When
the Wind
Calls
A Chanmyr Chronicles Companion Story
By TJ Muir
This is a work of fiction. All characters are a work of fiction from the authors imagination.
Independently published
Copyright ©2016, Teri J. Dluznieski M.Ed. All rights reserved.This book, or any part thereof, may not be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher. Exceptions are made for brief excerpts used in published reviews.
Dluznieski, Teri J.
https://tjmuir.com to find more great stories!
I want to say thank you to the people who have supported me along the way, in the writing of this story. In particular, the many authors and support groups that have helped me. Susan Kaye Quinn, Derek Murphy, Laxmi Hariharan, Jen Redmile, my many critique and beta-readers.
Chapter 1
Kijah rushed through the last of the weeding, knowing she would hear about it from her mother. But that would be later. She straightened up, and wiped her hands on her sweater. She’d probably hear about that, too. She sighed. It was never good enough. And she never had the patience to do the tedious maintenance. She didn’t exactly hate the small farm, nested into vacant building space on the lower side of the city. It just wasn’t very fun for her. As she looked around, making sure she hadn’t missed her bare minimum, she got a solid bump behind her knee, and her leg buckled.
“Bumper!” she exclaimed, turning around to deal with the silvery-grey nuisance. Goats kept more easily within the city than most livestock, but Bumper was a master escape artist and pest. She smiled as the yearling looked up at her with adoration in her eyes, and chard in her mouth. Kijah retrieved the poor greens, and tried to tuck them back into the soil. Then she dashed over to the shed, where she always kept an emergency can of grain, to bribe the little miscreant back over to the herd in the neighboring meadow.
Then she took one last look around, in a hurry now, before either of her parents showed up with ‘one more thing.’ Satisfied that she didn’t notice anything glaring at her, she ducked around the back shed, slung a light pack onto her back, and headed down the alley that led to the canals. She knew she had to be home by Nibbin’s fourth pass, to do evening chores. But the rest of the day was blissfully hers.
She broke into an easy run, muscles pumping a steady rhythm. The light spring breeze felt good, as she headed along the canal that led away from the city. She preferred the open areas and woods to the city lanes she used to run. Before long, she hit her stride, and felt the easy flowing rhythm that she knew from years of running. After a while, she thought she could even hear the trees singing. It was probably just the breeze through the leaves and the bamboo.
She wondered what the trees might be saying to her? Or maybe they just talked to each other, and she was merely eavesdropping. She blushed momentarily, and then laughed at herself as she ran. The leaves rustled around her, she was sure that they were amused.
She knew her friends would laugh at the idea. But she did feel it, she was sure. They just didn’t get it, and she got tired of trying to get them to be interested or to even understand. They all chattered on about things that made no sense to her. She understood the words and all, but she didn’t feel the significance of it the way the others did. Did it matter who danced with whom, or who was seen talking together? Evidently it was important to her friends. But she just didn’t feel it.
There was a whole world around them- a world that didn’t care about clothes, or dating, or gossip. She hungered for it. That soul fire, often drew her up to the Pindar Ridge, to watch the fliers sail off into the wind. She spent hours, watching them glide on the wind. She imagined all the places they might go, and the things they might see from high above the world. Mostly, they just landed back in the same field, but while each one was in the air, the possibilities stretched to infinity. .
One day, on her way back down, she kept watching the skies, and tripped over a young man sitting on a rock at the edge of the lane.
He looked up, to see what she found so fascinating, but the flier had already passed.
“Watching the ground one walks upon may be more beneficial than watching the sky,” he commented. Kijah blushed, knowing he was right. But she wasn’t going to admit defeat without a fight.
“Well, your big feet shouldn’t be sticking out into the lane so far anyway,” she countered, knowing just how foolish it sounded even as she said it.
The young man cocked his head, and then broke out in laughter. This only confused Kijah, who was sure he must be laughing at her foolishness. But then she looked into his face, and saw an open innocence there, combined with something she couldn’t define. She could only smile back, and look at his feet.
“In the future these feet will be much better behaved,” he said.
“And I will remember to watch where I am walking,” she mumbled, conceding defeat.
“Perhaps four feet will be safer, walking in the same direction,” he offered, glancing down the lane.
“Perhaps they will,” Kijah agreed, reaching out a hand to help this intriguing stranger to his feet. “My name is Kijah,” she said, introducing herself. It seemed only proper, given that she had extended her hand to the man.
“Zria,” he responded. “And it is most pleasing that the fates have crossed our paths.”
As the two of them headed down the mountain, Kijah looked down at Zria’s feet.
“They will stay where they belong,” he assured, smiling.
“No, it’s not that. It’s just, well, they’re different.”
Zria looked down at his feet, and looked at Kijah’s feet. Then he looked at Kijah, perplexed. “Two feet to each one of us. Both of which have the appropriate number of…”his voice trailed off here, searching, for the correct word in Chanmyr.
“Toes?” Kijah supplied.
“Yes. Toes,” he repeated after her, smiling.
Kijah smiled back, and then laughed. Zria looked confused, but Kijah caught her breath and began to explain.
“I’m sorry. I meant your shoes are different. Very different than mine,” Then she paused, curious. “Are your feet…different?”
Now it was Zria’s turn to laugh outright. “Just feet,” he assured, wiggling his toes.
“So why are your shoes so different?”
Zria looked down at Kijah’s shoes, studying the two side by side, to see what was different.
“Your shoes, they do not change?” he asked.
Kijah looked at him like he was dim. “They’re shoes. What else should they be?”
“No, not like that,” he said, “not to become other things. To change on your feet.”
Kijah was beginning to feel frustrated, trying to figure out what Zria meant, or if he was just plain weird. Or maybe Faenyr shoes changed colour or something. But she noticed that Zria was trying to show her something on his shoes, so she looked down, and just paid attention.
The shoes weren’t like ones she’d seen before. She admitted to herself that she’d never paid much attention to what people wore on their feet though. She watched as Zria unlaced his shoes to explain something to her.
“See, like this, the shoes. They can change.”
“Oh,” Kijah said, understanding. “You mean you can adjust them.”
“Adjust?”
“It means to change something slightly. To make it bigger or smaller or something.”
“Yes. To adjust,” Zria nodded, agreeing. “All of these places, the shoes can be changed, adjusted,” he corrected himself. “They can be worn for many years, especially good for the young, with growing feet. Also good for winter, when a fleece lining will fit inside.”
K
ijah went from curious, to fascinated.
They found a big rock and climbed up onto the top of it. She noted how easily Zria scaled up the rock, as he reached a hand back to her. At the top, Zria took off his shoes, and fit them onto her feet. Her feet were only slightly smaller than his, so it was an additionally comfortable fit. She squealed in delight as she tried moving around on the rock. Up at the top of the boulder, she stretched her arms up, feeling the breeze, and danced. Zria scrambled up barefooted, and enjoyed himself, watching her.
~
For the first time in her life, Kijah felt like what she was, didn’t matter. Even though Treyu was a city of mixed races and several cultures, Kijah had been raised Chanmyr. She had never learned to read colours, and was never sent to the B’ashan. Even full human blooded children were taught these things. They were encouraged to learn what they could. It helped the two races understand each other, and get along with better clarity.
But not Kijah. Her parents had made the very clear decision to raise her outside of all things Faenyr. Away from Magic, away from the lore and teachings. She was growing to resent that decision more and more. Chanmyr became synony,ous for dull and boring.
Zria was Faenyr. Full Faenyr, tawny golden skin and honey-gold hair with copper highlights. Zria was the first full Faenyr her own age that she had met. WhileTreyu had more Faenyr than the rest of the country, Kijah felt that they weren’t the same. Not like Zria, who was actually from nearby Treyene. He was from outside of Kijah’s world-bubble. Zria’s Faenyr culture and approach to the world intrigued Kijah. she was mixed-blood, and Treyu was a very mixed-blood city, but she discovered how little she really understood about the Faenyr.
As with the shoes, she became fascinated and obsessed with all things Faenyr.
Conversations at the dinner table became peppered with references like, ”the Faenyr cook their fish in leaves,” or, “the Faenyr would never pretend something was true.”
The change was much to her parents’ dismay. They tried to get her interested in the usual things.
“Are you and your friends going to the Spring dance?” they asked.
Kijah rolled her eyes, “Those dances are so boring,” she said, exasperated. “I’d rather go up to Treyene, to their dances.”
Her mother looked worried, and her step-father just growled softly. Her parents exchanged a look, and her mother cleared her throat, “We’ll see,” was all she said.
Kijah’s face clouded over. She knew what ‘We’ll see’ really meant. She was angry that her parents tried to control her life.
She was sure it was her stepfather’s fault. He was the one who had made the choice to raise her as a Chanmyr. At least that was what Kijah had decided. He had forced her to deny the Faenyr blood that also ran through her veins. She felt like it wasn’t okay that she was mixed-blood. That was insane, because half of her friends were mixed-blood. No one had any problem with that-- except her parents, it seemed.
She certainly wasn’t going to let that stop her. She decided she didn’t need her parents’ permission to be friends with Zria.
~
“Do all Faenyr have magic?” she had asked Zria one day.
He paused, and looked thoughtful for a moment. “Magic just is. It’s like air, or water. Just…there. Just as some are better runners or better hunters, some are better at drawing on magic.”
“So how does it work?” she asked. It felt like a child’s question. But these were questions she could never ask growing up. She tried asking her friends, but it was like asking about sex. A lot of vague answers and comments that only demonstrated how little anyone actually knew.
“Well, when making a bow, for example, the maker wants the bow to be strong, flexible, and have good aim. So the maker feels and wishes these things into his hands, and asks the bow to be the best bow, that bow can be.”
Kijah thought about that.
“Do you think there is magic in my blood?” she asked.
Zria paused again, looking at her, closely. Kijah guessed he was studying something invisible, like listening to magic or something.
“What are you looking at?” she asked, as she watched Zria as he was watching her, studying her.
“The colours. The colours that swirl around a person reveal a lot about them,” he explained.
“Oh. Right. Reading colours,” Kijah said, repeating his words. “I know about that. But my parents chose not to send me to the B’ashan, not to teach me.”
“Why would something so vital, be forbidden?”
Kijah just shrugged at that. That was part of ‘the question of her life.’
“Reading colours is not difficult, although it comes easier to children.”
“Do you think I could learn? Could you teach me?” She asked, eagerly, forgetting for the moment, the whole topic of magic.
After that, much of their time was spent teaching Kijah how to relax and focus- a seeming contradiction, to her thinking- but she stuck with it, practicing all the time. She worked on it when she was doing chores, even weeding. Relax, focus, concentrate. Impatience warred with determination. Determination won, finally. After a couple of weeks, she began to see the flicker of light around things. That bit of success fired her up, and soon the trickle became a steady flow. Flickers became hazy glows, and before long, with guidance from Zria, hazy glows began to take colour. The whole world was bursting to life around her- a layer of life that had been hidden just beneath the surface, all along.
~
“I met a boy,” Kijah said over dinner, trying to slip this bit in casually, while asking for more salad, “from Treyene.” It was the last bit that caught their attention. They both looked at her sideways, and then looked at each other. “He’s a really nice boy,” she insisted. This wasn’t going anything like she had hoped. And, she hadn’t said anything about reading colours, or anything that might be what Ma called ‘a touchy subject.’
Even still, her father and mother exchanged ‘a look’; then he left the room and Ma started scolding. ‘Running around with the likes of 'em, as live up in the hills, in some mysterious hidden place. Girls like you, should as be stayin’ put and not chasin’ after them faery dreams, you hear?’ her mother had said.
Dismay quickly turned into resentment. Kijah stopped herself from snapping back. ‘What about you?!’ she wanted to ask. ‘You chased after those “faery dreams” as you call them.’ But when she heard her mother say that, she looked up. She was ready to give voice to her angry thoughts, but she saw a strange look in her mother’s eyes. Kijah didn’t understand that look, but something inside her prickled, similar to reading colours, but not quite the same. It told her that this was not the time to fight.
~
So her parents didn’t approve. That wasn’t going to stop her. It wasn’t hard to come up with excuses about where she was or what she was doing. She regularly flew out the door, calling out over her shoulder that she was going down to the central square to play games with the other kids, or going up the hill to watch the flyers. That was the white lie she liked best. And it was mostly true. Kijah loved watching the flyers gliding through the sky. She just didn’t say who she was going with. The best part was that when she said she was going up the hill it meant she would be gone all day. That meant more time with Zria, and no questions.
~
Kijah and Zria chased each other down one of the back alleys that ran between shops and the waterfront. The morning mist was still lingering along the small river city. The two of them weaved in and out of the odd shopkeeper-- laughing at nothing.
She felt like she knew Zria, better than she could have imagined, in the few weeks since they had met. She paused at the corner of the alley, catching her breath. “Do you smell that?” she asked. He looked at her, and they both said “Sausage on a stick,” at the same time. They took off again, dashing down to get breakfast on the docks.
Breakfast finished and fingers licked
clean, Zria reached into his pack and brought out a small wrapped bundle. Kijah wasn’t sure what to expect, as he handed it to her.
The bundle unfolded into a pair of faenyr shoes, brand new.
“To make your feet happy so that you can dance,” he said.
Kijah flung her arms around Zria, shoes clutched in her hands. She hugged him close and thanked him over and over again, and liking the feel of him in her arms. He hugged her back, laughing. Then he broke away, looking at her.
“Will your feet be happier than the rest of you?” he asked, , motioning her to sit down, while he put them on for her, showing her how to adjust them herself.
She stretched her feet in them, wiggled and curled her toes inside, rolled her ankles. Then she jumped up, her feet eager to take charge. Zria was clearly delighted by Kijah’s pleasure, and popped up next to her. She hugged him again, and kissed him on both cheeks. And then she grabbed him by the hand, and they headed toward the Pindar Ridge.
While the ridge was not as tall as the mountains to the north, it was high enough for the flyers to catch the wind and ride the current up into the skies. Watching them launch took her breath away. Each time, her breath would catch, afraid that the Wind might not hold them, might not carry them safely. And each time, she was filled with wonder, as they soared aloft.
Zria also liked to watch the fliers, which he had been doing that day they met. They lounged on a blanket-- borrowed from one of the fliers- and they looked out across the valley-- that sprawled below them, and they watched the clouds go by, and the fliers that dotted the sky. The two of them tried to tell who each flier was, and they had both gotten good at recognizing the different sail-cloths that belonged to each flyer.
She looked down into the valley where Treyu nestled in between the river to the south, and the hills to the north and west. “Where is Treyene?” she asked suddenly, curious about where Zria lived.
He sat up next to her, looking out across the valley toward the northwest. “Over there,” he pointed, up the valley along the low rolling hills and ridges.
“There’s nothing there. I can’t see anything.”
He smiled. “It is there, all the same.”