Guardian of Elements

Chapter 34 - To the border

After Tawarthion's departure, Kate headed north. The forest was quiet. The air was still and there were no birds to sing. Kate was alone with her thoughts.

No, she was never alone during the day. There was someone with her at every moment, she knew that. As she was walking slightly uphill through the forest, Andúril was floating somewhere next to her. She got an idea what to do on her way to Eriana's domain.

"Mum? Are you here?"

There was no response.

"I can't see nor hear you, but I know you're here. You told me you'll be, and I believe you."

Steady breeze began to blow. Whistling of leaves was the only thing to be heard.

"Were you down there with us? Did you see what we've discovered? Another Shard... What do you think this might mean?"

...

"A Guardian of Time... I wonder what powers he or she would have. Verilion can see glimpses of someone's destiny, thus, future. Could a Guardian of Time see the future as whole? I think I did, when I touched the Shard. It showed me images of past and future. You created Verilion's maze for him, right? Um, sorry..." she giggled.

"If there's going to be a new Guardian, he or she would need a domain. But the world is already divided into seven of them. Would that change? No, I don't think so, they are already adapted to their Guardians. Maybe I could raise a small island from the ocean somewhere off shore... Too confident, am I, huh?"

...

"Speaking of domains, how's my... our forest? Is everything fine there? The only entrance are Verilion's plains, so I hope he was able to stop any incursions. But you are there every night, so I'm sure if there were any trespassers, you'd protect it. Actually, I wonder what you would do. Probably something like that human ghost did to me..."

That reminded her of her disasters in foreign domains.

"Am I really that pitiful? I messed up everywhere. Lerinth had to destroy a spirit to protect me. I was careless in this cavern and the maze lies in ruins thanks to me... I need to return there someday and repair it, or no one in the domain of Wisdom will be able to earn a name."

She remembered Fellas and her three cubs.

"I wonder what happened to them," she said aloud. "Do you meet them when you go to our forest through there every evening? I hope they are all right. They really helped me after Tawarthion left me, you know? Well, of course you do."

*

After about thirty minutes of walking uphill, a wide area opened in front of her. The forest was ending suddenly and there was a lane of grass, around twenty meters wide and spanning from the west to the east, just like between Lerinth's forest and the mountains. On the other side, there was a much sparser boreal forest of dark green and brown coniferous trees, mostly firs and spruces.

But as Kate was crossing the strip of meadow, she noticed that those trees were much taller than they should be. When she was almost in the other forest, she looked back. The trees of Tawarthion's forest were also taller than she remembered. This wasn't normal. She returned to the middle. As she was coming back to the green oaken woods, trees were growing smaller on both sides, until they were just right. From the domain of Nature, the trees on the other side were looking like completely normal firs and spruces. But when she began walking towards them, they were appearing taller and taller and the grass under Kate's feet seemed to be longer too. Her eyes were deceiving her. Or was it her mind?

This wasn't right. She was a Guardian, powers of others shouldn't affect her. Yet she felt dizzy when she was looking at those trees that were growing when she wasn't looking at them directly, but when she looked behind them, they seemed to be reaching the skies. What was this optical illusion?

Nevermind, she had to enter. If this was Eriana's doing, she knew it wouldn't harm her. She already met her, in her mother's memories, and she seemed to be kind and caring. But she would find out soon enough. She took a deep breath and entered the illusionistic forest.