3. Peacekeeping
Raelametanashi whipped through the forest, her mind whirling between shock, excitement, terror, and foundationally, confusion. The trees bent their branches out of her way to avoid hitting her face, and the rabbits knew better than to slip under her footfalls. The wind wrapped her in its embrace, surging with her emotions and sweeping through her hair—its attempt to cool her agitation.
A stranger in their forest. One whose hair was only slightly lighter than onyx, with a rectangular head and a fuzzy (dirty?) lower face. Whose skin was the color of the light, muddy sandstone. Was this a man? She had never seen one before.
Light pierced through the trees and blazed onto her path. She sidestepped it. “I don’t want to talk to you. You let him in.” Another beam, this one even wider, blocked the path. Raela stopped short. “You’re supposed to guard and protect us!” As the light surged before her, she could feel it begging for her attention, and she huffed. “Fine. Show me.” She stepped into its rays.
The forest faded in an indistinct haze as the light filled her soul and mind. The light brought joy and warmth and was blinding in its intensity. She thought of the man, and the light responded with images and sentiments that were not her own. She saw glimpses of what the light had seen in him as a small child, then a boy, and finally, a man—the glimpses came almost too fast to comprehend. The light exuded an earnest feeling, trying to convince her of the reasons it had chosen to let him pass. She saw a mother’s love, a father’s pride, the trust of friendship.
The vision shifted. In front of a wall of light, the silhouette of a man strode in. Light shone in the center of his chest, caged and restrained but clear. The beam of light around her heated, nudging her mind.
She gestured at the caged heart before her. “So, he’s not evil, but he’s also not right. Look at his soul.”
A shadowed woman approached the man. Raela frowned. She knew the shadow was her. The woman took the man’s hand, and the cage around him burst, releasing the brilliance … and nearly blinding her. Raela shielded her eyes and dashed out from the beam. “Nope. Not happening.”
The light chased after her, licking at her heels as she stormed toward the grassy area near the cottage. “I don’t know what you think you know, but I will not be touching him.” The beam flicked ahead and blocked the path surrounding her, forcing her to step into it again. Her own shadow-self was suspended in the middle of the beam. A bright blushing pink light pulsed from the center of her chest. But as she watched, it began fading with each pulse until it barely flickered at all, and the silhouetted woman started to stumble. She fell to the ground where she lay unmoving. The shadow man approached, his heart uncaged as he reached for the collapsed woman.
Raela glared and stepped again through the beam, unwilling to see anymore. “My light is fine. Thanks.” The light heated and pulsed angrily, slightly searing her hand. She felt it begging her to look again. Gathering her breath, Raela let out a slow exhale, relaxing her shoulders. “Okay. I’ll … consider what you said. Thank you for showing me.” The light pulsed once more, as if to stomp rather than say a farewell, then it disappeared, leaving the forest darker in its wake.
Raela shook her head as she hurried home. The light had never been so pushy before. The man was disrupting the forest. Having an ancient wolf with him—as she had her bear and her aunties had their elk—proved he wasn’t wholly evil, but was he magical too? The light hadn’t indicated one way or the other. Maybe the wolf owned the man. Or owed him a life debt. Ancients were picky. Raela shrugged to the wind, which tugged on her hair. Some mysteries weren’t meant to be solved.
As Raela burst through the cottage door, her auntie screeched and tossed her cupful of almond flour into the air. “Raelametanashi, what is in your head? Are you the storm? Are you the wind? No!” Her auntie waved the now empty cup at her as she yelled. She was perched precariously on her three-step stool beside the table, yet she still barely met Raela at eye level. Her salt-and-pepper hair curled around her round, pink-cheeked face. The wrinkles on her eyes and mouth were lined with a coating of flour that drifted from above her. Raela restrained a smile as it sifted over the shoulders of her auntie’s rough cotton dress like snow.
She reached a hand to brush off one side of her auntie, schooling her features to look more contrite. “Ach, Auntie, I’m sorry. I just—”
“On the day we honor Auntie Shourentameta’il, no less. And now you have nearly ruined the cake! Pass that bag, young lady.”
Raela ducked her head under her auntie’s swinging arm as she pointed. Reaching for the small canvas bag of almond flour, she passed it over. “Yes, Auntie Mo.”
“Do not dishonor your aunties with your laziness. Say the whole prayer.”
“Yes, Auntie Motukalatabeli.”
She lowered the spoon she’d been threatening Raela with. “Better. Your Auntie Torulonmana’at is getting straw. She says the roof leaked last night.” Raela opened her mouth to mention the man she had seen, but her auntie shook a wooden spoon at her, more like a weapon than a stirring device. “Ah-ah, no talking back now. Get the handkerchiefs ready for her. You know how she is on this day.”
Raela did. Auntie Toru would be a walking puddle today—the day they remembered and honored the third sister, Auntie Shourentameta’il, who had disappeared years before. Her aunties said that she would be back any day now, but it had been almost eleven years and she hadn’t returned. The familiar wave of guilt caused Raela”s throat to constrict.
Raela had only been seven, so the memories of her auntie were not as sharp as she wished, but she could still see Auntie Shou’s enormous smile, feel her hugs, and hear her singing. She remembered how her auntie’s mischief always got them both into trouble with Auntie Mo.
She loved her other two aunties, really, she did. But with one bossy and one morose, Raela missed the lightness and laughter of Auntie Shou—ach, Shourentameta’il, she corrected herself. Auntie Mo was right. Today of all days was the day to say her whole name—to pray the facets of her character.
Raela set stacks of facial cloths throughout the main room, using a dampened one to help Auntie Mo clean up the mess of flour. Her auntie bustled down from her stool, grabbed the nearest cookbook, and set the book flat on Raela’s head. She was always strict with her lessons on grace and balance. Auntie Mo pushed her stool to the cupboards, struggling on tiptoes to reach the shelf above the window. Smoothly rising, Raela grabbed the sugar for her auntie.
“Oh, to have legs like trees!” Auntie Mo exclaimed. “Instead, the Spirit made me look like a stack of bread rolls.” She sighed. “No matter. Each body to its purpose. You must be needed to clean the dust and rafters.” Auntie Mo tossed the feather duster toward Raela from the counter. “Yes, indeed.”
Raela huffed a laugh as she began to clean. Subtlety was not one of Auntie Mo’s strengths. As she dusted the cabinets and shelves, the door burst open behind her revealing a walking cluster of grass pushing through the doorway.
Auntie Mo screeched. “Torulonmana’at, do not bring that in here. Don’t you dare!”
Raela gaped at the door. Billowing straw, four feet tall, towered above the two tiny legs of her auntie. The woman’s dress snagged on the grasses and piled up in the front, baring her spindly calves and falling stockings. Her small arms barely reached around the bunch, her arthritic joints pale from the force of her clasping. Behind the grasses, a muffled and warbly voice whined, “But why not? Where shall I place them, then?” Auntie Toru shuffled in a step and wailed, “It’s windy outside!”
Auntie Mo gestured to the table, though Auntie Toru couldn’t see it. “I’m cooking!”
“Aw, Momo…”
Auntie Mo whipped out her threatening spoon again. “Don’t you Momo me. Get out!”
“Don’t yell.” Auntie Toru sniffed. “Not today.” The grasses shook with her hiccupping, exaggerated sobs, shivering like a baby snake’s rattle. Auntie Mo cast Raela an exasperated glance.
Nodding, Raela slipped beside Auntie Toru, reaching down to set her hand on the woman’s bony shoulder. “Come on, Auntie, let’s go get that roof fixed. The bramblebushes will help protect these from the wind while we work.”
Auntie Toru shuffled backward, waving the grasses above her as she struggled out the door. Bits of straw scraped the frame and fluttered to the threshold. Raela would be sweeping that up later. Auntie Toru nodded her head against the stalks. “The wind likes you, Raela. Why can’t the wind like me too. I’m a nice lady.”
“You are, Auntie. The nicest.”
Finally freed from the small doorway, they turned toward the back of the cottage. Raela heard Auntie Mo mutter, “For someone who should know things, she’s as thick as those very stones …”
Raela reached up and shuffled the grasses with her fingertips so that Auntie Toru wouldn’t hear, then she reached out with her magic, and the wind followed behind, scooting discarded pieces of grass that had fallen from Auntie Toru’s arms and pushing them forward to keep up with their steps. Raela smiled and whispered to the wind, “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome. Thank you for noticing my hard work!” Auntie Toru dumped the pile beside the thick bramblebushes that lined the southern edge, revealing her waifish form. Taller than Auntie Mo, she still only stood just above Raela’s elbow. Her sweet, little aunties. Auntie Toru brushed her hands over the stack. “At least someone acknowledges my contributions to our home. At least someone thanks me. At least—”
“Where was the leak?” Raela asked, trying to divert her auntie from her ruminating.
“It was … It …” Her eyes filled with tears. Oh no. Raela braced herself. Diversion failed. “It was over her rooooooooooom.” Auntie Toru wailed and clasped her knobby fingers against her lids. Water now poured from them in impossible rivulets.
“There, there, Auntie.” Raela patted her pockets but found she had left her tissues inside. “Ach.” Small paws patted at her dress from behind. A little white rabbit held a leaf from a fuzzy lamb’s ear plant in its mouth. “Thank you.” Raela took it and dabbed at her auntie’s cheeks. At her touch, her auntie whipped the leaf from her hand and honked her running nose into the makeshift tissue. She passed it back to Raela, who accepted it with a grimace.
“You are the dearest. Just look at you. You look just like her.” The edges of Auntie Toru’s eyes brimmed with water ready to fall again. Raela didn’t think she looked anything like her missing auntie. From what she could remember, her auntie’s chaotic white hair had stuck up in a thousand directions like dandelion fuzz. Nothing like Raela’s long yellow strands.
It was time to refocus. “Okay, Auntie Toru. Let’s fix things up.”
Auntie Toru nodded. “Yes. She would have liked that.” Her lip wobbled.
“The twine, Auntie?”
From Auntie Toru’s mosquito-bite-size bosom, an impossible amount of twine emerged, further deflating her thin frame. She passed it to Raela with a toothless grin. Raela took it between her thumb and index finger delicately, wondering at the fact that her aunties never changed.
“Okay.” Raela breathed out. “Let’s get weaving.”
Hours later, Raela tied the last bit of twine into the thatched roof. “Finally,” Raela muttered as she rubbed her chaffed hands. Other parts of the roof looked like they could use patching before winter, but they would have to wait for another day. The sun would soon set, and the roof was too large. The cottage was a comfortable size with four tiny bedrooms and one large central space downstairs. The first floor was the only place that Raela didn’t have to duck while walking.
“… then the willow whispered to the wisps, ‘The time has come, my sweets, to rest your weary spirit feet, so come and lay among my fronds, and sip from the rippling, sweet, deep ponds.’ So the wisps drew closer …” Auntie Toru was on her hundredth story and had, not surprisingly, stopped working an hour before. Though, Raela had to admit, the stories did help pass the time.
This was Auntie Toru’s way. Her mind was filled with every tale and story and wish and myth that she had ever heard. Her memory was not as good when it related to daily tasks—like remembering where she had put her cup or if she had rinsed the soap from her hair.
“Torulonmana’at! Raelametanashi! The time has come!”
Auntie Toru’s face crumpled as if she had forgotten again, but now, the weight of her grief newly struck her like a physical blow.
“Oh, Auntie.” Raela climbed down and clasped the small woman by the shoulders. “I miss her too.”
Tears dripped steadily down her auntie’s face as Raela led her through the front door. Auntie Mo had set the cake in the center of their table and placed the unlit memory candle beside it. She passed each of them the sprig of a bitter herb and a slice of sweet pear. Four plates were set.
“Raelametanashi, if you would, please, light the candle,” Auntie Mo said with a catch in her voice. Raela twisted her fingers against her thumb. A spark flitted to the wick. Auntie Toru whimpered.
Holding up her bitter sprig, Auntie Mo spoke, her voice low and rough, like rocks rubbing over bark. “Dear sister, Shourentameta’il. We bite this herb as a symbol of our bitter suffering and loss.” Auntie Toru sobbed as she placed the bitter herb on her tongue. Raela’s eyes filled with tears as she tasted the herb’s bitterness. Auntie Mo continued, “We ache for you. We cry out for you. We wait for you. As the morning waits for the sun. As the willow waits for the rain.” As she lifted her slice of pear, Auntie Mo cleared her throat. “And with this, the sweetest fruit of the season, we remember every joy you brought to our lives.” She chewed slowly, swallowing before adding, “I remember your ridiculous jokes.”
Auntie Toru nibbled on her pear. “I remember your hugs.”
“I remember your smile,” Raela whispered.
“You smile like she does,” Auntie Toru said as her knobby thumb brushed Raela’s cheek. “You smile with your whole heart. The forest lights up with your happiness. Like it did for her. You feel like she did.”
Auntie Mo glanced between them before she nodded slowly. “Our Raelametanashi is much like our Shourentameta’il. Let us speak her name.” They all spoke softly, with reverence, pausing between each word. “Shouren. Tam. Meta. ‘Il. May you be at peace, wherever you are. And may you soon find your way home to us.”
They always had cake on this day—the dark day when the youngest of the three sisters went out of the forest and never returned, the day Raela wished she could somehow change. It had always felt odd to have cake, but her aunties always hoped and made ready for their sister’s return.
They always saved a piece for her.
After the meal, Raela’s aunties regaled each other with story after story. She had heard them a thousand times but never tired to see their eyes glitter warmly as they remembered Auntie Shou. After one story, Auntie Mo looked suddenly at Raela.
“Today, you rushed in more agitated than a swarm of bees the ancient bear had asked for honey.”
Raela had almost forgotten her earlier encounter, caught up as she was in the evening, but at the reminder, her cheeks flushed, and her heart raced. She had no idea how her aunties would respond. “Oh. That. There was someone in the forest. A man.”
Auntie Toru blinked once, then burst into laughter, her knobby hand slapping her bulbous knee. “Someone in the forest? Why, you are a good storyteller!”
Frowning, Raela said, “I’m serious.”
Auntie Toru kept laughing. “And you say, a man? This has never been. The light would never. Ha!” She wiped mocking tears from her crow’s feet. “Oh, you sweet girl, I needed to laugh today.”
Auntie Mo’s lips were pinched, like she had eaten a berry too early. “Torulonmana’at. Stop.”
“But Momo, you know—”
“This shall never be spoken of again.” Auntie Mo’s voice snarled like a bear. “Even if there was a person in this forest, you”—her gaze pierced Raela’s—“are never ever to look at him or talk to him. You are to stay away, to never approach. It was a mistake. The light will not make it again.”
Raela’s lips popped open. “But the light sh—”
“Never again.”
Her aunties had many rules for her. Don’t eat the green berries of the Rushi tree. Never let the mushrooms form into fairy circles. Never go farther than one knuckle away from the house, certainly never go to the Spires … but nothing like this. Something like obstinance bloomed in her chest, and she crossed her arms. “I’m never to talk to him?”
“Never,” Auntie Mo answered. Her gaze drifted out the window, and Raela followed. The ancient elk stood just outside, staring at Auntie Mo. Auntie Mo nodded in acknowledgment of whatever the elk said to her and turned back to Raela. “If there was ever someone, you shall not speak of it. Do not even be downwind of anyone else.” Raela’s chest fluttered with frustration. The elk had been there! He should have confirmed her story! Why only talk to Auntie Mo?
Auntie Toru snorted. “If. If? As if anyone could enter!”
Auntie Mo held Raela’s gaze. “My word is final, Raelametanashi.”
Raela knew better than to lock horns with her Auntie Mo. But her heart hardened even as it questioned … well … everything. Raela knew other people existed—some of Auntie Toru’s stories included them—but she had never seen them. She had only seen animals, both ordinary ones and a few ancients, and her aunties. She had never ventured far from their home. Never left their forest. Especially not after what happened that one time she had ventured down the riverbed—she had gotten lost and caused Auntie Shou’s disappearance.
She had learned her lesson. She knew to stay in her little world and never venture far. But now, it was as if light shone through the haze. Now that she had seen one man, she had to consider that he had come from somewhere out there—and that Raela, herself, could go somewhere. The idea pricked her mind like a splinter.
She lifted indignant eyes to the concerned gaze of her Auntie Mo. And she deflated. She loved her aunties, so she would try to obey. Really, she would. They didn’t make rules to harm her. Maybe she could return to the way things were before. Raela could live in her simple existence, cleaning, cooking, practicing with the magic of the forest …
But as Raela settled herself back into her chair, studying the steam of her tea, new questions simmered, each one rising to the surface like the bubbles in her cup. Where was the man from? Were there others like him? Why couldn’t she understand him? And then other questions squirmed uncomfortably. How did Raela come to the forest? Who were her parents? How could she be so tall while her aunties were so short? And why was he taller than her aunties like she was? And, most disturbingly, why hadn’t she asked any of these questions before? It was like her mind was waking and ideas that should have been obvious to every child were suddenly clear to her. She remembered Auntie Mo talking about her parents when Auntie Shou was around, but it had all stopped when she left, and Raela never thought to ask about them again.
She peered at her aunties with an uncomfortable, sinking sensation. They were so defensive—and these ideas felt so new when they should have been obvious and common—that she wondered if they had done something to make her forget. Prickling with distrust, she set down her mug, bade them a quiet goodnight, then went to her room to stare at the ceiling.
The ceiling provided no answers at all.