The Cleansing (Book One: The Folara Chronicles)

016: Kara

In her mind, Kara perceived an image: of rocks and plateaus, a desert scene, with windswept boulders and sparse cracked land. She saw a city, clouds covering it as a lightning storm passed over. And she heard once again the zing! pssst! of the release of energy from the bow.

The arrow released from the image bow, fanned across the landscape, left the desert, left the swamps, filed through the living stone tunnels of Sentinel, and entered the sea to race undeterred across it. She saw an undersea dome and herself on the field, as the arrow came to her, and she caught it in her hand.

Immediately Korlon let her go.

"It is complete, my Kara."

His breath in her ear once again tickled her senses and she felt her knees go weak. A new image assailed her: of herself in a bed, similar to that of Galantyne and Feniece, and herself in the position of Feniece with just a sheet to cover her breasts. Her breath caught in her chest and she flung herself out of Korlon's arms, hoping the image had not traveled from her mind to his, for she knew it was her image.

She faced him, a hand to cover her traitorous heart.

Korlon  turned away and with a deep breath he trotted out to the spot where the arrows were embedded in the target.

"Tonight Kara, I will teach you the art of bow making." He called to her, pretending he'd not seen the reason for her discomfiture, and secretly taking a slight bit of pleasure from her reddened cheeks.

Kara managed a smile, resisted the urge to fly again and strode with her head high, stepping resolutely across the grass and rocks. She'd rather face a charging Shadow Eater right now, than know if Korlon had seen the thoughts in her mind as he'd held her. She should have been concentrating on his instruction. She should have been internalizing the moment of ownership and transfer of energy.

"Do not be ashamed, love." Came his voice in her mind and Kara stopped dead still in her tracks. The feeling of the mind touch just moments before as she'd sat in the grasses overwhelmed her. Had he used the mind touch then, had that voice been his? But no! This was his voice, just now, telling her not to be--- embarrassed!

He knew! He had seen the image!

"Kara!"

Her name in the air startled her, and she blinked at him, his short close cropped black hair standing straight on end, his wide shoulders a booster to her supple strength. "Kara! Come to me!"

Kara swallowed her fears and displeasure with herself, if the voice had not been Korlon's earlier, then whose had it been? A man here in the fortress had sensed her abilities and chosen to tutor her? A nagging anxiety pressed into her awareness but she tamped it down forcefully.

She stepped the few feet to Korlon's side as he showed her in his normal teaching voice how to remove the arrows from the target properly, for once they were shot they had to be retrieved or they would lose their potency. She'd not known they had a potency and found herself intently paying attention as he taught her about a sea arrow's real damage. It lay in the toxins it possessed that Korlon had used from the indigent plant life on the surface. He explained that in giving her the two arrows and with her care of them they had both endowed the arrows with this ability to release and retain toxin that would kill their enemies. He gave her a vial of antidote as well, and let his fingers brush hers softly as he withdrew them.

"But that is not the only reason I brought you out here, Kara. There is something else I wish to teach you today." His voice was deep and firm, always the teacher, and never ruffled or embarrassed.

Kara breathed deeply, letting her confusion fall away. "I would think the gift of arrows and the transfer of arrow energy to me, a mere tri-realm-er, would be enough of a lesson for one day, my lord."