The self, the sanctuary, the divine; to return, to remember, to reignite. Each diviness taught this arrangement and its perils, and each seer quickly learned the risk of her gifts. They learned of hearts abandoned, minds lost, and senses dulled to uselessness. Prosperity abhors the ages, and so an unfortunate few saw these lessons first hand.
She had taught these lessons. She had seen pupils and seers succumb to such horrors. In the latter, she learned that even a diviness, the steward of their people’s craft, the subject to no king, the one mortal who lay claim to centuries, can witness what cannot be unseen.
She knew what troubled her mind as she reached the earthen fork, knew what caused her to falter on the route she had walked throughout her life. One path carried upward and out of the silent wood, and – for those gifted few – the other went into darkness, into timelessness, into astral flight and a boundless sequence that rendered a dim beacon of the lonely, waiting body. The land was supportive beneath her feet and the canopy melded with umber twilight. The undergrowth reflected no trace of her unease, and nearby rustling hinted the immense trust of birds and woodland beings. They felt her intention but not her heart, doubting and disquiet, not the choice that may at last bestow victory to the tyrants that struck and schemed and waited to feast on the corpse of her order.
Her fists didn’t unclench easily. She could avoid battle with the myriad threats and shield her order from any source. Would the girl be among those threats? The prodigy child who surpassed her inner circle and delved through time as easily as waking. The gifted pupil who came from no family or home. The brat who kept her waiting for hours. The diviness pondered if the divine held back her cursing.
A tired and frustrated laugh escaped her. Without a worthy successor, what choice did she have? She was chosen among a group of equally capable seers – women strong with accomplishment and graced with certainty, tempered and just and generally more deserving. She stood alone then and felt more so before the girl, before living proof that the gift of prescience flourished. Proof of a brash and headstrong spirit that cooperated on its terms, that answered each call as gently as lightning.
Stars peered above the canopy. The path inward was darker still. The diviness believed the girl could learn in time, but would she survive this night? There was danger in rituals and workings among the order. Far more here, where the diviness had no power to guide or guard against what lay within. And yet, the girl scoffed when asked to come, rolled her eyes as if she’d already seen enough of the land of ever-present light. The diviness sighed and pondered if she heard footsteps, and sincerely hoped the girl was no stranger to what lay ahead.
A branching path far atop the bluffs of Starved Rock State Park in Utica, IL.
Mamiya RB 67 Pro-S
Mamiya 50mm f/4.5 C
Rollei Infrared – ISO 400 – 6×7