Windhaven

Woodwings is your place — without you, it could never have existed. Don't turn your back on it now."

"You don't understand," Maris said. "How could you? You can still fly."

S'Rella reached out and took Maris' hand, and held it even though it remained limp, not answering her pressure.

"I'm trying to understand," she said. "I know how you must be suffering. Believe me, ever since I heard the news I've thought about what my life would be if I were injured. I have been grounded for a year at times, you know, so I have some idea, even though I've never had to come to terms with the idea of its being permanent. Everyone has to think about it. The end comes for all flyers, you know. Sometimes it comes in competition, sometimes in injury, often just in age."

"I always thought I would die," Maris said quietly. "I never thought about going on living and being unable to fly."

S'Rella nodded. "I know," she said. "But now it has happened, and you have to adjust to it."

"I am," Maris said. "I was." She pulled her hand away. "I've made a new life for myself here. If you hadn't come — if I could just forget—" She saw by the quick flash of pain in S'Rella's face that she had wounded her friend.

But S'Rella shook her head and looked determined. "You can't forget," she said. "That's hopeless. You have to go on, to do the things you can do. Come and teach at Woodwings. Stay close to your friends.

Hiding here— you're just pretending…"

"All right, it's pretense," Maris said harshly. She stood up and walked to the window where she looked blindly out at the wet blur of brown and green that was the forest. "It's a pretense I need, in order to go on living. I can't bear the constant reminder of what I've lost. When I saw you standing in the doorway all I could think of was your wings, and how I wished I could strap them on and fly away from here. I thought I'd stopped thinking about that. I thought I had settled down here. I love Evan, and I'm learning a lot as his assistant. I'm doing something useful. I've been enjoying having Coll around, and getting to know his daughter. And the sight of one pair of wings sweeps it all away, turns my life to dust."

Silence filled the cabin. Finally Maris turned away from the window to look at S'Rella. She saw the tears on her friend's face, but also the look of stubborn disapproval.

"All right," Maris said, sighing. "Tell me I'm wrong. Tell me what you think."

"I think," said S'Rella, "that what you are doing is wrong. I think you are making things harder for yourself in the long run. You can't wipe out your life as if it never was; you don't live in a world without flyers.

You may hide here and pretend to be an assistant healer, but you can never really forget that you were, that you are a flyer. We still need you — there's still a life for you. You haven't come to terms with your life yet — you're still avoiding it. Come to Woodwings, Maris."

"No. No. No. S'Rella — I couldn't bear it. You may be right, and what I am doing may be wrong, but I've thought about it, and it's the only thing I can do. I can't bear the pain. I have to go on living, and to do that I must forget what I've lost, or I'll go mad. You don't know — I couldn't bear to see them all flying around me, rejoicing in the air, and to know that I could never again join them. Forever to be reminded of what I've lost. I can't. Woodwings will survive without me. I can't go back there." She stopped, shaking with intensity, with fear, with the renewed reminder of her loss.

S'Rella rose and held her until the shaking passed.

"All right," S'Rella said softly. "I won't press you. I have no right to tell you what you should do. But… if you should change your mind, if you think about it again when more time has passed, I know the position would always be open to you. It's your decision. I won't mention it again."

The next day she and Evan rose early, and spent the morning humoring a sick, querulous old man in his lonely forest hut. Bari, who had been up and playing at first light, tagged along after them, since her father was still asleep. She had better luck than either of them in bringing a smile to the old man's thin lips. Maris was glad. She herself was depressed and out of sorts, and the ancient's whining complaints only made her more irritable. She had to suppress the urge to snap at him.

"You'd think he was dying, the way he carried on," Maris said as they started the walk back home.

Little Bari looked at her strangely. "He is," she said in a small voice. She looked at Evan for support.

The healer nodded. "The child's right," he said grumpily. "The signs are clear enough, Maris. Haven't you listened to anything I've taught you? Bari is more attentive than you've been of late. I doubt that he'll last three months. Why do you think I made him the tesis?"