Journal of Tharndor

It started very simply.

         It started very simply.
         One night while talking on messenger in one of the travel chat rooms, I got a message from an unknown user. The message directed me to website based in the UK. It was all about Wicca and Druid beliefs. As I began to read, something about it all seemed familiar to me. Then I clicked on a picture album, one called Alba. I looked with wonder at the mountain in the picture. It was familiar, and I had a longing to go there. Feeling stupid and a little scared, I shut off my computer and went to bed.
         The strange feelings continued the next day at work as I pounded on the medication dispenser’s keyboard, that now had me locked out for the fourth time in two hours, “You damned thing. I realize you hate me, but just once, would you let me take care of my patients.”
         Dottie, my conspirator in crimes committed against new medical technology, walked up behind me and yelled over her shoulder, “ April, she has done it again. Could you come help us?” I heard her laugh and quietly she said, “ What I wouldn’t give for the old days when all you had to worry about was losing the keys.”
         “You said it.”
         Dottie had been a nurse for almost thirty years, while I’d only worked for five. She was not what I’d call a grandmother type, unless your grandmother was a Hell’s Angel. Dottie could work on any vehicle made before they started putting computers in cars. And had even built her own house, before her husband died. But I looked up to Dottie like a mother figure.
         My own mother had been absent for most of my life. I lived with foster parents more than Summer Eve McCallum. Summer was quite the partygoer, having no time for the product of the one and only time her birth control had failed. I knew she loved me in her own way, but let’s face it; my mother was selfish with a capitol “I”.
         “Dottie, how can you always have such a happy outlook on life,” I mused.
         “It’s like that book title by Richard Carlson says, Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff, and It’s All Small Stuff. Sweetie, you’ve got to quit letting everything get to you. Remember you can’t fix everybody’s problems. Lord knows, we can’t fix their problems even half the time,” she replied soothingly, as she grasped my arm and pulled me out of April’s way.
         April scurried by us complaining, “Ken, just once, I wish you’d take your time and remember that your password is case sensitive…” she pause before continuing in a tone of amazement, “Okay, are you pulling my chain? Ken, how did you get that picture to come up on the computer monitor?”
         Dottie and I looked over her shoulder at the screen. There on the screen was the same picture as last night. Dottie questioned, “April, how can that happen? I thought the medication dispenser’s computer was separated from all the other computers and it’s screen unable to display pictures.”
         “I don’t know how it happened, but it’s not the screen that keeps it from displaying pictures, it the programming. I’m going to have to call the “Geeks” down in technical repair. Joy, joy!” April quipped as she left the med-room.
         I couldn’t believe my eyes. It was the same picture, but how. I must have gasped, because Dottie whorled to look at me. Grabbing my arm, she hauled me out of the med-room and down the hall to an empty exam room. She pushed me in as she slid the lock to show occupied.
         Dottie took several deep breaths before she turned to look at me. She said apprehensively, “How long have you known?” After she briefly read the look of query on my face, she continued, “You don’t know, do you? You have no idea about what you just did and it’s significance? Oh, Kennocha, sweet, you are a lost one,” I stared in bewilderment at Dottie, dozen of questions speeding through my mind. Dottie must have perceived my thoughts because she held up her hand and shook her head, “I can not explain now but you must come home with me after our shift so I can explain…No, no, I will explain later.”
         I knew I couldn’t pursue this now. Dottie had heard the pages same as I. She had to go because she was on the code team and ‘Dr. Blue’ could not wait.
         Later, April was complaining about how the Geeks had laughed at her, when they had come up to fix the medication dispenser and there was nothing wrong. Worst of all was James Garrison, one of the guys in technical repair, had hit on her. I should have felt sorry for April, but I was to wrapped up in my own concerns to give much thought to hers. Dottie was nowhere to be found for the next four hours, successfully avoiding me.
         As the on-coming nurse and I made our rounds, I did spy Dottie going into the locker room. As I finished the narcotics count and signed out, Dottie knocked on the window and pointed at the elevator. I nodded my understanding to meet her and she headed that direction. When I came out of the double doors, leading to the employee parking, I had the feeling of being watched but saw no one. Dottie sat in her vehicle. As I walked up to my car that was parked right beside hers, she said, “I will tell you what I know, but not here! It is not safe.”
         I slid into the driver’s set of my Toyota Camry and followed Dottie’s Nissan Titan out of town, down the winding road to her farm. Burning with curiosity, I wondered: what did Dottie know, why had she called me a lost one, and why was I feeling like I’d just passed a major milestone in my life and never saw it?
         Finally, we pulled up in front of Dottie’s two-story log cabin. I always carried extra clothes in my car, being a nurse you never know when your going to need a clean change, so I popped the trunk and got out my bag.
         This was not the first time I’d come to Dottie’s and stayed the night….
Several months back, I got pulled to the Pediatric floor. There was a beautiful three-year-old named Samantha, who had leukemia, which had been brought in with a temperature of 105 that her parents couldn’t get down. The child had had a bone marrow transplant and had been cleared to come home. For some reason the transplant was not taking, so, her little body was not producing the white blood cells she needed. She was neutropenic, and her body was being ravaged by the common cold. So her mother could step out for coffee, I promised to stay with Samantha. As soon as her mother was out of the room, Samantha called my over to her bed. In verily a whisper, she said, “You are an angel aren’t you? You’ve come to take away my pain and take me to heaven, right? Mommy said you’d be beautiful. She didn’t tell me you’d be surrounded by pretty light. Please hold me.” I was stunned by what the child had said. No one had ever thought I was beautiful let alone an angel. I sat on the bed and scooped up her frail little body on my lap. I stroked her hair and cooed that her mommy would be right back. She shook her head and said, “It’s alright. I’m ready to go. I’m so tired. Mommy told me I’d be an old lady when I saw the angels, but I knew I wouldn’t. Please let her know I love her. Will you watch over her?” Her eyes pleaded with me, so I agreed to watch over her mother. As soon as I said I would, she smiled at me then stopped breathing. One of the other nurses was in the hall, and heard me scream at Samantha to start breathing again. The next thing I remember was the nurse taking Samantha out of my arms and starting CPR. I stood in the corner and watched them work, knowing that it would do no good. When Dr Grayson called a stop to the code, Samantha’s mother was let back into the room. I told her that Samantha wanted her to know that she loved her and she’d gone with the angels. I never told anyone, not even Dottie that she thought I was the angel.
         That memory had come rushing back to me when I walked through the front door. Much like that night, my mind did not take in the splendor of the room. Dottie directed me to the spare bedroom and got me out some towels. She urged me to take a bath while she made us something to eat. Being the procrastinator I am, I allowed her to leave me to bathe.
         Half an hour later, I walked into the kitchen clean but scared to death of what I was fixing to find out. Dottie turned and smiled at me as I came in. Taking a deep breath, I spouted, “Why did you call me a lost one? What did you think I knew? Why are you being so secretive? What is the significance of the picture of a mountain and how did it get on the medication dispenser monitor?”
         Softly, Dottie answered my questions with, “Kennocha, I need you to tell my what your full name is and what you know about your father?”
         “What?” I stammered not believing how calmly Dottie had skirted my questions and wonder what my father and my name had to do with being a lost one.
         “Kennocha, I must know before I can tell you what you need to know,” she assured me.
         “Okay Dottie, my full name is some weird ancient sounding names my mother saddled me with. I always figured that on one of her highs, she wondered into a library and found them in some obscure book. But if you must know, it is; Kennocha Koisidura Teranika McCallum. And I know nothing of my father. Summer refused to talk about him. All I know is that she was on tour in the British Isles with a group from college. She had been studying anthropology, and went with a group to study the stone formations and other pagan sites. Come to think of it, on one of the rare occasion I was staying with her, we’d went to the store and ran into someone from that group, or I probably wouldn’t even know that much.”
         “Kenny, do you know if you were born full-term or were you premature?” Dottie inquired.
         “Actually, I was born at 20 weeks. Summer whined to me on one occasion about how I couldn’t even come when I was suppose to, but she never took me to the hospital. I always wondered if she thought that by not taking me to the hospital, I would die being so premature…. Dottie, I don’t see what any of this has to do with the picture of the mountain and how it got onto the medication dispenser monitor.”
         Dottie smoothed her hands over a leather bound book on the table that I hadn’t noticed until then. I could tell by the look on her face, she was working something out in her mind. “ Kennocha, I believe your name was given to you for a purpose, or more to the point, to tell you your purpose. If I am correct, your birth was not premature, but late by about three weeks. Who can say, since we know very little of elf births and even less about mixed blood births. When I called you a lost one, I meant just that. You have been lost from the Cloister’s knowledge. Of course, I wonder if that was on purpose. I am certain your father was an elf, and I suspect your mother was aware of that fact. Which means that Summer may have given you up to foster care for fear of the Gerousia finding out and coming to get you.” Dottie had opened the old leather-bond book while talking. As she paused in her explanation to me, she turned the book so that I could see the drawing of a being, which I surmised to be an Elf.
         “Dottie, you said my name told me of my purpose, so what is it?” I questioned as I studied the picture in the book.
         “Sweetheart, your given names together mean: lovely guardian of the door and Earth’s victory, and the McCallum clan motto is ‘He who has attempted difficult things.’ They are a mixture of the old Gaelic and Celtic,” she sighed and studied a spot on the wall as if in deep thought before adding, “I don’t think Summer was the one who chose your names, however. Did Summer ever tell you who helped her with your birth?”
         “Dottie, had she not complained to me that one time about my birth I would never have known I was born at 20 weeks. I figure she told me, so I’d know how unwanted I was,” I sighed as I continued to leaf through the book.
         “Well, I’m going to have to contact the priestess of my coven to see if the Cloister has any knowledge of Summer and your birth,” Dottie spoke as she reached for the phone.
         “Wait a minute, who is this Cloister and why would they have any reason to know about me or my mother?”
         “The Cloister is a council made up of thirteen High Priestesses or Priests from different covens, called Elders. They are the ones with the knowledge of the gates. They, also, have some contact with the Gerousia. I need their help, because I am way out of my league here. This book,” waving her hand at the book I was flipping through, “only tells the basics about the Shenn. There are many things about the Shenn that I do not know. I am bound by my faith in the Lord and Lady to cause no harm. Because we don’t know the whole story about you, I need to contact my mentor and High Priestess, Evelyn.”
         Dottie looked worried and I knew she was right, so I nodded my head yes and she went into the next room to call. I sat staring at the pictures in the book.
                                                           ***
         I studied the book that Dottie gave me, until the early morning hours. Dottie had not been able to get in touch with Evelyn, because the Elders were in a meeting. Unbeknown to us, the Gerousia had sent a representative to the Cloister. The Gerousia had intelligence that the Du-Sith was closed to finding the key to unlock the gate to the realm of the Doidhean and that it laid in the earthly realm. Evelyn would tell Dottie later that Kaon, son of the High Lord of Rasse Foalooke to the Drow King, was sent to neutralize this threat, but that the Lady had shown her that the warrior elf would find more than the key to Doidhean.
                                                           ***
         I woke to find Dottie had made brunch for us. As I sat sipping on hot tea at Dottie’s huge kitchen table, she told me of the spells used to secure the house. She told me that her familiar was a marten named Bradach. Bradach had warned her that the creatures that Dottie looked after in the forest had seen an intruder whose spirit was not of the earthly realm. As Dottie was explaining that the spirit is the soul and that all animals can see it manifested as light around the being, the phone rang. Dottie answered it in the den.
         Bradach came around the corner as Dottie rushed in to answer the phone and jumped into her vacated seat, and then climbed onto my shoulder. He rubbed his silky fur against my cheek several times before purring, “You were not bound for this world. The fates have deemed that you fulfill a higher purpose. Are you ready for it?” I stopped petting Bradach and looked at him in disbelief.
         Dottie came back into the room at that time, swiping a hand at Bradach. “You get off Kennocha’s shoulder, you could scratch her…. I can’t believe he did that. He doesn’t usually like strangers. Every time you were here before, he stayed out in the woods.” Dottie picked up her coffee cup and looked me in the eye, “Are you all right, he didn’t hurt you, did he?”
         “Dottie, I know you told me Bradach told you someone was in the woods, but I guess I didn’t really believe it. I would swear I could understand his purring,” I mused as I watched Bradach’s tail go around the corner.
         “He spoke to you…. Kenny what did Bradach say?”
         “He told me I was not bound for this world. He said the fates had deemed a higher purpose for me to fulfill and wanted to know if I was ready.”
         “Well, that higher purpose maybe coming your way sooner than later. Evelyn wants us to come to Scotland ASAP. She is sending us personal transport. Even though, we won’t be going through the airports, you will need your passport. Kenny, you do have a passport, don’t you?” Dottie looked at me pleadingly.
         “Dottie, you know I have always wanted to travel overseas. I got one two years ago when I was dating Jeff. I thought we’d go on a cruise together, but he went with Rachel instead.
         “Anyway, that doesn’t matter, I can’t go to Scotland. You know Jaimma won’t let any of us off without at least two weeks notice, let alone, you and I both. Plus, I have that test in Dallas to get my certification as a wound care specialist in three weeks that I’m already off for.”
         “Kennocha, sweetheart, you don’t understand this is not something that you can shrug off. Evelyn said this is a matter of great importance to the compact between the Shenn and humanity. And we must…”
         Cutting her off I interjected, “Dottie, look I’m not even sure I believe all of this. I respect your right to believe what you will, but I just can’t give up my job and go running off to Scotland. I’ve work and struggled very hard to get what I have and I can not give that up on the spur of the moment.”
         “Oh, Kenny, I realize this is overwhelming, and hard to assimilate, but the things that are happening around you and to you are not going to stop. I realize your life has been hard, but this is your destiny. Your life has made you ready for it. You are strong and smart with a compassionate soul, but most of all you, Kennocha Koisadura Teranika McCallum, are someone who does not run away from a challenge,” Dottie said with strong conviction.
         I looked at Dottie for a long moment, unable to speak, being no good at taking compliments. She must have thought I needed more reassurance, because she continued in a calmer voice, “You know I’m right. As for our jobs, you know as well as I do, we can get other jobs, probably a better ones, when we come back. After all, we nurses are in demand. Please, Kenny, come with me to Scotland and find out. If you need help getting through after this is over, you know I will be here for you. You know Neal and I were never able to have children and I think of you like my own…what do you say?”