Will and Rowan went back to work after a little while. They didn’t talk to each other much as Will had a lot occupying his thoughts. He wasn’t even sure he believed in mages, yet there was an unmistakable air about that woman that he couldn’t ignore. Now Will could understand why Rowan was afraid of her and unless he was feeling particularly suicidal, Will decided to steer clear of her as well. Hopefully, Rowan’s grandfather was wrong and all of this discomfort was just their imaginations running wild.

About an hour after they’d seen the Lord’s party head up to the manor, Geoffrey came back to the stable with his own and the remaining horses that were taken in the morning. Geoff didn’t have the black stallion with him, which made sense. How were you supposed to control a horse that looked like it had just been captured from the wild with no saddle, reins or stirrups. Will was glad that it was Geoffrey who brought back the horses because he was dying for some actual news. All he had to go on so far were crazy ideas in his head which were increasingly making less and less sense. Rowan was also looking expectantly at Geoff, hoping for some news. Geoffrey wore a grim expression which was never a good sign. Geoff wasn’t a man who was easily shaken.

Geoff helped Will with putting horses back into the stall while Rowan gave the horses a once over.

“What’s going on in the manor Geoff? What was all that about today morning?” Will asked.

“ You remember what I told you about Messenia yesterday?”.

“Yeah Geoff, you said she was feeling a bit under the weather”.

Geoff grimaced as he answered “Messenia’s condition got a lot worse by yesterday evening Will. She was vomiting and it seemed like the fever was not coming down. By last night, she couldn’t even recognize those around her and she started bleeding from her nose and ears. The healer did everything he could but he said that he was pretty sure it was hemorrhagic fever.”

Will felt a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach. He was familiar with hemorrhagic fever. This was the same disease that had carried away Rowan’s wife Mary’s father. Will’s mother Anya had tried her best to heal him, but in the end all she could do was try to make Mary’s father comfortable. Everyone knew that hemorrhagic fever meant certain death and it was a painful way to go. As much as Will hated piggy, he didn’t feel the least bit of pleasure from knowing that Messenia was in acute pain and suffering. If only Messenia had listened to him and stayed out of the storm.. Now, it was going to end up costing her life.

Will’s train of thought was interrupted as Geoff continued speaking. “Apparently, last night, the healer said that there was nothing more to be done than to ease Messenia’s pain. I heard that lady Mildred lost all control when she heard this and attacked the healer with a bedpan. It took Lord Damien and the captain to prise her off the poor healer. I heard that she completely broke down after that”.

Will felt sorry for that poor healer, but he found that he couldn’t summon much sympathy for Lady Mildred.

Geoffrey continued “ Lord damien and lady Mildred were shut up in Messenia’s room for a long time after that. We could hear the sound of Mildred wailing from outside. Except for the maids, we all went to bed a little later. The captain shook me awake early in the morning and told me to be ready to ride out. I got ready as fast as I could and by the time I got to the courtyard, Lord Damien and captain were already there. We headed to the stable and that’s how you were woken up so early today”.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Will remembered today morning’s events all too well. Now he could understand the reason why Lord Damien looked the way he did. He waited for Geoffrey to continue with what happened after they left the stable.

“We rode in the direction of the forest. I had no idea why we were heading there hours before the sun was even up. I was really worried one of our horses might end up breaking their leg going around the forest in the dark. But when we reached the edge of the forest, the captain led us forward on a narrow path and we followed him in single file. We were going slow since it was dark and a little after sunrise we reached the edge of the inner forest ridge” Geoff let out a small sigh as he finished.

“Wait, don’t tell me you guys actually climbed into the inner forest” Will asked feeling aghast.

The forest outside the border of the village was divided into 2, the outer and the inner forest. Will had been to the outer forest with his mother to pick herbs when he was little. He’d never seen the boundary between the outer and the inner forest, but apparently they were clearly separated by a thirty foot ridge. There were places along the line of the ridge where it was possible for you to climb up, but no one ever did. And those who had gone into the inner forest had never returned to tell any tales.

“No, we didn’t actually go into the inner forest, although, that would’ve been fun” Geoff looked really disappointed. Will knew that it was a long held desire of Geoff to go exploring in the inner forest. Thankfully, lord Damien had better sense and had expressly forbidden Geoff from going anywhere near there. Adventurous as Geoff was, he couldn’t disobey a direct order from the lord he was serving. That went against the knights code apparently. Will was also curious about the inner forest but in his case, like most people in the village, common sense prevailed above all else. Will always dreaded that a day might come when Geoff’s sense of adventure got him seriously hurt.

“Then what happened?” Will prompted Geoff.

“Once we reached the edge of the inner forest ridge, lord damien pulled out a silk bag”.Will had noticed this bag today morning. It had looked so out of place with all the other rough riding gear they usually carried.

“Lord Damien pulled out an alabaster horn adorned with what looked like sapphire jewels out of that bag. He put the horn to his mouth and blew it. It was the strangest thing, there was no sound coming out of the horn, but I could see it and feel it. It was like the air was shimmering around the horn and there were waves moving out from its mouth. As soon as Lord Damien finished blowing the horn, it shattered into thousands of pieces. Maybe dissolved would be a better word because the horn turned into such a fine powder that the wind carried it away”.

Will was hanging on Geoffrey’s every word. What he described sure felt like magic. Will didn’t know if he was more excited or scared.

“What happened then? And who was that woman with you?” Will asked eagerly.

“After Lord Damien blew the horn, we just waited there. Damien never took his eyes away from the edge of the ridge. After half hour or so, we saw some movement along the top of the ridge line”. Geoffrey stopped for a moment with his eyes staring straight ahead.

“That’s when we saw her, coming down the ridge from the inner forest riding that black stallion. Lord Damien motioned for us to wait and he moved forward to meet with her. Captain wasn’t too thrilled at this idea, but lord Damien went ahead and met up with her. They talked for some time and then Damien told us she would be coming with us. We followed the path out of the forest and once we got out in the open, I thought we were gonna have to move slow because she didn’t have a saddle or stirrups, but it seemed like she was faster than any of us. It was strange, it was like the horse was responding to her thoughts without her having to even wriggle her pinky”.

At that moment Will shot a look at Rowan who was standing a little away but close enough to hear their conversation. Geoff’s description had matched almost perfectly with what Rowan was told by his grandfather. There was no doubt about it. That woman was definitely a mage and she had been brought here to save Messenia.