Role

Chapter 9

Images of Lyrentia raising her hands in that familiar fashion. Weaving the
spell of slumber she had already used to harm him, in such a practiced
manner, cold, heartless set in her eyes as she spun a spell to harm her son.

She was never a mountain. She was never the sea. She was never a mother. A
monster-all that she is. He raised his other hand to his forehead, above his
left eye, and smeared the dark black paste over his brow and eye and cheek in
one deliberate, painful gesture. 'Die, Lyrentia!' the thought echoed in his
buzzing head. A mark, for the creature that he would slay.

Green motes swirled from the earth and the autumn foliage, up the tree and to
his branch, coalescing in a translucent form of a wolf seating next to him.
The guardian spirit keened at him, then yelped, the barked. But Admund did
not respond. He was working on yet another paste.

Memories of his own voice, broken, shaking, childlike. 'Mother. Don't. Mommy,
stop!' An image of a grief stricken forest spirit. Rising from the nearby
tree and offering a leverage for his straining mind to fight off the tendrils
of necromancy dragging him underground.

Two fingers he raised to the middle of his forehead, gently impressing a pale
gray circle. A mark, for the spirit allies that guide him.

Man, wolves and spirits, for a long time remained where they were as the sun
drowned in a crimson bloodbath to the west, and the large Harvest Moon of the
autumn solstice started climbing the night sky. Under the light of the
Harvest Moon, Admund had drawn a sharp knife and was mutely and deliberately
sharpening the end of his staff. The wood knows his pain, and for him, the
wood would bear the pain of the knife. A staff, would give up its own self
for him and become a sharpened spear.

The large moon at its zenith, Admund rose to his feet, spear in hand. A howl,
one fit for a wild beast ripped from his throat. With a cry full of feral
rage and anger and grief and regret and deep sorrow he screamed at the world.
And the wild spirits and wolves rose up to join him.