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#Post#: 884--------------------------------------------------
New Beginnings (Aphera Evermore)
By: MISSimissyou Date: May 24, 2020, 6:41 pm
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Aphera had never much cared pine trees. They were always sticky
and liked to make pointless accusations about everyone around
them. Not to mention, if you got on their bad side you would
never hear the end of it. The ground she now lay on was covered
in pine and she couldn’t quite find a comfortable position. Of
course, this shouldn’t have been difficult. The sky was much
darker than it had been when she had first lay down her head and
the pine bed she had made wasn’t entirely uncomfortable. She had
slept in worse places before. The only issue she had with
falling asleep tonight was the simple fact that the pine tree
these particular bristles had fallen from must have had a grudge
against her. No matter where she lay her head or how she kept
her body positioned she could not find a place where she was
comfortable.
“Why must you be so angry with me?” She muttered, not sure which
tree in the grove was her enemy. “I have only just arrived and I
haven’t done anything to…” Aphera’s eyes widened in sudden
realization and she sat up abruptly, pine needles falling off
her back and hair in curtains as she stood and walked over to
the tree she knew she must have offended. “I am sorry, dearest
tree.” She wrapped her arms around the trunk as best she could,
a stray branch nicking her cheek as she tightened her embrace.
“I know it mustn’t have been very pleasant having me relieve
myself at your base. I only thought you wouldn’t mind as I am
sure the native animals do so all the time. I had nowhere else
to go, you see, and your shade looked so inviting. I promise,
dear tree, that I shall never do such an evil thing again.”
As Aphera released her embrace and took a step back the tree
gave her a gentle pat on the head with one of its branches.
Thank you for the apology, the tree said as she smiled up into
its branches. You may rest your head now and are welcome in this
grove. Aphera made her way back towards her makeshift bed and
lay down on the pine needles and boughs. She no longer felt
pricked or prodded and it was only a matter of time before she
fell asleep.
The only problem with falling asleep is you can never tell when
you might wake. The tree had forgiven her so completely, in
fact, that she had slept far better on the needles than she had
anticipated. Instead of waking up just before dawn, as was
usually her habit, she found herself waking at what must have
been just before noon. Stretching, Aphera squinted up at the sky
peering at her from between trees. The light was high already
and she wondered briefly if it had been a nasty trick of the
trees to allow her to sleep so long. She wouldn’t put it past
them, trees had been known to let travelers rest beneath their
branches before. At least she was confident in the fact that any
tree worth its salt would have awaken her if there were danger
nearby.
As she rose from her sleeping position, she found her hands
moving immediately and fluidly to the bow on her side. In a
matter of seconds she had strung the bow and had an arrow at the
ready, her position propped on one knee in a ready sitting
position. She tilted her head curiously at the man sitting on a
fallen log just on the outside of the clearing, her eyes
squinted in concentration, her countenance almost cat-like. The
man simply smiled at her and lifted one hand casually, an
indication of greeting rather than surrender. “Good morning,
little one.” He said simply.
The man was certainly not young but couldn’t be old either. His
ears were decidedly pointed, his face framed by a mass of curly,
snowy white hair. His eyes appeared kinder than Aphera would
suspect from an old man creeping by the bedside of a lady. Blue
in color and milky towards the edges, the man continued to smile
at her, eyes crinkling merrily around the edges. “Pardon me,
sir.” Aphera said, still keeping her bow drawn and ready. “I do
not think we have met. The trees did not tell me you were here
so they either are holding a grudge against me or they trust
you. Either way, I must say I have no reason to trust someone
who wears so much red.”
The man’s smile never faltered but his forehead did crease in
what could have been concentration or confusion. “The trees, you
say?” He looked around the grove. “No, I suppose they wouldn’t
have told you. I am a man of religion and scripture peacefully
traveling through these parts. This fallen tree was…kind enough
to allow me to sit upon it.” He looked back at Aphera, his
expression so grandfatherly she found herself lowering the bow.
“You speak with the trees?”
Aphera nodded, unstringing her bow and replacing the arrow in
its scabbard. “I speak to all things that grow from the earth.
Trees, flowers, grasses, vines….I like flowers the best.” She
said the last part in a whisper. Pines had a hard time
understanding things that sounded like the wind and she didn’t
want to offend them.
The man’s smile widened at that. “Have you been to a city known
as Alessandria?” He asked. “There are gardens there that could
be said to be the most beautiful in all the lands.”
Aphera frowned at that. “You see, sir, I travel often but I
don’t go into cities. There is only one that I would ever wish
to enter, and Alessandria is not what it is called. Cities have
too few living things, you see. I fear if I were to enter, I
would never find my way out again. Flowers give wonderful
directions, you see, sir. Without their help I may never find my
way anywhere. You see?”
The man’s look became more puzzled. “Why is it you trust the
flowers and trees so much.”
Aphera smiled at this. “Because my goddess gave me a gift and I
mustn’t ignore it.”
The man nodded, a look of understanding passing over his
features. “Your goddess…are you perhaps speaking of Nomisia?”
Aphera brightened at this, her smile widening. “Why, yes!
However did you guess that?”
The man nodded sagely and closed his eyes, his head lowering
slightly. He was quiet for so long Aphera was beginning to worry
that he had fallen asleep when his eyes shot open once more and
he looked at her with a renewed interest. “It is just as I
thought.” He said, his hands folding in his lap as he looked her
over. “I knew I must have been led here for a reason. You see, I
am a man of scripture and I have…well, you might call it a
relationship with the Gods. That’s the reason I wear this red
robe, you see.” He gestured to the red garment he was wearing as
he spoke, his hand resting in his lap once more as he completed
his gesture. “It is a color that signifies I can translate the
will of the gods.”
Aphera tilted her head to the side, her smile fading into a look
of confusion and concentration. “Why must it be red?” She asked,
her nose crinkling further. “Red is the color of blood and
roses. Out of all the flowers I have ever known I have known
roses to be the most deceitful. It doesn’t seem a color that
would be Godlike.”
The man chuckled and shook his head. “Red is also the color of
fire, an element of both destruction and rebirth. The truest
instrument of the Gods.” Aphera’s mouth opened slightly at this
and she began to nod slowly. She had always known fire to be a
holy thing. Gods could wield it, of course, and it always
followed after a strike of lightning. Lightning was, after all,
a blessing from the sky. If anything burned by lightning it was
the God’s will, that much was obvious to anyone. “Child, what
brought you to be in this wood?” The man asked, smiling at her
with that grandfatherly expression once more.
Aphera crossed her legs and looked up at the sky. “I was staying
in a town not far off before I was told to come in this
direction by a group of vines. There was a field of wildflowers
with all the purple ones pointing north so I had to go there
next. When I entered the trees I followed the lines of acorns on
the ground,” she pointed to an acorn on the far edge of the
clearing, “and they led me here. Of course, I had plenty of
conversation along the way. There were some ferns just a mile
off that had a wonderful way with words. Such poetry….I can’t
recall much of it but I can try to remember some if you like.”
The man nodded slowly. “Yes…perhaps you can recall them to me on
our journey.” He began to stand, reaching for a staff that
Aphera hadn’t noticed before to steady himself.
“Our journey?” Aphera asked, standing quickly to assist the man
as he stood. He smiled at her once more, his face a sincere
expression of gratitude. “But the trees here haven’t yet told me
where I need to go.”
“I believe they will.” The man said, a twinkle in his eye. “Most
people refer to me by my last name but I believe you have earned
the right to my first name. Please, child, call me Willow.”
Aphera stood still for a moment, blinking in the sunlight as the
name settled in her mind. She had never known someone named
after a tree before. As the man began walking away from her,
leaning heavily on his staff, he brushed past a large clump of
brush to his right. A single flower caught the edge of his robe
as he passed and Aphera smiled, following in the man’s wake.
“Where are we going?” she asked as she followed.
“I know a young woman who is in need of a body guard.” Willow
shook his head slightly. “No, I don’t know her. I know of her. I
was summoned to help procure her a bodyguard and I think I have
found one for her in you.” He smiled, looking back at her. “The
woman I speak of has been chosen by all the Gods to lead the
world into a brighter tomorrow. She needs someone to make sure
she doesn’t meet an untimely end. There are evils out there that
seek to destroy her.” He nodded at Aphera’s sword then. “I trust
you do no just wear that for show. And I know for a fact you
could have killed me in an instant with that bow of yours.”
Aphera’s face grew pale and Willow laughed, her face apparently
bearing an expression he found comical. “Don’t worry, my dear. I
believe Nomisia brought us together for a reason.”
Aphera nodded slowly as the man turned back towards the narrow
path to continue on. “What is her name? The woman my Goddess
wants me to meet?”
Willow didn’t turn to look at her as he spoke. “Her name is
Gabrielle Brighteye.”
“Gabrielle Brighteye…” The name danced on her tongue and she
smiled. The words tasted right. They sounded right too. She
leaned over as she walked and picked the flower off of the back
of Willows robes. She twirled the stem between her fingers for a
moment as she thought, looking up at the sky in wonder. With a
final nod she decided there was no better option then the follow
the man in front of her and go on her way to her destiny, to
meet the woman who would make the world a better place and,
possibly, make all her dreams come true. Aphera smiled as she
tucked the Affe flower, her namesake, behind her ear.
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