Young Writers Society

Hirushi
When Hirushi heard the scream, her head snapped up and she was so surprised that she hit her head on a tree branch and tripped over a root.

"What-?" Hirushi tried to get up again, but something hit her head with a heavy blow. She fell, the world turning dark. Soon enough, she was unconscious.

Haar

"Oh. My. Goodness. Again? Hey," called Haar, walking over to the life kind, whom she realized hadn't even introduced herself. She was thrilled that she could help herself over there, rather than always relying on Twyla, but she had to put that joy aside for now, for her healer's sake, she supposed.

"Hey. Can you hear me?" When there was no response, Haar put her ear close to the elf's face.

"She's still breathing," she said to Vagare and Twyla. Then addressing Vagare directly, she asked, "Do you have any healing skills?"

He froze a little. "Huh? Me?"

Haar sighed. "Yes, you. Do you think I could possibly know how to treat people's wounds when I was blind for my whole life?" There goes the secret again . . .

"Well?" she demanded. "Can you check her?"

Vagare Faerius:

He knelt down next to the life kynd. Then his head swung around. "Wait, you were blind? How were you able to see-" The stare she gave him jerked him back into reality. Face once again red in embarrassment, he looked the girl over.

He didn't see any blood coming out of a head injury. It was a major relief to him; he wasn't sure if he could treat an injury like that. "I know a little," he informed the shadow kynd. "Just bits and pieces, though, from when I've gotten injured. I haven't suffered a head injury before..."

He bit his lip and tried to recall any useful information he could have learned. Instead, he remembered something inside his bag. He hurriedly opened it up and began to rummage through its contents. "I'm looking for a book I bought the other day on survival," he explained. After buying it, he had lamented his decision to not spend his money on food, but now it appeared to have been the right choice.

Vagare quickly flipped to the section on healing. It would definitely be hard to find a cure when he didn't know what the problem was-

He stopped at the picture of a blue fruit. The information on it said it was a sana; it was used for healing injuries caused by heavy impacts. It was exactly what was needed. Vagare knew he had seen it somewhere before...

He glanced around the clearing. Not too far away, growing on one of the trees, was several sanas. A smile grew on his face as he showed the shadow kynd the page and gestured at the tree. "I think we can use that!"

Haar

"Oh, good," said Haar, even though she didn't know what the page was saying about the fruit. "Could you get some please, Twyla?"

The shade nimbly climbed up the tree and sliced through the stem of one with her claws. Haar knew that she would have terrible hand-eye coordination, so she closed her eyes and listened for the whistling sound of the falling fruit . . . and caught it.

"Here," she said as she placed it beside Vagare. "Is that enough?"

Vagare Faerius:

He gave a hesitant nod. "I guess so. The book doesn't say the exact amount needed..." Taking a deep breath, he picked up the fruit. The information given in the book wasn't enough. He didn't even know if he was supposed to use it as a poultice or make her eat it!

He consulted his book once again. Maybe it would give him an idea on what to do.

And it did.

The juice of the sana seemed to be the part that did the healing.

He could easily take care of that. He quickly searched through his bag for a knife. With precision, he cut open the fruit. Juice immediately surfaced to the incision. He grinned once again and grabbed his wooden bowl from his bag. He continued to cut up the fruit, watching its oddly golden juice fill the cup. There wasn't much there once he finished, but he guessed it would be enough.

Using one hand to open the life kynd's mouth, he poured the juice in. A second later, her eyes flew open and she began to cough up the juice she hadn't swallowed - all over Vagare's jacket.

Hirushi
Hirushi regained consciousness when something sweet flowed into her mouth. Her eyes opened and she spit the remaining juice out and all over one elf's jacket. He looked at her in shock and attempted to wipe of his jacket.

"Are you alright?" asked a girl in a dark hood. Hirushi shook her head and gazed confused at the girl.

"I-I think so," she said, "Who are you?" The girl looked confused.

"You helped me regain my sight temporarily. You- you don't remember?" Hirushi shook her head again.

"No. Where am I? Who are you people?" Her eyes drifted to her own hands and she whispered;

"Who am I?"

Devlin
Devlin was about to protest when Onvyr tensed.

"Did you hear that?" he asked.

"No," said Devlin, wondering what Onvyr was going on about.

"That thump." Onvyr started moving towards a thicket.

"Come on!" he called to Devlin. She reluctantly followed him until they came across a small gathering in a clearing. Three elves were there, one on the ground and two kneeling over her.

"What happened?" asked Onvyr. The elf on the ground looked up, a glazed expression on her face.

"Should I know you too?" she asked. Devlin shook her head.

"What's wrong with her?" she asked, kneeling beside the elf with the black hood.

Vagare Faerius:

To his surprise, five people entered the clearing: a water kynd, a wind kynd, a fire kynd, a death kynd, and a tiny child he was sure was a dwarf dragon - he had been lucky enough to see them in the wild before, and knew they could change their form.

The death kynd terrified him, but there was more important things to worry about. "You must have amnesia," Vagare informed her.

"Obviously," the shadow kynd said. Her attention turned to the life kynd. "Do you remember anything at all?"

She shook her head.

"This is bad," Vagare whispered. "Really, really bad. I'm guessing her head trauma caused her to lose her memory. And unless one of the people who just entered are secretly healers, we'll have to leave the Spirit Woods to find one."

Hirushi
Hisushi looked around at the f=gathering of elves, this time a little scared.

"What am I doing here?" she asked, "I can't remember anything." Suddenly a huge stag appeared out of the woods and headed straight for Hirushi. The rest of the elves scrambled out of the way, but Hirushi stayed put. The stag nuzzled her and a puzzle piece clicked into place in Hirushi's mind. One part of her memory had retured.

"Shye?" Hirushi asked, "Shye. You're my pet. I remember that now."

Haar

Well, at least she remembers her pet. First she tells me to use my temporary sight wisely, and now I'm using it to help her! Haar sighed.

"Do you remember your name?" she asked the life kynd gently.

The girl's eyes widened. "I . . . I don't remember! I don't know!"

Haar patted her on the shoulder. "There, there, it's okay. I'll help you out." I suppose I have no choice if I want to be able to see for the rest of my life . . .

She stood and studied the newcomers. She couldn't tell what kynd any of the four were just by looking (nor could she interpret their facial expressions) and she was pretty sure the short creature was a dragon from descriptions in her own stories, but then, when you were blind for your whole life, you weren't really expected to learn these things. All she knew was none of them looked like the life kynd (obviously the healing type--she knew that at least), which was bad, but at the same time, one of the new elves looked almost like her. She suspected people thought of this one as scary.

Haar blinked. Focus. There will be time to chat later.

"Are any of you healers?" she asked the newcomers. When none of them replied right away, Haar sighed again. She had no idea whether they were shocked or apathetic (or anything else), even if those looks on their faces were supposed to be obvious.

Well, here goes nothing, she thought. Maybe intimidating them will get them to their senses.

She pulled her hood off and watched the elves as their eyes seemed to all pop out of their heads. The dragon-like creature hid behind one of them, muttering, "Scary!"

Haar smirked, though a small, vulnerable part of her hurt at the thought that people hadn't changed at all in the past years and still found her scary. "So can any of you help her, or do we have to go to the nearest town?"

"Well, actually, going to the town wouldn't be bad either. Those people are at your beck and call anyways," Twyla's voice whispered in her ear, and the familiar feather brushed her cheek. Apparently the shade had shifted back before Haar had taken off her hood.

But getting this elf treatment here would be better, thought Haar, if it's possible.

She crossed her arms. "Anyone? Anyone have the proper skills to help her at all?"

Hirushi
Hirushi looked up at the elf who'd just taken off her hood in awe.

"Wow," she said. The elf looked down at her.

"You're really pretty," she said, "You should show your face more often." The elf with the hood looked taken aback.

"Uh, what?" Hirushi got to her feet and looked around. Suddenly, the elf standing next to the tall white one stepped forward.

"If her pet jogged her memory, then we could try showing her other things from her life. Look in the saddle bags." The elves turned around and rummaged through the bags on Shye's back. The one elf brought forward a big leather book and bag. Hirushi took them and looked at them.

"Mm, nothing," she said. She opened the bag and went through it. Suddenly, she felt a sharp pain in her hand and she drew it out. There was a long scratch stretching from her thumb to her wrist. Hirushi searched for what had cut her and drew out a long silver knife.

"What-?" Suddenly, everything came rushing back. The knife... Hirushi fell to her knees and started to cry. This knife was a gift from her best friend, Teruva, before she disappeared. Hirushi made it one of her life's missions to find Teruva and bring her home. So far, she'd failed and she'd almost given up hope.

"Um, are you okay?" The hooded elf asked her. Hirushi looked up, her eyes watery.

"My name is Hirushi. I'm an adventurer and amateur healer. I'm looking for a permanent cure for your blindness."

Haar

"Aaaaaaaaand the secret's out again," whispered Twyla so only Haar could hear.

Haar resisted the urge to groan aloud and hide in a hole. She also had no idea if the life kynd had been joking or telling the truth when she had said Haar was pretty; she didn't really know if amnesiacs told lies. At the same time, maybe this girl just had a weird outlook on people, since most people who had seen Haar's face had screamed, fainted, or run away at first sight.

Haar forced a smile on her face. "That's right," she said. "You're . . . Hirushi. And I'm the Wandering Haar, if--if you can't remember."

Hirushi
Hirushi smiled and held out a hand for the Haar to take. She looked uncertain.

"Yes I remember," she said, "And forgive me." Hirushi faced all of the elves and bowed. It was a custom in her village.

"Thank you."

Haar

Haar quickly flipped her hood back over her head, hiding her face once again in the comfortable shadows. After all the excitement had died down, she was finding that it was hard to really focus with all of the lights and colors hitting her eyes at once; it was as though her brain couldn't exactly handle all of these newfound signals coming from her eyes, once dead organs.

"Well," she said as nonchalantly as possible, "this will make for a good story to tell."

Torva Messor:

"Um...you're welcome?" he said. He wasn't quite sure who the life kynd was, or what she was thanking them all for, but some manners couldn't hurt. He cleared his throat. "My name is Torva Messor."

"I'm Calidus Ignis," the fite kynd introduced herself. "But you can call me Lidus." He was more than slightly hurt by that comment. She had never told him that. She gestured at Parva, who was currently hiding behind her leg. "I'm sorry if he offended you, Haar. His name is Parva Draco. He's a dwarf dragon I raised, and he's afraid of everything. I'm surprised he wasn't afraid of Devlin, Onyr, Hirushi, and that wind kynd."

Another hurtful comment. She hadn't apologized like that when he had been terrified of Torva.

"My name is Devlin, and this is my companion, Onyr," Devlin said.

The wind kynd got to his feet. For some reason, the front of his jacket was wet. He wiped off the dirt on his pants. "My name is Vagare Faerius!" he exclaimed with a smile.