Read Rising From the Ashes: The Chronicles of Caymin for Free Online

mixed older and young, male and female.
    One man, enormous, with a wild head of black hair and a beard covering most of his face, stepped forward. “Enat.” He greeted her by placing his huge hands on her shoulders and bending to touch his forehead to hers.
    He turned. “Who have you brought?”
    Enat rested a hand on Ash’s shoulder. “This is Ash.” Enat gestured toward the man. “This is Ivar.”
    Ivar looked at her curiously, his black eyes raking her face, taking in her scars, her naked head. His nose twitched as he sniffed, and he suddenly reminded Ash of a bear she had seen once, snuffling as he trundled along, hunting grubs.
    “We should have known you were coming by the smell alone,” he said.
    Enat was unperturbed. “We have had a long journey. We can both use a bath.” She nodded to him and the others, and led Ash away, back into the forest.
    “Will we not live there, with them?” Ash hurried to catch up.
    Enat shook her head. “My cottage is a wee bit farther on. I prefer solitude.” She glanced at Ash, her eyes twinkling. “I guess you would prefer it as well.”
    Ash was filled a sense of relief. Through all their journey, she had been fretting silently about having to live among a group of humans. She still felt a little ill at ease even with Enat, who had been only kind to her. She had watched the villagers near her sett enough to know that they sometimes fought, especially the children. She had seen several of them beating up on one child, yelling and jeering, far out on the hills when they were supposed to be tending the cattle and goats and sheep, and there were no grown humans nearby. Again, Enat seemed to read her thoughts.
    “The other young ones who are here for training live together in separate houses – one for the girls, one for the boys. You’ll meet them, but not just yet.”
    She led Ash around a twist in the trail to a small cottage, thatched like the others, but with plants growing along the walls. Enat pushed open the wooden door and Ash followed her inside. Daylight came through the openings in the walls, but the cottage was dark and cold. Enat pointed to the hearth.
    It was unlike anything Ash had ever seen. Built of stacked stone, it contained a deep cavity that was blackened, with a circle of stones sitting amid the ashes. A metal rod was suspended in some way from the stone so that it could swing over the fire. Strangest of all was a tall column of stone that went through the cottage’s roof. Ash stuck her head inside and craned her neck to look up.
    “It’s called a chimney,” Enat said. “It allows us to have a fire inside and yet channel all the smoke out through the hole in the stone. Will you light a fire for us?”
    Ash found a pile of twigs and shredded bark for tinder, but no wood. She turned to Enat in question.
    “Use the peat,” Enat said, pointing again to blocks of dirt stacked next to the hearth. She came over. “We don’t cut wood here. Even the fallen trees are sacred. Only the branches that fall do we use and sometimes we ask permission to cut live branches and flowers for medicines. The trunks of the fallen become homes for other life. All of the wood we build with or make things from comes from outside the forest. This…” She held up a brick of peat. “This is dug from the earth. When it’s dried, ’twill burn.” She showed Ash how to stack the peat bricks around the tinder and watched as Ash struck a steel to her flint to light it.
    Almost immediately, the cottage began to warm. Looking around, Ash saw that the rafters were hung with bunches and bunches of dried plants and flowers.
    “Now, for our baths,” Enat said.
    She gathered up an armful of folded cloth and led Ash deeper into the forest, to another stone building that housed a small pool of water. Nearby was a stone fire pit already filled with blocks of peat. Rather than using steel and flint, Enat waved her hand and the peat ignited into large flames. The interior of the