hundred years – humans were a warmongering lot. She was now solidly within Zecair territory; they had been traveling in the opposite direction she and Mule had gone after leaving Zecair.
The Lidark disappeared into the trees when it came east – this was what separated Zecair from the neutral territories. Somewhere, deep in the woods right beyond the river was this monastery Mule was taking her to. It couldn't be seen easily from this distance; either it was obscured by trees, or something else. But it had to be in that direction, it wouldn't be safe for a human settlement to be much farther into the wilds of those territories.
Riyarra paused in her search and look down to the base of the tree she was in. Far, far below, the ground still stood undisturbed. She would wait a bit longer before returning to the camp and repeating this exercise. It was one thing to train them to track an Eltharian they had, but more importantly she needed to know if they could find one they lost.
Lysia stirred awake. Soft strokes on her cheek brought a smile to her face. But as her eyes opened and she saw a grey-blue skinned Zecarin stroking her cheek, the illusion of comfort disappeared. Timidly, she pulled the blanket up to her neck and tried to smile appreciatively at him. She had seen him around, but had not been asked to entertain this one. He was one of the strider riders, more refined and graceful than most of the brutish soldiers here. There was a glint of devious intelligence in the way he looked at her. She suspected that his visitation here meant he had needs just the same.
"Good morning kitten." He said with a silky voice. Lysia smiled bashfully, but didn't move. His soft fingers ventured up her cheek to her long ear, and traced the upper ridge to the tip. Lysia's eyes fluttered for a moment as she struggled against the goose bumps that ran over her skin.
"You see, we are not so different," he chuckled. Propped up on one elbow, his eyes roamed over the features of her face, and his fingers soon followed. They paused when they came to her Yvarna, the cursed mark on the side of her neck. "Will you indulge me? I wish to know what this is, it seems important." He said softly. His voice was so gentle, she could hardly tell him no. Even as her voice started to speak without her consent, the fact he was asking about something so personal and embarrassing was enough to break the spell his touch was having over her.
"It is called the Yvarna, it is a curse." She said.
"Does it hurt?" he asked as his fingers stroked it softly. The side of her neck, halfway between shoulder and jaw was usually sensitive in Eltharian women, but this mark dulled the skin around it.
"It feels nothing," she said. "It isn't made with needle and ink, but with magic."
"Really?" his fingers flowed down her shoulder and traced the ridgeline of her collar bone. "To receive a magical curse, you must have done something very wrong in the eyes of your leaders. I wonder if we would view your deed the same way." his hidden meaning was an almost hypnotic suggestion.
"I.. I..." she started to say, but the words caught in her throat. "I betrayed my lover."
"Oh? You sly minx you." he laughed lightheartedly. "It is not such a terrible crime amongst us, so long as you profit from it, and harm no others. Oh, but I see this is uncomfortable for you, so I will pry no further. I merely wanted to engage in an exchange of... pleasantries." He trailed the word off his silken tongue as his fingers found their way back up to her ear to massage the backside of it. Lysia's mouth parted with a faint sudden inhale of breath. He certainly knew his way around a woman's body.
"I have a patrol to run, but I would like to exchange more pleasantries later tonight, in a very casual and civilized manner... Would you like that?" The way he played with her ear made it difficult to focus on his words. Lysia found herself nodding in agreement despite herself.
Disappointingly, those expert fingers stopped, and he rose and left her tent without another word, leaving behind a flushed and embarrassed Lysia. She threw on a beige colored shirt that was growing tattered with travel, along with a pair of tanned lizard skin leggings one of the riders had handed down to her when her dress was caught on a bush and torn beyond repair.
She spent the rest of the day in seclusion in her tent. Lysia left only to get meals from the cookfire, and returned promptly to her tent without interacting with the Zecarins. They didn't mind her avoiding them. Ever since The Cat had made her a part of this troop, she had also effectively made her off limits to any recreational activity. According to The Cat it negatively affected morale and performance. Lysia had no argument against that; it gave her some semblance to normality despite being a member of the enemy's scout party.
Lysia stirred the half eaten bowl of stew wistfully. Her life had certainly taken an odd turn, and just when it seemed to be mellowing out, she was dragged back into the crucible again. Somehow it all seemed too unfair to be real, but she tried not to brood on that too much. Riyarra would save her. Her queen would fix this. Ever since they met on that bloody fateful day she had felt there was finally hope for herself. The strength she had seen in Riyarra was inspiring to say the least, but she was also compassionate and fair, cunning and flexible in her reasoning. It was a rare combination to find in an Eltharian nowadays, she thought. All those she had met lacked one or the other qualities, usually embracing some form of zealotry. The king had swept the people up in his crusade to purify the nation's spirit. Anyone found lacking was severely disciplined, or worse...
Lysia's hand drifted to the mark on her neck to echo her thoughts. Touching it sapped her strength of will and all the troubles came rushing to her mind again. She collapsed backwards in a cloud of her long brown hair onto the bedroll. When faced with depressing thoughts she did the one thing that usually helped. She napped.
Riyarra was once again standing proud and tall in her secret meadow. The wind picked up her free-flowing blond hair and tossed it about around her. Dressed in the stitched leather uniform of the Leaf Knights, she stood alone to take in the scenery around her...
She opened her eyes and scanned the treetops around her. The wind picked up and the pine top she hugged her body to swayed gently in the breeze. This was her element; the chaotic storm of feelings inside her were finally being suppressed and beaten into submission. Her eyes relaxed and the details in the far distance expanded to become clearer. The mountainous hillside that rose high to the north was covered in pines, but there was movement within. The tree swayed again in the breeze, and Riyarra moved with it. It took a moment for her eyes to refocus on the distance, but she could pick out something humanoid at the tree line near the top. It disappeared into the brush, but in time she saw more in the distant pines. She picked one tree in particular that was bustling with activity and let her eyes drink it in. Eltharian farsight took time to perform, but a well trained soldier could see details at impossibly far distances. These details came slowly as her pupils dilated. She saw a man. A man dressed in colors that blended with the forest. Familiar colors... Eltharian colors...
Riyarra held her breath as she strained to see his face. If she was right, his head would be covered by a cloak, and she saw that it was. But her proof needed to be definitive – she needed to see his face, she needed to be absolutely sure. But he had moved out of range before she made it out. Something else caught her attention that she hadn't noticed before. What she thought was a motionless rock at the base of the tree seemed to have a certain hunched figure. It was too dissimilar to be a rock or flora. She focused on it and the faint, unmistakable glint of highly reflective eyes – Eltharian eyes engaged in farsight – stared back at her.
Riyarra fought to stay perfectly still. She hadn't covered her head; her blond hair would be a dead giveaway if he was looking at her – and as far as she could tell at this distance, he was. A nervous lump crept into her stomach; she couldn't take cover and risk drawing attention to herself. If he hadn't seen her yet, he would if she dared to move.
From the curtain of his mottled grey cloak a hand appeared, and it gestured at her. She read the signals, and the nervous knot in her stomach grew worse.
Camp. Safe. Come.
The hand disappeared and he remained still as a rock again.
Riyarra blinked her eyes and slowly let them readjust to short range vision. Her breath returned, led by a nervous chuckle. Careless! Reckless! - she had forgotten procedure that had been grilled into her for years. Apparently her time in Zecair and out here in the wilds had quickly taken all that training away. Yet that wasn't the problem that made her uneasy. Her loyalties had turned fluid since her escape from Zecair, her people wanted her dead and her blood-enemy was the only one giving her safe refuge. But this Eltharian scout, if he was indeed a member of a Leaf Knight platoon, might be her best chance of getting information. No doubt if they knew who she was, they would not be friendly about it.
That was just the beginning of her problems. The Zecarin patrol she was with would not like the feeling of having Eltharians so close to their border, especially if it was a platoon in such numbers. If she wanted to go pay them a visit, clandestine or not, it would make many of the Zecarins suspect her true loyalties. They might not let her go without a fight if they knew what was at stake.
