The guardian deity of Aruka

The wolf Spirit who had just defeated half a dozen Shadows on her own was waging her tail happily, still holding a sword in her mouth.

Helia snorted despite her best efforts not to laugh. Not sensing any more Shadows in the vicinity, she put her bow and arrow away. Arthem did the same with his own weapon shortly after.

“Yes, yes, Aruka, you are a very good girl”, said an elder woman who had walked up to the Spirit. The wolf looked at her expectantly, waging her tail even harder.

The woman extended a hand with her palm towards the floor, and the Spirit, whose name seemed to be Aruka, swiftly sheathed the sword inside the scabbard on her side with a practiced motion. In the blink of an eye, her shape shrunk. Where a wolf used to be, was now a big dog, sitting down. The only sign that it was the same entity was her unusual fur color, golden with some deep navy spots, and the sword still resting on her left side, now much too big for her size.

“Thank you as usual, Aruka”, said the woman as she patted the head of the Spirit, who looked extremely happy. “And, who might you be?”, she asked, directing her gaze to the still dumbfounded trio.

“Just a warrior and Handler passing by, we heard a commotion and wanted to help”, responded Arthem, pointing to the lumiranite polearm on his back. “But you clearly have everything under control. Are you this Spirit’s Handler?”

The woman seemed surprised at the question. “Oh dear, Handler? No, no, no. Aruka isn’t a Spirit, she’s our guardian deity.”

They looked at each other, confused, then at the Great Spirit getting her ear scratched happily in front of them.

“In any case, we won’t bother you further, madam. We will go back to our camp, but we will keep an eye out just in case”, responded Helia.

“No way!”, protested the lady. “Even if you weren’t needed, you still came to help. I’m not letting you sleep outside when I have several perfectly good empty rooms in my house. Get your stuff and come back, I’ll leave my door open.”

Not leaving them time to object, she walked into a nearby home while waving, and Aruka trotted up to them with a big smile.

“Aruka protected everyone!”, she repeated, proudly, her deep voice resonating in everyone’s minds.

Helia nodded and patted her timidly on her head, which apparently was what she was expecting. After a while, the Spirit left, looking for more pets.

The name of the lady sharing her house with them was Gloria, and she immediately had tea, sandwiches and biscuits ready for them.

On the way back to retrieve their belongings, they talked it over, and determined it would be safe to stay there for the night. The village was so small that it didn’t even have guards or soldiers, or even a church. There were no posters for wanted criminals anywhere. News probably took months to arrive to these parts, if they ever did.

Plus, they were both dying for a warm bath and a real bed.

“So, Marcus and Elyse, right?”, she asked, sitting down on a worn chair facing them, who were on a two-person couch. Just in case, they had given her fake names, for which Arthem was more prepared than Helia. “What brings you to these parts?”

“We are on official Church business”, responded Arthem, also ready for such a question. No one would question a Handler and warrior duo traveling around the country.

Gloria nodded, agreeing. “Of course, of course. Please keep working hard.”

They drank their tea in silence, with Helia doing her best not to show how bothered she was of having to lie to such a nice lady.

“So, uhm, will you tell us more about Aruka?”, Helia tried to move the conversation in a different direction.

“Oh, I’d be delighted to!”, responded Gloria with a big smile. “For starters, did you know that the village is named after her?”

She waited for them to react, as if it was something impressive, something they should have known. They shook their heads, which prompted her to continue. “This is a story that I heard from my grandma, and she heard it from hers. Today, most young people in the village have left, trying to find a better life in the city. I do hope that they do, but I also hope that they don’t forget where they came from, and that they tell the story to their own children.”

“A long, long time ago, so long that most places on the map had different names, life wasn’t as easy and peaceful as it is now”, she stopped herself, furrowing her brows. “Though, I guess that doesn’t apply anymore, right? With the Shadows, and all that. Anyway, that’s what how my grandma told it.”

“Monsters roamed the world. Sometimes, they resembled fearsome creatures, and other times, they took the shape of humans”, she paused for dramatic effect. “But still, Aruka thrived. Back then, the village was a big town, full of life. And the reason was, of course, our guardian deity. The mighty wolf warrior who had saved the life of the town’s founder, who dedicated its name to her in gratitude. The townspeople worshiped and took care of her, and in exchange, she protected them.”

“Until the evil looming over the world was defeated, and so, she wasn’t needing to fight anything anymore. Legend says she left, and had many adventures, which my grandma also had many stories of. Slowly, the Church as we know it took over in people’s hearts, so there wasn’t much of a cult to Aruka for a long, long time.”

Gloria took a sip of her tea, and they all knew better than to interject. “But everyone who has grown up around here knew in their hearts that she still watched over us. So, when the Shadows first attacked, we called for her, and there she was, riding a strike of lightning, ready to protect us.”

She said such an impossible thing as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Helia wasn’t exactly a scholar, but she knew her fair share about Spirits and Handling by now, and this made no sense.

When a Handler makes a Pact with a Spirit, the human gives up a portion of their Soul to allow it to manifest into the physical realm. The Mana in the air is teeming with immaterial Spirits, eager to acquire a body. Both of them then essentially become one entity, capable of Handling any element the Spirit has an affinity for.

There were also Great Spirits, who were so powerful that they could maintain a physical form without the need of a Pact. Sometimes, they would choose a person to be their Handler, and allow them to form a Pact. This was the case of Ceres and Helia.

But Aruka was a Spirit without a Handler, who seemingly had materialized out of thin air, if she had understood Gloria’s words correctly. They also didn’t know she was a Spirit, so, unless someone was lying, none of them had entered a Pact with her. Actually, was that even possible? To give up such a big part of yourself, and not know it? Having lived through it herself, Helia was skeptical.

“Anyway, I won’t bore you any longer with all this ancient history”, declared Gloria, standing up to tidy the plates up. “There are a few spare bedrooms upstairs, from my children who are now all grown up and far away. Please, make yourselves at home.”

“What do you think is going on?”, asked Helia, not knowing who her question was directed at. “Aruka is a Spirit, I’m sure of that.”

“She is, indeed”, confirmed Ceres. “A Great Spirit, even, since she was able to communicate with us.”

Too used to hearing Ceres talk so much all the time, Helia had overlooked that detail. Regular Spirits could talk with their Handlers, but couldn’t project their voices into other people’s minds.

“Maybe she was just somewhere else, then, and came to their rescue like Gloria said?”, tried to reason Helia, unconvinced herself.

“I don’t know, but whatever it is, I hope the Solarists never learn about it”, said Arthem with a really serious expression. “Just a hunch”, he added, responding to Helia and Ceres’ unspoken question.

With that worry lingering in the air between them, they took two different rooms and went to sleep.

Later that night, Arthem stood in front of the door of Helia’s room, hesitating. His right hand hovered on top of the doorknob, unsure what to do. His head was full of unresolved questions and emotions swirling around, which he didn’t know how to properly face.

“What do you want, Arthem?”

He repressed a scream, taken by surprise by Ceres’ voice speaking to him through the door. His whole body turned red from embarrassment.

“Uh, no, nothing, it can wait until tomorrow”, he mumbled. “I thought you would be asleep, Ceres. Sorry.”

“I told you, I don’t need to”, responded Ceres.

“Right. Yeah. Well, good night. Or not?”, he turned around, cursing his own clumsiness.

Helia slept really well that night.

The following day, they were getting ready to leave when one of the villagers intercepted them. Apparently, Aruka wanted to have a word.

Every door of every house in the village was open for the Spirit, and they all had big, fluffy beds ready for her. However, the past night, she had apparently stayed outside, standing guard, just in case any more Shadows appeared. Once again, Helia was reminded against her will of the fact that Spirits didn’t need to sleep.

Aruka was laying down on her front paws staring into the forest when they arrived. “Ah, you are here, good”, she perked up, wagging her tail slightly.

“We should get back on the road soon, what did you want to discuss with us?”, asked Arthem.

“You’re fighters, right? A Handler with her Spirit, and a man with the eyes of a warrior. You wanted to protect the village too, yesterday. Aruka remembers”, she said, sitting down in her rear. In this form, the sword scabbard hanging by her left side looked comically big for her size.

“We are, yes”, responded Helia, sitting down on a nearby rock and extending her hand towards Aruka, who immediately wagged her tail once again. Helia took that as a sign she was allowed, no, encouraged, to pat her head.

“Will you help Aruka?”, continued the Spirit. It was unclear if she meant the village, herself, or both.

“Well, Aruka, we really can’t stay here very long, you know”, Arthem tried to refuse indirectly. Even he wasn’t immune to the Spirit’s charms, who currently looked like a very cute dog with floppy ears, happy to get some scratches.

Helia frowned her brow at him. Just by looking into her eyes, he knew she disagreed. “What does Aruka need help with?”, Helia completely ignored his previous words.

“Aruka can sense a very strong danger to the south. It’s close enough to worry Aruka that it will come for her family. But maybe Aruka can’t defeat it alone, and if Aruka loses, who will protect Aruka?”, the way the Spirit talked was hard to follow, but they were all almost certain the last Aruka referred to the village.

Ceres closed his eyes for a second. “Aruka is right. There is something there, I can feel it, faintly, if I'm looking for it.”

“Please, help Aruka”, the canine Spirit said once again, this time putting her head on top of Helia’s thighs with big, sad eyes. Helia and Arthem both thought it was really unfair of her to be so cute, really.

Helia looked up at Arthem, searching for his approval. He also thought that it was really unfair for her to look at him like that, as if he would be able to refuse.

Plus, he knew she would just go without him, anyway.

Arthem sighed, averting his gaze from Helia’s and blushing slightly. “Fine, we will help you, Aruka.”

Both Helia and Aruka perked up at that with bright smiles. Really, they were both being extremely unfair to him, and they weren’t even aware.

“Yes, yes, thank you!”, Aruka jumped around happily, making Helia and Ceres laugh. “Let’s go, let’s go, before night!”, with that, she stepped back and transformed into her true form.

“Aruka can take you”, she said, lowering her body and offering her back.

“Oh, I have my own ride”, responded Helia with a wink. As if they had rehearsed, immediately after Ceres grew into his real size, and she jumped on top of him.

Arthem looked perplexed at all of them, unsure what to say. “Why don’t we just walk?”, he settled on.

“No time, it’s too far”, Aruka poked Arthem with her snout. With a very long sigh, he resigned himself and stepped over the Spirit, who then stood up. Surprised, Arthem almost fell off immediately, holding on to some of her thick fur as if his life depended on it.

“Hold on strong!”, she warned him. “Aruka is very fast!”

“Race you there!”, joked Ceres, spreading his wings wide.

Aruka jumped happily some more, whipping her now much bigger tail around, much to Arthem’s dismay. He laid down on her back, holding desperately onto her fur and the straps of her scabbard.

With a powerful flap of his wings, Ceres took off. At the same time, Aruka started running, her whole body becoming a blur of fur and electricity.

Up in the air, Ceres and Helia rode the Winds they themselves created, laughing. He kept his flight as close to the ground as possible, to make it fair. Aruka joined them, howling happily as she ran.

On her back, Arthem prayed for the first time in years.