Woodlock by Steve Shilstone

I…I saw her…standing on the rocks above the cave…The flash of her dark eyes…The gleam. Riffle Sike bolted past me into the cave. I was ice frozen staring at her. She disappeared in green sparkles. Riffle Sike had done it to me again. Yes, he was gone. His pouchbag was gone. And I knew…I knew…I floated here and have been here ever since dreaming of one day becoming a river. His pouchbag was gone and I knew…she was his.”
    â€œNo, that’s not right!” I scraped with my raspy voice. I jumped to my feet.
    Too late! He’d plunged both hands into his pouchbag, and he must have conjured some wizardy spell, because in a nince he was a purple streak blazing a trail through the sky.

Chapter Twenty-One
    Frustration
    I went hollow, not with anger, but with frustration and despair. I didn’t want to be a bendo dreen alone again. And yet, and yet, I was.
    â€œArrange your thoughts, Chronicler,” I muttered to myself. “Arrange ‘em.”
    To do so such, I gripped my chonka and tapped it on my leg. I paced back and then forth across the meadow. I spoke silently to the absent Kar, who was way far off in the future doing I wondered what.
    Kar, I have seven days to do something I don’t know. Where are the answers? Why aren’t you here? I think better when you are looking at me. You expect me to be smart. So such I try harder. The shifter Shendra Nenas told me I should have kept the orb. Am I a mind reader? No, I am not. I am a timid bendo dreen from the hedge. I have no powers. Well, you say, what about the Carven Flute, the Jo Bree? What about it? I don’t have it! I didn’t bring it! Lackwit? Yes! So such simple it would have been to slip it under my belt while I was picking up my chonka. It was right there on the shelf! Pah! All right, Kar, I can hear you say, ‘Settle, Bek.’ I’m listening. I can settle. There. Now about Runner Rill. He’s wrong, you know. He’s confused, and I failed to untangle him. How could I? I was given no time! He might be gone forever. All might be as it isn’t off in the future with you, Kar. I do have a week left to complete the unknown task. A week unless…unless the shifter is a complete lackwit and wrong about that, too! She could be. She might be. She probably is! Lackwit. All right, Kar, I’ll settle. I’ll pretend I have a week to…what?
    I paced faster and began to wave my arms about. I’d reattached my chonka to my belt. So such, waving wildly and pacing faster seemed to help organize the babble in my brain.
    I recognized Riffle Sike’s beckoning pool from Runner Rill’s description. The cave and all. The Gwer drollek story of Rindle Mer starts at that pool, dried to dust. So such. Riffle Sike HAS found his beckoning pool. One future fact is unveiled. He will raise his niece, Rindle Mer, in and around that very pool and cave. If! If! Oh, what did happen there yesterday? Where did Riffle Sike go when he spelled himself invisible? I should hunt for his beckoning pool. It is his! It will be his then in the future! He’ll return there. I need to talk to him. Did he have another visit from Shendra Nenas as a silver wizard in a dream vision? Such might be so. Such could be so. But wait, you muddled lackwit! Kar, why didn’t you remind me? It’s the orb! I should have kept the woodlock’s orb!
    I was struck still by that last thought. My arms dropped to my sides. Standing in purple grass, I stared at the stream.
    â€œI have to steal her orb,” I said aloud evenly, though my voice remained a nince raspy. “I have to find Delia Branch. Where to start? Where?”
    After the thinnest span of time, I made a decision. I trailed off east, away from the stream. Why? I didn’t know. I felt it. It was a guess. I knew I’d been moving south along the stream. West I calculated would take me to the high cobbled road and on to Danken Wood. Such I felt