Obliging Souls

Elden was always such an obliging person: a foster mother to me, who took better care of me than my own mam, always had been. There was nothing she wouldn't do for me, no tear too small to wipe away, no threat too menacing to face.

At eleven I was plagued by bullies. The worst was Lisa Maddigan. Nothing she wouldn't do to me to ruin my mind and heart, my body. I couldn't tell Elden, but she told me. She knew. She told me, after Lisa was no longer a problem.

I didn't understand what that meant when she said that. I told her I owed her one--lacking the details, I still repeated it.

At 17 Elden said: Tarnel Spengly was giving her problems. She said: I owed her.

I was stronger by then, I knew how to solve the problem. Even without understanding Lisa's fate, I had learned much from my mentor. I repaid the debt--that debt, at least.

For I was obliged to.

And then she told me what she'd done to Lisa. In detail.

Elden's dying now. And she's obliged to go to the suffering lands.

.

I will follow her there.