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The World Walkers: Quiar: The Case of the Counterfeit Enchantments (part 10, continued)
“I did what needed to be done, Merry, and that is my job.” Lucille smiled at him, certain they’d had the same conversation before, but then that wasn’t exactly a surprise. Meriwether seemed determined that she was going to understand how important she was, even though she didn’t feel like she was anything more than a Moonjumper doing the right thing. “Quiar will be one of my worlds…” She brushed a hand through her hair. “I don’t even know why I say that any more. I feel like all the worlds of the Web will be my worlds. Maybe I’m only meant to pick a few but that’s not the way things work when you’re in this position.”
“The rules for the Moonjumpers weren’t created by the Moonjumpers themselves, which was always going to be a problem.” He smiled. “When you decided to become a Moonjumper you were like every one before you – you didn’t understand what it meant to travel the worlds. Now that you do things are very different and they always will be. You’re also lucky enough to be a true Moonjumper, which changes things for you. I don’t know if Tegan was a true Moonjumper, because I never knew to ask her, but I think she might have been. She always seemed to know so much more than everyone else, except for Emrys.” He rubbed his antler. “As Emrys ended up travelling the worlds I think he was the first true Moonjumper.”
“Even if he’d never travelled the worlds he was the first true Moonjumper, because he had a connection to Athare, and I’ve known other true Moonjumpers who’ve never left the world they were born on. It has to do with having the ability, rather than actually using it when it comes to the naturals.” Lucille smiled. “I hope the day comes when I do get to meet him, because I think it would be fascinating to find out what he’s done while he’d been travelling through time. He always seemed like the sort of person who’d make the most of every moment, no matter what happened, so he’s got to have some interesting stories to tell.”
“Was Emrys a natural Moonjumper?” Durai was busy with the vision crystal, but Lucille smiled at him anyway. “He was one of the fae and from what Merry’s said before I get the feeling that the fae could use any of the doors they created.”
“You’re right about that, but Emrys had a connection to Athare before he travelled from Kalinia. To me that makes him the first true Moonjumper, especially as he is the only one to have made that journey, and then he’s more than proved that since then as he was asked by Athare to travel through time, so he could be at certain points when he was needed. She wouldn’t ask anyone she didn’t trust to do that.”
“Did he have a connection to any of the other worlds, Merry?”
Meriwether shrugged. “If he did it wasn’t something he talked about. Emrys didn’t talk about much though, so there is a chance he did, and I don’t doubt that he has them now, after all the time he’s spent travelling them. There are stories of him on all the worlds, including Quiar.”
“He came to Quiar?”
“According to the stories he travelled to all three hames, including Mothar, although I’ve always thought it must have been an accident when he found himself there.”
“You think Emrys can make mistakes?”
“I know that Emrys can make mistakes. He was fallible, like we all were, Durai, and he knew he made a mistake when the Witches ended up on Raenarin, as he did his best to stop that from happening. Unfortunately things didn’t work out the way he needed them to.” Meriwether sighed. “There were long arguments about what we should do next. By then we all accepted that he was the one we went to if we needed to know what would work, because he knew so much more about everything than we did, and I remember talking to him about Gaelom. He told me it was an experiment that he hoped would keep the Web intact if something did happen to Raenarin, even though we were all hoping that it wouldn’t. I think everything would have been better if the Witches hadn’t decided to kill their Queen, but they did, sadly, so they’ve spent the rest of the time since that happened fighting every territory.”
“The choices the Witches made have never been good ones, unfortunately.” Lucille sighed. “I liked the Witches I met, but as a race they are dangerous, and every Moonjumper knows that. Any Witch who chooses to travel to Athare, though, is always going to be more open minded, because the majority don’t actually believe the Web exists.”
Durai looked up from the vision crystal. “How can they believe the Web doesn’t exist?”
“Moonjumpers have a tendency to avoid going too far away from the doors there, so it’s only the Witches who live close to them who get to meet us. To the rest we’re little more than a story. Some I think want to believe in us, because they want us to change things, while the others are glad we aren’t getting in the way.” Lucille brushed a hand through her hair. “It also seems as though there are a lot less natural Moonjumpers born to the Witches. Most of them are Sorcerers or Sorceresses. There are a few, but they make the most of their ability as soon as they can to escape Raenarin. Very few of them go back, because they know they’ll be executed if they do, to show the others that no one can escape without being caught.”
“Am I the only person who doesn’t think that makes any sense?”
Lucille laughed. “No, you’re not, but it keeps the Witches scared and that’s what the High Priestesses want. Witches who aren’t scared have a habit of doing things the High Priestesses really don’t like. A couple that I know of went hunting for the Witch Queen’s palace in the hope that finding it would mean they could bring an end to what was happening. Sadly they got caught before they could, because the High Priestesses employed someone to find them, someone who then decided he quite liked hunting down Witches, as they gave him a nice little energy boost if he grabbed hold of the magic that escaped them quickly enough. In the end the High Priestesses had no choice but to get rid of him.”
“However there are still Witch Hunters on Raenarin.” Meriwether shook his head. “Once one person realised that killing Witches was addictive he passed on that information to other people, who became Hunters themselves, but they aren’t stupid enough to go after Witches who belong to one of the covens. A lot of Witches do choose to join one of the covens, if only to protect themselves from the Hunters, but there are those who won’t join any coven for any reason. Solitaries are getting less rare than they were as well, because several of them have created their own territories. They are only towns, but having that many people willing to fight for them is enough to stop the High Priestesses from going after them, even though that means they have to give up that town.”
“Why does territory matter that much?”
“For some it’s simply the best way of showing off how strong they are. If you have a large territory you have a greater area in which to find more Witches. Some of them choose to flee, often to another territory, but some, if there are no safe territories close by, will leave the world behind.”
“Safe territories for Witches are those run by solitaries or the couple of High Priestesses who aren’t totally corrupt.” Lucille bit her lip. “A solitary can only keep a certain number of Witches safe though, although if they can’t take someone on they will do their best to find somewhere for them to go. The solitaries are, slowly, beginning to work together in a way they weren’t before, as there are enough of them that they’re beginning to worry the High Priestesses. I worry that the Highs will do something against them before Katya can take control, but there is nothing I can do to stop that, not if I want to support Katya.”
Meriwether nodded. “Yet the time will come when you can be there to help her, Lucille, and I know she’ll appreciate that, because I would if I was in the same position.”
“I hope that the wards will be down by then, otherwise I’m going to have to be very careful about what I do.” She sighed. “The fae are already going to be unhappy with the choice that I made here, even though they know that I’m right. If I let the counterfeits leave Quiar who knows where they might end up next.”
Mirrored from K. A. Webb Writing.