Beyond the entry to the gully, as the hill slowly dips downward into the deep end of the valley, the signs of human passage are not so packed in. Here, someone as lost their handkerchief, and another has placed it in the V-shaped crook of a tree branch. There, some picnicker has left behind a brown bottle that once contained ale.
And always the ribbons. The ribbons are more sparsely wrapped and strung, and the wishes less frequent, but they wave cheerfully above the path that Kaia first blazed, that other, larger feet have now widened.
As they enter the forest foyer of the temple beyond, they each would receive singular impressions and feel unque sensations.
⁂
For Mekarie, leading the way, the air becomes thick and still, and the sounds of the forest far away and muted as if hearing through damp plugs of cotton. But it is not the dense humidity of a brewing storm she would feel—it is the stillness of a ship stranded at sea, long trapped in the doldrums without a wind. The trees around her do not stir, and no birds or small creatures dart by. The air does not push or press back—there is no resistance, but neither is there a lifting breeze ...
⁂
... as there is for Gloria. The air presses softly at her back, pulls softly from the front, and urges her onward. Squirrels chatter in the branches above her head, well out of reach of her clumsy blade. They race through the wood ahead of the trio where only she would see. Their bushy tails bounce and flash, and they vanish to circle tree trunks or dive trough thick leafy growth. And they race ever on, bounding eagerly. The moment she raises voice or hand to point them out, gone will they be, like little grey ghosts.
Follow us, they'd cry, had they human speech. But their voices are just noisy squeaks, not at all musical ...
⁂
... like the chiming of bells that ring out around Cat. For the breeze that pushes and pulls at the girl in front of the youth, is less directed in its buffeting of the little sharp-tongued urchin. If Mekarie feels the dull weight of equitorial sea air, and Gloria the whispering demands of autumn's arrival, it is Cat who is caught in the capricious winds of spring. It tugs on the child's cap and plays havoc with the tails of a tattered jacket, and the chiming bells hung in the woods above ring even more clearly here in the gully.