Wednesday, June 14, 2006
Chapter 14B-The Mystery of the Lake
During circle he noticed Ellen was training Misty to be High Priestess. He had forgotten that Misty was a Master now. He was going to miss Ellen and wondered what she would be doing next. It was strange to see people he knew advance on to different positions.
He noticed earlier that Rafe had been put on wood crew along with Dirk. That meant they were responsible for there being enough fire wood at the gathering spot for circle. Everyone was encouraged to help, but only a few Journeymen were actually tasked to ensure there was enough wood. Angel would be given new duties next month as well. He noticed this morning that she now had four chevrons and seemed to be moving up the ranks more quickly than Rafe was.
Since Journeymen didn’t spend all of their time training newbies, they were each assigned duties that normally lasted two or at the most three months before being assigned to the next duty. The wood supply for the Circle was usually gathered well in advance and there was little work to be done during circle itself except tending fires as needed. That’s what Rafe was doing when Tobal spied him between initiations.
“Hey stranger”, he teased. “Who did you kill to get that?”
Rafe grinned as he turned in surprise. He postured and showed off his first chevron.
“One of the girls challenged me. She thought she could beat me. Bad mistake! She almost did too.” He admitted ruefully but then brightened. His mischievious smile was still the same. “Now I’ve got all the girls fighting over me. I must be the most popular Journeyman ever.”
Tobal looked at his friend. Rafe was filling out, getting taller and stronger.
“I think you will be winning quite a few fights soon”, he said. “You’re not so little any more. Pretty soon you might have to start picking on the girls instead of having them pick on you.”
“You really think so?”, Rafe laughed. “Guess I can give up on the idea of fighting babies then. So what have you been up too? Is Sarah ready to solo yet? I’ve been hearing some good things about how you taught Nick and Melanie.”
“Well, I’ve run into a bit of a snag”, he confessed. Sarah isn’t ready to solo yet and I’m thinking about having Melanie, Nick, Becca, Mike, Butch and Sarah all over to my place this month. We can all make our winter gear together. None of us is really that good at it and maybe helping each other out will work.”
“That’s a terrific idea”, Rafe said. “I wish I had thought of it when I was training newbies. I guess we really didn’t do that much training for winter did we? There was only about one week of snow in your training before it melted away. Is there anything I can help with that you don’t remember?”
“I remember how to do most of it”, he replied. “But I will need to go back to your base camp and get some of my things if that is all right?”
“Sure, take anything you need. I probably won’t be around there very much this winter. I’ll be hanging around the Journeyman area most of the time. Either that or be out here getting wood or doing some other duty. Being a Journeyman is nothing at all like being an Apprentice.”
“Hey Rafe,” he changed the subject. “ I really need to talk to you about something. Remember when I tried building my base camp on the lake and it was destroyed by those rogues? Do you remember that abandoned gathering spot I told you about?”
“Yeah, what about it. I hope you haven’t been snooping around there.”
“I think Sarah’s mother is buried there and two older brothers that she doesn’t even know about. I also think it’s where my parents died.”
“What!” Rafe exclaimed. “You’d better tell me what you are talking about.”
For the first time Tobal told Rafe about his parents and how they had been the creators of the sanctuary program, how it had been first a social experiment and then a classified Federation project. He told how his uncle had been the military officer in charge of the program and how his parents had been found floating dead on the lake. He added the part about uncle Harry getting injured and closing down the project.
Then he went on to mention what Sarah’s father had told him about knowing his parents and working on a classified matter transmission project and an even more secret project concerning bi-location and a shaman named Howling Wolf. He told how his parents and a small group including Sarah’s father had been at a secret meeting when the entire village by the lake had been attacked and everyone massacred.
It had been right after that his parents were found dead and two surviving members of the secret group were hunted down and executed. Howling Wolf and Sarah’s father were both members of the secret group that had survived along with a few children.
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