Elbryan looked up to his elven friend, but found no answer there. Carefully, his hands trembling, he repacked the satchel, then stood tall before Juraviel and the Lady of Andur'Blough Inninness.
"The red band is soaked in permanent salves," Juraviel explained. "Both bandage and tourniquet. The green will filter air when placed over nose and mouth, will even allow you to pass under water for a short time."
"These are our gifts to you, Nightbird," Lady Dasslerond added. "These and this!" She snapped her fingers and Belli'mar Joycenevial stepped forth from the ranks of elves, cradling the beautiful bow.
"Hawkwing," the old elf explained, handing it over. "It will serve as a staff, as well." With a simple movement, he removed the feathered tip, taking the bowstring with it, then just as easily replaced it, bending the bow to restring it with hardly an effort. "Fear not, for though it seems delicate, you'll not break it. Not by striking, not by a bolt of lightning, not by the breath of a great dragon!"
His proclamation was met by a sudden burst of well-deserved cheering for the old elf.
"Draw it," Juraviel prompted.
Elbryan put down the pack and raised the bow. He was amazed by its balance, by the smoothness of its long and comfortable draw. As the bow bent, the three feathers on its top tip separated from one another, looking like the "fingers" on the end of the wing of a gliding hawk.
"Hawkwing," the old bowyer said again to Elbryan. "It will serve you as bow for all your days, and as staff until you have earned your sword, if ever you do."
Tears in his eyes, the old elf handed over a quiver full of long arrows, then slowly turned and moved back to his place in line.
"Our gifts to you," Lady Dasslerond said again. "Which do you consider the most precious?"
Elbryan paused for a long while, understanding that this was a critical moment for him, a subtle test that he could not fail. "All the supplies and clothes," he began, "are worthy of a king, even a king of elves. And this bow," he said with all reverence, looking at Joycenevial. "I am sure that it has no equal and know that I am truly blessed in carrying it.
"But the Oracle," Elbryan continued, turning back to Lady Dasslerond, his voice firm, "that is the gift I hold most precious."
The Lady didn't blink, but suddenly Elbryan knew that he spoke mistakenly. Perhaps it was the slightly crestfallen look of his friend Juraviel that tipped him to the truth of his own thoughts.
"No," he said quietly, "that is not the greatest of your gifts."
"What is?" the Lady prompted anxiously.
"Nightbird," Elbryan replied without hesitation. "All that I am; all that I have become. I am a ranger now, and no gift in all the world - not all the gold, not all the silverel, not all the kingdoms - could be greater. The greatest gift is the name you have given me, the name I have earned through your patience and your time, the name that marks me as elf-friend. There could be no higher honor, no higher responsibility."
"You are ready to face that responsibility," Juraviel dared to interject.
"It is time for you to go," Lady Dasslerond stated.
Elbryan's first instinct was to ask where, but he held the thought private, trusting that the elves would tell him if he needed to know. When they did not, when they did nothing but bow to him once, then filter out of the field, leaving him, once again completely alone, he had his answer.
The Oracle had shown him the way.
The land was relatively flat and brown, with sparse low shrubs poking here and there. But the gentle slopes were deceiving and the ranger, running smooth, could not usually see very far in any direction. There were the Moorlands - the Soupy Bogs, they had been affectionately called by the settlers on the edge of the Wilderlands. To the child Elbryan, this had been the place of wildly exaggerated fireside tales.
Except that now, he ran through the Moorlands, and recalling those tales of howling beasts and horrid guardians wasn't very comforting.
The mist was light this day, not closing in on the man as it had the previous day, when Elbryan felt as if watching eyes were with him every step. He came over a rise and saw a silvery stream winding below him, meandering this way and that across the brown clay. Instinctively, the ranger's hand went to his waterskin, and he found it less than half full. He trotted down to the stream, which was just a few feet across and less than a foot deep, and dipped his hand, nodding when he found that the water was quite clear. The ground here was simply too compacted to be swept up in the light flow. Rivulets of runoff had been crystalline all through the Moorlands, except in those low basins where the water collected and remained, where the ground and water seemed to blend, to melt together into a thick muddy stew.
Elbryan continued his inspection of the stream to make sure that nothing ominous was swimming along its course, then hooked his pack on the stiff branch of a prickly shrub and gingerly removed his boots. He had been running for five days, the last two in the Moorlands. The cool water and the soft bed beneath it felt good indeed on his sore feet; he briefly considered pulling off all his clothes and lying down in the flow.
But then he felt something, or heard something. One of his senses subtly called out a warning to him. The ranger froze where he stood, tuned his senses outward to his environment. The muscles in his feet relaxed, nerves on end, feeling for vibrations beneath him. He turned his head side to side slowly, eyes sharp.
He noted a splash, not so far in the distance upstream.
Elbryan considered his position. The stream flowed around one of the deceivingly high rises, turning out of sight just a couple dozen yards from where he stood.
He heard another splash, closer, and then a voice, though he could not make out the words. He looked around again, this time searching for a vantage point, a perch from which he might ambush any enemies. The terrain wasn't very promising; the best he could do would be backtrack up the rise and crouch just beyond the ridgeline. He would have to time his move perfectly, though, for various areas of that high ground would be visible from around the upstream bend.
Elbryan dismissed the notion altogether; he was on the eastern edge of the Moorlands by now, not so far from human settlements. Whoever or whatever was coming certainly wasn't kicking up a storm - it could not be giants. There was no reason for him to think that these would be enemies.
Even if they were, Nightbird had Hawkwing in hand.
He pulled his forest-green cloak tighter about his shoulders, lifted the hood up over his head and cap, then went about his business, crouching low to dip his waterskin in the stream.
The noise increased - by the volume and consistency of the splashing, Elbryan figured there must be about a half dozen bipedal creatures approaching. More important to him, though, was the continuing conversation, not the words, of which he could understand only a few, but the high, grating tone of the voices. Elbryan had heard such voices before.
The splashing and talking stopped suddenly; the creatures had rounded the bend. Elbryan remained crouching. He peeked out around the side of his hood to make sure that they carried no bows.
Goblins, six of them, stood and gawked from barely thirty feet away, one with a spear up on its shoulder, but not yet ready to throw. The others held clubs and crude swords, but thankfully, no bows.
Elbryan stayed low. With his posture and his cloak the creatures couldn't be sure of his race.
"Eeyan kos?" one of them called.
Elbryan smiled under his hood and did not look the goblins' way.
"Eeyan kos?" the same one asked again. "Dokdok crus?"
"Duck, duck, goose," Elbryan said under his breath, the name of a game he had played perhaps a decade before. He smiled again as he thought of that innocent time, but it was not a longlasting sentiment, swept away in the wave of darker emotions as he considered what creatures such as these had done to his world.
The goblin called out again. It was time to answer, he knew, and since he had no idea what the goblin was saying, he merely stood up tall, too tall to be any goblin, and slowly dr
opped back the hood of his cloak.
Half of the goblin party shrieked; the spear wielder accompanied its yell by rushing three strides forward and hurling its weapon.
Elbryan waited until the last possible moment, then flashed Hawkwing across in front of him, deflecting the spear. He moved the bow around and out as it connected, diverting then defeating the spear's momentum, turning it harmlessly in midair and then catching it mid-shaft in his right hand as his left brought Hawkwing back to his side.
Suddenly he held the spear, aimed right back at its original wielder. That stopped the goblins cold before they could even begin to charge.
Emotions churned confusingly in the young man. He remembered the teachings of the elves, mostly of tolerance, though they held no love for goblinkind or for any of the fomorian races. However, Elbryan was not in any human settlement, not in any land claimed by his kind, and quite possibly was within the boundaries of goblin territory. If that was the case, would he be justified in waging battle with these six?
Yet, one had just attacked him, though it might have come more from fear than aggression. And Elbryan, whatever logical reasoning he summoned, could not possibly dismiss those memories of Dundalis.
He hesitated; were these goblins responsible for what their kin had done to Elbryan's home? The one the elves had named Nightbird had to give himself an honest answer; he owed that much, at least, to Belli'mar Juraviel.
A flick of his powerful wrist sent the spear flying back the way it had come, to land with a splash and stick up from the stream just a foot or so in front of the creature who had thrown it. Elbryan cast a warning glance the goblins' way, then turned sideways to them, focusing on the water, and bent down to finish filling his waterskin.
He had given them one chance; a large part of him, that boy who remembered Dundalis, hoped they would not take it.
He heard and felt the water stirring as the creatures came on slowly. He sensed that at least two had broken away, moving out of the stream to flank him front and back.
Elbryan measured their approach, kept wary for any hint that the spear was coming his way once more.
Everything seemed to stop, all movement, all splashing. The creatures were not more than ten feet away, he knew. Slowly he turned square with the main group of four, rising to stand straight, a foot and more higher than his tallest foe.
"Eenegash!" the closest and ugliest of the group demanded, holding forth its sword, a two-foot blade not unlike the one Olwan had given Elbryan for his patrols.
"I do not understand," he replied evenly.
The goblins muttered something among themselves; Elbryan realized that they could not understand his language either. Then the ugly one turned back to him.
"Eenegash!" it said again, more forcefully, and it pointed its sword at the staff, then at the riverbank.
"I hardly think so," Elbryan replied, smiling widely and shaking his head. In a barely noticeable movement, the ranger pulled the feathered tip from the bow, tucking it and the bowstring into his belt.
The goblin gave a threatening growl. Elbryan shook his head again.
The creature rushed to close half the distance and prodded with its sword, a movement more of intimidation than an actual attack. But it was the creature who was surprised.
Elbryan grabbed the staff, right hand over left; reversed his grip with his left as the pole started moving, and snapped it across so quickly in front of him that the goblin never had a chance to move. The staff connected simultaneously on the sword and the goblin's hand, knocking the weapon from the creature's grasp and launching it a dozen feet away. A subtle shift, still too quick for the creature to dodge, and Elbryan stabbed the tapered end out straight, striking the goblin on its sloping forehead right above and between the eyes, laying it out straight in the stream.
With a whoop of delight, the other goblins, predictably, came on.
Elbryan brought his staff back in, letting go with his left hand, flipping with his right to send the forward tip under. Never breaking the momentum, he extended his right arm out, catching the closing goblin, the one that had run out of the stream to flank the man, completely by surprise, Hawkwing's tip stabbing right under its chin.
Back in came the weapon, a full and defensive spin between the ranger and the three goblins coming along in the stream. Elbryan caught the staff firmly in his left hand and extended that arm out in similar fashion so that the other flanking goblin was poked away. Back in came the staff, half spun and caught again in the right hand, half spun, angled outward diagonally, and caught again in the left, and then the right hand catching it, too, as the trailing end came around and over, Elbryan shifting the weapon's angle and striding boldly ahead. The downward chop connected squarely on the head of the center goblin, the spearwielder, Hawkwing's incredible hardness splitting wide the creature's skull with a resounding crack!
Elbryan swept his staff out to the left, knocking aside a club strike, then back to the right, parrying a sword. Back left, back right, each time the angle shifting to defeat the intended attack. Then back left, then left again, knocking wide the creature's club arm. Elbryan stepped left as well and spun, avoiding an awkward cut of its sword. He came around hard and low, Hawkwing flying before him. The goblin, to its credit, recognized the circuitous attack and managed to get its club down, but Elbryan merely lifted Hawkwing's flying tip, cracking across the creature's skinny forearm, shattering bone. The club fell into the stream; the goblin shrieked and clutched at its arm.
Elbryan stepped forward, facing the creature squarely, staff coming horizontal in front of him, and punched out with his left, right, left, Hawkwing swishing about to smack the goblin hard on alternate sides of its head. The ranger dropped his right foot back after the last strike, retracting the staff, then turned sidelong to his current foe, expecting an attack from the sword wielder. Seeing that creature in full flight, Elbryan stabbed the staff back out hard to his left, hitting the dazed and battered goblin right in the face.
He didn't see but heard the movement as the goblin that had come in at his left struggled to its feet. Hawkwing went swinging again, turning a vertical circle under and then over Elbryan's right shoulder as he turned and leaped out to the left. Down raced the staff above the angle of the terrified goblin's pitiful attempt to parry, crashing hard against the base of the creature's neck. The goblin jolted perfectly still and then, as if the wave of energy had rolled right down to its feet and then come rushing back up, the creature went into a weird backward leap, landing on its feet for a long moment, then slowly falling over.
Elbryan turned and dropped into a defensive crouch, but no enemies presented themselves. The first one he had hit, the leader, was on its hands and knees in the middle of the stream, facing away, too dazed to even get back to its feet. The one he had hit to the right of the stream was still on the ground, squirming and gasping for air that would hardly come. This last one he had hit was surely dead, as was the spear wielder, and the one who had taken four blows to the head lay unmoving at the stream's edge, its face in the water. The last of the group, the one with the sword, faced Elbryan from twenty paces, hopping up and down, hurling curses that the ranger did not understand.
Casually, in no hurry, Elbryan replaced the feathered tip of his bow and in one fluid motion, bent the shaft around his leg and hooked the bowstring over the bottom edge.
The goblin caught on, howled, and fled.
Up came Hawkwing; three feathers separated. Clear and straight for thirty-five feet.
The arrow slammed the goblin square in the back, lifting it clear of the stream and sending it another five feet. Arms and legs flailing, it flopped heavily, facedown in the water.
Grim Elbryan retrieved the axe from the side of his pack and finished the task at hand.
Then he was on his way, running across the Moorlands.
Part Three
CONFLICT
Did you go home, Uncle Mother? When you walked away from Andur'Blough Inninness, from your elve
n home, did you return to the place you had known in your childhood?
I had thought it a vision that led me across the Moorlands then north to a sweeping vale of knee-deep caribou moss and stark pines. Now I wonder if it wasn't merely a memory returned, a backtracking of the same course the elves had taken on that day when they pulled him from Dundalis. Perhaps they then placed a veil over my memory, that I had no desire to escape Caer'alfar and run back to the place of my kinfolk. Perhaps that last Oracle in Andur'Blough Inninness was no more than a lifting of the veil.
I had not even considered this until my northern trek led me back to these lands familiar. I feared that I had erred in my course, that I had returned home by memory, not by vision.
Now I understand. This land is my land, my ranger haunt. It is under my protection, though the proud and hardy folk here would hardly believe they need it, and certainly would refuse it should I ask.
They are more numerous than when I lived here last. Weedy Meadow remains a village of four score - the goblins never attacked after the sacking of Dundalis - and a new village, nearly twice that in number, has been built some thirty miles to the west, even further into the Wilderlands. End-o'-the-World, they call it, and a fitting name it seems.
And, Uncle Mother, they have rebuilt Dundalis and have kept its name. I do not yet understand how I feel about this. Is the new Dundalis a tribute to the last or a mockery? It pained me when, walking along the wide cart path, I happened upon a signpost, new signpost, for we never had such things - proclaiming the village limits, the edge of Dundalis. For a moment, I admit, I even held fast a fantasy that my memory of the destruction, of the carnage, was in error. Perhaps, I dared to think, the elves had tricked me into believing that Dundalis and all its folk had died, to keep me from fleeing their custody, or from wanting to flee.
Under the name on the signpost, someone had scrawled "Dundalis dan Dundalis," and under that, another prankster had added "McDundalis," both indications that this place was "the son of Dundalis. I should have understood the implication.
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