Once Upon a Dreadful Time

by Dennis L McKiernan

  “My lord,” said Petain, “the Sprites report that Orbane’s forces gain enormous strength as they march. Their numbers increase seemingly without bound.”

  Roél said, “Then mayhap that’s all the more reason for us to make a stand in a narrow lieu where they cannot bring those numbers to bear.”

  Luc nodded in agreement with Roél. “ ’Tis the best way for dealing with great numbers, yet what of the Sickness? How will we contend with that?”

  Émile sighed and said, “The Sprites tell us that the throng marches out before the contamination, and so I deem we can do battle until the corruption comes upon us.” He looked about and said, “It is not the way I would want it, yet it is the best we can do.”

  “Mayhap the Firsts can deal with it, as well as with Orbane,” said Laurent.

  Blaise shook his head. “If I understand what went before in the war with Orbane, the Firsts could not do more than delay him. And, given Lady Lot’s rede, I think that making a stand in the slot is not the last gasp, not the final day.”

  Laurent growled. “Why do we depend upon the words of a soothsayer?”

  “My boy,” said Sieur Émile, “she is not a mere soothsayer. Lady Lot, Lady Verdandi, she is one of the Fates.”

  A silence fell among them as on toward the gap they fared, but then Michelle said, “It is the last quatrain that seems to provide some clue, yet what it might mean escapes my grasp.”

  “Refresh my memory,” said Émile.

  Michelle nodded and intoned:

  “Summon them not ere the final day

  For his limit to be found.

  Great is his power all order to slay,

  Yet even his might has a bound.”

  As Michelle fell silent, Luc said, “‘All order to slay,’ might that not refer to the corruption of the River of Time, mayhap throwing all things into chaos?”

  “I think you have it,” said Blaise.

  They rode a bit farther, and Blaise added, “It seems to me that when the Firsts come to the battle at last, then the limit of Orbane’s power will be reached.”

  “And . . . ?” asked Laurent.

  Blaise looked at his older brother. “ ‘And,’ you ask? Laurent, I do not know what will take place when he reaches the limit of his power. Yet this I do know: whatever it is that might happen, Lady Lot says we need it to occur.”

  They rode onward, for long moments, and finally Sieur Émile said, “Since none has come up with a better plan, tell all your warriors this: if the gap is suitable for making a stand, we shall do so. And if the pollution comes upon us, then will we make our retreat.”

  “What of our deployment?” asked Bailen.

  Émile said, “Orbane is a day behind us. Hence, let us first look at the ground in the gap ere we make our plans.”

  The following day the skies grew black, lightning and thunder raging overhead. Even so, no rain fell, nor did the darkness bring cooling air with it.

  “They will not be far behind,” said Blaise, sitting on a rock and sharpening his blade.

  “Non, they will not,” said Luc, adjusting the tack on Deadly Nightshade, his well-trained horse of war.

  A candlemark passed, and a horn sounded to the fore.

  “They are sighted,” said Laurent.

  “Indeed,” said Roél, buckling on Coeur d’Acier.

  They mounted up, did these four knights, did these four horsemen—deadly in their power—on mounts white and roan and black and grey. And they rode up a small slope toward the opening of the gap, for with Léon’s chevaliers following, they would be the first to meet the foe after the archers were done.

  Up to the crest of the rise they went, and there they stopped. And they watched as across the plain below came Orbane’s throng, the putrescence following after.

  “Oh, Mithras,” said Blaise, “there must be sixty, seventy thousand of them.”

  “More like ninety,” said Léon, riding up alongside.

  “They’ll funnel down when they get to this gap,” said Luc, “and we can deal with—what?—two or three thousand at a time?”

  Émile, who had joined them, looked at the width of the pass. “I think even less; mayhap half that.”

  “Even so,” said Luc, “with their numbers, they can afford for ten to fall for every one of us.”

  “Then mayhap you can use some help,” sounded a familiar voice amid a jingle of silver bells.

  Luc turned to see Prince Regar stop alongside, and downslope behind him came the Fairy army, Auberon in the lead.

  53

  Straits

  Under roiling black skies streaked with lightning and re-verberating with thunder, Auberon looked down at the oncoming throng and then beyond to the bilious cloud that followed, and he sucked air in between clenched teeth. “He has raised the Sickness.”

  Both Flic and Fleurette, sitting upon Regar’s tricorn, gasped in alarm. Buzzer was quite asleep between them, under the dark skies.

  “Oui, my lord,” said Émile.

  “Sickness? What is this so-called ‘sickness’?” asked Regar. “Is it that low-lying yellow-green cloud I see?”

  “Oui,” said Blaise at the prince’s side. “Note how it moves: it follows Orbane’s horde.”

  “To what purpose?”

  “With it, somehow, Orbane intends to pollute the River of Time.”

  Auberon sighed and looked at Regar. “It comes from the under-bottom of swamps, where it lies entrapped unless someone or something sets it free. It can cause great illnesses among living things, and will slay all that remains within its embrace too long.”

  “Even the Fey, grand-père?”

  “Especially the Fey, mon petit-fils.”

  “Can you do nothing to stop it?” asked Luc. “Use Fairy magic or such?”

  “Non. Gloriana’s geas has seen to that.”

  “Gloriana?” asked Blaise.

  “Orbane’s mère,” said Regar.

  Blaise cocked an eyebrow, an unspoken question in his gaze.

  “Auberon’s consort,” said Regar, quietly. “Orbane is their only child.”

  “Oh, my,” said Blaise, but then fell silent.

  As they watched the throng and the Sickness move across the plains and toward the gap where the allies stood, Auberon sank into thought. Finally he said, “But there is something I can do, and that is to cast a protection spell over all of us.”

  “All of us?” asked Émile.

  “All of the allies,” replied Auberon.

  “Horses too?”

  “Oui. Horses too.”

  “But what of the geas?” asked Regar.

  “This spell is to give us temporary protection from some of the ills of the Sickness,” replied Auberon, “hence is a healer’s charm, and one, I think, that I will be able to cast, for it is not in direct opposition to Orbane.”

  “Will it negate the putrescence?” asked Émile, hope playing across his face.

  “Not completely,” replied Auberon. “It will protect us on the fringes of the contagion, but the deeper one goes into the miasma, the less effect it will have.”

  “Will it allow one of us to reach Orbane?” asked Regar.

  Blaise swiftly glanced from Regar to Auberon to see the look of sad dismay that flickered across Auberon’s face. But then Auberon’s mien shifted to one of determination, and he said, “I don’t know. Certainly it will not protect one of the Fey long enough to reach him, and you, my grandson, are one of the Fey. But as to a human doing so, that I cannot say.”

  “I will go,” said Laurent.

  And I, said Blaise and Roél together.

  “But first,” said Luc, pointing to the masses of Goblins and Bogles and Trolls and Serpentines, “we will have to win our way through that.”

  “You four?” asked Regar. “You four will go after Orbane?”

  A rakish grin crossed Luc’s face as he glanced at the three others. “We four.”

  We four! they responded.

  “But as you say, Prince
Luc,” said Auberon, “first you have to win your way through an entire throng.” The Fey Lord turned to Émile. “My archers will stand to the fore, for with each arrowcast, we will bring one of them down . . . until we run out of shafts, that is, for there are more of the foe than we bargained for.”

  “And I will stand with your archers,” said Michelle, sitting ahorse to one side, with her Wolves gathered ’round.

  “It will be perilous, my lady,” said Auberon.

  “Nevertheless,” replied the princess.

  Auberon looked to Émile for a countering word, but he merely shook his head and said, “I lost that argument long past, my lord. Besides, she will have seven Wolves and a warrior named Galion to protect her.”

  “Trained Wolves?”

  “Oh no, my lord,” replied Chelle. “It is Borel’s pack. We work as a team.”

  Auberon smiled and said, “And where is your prince, my lady?”

  “Trapped with the others in the Castle of Shadows,” said Chelle, “or so it is we think.”

  Regar took in a sharp breath at this news, and both Flic and Fleurette burst into tears. “What others?” asked Regar.

  “The entire royal family,” said Chelle. “Valeray, Saissa, Borel, Liaze, Alain, Céleste, Camille, and Duran—all trapped, borne away on a black wind. Mayhap Raseri and Rondalo, too, for a black wind bore them away as well.”

  Auberon gestured at the roiling sky. “He was always master of the winds; the rage above declares it, if nought else.”

  “You’ve got to get them out,” said Fleurette, choking back her tears.

  Luc jerked a nod and said, “As soon as I retrieve the key to the castle and we find someone to fly it through the Great Darkness to set the prisoners free. Hradian has the amulet, and we deem she is marching at Orbane’s side.”

  “This is ill news, and mayhap there is more,” said Auberon, “but it will have to wait. I must needs cast a great spell, and then deploy my archers.”

  As they rode back down to the midst of the army, Regar glanced across at Luc and Roél, Blaise and Laurent. “My mother once told me of an old legend about four deadly horsemen: the fable tells that the rider on the white horse was Plague himself, while the one on red was War; the one on black—or was it grey? Ah, never mind—was Famine, while the one on grey was Death.”

  Blaise laughed and said, “Well, then, I must be War, for I ride a red horse. Whereas, Laurent on white is Plague. That leaves Luc on black to be Famine or Death and Roél to be vice versa, whichever it is the legend says. But as for me, I would pick Roél to be Death.”

  “And why is that, other than simple family pride.”

  “Because he has a special sword—Coeur d’Acier.”

  “Heart of Steel?” Regar frowned and declared, “But iron and steel are forbidden in Faery.”

  Blaise smiled. “Oui, I know, though I’ve been told there are a few exceptions—the arms and armor of the Dwarves of the ship Nordavind being one, and the weapons of King Arle and his riders being another, now that they’ve broken their curse, though they’ll not take iron or steel into the Halls of the Fairy Lord ever again. Yet did I not say Roél’s sword is special? The steel, you see, is bound by arcane runes flashed in silver, hence I am told it does not twist the aethyr, whatever that might be. It was given to Roél by Sage Geron, who got it from a source he will not or perhaps cannot name. Regardless, with the sword Roél cut through the Changeling Lord’s magical protection and took off his head, and thereby set Laurent and me free from an enchantment.”

  “It overcame a spell of protection?”

  “Oui,” said Blaise. “I think it’s the steel that did it, or perhaps the runes.”

  “Mayhap both together,” said Regar. “ ’Tis a powerful weapon indeed.”

  “Then can we name Roél ‘Death’?”

  Regar laughed and said, “As you will, Blaise, as you will. But regardless of what you call one another, I hope that when you four go after Orbane, you are just as deadly as are your namesakes.”

  “So do I,” replied Blaise, as Roél and Luc merely shook their heads and Laurent snorted and spurred forward to come alongside Auberon.

  “A splendid high-stepper of a mount you have, my lord,” said Laurent. “Are all Fairy horses such as he?”

  “To a lesser degree,” replied Auberon. He patted the white animal’s neck. “Asphodel is quite special.”

  “Asphodel? Ah, then that’s where Duran gets the name for his toy hor—” Of a sudden, Laurent’s words jerked to a halt, and he frowned in puzzlement and then his face lit up in revelation.

  “My lord, I do not know what all of this means, but Lady Wyrd gave me a rede.”

  “Skuld?”

  “Oui, my lord, and I think it has to do with Asphodel.”

  “Asphodel? Say on, Laurent. Say on.”

  “The rede goes like this.” Laurent paused in recollection and then intoned:

  “Swift are the get of his namesake,

  That which a child does bear;

  Ask the one who rides the one

  To send seven children there.

  At the wall there is a need

  For seven to stand and wait,

  Yet when they are asked to run,

  They must fly at swiftest gait.

  The whole must face the one reviled

  Where all events begin:

  Parent and child and child of child

  Else shall dark evil win.”

  Laurent paused and Auberon frowned and said, “I do not understand.”

  “My lord, Prince Duran, the child of Alain and Camille, has a toy horse named Asphodel. And so the first two lines of the rede refer to that: Swift are the get of his namesake, that which a child does bear. Thus the get of Asphodel are swift, or so I would surmise. Does he have any offspring?”

  “Oui, he has sired seven colts.”

  Laurent clenched a fist and grinned in triumph. “Then list, the next lines say: Ask the one who rides the one to send seven children there. Hence, my lord, I ask, can you send the seven colts somewhere?”

  “Oui, I only need to give the command. But where?”

  “To the Black Wall of the World, my lord, for the next lines say: At the wall there is a need for the seven to stand and wait. Hence they are to go to the Black Wall of the World, for what other wall could it be? And when they get there they are to wait.”

  “Ah,” said Auberon, then frowned. “But wait for what?”

  “I don’t know, my lord, but Lady Wyrd’s words must mean something, else she would not have said them. She also said that if I did not give this message to the one for whom it is intended, then all will be lost forever. And you, my lord, are surely the one for whom it is intended.”

  Auberon slowly nodded. “Sieur, I do not know what is intended, yet if Skuld said those words, then indeed I must heed them.”

  Auberon raised his silver horn to his lips and blew a call, silent to the human ears, though Asphodel nickered and all the Fey glanced toward their lord.

  And even as Laurent looked on, out from among the Fairy horses, seven trotted forth. White they were, each and every one, as was their sire, and they were caparisoned with gilt bridles and saddles, and silver bells sounded as they came, and each was laded with accoutrements to equip a warrior.

  “Where are their riders?” asked Laurent.

  “They haven’t any,” said Auberon. “Asphodel, by snorting and nickering, insisted they come unridden and bearing gear, and now, it seems by this rede, we know why.”

  “Perhaps he, too, speaks with Lady Wyrd,” said Laurent.

  Auberon laughed and said, “Mayhap.”

  Then the Fey lord dismounted and stepped to the colts, and they all looked at him intently, as if expecting a command. And Auberon uttered words in an arcane tongue, but what he said, Laurent could not tell, yet the seven colts whickered in return, and then galloped away, straight for the end of the pass toward which the throng marched.

  Laurent wheeled his horse
, Impérial, and galloped after, yet the colts were all the way down on the plains ere Laurent reached the crest of the outlet slope where he could see. He marveled at their fleetness as they hurtled ahead, passing wide of the oncoming horde and racing onward.

  “Loose!” cried Auberon, and arrows flew into the ranks of the throng, each one bringing sissing death with it. And Goblins shrilled and fell slain, as did Bogles and Serpentines. Trolls, though, were felled by heavy crossbow bolts, manned by Sieur Émile’s men.

  Yet onward came the horde, stepping over their fallen and boiling into the narrow pass, and again and again the archers loosed their sleet of arrows, thousands of the enemy dying with each volley.

  Goblin shafts flew in return, most to be caught on the pavises born by the shield men.

  Michelle stood in the ranks of the archers, her own shafts nearly as deadly as those flown by the Fey, but the Fairy arrows were quite lethal, in spite of the fact that their magic had been negated by Gloriana’s unbreakable spell, a spell cast long past.

  And yet the throng came onward, into the teeth of death, and soon on both sides the shafts of the archers had been spent, and now the phalanx of spearmen stood in the way of the horde.

  Thousands of Goblins, gibbering in fear, were pushed forward by those behind, and, shrieking in terror, they tried to turn and flee back into the ranks. But the press would not let them, and on they came, only to be spitted by lances, or slaughtered by the blades of the men and the Fey. And the ones behind stumbled through entrails and blood and severed limbs and over the corpses of their dead, only to be slaughtered in turn.

  Yet not all were killed ere they got in strikes of their own, and allies fell before the wildly swung clubs and bludgeons and scimitars and tulwars, of which there were so very many.

  And the throng battered the allies back and back, deeper into the gut of the pass.

  Time and again the knights hammered into the horde, reaping death as their harvest. And leading these charges were four lethal horsemen on white and red and black and grey mounts. They were not Plague and War and Famine and Death, yet they were nigh as fatal.