PELAIR. The Gems of the Golden Serpent.

13. Máire

The terrible and malicious ordeal Aela suffered prompted the council of dwarves from Magyar to act on her behalf. They regarded Aela as one of their own, and their anger knew no bounds when they found out what had happened.

Rinna had been crying in the deeps of the woods. She had never done that, not even when her beloved Elenor had died. Balin tried to comfort her, even though there was little he could do, for his anger was such that he walked up and down, mumbling incoherently, trying to contain his rage.

Rinna just could not believe how pitiful she had found Aela. She had returned three days after the girl had suffered such an ordeal.

"What happened to you, my girl?" she had asked, alarmed when first saw Aela. How did you get those stings?"

The girl raised her swollen eyelids, which she could barely open, to stare at who had been like a mother to her, and she could not restrain herself from bursting into tears. Rinna's alarms went on and knew that something was very wrong. Her daughter, because she considered Aela a daughter from her belly, rarely cried. The last time she had seen her shed tears, were those on the tomb of her beloved Aenor so long ago. Since then, Rinna had never seen her pupil mourn again.

"Oh, my girl! What happened?" she had asked worriedly.

"I failed you," replied Aela bereaved. "After everything you taught me, I fail the trial!" said the girl in a tone of anguish.

"You failed me? What trial? Rinna asked, almost sure of knowing the answer.

"The novitiate trial," replied the girl. "I failed the test for which you prepared me for so long."

More than the wounds, what distressed Aela the most was the disappointment she thought her tutor would feel, after her failure to overcome the challenge they both had been brewing for so many years.

"You shouldn't have gone through any trial without me," said Rinna, trying to contain the fury and indignation that invaded her. An involuntary tremor began touring throughout her body. "Who ordered it?" she asked almost rhetorically, knowing the answer with a great hunch of certainty.

The girl didn't respond. She simply closed her puffy eyes and tried to accommodate as best as she could in her cot, considering that the bees had stung most of her body during her ordeal.

Rinna rushed out from her pupil's room and walked to the room of another novice, with whom Aela had established some degree of friendship. This girl had had no choice but to relate to the angry priestess the events that led her friend into such a deplorable state.

Rinna had some powers that allowed her to move some objects at will, a skill she had developed over the many years she had spent in this valley. No one knew for sure why at this exceptional place in the mountains of Magyar, some skills arose among the sisters. Each novice priestess developed different abilities, depending on her personality and character. The presence of the dwarves seemed to influence this, even if the order denied or failed to recognize it.

She almost rushed to the abbey, where the council of the Sisterhood met. Such was her anger as she walked through the hall of the convent, that some oil lamps that hung from the walls got detached and thrown away violently as she passed by, while most went off, leaving the corridors of the abbey in complete darkness.

With a wave of her hand, she made a motion that opened the chamber's door violently. Upon entering the meeting room, she noted that the board of the priestesses of Noor had gathered in full.

"So, we see that it wasn't necessary to invite you!" said Elizia somewhat sarcastically. "To what do we own such rapture?"

"How dare you?" Rinna snapped with resentment and anger at the High Priestess.