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The next few days were spent in relative silence. I had to prepare for a journey that would send me far affield and Jetsam was preparing for the short-notice potions final that I would give him before I went away. Flotsam and I... well, let's just say we kept our distance from each other, not a word exchanged between us. I'm thinking I was more embarassed than he was since I blushed every time we did meet, but he wouldn't say anything to tell me he wasn't.
The late November day rolled around, and I said goodbye to Flet and Jet. I wrapped my familiar green cloak around myself and started up the chalky cliffs. I was going into the forest first to search for the Spartan Cloak. (His majesty had had his eye on it for sometime, so I figured I'd put an end to his waiting. Also, I hoped he would answer a few more of my questions; I had the nagging notion that he hadn't told me everything.)
I reached the top of the cliffs and looked out at the sea. Even on a foggy day like this, the waves promised adventure and comfort. 'Farewell my friend,' I thought, slightly misty-eyed. 'This is the last I shall see of you for a while now.'
I turned into a snake and slithered into the forest. It wasn't my first time as a snake, but I had never tried it on land. 'So this is how it feels when Flet and Jet move around.' They half-walked, half-slid around when they were out of the water, but I had never understood quite how they moved before now.
An unordinary light shone down through the trees, mottling the light so it shone green-yellow, the color of my skin. I moved deeper into the trees, meeting no creature for miles. I was virtually alone in the forest, or so I thought. stare
I spied a wood mouse, just the thing for a mid-morning snack. I had been slithering along for hours and I was ravenous. I hid in a bush near the place where it sat, waiting for the chance to strike. I tried to clear my mind to concentrate on my prey, but the nagging notion that I was missing something kept coming back to me.
My eyes narrowed as I prepared to pounce. What I wasn't prepared for was the mouse turning around and speaking to me with his thoughts. 'I know you are not a snake,' he said. 'Come out of that bush and speak to me in your true form, sorceress.'
eek How had he known that I was a girl? Male and female snakes were supposed to be undistinguishable with their bellies to the ground. Even still, I transformed back into a woman while a purple light flashed from behind the bush. When he had spoken to me with his thoughts, I knew he was a practioner of magic as well, to what degree though I still couldn't say. 'So, he'll speak to me in his true form as well,' I thought as I was standing up from where I was lying on the ground. 'This should be interesting.'
The mouse had sounded young, so I expected an adolescent, maybe a child, as I came out from behind the bush. But no. It was a full grown man who was staring at me in my green cloak, sleeveless black top (it was unusually warm in the forest), cargo shorts, and hiking boots, my long brown hair dangling down my back in a single braid.
From the way he looked at me, you would think I was a tree-nymph or something. That was nothing compared to how he looked though. If I was a tree-nymph, he was a god who had been banished from Mt. Olympus, though a strange and dangerous god he was.
Here's a picture from one of my texts that looks the closest to what he looked like: http://mette-miko.deviantart.com/art/Snake-summoner-Orochimaru-8701997
"Who are you?" I asked him after a long moment of stunned silence. "What do you want from me?"
"I would settle for your name," the "god" replied, "unless of course you think you're breaking your hyadis from men by doing so."
I flushed, embarrassed. How had he known about my vow to not see another man until... who was I waiting for again? If I couldn't remember who I was doing this for, why should I worry about them? The blush receded from my cheeks, and I said, "It's Anastasia, and I should like to know yours because I've never seen an Earth god like you in all the books I've read."
"You have me all wrong my good woman. I am not a god because I can die as you can. But neither am I an ordinary mortal." (I could see that. No ordinary mortal could be that handsome.)
"Just who, or what, are you then?"
He took my hand and pulled me close to him. His hand smelled of damp earth, summer rain, and spring flowers, but it smelled of something else too: battle-stained grass, corpses, abundant fungi, dry blood, bone dust, and an assortment of other gruesome things. 'How strange his hand smells,' I thought, 'like a combonation of both new life and old death.'
"Yes. I am neither alive nor dead," the man said. (He had heard my thoughts! He must be a strong mage to have done that without even trying.) "I am stuck between the two planes. My soul is still on the living plane but it is not my true body that it inhabits. I must change bodies every few years in order to go on living. An immortal soul is both a gift and a curse to a mortal body I'm afraid."
I looked at him, stunned. I was talking to a man who may have lived for at least a century. He didn't look it though, barely on the cusp of his thirties. "Y-y-you still haven't a-a-a-answered m-my other question," I said, trying to hide my apparent shock. "Wh-wh-who a-a-are y-y-y-y-you?"
His golden eyes peered deeply into my face as he let go of me. I fell backwards, still stunned, but something caught my back and stood me up again, something slimy. I looked back at him and saw a long tongue retreating back into his mouth. "I am simply a man who can talk to animals" he said, a wry smile on his face. "And also, I may have an answer to what you seek. Not too long ago, a traveller came to my village and told me to watch for a sorceress in the guise of a green snake. He was blue, very fast, and carried a sword. (It was Mat!) He didn't stay too long, but before he went away, he said, 'Tell her to head towards the setting sun. She will find a town where she will find the prize she desires.'"
"Thank you," I said. "That was extremely helpful."
"Snakes know all the secrets of the Earth; I'm lucky that they even share that knowledge with a person such as me."
"You still haven't told me your name."
"I have a feeling we shall meet again my dear. And when we do, you shall know my name." He jumped up onto a branch in the tree we were standing next to and disappeared. "What a mysterious man," I said to myself. "Such a very mysterious, golden-eyed man."
 srs diva 2011 xxl · Thu Mar 19, 2009 @ 03:40am · 1 Comments |
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