Celine crept through the trees, hiding in the shadows so that she would not be seen. As she got far enough away from Janders' tree so that she wouldn't be seen, she turned back and looked. All was dark and quiet. She hesitated in moving any farther away. Celine had no real desire to go, but she knew that if she stayed she would cause Jander to go through a lot of trouble to keep her out of a trial. She knew Katrander had to be wrong, she was no magic-user, she just had this silly amulet. Sighing, she looked once more towards Janders' and then slipped away, heading towards the outskirts of the village.

Unknown to Celine, she was being watched and followed. Two elves silently and stealthily stalked her as she left the forest. They were going to make sure that she never came back.

Suddenly, a twig snapped to her left. Celine stopped, listening alertly. She took out her dagger and crouched, waiting. She heard the noise again, this time to her right.

"Allright, who is out there? Come out and face me, you sneakthieves!" she said, drawing her sword with the other hand. Two forms stepped out of the bush on either side of her. Katrander and Alarius, she remembered from the archery range.

"Come on, mage, use a fireball on us." Katrander taunted, drawing a short sword. "I know you are a mage, but since you don't choose to show it, I will have to take care of you before you do."

"I am not a magic-user." Celine protested, lowering her weapons and standing, hoping to avoid a fight. "If I were, why would I not just teleport myself away or something?" she asked, trying to alleviate their fears. It wasn't working. Alarius now had drawn a short bow and was nocking an arrow, keeping an eye on her the entire time.

"Show us, Celine." Katrander said, using a wheedling tone now. "Come on, you can do it, mage."

Celine was quickly running out of options. Katrander, a semi-deranged look on his face, was advancing towards her on her left, a short sword wavering in front of him as he did so. Alarius, standing stoically, but attentively, was covering her right side with an arrow. Furiously thinking of something that she could do to prove to them that she was not a magic user, she thought of the only magic she had ever seen. The centaru shaman had once had to stop a fight between a halfling and a dwarf, and, threw dust at them while uttering a magic word. Both had fallen sound asleep. She knew if she could try to make them think she would, and failed, they might believe her. It was worth a try.

"Ok, if I were a mage, I should be able to put you to sleep with a single word, right?" she asked, frantically gathering some dust off of the ground. Grudgingly, Katrander nodded. "Ok, then....." Celine threw the dust at Katrander, and, yelling a pirate war cry that she had learned on her travels by sea, she ducked and rolled towards Katrander's legs. Sneezing violently, and blinded by the sudden dust in his eyes, he grabbed for her. Eluding his grip, she looked up, and could only watch as an arrow struck him in the chest. Alarius, confused by the sudden action, had let go of his bowstring. Stunned, Celine crawled over to the fallen elf.

"Katrander!" Celine exclaimed, watching as his eyes began to glaze over. "I'm sorry. It wasn't my fault. I just wanted to convince you that I'm not a mage."

"It's allright, Celine." he said, seemingly clear headed now. "My father, he was killed by a mage who didn't recognize his own powers until it was too late."

Katrander, now realizing that he was dying, saw the error of his ways. He knew, deep down in his heart, that it was not the wild mage's fault that the fireball had come down out of the sky. Wild magic was a hard thing to control, and if Katrander's father hadn't taken the entire blast, Katrander's sister and her four friends might have. Tears welling up in his eyes at what he had done, he looked to Alarius.

"Friend, please make sure that neither you nor Celine takes the blame for this." Katrander said, his voice fading, as all Celine and Alarius could do was watch him, neither one knowing how to heal him. Alarius nodded, his bow laying forgotten at his feet. "I blame no one for my father." were Katrander's last words as he faded into the cold embrace of death. Celine closed her eyes and bowed her head in reverence.

"May his soul rest in the hands of Corellon Larethian." she said softly, prayerlike. Alarius just looked at his friend, shocked. Finally, Celine looked back up at the other elf. "You are going to have to take him back to the village." she said.

"Me? What about you?" the stunned elf asked her, making no move to touch his friend.

"I'm not going back to the village. I need to move on." Celine said, rising and forcing Alarius to look directly at her. "He was your friend. You must take him back to his family."

"They'll blame me." Alarius said, semi-panicked. "It was my arrow that killed him." he said, backing away. At that point, another elf stepped out from the trees. Serander looked down at Katranders' body, his face expressionless.

"I've heard everything after your dust-throwing." Serander said, looking towards Celine. Celine stood up defiantly and looked at him, her stare projecting the fact that she was clear of all crime. "Very interesting technique." was all he said, looking at Alarius as he stepped towards the group.

"You don't think I'm a mage, do you?" Celine asked, looking at him and edging her hand towards her dagger, meaning to trap him on a tree if he made a move to attack her. Serander shook his head and Celine relaxed her hand.

"No, I just think you know a few tricks. Sleight of hand, as they would call it." he told her, stepping up towards her. Celine looked him straight in the eye, her emerald eyes proud and defiant. "But I can't allow you to travel by yourself. These forests are dangerous to those who don't know it." Raising an eyebrow, she gave him a hard stare, which, to her satisfaction, made him step back a step.

"You have no control over what I do." Celine said, gesturing then towards the prone body of Katrander. "But you do have a duty to make sure that your comrades' body gets back to the village. And I don't think that his slayer is of the mind to do so, don't you think?" she asked, giving him a sly grin. Serander looked at her, and then back at Alarius, who was trying to make himself look smaller by pressing himself against a tree. Finally, he nodded.

"I will have to see Katrander back to the village." Serander said, "I will also tell them of the real story of how Katrander was killed, and I will clarify your name as being that of a non-mage." he said, bowing elegantly. Celine resisted the urge to hit him over the head with her sword for being such a paladin. Paladins annoyed Celine, she thought that they were too lawful and placed too high of a price on being honorable. Although Celine herself was very honorable, but she would not admit that.

"I may never return here again." Celine told the two elves, who had started working on making a litter on which to carry Katrander's body, "Make sure Jander knows that I hold no ill towards him. I do what I have to."

"Yes, I will tell him of the lovely and courageous swashbucker who had tried to avoid killing Katrander for a false belief." Serander told her as she turned to walk away. "You shall always be welcome in the Kin'stara forest, I assure you."

"Fare well." Celine answered, without turning. She quickly glided off into the forest. Serander stared after her a bit, and then shook his head and helped Alarius finish the litter.

***

Celine walked on through the night and most of the next morning. By midday, she was on the edge of the forest and fatigue had finally caught up with her. She had been single-mindedly trying to get as far away as possible, so that Serander would not come after her, and now, at the edge of the Kin'stara forest, she took a reverie beneath a large tree. Relaxing, she started to remember.

Five glass spheres sat on a large table in a beautiful temple. These spheres, called "Corellon Globes" by the preisthood, were infused with the magical energy that surrounded each priest of Qualinesti. The only magical energy, though, that the sphere could contain was any magical energy that the priest had not learned or recieved especially from Larethian. This energy was identified by the dagger that all priests were given upon becoming a full priest, and when the dagger was lost, it being a special dagger that always teleported back to the users' hand, the priest was assumed dead, and the sphere shattered in sympathy.

The young apprentice priest who was about to be accepted into the priesthood nodded once, solemnly, as the elder priest asked if she understood. This had been expected of her most of her life, so she felt no excitement, only calm acceptance. Her becoming a priest had been bound to happen.

As the elder placed the dagger in her hands, a strange blue light eminated off of it and touched the young priest in the center of her forehead. She felt only calm, the elder seeming a bit unsettled. This had never happened with any of the other priests. The light dissipated after a moment and the young elf smiled, tucking the dagger into her belt.

"He is with me." she said, smiling. "His companion, the moon, also. They have promised to watch over me and guide me in the right direction." The now full priest told her elder. The elder stared at her a moment, then smiled and touched her golden hair lovingly.

"Go, my daughter." she said, motioning for the young priest to leave. The younger elf walked out of the temple reverently.

The elder stood there for a moment, her mind thinking back over what had just happened. Eventually, she shrugged it off, thinking it a sign that Corellon Larethian had put this young priest in good favor and returned to her studies.

Celine "woke up" with a start, almost jumping up into the tree. She kept "remembering" things about a priest. Why would she remember things about a preist? She wasn't a priest. She sighed, thinking that maybe that centaur shaman had told her some story that she had, for some reason, remembered really well. That was the only explanation that Celine could put on this strange occurance. As she was thinking about this, a rustling started in the brush near her, and a bunch of guttural noises could be heard.

Quickly, she pulled out her longsword. She could understand goblinish, and that kind of language could only come from goblins.

"Come out, cowards!" she shouted, readying her sword and sheild for an attack. "It's one elf against all of you, come out and fight!"

With a roar, four goblins burst out of a nearby clump of bushes. Drawing her sword, she squared off in front of them, her first swing taking the weapon arm off of one of them. Another one, trying to throw her off balance, rushed at her sheild. Nimbly, she leapt, and the goblin fell to the ground, stunned. Another swing of her sword took the head off of another, and the remaining three, including the one who was bleeding severely from it's shoulder, backed off, suddenly cautious.

One of them though, in a sudden, uncharacteristic show of bravery, came up to her again, squaring off to fight. It attacked with its short sword, and Celine met it head on. The two were locked into battle for a few moments, and then finally Celine thrust her sword through it's flimsy armor, and it fell to the ground, dead.

The remaining goblins decided to run away. Whipping out her dagger, she quickly threw it at the one who was bleeding, hoping to kill it. It only snarled though, as the dagger hit it in the side, and kept running after its' comrade.

Celine sighed, and cleaned off her sword on a neaby goblin. Waste of a good dagger, but it couldn't be helped. She would just have to get a new one in the town that she saw up ahead. She replaced her sword in its' scabbard, and the sheild on her back and started for the town.

*** A Kingdom