The Children of the Forsaken

The villagers called them “Children of the Forsaken”, those shunned to the Bearclaw Mountains, exiled from society. But the children called themselves “the Watchers” for their view of the villages nestled in the valley below, and to their parents, they were merely Rya Nevarium, Lyleth Skyden and Quill Westyn. 

“Who in the Risen’s Name takes the forest path to Bearclaw?“ asks Quill, features twisting as a gentle frown and harsh laugh compete for dominance like wolves fighting over a kill. 

Lyleth gives him the scolding look of a mother. “Don’t say that. Mother says it’s a bad word. I heard that the Risen will come take your voice at night if you forget to say your prayers.” Though the Risen, fallen dead brought to life by the God of Death, Voltyrem, were more myth to faithless villagers than a poor, disease-ridden harvest; amongst the Forsaken the ancient gods were sacred.

Quill gives an assertive nod to Rya. “You were brought to the Forsaken as a child. What do you think? Are we going to make another friend?”

Rya’s features may as well have been carved from stone, like the statues of the Risen in the underground temple below their feet. Her eyes are cast on the singularity in the distance—the cloaked figures cutting through the path against a blur of wind and snow, with the relentless endurance of a river’s current. Rya was only a child when she was sent to the Forsaken, but as she grew, her past came back in fragments, like the shards of a broken clay bowl she’d accidentally dropped onto her foot trying to reach the table earlier this morning. Sometimes Rya prayed to Voltyrem at night, for the empty contentment of forgetting, to let her past die like all things in this world. But watching the figures, she supposed that there was a certain strength to remembering and enduring that was a part of living. 

“I remember that the nun who heard me singing and saw me floating, screamed and threw a book at me. I remember crying because I was confused more than hurt.” Her face falls to her woolen boots covered in snow. “I remember the thin, cotton blanket that I shivered through all the way up to the mountains. I don’t remember my father very much, except for the fact that he lived in a very big house, and never seemed to be there.”

Quill squints through the haze, trying to see through the chaos of the storm. “I don’t see a child with them.”

Rya climbs atop a boulder with practiced movements, testing the heel of her boots against the stone for ice patches, and peers over the edge. “I think you’re right.”

Quill crosses his arms with false bravado. “Of course, I am.”

“They’re coming for us, but not for the reason we think.” Rya turns to each of them and asks them the same question: how old are you?

Quill is ten-years-old. 

Lyleth turns eight next week. 

Rya is the oldest of them, almost eleven. 

“One of them wears the white robes of a priest. They were sent to cut our throats and take our voices too.” Rya abandons her perch, staggering backwards. 

“We’re not even 16. Must’ve been a terrible harvest—“ Quill starts, before cut off by an elbow blow to his side. 

Lyleth’s voice trembles, and Rya tells herself that it is Lyleth’s teeth chattering from the cold, while Quill merely rubs the edges of his bony ribs. “I need to tell Mother. She’ll know what to do.”

Word of the priest’s arrival and rumors about another nulling ceremony to take the voices of the children, spread through the small town of Bearclaw faster than an avalanche. The children are kept safely behind locked doors and shuttered windows while townspeople brandish an assortment makeshift weapons—knives, pickaxes, woodcutter’s axes, shovels, old potions and spellbooks. By the time the travelers arrive, the townspeople are ready and waiting. The children have been instructed to stay inside, stay away from the windows and door, but the coziness of the fireplace is almost stifling compared to the tenuous cold, bitten air. 

Lyleth turns away from the window, her eyes damp with tears. A few moments ago, her mother had forced her to look her in the eyes, and wrote that if she could not be strong for herself, she must be strong for others. Her father who mostly grunted in response to anything she said, hugged her and wrote that he loved her. Only now, Lyleth started to realize that she would need to be strong for her people if her mother wasn’t there to lead them.

Huddled in the corner, hugging her knees against her chest, Rya tries to press her body flat against the wall to steady her trembling frame. Her mother wrote mutterings about the trouble that youth these days seem to find. Then she had stuffed firelight potions in the bag across her chest, wrapped another coat around her shoulders, and strung an amulet around her neck. Rya rubbed the markings on the rabbit bone, hoping there would be enough magic in the amulet to protect both of them.

Meanwhile, Quill fights the urge to sneeze, itchiness crawling up his throat, threatening to explode. Earlier that evening, his father had taken out a gleaming, enchanted sword from a cabinet, and donned the knight’s armor that he’d stolen off a rotting corpse in a cave. When his father gave Quill the dagger that he used for skinning game, he wrote for Quill to protect the girls. At first, Quill wanted to point out that Lyleth had been practicing her bloodsong, and Rya was a gifted illusionist. But taking in the hard lines of his father’s face, cast against harsh torchlight, Quill understood his father also expected him to protect himself—prove himself.  

“We’re no priests, and we mean you no harm.” The woman’s weary steps sink into the snow, too loud and soft at the same time like the toll of church bells, carried by the flurries of wind.

Lyleth’s mother uses a pierce of charcoal to write on an empty page of her spell book. Rya flinches at the groaning wooden beams of the cabin, as the wind rattles the bolted shutters. Lyleth inhales a deep, shaky breath, and Quill stifles his sneeze.  

“I apologize for our deception. Only priests or knights are allowed to travel to the mountains.” Tugging down the pristine, pale cowl of his cloak, the man takes a step closer. “We came here to warn you that your children are in danger. Are they well?”

Quill’s father aims the tip of sword against the man’s throat. The crowd gathered in front of the gates stands unwilling, unyielding against the wind. They lurk like a massive shadow, looming over the two strangers, as the sun dips below the horizon. 

“They want to take your children’s ability to speak.” As if sensing their prying eyes, watching from the window, the woman turns to the them, tugging at the man’s cloak. “Can we see the children? Please?”

Lyleth’s mother gestures towards Quill’s father. With a heavy sigh, he drops the sword to his armored side. 

Rya’s mother walks towards the door. All three of the children duck their heads down below the window, as if caught stealing maple sweets from the table, and glance at anywhere but each other in guilty silence. None of them flinch when there’s a gentle knock against the door. 

As they follow Rya’s mother in stunned, uncertain silence, the fickle, unruly wind seems to whisper in their place. Lyleth tugs her thick cloak, closer around her shoulders and straightens her shoulders to seem older than she is. Rya keeps her head lowered, focused on chasing her mother’s shadow in a game of tag she’s been playing since she was born. Quill trudges along, wearing his father’s boots that are a few sizes too large for him. 

Kneeling on the snow, the woman flicks back her cowl. Her eyes are focused with concern. “They said you were young, but they failed to mention you weren’t old enough to bleed.” Her gaze softens as she glances at Lyleth. “I have a daughter—Pyrrha. You remind me of her.” 

The man turns to Quill. “Do you know why we are here?” 

Lyleth glances at Quill who in turn glances at Rya, their eyes locked in contest. A contest that Rya lost. “Yes,” she says forcing the truth out of her mouth, harsh as the burning cold.

“A few hours ago, the priests sent knights to your village. They will arrive soon. We are offering to bring you to a safe place for a while—“ The woman meets Lyleth’s mother’s gaze with deference. “—if your parents will allow us.”

Lyleth’s mother writes. We can protect our own. Why should we trust the kindness of a villager?

Then Rya’s mother follows. How do we know they will be safe with you?

Quill’s father hesitates before adding, Where will you take them? When will we be able to see them again?

The rest of the crowd lift their spellbooks in the air, messages scrawled in crooked, furious strokes that reminded Rya of the warning signs written with animal blood and placed before the forest path.

You take our voices, our magic, and now you want our children?

Leave. You are not welcome here.

Lyleth tugs on her mother’s tunic sleeve, insistent like a furry bloodmoon moth drawn to a candle. “They’re only trying to help.”

“That’s what the priests say,” replies Quill with an annoyed scoff. 

Rya closes her eyes trying to put up a mental fortress around her mind, blocking out the argument. She still remembered the long, tortuous walk from the church orphanage, as she left the village. A man smelling faintly of bread spat on her feet. Someone wearing a silk dress called her a sorcerer slut. When she tripped and fell on her feet, a rosy-cheeked child took the opportunity to throw rotten fruit at her back. Despite having a priest for company, Rya knew that she was alone. 

But when she opens her eyes again, the memory of the villagers fade, and all Rya sees are two people, who ventured through the cold wilderness to protect three children they’d never met from knights. Standing alone. 

Rya addresses the crowd. “I think that they’ve come all this way. We should at least hear what they have to say.” 

“My wife, Veya, has a sister that lives in a cottage on the other side of the sea in Wayleigh’s Fair. Your children would be staying there. You could come visit whenever you wished, so long as you were not followed by knights.” The man takes a step away from the crowd, giving them some privacy. “Whatever your choice may be, we will understand.” His eyes turn far more distant than the few paces between them. “We know the loss of being separated from a child.” 

As heated conversations fade to concerned murmurs, leaving torn messages from spellbooks crumpled and discarded in the snow, the parents turn to their children.

One last message. It is your choice.

Rya, Lyleth, and Quill glance at each other, silently coming to an agreement. “We’ll go.”

The villagers called them children of the Forsaken, those exiled from society and their home in the Bearclaw Mountains. But the children called themselves the Watchers for their view of what others sometimes fail to see. To those who knew them, they were merely Rya Nevarium, Lyleth Skyden and Quill Westyn—the children who defied the silence of death like the Risen.