The Gully Snipe (The Dual World Book 1) (21 page)

Gully said, “It does not?”

“It is not like the people of Iisen to wander into the forest, especially when near dark, except for a very few that we have reason to fear and despise. How is it that you are willing to venture into a forest that all other of your countrymen would avoid at almost all costs?” asked the man.

Gully wondered whom these people were if they were not Iisen. His mind briefly flashed an image of himself roasting over a fire while wild gypsies prepared for a feast.

“Goodsir, you speak very true,” replied Gully nervously. “But unlike all other Iisenors that I know of, I grew up deep in the Ghellerweald. I know my way around the forest lands well and have no fear of them.”

The old man was quiet once again, and Gully could not help but blurt his own question out in the silence, “Have some among you been disappearing as well? Iisenors have been vanishing for over twenty years now! Freeing these two men before me pieced together the puzzle for me and I know who in Iisen is committing these foul crimes! It is why I am back now, searching, to try to gather evidence so that I may put a stop to them!”

The crowd that had gathered around began murmuring amongst themselves at Gully’s outburst. The elderly man never took his eyes off of Gully and raised his hand, only slightly, but it instantly silenced all the discussion that had erupted around him.

“I have many questions for you, young man, and I am sure you have many questions for me,” said the old man very deliberately. “I think... the time has come for the two of us to perhaps have a little supper and a more serious conversation.”

He added with a glance at the group that had gathered around the scene, “Alone.”

“You cannot be serious, father!” exclaimed Encender, stepping forward. “You do not intend to free him, do you? He had a throwing knife on him when Raybb found him! Who knows what wounds he will inflict, how many he will maim, if he gets his hands on a weapon before we take him down!”

The ocelot stood and growled slightly at Encender.

“Encender, please,” said the patriarch. “Your ardent concern for our safety is never doubted. But the quiet and small ways of fate can often be drowned out by our own suspicions and doubts, my son. Gallun and Gellen will accompany us while we talk.” He glanced at the two bare-chested men for their consent, and they both nodded their agreement to him.

Encender began to protest again but his father raised a hand at him, silencing him. The patriarch said rather flatly, “Free our guest from the restraints, Encender.”

Encender scowled but did as he was told. As he cut the ropes from Gully, the patriarch asked, “May I ask your name, young man?”

Gully froze, unable to decide which name to give, unsure whom he should be for these strange people. He finally said, “It is Bayle Delescer, goodsir.”

“Bayle,” repeated the patriarch. “My name... is Aian Mercher. I am the patriarch of the Mercher clan, some of whom you see gathered around. You have previously met Gallun and Gellen. And, of course, you have also met my two sons, Encender and Exoutur,” he said, pointing to the two men. He also pointed to the large man that had arrived with Exoutur and added, “And Raybb, too.”

Gully rubbed his wrists to get the blood flowing once again in his hands. In the darkness of the forest, the variously-colored lights of the sparkflies prevalent in the summer woods had begun to wink on and off around them.

The old man turned to the young boy and said, “Wyael, will you see to it that a little supper is prepared for us? For Gallun and Gellen as well. And take the kilts from them as I assume they will want to transform, yes?” He glanced again at the two bare-chested men, who nodded again and removed their skirts, or kilts, to hand to the young boy.

Before Gully could wonder at the sight of two men who seemed to think nothing of being utterly naked in front of a crowd of people, the images of the two men stuttered slightly and then there were two wolves once again where the men had just been.

Gully stepped back, startled by the sight, but the patriarch put his hand on Gully’s arm and smiled at him, “Let us walk, young Bayle.”

The ocelot led the way, and the wolves fell in on either side of Gully and the patriarch as everyone else slowly wandered back to what they had been doing before the commotion over the intruder had begun. It was getting dark in the woods now, and Gully could see multiple small fires lit in the distance, implying a larger encampment than he had originally expected.

As they began to walk, Aian said to Gully, “You must forgive my son, Encender. He is very protective of the clan, and does all he can to ensure our safety at a time when we are in much danger. But he sometimes takes it too far, and it saddens me that he still would prefer to act rashly before he understands what fate is perhaps working towards. I would also like to thank you, on behalf of the clan, for rescuing Gallun and Gellen. We’ve only ever recovered one other in the past, and the loss of two of our best would have been very sad, and discouraging, for the rest of us.”

As he said this, the wolf immediately next to Gully nudged up at his hand and seemed to have a smile across his muzzle, his tongue hanging out happily as he panted. Gully drew his hand back, afraid the wolf was maybe trying to bite him. He wondered, if he made a run for it, how far he’d be able to get with people and animals like this chasing him. He didn’t like the odds very much, but at least he was reassured by the very genuine courtesy the patriarch was showing him.

The patriarch continued, not even noticing, “I confess to having a very burning curiosity about you, Bayle, one that I can imagine is returned by you in an even greater share. You are our guest, though, so I will let you quench your curiosity first. You are welcome to ask any questions you have of us.”

Gully stopped walking entirely, causing the patriarch, the ocelot and the two wolves to stop as well.

“Uh...” said Gully, unsure where even to begin. “Forgive me, sir. I mean, patriarch. I will start by being entirely honest with you about one thing. I truly believe that I have hit my head and scrambled my senses terribly. You will take me as crazy, but I am seeing things that cannot be real. It seems that I have twice now seen wolves turn into men, and men then turn into wolves. There is no such thing as this in the world, no such sorcery, so my mind is somehow playing terrible tricks on me.”

The patriarch nodded with a smile and said, “You say you grew up in these woods, in the Ghellerweald. Is this not the case?”

“I did,” said Gully.

“Then you are familiar with the small insects that flash a light in their tail, some green-gold, some pink, some pale blue, correct? They are out in multitudes tonight, as a matter of fact, and all around us.” The patriarch waved his hand around at the lazily blinking insects among the trees around them.

“Yes, the sparkflies,” agreed Gully. “I spent many nights of my childhood chasing after them.”

The patriarch nodded. He said, “And if you had never seen a sparkfly before, but someone had described such a miracle of nature to you, would you have believed it?”

Gully thought a moment, and replied, “I see your point. An insect that glows with its own light in the darkness would be difficult to accept as true if I had not seen them myself.”

“Your mind and your eyes are not playing tricks on you, Bayle,” said the patriarch. “Place your hand there, on Gallun’s back. The back of the wolf standing next to you, I mean.”

Gully hesitated at the idea of touching the wolf next to him, but did as he was told. The wolf allowed him to do it without so much as a jerk or a snap at him.

“He is as real as you and I,” said the patriarch. “Now remove your hand. Gallun, if you would indulge me, please transform so that Bayle may see.”

Gully removed his hand, and instantly, the man named Gallun was standing next to him. The patriarch said, “Gallun and the wolf are the same, Bayle.”

Gallun took Bayle’s hand and placed it to his own shoulder to prove he was real. Gully could feel the skin and muscle, and the bone underneath, of a living person — the same person whom he had freed. As soon as he removed his hand, and with a tiny flicker of the image, there was once again a wolf next to him.

“How is this possible?” asked Gully, utterly dumbfounded.

“How is the flickering light of a sparkfly possible with neither heat nor flame?” countered the patriarch gently.

The patriarch resumed his slow walk and Gully followed as well. He asked in utter astonishment, “Who
are
you?”

“Whom and what we are will take a little more to answer, but we have time and I promised you answers to whatever questions you cared to pose.”

They arrived at one of the fires. There were many other people around, but they left Gully and the patriarch alone as requested. In addition to a few logs pulled around the fire, there was a single wooden chair. The patriarch slowly sat in it with a slight groan of effort and laid his walking staff down next to it in the sand.

He said to Gully, “Forgive me for not offering you the chair. I am old and trying to sit on the logs exhausts me too quickly.”

“I’m quite comfortable on the ground, sir,” said Gully. He sat down on one of the logs, now terribly eager to hear about these strange people hidden away in the middle of the Ghellerweald. For cannibal gypsies, they were not at all what Gully expected. But what they actually were was
completely
unexpected. Both Gallun and Gellen, or the wolves rather, sat down next to Gully, although he had the impression it was less to guard him than it was to stay close enough to hear the full conversation. The ocelot sat on the ground peacefully next to the patriarch.

The patriarch took a deep breath and said, “Let me begin with some history of whom we are, if I may.”

“Please do,” said Gully, fascinated and eager.

“We are not quite the same as you, as you have guessed,” began the patriarch.

“You are called Merchers?” asked Gully.

“That is merely a family name...
my
family name,” answered the patriarch, “and the clan has taken it to represent all of us. We are almost all that is left of a people that lived in a great empire to the north of here. Have you ever heard of Balmorea?”

Gully’s brow furrowed as he tried to think. “I do not recall ever hearing of such a land.”

“It died away many hundreds of years before Iisen began to form, so I am not surprised. Iisenors do not seem very interested in exploring the land to the north, but if any were to go there, they would still likely find ruins of the civilization. The name of the empire, Balmorea, comes from our word ‘balmor,’ which means dual-bodied. Many of Balmorean blood have one mind and one soul, but it is shared among two physical bodies, one human and one animal.”

Gully glanced at the wolves near him.

The patriarch pointed to the wolf closest to him with his hand. “Gellen here, for example, can shift between a human and a wolf form, as can his twin brother, Gallun,” explained the patriarch.

“Does it hurt?” asked Gully, and then without waiting for an answer he was so curious, “Whom does the ocelot turn into? Can you turn into any animal? How come Gallun and Gellen as wolves have their tongues? Shouldn’t they have been cut out?”

The patriarch laughed and said, “Slowly, please. I can no longer move as fast as one as young as you. Shifting hurts no more than blinking an eye does. It is in their intended nature to transform at will between the two forms. Their wolf forms still have their tongues because the two bodies are separate. Damaging one does not damage the other, with the exception of death. Death to either form is death for both.”

The child, Wyael, arrived with a platter of food for their supper. He also laid the kilts on the log for Gallun and Gellen. Both changed back to human form, which Gully watched with interest now that he could see it happen plainly in the firelight. Aside from the strange flicker in their image that immediately preceded the change, the act of transforming was instantaneous. One moment, the animal was there, and then the next, there was a person. They fastened their kilts around their waists and resumed their seats on the log with Gully. Wyael served out the food to the men, and then seemed to dawdle idly as they began to eat.

The patriarch nodded at him and said, “You may stay, Wyael. But you must let the adults speak in peace, please.”

Young Wyael nodded his agreement violently and sat on the ground so he could listen.

The patriarch chuckled and told Gully, “There is nothing we’re relating that really needed to be discussed alone. To be frank with you, I wanted some time for Encender to calm down and not interrupt every time he thought of a new reason to oppose your presence in the camp. He will likely intrude in on us before too long, my request to be left alone notwithstanding.”

Gully ate a few bites of the steamed greens and asked, “So, whom does the ocelot become when he transforms?”

“The ocelot does not transform,” said the patriarch with a smile. “Ignoring the myths and legends for a moment, and the kinds that have not existed for a while, there are two kinds of balmor. Some, like Gallun and Gellen, are balmors called transmutes. And others, like myself and my son’s husband, Raybb, are balmor familiars.”

“Familiars?” asked Gully. The other way the patriarch referred to Raybb also caught Gully’s attention, but he placed far more importance on the “familiar” concept for the time being.

“I am dual-bodied with the ocelot. I do not change back and forth between the two bodies. Rather, when my balmor nature emerged when I was a young boy entering manhood, I paired with an ocelot and we became one and the same. Two bodies sharing the same mind and soul,” explained the patriarch. “I see with two sets of eyes, smell with two noses, hear with four ears, all at one time. No matter the distance that separates my human form and my ocelot form, one mind experiences both. I am fully cat, and fully human, at the same time. The same is true with Raybb, who shares his human form with the large brown bear that, I believe, startled you in the woods.” He chuckled again and added, “Which is amusing, because amongst all of us and despite being a very accomplished fighter, Raybb has one of the kindest hearts in the entire clan. But, yes, he is quite intimidating if you have no knowledge of that beforehand.”