A pleasant wellhead of running water was heard not that far from the road on which the red foxes were advancing. All over around, a warm coat of white snow was seen, covering the blowing of the tired soil, giving it time to breathe and get new forces for the next spring that was fast approaching those places.
„It’s still cold enough,” murmured Inmar, watching the surroundings, and, arising on her rear legs, she turned into a human. „I think that here it will be a great storm soon, but I don’t understand why. What do you think, Samaya?”
Watching back, she didn’t see the small, red fox that was generally following her only a few steps behind her. And, not seeing her, made Inmar alert. „Samaya? Samaya! Where are you?” She shouted, scrutinizing the surroundings.
„Don’t worry, Inmar! She stopped on the rock, over there, from off which the valley can be seen as if being right in your palm,” another fox told Inmar while passing by. „We’ll wait for you at the drop. Don’t be late!”
Inmar only nodded yes and, at a slow step, she started to descend the cliff. After about 200 meters of descending, she saw the small fox, sitting on that rock and sniffing the horizon.
Feeling Inmar not that far, the fox murmured, truly disturbed by something: „I don’t like this place. I would have liked to remain in the woods. At least this harsh cold isn’t felt there.”
Inmar said nothing and, approaching the girl, she also looked at the valley. „I also hate the changes, Samaya, but this time it was necessary.”
„For who?” The little fox asked and a short silence took over them. „And… stop calling me, Samaya. My name is Mayar. I’m tired to listen to this name all the time. It isn’t and it has never been my name.”
Inmar looked at the girl and noticed her upset as if hearing the name of the „other” had been something that was driving her crazy. But what really amazed Inmar was to realize that the girl remembered her real name, even if she never told them about this. She knew, at least reportedly, that those who at least once saw Mannar in their life, were losing their mind and they couldn’t remember anything from their former life. But now, it was different with Mayar. Yet, even if she was confused, finding this out, she decided to ask: „Where did you hear this name - Mayar?”
„Why should I have listened to it from someone else? This is the name I have had since I’ve been born. My mother gave me this name. My real mother.”
„Do you remember your past? Even after you…?”
The girl looked at Inmar and burst to laugh. „Why shouldn't I remember who am I? Am I a ghost or something? Or… did I die and I don’t remember this?”
Inmar stared into Mayar’s eyes, but she couldn't see anything from her past or future.
„Oh, a rabbit!” The fox happily hissed through her teeth, but she couldn’t run after him, for Inmar forced her to take her human body by touching her shoulder and a wave of warm air entered deep under her skin. „This is not fair, Inmar. I could…”
„I know that you could have easily caught him, but it’s time to go further. Follow me!” And Inmar left that place first.
The girl instead kept staring at the rabbit, which showed her his fluffy tail before entering his den, and Mayar only unhappily murmured: „such a loss! And it looked so tasty,” and, turning her back on the bunny, she didn’t see it suddenly showing its wet, black nose out of its den, sniffing the horizon while she was leaving.
***
At the top of the mountain, there was colder than at the foot of it, and that harsh blow of the wind, rich in snowflakes, was quickly sticking on the foxes’fur, which were already difficultly advancing through the snowstorm started from nowhere.
But even if advancing through that harsh snowstorm was difficult, only one of the foxes stopped to sniff the horizon: „the night will be also harsh,” she said and, after a sudden explosion of air, she recovered her human body.
She was a woman about 60, who still kept traces of her previous beauty on her face, even if she looked as if she crossed through a lot of difficult battles and hard moments in her life, and the light of her eyes was still warming those who were mirroring in her glance. Her hair was long and blond, even if the color of her fur was dark red and her eyes had a shade of dark red too, a hint that that fox wasn’t like the others, that she had a huge power flowing through her veins.
„What’s wrong, Anaya? Is someone approaching us?” Inmar asked the old woman when she and Mayar approached her.
„It’s the wind. I don’t like its smell. It’s too harsh and I have the feeling that it’ll be a big snowstorm tonight and that everything around will be covered by ice. And… I also don’t like this place, for I feel someone’s presence here, of someone who isn’t by our side.”
„Island!” Ahi told the foxes, exiting his grotto, whose entrance appeared from nowhere on the steep wall of the mount and the foxes stopped. „He’s my little brother and he still hates when someone enters his territory without his permission… I think that this thought puts him in trouble.”
„Brother!” whispered Inmar, slowly bowing her head. „I thought that you’re far from here and you won’t be back sooner than in three months.”
„And you were right: I’ve been in the Northern Lands of the humans, but I didn’t like their food and that’s why I turned back,” Ahi made a joke, but nobody laughed hearing it. „I think that I’m old already if no one laughs at my jokes. What a shame!”
„Then, you should learn better jokes,” baited him Mayar, who was actually the only one who dared to look into Ahi’s eyes - of course, along with Inmar and Anaya. The other foxes instead were looking to the ground as if they had been afraid of him, but when Inmar shouted at the girl through her teeth to bow her head, Mayar raised it more, as if trying to provoke Ahi more.
The Mago of the Black Stones, as Ahi was also known among the other Wizards, took a few steps toward the girl, trying to see something in the mirror of her eyes. But he had seen himself forced to make a wry face when his power hit the girl’s power, impeding him to see something.
„Interesting,” he whispered, „a creature that has the ability to hide her past, present, and future from me. Nobody ever has been able to do that. But… how can you do this?” And he bent toward the girl, trying to take Mayar by surprise.
The girl instead didn’t scare at all and neither did she move from her place. She only scornfully looked at him, wondering what that mad old man was trying to do with her and considering his attempt of „reading” her like a book something damn unpleasant and disrespectful to her. But when she saw him insisting to pierce that wall of power that was protecting her inner world, Mayar made a wry face and this has been something that Ahi disliked.
However, Mayar didn’t bother at all by Ahi’s sour face, which he made once he realized that he was incapable to control the girl. And, staring straight into his eyes, she ironically asked him: „Will you stay so for long? If so, I better go for a walk,” but when to pass by him, Ahi suddenly grabbed her by the left wrist, transforming her into a black, ice statue, through whose body the blood was still quickly flowing and Ahi resorted to cunning just to can read what kind of power had that girl that dared to provoke him.
„Brother,” whispered Inmar, frightened. „She’s just a child. Don’t…”
„Shh, silence!” Ahi demanded and, moving his hand above Mayar’s body, without touching it, he managed to form a current of black, magic air around her and, from that air, he made a kind of ovoid mirror later, about two meters from him, in which he used to reflect the memories of that person subjected to his spell. But, at that time, he only saw a deep void and nothing more.
„Follow me!” He told Inmar in a demanding voice and she listened to his command. Thus, both entered that mirror and got into the middle of a forest, completely sunken into darkness. But, as Ahi wasn’t rushing anywhere, Inmar preferred to keep a safe distance between her and her brother.
And, to be honest, Inmar was also afraid of that forest, which they were crossing through, because it was completely dead: the trunks, the leaves, the branches, and even the aerial roots seen in some of the trees were breathing death. The same happened to the young trees that seemed to have frozen, getting a dark brown color, and even their growth seemed to have „frozen.”
„What kind of forest is this?” asked Inmar.
„Mayar’s inner world,” the Wizard answered and, as if something caught his glance, he approached a hollow, whose entrance was completely covered with spider web.
Squatting in front of that hollow, Ahi stretched his hand in front and made a small, lit candle appear in his palm. Then, he approached the flame of the candle of that spider web which he later burnt. And, when it was already good visibility there, he moved that candle closer to the entrance, and he and Inmar saw, inside of it, a 5-year-old Mayar, squatted in one of the corners, full of blood and shaking like hell because of fear.
„Now I understand why her world is hidden from me: she „froze” it,” and he grinned. „That’s why nobody sees her past as nobody will ever see her future either.”
„She froze it?! But… how did she do that? I thought that only a Black Mago can do it.”
„And… you are again right,” and Ahi suddenly stared with hatred at Inmar, hissing through his teeth: „she’s my child, isn’t she?” And this made Inmar shake like an aspen leaf, avoiding his glance. „She’s the child I had with Morena. But I thought that she died a few days after her birth. So, what else are you hiding from me, you, cunning fox?”
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A sudden move of Ahi’s hand, who moved through the air and got in front of her, and he grabbed her by the throat, raising her from below as if she was something very light. „You said that she died. You said that both died. Why did you lie to me? Why?”
„I didn't lie to you, brother! I swear! Trust me!” Inmar shouted and started to struggle to release herself. „I can’t breathe, Ahi. Please, I can’t breathe!”
Roaring like crazy, Ahi threw Inmar against a tree, which her body sturdily hit, and, till she composed herself, he managed to kindle and extinguish the burning of his soul several times.
„Why everybody is lying to me these days? Why? Do I look like a fool or what?” And he squatted in front of Inmar again, who was crawling back without taking her eyes from him. „Tell me, Inmar, tell me, sister, what else are you hiding from me?”
„Mannar! Your brother is who transformed this child into what she’s today. I don’t know why or how, but he found Morena’s house and made this child Eris’s slave… her human shape on earth. And…”
„And…?”
„He has, in the middle of his forehead, between his horns, a black diamond, and, in that diamond, Eris’s face is reflected all the time. I saw him once. When he killed that woman on the river shore.”
„Woman? What woman?”
„Dike’s wife! She tried to take that diamond off his forehead that day and then is where she also saw Eris reflected on one of the diamond’s facets. After that, Mannar made Mayar look like Dike’s child.”
„Twins-shapes!” Ahi hissed through his teeth and, standing up, he looked around. „Now I understand why Mannar is hiding from me and why I can’t find him anywhere.”
„He isn’t hiding. He simply doesn’t remember his former life.”
Ahi slowly turned toward his sister, looking at her with a curious glance. But, even after minutes of staring into her eyes, he saw nothing else than that she wasn’t lying to him.
„Interesting! Interesting!” Ahi murmured, for he knew his younger sister’s character very well, who he saw growing up after his father, Coallar, abused a mortal on the Field of Spirits, next to Kiago Forest, and, after Inmar had been born, her mother drowned herself into the river.
It was Ahi who saved the girl that day and hid her from the humans and from the other Magos, transforming her into a red fox and giving her the power to control the other’s minds.
„Mannar has already a bigger power than ours or of Island and Inlan Diar’s. He got that power from Eris, like a gift when he received that diamond on his forehead and everybody, who ever saw him, is losing his mind and forgets who he was. But… this didn’t happen to Mayar. She remembers everything of her past and she also knows that before being a red fox, she was just a simple kid.”
„Interesting. Keep going!”
„At the age of five, Mayar started to feel the sweet taste of blood. It was then when she killed all the chickens, in the village where she and Morena were living, leaving those poor villagers at the mercy of fate, right on the eve of winter. But she didn’t do that because she wanted: she has been controlled by Mannar that day. But… what’s more surprising is the fact that even if Mayar is five years younger than Dike’s daughter, they look as if being the same age, as if they had been born the same day. However, there’s something else that worries me: that he’ll probably try to take the power from Mayar when the time comes and, if he does it, then he’ll probably be invincible.”
„Nobody is invincible in this world, Inmar and you know that. If such power ever appears in this world, Chaos or the Holy Tree will bring a similar power into this world, an equal one, to can control that first power. Probably, Mannar’s rival is already born into this world.”
„Mayar’s copy!”
„No, here you’re wrong, as everybody else, actually: Mayar isn’t the copy of that girl, but a power that supplements it, and this is what preoccupies me, for… I feel that somehow Mayar will be against us someday.”
Inmar finally dared to stand up and approach Ahi, who wanted to leave. And, touching his arm, Inmar forced him to stay and look at her: „What if there isn’t like you think? What if Mayar looks like this just because Eris read that other girl’s fate and tries to unify their power thus, just to bring her into this world and release her from that dungeon?”
„To be honest, sister, I don’t know why Mayar looks so, but I know that a war is approaching and that that war will involve us all and that we must prepare for this. Especially we must prepare Mayar for that war, for… I feel that she’ll have a great role in that battle,” and Ahi looked again at the hollow inside of which Mayar was hiding.
„But…”
„Let’s go, Inmar! You know that that child can’t stay „frozen” for long or the ghosts of her past will completely swallow her, and this is something I want the less: to lose her and her power.”
At the moment Ahi and Inmar returned from Mayar’s inner world, the mirror broke into thousands of pieces and the girl awoke from her sleep.
But… she didn’t remember anything of what just happened and she also didn’t suspect that someone entered her inner world. She just grinned at Ahi who insistently looked at her and, turning her back on him, she turned back on the same path onto which she and the other foxes got till there. Soon after, Anaya followed the girl, at Ahi’s command.
***
„Who’s that man?” Mayar asked the old fox, who she was following like a staunch puppy.
„Ahi, the Wizard of the Black Stones. He has the control of the old times in his power, and this gives him the right to use them in his favor. The power he’s using now is something that he got while being in the deep underground tunnels, dug by the gnomes. But he also learned to use his power by listening to nature’s whisper, bathed in the night’s light. Also, he can listen to the dead nature’s voice while it is turning black and the thread of alive energy leaves its green body. And… because of this, everybody is so afraid of the Mago Ahi.”
„But… how do you know that much about him?” Mayar asked while they were advancing among the trees that were growing on the top of the mount and which were completely covered by snow and ice at that moment and looking as if being painted with white paint on a black canvas, and the black of that canvas was seen only here and there, in some places.
„Because I know him since I’ve been born. Actually, since I’ve resurrected. Then, the others told me about his great power and that nobody wants him as an enemy or he’ll be lost and dead for sure. And, to tell you a surprising thing: everybody is also afraid of Inmar for being Ahi’s sister.”
Mayar suddenly stopped, staring at Anaya: „Inmar has a brother? Wow! I thought that she isn’t loved by anybody and she doesn’t love anyone in this world.”
Anaya just smiled and, taking her fox shape again, she sat down on the snow and her long, red tail was lying on the white snow as if it was a red scar of the white soil. Then, Anaya looked at that white monster seen all over in front of them.
Soon after, Mayar also transformed into a fox and sat down next to Anaya, and, the two foxes - a cub and an adult one, were watching the horizon with black stains on it because of the trunks that weren’t totally covered by snow, as if that snow was just a beautiful bride hugging her groom.
„Inmar is the youngest of the four children of Coallar - the king of the Coal Mines, which can be found deep in the womb of this mount. Actually, nobody knows when Coallar has been born in this world or what story he hides on his shoulders. Even so, everybody knows him as a mad king, who brings a lot of suffering around. And… also a lot of people suffered because of him. Especially the gnomes, who listened to his command before.
But… when the king completely lost his mind, the gnomes rebelled against him and, after winning that battle, they left the coal mines and moved deep into the paunchy belly of the Southern Mounts where they laid the foundations of a new kingdom, known today as the Shinning of the Diamonds or Adamant Sheen.
Their king is and has always been Shalamar, the only gnome who ever drank from the Stream of Life and became immortal, and he had that blessing after helping Gaea bring the underground streams to life, which are blessing nature around now.
But the luck of Shalamar and his people meeting Gaea wasn’t something Coallar could accept. That’s why he decided to kneel them down and bring them back into his coal mines. That’s why the king with a black heart first met Tenebre, the Titanide of Fear, and they had Ahi.
But it hasn’t been enough for Coallar to have only one son. That’s why he took a second wife, Inlan Diar with whom he had a second boy - Island. But, meanwhile, Tenebre gave birth to a third child, Mannar, or the demon of the fires.
Yet, even if Coallar had three sons, he loved only one of them, he loved Mannar while the other two boys had been always oppressed and they felt cheap each time they met their father.
However, in contrast to the other two boys, who Coallar had with Tenebre, Island inherited, from his mother, her kind heart, and when Coallar asked him to help him in his war against the gnomes, the Titan of Ice said „no.”
That’s why Coallar tried to kill his second son later and was so against the whole world. Yet, he always failed, as Ahi and Mannar actually, who accepted to help their father.
But because the power of the Underworld and of the Ice was equal, none of them could ever slope the Balance of Power in his favor. And… because of this, Ahi turned his back on his father, in time, and this happened because Coallar preferred Mannar over Ahi and not because they failed.
Island instead never bothered about his brothers' and his father’s problems - he just lived his life and did what he had to do. However, he always kept an eye on them, for he never knew what to expect from his family.”
„What about Inmar? Whose daughter is she: Inlan Diar’s or Tenebre’s?”
„Of none of them, for… as I said before, she’s the daughter who Coallar had with a mortal and, after she gave birth to Inmar, her mother turned her face to the wall by throwing herself into Tenebre’s River.”
„What about you two? How did you meet and how did she become a red fox if she is the daughter of a mortal?”
„Here you’re wrong, my child, for Inmar has always been a red fox, since I’ve met her. I can’t explain to you how from the union of the king of Coal and a mortal a red fox was born, but it’s the truth.”
Then, Anaya kept silent for a long while and closed her eyes, trying to get at the bottom of her sack with memories. And, still, with her eyes closed, she continued her story: „I met her when she was a newborn, and who brought her to me has been Ahi when he met me that day on the river shore.
He told me that he found her in the snow, more dead than alive and he gave her to me to grow her up and take care of her. And I accepted that creature as being my daughter, for I’ve always wanted to have a child, but fate never gave me such pleasure, or at least I don’t remember this. The truth is that that small creature, that looked so unprotected in my arms, stole my heart from the first second I saw her.”
„I also miss my mother… a lot,” whispered Mayar after another few moments of silence and her words resounded so sadly and sweetly at the same time in that rhythmical breath of silence that was felt around. „But… when I saw her… when we crossed that village of humans, I couldn’t get closer to her and hug her, as I wanted.”
„Why?”
„Because I know that she won’t accept me as I really am, even if she has been forced to give up on me, also unwillingly. And… even if we miss each other a lot, we can meet and hug each other only in dreams and memories, for it’s the best for both of us.”
Then, Mayar stood up and moved toward the new home place of the red foxes, leaving the old Anaya in the same place, looking at the horizon.
„Poor child,” whispered Anaya, after a long time of silence. „She had such a cruel fate in the past and she still has such a bitter future to fulfill, something that she never chose by herself. But… it’s your destiny, daughter of mine, for being Coallar’s heir, and you have the decision of controlling or destroying his kingdom in your power, as you have also in your hands the power of deciding over the life and death of all the children king Coal ever had.”
And, saying this, Anaya started to slowly hum an old melody she had known once while Mayar was moving further and further from that place where she had stood and had had a heart-to-heart talk with a fox that was just a ghost, a wandering soul seen only by three people from their group: Ahi, Inmar, and she, even if none of them knew the reason of why they were the only ones seeing the old Anaya.
Actually, it wasn’t known only by Mayar and Inmar while Ahi knew everything about Anaya’s past while about her future... he could only guess.