“Eagar, the steward of Sylthia.”
“Eager? What kind of name is Eager? Why is he eager?”
“Eagar,” Charlie said, emphasizing the long a after the g. “A very wise man and one of our leaders.”
The closer he came, the more uneasy Jane felt. The older man was dressed all in black, in linen trousers, leather boots and a tight shirt that emphasized his lean body. Not one hair grew on his head, making his ears seem more prominent and pointed. His eyes, as dark as his clothing, had three sets of bags under them. Jane’s flesh crawled from the evil flowing from him. He looked like a pedophiliac priest or a satanic Uncle Fester.
She gulped and laid a hand on Charlie’s arm. “Ummm, he’s not involved in my trial, is he?”
Charlie looked at her, a surprised expression on his face. “Of course. The elders will hear your case and decide your future.”
This is not good news. She didn’t know why this elf should make a bad impression on her, but she’d learned long ago to trust her instincts, at least about people. Get-rich-quick schemes were another matter. Her people instincts never misled her. “A touch of the fey,” her mother called it. Wouldn’t it be more pronounced in the fairy world?
Her usual bravado deserted her. Jane took a deep breath and put on a wide smile. Eagar, partial holder of her fate, would not see her flinch.
Charlie stepped away from her to catch the bridle of the pony, stopping the wagon. He looked at his brother.
“Well met, Hugh. I did not look forward to the rest of the walk.”
His brother took out a handkerchief and wiped his brow. “You passed safely?”
“Safely enough.”
Jane caught the look that moved between them. Before she could comment, Charlie turned and drew her to his side.
“Jane, may I present my brother, Hugh Tanner, and Eagar Currge, elder of Sylthia. Gentlemen, this is Jane Drysdale, of whom you have no doubt heard.”
Murderess of a shape-shifting elf, plower-downer of a body-sharing rabbit, car destroyer and hostage in Disney World. Or an unconscious victim of a violent accident? She preferred the latter; it seemed more real.
Hugh nodded, touching a finger to his brow as if lifting an invisible cap. Eagar stared at her, not a trace of friendliness showing. Jane gulped, despite her earlier promise to not show fear. She couldn’t help her nerves. After all, she’d been accused of murder. Forgetting to ask Charlie the punishment for such a crime had been a mistake. To know the worst would curtail her wild imagination, which was wilder, seeing eager Eagar already condemning her with the look in his eyes.
Hugh leaned down and extended a hand to help her into the wagon. Jane took it. Already she felt shackles on her ankles and a noose around her neck. She settled behind Eagar, staring at his bald, malevolent head. She waited until Charlie sat down and Hugh turned the wagon.
The castle of Sylthia in front of her, Jane lifted her chin in defiance.
“Lay on, Macduff,” she said.
Chapter Three
“Shabby” best described Sylthia. “Derelict,” maybe. A new coat of paint here, a planter spilling over with geraniums there, indicated some attempts at upkeep, but the place reminded Jane of an elderly neighbor she’d had while growing up. No matter how hard he’d tried, his efforts at taking care of his house and yard couldn’t stop the gradual deterioration.
Jane didn’t know castles outside of movies and the trip she’d made with her family to Disney World the summer she’d turned seven. Those buildings had been clean and well tended. Sylthia looked as if the king couldn’t afford new curtains. Even the pennant at the top of the tallest tower, a blue cross on a white background, flapped in a half-hearted manner.
The wagon pulled through a second gate, then up a hill to the main building of the castle. The keep, Jane reminded herself from the picture book she’d read the week before to her brother Paul’s children. Home of the royal family. Home of the royal dungeons. Jane gulped and tightened her hold on Charlie’s arm. The thought of this being real and her never seeing her family again was sobering.
Hugh stopped the wagon. All three occupants turned to her.
“Is this when I’m clapped in irons and chained to the dungeon wall?” she asked, afraid she spoke the truth. She still couldn’t believe her bad luck.
Eagar looked as if the treatment might be too gentle for her. Charlie squeezed her hand. Hugh, bless him, smiled, dispelling some of her fear.
“The dungeons have been closed for years. We generally put our prisoners in a storeroom while they wait,” he said.
Storeroom? Great. Jane pictured rats gnawing her face while she slept. If she slept. She shivered.
“That’s a relief,” she muttered.
“Come, Jane,” Charlie said. He helped her disembark, his hand on her arm. It did not reassure her.
Eagar followed, brushing dust off his impeccable clothes. Hugh remained in the wagon.
“See you later?” he asked his brother.
Charlie shook his head. “I’m too tired. I’ll stay in my room here. Give my love to Mara.” He stepped back.
Hugh chirruped to the pony and drove off down the hill.
Mara? Jane asked herself. Who is Mara, and to whom does she belong? Charlie’s voice had sounded affectionate. A girlfriend? His wife?
She didn’t have time for more speculation. They moved toward the entrance. She counted twenty steps before an iron-pinioned oak door swung open.
Threadbare tapestries and tarnish. Cobwebs and dimness. The rooms they paraded her through reinforced her first impression of the palace: It needed a massive spring-cleaning.
They walked down a hall wider than a four-lane highway to the far back and a carpeted stairway. Eagar hustled them around corners and along corridors to another stairway, inlaid with wood this time. Two flights down found them negotiating narrower halls and plain wooden steps. By the time they reached their destination, Jane felt lost and claustrophobic.
Eagar produced a key from a pocket she hadn’t noticed and shoved it into the keyhole of a windowless door. It opened with a Boris Karloff rusty-hinges squeak. Jane expected bats to fly out, at least one of them a vampire in disguise, intent on sucking away her lifeblood.
“In you go,” Eagar said, the first he’d spoken to her.
You murderous tear-my-liver-out-and-serve-it-to-me-for-breakfast wench, Jane knew he wanted to add.
It took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the dim interior of the room. Sacks of grain, no doubt rodent hors d’oeuvres, reached six feet up the back wall. Barrels sat in one corner. Dust covered everything. There were no signs of rats. Yet.
“Restful and homelike,” Jane said, trying to be brave. Her insides had metamorphosed into enough Jell-O for a church picnic. She looked at Charlie imploringly.
“Leave her a light,” he said to Eagar. “She can’t do any damage, the room’s made of stone.”
Eagar hesitated. Jane bit her lip, knowing this wasn’t the time to beg or plead. That would come later.
She watched the unspoken communication between the two elves and held her breath. At last, Eagar pushed past and walked into the room. From another pocket, he conjured a small torch. With a flick of his wrist, it flared to light. He stuck it into a hole in the wall and spun on his heel.
Panic tore at Jane. “Charlie?” she asked. Her voice wobbled. She clung to his arm, not wanting to let go.
His brown eyes filled with compassion. “It will be all right.” He patted her hand. “Nothing will happen until tomorrow at the earliest.”
Don’t go, don’t go, her mind begged. Maybe telepathy would work in this strange land.
Maybe not. He didn’t seem to have received her signal.
“All is not lost,” he reassured her. Bending closer, he whispered in her ear, “I still have a few ideas. I’ll take care of you, Jane Drysdale.”
He pulled away. “Try to get some sleep,” he added. With obvious reluctance and a look she knew he meant to make her feel better, he backed into the hall.
Pure satisfaction on his face, Eagar shut the door. Although it was made of wood, it sounded to Jane like a 1940s movie, Jimmy-Cagney-on-death-row, prison-issued, you’re-going-to-fry metal clang. She’d been abandoned to the sputtering of a weak torch and the imminent arrival of several dozen hungry rats.
A short time later, in his office next to the castle’s receiving dock, Charlie was struggling to rid himself of Jane’s image. He felt as if he’d abandoned her. She was alone in a strange land and afraid. Even though a prisoner, she deserved better treatment. A cot, some food—he’d make sure Eagar improved her spare conditions. For that matter, the castle had enough empty guest rooms to accommodate her.
Poor Sylthia. Poor Lowth. Charlie tried to get comfortable. Unable to concentrate on work, he’d been planning to take a nap on the cot he used when business kept him from returning home to the Malin village. Which isn’t often anymore, he reflected. His side business, importing and exporting wool, like all businesses on Lowth, grew less each year.
Because of the Dymynsh. Faceless, an invisible entity, it spread its deadly tentacles to all corners of his world. Not exactly a disease, not exactly a blight, but both; no one could pinpoint when it had started. Old-timers said as long as twenty years before. Speculation on its cause yielded many theories. The current, most popular theory had to do with a spell cast by a wizard in the Malik forest. Charlie didn’t care or wonder. He only knew that, in his ten years of working with the different trades, each harvest, each shearing, brought less to the market.
The Dymynsh didn’t affect only wool, grain and cattle; Lowth’s population had dwindled over the last few years as well. The elderly and infirm died more frequently. Rare illnesses swept the land, taking many victims. Charlie, the middle child in a family of five, belonged to the last generation of multiple-child families. Women couldn’t conceive. A single offspring or, more alarmingly, none at all, seemed normal now.
Lowth was dying. The Dymynsh, insidious and persistent, hindered or prevented life. He’d seen how it had crippled his beautiful world. People, crops, livestock, food: all had suffered. Each brought more repercussions.
He stopped, postponing thoughts of Lowth’s fate until later, after he brought about Jane’s release.
Jane. Her green eyes haunted him. Outspoken, nonsense-speaking, annoying mortal she might be, but he’d never met anyone like her. Wanting to see his wings again—he groaned at the memory of her boldness. Her presence in his world upset his careful routine. He disliked that he had to represent her. But part of him liked being around her.
Charlie twisted on the cot, restless. Despite his reassurances, the lack of a corpse was her only defense. How strong would the prosecutor’s case be? There were five witnesses.
Of course, if the elders found her guilty, her execution would contradict Charlie’s people’s fight against the Dymynsh. Her debt might be paid in another way. He closed his eyes, thinking about it. For the first time in hours, he relaxed. A punishment in Lowth made return to her world impossible. He chuckled. Maybe they’d found a cure for the Dymynsh after all.
He fell asleep to thoughts of Jane battling the scourge. It never had a chance.
“Move and ye die,” a voice hissed in Jane’s ear, startling her from sleep.
Can’t I ever wake to bluebirds twittering and coffee brewing? she wondered. In the past twenty-four hours, she’d regained consciousness to a car wreck, after being drugged and seeing a man with wings, and now she rode The Disgruntled Pirates of the Caribbean ride, no doubt with Long John S’elf’er.
The cold touch of metal against her throat suppressed her snappy retort. Her heart hammering, she squeezed her eyes shut. There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home. She transmitted the plea in silence. Glinda, hear me.
“Name’s Muttle, and ye ain’t never goin’ home,” the stranger said.
Jane’s eyes snapped open, despite the command not to move. They change into animals and read minds. What next? Teleportation?
“Death for ye, that’s what,” came the answer.
Jane stared at the little person in front of her. Not Little Person, like a midget, but a tiny, incredibly detailed miniature person. Or elf, or fairy, or whatever species he might be. Barely two feet tall, in tattered brown clothes, he stared back at her through multicolored eyes. Green and blue and hints of yellow swirled in their depths, like a fiery water opal. Thin brown hair covered his head. Slim, tapered fingers held a knife with a three-inch blade. She assumed its mate lay against her throat, ready to slice her to ribbons.
She’d never seen anything like him, and again the reality of her bizarre situation slammed into her. Last night hadn’t been a dream. Those events had actually taken place—the accident, the murder, her imprisonment. George Lucas wasn’t testing his newest animatronics on her. She’d left Earth. A new world had trapped her. Depression struck.
“You’re real,” she whispered.
“Of course I be real, daft mortal. Did ye expect else?” The creature moved back a step, releasing the pressure on her neck. He pirouetted for her inspection. “Like what ye see? It may be yer last sight.”
Jane doubted he would hurt her. She had a feeling he was all talk and boasts. Slowly, she sat up from her lumpy mattress made of grain sacks. Aches and pains she’d forgotten reintroduced themselves. A car accident, being slung over someone’s shoulder and a nap on a bushel or so of corn contributed to the stiffness of her body. With great care, so as not to alarm the halfling, she extended one hand.
“I won’t hurt you,” she reassured him.
“Hurt I? Humph.” He twitched his little head. “I be not afraid of the likes of ye.” He brandished twin knives in what should have been a menacing way. Instead, Jane smiled at his comedic attempt at fierceness.
“Who are you? What are you?” she asked.
He rolled his eyes in the same manner she had done to her parents countless times during her adolescence.
“Be ye deaf? I be Muttle, a Belwaith of Malin.”
Belwaith? Was that some kind of fairy? A pixie? Or a half-breed? She wished she could ask Charlie.
“He sleeps,” Muttle said.
How did he know?
“Lots of things I know.”
“Hey,” she said, rolling to her feet, heedless of any danger the creature posed. She towered over him. “Stop that. It’s rude to dip into people’s minds.”
“I stop not.” He thrust out a tiny chin.
“You stop, yes,” Jane retorted, angry. When he flourished a knife in the air, she added, “What are you going to do, stab me in the kneecap? I can pick you up and fling you against the wall if I want. Stay out of my head, Muttle, Belwaith of Malin. I am very, very dangerous.” She emphasized the last sentence by stepping closer to the creature. She’d taken a lot of crap from the citizens of Lowth. If she had to fight back, a mini-Munchkin was as good a place to start as any.
Muttle regarded her through whirling, sea-colored eyes. After a moment, he grinned to reveal surprisingly white teeth.
“I like mortal,” he said. “Mortal not afraid.” The knives disappeared into the folds of his clothes.
“My name is Jane,” she said, relieved the weapons were no longer an immediate threat. She tried to calm her heart. Her mother warned her often enough about the prudence of thinking first and speaking later. Maybe she should listen for once, especially with knives involved.
“Yes. Jane of the dryad’s dale.” He circled around her, no doubt as fascinated by her as she by him.
“Riiight. Dryad’s dale.” Why not? Maybe if she claimed kinship to them, she’d be exempt from the death penalty in a murder trial.
“How did you get in here? What do you want?” she asked.
Muttle crooked a finger and shuffled in bare feet to one of the barrels in the corner.
“Here.” He pointed.
Jane fetched the torch and handed it to him. She took hold of the barrel and grappled it aside. A hole the size of a melon lay car
ved in the stone wall.
“Nice,” she said. “Where does it lead?”
“Him.”
“Him? Him who?” Charlie? God forbid, Eagar?
“No. Him.” Awe filled Muttle’s voice.
“Okaaay. Him. Are you going back now?” Maybe she could tie a message to the Belwaith. Help. Save me. I’m being held captive by demented movie characters.
Muttle took her hand, his skin cool and dry.
“Come, Jane of the dryads. Sent me to get ye.”
“To get me? Who? Him?”
He nodded.
Jane disentangled herself from the creature. “Look, Muttle, as much as I’d like to escape from here and tick off Eagar, I can’t do any of that shape-shifting, voodoo, hocus-pocus stuff.” At his bewildered look, she said in a softer tone, “I don’t fit.”
“Yes.” He nodded vigorously. “Sylthia like Jane. Sylthia move for Jane.” He took her hand again. Tugging, he pulled her over to the opening.
Resigned to whatever he had in mind, Jane knelt down and let the Belwaith guide her. He put her hand on the stone.
“Pull,” he commanded.
Jane sighed. It wouldn’t do any good, but she gripped the rough edge and gave a halfhearted tug.
The stone blurred. She felt the hole expand to twice its previous size. Unable to believe she’d actually changed its shape, she threw all her weight into the next effort.
An opening the size of a refrigerator formed and stabilized.
Jane blinked in surprise. She looked over to Muttle. He smiled, delight dancing across his face.
“Well, bless my buttons,” she exclaimed. “Come on, Scarecrow, we’re off to see the Wizard.” Taking her diminutive rescuer’s hand, she walked through the gap.
Chapter Four
“So, what’s she like?”
Charlie looked up from his evening meal and over at his sister-in-law, Mara. She stood with one hand on an ample hip, regarding him through inquisitive hazel eyes.
“Who?” he asked, his mind on the work undone today. His nap short-lived, he’d tried to involve himself in his duties. Soon, that too had proved futile. Hoping to have better luck the next day, he’d left Sylthia to walk down the hill to the house in Malin Village that he shared with Hugh and Mara.
What Do You Say to a Naked Elf? Page 3
