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[Arahim]

---

Only two days had passed by, but the hollow feeling Arahim had been unable to fill since Sylvan had packed and left, continued to dominate his moods.

She had only spoken briefly, nearly distractedly, to him about her seemingly sudden decision. Promising him that he would not truly be without her, and that she would return home as quickly as she was able.

Brushing a trembling hand lovingly across his face, chasing stray hairs away from his eyes, she stated flatly,

"It's something I just can't do here."

Placing two fingers upon his brow to punctuate the word, 'here,' and smiling sadly.

Turning from him, she knelt eye level with her son, staring intently into his eyes. The strange green of hers mirroring the strange green of his.

Sharing those things Arahim was simply not made to share in.

"Mommy loves you, Christopher."

Standing, not daring to hazard a final,parting glance, Sylvan Sherwood went her own way one more time.

Alone.

[Arahim]

---

The Crystal Skull was one of only a few and, by all accounts, powerful in the hands of the right gypsy with the right bloodline. Stories from simple curative properties, to precognitive abilities, to blazing, consuming energies abounded around them, and differed depending on who you asked.

All things to all people? An object of the gypsy love of lore and tall tales?

Arahim could not say one way or the other.

Christopher ran pell mell through the hops garden, laughing loudly to no one in particular, and trailing his hands along the dark green growth as he went. Shaking the orderly mass of fragrant plants in such a way as to make it seem like a living thing. Every now and then, he'd pop his little face out, red with exertion, and grinning, to shout, "Boo!" at his father as he sat on the grass facing his garden.

Arahim feigned a dramatic surprise at every "boo," much to the joy of the wild haired little boy.

Idly, he scratched at the three tiny blood stains which marred the pristine surface of the Crystal Skull held in his care. A gift from his Aunt Merrique so many months ago.

These days, he carried it everywhere he went.

Merrique, and her twin sister Xana had disappeared recently. Given their natures, their absence was not viewed as something entirely sinister, or unusual for that matter. It did, however create a void. Leaving the tumultuous dealings of the clans in the hands of a disparate group of younger gypsies, of which he found himself a part of.

Arahim had no real feel for how they were doing, or if their elders approved, or no.

Silence said nothing.

"Say something, if you -know- something," he muttered angrily at the skull, bringing it inches from his face to stare into it's pearlescent eye sockets. It's cold, silent visage seemingly unimpressed with his attempts at intimidation.

"We can go see Nice Anna now daddy," Christopher chimed out while climbing through the garden's fence, thoroughly startling his father, only for real this time.

"I don't know where Aunt Xana is, Christopher," he laughed. At himself, more than anything.

"At the big tents," the boy stated as though the matter was not up for further discussion.

Clapping dirt from his little hands, he walked, be-boppedly, over to his cross-legged father and patted the Crystalline Skull as if it were a well behaved pet.

"Where she made fishes in the fire."

Arahim regarded the boy intently, a dozen questions on his tongue. He answered his son slowly.

"Wouldn't you rather go find Mommy?"

Spinning to watch some small bird as it twittered across the cloudless, afternoon sky, Christopher smiled and shook his head. A play of certainty and faint sadness, far beyond what was normal for a boy his age, crossed his face.

"Um...nooo. Nice Anna, ok?"

"Big tents?" Arahim asked, "Minoc?"

Waving goodbye to the songbird, so far away now, Christopher turned and smiled brightly.

"Mhm. I think so."

[Arahim]

---

"Christopher...stay where daddy can see you," Arahim called over his shoulder as he crouched over the ashy remnants of an old campfire.

The Minoc camp seemed a ghost of itself. It's tents empty shells. Where once there was light and laughter, there was now only wind, and memories.

"This has gone on for too long," he thought.

Behind him, Christopher ran around the camp with a large stick, drawing Xs in the dirt at odd intervals, and singing out his actions to himself.

"Draw-in heeeere! Now I'm gonna run! Hm..hm..hmmm!"

Shaking himself free of the thoughts of the now empty camp, and remembering why he had come here, Arahim called his son over to him.

"Christopher, Aunt Xana's not here, let's go home."

"Wait! Not yet," he said as he ran over to a lonely tent, and marked one last X at its corner, "Now we gotta see! You sit down over there, daddy...ok?"

Handing his father his stick, Christopher wiped his dirty hands on Arahim's kilt quickly, yet thoroughly, and ran off giggling and shaking his head.

Watching him curiously, Arahim got the idea that he'd never fully come to understand what it was the boy saw or heard. And not for the first time.

Christopher ran from X to X, becoming rigid upon each stop, and screwing his little face up into a mask of utter concentration. After what seemed like an interminably long series of moments, he would shake his head, and run off to the next X.

Whispering, "Not here," to himself over and over, Christopher heard his father yelling for him to stay close, but curiously made no move to come collect him, as Christopher made no move to obey him.

Waving his hand, but not turning around, he stopped at an X at the very edges of the abandoned camp and stood stock still. A light Spring breeze abruptly tickled the nape of his neck and toussled his shaggy hair. Turning slowly, the small boy cocked his head as if listening, and stuck his pinky in his mouth.

Without surprise, although touched with a shyness that was not usual for the child, he looked up and smiled very faintly.

"Hi."

[Ember Cawood]

---

Something had stirred. It resonated within the depths of Ember’s soul, and bounced off the sky and fell upon her ears and face like a welcome rain. Tides of murmurs pushed and pulled her, ebbed and flowed, and each time the sound came closer.

Someone was there. And not just any someone. This wasn’t the hushed voices of gypsies stopping through to collect lost and left belongings. It wasn’t the searching calls of those who returned now and again to seek friends and relatives who had become separated during the exodus from the camps.

This was the sound of something more powerful, calling, invoking that which for most remained unseen and unspoken. He called to her, and she would find him. Wordless pleas filtered through her being, and Ember wandered driftingly toward the caller.

When at last she had found the place, she met with only confusion. What stood before her was a child. Yet tendrils of his spirit stretched in spiral wisps of light that dwarfed her own at times. She stopped before the boy and watched the spires in wonder.

Ember’s brilliant red hair her hair tangled gently in the breeze, an action akin to cell memory, in much the same way her mouth moved when she spoke. “Greetin’s Child.”

Slowly, the boy turned, his eyes betraying the depth of the pool of light beyond his flesh. He stuck a pinky in his mouth and smiled shyly.

“Hi.”