Date: Sun, 16 Sep 2001 17:29:19 EDT
From: Faradhi269@aol.com
Subject: Re:neriam-story-2

*Okay, this is chapter two, we all know how this thing goes, right?  It is
a work of fiction, and as I've created all these characters on my own, then
no surprise at that.  Questions, comments, concerns, send to
Faradhi269@aol.com.  Flames will be ignored.*

	Neriam attempted to dry himself off using the scrap of his shirt
before pulling on his short pants and sandals.  He immediately set to work,
hoping that exertion would stop the chill of the water and the air from
settling into his muscles.  The day was fading, and Neriam needed
desperately to set up a campsite.  He pulled several large round stones for
the fireplace from the riverside.  A heavy wood lay not far from the river,
so Neriam decided to make his camp on the leeward side, or within a
clearing.
	He carefully piled his rocks near the edge of the woods for easier
access, and then wandered in them for nearly two hours, gathering twigs and
branches as he went along, in order to find a suitable place.  Eventually,
he happened across one of those hills that just rise up, treeless, in the
middle of woods.  The grassy knoll rose perhaps twenty feet into the air at
its crown with fifteen feet of emptiness around it before the trees began.
With an exhausted smile, Neriam dropped his bundle and rushed back to get
his rocks.
	Hours later, he sat back with a smile, having completed his camp
except for the fire.  He shivered in the cold and stared up.  Above, the
cold stars shimmered with a prismatic hue and the moon hid from view.  In
the darkness, the woods seemed oppressive, but no hint of wind chilled him
any further.  "I'd better get this fire started quickly," he muttered to
himself, "or I'm going to freeze."  He searched the stones he'd pulled for
flint, unable to find any.  "Whelp of a bitch," he uttered under his
breath, his cheeks flaming at even this indiscretion.  He grabbed rocks at
random, banging them together, trying to find any combination that would
make a spark, to no avail.
	"Ok, Neriam, think.  What about a woodbow?"  He pulled one of the
largest chunks of wood from his pile and grabbed one of the straighter
inch-thick branches.  Laying the larger one across his lap, he put the
smaller one into its center and began to twirl it between his hands.  His
hands burned from the blisters, and his shoulders screamed at him, but the
fire refused to light.  Neriam pulled his thin shirt over his slim
shoulders and huddled into a ball, shivering as the night grew colder.
	Master Adane, slipping silently through the woods found Neriam's
campsite and approached it from the back.  He had promised not to interfere
unless necessary, and he hoped that it would not be although the boy's lack
of fire was disturbing.  Perhaps thirty yards behind Neriam, the old master
sat back on his haunches and watched, his weathered body not even feeling
the temperature.
	Neriam, meanwhile, looked with intense dislike at the fire.  His
anger at Master Adane from earlier that day-suppressed by the
children-flared up even hotter as he realized the desperate situation he
was in.  "I'm going to die out here, and it's that old..."
	He stopped himself from openly disrespecting a teacher, even in
private.  The rules of the Order were too ingrained into him.  He knew that
he needed to move in order to get some heat into his muscles, so he stood
and paced around the circle of his futile fire.  The cone-shaped woodpile
seemed to mock his efforts as he moved around it, and he grew angrier.
	The heat of his anger flooded him, allowing him to ignore the cold
as he muttered constantly swearwords he'd heard the older Students say when
they thought they were alone.
	"Damn you!  Why won't you LIGHT?!" he finally screamed at the pile.
The fire exploded, shooting flames nearly to his shoulder height.  He gaped
momentarily before his eyes rolled back in his head and he collapsed, as
though boneless, to the ground.

	Adane started to stand.  Apparently the boy was not going to get
the fire lit, and Adane did not expect him to last the night.  Also
apparently, his temper was growing, as the muted muttering became obvious
to the old master.  Just as Adane stood and prepared to approach Neriam,
the boy shouted "light."  The stars seemed to intensify and the night
coalesced about the boy as deep in the center of the pile of wood a
blue-white flame lit, igniting the wood instantly into roaring flames of
ordinary color.  The old man stopped, amazed and, he admitted to himself
privately, frightened by what happened.  He cautiously approached the limp
form of Neriam and quietly pulled a simple wool blanked from his backpack
to lay over the boy.  He added some more wood to the intensely burning
flame and returned to the monastery deep in thought.

	Neriam woke the next morning feeling drained and weak.  He was
surprised to see the blanked wrapped around him and the embers from the
intense fire still glowing slightly.  He rose, pulling the blanket around
him as he looked up at the sky to gauge the time.  Sighing, the boy folded
the blanket, kicked some dirt over the rest of the embers, and walked back
toward the river and the monastery.
 	Mordeth waited for him by the entrance, sitting in sieza position.
"Neriam," he called out, a big grin on his face.  "Where were you last
night?  I missed you."
	Neriam gave his best friend a weary grin before his knees buckled.
Mordeth rushed forward and picked up his little friend in his arms.  Neriam
snuggled into Mordeth's warm chest and fell asleep once more.  Mordeth
moved as quickly as he could back into the compound to ask one of the
Masters what he should do with Neriam.  As he entered, he saw Master Adane
approaching.
	"Master," he bowed awkwardly, cradling his friend to his chest.
	"Well well, Mordeth," Adane answered with a small smile.  "Taking
advantage of your friend are we?  That's your worst offense yet.  I don't
know what to say!"
	A look of shock and horror overtook Mordeth's face, and he began to
stutter.  Adane laughed.  "I was only kidding, child.  Take him to his
room.  He has earned his rest."
	"And Master," Mordeth began.
	Adane gave him a knowing look and Mordeth blushed a deep crimson.
"Yes, you may take off lessons today to stay with him.  It's irregular, but
such _brotherly_ love should be encouraged among our acolytes.  Just do not
wake him."
	Mordeth's color darkened even more, but he bowed once more and
rushed toward the dormitory.  Adane chuckled slightly and went to Mordeth's
and Neriam's instructors to inform them of the absences before entering his
chamber to meditate on last night.

	Mordeth carried Neriam upstairs to his room that he shared with
five other Students.  He gently lowered his friend down to his cot,
brushing the sandy hair back away from his head.  Neriam's skin felt cool,
dry, but somehow not right to Mordeth.  He removed Neriam's clothes and
covered him with the blanket as he rushed down to the kitchen for some warm
water.  When he returned, he dropped the wooden bucket with a crash and a
shout.  Neriam's eyes were open and blue-white light was shooting upward
from them as his body writhed in pain, his mouth open in a soundless
scream.  Mordeth ran to his friend, rubbing a comforting hand across his
chest and placing the other on his forehead.
	"Please, Neriam, calm down.  What's happened to you," Mordeth
cried.  "Oh lord Araman," he called out, "you are master of this monastery.
What has he done?  What law has he broken?"  Upon hearing no answer, seeing
no alleviation, the young man angrily yelled, "leave him alone!"
	"Mordeth," Master Adane called, rushing in.  "What is going on?  I
heard a sh-" he stopped.  "Oh no!  Neriam!"  The old teacher rushed to the
boy, feeling his pulse and running his hand across the nerve centers of the
body.  "Get some more water, Mordeth, quickly," he ordered, placing his
hand over the boy's racing heart.
	Mordeth hesitated.  "NOW," the old man barked, and the teenager
bolted.  Master Adane focused his own energy to try to relax Neriam's
muscles, but was sent backward with a jolt of blue-white light.  Mordeth
returned in time to see the old man on the floor with some wisps of smoke
rising from his startled form.  "Master, what happened," he asked quickly.
"I, I do not know," the instructor admitted, "but we must find out.  Stay
with him, and I will find our healer."
	"No, Master," Mordeth begged, "please!  He will be expunged from
the Order if he is discovered like this!"
	"I suppose you are right," Adane admitted, closing his eyes in
thought.  "Wait here and try to comfort him normally.  I will guard the
door."
	Only moments later, after Adane closed the door behind him, the
light ceased and Neriam settled back into the cot, shuddering
uncontrollably.  Mordeth placed his hand on his friend's breast, trying to
comfort him.  Neriam felt cold to the touch now, as though all his body
heat had fled with the light.  Mordeth quickly rushed to the other cots in
the room, grabbing the thin wool blankets off them and piling them on
Neriam's shivering form.  The boy would not warm up, despite Mordeth's
constant ministrations of decreasingly hot water from the bucket.
	"Come on, Neriam.  What is wrong with you?"  Neriam would not
respond.  When the water lost too much heat to be of much use, he put away
the washcloth and reclined on the cot next to his friend, pulling them
together under the covers, hoping his body heat would help keep his friend
warm.  They sat like that for several hours when Mordeth felt he could no
longer hold his eyes open.  He just wasn't used to lying abed for so long.
"Lord Araman, help him.  Please," he begged, before hugging Neriam even
closer and falling into his own worried sleep.

	Master Adane opened the door after a few hours to see if Neriam had
made any improvement.  He looked over to the cot to see a slight sheen of
sweat on Mordeth's face wrapped up under the covers holding tight to his
friend.  Neriam no longer shivered, and a slight smile was on his face.
Adane picked up Neriam's clothing from the floor next to the bed and
summoned one of the young Novices to launder the clothes and to call the
High Master to the dormitory.  The boy, one of the newer Novices named
Darin bowed and ran off.  Nearly half an hour later, High Master Teramon
arrived at Neriam's dorm.
	Master Adane explained the situation to the High Master, who looked
in to see the two youths together.  His eyebrows furrowed until Master
Adane explained what happened when he tried to use his own abilities to
block the shuddering.  He neglected to mention, however, the bright light
streaming from Neriam's eyes saying only that, "The boy's muscles were
screaming in pain, and for some reason, I could not penetrate into them to
ease them."  High Master Teramon looked surprised.  "You are one of our
strongest teachers, Adane.  What could it be?"
	"I do not know, sir," Adane replied, "although the friendship
between the two of them did more to help Neriam than anything I did.  I ask
that this room be closed until he recovers, and we allow Mordeth to remain
with him."
	"Why go that far?  If the boy seems recovered now."
	"Sir, did you notice that Neriam is not hot under all the covering
and warmth around him, though Mordeth is obviously quite discomfited?"
	"Yes," Teramon admitted slowly.
	"I think that, were we to take away those things, the boy would be
unnaturally chilled again."
	"I see.  And you blame yourself for him being out all night last
night.  Don't you?"  Adane hung his head slightly.  "My friend," Teramon
responded, "do not blame yourself.  The child will be quite fine.  Truly.
We will let them rest, and see what tomorrow brings."
	"Yes, Master.  Thank you.  If you will excuse me, I will meditate
on my own errors from last night."
	"Of course, Adane.  Do not overburden yourself with guilt.  The
child will be fine, and stronger for this ordeal."

	The Students complained under their breath and in private, but the
other five boys from Neriam's room were placed into other dormitories and
the majority slept on the floor.  Some of the slimmer ones managed to fit
two to a cot.  Around midnight, the moonlight shone through the room's only
window to form a pool of silvery light on the floor.  Mordeth awoke,
overheated and looked around the room.  -I slept longer than I thought-he
mused.  -I wonder what time it is?-
	He removed his own clothing and a few of the blankets off of him,
feeling much cooler, and settled back against Neriam to return to sleep
when a glimmer from just below his partially-closed eyes jerked him awake.
An indistinct, shimmering figure stood at the foot of their cot.  Mordeth
froze, wondering what was going on, and tried not to draw any attention to
himself.  The figure at the bed seemed a youth-perhaps in his very early
twenties, and had white blond hair, pale skin, and eyes bluer than anything
Mordeth had ever seen.  The wraith gently pulled the covers off Neriam,
incidentally exposing Mordeth as well.  Mordeth blushed and attempted to
cover himself and his friend at the same time, but the figure held up a
hand, stopping him.  Then he leaned over Neriam's prone form and touched a
ghostly hand to his feet, hands and heart.  Finally, the figure touched
Neriam's eyes, and Mordeth heard the faintest musical whisper of "The pain
will ease, child, in time," before the figure vanished into wisps of fog
and faded away.
	Mordeth pulled his eyes away from that spot and wandered down his
friend's body as he thought about what happened.  Suddenly, he jerked his
head up, realizing that he was staring at his best friend naked, and felt
uncomfortable.  He yanked the covers over them and settled back to go to
sleep, noticing before his eyes closed that Neriam pulled him closer and
smiled when he did so.  Mordeth smiled as well, and finally fell asleep.
	In their sleep, the two of them felt together and warm, although
they didn't know the other was there.  Before him, Mordeth saw many miles
before him and had a vision of himself older, more mature and wearing armor
wielding a heavy sword against a foe that scared him.  He knew only that he
would not allow himself to fail his friends.
	Neriam, however, saw flames of silver-blue and purple flooding
through him, burning him with agony such as he had never felt.  But
someone's cooling hand put out the flames, and he saw Mordeth, wearing
beautiful armor, holding him and protecting him.  He saw him and his
Mordeth along with several others, ones he didn't recognize, and all
surrounding something that frightened him, but only the love of his friends
kept him sane, and the warmth and closeness around him lulled him into a
more peaceful sleep.