Book of Remembrance: The Forgotten Gods: Book One by Tania Johansson

I know is she comes every time.”
    Jamber spoke up. “Show us then.
Call her forth.” There was a note of mockery in his voice that I would not have
expected.
    I breathed deeply to avoid
snapping at him. “It does not work that way. No one has actually seen her apart
from me.” And Quiniewa of course, but that may be revealing too much.
    Jamber had an ugly sneer on his
face. “Humour us. Try.” I looked at the others and shrugged.
    Clearing my mind, I focused my
Navitas. A moment later Markai came walking towards us. They were all facing me
with their backs to her. I pointed past them at her. Slowly they turned and
looked. One and all they cried out in shock and ran past me away from her. I
did not know who was more surprised, them or me.
    They stopped some distance away
and looked back, disbelief written all over their faces. I sensed from Markai
that it had been her deliberate decision to reveal herself to them. She strode
up to me. I took in her massive size, muscles rippling as she walked. No wonder
she scared them.
    She sat down next to me and
regarded my brothers with cool blue eyes. Even sitting down she was more than a
head higher than me. I put my hand on her back and the now familiar ice and
fire covered me, ran in my very veins. “She won’t harm you!” I had to raise my
voice to carry to where they were standing.
    Prea started walking cautiously
toward us and the rest followed him. His eyes never left Markai. “How? What? Why have we never seen her before?”
    A few
minutes before I had not known, and yet Markai was….telling me. “As my
strength in the Navitas grew so did my Enchantment bond with her.   My strength flowed into her and now we are so
strongly bonded that we are connected on a deeper level. She is almost at her
full strength and she chose to reveal herself to you today.”
    Jench chortled nervously. “So, she
is like your guard, um, dog?” The idea of her being compared to a guard dog was
comical.
    I snorted. “No. Markai is not a
mere animal. She is as intelligent as any human and more so than most.   She is more like my partner.   We are a team.” I could feel approval rolling
out at me from her.
    Prea looked at me.   “You still haven’t really explained what
happened back there. That wasn’t her howl we heard, otherwise you would not
have reacted in that way. So what did happen?”
    I shuffled my feet and ran my
hands through my hair. I was toeing the line a bit of what I was permitted to
tell. “No, that howl was from a creature called a Dyrrendrel.”
    Jench interrupted. “Dyrrendrel. What is a Dyrrendrel?” I frowned at his interruption
and the note of disbelieve in his voice.
    I sighed and continued. “I
cannot say much at this time, but suffice to say that they are distant cousins
to the wolf. They are extremely dangerous and they do not always work alone. I
encountered some during my Seeking and would rather not confront them again
anytime soon.”
    Wilm’s eyebrows were raised so
high they were in danger of being lost behind his hairline. “That must have
been some meeting if that is the way you react when you hear one howl in the
distance.”
    I merely nodded my agreement.
Jamber was scowling angrily. I looked at him. “Do you have something to add
Jamber?”
    His lip curled in a sneer. “You
kept this from us? This, uh, ability of yours. Why?”   I swallowed my own anger in an
exasperated sigh. “Apart from Moma and Lilana, being with you four has been the
only place where I have fitted in; where I belonged. I guess I thought I might
ruin that by admitting to being different.”
    Jench smiled and punched me on
the shoulder.   “Fool, we are your brothers. For life. You should know that.” I smiled at him
gratefully and the others nodded their agreement. All except
Jamber. He was keeping his face carefully blank, but his eyes were
thunderstorms.  
    Wilm saw that we were looking at
each other. I opened my mouth to say something, but he interjected