The next day, Telon asked his new pupil for her thoughts on the bay. It was a pleasant morning, and the calm waters twinkled here and there through the trees as they walked the shoreline road. Ayleah was ready with her response.
“The Lake is ancient, and very deep. When I look out over it I can feel its pull, like the majesty of an old building or historic monument. Its grandeur definitely calls back to when it was a larger sea... it still wants to be thought of that way. The land seems a little perilous, especially on the rocks. Almost like we should be grateful that the lake allows us to stand above it as we do.
I've often wondered what it would be like to look out from one of the palisade cliffs on the western shore. To be so high up, on the strong foundation of the mountain over there, the water must not look so intimidating. Here the rocks seem to struggle to rise as high as they do, and they keep crumbling back into the water again. Is that a lesson? That nature recycles itself? Things are always falling apart by the erosion of the waves, but (at least I've heard it said) in other places islands burst forth from the ocean and water recedes from marshy shore-lines.”
Telon nodded gently. “Yes, that is a lesson, and a good one to know. But let us return to the nature of the lake. You spoke for a moment as if it has sentience.”
Ayleah thought for a moment. “Well, we tend to think of a lot of things that way, don't we? We talk about the qualities of things, and just sort of automatically, what's the word... anthropomorphize them in our heads. There's something more to how the lake feels though... like I'm actually communicating with it.” she said the last part a little softer, as if unsure.
“We anthropomorphize things in order to better relate to them.” Telon responded. “We can do this with anything though, so why is it so easy to do with the lake? Perhaps for you it is because it has always been present in the lives of the people here, almost as a relative. You know more of its twists and turns, and thus more easily think of it as an actual acquaintance.”
“Is it also easier to do because it's so big?” Ayleah asked.
“Yes, and no” said Telon, “the greater energy we receive from something, the more likely we are to perceive it with awe. It is important to note however, that this says nothing about the object in question's physical size. A very small thing may nevertheless inspire a great deal of awe. When considering the lake, we are speaking of something far greater than ourselves in both energy and physical size, so you are right to feel intimidated. What then can we do about that feeling?”
A farm wagon carrying produce passed slowly, merging a little ways in front of them from a side path. Ayleah spoke: “We have to think of our relationship to the lake; all the communities that rely on it, or live alongside it. There's a message I thought of while looking out at the water last night. The lake seemed to say that it had amazing energy to give, and if we only took care of it, we would be taken care of in return. It's kind of a typical environmental statement, but it felt so...energetically real last night. That body of water out there is a body of life and recorded feeling and us little humans have a relationship with that.”
Telon smiled reassuringly. “This is where we begin, with the knowledge that we have a deep relationship with the lake into which all water in this land flows. The relationship is a positive energetic flow between us and all our water. We are responsible for what we put into the lake, and what we take from it. What you have said is true, but remember the lake is not sentient. It is only a basin filled with water and numerous life forms which have their own energy. What you feel as the energy of 'the Lake' is merely an energetic whole of all those parts presenting an aspect based on your perspective.
The back and forth of our relationship with the lake is largely without awareness of the significance of each act. The intricate interactions between energies of our communities and the lake are far too complex and subtle for the average observer. Therefore you can see why it is important to put as much awareness as we can into the important acts of our lives. We must do our best to work and prosper alongside such ancient and deep forces.”
Ayleah spent some time in thought then. She could tell his words were speaking to more than just the peoples' environmental responsibility toward the lake. They walked most of the morning along the pleasant shore road, under a dappled canopy of slender younger trees. Eventually the road split, and the farm cart in front of them continued straight toward a large market clearing. Telon and Ayleah took the left-hand road, following the view of the water. Before long they arrived at a second clearing, this one dominated by a well-kept logging camp. Here and there cut sections of trees stood tall over the grassy plaza. Each was the size of a small apartment building, and numerous ones sported balconies or market stalls at their base. A boy's scouting club banner flew from one of these round wooden towers.
Ayleah and Telon headed for the far side of the square, where large haulers were being laden with wood chips and lumber. “We should be able to hitch a ride on one of these haulers.” Telon said. “I know it's not very glamorous travel, but it'll do until we're out of the forest.” he lowered his voice, “No need to worry yourself, but I've been trying to keep my hood up lately, if you know what I mean.”
“Do you mean to say that my new master, the acclaimed scholar, is a fugitive?” Ayleah looked partly shocked and amused.
Telon mirrored the look. “Well, only in Queen City, though you must believe me when I say I have no idea what I did wrong. In fact, that's what led me to the college in your town; I was looking for answers.” Telon trailed off, lost in a sudden thought. “But like I said, no need to worry. The countryside is a very big place, and we are going far from anywhere those metropolis people might think to search.”
This was actually less reassuring than exciting to Ayleah. She watched one of the haulers lift and glide off down the bay-side road, realizing just how good of a decision she had made in taking this apprenticeship.
--
To say that the ride out of the forest was uneventful is to say that one has had the good fortune to travel often. The hauler had three times the number of repulsors as Tormund's, but grumbled along at a steady rate, heavy with its load of lumber. Ayleah watched cottages go by; small hamlet squares under the shelter of the tanglewood. Once out of the main pine grove, the trees had grown smaller and denser. Tanglewoods were the name given to areas like this, where the trees grew so close together that their branches crossed and grew between one another. No grass or undergrowth could grow in this kind of woods, so travel was often easy, but it was unsettling to have the canopy of wood so close above one's head. This was a small section of tanglewood though, and soon the road opened into a narrow meadow.
Ayleah had only vague memories of meadows, from a trip she had taken with her parents as a child. They were strange places, where trees didn't grow, or if they did, only in very small patches of 'forest'. Instead, there was grass, often growing a hundred feet tall (or so she had read in some geography books- the grass here and in her memory was much shorter). Meadows it seemed, were often wet and swampy, though she wondered if that was always the case. The repulsors reacted sluggishly to the road surface, it being soggy and not entirely stable. What few houses had settled under the bushes on either side were either abandoned and rotting or bolstered and raised above the mucky grass with stilts. Above a slit of sky gave more light than usual to the scene, and Ayleah thought it seemed like a place that, if left alone to stabilize and prosper, could easily be a version of paradise.
The road conditions improved as they passed through a couple clusters of dense narrow trees and into a much wider meadow. Here the trees were only large shapes forming the edge of a great bowl. The hauler rumbled on towards the other side. Telon turned in the direction of the deeper woods from which they had come, touched his hands together, and said a word under his breath before releasing the touch. To Ayleah he said:
“Thanking the forest for letting us through safely. It's an old tradition I picked up from a friend of mine.” he noticed Ayleah looking ahead, over the pile of logs and the cab, at the open land in front of them. “This is the largest meadow you've ever been in isn't it? That unsettling feeling, of being out under the open sky, it comes and goes with time.”
“I'm not worried about being out in the open,” Ayleah replied, “it's just like being out on a boat. But it feels strange to think that there's land beneath us when there are so few rocks, and the nearest trees are so far away. Does anyone actually live in meadows or fields? How do they find shelter?” The College at Silver Shores, though well-versed in broad regional geography and the ways of the metropoli, had had little to say in its books about the styles of rural culture away from the wooded shores of the lake.
Telon responded. “Not many do live out in the middle of the grass, that I know of. Most settle by small clusters of trees, and the edges of forests. But there are ways of finding shelter in the open grasslands. You'll see plenty of that where we're going.”
“And where is that, exactly?” Ayleah said teasingly, “you keep changing the subject every time I ask.”
Telon gave a mock look of shock. “You don't know? Didn't we both have the same dream?” His face relaxed and he chuckled. “Oh I don't expect you to recognize where we were then. Presently we're headed to the open grasslands, just a little ways in from the lake. In one of the valleys around here is the Sanctuary of Mu'ryama, where my older brother took up residence some time ago. We, uh, haven't spoken in a while, and it seems he would like to catch up.”
“Fortunate of him to know you were traveling in this area already, and also that you might need help.” Ayleah pointed out.
Telon looked off across the meadow. “He's always known things like that. Just always had the right timing.” He looked back at Ayleah. “That's what most of magic is, you know. Just good timing.”
--
That night, Ayleah sat looking up at the stars from a sandy beach beneath towering willows at the end of the bay. She had decided to start keeping a journal- there was so much she had seen in just a couple days of traveling. It all seemed familiar, from similarities to home and her knowledge of the world, and yet all was mysterious and new.
Magic, she thought, was in that feeling of wonder that comes with experiencing that the world is more than it had seemed to be. Magic is in the feeling that one can reach out and be with that which you know exists but you have never known. Magic is in the drive of all of life to expand and be.
