We ride on like this for what feels like a long time, weaving through a forest of massive trees that I notice have started to change again.I swear I just saw a copse of birch and aspen, and the big jagged trunk of a douglas fir.These trees shouldn’t be growing at this altitude,I ponder, making a mental note; my botanist’s intrigue is piqued even though I feel like I may pass out. Not the most useful information when you’re bleeding profusely.
The wind rushing against my wet clothes makes my teeth chatter and the throb in my arm turns into a steady ache as I feel my whole body going cold. I get a shock of deja vu about this very same ride through this very same forest and a wave of nausea hits – I lean over to throw up the bile of my empty stomach, barely missing Durga’s now blood spattered shoulder.Horseback riding, plus searing pain, plus no breakfast equals a very upset stomach,my head is spinning.
“Durga, I need water, please we have to stop,” I say weakly, leaning forward to speak in her big ears. She slows her speed as we pass a big blackberry bush with a few big juicy berries still holding on, untouched by the birds. My stomach gurgles so audibly that I’m sure Durga can hear it as she abruptly stops on the other side of the bush and kneels down so I can slide off. I look into her big black eyes, with their long soft eyelashes, and can hear her say,stay here and eat something, I will be back shortly,before getting up and trotting away, leaving me alone.
The realization that she hasn’t been able to communicate with me this whole time because I have not been looking into her eyes dawns on me. I wonder to myself if that is how the channel of communication is opened but before I can ponder on that further I find myself distracted by the very real hunger thatis flipping my stomach over and the awful taste in my mouth so I grab a few blackberries to eat.
The sweet, juicy blackberries are a momentary reprieve from the throb of my arm; the sugars from the fruit seem to revive me enough for me to become even more aware of the dire situation I have gotten myself into. My arm is ripped open, but thankfully has stopped gushing, my feet are wrecked, my clothes are all wet, I’ve lost the trail of my sister and I have no idea where I am. A deep panic starts to build in my chest. My heart quickens and my breath comes in shallow bursts.
Is this what a panic attack feels like?I recall seeing Mom coach Marissa through these when she was younger. When she first entered middle school she was having them every week and sometimes they really scared me. I thought she was going to suffocate as she would stare blankly ahead and just gasp for air. Mom would tell her to say one thing she could see, one thing she could hear, one thing she could touch and one thing she could smell and it would almost always work to settle her heart down. So, in this moment, I try to do the same.
“Ok, ok, ok, I can feel the sword in my hand,” I say out loud, the sound of my own voice a comfort as I try to take in a normal breath, clenching the sword, the firm, cool metal grounding me.
“I can hear a creek nearby… I can smell cedar trees… I can see… I see… boulders rolling towards me?!” I drop my sword to rub my hand over my eyes, not believing what I’m seeing but there are, in fact, boulders rolling straight at me!
The next moment, Durga bursts out of the bush on the far side of the meadow that lies in front of me and I see even more boulders rolling in after her. I jump up onto my feet wondering if I should run, when a big moss covered boulder uncurls and springs up onto two feet, right in front of me.
“Hello poppet! Don’t fear, Granny Mog is here!” the big moss haired, bespectacled rock exclaims. I scream and my head spinsand my vision goes dark. It feels like my feet are swept out from under me and I hit the ground.
Chapter Five
“Oh dear, oh dear, I seem to have frightened the poor thing,” I can hear a gravelly voice say as I come back into consciousness. I keep my eyes closed, not wanting to acknowledge that there are actual talking boulders, like the ones from my vision a few days ago, standing in front of me.
Was that only two days ago?It feels as though time has warped on this journey as I think back to the painting I made with the very same creature in it that is standing before me now.
“Quick, Sister Buttercup, go and fetch us some yarrow and plantain. She has sustained a deep wound that we must attend to!” The one called Granny Mog instructs as I crack open an eye to see who she is addressing. A taller, thinner rock creature with light green, curling old man’s beard lichen for hair nods and scurries off into the meadow.
“Ah, she’s awake. Welcome back, Nuria!” A boulder even bigger than Granny Mog reaches out a stone hand to help me up.
“Who… what are you?” I stammer as I tentatively reach out to feel its scratchy, cold, hard hand grasp onto mine and pull me upright.
“It is I, Brother Willow, do you not recall? We were gnome childlings together. I guess I am a tad larger now eh?” Willow chuckles back. The name rings a bell but with no clear memories. Despite the thought that he could crush me with one squeeze if he wanted to, I feel at ease hearing his deep voice.
“I’m sorry I don’t remember… gnomes?!” I question, shaking my head.
“Oh dear, she has forgotten all about us,” a plump, rosy cheeked gnome squeaks.
“Dear child, you were born here, right in this glen,” another gnome with a scraggly moss beard and an Amanita mushroom as a hat butts in.
“We raised you as one of our own but one day you wandered off and we could not find you anywhere. Brother Spruce ventured far, much farther than us boulder gnomes would ever dare to go and he found signs ofhumans,” a tall, thin gnome that looks much like Sister Buttercup adds next, and I feel my head is swimming as it snaps from gnome to gnome.
“We thought perhaps they had taken you and there was nothing we could do,” Granny Mog laments as she takes hold of my hand and gives it a tender pat. I sit with this information for a moment while Sister Juniper returns with the plants Granny Mog had asked for. Granny pops them into her mouth, chews them up, spits them back into her hands, creating a paste, then she reaches out to put it on my arm. I flinch away but she gives me a glare that makes me feel like a child being scolded and some subconscious part of my brain tells me to submit.
Yarrow and plantain she said… I’ve read about these somewhere.I recall that yarrow was used on battlefields to staunch bleeding. The kind of information you tuck away, never expecting to have to use it. My curiosity trumps my squeamishness, so I watch her apply the paste to my ripped up arm.
“If I was born here… then where is my mother buried?” I question cautiously, wincing as she smooths the paste over my ripped up arm. I realize maybe I do not want to know,maybe they are the ones who killed her.
“We did nothing of the sort! boulder gnomes do not harm. We create and maintain!” Granny snaps at me as she grasps my hand tighter and starts to pull me along with her. The ease at which I transferred that thought to her surprises me.There must be some way to moderate this, or am I just doomed with having my inner dialogue on display?
“Come child, I will show you,” she says as I try to keep up with her startling speed, considering she has very small, stubby legs. The other gnomes roll into tight balls and start rolling along after us and Durga keeps up pace easily with her long, elegant, now blood stained, legs.
We pass through a copse of rustling birch trees, hop over a babbling creek and walk past a glistening lake that has swans lazily floating on top of it. I realize how much warmer it is up here.What a strange microclimate,I marvel at my surroundings as we follow a larger creek that branches off the lake.
A small patch of beautiful white flowers catches my notice. An intoxicating jasmine scent is coming off of them. I wish we could stop and examine them for just a brief moment but before I can make the request I am pulled along. Up ahead, in a small meadow with poppies and cornflowers dancing in the breeze, there is a mound of white flowers all clustered together just like the ones by the creek, except here there are hundreds of them. The scent of jasmine and cinnamon fill the meadow and the sun is illuminating the spot with a bright column of glittering, gold light. We all stop at the foot of the mound and the boulders uncurl from their balls and stand with heads bowed. Durga looks at me then bows her head as well.
“What is this?” I ask, confused as to why we have stopped when I thought they were bringing me to my mother.
“This is your mother’s resting place. We had planned to give her a proper ceremony sending her back to The Divine Mother but she transformed into this before we could,” Granny Mog says, with a sympathetic look mixed with something else, a secret perhaps that she is not sharing. She refuses to meet my eyes, so the answer to that is lost from me.
