Kingdom Hearts } Beating Drum Heart - Chapter 4
Word Count: 6277
Genre: General, Action
Ships?: ggg the return of Lexaeus/Nakoma
→Friendships?: mentioned Aleaus&Ienzo, Pocahontas&Nakoma
Characters: Lexaeus, Nakoma, Grandmother Willow
→Mentions: John Smith, Pocahontas, Ienzo, Kocoum, probably others I'm forgetting
Rating: PG
Spoilers: KHII - Second visit to Port Royal
Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.
Notes: *rocks back and forth* Whyyy do I ship the weirdest things ever? I'm sorry if this came out really awkward.
Takes place in that inevitable space of time before the last world where Sora & Company go on a lot of sidequests.
In which Nakoma discovers that there is more to everything than meets the eye.
Beating Drum Heart
Chapter 4: The Voice of the Mountain
Hearts break, hearts mend
Love still hurts
Visions clash, planes crash
Still there's talk of
Saving souls; still, the cold
Is closing in on us
~ "World on Fire", Sarah McLachlan
He didn’t know why he had heard something in the wind. Of course it had been the earth that was calling to him. It pounded beneath him, a solid block of colour and sound. It rested in his head like a stone in his hand, thudding against the hollow in his chest. It sounded like a drum.
There was a secondary beat here, too. It was softer, quieter and he could barely notice it. Eventually, it seemed to disappear, falling into synch with the earth beneath.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed when the wind blew by, carrying the sound of chimes in it, as though signalling the end of a session. He struggled to open his eyes, not entirely wanting to leave the trance. With a deep sigh, he succeeded.
Nakoma was kneeling not far away. He found he wasn’t entirely shocked to see her. It looked like she belonged there. The tear marks on her face were another story.
She raised her head, looking imploringly at him. “Am I crazy?” she asked.
He narrowed his eyes. The thought of mental instability had never once entered his mind around a Somebody so balanced. “You are one the sanest people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.”
She nodded quietly. She didn’t seem to believe him.
“Stand,” he said. “You can tell me when we return to the ship.”
---
“Nakoma, how long has it been since we met?” Lexaeus placed the teakettle on the fire. The sun set had set quickly on their way back to the clearing. Everything beyond the warm circle of light was quickly overtaken by the navy blue cowl of midnight. She sat like she had on the night they first met, hugging her knees to her chest.
“Hmm. I think the moon has gone her course at least once since you’ve gone. Why?”
“One moon?” Lexaeus looked up to the sky. The white crescent curved over the trees to his left. “It seems like a lot longer.”
“Are you making tea?” Nakoma asked, leaning forward a little. “The people down by the salt water drink that too.”
“The salt water?” He sat across from her, folding his legs. “There are people other than you living here?”
She nodded. “After John Smith and his people returned to their home, some of their people came back and settled here. Pocahontas makes sure we get along with them, but the warriors aren’t so sure.” Nakoma smiled into the fire. “I like them. Some of my people think that they are too different from us. They are, I guess, but they’re very nice people all the same.”
“Nakoma, I’m sorry to interrupt, but - what are you doing out here? What answers are you looking for this time?”
“Well…” She laced her fingers together. “It’s sort of a roundabout vision quest. I’ve been having really vivid dreams lately, and I’ve been trying to find out what they mean. But now I’m not sure which are visions from the quest and which are dreams.”
He tilted his head towards her. “Dreams are why someone called you crazy?”
She shook her head hastily. “No, that was stupid for me to say. No one called me crazy. I was just - scared.”
Lexaeus frowned, drawing himself up. He remembered how close this world was to the darkness. “Why are you scared?”
She took in his face, hesitant to speak, but still trusting. A twig in the fire snapped. “Lexaeus…”
Then she laughed. She shook her head and grinned into her kneecaps. “Don’t take me so seriously! I’m just trying to become more in touch with the spirits. The dreams will probably pass soon.”
“How many vision quests have you been out here looking since I last saw you?” He said falteringly. “If you need to fast each time, then-”
“I’m eating fine,” she interrupted quietly. The fire burned in her small eyes. She laughed once. “If I didn’t know any better I’d say you were worried about me.”
He drew himself up to his full height now, looking down on her. “So what if I am?”
Nakoma’s eyes widened, and she cringed just slightly, looking away. “I’m sorry. That was…disrespectful. Of course, you probably already knew all that.”
Already knew…? Cold flashed through him. When exactly had he remembered the fact that he was a ‘spirit’ here? He told himself that it had definitely been some point before now.
“It’s just… you make me forget, sometimes,” she was saying. He looked across the fire at her. She turned back to him gradually, still guarded against the possibility of his anger.
“Forget what?” He lowered his voice to her level without realizing.
“That you’re a spirit. I didn’t tell you that last time we met, did I?”
He watched her as the teakettle finally started whistling. She only rested her chin on her lower arm. They exchanged smiles.
---
“So what exactly are these dreams like?”
Nakoma lead the way as they trekked down the hill side. The sun was a bright green-blue through the canopy of trees.
“They’re… kind of all over the place. They’re exciting, but something about them scares me. The first night I was a rabbit. The second night,” she frowned over her shoulder, “I was a skunk.”
“You were a rabbit?” Lexaeus asked. His boots skidded on a patch of mud. Nakoma hadn’t faltered when she had passed over it a couple of paces ahead of him. “Are you sure it wasn’t a dream with a rabbit in it?”
“No, I was a rabbit. I’m sure of it. I’ve never been able to run that fast, even in my dreams. And you know what the strange thing is? My friend, Pocahontas - she’s always had more vivid dreams than me. But she’s never become something. She’s the one who kept telling me to come out here looking.”
“Well, maybe your dreams have just been waiting to become vivid. Maybe something has triggered them.” He had to duck under a tree branch for the fifth time.
“Hm.” Her head tilted and she stared at the forest floor. “That’s the part that scares me. I’m always running away from something. But I don’t know where I’m going either.”
“Perhaps you’ll find out when we get to wherever it is we’re going. And hopefully I’ll find out what those chimes in the wind were. Or that drum in the ground.”
“You heard them too? Pocahontas calls it the Voice of the Wind, but she’s never heard a drum before. And I told you, we’re going to see a spirit. An old spirit, who can help both of us find out what’s going on.”
Lexaeus looked up towards the broken pieces of sky he could see through the branches above him. The sun was still high in the sky. “I certainly hope so.”
“You hope? You fly between worlds in a giant… squishy ship. Rocks jump out of the ground when you want them to. What is it that you need help with?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I’ve gotten out of touch with the earth. Or maybe I’ve gotten into touch with this one. And I thought we mentioned this last time,” he suddenly found himself watching her hair sway in that odd up-do, “but aren’t we friends? You don’t need to treat me as a spirit at all times.”
“Right. I’m sorry, but it’s a little strange for me. Friends with a spirit?”
“This other spirit we’re going to now - Grandmother Willow, wasn’t it? She’s your friend, isn’t she?” How did she keep her hair up? Was that an elastic or a hair ribbon? They didn’t have elastics here yet, did they?
“Well, I guess. But she’s really more of an eld-aaugh!” Nakoma’s hand swatted at his hand as he pulled the short stretch of leather ribbon out of her hair. She turned on him, her eyes wide and her hand curling into the hair at the back of her head. Most of it was loose now, sweeping down onto her shoulders.
“Hm. So that’s how that works,” Lexaeus said.
“You… ngh.” Nakoma gnashed her teeth. “You could’ve just asked!”
She made a leap for the hair ribbon in his hand, the rest of her hair spilling down out of her grip. His arm pulled up, far beyond her reach, like a knee-jerk reaction he’d never been tested for.
She sighed at him before starting to pace around him in a circle. “And I thought I was finished with games like this. Thank goodness you’re so short.”
“Your hair is longer than I thought it was,” he replied, watching her until she went into his blind spot. “You’re more sarcastic, too.”
“I guess I’m full of surprises?”
“Ye-aaugh!” Lexaeus stumbled as Nakoma jumped onto his back. He could feel her feet tracking mud down his leather back and her hands gripping at his shoulders. “What in the world-” she kneed him in the lower back and he nearly face planted.
“Climbing you,” she answered his unfinished question. “It’d be easier if you didn’t move.”
He straightened up, and the back of his head nearly collided with her face. He tried to figure out how in the world she was hanging on, but was unable to. “It is absolutely ridiculous how humiliating this.”
“Got it!” She threw herself over one of his shoulders, succeeding in grabbing the ribbon from his hand. The shift in weight forced him forward, off the beaten path and down a particularly muddy slope.
He tried to stop, but the forward momentum was carrying his legs down and faster in a terrible wheel. He hated the feeling, his knees and legs moving like pistons that he couldn’t control. Nakoma was trying to get a good grip and squeaking and ducking to avoid branches on his back. The feeling of her fingers flashing through his hair wasn’t helping. He winked one eye shut to avoid a twig from somewhere, as she elbowed him in the back of the head somehow. When he opened both eyes, he nearly collided with a tree.
The earth gave under his feet, swerving him out of the way. Suddenly, the wind was whipping past him, and his legs weren’t raising and falling. Nakoma seemed to realize what was happening at the same time he did, because she started laughing, readjusting herself. Her arms wrapped around his neck and her legs somewhere around his ribcage.
He was riding his own mudslide down the hill.
He suddenly understood what Vexen had meant when he said he ‘just knew’ how to skim the surface of the snow on his shield in the high mountains. Or what it was like for Xaldin to fly. All he had to do was shift his weight onto one leg, and the earth would take him that way, past those trees and that rock. A hair ribbon whipped past his ear, its owner quiet and content on his back.
He pulled to a stop at a rocky ledge, the stones lifting up to stop his feet short. His head was pulled back as Nakoma hung on only from around his neck, but the she dropped to the ground. He turned around and she was tying her hair back again.
“Now that we’re done that little detour, do you think we could maybe get back to the path?” She walked off, completely sure of where she was going even after all that.
“Hm. Pity. I think I liked it down.”
She stopped in her tracks and gave him the least amused look she could. She walked backwards until she was standing next to him.
“On second thought, I’ll just lead from back here,” she said, giving him a wary glare. She was about to step forward, but her knees folded and she sat slowly, balancing on her toes.
“Nakoma?” he asked. He crouched next to her. She looked just as confused about the sudden change as he did. She rubbed her arms as though chilled. “Are you hurt?”
“No, it’s-” She rocked back and forth, mouthing out words. “I feel something. Something… bad.”
There was a quiet snort in the woods. Gold eyes glinted in the shadows. Lexaeus stood.
“Oh, damn it,” he said.
This time he was ready for the deer Heartless, caught its antlers in his grip before it was able to catch him in the stomach. It pushed against him, putting all its weight into its charge, but Lexaeus didn’t budge.
“Behind you!” Nakoma said, somewhere beyond the circle of battle. Before thinking it through, he turned, starting with his left foot, letting the rest of his body follow. He threw the first Heartless into its charging partner with such a force that both dissolved into black dust.
“It’s over now,” he said, looking over at her. She shook her head in reply, covering the crown of her head with her hands.
“No. Above.”
The earth was an extension of his arm, he thought, he knew, and that was all it took for the tomahawk to come to his hand. He raised it to block the Heartless shaped like an eagle that nearly dive-bombed his head. It collided with the steel, flapping helplessly. He reached out and grabbed it by the neck, before tossing it into a tree trunk. It dissipated into the soil.
Nakoma was still crouched in the grass where she had been, but she had stopped rocking back and forth. She looked up at him as he approached, as though he was coming at her out of mist behind her eyes. He crouched down in front of her again, dismissing his tomahawk as he did. “Nakoma. Can you stand?”
She nodded. “Yes. I don’t what came over me.” She stood up, but reached out to touch his arm for support. “It felt like something from my dreams.”
“Then we should keep going. And we should do it quickly.”
---
Nakoma parted the curtain of vines, peering up at the late evening sky through the branches. “How long have we been walking?”
“Long enough?” Lexaeus guessed.
The woman shrugged and smiled. “Probably. We’re here, anyway.”
The wind rustled through the willow’s vines loudly. Or at least, that’s what made the most sense. The vines didn’t sway, but what else could he be hearing? Nakoma was ahead of him, climbing carefully over tree roots that disappeared into a deep blue pond. “I’m here, Grandmother Willow,” she was saying. She was the only one speaking.
“Did you hear something?” he asked. He took off his gloves and dismissed them from him, like he had his weapon earlier. It felt odd wearing so much black in this place. He had no idea why.
She climbed up onto a piece of the trunk cut off like a large stump. She kneeled in the middle of it and smirked enigmatically. “I don’t know. Did you?”
He stood behind the stump, and leaned his arms against its surface. Nakoma was looking up at a knoll on the trunk, shadowed by the setting sun. “Did I?” he asked her.
Her lips quirked. “Listen again.”
He looked up and around. Silence. He did notice that the upper branches of the tree held all manner of animals, watching the two of them patiently. He had a feeling something was supposed to happen, either now or very soon.
He was looking at a bluebird when he heard it again: snatches of words. There was a quiet voice somewhere around this tree, and it wasn’t his and it wasn’t Nakoma’s. He tuned into it.
An old woman’s voice. It didn’t seem to be coming from any one direction, but from all around them. He couldn’t understand the words, but… it went right through him - a feeling of unfeasible familiarity.
The knoll changed into a face.
Lexaeus leaned back, unfolding his arms. Nakoma seemed satisfied, patting the wood next to her. He climbed up next to her, sitting cross-legged. The face in the tree smiled. It was an old woman’s face, wise and true. The bark surrounding her face looked like long green hair. “Hello, Spirit-With-No-Drum.”
Lexaeus’s insides had another flash-freeze. “No drum?” Nakoma asked beside him.
“A thing between spirits, dear. Are you going to introduce me to your charming friend?”
Nakoma shifted slightly as some of the animals crawled down from the branches and came to sit on the stump next to them. She ran her fingers absentmindedly through the fur of a rabbit’s. “Lexaeus, this is Grandmother Willow. Grandmother Willow, this is Lexaeus.”
“The spirit who helped you on your first vision quest. I see, I see.” She nodded, and the trunk moved with her. It was absolutely fascinating. “Well? Have you nothing to say, Lexaeus?”
“Uh…” He wasn’t used to being caught off guard. “It’s an honour to meet you.”
“He and I need your help, Grandmother Willow,” Nakoma stepped in.
“Hmm.” The tree spirit nodded, the trunk creaking quietly. “I’ve heard. All the forest has been telling me of your wanderings. And I’ll speak to you about that in a moment. But what is it that you need, Brother Spirit?”
Lexaeus thought, recovering from his shock. How to word this? “I’m not entirely sure if this is correct, but I believe something on your world is calling to me. Something that stays with me even after I’ve left.”
“Hm. I’m afraid you’ve come a long way in order for me to tell you something you probably already know,” she said softly. “Nobody ever knows exactly why some spirits are pulled towards certain worlds. Perhaps you were born here in a past life?”
Lexaeus chuckled. “I somehow doubt that.” He cast a glance over his shoulder, where Grandmother Willow’s branches spread out over her pond. “I would’ve liked to, though.”
“Have you thought about the idea that it might be Mother Earth calling to you?”
Mother Earth… The Heart of the World would be more accurate. He shook his head slowly. “Possible. But like you said, nobody knows for sure.”
Nakoma laughed at him. “Now the tables are turned, aren’t they? You’re the one asking all the questions, and getting answers you already know.”
“Ha.” He looked at her, brow furrowed, smiling. “I guess so.”
“And what about you, child? Why haven’t you come to see me sooner?” Grandmother Willow asked.
Nakoma’s smile faded and she rocked from knee to knee. “I was trying to figure it out myself, Grandmother Willow.”
The spirit made a sound like wooden rhythm blocks, and then Lexaeus realized she was clicking her tongue. “You’ve always kept things bottled up, Nakoma,” she said sternly.
Nakoma flushed and looked at the pattern of rings in the stump. “I know.”
“Well, tell me what you’ve found out so far.” If she was human, Lexaeus could imagine the spirit sitting down and getting comfortable. The whole tree seemed to sigh. “You’ve been having dreams, haven’t you?”
Nakoma nodded. “In all my dreams, I never seem to be able to see where I’m going. All I know is… is what I feel. I know the forest is dark and cool, so I know it’s night-time.” Nakoma started counting out on her fingers. “I know the feel of the ground beneath my feet. And I know I’m not me anymore because I can feel that I’m a rabbit or - a coyote. And sometimes I’m even an owl, but I still can’t see what’s in front of me. Or what I’m running away from.
“I asked Pocahontas about it, because I know she’s been able to call spirits to her aide before, and she told me to come out here. How is she, by the way? Have you seen her?”
Grandmother Willow chuckled deeply. “Oh, she’s doing much better. She’s actually come out here asking about you. She wanted to go out looking for you, but I told her to wait. I told her you’d come back with news.”
“And what news am I bringing back?” she asked. Lexaeus could hear her nervousness mix with anticipation.
“It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a very long time. Now, how long have you and Pocahontas known each other, Nakoma?”
“Oh.” Nakoma looked at the rabbit that had climbed up into her lap. “As long as I can remember, I suppose.”
The tree spirit smiled widely. “That’s what I thought. Let me tell you a story.”
The animals and birds in the branches reacted instantly, all twittering and fluttering about. Lexaeus nearly clubbed a cardinal out of the air when it started circling his head in wide circles.
“Quiet!” Grandmother Willow shouted. “Quiet!”
All the animals and Nakoma flinched. Lexaeus observed this all, spellbound. “Huh,” he said, smiling widely.
The tree spirit gave him a pointed glance. He cleared his throat. Nakoma laughed.
“Now, as I was saying…
“A long time ago, a farmer planted two seeds in his field. He kept them far away from the shade at the edges of his field, and he felt sure that both would grow tall and strong in the sunlight.
“Despite his best efforts, only one seed grew. It grew taller and taller until it could see everything. It could see past her farmer’s field and into the whole village.
“One day, the farmer asked the plant, ‘Why won’t your sister grow? I have given her water, she has plenty of food. But she doesn’t want to come up and see the sun. Is something the matter?’
“The plant replied, ‘My sister does grow, and she does want to see the sun. But she needs something to pull her up from the soil. And once she does, she will be able to see as far as I can.’
“The farmer thought on this for many days. He decided that he would move the other seed. With the shaman’s advice and help, they moved the smaller seed closer to the shade of the forest.
“The farmer watched in amazement as the seed grew faster in the gloom. Her sister had been right: the seed had been growing underneath the ground and simply needed the shadows of the forest to start her climb. In a couple of short days, the two plants stood tall in the field, and were able to see the whole village.”
The story ended, and there was quiet beneath the willow branches. ‘The shade of the forest.’ Lexaeus realized slowly that he didn’t like where this was going at all.
“So, Pocahontas is the seed in the sun. I’m the seed in the shade.” Nakoma didn’t sound excited or nervous now - just solemn and pensive. “What shade? Where is it coming from?”
“I don’t know child, but I feel it in my roots. What ever happened with that black elk you mentioned last time?” The tree spirit looked around as if daring one to appear.
“Lexaeus and I did come across more of those creatures on our way here,” Nakoma pointed out.
He nodded. “There was a new one shaped like an eagle.”
Grandmother Willow thought for a long time. “Then those creatures must be the thing that’s drawing your link to the spirits out, Nakoma. But I don’t think your link is quite the same as Pocahontas’s. She sees the things in her dreams. You said that you can feel what’s happening more clearly?”
“That’s right.”
“Then we’ll have a lot to talk about. You should get to sleep, child.”
Nakoma’s mouth dropped open. “But… the sun only set a couple of hours ago. Shouldn’t we-”
“You need to sleep, child. Especially considering all the growing the second seed did in so few days.”
The woman sighed quietly and stood, following a ridge in the bark to their right. From there she started climbing up the trunk quickly and efficiently, until settling on a high branch. “Good night, Grandmother Willow. Good night, Lexaeus.”
“Good night, child.” Lexaeus looked on in fascination as Nakoma curled up against the trunk to prepare to drift into sleep. “And you, Spirit-With-No-Drum.”
He looked back to the great tree spirit. She looked deathly serious. “We’re going to need to talk, young man.”
---
Days past. The shadows got longer, Nakoma continued to dream, and Lexaeus taught her how to meditate the way he had been meditating: how to open up your chest like a door and let everything flow through you.
The tree spirit kept a close eye on him. She knew that he had no heart, no ‘drum’. She probably suspected the same thing he did. If he were to follow protocols, he’d allow this world to crumble and try to figure out how to hotwire a Nobody into the system of hearts and connections. It was something the Organization had allowed to happen countless times before. And would continue to do.
Nakoma, they learned, had a link to the spirits similar to the ancient shape shifters, the shamans who were able to turn into animals in the legends. But Grandmother Willow explained that it wasn’t their bodies that had changed, but their minds - their souls, perhaps. When a shaman became an eagle, he gained the divinity and sight of an eagle, not the body of one.
Nakoma channelled the spirits of the forest most easily when she dreamed. On nights when she remained still in sleep, they figured she channelled the spirit of a rock or a tree. But most nights, she sleepwalked. Grandmother Willow said that one of her owls had seen Nakoma sleepwalk for many nights before he had arrived and had kept her out of trouble.
But she was getting better at channelling when she was awake too, thanks to his lessons of opening her heart to all the spirits around her. Unfortunately, he deadpanned, she seemed to be a little too open, as one day she went about the forest inexplicably smelling like a skunk. He tried to find some extrinsic explanation to it, but had rocks thrown very precisely at his head before he could. Then his specimen would leave to another part of the forest to meditate.
Despite her day-long hiatus, she stayed close to him. He was… glad. He found it easier to tap into the drum beat beneath the earth with her around. It made the blood pump through his own idle veins to hear what might’ve been the Heart of the World beating far below him, keeping the lifeblood of the little blue-green-brown planet moving.
And yet something twisted uncomfortably in him when he thought he noticed the heart palpitating faster as the days past. The World was preparing itself for battle. If only the rest of its inhabitants might do the same. It was Nakoma that kept this thought far away from him.
He liked how she managed to work sarcastic jabs into the day, even if neither of them spoke very often. They spent hours alternating between going into trances and walking beneath the green shadows of the trees. He gave her vague stories of his own world, tales of Xigbar and Saïx without names. She never asked for names, and she never gave them in her own tales. She shoved him in the elbow when he said something that made her laugh because she couldn’t reach his shoulder.
On the fifth day, Nakoma confided something in him, probably because she could feel scraps of his death experience. She knew for sure now that he was a spirit, and that he couldn’t tell any other human.
She told him of the night that had started to unravel Pocahontas from John Smith, the man she loved and now grieved for. She told him about the princess running out to meet him under Grandmother Willow’s own branches, how she had sent the brave warrior named Kocoum out after her in concern of her safety. And how somewhere deep inside, Nakoma had guilt in her that she refused to burden anyone with. Guilt that was burrowing deeper into her heart.
After that, it became slightly easier to decipher the words she sometimes murmured in her sleep, up in the willow branches.
On the sixth night, as he followed Nakoma as she sleep-walked, he came to an interesting conclusion.
Why not let her wallow in her guilt? Why not he let her heart collapse into the oncoming darkness? Her heart was strong - very strong. She would make a good Dusk. And good Dusks could become other Nobodies. She could be a good Geomancer. A good Lam.
It was an incredibly intriguing possibility. Her shoulder bumped into a tree up ahead. She moved out of the way and kept walking.
The day came and past. On the seventh sunrise, he found her asleep in a clearing, sitting cross-legged. Lexaeus touched the crown of her head on his way to the other end of the clearing. She woke up.
She looked around and then back to him as he settled opposite her, in the same position. “I sleepwalked again, didn’t I?”
“No, of course you didn’t,” he replied.
She snorted at him. “Ooh, sarcasm. Any idea what I might’ve been dreaming about?”
Lexaeus shook his head. “I just found you now. You don’t remember?”
“Not at the moment. Maybe I should try and find out.” Her hands folded in her lap and she closed her eyes. He could almost hear her think the mantra out loud: Open your chest, open your heart.
Lexaeus wasn’t as flashy about summoning heartless as say, Saïx or Luxord might be. They liked to snap their fingers and get instant results. Lexaeus summoned one Shadow by calling out with his mind.
Her heart had already been needlessly darkened by guilt. All she needed was a push.
He felt oddly detached from the entire scene as the Shadow melted into the grass and climbed over her legs and up to her chest and disappeared inside. Nakoma gasped for air, her eyes shooting open. She clutched at her chest with one hand and ripped weakly at the grass with her other. She heaved and her eyes flashed yellow.
He stood and approached her almost relaxedly. She had been a great help to him on his first visit here. He was almost positive she would be a great Lam, he thought as he stood over her. Normally this took longer, but she was apparently putting up a good internal struggle.
She reached up and clutched at his hand. “Lexaeus… Help me.”
Something wound up his arm and settled in the hollow of his chest. It was warm and light and all his thoughts halted. Maybe it was something to do with her affinity to the spirits. Maybe it was something else entirely.
This was wrong.
Traitor, traitor, traitor. You’ve entangled yourself too deeply here. Sever your ties to her. You’ve made your decision, you can’t go back.
He wasn’t sure what part of him was speaking, but he ignored it. His bare fingers closed around hers and he crouched down beside her. “Nakoma. Channel me.”
The dark brown in her eyes fought against the yellow, and her trembling body leaned against him. She gritted her teeth and something inside him left, called outside himself into her.
Her breathing steadied but parts of her eyes smouldered dull gold. She still leaned against him but her feet kicked against the forest floor, trying to stand up. He stood, carrying her up with him. She cupped her temple in her hand and closed her eyes.
Her shadow leaked out into the grass. It looked like a malformed rabbit - caught between the Shadow that had attacked her and pieces of her own heart’s darkness. It attempted to hop away with a twisted back leg when Nakoma surprised him by striding away from the support of his arm. She moved surely towards it and it twitched frantically.
Nakoma crushed it under her foot. Lexaeus felt vibrations through the soles of his boots.
She turned to him. “Spirit magic is kind of messed up.”
“You can say that again.” She stumbled back towards the steady hold of his arm. “Are you alright?”
She nodded into his elbow. “You have a spirit like a bear.”
“Nakoma, look at me.” He had to force her chin up with his hand. The aching inside his ribcage lessened when he saw the dark brown of her eyes. “Are you alright?”
She nodded up at him, eyes half-lidded. “It’s like it was your fault, you know. We were both meditating right?”
He felt his shoulders fall. He commanded his fingers to leave her face. She tilted her head. “Lexaeus?”
He looked away. Chimes blew in the wind. She didn’t move away from him, but turned her head sharply towards the brush at edge of the clearing.
“Kocoum had a spirit like yours, I think. Like a bear.” Nakoma walked towards the edge of the clearing. Her eyes shone strangely.
“Nakoma.” She only stared back at him quietly. She was sorting out what had happened and he need to delay that. “What are you feeling?” He followed after her.
“He wants us to follow him. It’s important.”
---
They were climbing. The trees had started thinning ten minutes ago and now they were surrounded by slate blue rock. Nakoma followed the spirit he couldn’t see up and up, and he followed after her.
In a lot of ways, it was like the walk a week ago. He could reach out and take her hair ribbon again. But…
What was it that had stopped him? It wasn’t remorse he was feeling - he couldn’t feel anything at all. He had lost his opportunity to create a wonderful Geomancer, a powerful Heartless. Nakoma had freed herself of her guilt, and it was his own fault.
Yet there was some string of logic that told him that it wasn’t a fault. That helping her protect herself was something so indescribable that he could never dream of fully understanding it.
He struggled with the idea of not knowing. Especially when it came to her.
“Lexaeus?” she said. He lifted his head and saw they had come to a cliff, over which the forest stretched out before them until meeting the horizon. The pale blue sea dominated the world to their right. Her fingers were tangled up in each other. She hadn’t been nervous around him for a while now.
No. She was nervous for him. He wondered why.
“You seem…” She couldn’t say exactly say ‘quiet’. They both smiled as they realized this.
“I’m fine, Nakoma.”
They looked out to the sea, away from each other. They both seemed to shiver.
“Nakoma. Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”
She nodded. “Clouds. Strange clouds.”
A gust of wind blew past them, bringing the black storm clouds closer to the settler’s village by the saltwater. “It looks like the ship that John Smith came here on.”
“Ship?” he asked. He was careful not to go to close to the ledge, but he had to peer closer. There was a ship amidst the storm front, tall masts and giant white sails. There was something eerie about that sight by itself, but what really disturbed him was that the clouds showed no signs of violence - no lightning danced up in the sky.
“Nakoma, how was it that John Smith was injured again?”
“He was shot by a man when he saved Chief Powhatan’s life. A man wearing black armour.”
“Did he have darkness in his heart?”
“Yes, the soldiers said that he was a very greedy man. That ship… You don’t think it’s…”
“What do you think? The darkness.” He turned to head back down the mountain. He wasn’t entirely sure where he was going. Away.
“Hey, wait! We can’t just walk away from this. We have to do something.” She caught up easily; her bare feet prevented her from slipping down the cliffside. She cut him off and glared up at him. The top of her head came up to the bottom of his ribcage.
“Correction: you have to do something, Nakoma. I do not belong here.” He pushed her aside (gently) and continued walking.
She didn’t start moving after him for a long time. He almost prayed that she would follow, but a stubbornness in him refused to stop and wait. Her voice was hushed. “I talked to Grandmother Willow about you. You’re like a puzzle in reverse.”
Flashes of Ienzo and wrapping paper and five-thousand pieces in a box. He was still walking.
“Usually, a puzzle’s something simple made up of a lot of little detailed things once you break it down. But you’re different.
“At first you were this spirit I couldn’t ever understand. And now you’re just pieces.”
His feet bonded to the earth. His element seemed to be controlling him now. The trees were thicker here. He was off the mountain.
“You’re simple now. You’re just like me. We’re made of the same pieces.”
Silence beat heavy on his ear drums, on his rib cage, on his knee caps and shoulder blades. He was so caught up in it that he nearly didn’t realize that she had come to stand beside him.
“When I channel, I think I take a puzzle piece away with me. I know you want to help me, but you feel you can’t.”
“I can’t feel,” he said before he could stop. It was a knee-jerk reaction, like pulling your arm away when someone goes to grab at something you stole.
She smiled up at him, not understanding. “Do what you feel is right, Lexaeus.”
And he looked down at her in the forest as the sun finished rising. And impossibly he said, “We need to move quickly.”
Chapter 3 ← Chapter 4 → Chapter 5
Chapter Listing
Genre: General, Action
Ships?: ggg the return of Lexaeus/Nakoma
→Friendships?: mentioned Aleaus&Ienzo, Pocahontas&Nakoma
Characters: Lexaeus, Nakoma, Grandmother Willow
→Mentions: John Smith, Pocahontas, Ienzo, Kocoum, probably others I'm forgetting
Rating: PG
Spoilers: KHII - Second visit to Port Royal
Disclaimer: I do not own Kingdom Hearts or any related characters. This was written out of enjoyment of the series, and no profit is being made.
Notes: *rocks back and forth* Whyyy do I ship the weirdest things ever? I'm sorry if this came out really awkward.
Takes place in that inevitable space of time before the last world where Sora & Company go on a lot of sidequests.
In which Nakoma discovers that there is more to everything than meets the eye.
Beating Drum Heart
Chapter 4: The Voice of the Mountain
Hearts break, hearts mend
Love still hurts
Visions clash, planes crash
Still there's talk of
Saving souls; still, the cold
Is closing in on us
~ "World on Fire", Sarah McLachlan
He didn’t know why he had heard something in the wind. Of course it had been the earth that was calling to him. It pounded beneath him, a solid block of colour and sound. It rested in his head like a stone in his hand, thudding against the hollow in his chest. It sounded like a drum.
There was a secondary beat here, too. It was softer, quieter and he could barely notice it. Eventually, it seemed to disappear, falling into synch with the earth beneath.
He wasn’t sure how much time passed when the wind blew by, carrying the sound of chimes in it, as though signalling the end of a session. He struggled to open his eyes, not entirely wanting to leave the trance. With a deep sigh, he succeeded.
Nakoma was kneeling not far away. He found he wasn’t entirely shocked to see her. It looked like she belonged there. The tear marks on her face were another story.
She raised her head, looking imploringly at him. “Am I crazy?” she asked.
He narrowed his eyes. The thought of mental instability had never once entered his mind around a Somebody so balanced. “You are one the sanest people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting.”
She nodded quietly. She didn’t seem to believe him.
“Stand,” he said. “You can tell me when we return to the ship.”
---
“Nakoma, how long has it been since we met?” Lexaeus placed the teakettle on the fire. The sun set had set quickly on their way back to the clearing. Everything beyond the warm circle of light was quickly overtaken by the navy blue cowl of midnight. She sat like she had on the night they first met, hugging her knees to her chest.
“Hmm. I think the moon has gone her course at least once since you’ve gone. Why?”
“One moon?” Lexaeus looked up to the sky. The white crescent curved over the trees to his left. “It seems like a lot longer.”
“Are you making tea?” Nakoma asked, leaning forward a little. “The people down by the salt water drink that too.”
“The salt water?” He sat across from her, folding his legs. “There are people other than you living here?”
She nodded. “After John Smith and his people returned to their home, some of their people came back and settled here. Pocahontas makes sure we get along with them, but the warriors aren’t so sure.” Nakoma smiled into the fire. “I like them. Some of my people think that they are too different from us. They are, I guess, but they’re very nice people all the same.”
“Nakoma, I’m sorry to interrupt, but - what are you doing out here? What answers are you looking for this time?”
“Well…” She laced her fingers together. “It’s sort of a roundabout vision quest. I’ve been having really vivid dreams lately, and I’ve been trying to find out what they mean. But now I’m not sure which are visions from the quest and which are dreams.”
He tilted his head towards her. “Dreams are why someone called you crazy?”
She shook her head hastily. “No, that was stupid for me to say. No one called me crazy. I was just - scared.”
Lexaeus frowned, drawing himself up. He remembered how close this world was to the darkness. “Why are you scared?”
She took in his face, hesitant to speak, but still trusting. A twig in the fire snapped. “Lexaeus…”
Then she laughed. She shook her head and grinned into her kneecaps. “Don’t take me so seriously! I’m just trying to become more in touch with the spirits. The dreams will probably pass soon.”
“How many vision quests have you been out here looking since I last saw you?” He said falteringly. “If you need to fast each time, then-”
“I’m eating fine,” she interrupted quietly. The fire burned in her small eyes. She laughed once. “If I didn’t know any better I’d say you were worried about me.”
He drew himself up to his full height now, looking down on her. “So what if I am?”
Nakoma’s eyes widened, and she cringed just slightly, looking away. “I’m sorry. That was…disrespectful. Of course, you probably already knew all that.”
Already knew…? Cold flashed through him. When exactly had he remembered the fact that he was a ‘spirit’ here? He told himself that it had definitely been some point before now.
“It’s just… you make me forget, sometimes,” she was saying. He looked across the fire at her. She turned back to him gradually, still guarded against the possibility of his anger.
“Forget what?” He lowered his voice to her level without realizing.
“That you’re a spirit. I didn’t tell you that last time we met, did I?”
He watched her as the teakettle finally started whistling. She only rested her chin on her lower arm. They exchanged smiles.
---
“So what exactly are these dreams like?”
Nakoma lead the way as they trekked down the hill side. The sun was a bright green-blue through the canopy of trees.
“They’re… kind of all over the place. They’re exciting, but something about them scares me. The first night I was a rabbit. The second night,” she frowned over her shoulder, “I was a skunk.”
“You were a rabbit?” Lexaeus asked. His boots skidded on a patch of mud. Nakoma hadn’t faltered when she had passed over it a couple of paces ahead of him. “Are you sure it wasn’t a dream with a rabbit in it?”
“No, I was a rabbit. I’m sure of it. I’ve never been able to run that fast, even in my dreams. And you know what the strange thing is? My friend, Pocahontas - she’s always had more vivid dreams than me. But she’s never become something. She’s the one who kept telling me to come out here looking.”
“Well, maybe your dreams have just been waiting to become vivid. Maybe something has triggered them.” He had to duck under a tree branch for the fifth time.
“Hm.” Her head tilted and she stared at the forest floor. “That’s the part that scares me. I’m always running away from something. But I don’t know where I’m going either.”
“Perhaps you’ll find out when we get to wherever it is we’re going. And hopefully I’ll find out what those chimes in the wind were. Or that drum in the ground.”
“You heard them too? Pocahontas calls it the Voice of the Wind, but she’s never heard a drum before. And I told you, we’re going to see a spirit. An old spirit, who can help both of us find out what’s going on.”
Lexaeus looked up towards the broken pieces of sky he could see through the branches above him. The sun was still high in the sky. “I certainly hope so.”
“You hope? You fly between worlds in a giant… squishy ship. Rocks jump out of the ground when you want them to. What is it that you need help with?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe I’ve gotten out of touch with the earth. Or maybe I’ve gotten into touch with this one. And I thought we mentioned this last time,” he suddenly found himself watching her hair sway in that odd up-do, “but aren’t we friends? You don’t need to treat me as a spirit at all times.”
“Right. I’m sorry, but it’s a little strange for me. Friends with a spirit?”
“This other spirit we’re going to now - Grandmother Willow, wasn’t it? She’s your friend, isn’t she?” How did she keep her hair up? Was that an elastic or a hair ribbon? They didn’t have elastics here yet, did they?
“Well, I guess. But she’s really more of an eld-aaugh!” Nakoma’s hand swatted at his hand as he pulled the short stretch of leather ribbon out of her hair. She turned on him, her eyes wide and her hand curling into the hair at the back of her head. Most of it was loose now, sweeping down onto her shoulders.
“Hm. So that’s how that works,” Lexaeus said.
“You… ngh.” Nakoma gnashed her teeth. “You could’ve just asked!”
She made a leap for the hair ribbon in his hand, the rest of her hair spilling down out of her grip. His arm pulled up, far beyond her reach, like a knee-jerk reaction he’d never been tested for.
She sighed at him before starting to pace around him in a circle. “And I thought I was finished with games like this. Thank goodness you’re so short.”
“Your hair is longer than I thought it was,” he replied, watching her until she went into his blind spot. “You’re more sarcastic, too.”
“I guess I’m full of surprises?”
“Ye-aaugh!” Lexaeus stumbled as Nakoma jumped onto his back. He could feel her feet tracking mud down his leather back and her hands gripping at his shoulders. “What in the world-” she kneed him in the lower back and he nearly face planted.
“Climbing you,” she answered his unfinished question. “It’d be easier if you didn’t move.”
He straightened up, and the back of his head nearly collided with her face. He tried to figure out how in the world she was hanging on, but was unable to. “It is absolutely ridiculous how humiliating this.”
“Got it!” She threw herself over one of his shoulders, succeeding in grabbing the ribbon from his hand. The shift in weight forced him forward, off the beaten path and down a particularly muddy slope.
He tried to stop, but the forward momentum was carrying his legs down and faster in a terrible wheel. He hated the feeling, his knees and legs moving like pistons that he couldn’t control. Nakoma was trying to get a good grip and squeaking and ducking to avoid branches on his back. The feeling of her fingers flashing through his hair wasn’t helping. He winked one eye shut to avoid a twig from somewhere, as she elbowed him in the back of the head somehow. When he opened both eyes, he nearly collided with a tree.
The earth gave under his feet, swerving him out of the way. Suddenly, the wind was whipping past him, and his legs weren’t raising and falling. Nakoma seemed to realize what was happening at the same time he did, because she started laughing, readjusting herself. Her arms wrapped around his neck and her legs somewhere around his ribcage.
He was riding his own mudslide down the hill.
He suddenly understood what Vexen had meant when he said he ‘just knew’ how to skim the surface of the snow on his shield in the high mountains. Or what it was like for Xaldin to fly. All he had to do was shift his weight onto one leg, and the earth would take him that way, past those trees and that rock. A hair ribbon whipped past his ear, its owner quiet and content on his back.
He pulled to a stop at a rocky ledge, the stones lifting up to stop his feet short. His head was pulled back as Nakoma hung on only from around his neck, but the she dropped to the ground. He turned around and she was tying her hair back again.
“Now that we’re done that little detour, do you think we could maybe get back to the path?” She walked off, completely sure of where she was going even after all that.
“Hm. Pity. I think I liked it down.”
She stopped in her tracks and gave him the least amused look she could. She walked backwards until she was standing next to him.
“On second thought, I’ll just lead from back here,” she said, giving him a wary glare. She was about to step forward, but her knees folded and she sat slowly, balancing on her toes.
“Nakoma?” he asked. He crouched next to her. She looked just as confused about the sudden change as he did. She rubbed her arms as though chilled. “Are you hurt?”
“No, it’s-” She rocked back and forth, mouthing out words. “I feel something. Something… bad.”
There was a quiet snort in the woods. Gold eyes glinted in the shadows. Lexaeus stood.
“Oh, damn it,” he said.
This time he was ready for the deer Heartless, caught its antlers in his grip before it was able to catch him in the stomach. It pushed against him, putting all its weight into its charge, but Lexaeus didn’t budge.
“Behind you!” Nakoma said, somewhere beyond the circle of battle. Before thinking it through, he turned, starting with his left foot, letting the rest of his body follow. He threw the first Heartless into its charging partner with such a force that both dissolved into black dust.
“It’s over now,” he said, looking over at her. She shook her head in reply, covering the crown of her head with her hands.
“No. Above.”
The earth was an extension of his arm, he thought, he knew, and that was all it took for the tomahawk to come to his hand. He raised it to block the Heartless shaped like an eagle that nearly dive-bombed his head. It collided with the steel, flapping helplessly. He reached out and grabbed it by the neck, before tossing it into a tree trunk. It dissipated into the soil.
Nakoma was still crouched in the grass where she had been, but she had stopped rocking back and forth. She looked up at him as he approached, as though he was coming at her out of mist behind her eyes. He crouched down in front of her again, dismissing his tomahawk as he did. “Nakoma. Can you stand?”
She nodded. “Yes. I don’t what came over me.” She stood up, but reached out to touch his arm for support. “It felt like something from my dreams.”
“Then we should keep going. And we should do it quickly.”
---
Nakoma parted the curtain of vines, peering up at the late evening sky through the branches. “How long have we been walking?”
“Long enough?” Lexaeus guessed.
The woman shrugged and smiled. “Probably. We’re here, anyway.”
The wind rustled through the willow’s vines loudly. Or at least, that’s what made the most sense. The vines didn’t sway, but what else could he be hearing? Nakoma was ahead of him, climbing carefully over tree roots that disappeared into a deep blue pond. “I’m here, Grandmother Willow,” she was saying. She was the only one speaking.
“Did you hear something?” he asked. He took off his gloves and dismissed them from him, like he had his weapon earlier. It felt odd wearing so much black in this place. He had no idea why.
She climbed up onto a piece of the trunk cut off like a large stump. She kneeled in the middle of it and smirked enigmatically. “I don’t know. Did you?”
He stood behind the stump, and leaned his arms against its surface. Nakoma was looking up at a knoll on the trunk, shadowed by the setting sun. “Did I?” he asked her.
Her lips quirked. “Listen again.”
He looked up and around. Silence. He did notice that the upper branches of the tree held all manner of animals, watching the two of them patiently. He had a feeling something was supposed to happen, either now or very soon.
He was looking at a bluebird when he heard it again: snatches of words. There was a quiet voice somewhere around this tree, and it wasn’t his and it wasn’t Nakoma’s. He tuned into it.
An old woman’s voice. It didn’t seem to be coming from any one direction, but from all around them. He couldn’t understand the words, but… it went right through him - a feeling of unfeasible familiarity.
The knoll changed into a face.
Lexaeus leaned back, unfolding his arms. Nakoma seemed satisfied, patting the wood next to her. He climbed up next to her, sitting cross-legged. The face in the tree smiled. It was an old woman’s face, wise and true. The bark surrounding her face looked like long green hair. “Hello, Spirit-With-No-Drum.”
Lexaeus’s insides had another flash-freeze. “No drum?” Nakoma asked beside him.
“A thing between spirits, dear. Are you going to introduce me to your charming friend?”
Nakoma shifted slightly as some of the animals crawled down from the branches and came to sit on the stump next to them. She ran her fingers absentmindedly through the fur of a rabbit’s. “Lexaeus, this is Grandmother Willow. Grandmother Willow, this is Lexaeus.”
“The spirit who helped you on your first vision quest. I see, I see.” She nodded, and the trunk moved with her. It was absolutely fascinating. “Well? Have you nothing to say, Lexaeus?”
“Uh…” He wasn’t used to being caught off guard. “It’s an honour to meet you.”
“He and I need your help, Grandmother Willow,” Nakoma stepped in.
“Hmm.” The tree spirit nodded, the trunk creaking quietly. “I’ve heard. All the forest has been telling me of your wanderings. And I’ll speak to you about that in a moment. But what is it that you need, Brother Spirit?”
Lexaeus thought, recovering from his shock. How to word this? “I’m not entirely sure if this is correct, but I believe something on your world is calling to me. Something that stays with me even after I’ve left.”
“Hm. I’m afraid you’ve come a long way in order for me to tell you something you probably already know,” she said softly. “Nobody ever knows exactly why some spirits are pulled towards certain worlds. Perhaps you were born here in a past life?”
Lexaeus chuckled. “I somehow doubt that.” He cast a glance over his shoulder, where Grandmother Willow’s branches spread out over her pond. “I would’ve liked to, though.”
“Have you thought about the idea that it might be Mother Earth calling to you?”
Mother Earth… The Heart of the World would be more accurate. He shook his head slowly. “Possible. But like you said, nobody knows for sure.”
Nakoma laughed at him. “Now the tables are turned, aren’t they? You’re the one asking all the questions, and getting answers you already know.”
“Ha.” He looked at her, brow furrowed, smiling. “I guess so.”
“And what about you, child? Why haven’t you come to see me sooner?” Grandmother Willow asked.
Nakoma’s smile faded and she rocked from knee to knee. “I was trying to figure it out myself, Grandmother Willow.”
The spirit made a sound like wooden rhythm blocks, and then Lexaeus realized she was clicking her tongue. “You’ve always kept things bottled up, Nakoma,” she said sternly.
Nakoma flushed and looked at the pattern of rings in the stump. “I know.”
“Well, tell me what you’ve found out so far.” If she was human, Lexaeus could imagine the spirit sitting down and getting comfortable. The whole tree seemed to sigh. “You’ve been having dreams, haven’t you?”
Nakoma nodded. “In all my dreams, I never seem to be able to see where I’m going. All I know is… is what I feel. I know the forest is dark and cool, so I know it’s night-time.” Nakoma started counting out on her fingers. “I know the feel of the ground beneath my feet. And I know I’m not me anymore because I can feel that I’m a rabbit or - a coyote. And sometimes I’m even an owl, but I still can’t see what’s in front of me. Or what I’m running away from.
“I asked Pocahontas about it, because I know she’s been able to call spirits to her aide before, and she told me to come out here. How is she, by the way? Have you seen her?”
Grandmother Willow chuckled deeply. “Oh, she’s doing much better. She’s actually come out here asking about you. She wanted to go out looking for you, but I told her to wait. I told her you’d come back with news.”
“And what news am I bringing back?” she asked. Lexaeus could hear her nervousness mix with anticipation.
“It’s something I’ve been thinking about for a very long time. Now, how long have you and Pocahontas known each other, Nakoma?”
“Oh.” Nakoma looked at the rabbit that had climbed up into her lap. “As long as I can remember, I suppose.”
The tree spirit smiled widely. “That’s what I thought. Let me tell you a story.”
The animals and birds in the branches reacted instantly, all twittering and fluttering about. Lexaeus nearly clubbed a cardinal out of the air when it started circling his head in wide circles.
“Quiet!” Grandmother Willow shouted. “Quiet!”
All the animals and Nakoma flinched. Lexaeus observed this all, spellbound. “Huh,” he said, smiling widely.
The tree spirit gave him a pointed glance. He cleared his throat. Nakoma laughed.
“Now, as I was saying…
“A long time ago, a farmer planted two seeds in his field. He kept them far away from the shade at the edges of his field, and he felt sure that both would grow tall and strong in the sunlight.
“Despite his best efforts, only one seed grew. It grew taller and taller until it could see everything. It could see past her farmer’s field and into the whole village.
“One day, the farmer asked the plant, ‘Why won’t your sister grow? I have given her water, she has plenty of food. But she doesn’t want to come up and see the sun. Is something the matter?’
“The plant replied, ‘My sister does grow, and she does want to see the sun. But she needs something to pull her up from the soil. And once she does, she will be able to see as far as I can.’
“The farmer thought on this for many days. He decided that he would move the other seed. With the shaman’s advice and help, they moved the smaller seed closer to the shade of the forest.
“The farmer watched in amazement as the seed grew faster in the gloom. Her sister had been right: the seed had been growing underneath the ground and simply needed the shadows of the forest to start her climb. In a couple of short days, the two plants stood tall in the field, and were able to see the whole village.”
The story ended, and there was quiet beneath the willow branches. ‘The shade of the forest.’ Lexaeus realized slowly that he didn’t like where this was going at all.
“So, Pocahontas is the seed in the sun. I’m the seed in the shade.” Nakoma didn’t sound excited or nervous now - just solemn and pensive. “What shade? Where is it coming from?”
“I don’t know child, but I feel it in my roots. What ever happened with that black elk you mentioned last time?” The tree spirit looked around as if daring one to appear.
“Lexaeus and I did come across more of those creatures on our way here,” Nakoma pointed out.
He nodded. “There was a new one shaped like an eagle.”
Grandmother Willow thought for a long time. “Then those creatures must be the thing that’s drawing your link to the spirits out, Nakoma. But I don’t think your link is quite the same as Pocahontas’s. She sees the things in her dreams. You said that you can feel what’s happening more clearly?”
“That’s right.”
“Then we’ll have a lot to talk about. You should get to sleep, child.”
Nakoma’s mouth dropped open. “But… the sun only set a couple of hours ago. Shouldn’t we-”
“You need to sleep, child. Especially considering all the growing the second seed did in so few days.”
The woman sighed quietly and stood, following a ridge in the bark to their right. From there she started climbing up the trunk quickly and efficiently, until settling on a high branch. “Good night, Grandmother Willow. Good night, Lexaeus.”
“Good night, child.” Lexaeus looked on in fascination as Nakoma curled up against the trunk to prepare to drift into sleep. “And you, Spirit-With-No-Drum.”
He looked back to the great tree spirit. She looked deathly serious. “We’re going to need to talk, young man.”
---
Days past. The shadows got longer, Nakoma continued to dream, and Lexaeus taught her how to meditate the way he had been meditating: how to open up your chest like a door and let everything flow through you.
The tree spirit kept a close eye on him. She knew that he had no heart, no ‘drum’. She probably suspected the same thing he did. If he were to follow protocols, he’d allow this world to crumble and try to figure out how to hotwire a Nobody into the system of hearts and connections. It was something the Organization had allowed to happen countless times before. And would continue to do.
Nakoma, they learned, had a link to the spirits similar to the ancient shape shifters, the shamans who were able to turn into animals in the legends. But Grandmother Willow explained that it wasn’t their bodies that had changed, but their minds - their souls, perhaps. When a shaman became an eagle, he gained the divinity and sight of an eagle, not the body of one.
Nakoma channelled the spirits of the forest most easily when she dreamed. On nights when she remained still in sleep, they figured she channelled the spirit of a rock or a tree. But most nights, she sleepwalked. Grandmother Willow said that one of her owls had seen Nakoma sleepwalk for many nights before he had arrived and had kept her out of trouble.
But she was getting better at channelling when she was awake too, thanks to his lessons of opening her heart to all the spirits around her. Unfortunately, he deadpanned, she seemed to be a little too open, as one day she went about the forest inexplicably smelling like a skunk. He tried to find some extrinsic explanation to it, but had rocks thrown very precisely at his head before he could. Then his specimen would leave to another part of the forest to meditate.
Despite her day-long hiatus, she stayed close to him. He was… glad. He found it easier to tap into the drum beat beneath the earth with her around. It made the blood pump through his own idle veins to hear what might’ve been the Heart of the World beating far below him, keeping the lifeblood of the little blue-green-brown planet moving.
And yet something twisted uncomfortably in him when he thought he noticed the heart palpitating faster as the days past. The World was preparing itself for battle. If only the rest of its inhabitants might do the same. It was Nakoma that kept this thought far away from him.
He liked how she managed to work sarcastic jabs into the day, even if neither of them spoke very often. They spent hours alternating between going into trances and walking beneath the green shadows of the trees. He gave her vague stories of his own world, tales of Xigbar and Saïx without names. She never asked for names, and she never gave them in her own tales. She shoved him in the elbow when he said something that made her laugh because she couldn’t reach his shoulder.
On the fifth day, Nakoma confided something in him, probably because she could feel scraps of his death experience. She knew for sure now that he was a spirit, and that he couldn’t tell any other human.
She told him of the night that had started to unravel Pocahontas from John Smith, the man she loved and now grieved for. She told him about the princess running out to meet him under Grandmother Willow’s own branches, how she had sent the brave warrior named Kocoum out after her in concern of her safety. And how somewhere deep inside, Nakoma had guilt in her that she refused to burden anyone with. Guilt that was burrowing deeper into her heart.
After that, it became slightly easier to decipher the words she sometimes murmured in her sleep, up in the willow branches.
On the sixth night, as he followed Nakoma as she sleep-walked, he came to an interesting conclusion.
Why not let her wallow in her guilt? Why not he let her heart collapse into the oncoming darkness? Her heart was strong - very strong. She would make a good Dusk. And good Dusks could become other Nobodies. She could be a good Geomancer. A good Lam.
It was an incredibly intriguing possibility. Her shoulder bumped into a tree up ahead. She moved out of the way and kept walking.
The day came and past. On the seventh sunrise, he found her asleep in a clearing, sitting cross-legged. Lexaeus touched the crown of her head on his way to the other end of the clearing. She woke up.
She looked around and then back to him as he settled opposite her, in the same position. “I sleepwalked again, didn’t I?”
“No, of course you didn’t,” he replied.
She snorted at him. “Ooh, sarcasm. Any idea what I might’ve been dreaming about?”
Lexaeus shook his head. “I just found you now. You don’t remember?”
“Not at the moment. Maybe I should try and find out.” Her hands folded in her lap and she closed her eyes. He could almost hear her think the mantra out loud: Open your chest, open your heart.
Lexaeus wasn’t as flashy about summoning heartless as say, Saïx or Luxord might be. They liked to snap their fingers and get instant results. Lexaeus summoned one Shadow by calling out with his mind.
Her heart had already been needlessly darkened by guilt. All she needed was a push.
He felt oddly detached from the entire scene as the Shadow melted into the grass and climbed over her legs and up to her chest and disappeared inside. Nakoma gasped for air, her eyes shooting open. She clutched at her chest with one hand and ripped weakly at the grass with her other. She heaved and her eyes flashed yellow.
He stood and approached her almost relaxedly. She had been a great help to him on his first visit here. He was almost positive she would be a great Lam, he thought as he stood over her. Normally this took longer, but she was apparently putting up a good internal struggle.
She reached up and clutched at his hand. “Lexaeus… Help me.”
Something wound up his arm and settled in the hollow of his chest. It was warm and light and all his thoughts halted. Maybe it was something to do with her affinity to the spirits. Maybe it was something else entirely.
This was wrong.
Traitor, traitor, traitor. You’ve entangled yourself too deeply here. Sever your ties to her. You’ve made your decision, you can’t go back.
He wasn’t sure what part of him was speaking, but he ignored it. His bare fingers closed around hers and he crouched down beside her. “Nakoma. Channel me.”
The dark brown in her eyes fought against the yellow, and her trembling body leaned against him. She gritted her teeth and something inside him left, called outside himself into her.
Her breathing steadied but parts of her eyes smouldered dull gold. She still leaned against him but her feet kicked against the forest floor, trying to stand up. He stood, carrying her up with him. She cupped her temple in her hand and closed her eyes.
Her shadow leaked out into the grass. It looked like a malformed rabbit - caught between the Shadow that had attacked her and pieces of her own heart’s darkness. It attempted to hop away with a twisted back leg when Nakoma surprised him by striding away from the support of his arm. She moved surely towards it and it twitched frantically.
Nakoma crushed it under her foot. Lexaeus felt vibrations through the soles of his boots.
She turned to him. “Spirit magic is kind of messed up.”
“You can say that again.” She stumbled back towards the steady hold of his arm. “Are you alright?”
She nodded into his elbow. “You have a spirit like a bear.”
“Nakoma, look at me.” He had to force her chin up with his hand. The aching inside his ribcage lessened when he saw the dark brown of her eyes. “Are you alright?”
She nodded up at him, eyes half-lidded. “It’s like it was your fault, you know. We were both meditating right?”
He felt his shoulders fall. He commanded his fingers to leave her face. She tilted her head. “Lexaeus?”
He looked away. Chimes blew in the wind. She didn’t move away from him, but turned her head sharply towards the brush at edge of the clearing.
“Kocoum had a spirit like yours, I think. Like a bear.” Nakoma walked towards the edge of the clearing. Her eyes shone strangely.
“Nakoma.” She only stared back at him quietly. She was sorting out what had happened and he need to delay that. “What are you feeling?” He followed after her.
“He wants us to follow him. It’s important.”
---
They were climbing. The trees had started thinning ten minutes ago and now they were surrounded by slate blue rock. Nakoma followed the spirit he couldn’t see up and up, and he followed after her.
In a lot of ways, it was like the walk a week ago. He could reach out and take her hair ribbon again. But…
What was it that had stopped him? It wasn’t remorse he was feeling - he couldn’t feel anything at all. He had lost his opportunity to create a wonderful Geomancer, a powerful Heartless. Nakoma had freed herself of her guilt, and it was his own fault.
Yet there was some string of logic that told him that it wasn’t a fault. That helping her protect herself was something so indescribable that he could never dream of fully understanding it.
He struggled with the idea of not knowing. Especially when it came to her.
“Lexaeus?” she said. He lifted his head and saw they had come to a cliff, over which the forest stretched out before them until meeting the horizon. The pale blue sea dominated the world to their right. Her fingers were tangled up in each other. She hadn’t been nervous around him for a while now.
No. She was nervous for him. He wondered why.
“You seem…” She couldn’t say exactly say ‘quiet’. They both smiled as they realized this.
“I’m fine, Nakoma.”
They looked out to the sea, away from each other. They both seemed to shiver.
“Nakoma. Are you seeing what I’m seeing?”
She nodded. “Clouds. Strange clouds.”
A gust of wind blew past them, bringing the black storm clouds closer to the settler’s village by the saltwater. “It looks like the ship that John Smith came here on.”
“Ship?” he asked. He was careful not to go to close to the ledge, but he had to peer closer. There was a ship amidst the storm front, tall masts and giant white sails. There was something eerie about that sight by itself, but what really disturbed him was that the clouds showed no signs of violence - no lightning danced up in the sky.
“Nakoma, how was it that John Smith was injured again?”
“He was shot by a man when he saved Chief Powhatan’s life. A man wearing black armour.”
“Did he have darkness in his heart?”
“Yes, the soldiers said that he was a very greedy man. That ship… You don’t think it’s…”
“What do you think? The darkness.” He turned to head back down the mountain. He wasn’t entirely sure where he was going. Away.
“Hey, wait! We can’t just walk away from this. We have to do something.” She caught up easily; her bare feet prevented her from slipping down the cliffside. She cut him off and glared up at him. The top of her head came up to the bottom of his ribcage.
“Correction: you have to do something, Nakoma. I do not belong here.” He pushed her aside (gently) and continued walking.
She didn’t start moving after him for a long time. He almost prayed that she would follow, but a stubbornness in him refused to stop and wait. Her voice was hushed. “I talked to Grandmother Willow about you. You’re like a puzzle in reverse.”
Flashes of Ienzo and wrapping paper and five-thousand pieces in a box. He was still walking.
“Usually, a puzzle’s something simple made up of a lot of little detailed things once you break it down. But you’re different.
“At first you were this spirit I couldn’t ever understand. And now you’re just pieces.”
His feet bonded to the earth. His element seemed to be controlling him now. The trees were thicker here. He was off the mountain.
“You’re simple now. You’re just like me. We’re made of the same pieces.”
Silence beat heavy on his ear drums, on his rib cage, on his knee caps and shoulder blades. He was so caught up in it that he nearly didn’t realize that she had come to stand beside him.
“When I channel, I think I take a puzzle piece away with me. I know you want to help me, but you feel you can’t.”
“I can’t feel,” he said before he could stop. It was a knee-jerk reaction, like pulling your arm away when someone goes to grab at something you stole.
She smiled up at him, not understanding. “Do what you feel is right, Lexaeus.”
And he looked down at her in the forest as the sun finished rising. And impossibly he said, “We need to move quickly.”
Chapter 3 ← Chapter 4 → Chapter 5
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