CHAPTER ONE ~ The New Child, The New Season
She was with child for the nearly the whole of the year, a young mother and her first child. Her husband and the father of her child overflowed with curiosity. They only knew of one other child in their lifetime and she was on her own way to adulthood.
The mother, Soledad, and the father, Featherfoot, had not yet even decided on a name for their child. Time was growing shorter for them to choose and so they asked their Elders. But there was also the problem with the Elders, with great and bitter needles in their hearts.
It was the echoes, the hundreds of days where their dreams offered the Elders no escape. Their purity and their Light was tainted with nightmares of death, blood on sacred ground, magic used to harm instead of heal, and the young falling and never rising. To them, a child was an omen. To them, one may as well give the child no name for they were doomed to death. Their spirits were broken, their hearts were fading away as were their hopes and their dreams for the future...
Featherfoot pleaded each day and each night for the Elders to bless their child with the sacred Light and honor them with a name. Time and time again they did not answer and instead they walked away as though leaving from the sight of death. Some shouted in disgust, others simply turned away and wept.
Soledad could hardly bear the look on their faces, in the moments where there should be rejoicing there were sullen looks and empty eyes. Instead she kept away from them and thought to herself, "No wonder the orphaned one left."
So in their solace, Soledad and Featherfoot awaited the birth of their child. This was the month when their child was set to be born at any day and it was best if Soledad spent her days at rest. As the pair sat together at the base of an ancient tree, they watched the sun set. The air was growing cool and crisp now at each dusk and the leaves were draining the green away, leaving gold and crimson in its stead.
"Remember how it was? When it was not just us and it was you, I, Treefern, Horus, Lemahrn, Cloverbright, and Meadow?" Soledad said softly to Featherfoot.
"When I shut my eyes every night before I sleep," he replied, even then closing his eyes. "I can still hear their laughter. I can still remember the look of love in Lemahrn's eyes when she was with child. It is the same look you carry now and may it never leave us."
"May it never leave us," agreed Soledad.
As the last word was spoken for that day, a single leaf fell silently down from the great and ancient tree to rest on Soledad's foreleg.
CHAPTER TWO ~ Omens & Dreams
Featherfoot did his best during that time to provide for Soledad and her unborn child. The sacred Light had not blessed their child and there had not yet been a child who was never blessed by the Elders. Ancestor was not pleased. The Elders had forgotten the old way, the miracle of life and the eye of the sleeping Ancestor slowly drew open from his ancient slumber.
Ancestor touched all their dreams with her powerful magic. The Elders in their gloomy poses in twilight were so blind in their sadness that they did not see the strange tendrils of Light that touched their minds and their hearts as they slept.
"I am Ancestor, have you forgotten me? In your sadness, you are also selfish. In your fear of life and death, you have become cold and unkind. I have not left you, yet you claim you are alone. How dare you insult me! How dare you insult all my people by denying the child his Light. Praise the Autumn King and bless him with the Light, or all with your kind shall truly be lost!"
They all awoke at once, cold sweats upon their brows. The Elders looked to one another and didn't say a word, for their expressions spoke volumes. The Light could not be placed upon the child because there had been none left in their hearts. They were ashamed of themselves and in the morning they agreed to bless the child.
CHAPTER THREE ~
