k_a_webb | The World Walkers: Quiar: The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments (part 9, 55th continuation)

Lucille sat in her room at the bed and breakfast, trying to write everything that Quiar had told her about the other fae worlds into her newest journal. She’d tried to buy it in the market, but, like many of the traders had started doing, she found herself being given it, along with a couple of new quills and a large pot of purple ink. There had, unfortunately, been nothing she could do to convince the trader to take anything for it, because they, the traders as a group, didn’t think there was enough they could do to thank her for the work she’d done to keep the market open. It was nothing more than her job, but they wanted to show their appreciation, as she was a Council Moonjumper and she was someone they hadn’t expected when they heard about her. Unlike the other Council Moonjumpers she cared about Quiar.

Quiar was off doing other things. Their conversation had lasted much longer that Lucille had anticipated, because, as strange as it seemed, Quiar was lonely a lot of the time, and from the time they’d first started spending time together Quiar had appreciated the way that Lucille wanted to know everything she could – not just about the Web, but the others Webs, the other fae worlds, and pretty anything that Quiar could possibly teach. For as long as she could remember she’d been like that. Lucille remembered sitting with her father when she was very young, learning about the worlds of the Web that he knew about.

Maybe it had been due to that she’d decided to become a Moonjumper. Lucille had always wanted to follow in the footsteps of her grandmother, and her mother even though the woman had given it all up, but if it hadn’t been for that early interest she might never have chosen to apply, especially not at nine. She could still remember sitting in the interview room, in front of the Moonjumper who became her mentor, being told that it was going to be hard work if she really did want to learn about all of the worlds of the Web, and it was something very few people managed. That was before they knew about her grandmother, because she’d used her father’s name on the application, because she didn’t want to get special treatment. If she was going to be accepted it was important that she was accepted for who she was, not who her grandmother was.

What Lucille hadn’t realised then was that they already knew exactly who she was. The Moonjumpers kept track of bloodlines, because they often found that their best candidates came from families where one or more of them had already gone through the process of studying the worlds, taking the exams, and walking the worlds. Of course that didn’t always mean they kept walking the worlds, but a candidate was not always going to fulfil their perceived potential. Luckily she had. Spending hours poring over books about the Web, from the time it was created onwards, had paid off, even though it meant she hadn’t had a social life until Carver had decided that she needed one even if she didn’t want it.

Thinking about Carver always made her smile, even though she hadn’t seen him in longer than she liked, and she had no idea when she might next be able to see him. If Quiar was right about the changes that were coming then hopefully he’d be able to return to Athare, because she knew that was what he wanted, as well as get his old job back, which was something she might be able to make happen if she spoke to Kester. She just wished she’d known the leader of the Council before, as she was certain that there were more lost Moonjumpers out there than he knew about. He was seen by the majority of the true Moonjumpers that she’d had contact with as a possible danger to them, instead of someone they could go to for help, and that was something she was going to change, preferably before the wards came down around the fae’s settlements.

Sighing, Lucille turned to the back of her journal. Quiar couldn’t tell Lucille how long it would be for certain and she had a feeling that was because the worlds didn’t know. Even though they were hoping they could complete their plans in time there was no guarantee, because they’d been working on bringing the wards down since they were first put up, and the only reason they were still standing was that the fae kept fixing them. At least that was what made the most sense. There was no doubt in Lucille’s mind that there were still fae who could strengthen the wards, but that was changing at time passed and the magic of the fae, it seemed, became weaker. With every generation born it seemed like there was less they could do and that was a problem.

Even though some of the natural Moonjumpers could create doors, thanks to the way their magic had evolved, it was nothing like the ability the fae had. The fae had created permanent doors, doors that had been used to millennia, and that was something the Web might have need of again in the future, if something did happen to close one of them. It wasn’t something that had happened before, but that didn’t mean it wouldn’t. Unfortunately that was something everyone needed to come to terms with, because the magic the fae had used was volatile. If they had of known what they were doing things might have been very different, but the creation of the Web had been an experiment they knew might fail, and probably would have done if it wasn’t for Athare.

Athare could easily have made the choice to let the fae fade away. She could have done the same thing Kalinia had done and healed herself once the fae were gone, but her decision had been to help the race that was going to take her over. Lucille couldn’t help thinking it wasn’t what she would have done if she was in Athare’s position. However Lucille also had no idea what it was like to be a sentient world, so it wasn’t as though she truly understood what choice it was that Athare was making, because, when Lucille thought about the big picture, she knew there was more she didn’t know and without that knowledge it was impossible to know for certain what she might have done if she had of been a sentient world suddenly inhabited by a race like the fae.

If they hadn’t lost their history would they have changed? Lucille didn’t think they would, because when the Thirteen Families stepped onto Athare their first thought was about how they could keep living the life they’d lost when they left Kalinia behind and that had led to the creation of the Web. The decision they made had been selfish. Yet if it hadn’t been for that decision she would never have existed. Maybe she had been one of the first, the souls they created because they had no other choice, or she might have been born on Athare. No one truly knew how new souls came about and that was one question she always seemed to forget to ask any of her worlds, which might be because she didn’t really want to know what the answer was. She knew some split, but she didn’t think she was one of them, as she thought she’d might feel as though there was a part of her missing.

The knock on the door dragged her out of her thoughts. “Come in,” she called, thinking it was probably going to be Peric or Bertram, so when Meriwether walked in it was a surprise. For a moment they just stared at each other. It was Lucille who broke the silence by asking, “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing really.” Meriwether rubbed his antler. “It’s just Bertram mentioned earlier that you seemed to be having a rather long conversation with Quiar and I was wondering if you had any questions.”

“Merry…” Lucille shook her head, smiling. “It’s not fair of me to use you like that. You’ve taught me more about the fae than I thought I would ever learn and I will always be grateful to you for that, but I’m not going to interrogate you about things you might well know nothing about.”

“I probably know more than you think I do. Even though I have no memories of the time before we came here that doesn’t mean I haven’t met fae who did and I promised them I would pass on what they told me to someone who’d be able to do more than I could. Now that I know what you want to do with everything that you’ve learnt I’ve realised that you are the person I should be telling their stories, because one they told me they chose to move on to a new life without any of the memories they had from their previous ones.”

Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.

The World Walkers: Quiar: The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments (part 9, 55th continuation)

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